This is pretty much turning into a repository for gaming art. The movie is finished as of three days ago, so I’m jumping back into the comic… but in the meantime, here’s the horror that soared into view during the weekly lunchtime D&D game I run.

This creature (plus an archer on his back) responded to a cry for help from a pack of scrawny little scout-beasts who the adventuring party were mercilessly pummeling. This bat-thing Free Willy’d the terrified ranger and the less terrified rogue, who scored its belly with his knife. The cleric sapped its strength, the fighter nailed it with an arrow, and the paladin dealt the killing shot with his trusty crossbow. The only problem with killing flying beasts is that they’re bound to tumble to the ground… and the fighter is directly in the way.

Filed under: gaming, sketching — Emma @ 12:49 am

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Voltz is a member of the WOE, World Organization of Evil. She’s a supercriminal, but is basically a giant walking battery. Since her power isn’t the type that ever shuts off, she wears a rubber bodysuit to gain some kind of control over what she sends her electrical currents through; because wearing a rubber bodysuit all the time can be seen as odd in some circles, she lives in a three-story fetish club in the Red Light District of WOE’s base city. In this club there are always girls running around in rubber suits, so she never feels out of place.

Austin started the WOE on Friday with Mungo Man, Everett beat me with Landslide, and I’m straggling in with Voltz, aka Lady Volt, aka The Electric Girl.

Feel free to create your own WOE supercriminal. I don’t usually draw superheroes OR supervillains, but it’s going to be fun once I get into it…

Filed under: supers, gaming, sketching — Emma @ 11:48 pm

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The Berry boys, Sean and Finn, have been searching the seas for their brother Tom - at least, that’s the story that they’ve been telling their crewmates. Last week Tom found them, arriving as captain of a privateer ship and saving the good ship Gabriele from the grasp of the dread lady pirate and fantastic cook Francoise. Strangely, Tom didn’t seem to recognize his brothers until Sean ran up, embraced him, and gave him a deep, passionate kiss. More disturbing than Sean’s incestuous tendencies was the enthusiasm with which Tom returned the affection.

The crew watched in bafflement and horror as Tom retreated to his ship with the boys in tow and disappeared into his cabin, doubtless for a twisted threesome.

After more than enough time for such evil deeds, the trio emerged, the boys completely changed. Cleaner, for one thing. Strangely buxom, for another. And, in the case of Sean, obviously pregnant. the brothers Sean and Finn Berry are now the sisters Rosie Berry and Coleen O’Shea, wife and sister-in-law, respectively, to Tom Berry.

Tom swore never to let Rosie from his sight again, and swore the same of Coleen, feeling some kind of familial responsibility, or maybe the inclination to take a crack at polygamy. Rosie took to this with enthusiasm - after all, she’s been searching for her husband so that they can be together again - but Coleen, having had a taste of relatively independent, productive, and intoxicating life of a cabinboy, was less thrilled. 

Filed under: gaming, sketches — Emma @ 9:25 pm

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Heavy on the gaming posts! My recent obsessive doodling is proof of the game-mastering prowess of Everett and Austin. They throw us into awesome terrifying situations, and we try to survive them.

Most recently, we added a this person to our crew. When we saw him floating in the wreckage of a sailing ship, we figured he was eating the flesh of the drowned sailors, and wondered if he was edible. We were informed by a more experienced sailor that he was a PERSON, not seafood. We hid the crabs we’d been eating and invited him on board. He’s proven to be a very pleasant person so far…

Pleasant or not, Finn can’t get over the fact that he’s a giant crab-person, and is completely revolted.

And this is the ship’s doctor. He’s been responsible for the deaths of any number of creatures - most recently this shark, which he killed with a single shot through the eye - and as far as anyone can tell, he’s only ever SAVED one person’s life.

Filed under: gaming, sketches — Emma @ 10:51 pm

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That’s what I think. Vilo “Grub” is the ship’s cook on a viking longboat, but his luck has been pretty bad since he set foot on dry land. Even though by all rights he’s sound of mind and body, he’s always tripping, spacing out, mishearing orders, and completely overlooking approaching danger. He used to get away with it because he was so damn pretty -

But now… he’s going to have to start getting it together. Beauty’s only skin deep, and his skin got stripped off during a visit to a giant toad’s digestive tract.

