Eh...

Have not had time for art lately. Rather depressing. I go into withdraw without drawing. I am, however, sculpting in ceramics class. That feeds my artsy side temporarily, but doesn't do much to the raging fire I have inside me to draw. Gonna work a bit today, me thinks. Hopefully all goes well. Ta ta for now.

~FL

Craptastic.

Feeling totally crappy and uninspired to make any art these past couple weeks. Blarg... The feeling as gotten especially bad recently. Attempting to color line art, looking at images online, talking with friends...anything to feel inspired again. Nothing works. Gonna try some more today. I'll never give up. I have to get out of this rut someday.

On the bright side:
Finished lineart a two days ago. Waiting for Larfsalot's (stock provider) permission for use on the blog.

Jockey Silks

I've been doodling jockey silk designs all over the inside of my school notebooks. I decided to start outlining them so that I can color them in marker and then make a sick layout with them in Photoshop. I already have it all planned out. When I will have time to do this, I can't say...hopefully soon, although I haven't felt up to doing much art. I want to do art, but there's always something holding me back.

Eh...life is too stressful. There should be more creating.

~Fearless

FEARLESS comic teaser

I made these a while ago. Haven't had much time for posting lately. I'm attempting to draw some jockeys, but it is a severe fail. I can't do it at all. Haven't had much time for art lately because of band. Hoping things will pick up soon with the comic. Gonna be showing some non-comic related WIPs of an elaborate drawing I'll be doing so I can apply to the Governor's School of Fine Arts. It's a summer program. I'm not too crazy about being away from family, friends, and pets for 30 days, but I really think it would be great for my career. I really want to create a detailed pencil drawing of a purebred Arabian. Arabs are simply lovely. Anyway, here they be:

Hay Hay colored:
I was playing around with the markers when I did this. I really wasn't planning on using this image for the comic because of the crappy, no reference shading, but since I have no time to make it look better, I will.

FEARLESS comic teaser:


That's all for now folks!

...

In relation to the comic, there are a couple images I have neglected to upload and post on the blog. I'm not in the mood for such things now. Maybe tomorrow...

Photography: A Lovely Power

For a reason I'd rather not mention, I am extremely stressed today. I was rather depressed and decided on a whim to walk outside and take some pictures...Nothing much; just pictures...I walked outside and I poked my lens into the grass, laid on the cool mossy forest floor, pressed my elbows into the cool soil, and simply did what I do best: create. It was an extremely freeing way to reconnect with not only myself, but also the macroscopic beings in nature around me that I have neglected to explore. I saw some wonderful things sitting there quietly. I saw the most beautiful black and yellow bird. And a chipmunk that poked it's head over top a log right in front of me. Simple things...
I always love taking pictures of dead leaves. There's something lovely about dead leaves that gets to me. I love how they curl inward and dip and twist and spin and twirl like warm caramel before reaching the tip, which curls into a little elf shoe. I may not be very poetic about it, but I cannot truly express how contented and at peace I feel inside. Photography is a lovely thing.

Some wonderful photography quotes from www.quotegarden.com/:

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.

~Ansel Adams

A great photograph is a full expression of what one feels about what is being photographed in the deepest sense, and is, thereby, a true expression of what one feels about life in its entirety.

~Ansel Adams

Photographers deal in things which are continually vanishing and when they have vanished there is no contrivance on earth which can make them come back again.

~Henri Cartier-Bresson

Photography deals exquisitely with appearances, but nothing is what it appears to be.

~Duane Michals

And my favorite:

Often while traveling with a camera we arrive just as the sun slips over the horizon of a moment, too late to expose film, only time enough to expose our hearts.

~Minor White

Sick!!! Noessssssss!

Blargh! I've been sick since Sunday and it's so annoying. I feel tired and exhausted all the time. I feel a bit spunkier tonight, though. I'm listening to the Beatles. Amazing band...probably one of the best, if not the best band that ever lived. Anyway, *as I lip-synch to "Help!" in the background,* being sick means the comic will be nonexistant for a couple weeks, at least until I get better and give myself time to get my head back into things. Yay! Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band = L-O-V-E

Three words: BEATLES ROCK BAND!!! It's out today, baby! And I ain't got no game system. *weeps in a corner* It's actually not that bad, 'cause all you need is love!

Anyway, I decided the possible release date for the cover and first two pages of the comic is going to be November 30th...I know...far ahead, but hey, i'm pushing it trying for that date. But I have Thanksgiving break, so that's good. :D

Remember:

All you need is love, love; love is all you need.

I need to make a banner.

I managed to find a nice, crisp clean layout that I like. It has really wide columns and a banner. I just have to make the banner. I'll have everyone vote on layout colors later. I kinda like the orange-y tones I have now. :) Orange is a nice, sunny color.

No more blogging for tonight. Gotta memorize like 4 marching band tunes for tomorrow. *yikes!*

Whoop whoop!

I planned out the first two-page set in English yesterday. Sure, I've had it planned out for a while, but I made some major changes and condensed it from a 3 page set to a 2 page one. YIPPEE! It's much better and more to the point. Hurray for planning out comic pages on a whim. I also thought up a great transition from the main horse character to the main human character for page 3. I decided it'll be really interesting to transition seamlessly between the two characters, Hayleigh's Comet (the equine) and Name Pending (the human.) I may or may not name the main character Rosalyn Peters. Her nickname would be Rori. If that's not the main character's name, it'll definitely be a character in the comic somewhere, since I love that name. I still need to work out a style for drawing/coloring/shading humans. I'll figure it out. :P

P.S. It's so nice to be blogging after the first week of school... *love* Tomorrow's FRIDAY!

