So we start 2002 off in a high note – I got my first wacom tablet for Christmas 2001!! No more mouse!!
January 28, 2002 – GALADRIEL
My first full piece done on the tablet – Galadriel! Of course Fellowship of the Ring had JUST come out so I was on a LOTR kick.
February 1, 2002 – ART POST: GINNY OEKAKI (HARRY POTTER)
So ok, this chat board program called an “oekaki board” started popping up in places – it let you draw in real time, while people commented and chatted. It was really neat! It wasn’t a super fancy drawing program, but of course I had to start playing with it. This doodle of Ginny was my first “oekaki” attempt.
February 12, 2002 – ART POST: LULU OEKAKI (FFX)
My 3rd attempt at a drawing on the oekaki board — getting the hang of it a bit more.
February 13, 2002 – ART POST: GANDALF (LORD OF THE RINGS)
I can’t skip Gandalf. I think he was on the front page of my site for a month or so while I redesigned?
February 23, 2002 – ART POST: RON AND HERMIONE (HARRY POTTER)
Another year another HP Valentine Project entry.
April 28, 2002 – ART POST: RAPPACCINI’S DAUGHTER
Notice the big gap? At this point I was frantically trying to finish the print version of SunDowner, which was MASSIVE, and also making costumes. So didn’t have time to do much standalone stuff, but I did this for class that semester.
May 3, 2002 – ART POST: ANIMAL CRACKERS
And of course doing the play poster again! This year it was Animal Crackers and this was always one of my favs.
May 15, 2002 – ART POST: BRITAN DESIGNS (SUNDOWNER)
I did a series of outfit guides for each character (well, tried to – I only did a couple of Miles, I didn’t get around to Madison or Qudiar at all), but I always liked these with the flat colouring. There’s separate posts for the other characters.
I also feel that, by this point, especially in terms of SunDowner, I’d settled into what was “my” style.
June 30, 2002 – ART POST: VASH AND WOLFWOOD (TRIGUN)
A marker piece I did to sell at Otakon… Otakon 2002 was the last time I had an official art table.
July 5, 2002 – ART POST: AH! MY GODDESS
Another marker piece for Otakon… but I always liked these two so I wanted to share them.
While I don’t have a post specifically about it… (it was posted all over the main page, not on my blog), I released the SunDowner print version in July. I had copies at Otakon and I sent them out to people who pre-ordered!
I never put any of it online. When I found all the original files again recently, it was like looking at some kind of alternate universe, because it was obviously my art but I didn’t recognize most of it. So weird.
Anyway, the self-publishing was a clusterfuck. The company I printed through raised the price on me at the last minute. They printed extras which they then just handed out to whoever wanted one. I had put up a poll on my site so I could determine who would DEFINITELY buy a copy to determine my numbers – and then I maybe only got half of those orders. (I should have realized that, but I didn’t, and I figured if people didn’t order extras would be good). I did eventually sell through most of them, I have a handful left somewhere at my parent’s house. But I don’t know that it’s something I would go through again – or maybe I would, considering I feel like I’ve learned my lesson, and self-publishing options these days are much more varied and affordable.
And honestly after focusing on nothing but finishing all the art for it for MONTHS… I was totally burnt out afterwards and really didn’t do much for the rest of the year. Or… for the next decade? LOL.
October 31, 2002 – ART POST: HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Another Halloween pic – this time my SunDowner characters dressed as just various fun characters.
December 19, 2002 – ART POST: GANDALF (LOTR)
I wanted to do some desktop wallpapers of LOTR characters, I had 4 planned, one for each season. Gandalf was summer, Legolas was fall. I can’t remember who Spring and Winter were supposed to be, but I only ever finished the 2.
January 3, 2003 – ART POST: HARRY AND FAWKES
This was a redo of this art from 2000.
February 2, 2003 – ART POST: TOM AND GINNY (HARRY POTTER)
THIS was my fav submission I did for the HP Valentine Project. Not really for the drawing or even the subject matter… but because I made it an animated gif and every once in a while, Tom would slowly blink at you. It was a fun little trick people didn’t expect. Unfortunately I apparently don’t have the gif version saved anywhere anymore 🙁
April 3, 2003 – ART POST: 1874
I doodled this in class and decided to finish it and it became a fav?! (see…. the banners I made for the birthday blog bash?! LOL)
May 2, 2003 – THE POSTER
This was one of the first posters where they were like… we want EVERYBODY on the poster. Like everybody. So I had to cram a gazillion people on there. And I had like 2-3 days to do it, start to finish. I mostly concentrated on the main characters and the crowds in the background were SUPER rushed. Also I watched Legally Blonde at least 6 times in a row during the final leg of finishing this, so that’s all I think of when I look at this one.