I guess this is mildly interesting: my first version of the new Grub, before Austin told me disfigurement was nothing to be afraid of… you can see there’s not a whole lot of difference, but I like seeing slight changes when other people do them, so here it is.

Filed under: gaming, sketches — Emma @ 8:52 pm

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A scuffle on and around an detoxing laudanum addict, the unfortunate and brilliant Doctor Perry Brighton.

Once their ship put in to shore, the first stop the brothers made was the church on the hill… where Finn suggested something in Gaelic that Sean didn’t take kindly to. Another crewman, Diego, intervened before Sean could completely drown Finn in the basin of holy water, but the priests kicked them out of the church.

Filed under: gaming, sketches — Emma @ 7:10 pm

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Right, so thanks for all the feedback. As per overwhelming request, here are some drawings. I’m actually storyboarding a liveaction short film on the side, so I’ll post some panels from that and talk about boarding/pitching soon.

A couple more from our privateering game, starring the extremely photogenic and disagreeable Berry brothers.

Here Sean is being untruthful about the gifts God endowed him with. Finn, full of brotherly love, is ready to set him back on the path of righteousness. For more deckhand action, check out Austin’s sketches of the boys.

Sean decided to engage the resident Maori warrior pirate in some antagonistic conversation, and when the big guy happened to kind of suggest Sean was of less than average height, Sean took a swing with the butt of his pistol. Aio didn’t think that was a great idea, so he shoved the boy, sending him sprawling across the deck. Finn leapt to his brother’s aid (and also onto the back of the pirate).

Not related to gaming - related to a comic idea which is brewing.

Again, that comic idea. Trying to figure out some specific faces for girls.

Filed under: gaming, comics, sketching — Emma @ 7:23 pm

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I started this blog back when I was working at a grocery store and putting together portfolios to try and get a job in animation or video games. I didn’t live in a city with many other illustrators or a concept/animation art community, and so blogs and art and the network of comments and updating was totally invaluable in staying motivated.

I’m a bit unsure what this blog is now. It’s a place to put sketches, but I haven’t been doing a whole lot of random sketching recently… most of what I’ve been drawing has been towards projects, my own or at work, and obviously I don’t want to show those until they’re done.

I’d like to talk about storytelling and film. Maybe I’m overthinking it - as long as I post a sketch along with whatever thoughts on storytelling I have, everyone is satisfied, right?

Reading the blogs of people gainfully employed at studios or successfully freelancing was so useful to me when I was working on getting into the industry, so I don’t want to STOP… but is there anything you guys want to know? What would you like to see here? Is just continuing to post sketches and gripe about balancing work and personal art enough to keep you happy? What more could I be doing (aside from, you know, updating more than once every three months)?

Anyway, here are some sketches. I’ve been playing tabletop roleplaying games with friends - you can see various sketches from the last two games at Dungeons And Shenanigans… a couple more games are starting up and so I was drawing up characters.

Finn Berry, a cabin boy on a Royal Navy ship. He and his brother Sean ran away together to join a ship for a life of adventure. He’s a bit of a loose cannon, but his more reserved brother balances him out.

Daz is a mutant smart-dog the size of a Shetland pony. He enjoys being a good dog, and also biting people in the face. The two are mutually exclusive, so he is conflicted.

Vilo is the ship’s cook on a viking longboat. Whenever the crew runs into monsters, they get to have a barbecue afterwards. Vilo is totally inept at seeing danger and usually also at keeping his footing, but he talks a good fight.

Yeah, mine are all guys. There’s a dwarf fighter who’s also a dude, and a short-lived cleric of the lightning god who was a lady… playing a girl in fantasy settings, I feel like I have to come up with a more elaborate backstory than if I want to play a guy.

Filed under: talk, gaming — Emma @ 5:00 pm

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