Clearing the Dust

 

How long has it been? A month? Three? Anyway, this is just to let y’all know that I ain’t dead. Wishing real horrorshow summers to all.

-Sheikah

Share this -- maybe with a little fanfare?

Check out what I found decaying under a pile of rotting hedge clippings at the back of my sketchbook folder! It still smells kinda like socks.

 

 

 

My little brother came home from school once and said, “The history teacher wants us to make a film poster of the story of Romulus and Remus! We aren’t allowed to use any existing film posters.” So I offered to make one for him, and he told me who he wanted the actors to be (and I feel compelled to agree with his choice — especially since it means Sean Bean plays a character who dies, haha), and so here we are. It’s nothing glorious, I had to do it on a time limit late at night, but apparently the teacher was impressed so there.

 

In other news, Erin tagged me with the You-Might-Be-A-Writer-If tag, in which I have to list four to six symptoms of – surprise, surprise – being a writer. The rules are that you have to list four to six symptoms, link back to the person who tagged you, and tag a couple of other people. I’m feeling lazy, so I’ll only list four symptoms and not tag anyone. Take that, Internet! Ahem.

You might be a writer if

1. Versions of other people’s characters exist in your headcanon, going on adventures you feel you ought to write down.

2. You constantly change your opinion of the quality of your work.

3. As you read a book you’re not particularly enjoying, you begin to rewrite it in your head, deciding what should have happened, and then proceeding to talk about nothing but your “better” version at lunch for a week. Or not, because nobody probably cares / is sick of your incoherent babbling.

4. When you listen to songs, you are convinced that a story is being told, even if it just sounds like a lighthearted love song, and you spend hours poring over the lyrics to try and figure out what it is. (China Girl is about Hitler’s time-travelling hooker! Really!)

 

Okay, so that’s that, not much else to say really okay bye.

-Sheikah

Art 32: Scarf Boy

 

 

This 8th-grader interrupted the middle of music class yesterday to claim a forgotten sports kit. He had a wide grin and a long scarf and was very skinny, and straight away I knew I wanted to write a book about this person.

Sheikah

Comic 23 : The Hobbit Movie : Eighty Percent CGI Elves

 

What a silly thing I have made.

 

 

HEY GUYS GUESS WHICH MINOR CHARACTER WILL TRAGICALLY DIE IN THE FINAL CLIMACTIC BATTLE

If the first Hobbit movie was ridiculously unfaithful to the book, wait until you see the second one.

Look! Will Turner is suddenly King of Dale! Aw, and Thranduil is offering his help to the Dwarves instead of locking them up in the dungeons for being stubborn and menacing. How sweet. Maybe he’ll offer them lollipops and helium balloons on their way out.

Argh. I realize this may seem a bit harsh on the movies, but frankly, I’m sick of disloyal film adaptations. It doesn’t actually seem that bad overall; what really bugs me is the gratuitous side-villain with the stupid spiky arm that was supposed to have died decades ago, and whatshername, the ginger stick-in-the-mud. Absolutely pointless extra characters who only make things seem overly dramatic. Grr.

Possibly what bothers me the most about miss scowly-face is that she is an Elf. More specifically, she is an Elf who is the romantic interest.

Think about it. If Elves went around having descendants all over the place like Humans do, the entire planet would be overpopulated with elves because  they are immortal. So I figured that, to reduce the chances of overpopulation, they would have a much weaker sex drive than Humans do, and only like a quarter would ever fall in love at all, much less have children. That the romantic interest in the film should be an Elf would simply be statistically improbable. Of course, this is just my theory, but it is still science, and it bothers me that science is being contradicted here. Even if it’s just hypothetical science.

There. My frustrations have been vented.

-Sheikah

Art 26 : Facial Expressions Sketchbook

 

Hello again, internet! Still haven’t found the word for a bird’s claws; no matter, I’ll just use ‘talons’. Anyway, this is a drawing in which I practiced facial expressions; namely, the one commonly know as “double-you tee eff”. And, yes, I decided to stick the face onto Legolases’ head because, well, why not? Also because in a lot of the comics I sketch (but don’t post), faces such as these are common, as well as their being on the scion of Thranduil’s face. Either way, it just seemed like a fun idea.

On an unrelated note, who else’s physics teacher looks like the Medic from Team Fortress? Because my physics teacher looks like the Medic from Team Fortress.

Sheikah

Comic 21 : Quoth the Raven

 

I am very bored. (click to enlarge)

Sheikah

P.S. : Buttercup Festival, for when life feels too complicated.

Back In The Game

Okay, so I’ve been almost completely inactive for like a month now, only to come back and find that both the tablet and the scanner are stubbornly refusing to cooperate with my artistic intentions. Well, that’s not going to stop me from posting a triumphant post-hibernation…Post, I guess. So even though I can’t pin up artstuffs (yes, in my world ‘stuffs’ is a suffix that can describe a plural of any noun), I can still write, well, writingstuffs (shut up, all you English teachers out there). And so I thought, why not give a teaser of the sequel to Let’s All Be Heroes that I’m writing right now? And then I thought, because this sequel sucks compared to LABH, so much that I can’t write a decent bit of teaser text. So…No teaser text for you, I guess. I’m just better at creating new worlds and stories than building on top of old ones. That’s probably why I don’t write any fanfiction-y stuff. I mean, I probably could write a short story using characters and setting from an existing literary work (I once read a bunch of short stories a guy wrote using LotR characters, with plotlines based on fortune-cookies messages — stories which turned out  pretty awesome), but I couldn’t just up and send those beloved characters on an entirely independent story arc. That would pretty much be an insult to the author for me.