May 19, 2003 – ART POST: SCHLEMIEL AND SCHILIMAZEL
These were illustrations for class but I still rather like how they turned out?
June 19, 2003 – ART POST: SUNDOWNER WEB DESIGN PIECES
These were done sometime in 2003 for a new site design… and I feel by like late 2002-2004 I was pretty settled into how I was drawing the SunDowner characters, I feel like I finally got to where I was happy with them, and still am.
July 19, 2003 – ART POST: SUNDOWNER WEB PIECES
More stuff done for web designs — I’m pretty sure these were a little later in 2003 than where I stuck them in my blog. These never made it into a gallery before so I don’t have dates written down. These were going for a little more of a serious look.
August 2, 2003 – ART POST: SUNDOWNER GROUP
Aaaaaaaand back to the cartoon-y. Honestly for me this is THE SunDowner group picture, this is the right look, the right style, this is where I wanted them to be.
September 19, 2003 – ART POST: QUI-GON
I had a school assignment, I don’t remember exactly what the project was supposed to be, but I wanted to do Star Wars character designs for a video game. I only did Qui-Gon and Padme before I decided to do something else.
November 4, 2003 – WHEN I DREW A STUPID COMIC
So as I mentioned in my Fav Posts entry from last week, at Dragon Con 2003, Cath, Ash and I wrote a LOTR roundrobin fic while waiting in line. It was mostly just us trying to bug the crap out of each other. I decided to illustrate it when I got home. It was really fun to do and some of the panels still crack me up. The whole thing is online there at that link.
January 3, 2004 – WHEN I WAS NOT IN A SLUMP
I was in the middle of making my original Arwen dress for the ROTK midnight show, and I decided I wanted to illustrate it into the scene (from the books) where she gives Frodo the evenstar.
I actually got an elfwood’s mod choice on this one… which was super funny to me because elfwood was a constant source of whining on my blog (I really didn’t like their fanart rules and was constantly getting stuff I uploaded deleted by mods), and a source of the weirdest comments I ever got about my art.
This one in particular CONSTANTLY got comments that either “Galadriel has blonde hair!” (ok the description says it’s Arwen not Galadriel), or “Arwen didn’t get Frodo the evenstar!” (yes she did, in the books). It was funny at first and then got super frustrating.
February 19, 2004 – ART POST: FRED AND GEORGE WEASLEY
So this was kind of an experiment. I wanted to take the method I used to draw the actors in my play posters but use them as reference to do some HP fanart – in this case, I used my cousin as both Fred and George. I wish I’d spent a little more time on it – it was a little rushed – but I feel like it was a step in the direction I’d eventually be going, so it seemed important to include here.
March 28, 2004 – ART POST: LEIA
A tablet doodle, and the matching Han. Even after having my tablet for 2 years by this point, I rarely drew stuff from scratch on the computer – I still almost always started by drawing in a sketchbook, scanning it, and then “inking” it and colouring it using the tablet. So this was some exercise in actually DRAWING with the tablet. I still don’t really care for it, though I think I’ve gotten a little better.
May 20, 2004 – ART POST: ARAGORN, GIMLI AND LEGOLAS
Another art auction piece for the school… the winner requested Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas so I was happy to oblige. I was always really happy with how this turned out and was sad to have to give it somebody else LOL
July 17, 2004 – WHEN MY WEIRD HARRY AND RON ART WAS ACCEPTED
Tanja came in to town and stayed with me for a week or so in July, and I think it was while we were out on the boat for the 4th, I started drawing this and it just got sillier and sillier. Ash drew the Hermione. And then somehow it got accepted to elfwood?! After all the other stuff they removed over the years?! It cracked me up.
December 11, 2004 – ART POST: HARRY, RON AND HERMIONE
I enjoy this just for how far it’s come from the first HP pieces I did back in 2000.
Next up we move into 2005 and….. a whole lotta nothing until 2010.