So basically, what I’m doing is giving you what was my first attempt at the sequel, which I scrapped long ago before staring over from scratch. It’s pretty awful, but hey, I as a reader love this kind of bonus material, and I’m guessing a lot of you out there do as well. So: I give you the beginning of Born To Slay Dragons, back when it was called Dancing In A Dragon’s Fire. Try not to puke if the familiar characters are too out-of-character.

 

THE STORY NEVER ENDS

                The story never ends. Not truly.

There is a realm called Belecostar. It consists of a short mountain range, with a large amount of forest clustered round the mountains and four villages along the foot of the tallest one.

Some time ago, a Hero named Berthond Gellcomar set out to complete a quest and save the realm. He had with him three companions; Reynold Blightington, Harresta Brittlebuch and Telcrow Despar. He also encountered Selebriar Darkleaf, an Elf, who agreed to aid them in their quest.

Only Berthond and Selebriar survived.

When they returned to Berthond’s home village, the boy – along with his best friend Frestel — created a group of warriors to defend the borders of Belecostar, to lessen the chances of invasion of any sort.

Berthond himself no longer had much desire to go around completing quests; but he had the blood of a born Hero, and a bloodline never dies out…

 

PART ONE

A CHILD BORN IN BLOOD

                ‘He’s sort of…cute, I suppose.’ Selebriar carefully prodded the small pink thing in the cot. It gurgled back at him. He sighed. ‘I’m afraid I’m not particularly familiar with children.’ Berthond stroked his newborn son’s forehead. ‘I wasn’t asking you to babysit. I just thought you might want to meet him.’

Meliann, who had been wed to Berthond for three years, bustled into the room with fresh nappies. She wasn’t very good at bustling. She was more accustomed to lopping orcs’ heads off.

She and Berthond had met when he had first set up the warrior group and started recruiting. Meliann Shivertimb was from Arcondrake, the fourth village. She had been training as a warrior in case she was picked for the quest. In the end, a mage named Telcrow Despar had been chosen. Like the others who had accompanied Berthond on his quest, Telcrow had died. Berthond was glad it had been Telcrow and not Meliann.

‘Hullo, sweetheart. Oh…Good day to you, sire.’ She bobbed a little curtsy. Meliann was always extremely polite to Selebriar, believing that since he was an Elf, he was superior to humans. It rather irritated him, but he mostly ignored it. ‘Lescir dalun tìnel, Sea-Rose.’

The young woman blushed. ‘Oh, I don’t deserve an Elvish blessing…’ Selebriar sighed once more. ‘It just means “all goes well”, lady.’ Meliann blushed further. ‘And I…I don’t think I deserve being called a lady, sire’, she stuttered. ‘And what is “Sea-Rose”?’ ‘It’s what “Meliann” means in the Elvish toungue’, explained Selebriar, only mostly patient.

It didn’t seem possible for Meliann to blush even further, but she somehow managed it, and turned a bright red color. ‘Oh…You needn’t have gone and translated my name for me, sire.’ Selebriar turned to Berthond, who was trying not to burst out laughing. ‘Maybe it’s better if I just left, before her head explodes.’

The child’s name was Draketoer, which meant ‘dragon-slayer’. It was a noble and heroic name, which Berthond hoped could one day be lived up to. Everybody called him Drake, though; it being easier to remember.

 

 

And that’s how far I got before realizing that I had made a terrible mistake in beginning with Meliann’s  introduction and starting over again. Also, Draketoer is a stupid name. It sounds like it could be the Ancient Belecostarian word for ‘dry toe fungus’. I changed it to Drakendrar in the new version, which admittedly is fairly absurd, but much better. Well, I’ve dropped enough hints for this to actually count as a teaser, so there you go. Until next time, I guess.

Sheikah

Comic 18 : Braces

 

 

Those really were my friend’s first words when she saw me with braces. Her next words were, ‘Ooh, Elvish braces’.

Sheikah

P.S: By the way, try typing “if you are what you eat then” into the Google search bar and see what comes up. Don’t ask. Just do it.

Stuff! Lots and lots of stuff!

Okay. First off, I got braces. Not cool, but I’m going to be doing a comic about it soon. I think. If I don’t keep putting it off too much. You know what, I’m just going to say I will draw it, and now I can’t not do so, because I said I would. Or whatever.

Secondly, I updated the About page. New picture, new text. You can go check it out if you want.

But, thirdly and most importantly, my friend started her own art website, because apparently I inspired her to do so. Aww. Isn’t that cute. Anyway, you should go see it, maybe become a member or something. I’m a member; so maybe I’ll post some drawings on her website only, to force you to go there if you want to see it. BWAHAHAHAHAaren’t I cruel.

Happiness is Art Shaped! Yaaaaaaaaaaay

…Just…Just go check it out, okay?

Sheikah

Art 24 : Hunters

My friend and I are always talking and joking about how I look Elvish and she looks Dwarvish, so I drew this.

 

The one to the far left is this other friend who’s never actually even seen LotR, but I needed someone to be the human. No offense, Em.

Sorry about the terrible image quality, but I have a rubbish scanner. I had to darken the lines, and that made the ones I erased show up. So please ignore the blurry bow, the extra feet and the double mountain, and if you want to see the unchanged, original scan, you certainly can. It’s not as blurry in any case.

Anyway. I also have some good Doctor Who stuff I’d like to scan in, but I don’t like mashing all my posts together like that, so not today.

Sheikah