Yay! :D

Doug might like this!!!

Stumbled upon this cool comic-hosting site. Sure, nothing can beat having a blog, but this is still pretty cool. Check it out: comicgenesis.com/

La dee dah...

I luff blogging. Especially blogging about art. 'Cause, quite frankly, I can't talk enough about art. But, anywho, I be looking up comic creation tutorials while drawing. I'm a big multitasker. I just read an article on how multitaskers have a harder time focusing than the average Joe. I have a decent time focusing while multitasking.

OHMYGOSH! LOOKIE AT DAH LLAMA!!!

Just kidding. :P

Back to the comic, the first three pages and the cover will probably be released as a set, considering the first page makes zero sense without the second and third and I can't do the cover until I have a good enough image for on the cover. :D

NOESSSSSSS!!! School tomorrow! *burrows underground* YoucantmakemegocauseIsayso... 0_o

Prismacolor Markers!!! :DDDDDDD

Got me some more prismacolors yesterday. I wrote out a specific list of all the colors I wanted, and being me, left the list at home. Ended up picking up doubles of colors I already own, but hey, it happens. And I had a coupon, so I got $30 worth of markers for only 15 bucks. Prismas are expensive (about $4.20 a marker.) Ew...look at my disgusting grammar today...Hey, I'm lazy today. I have good reason to be to. School starts soon. Blargh. Anyway, I was playing with the markers, and I colored two pictures of Hay Hay and was very happy that it only took a few hours. The first picture is el crapo, considering I was purposely scribbling and never intending for it to turn out decent. But I'ma gonna use it anyway, since I don't have much time to do another. The second one is nice. It only took an hour and a half to do. Very speedy! Hurray! Now, I just have to devise an evil plan to speed up my lineart. Muahahaha muahahahahaaaa! :D

I shall upload the pictures later.

Argh...and PS update...

Blogger was being retarded and not letting me post anything yesterday. But anyway, I got the PSE situation somewhat figured out. I called Adobe and this nice Indonesian gentleman helped me out. Apparently PS corrupted itself. All I have to say is: Good job, technology. Good job. Anyway, PSE isn't really in tip-top shape. After "fixing" the problem, PSE corrupted some of my files, (which I shall gladly rant about later,) and I'm holding my breath 'cause I'm afraid it'll crash any second...or corrupt another precious file.

So, about those corrupt files I previously mentioned. As far as my knowledge goes, I only know of two files PSE has corrupted. Of course, those two files are the digital painting of Hayleigh's Comet that took about 30 hours to do, and the copy of the Comet painting. Of course. PSE just had to pick those two files. Naturally, I just about had a heart attack when I noticed this. I started hyperventilating and almost passed out. Yes, I am well aware of the fact that I can and will act strangely when the situation permits. I don't think I overreacted, considering I love my art, even if it's not the best art ever, and I put a lot of time into my art. My reaction was only normal in my opinion. So, I was very ticked off and anger yesterday. I do live by the saying that "anger is a wasted emotion" and by the end of yesterday, I sorta shrugged it off. I'm just a tad upset now.

I feel sick...

I literally feel sick over this. Photoshop just crashed on me. I feel like I'm going to throw up. It's difficult to explain...but I just do not, I repeat, DO NOT want to buy another version of Photoshop. I can't call technical support until tomorrow, so until then, I'll be so frustrated and worried. And to think I was in such a good mood today, ready to make art. Argh...I even finished a loose version of Hayleigh's Comet in marker that I was gonna tweak in PS and then upload. Augh...so depressing.

Prismacolor Markers

So, I'm still trying to find a way of coloring that is quick and painless, and actually looks decent. I'm playing around with Prismacolors, which are expensive, but really nice. Only bad thing is, I don't have a ton of colors. I only have 25 or so markers, which may seem like a lot, but it really isn't. I printed out the lineart for Hayleigh that I outlined in Photoshop and I'm scribbling all over it with a lot of different markers. Ish fuhn. :D I miss arting. :( Band is fun, but at the same time it's a fun sucker. :,(

I might get around to uploading that some time. I have a band thing that is'nt mandatory tomorrow and I wanna try and get out of going. It's up to my mum, though. Then there's two band events on Monday and every week after this week or until my brains explode, there's band practice Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, with football games every Friday and 3:00 A.M. sub sales occasionally on Saturdays followed by parades, festivals, and the like. Argh...That whole routine sounded nicer in my head. But, hey, who knows? I could enjoy myself. Wish me the very best of luck!!!

Hopefully I'll still be able to log on to this here blog every week or so to post what I'm doing in art class. That is, if I still have time to breathe.

Baaaaaaaaand!

Marching band camp is finally over!!! I feel like all the artistic energy I've ever had has been sucked out of me. I really want to make art, but I feel so drained. Also, I've been meaning on drawing songs for over a year, especially more now since we're playing Beatles songs for our marching band show. I'd love to draw Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and Octopus's Garden. I should probably start that today. Sorry for all the inactivity. I'm still trying to find a fast way of shading that I can use for the comic. I'm thinking of using prismacolor markers. Cel shading in Photoshop is a fail for me. Any suggestions???

I just saw Hayleigh's Comet...

Hurray!!! I finished (maybe) painting Hayleigh's Comet. Now, when I say maybe, I mean that I'm not totally satisfied and may change or tweak a few things later. Such as the fact that she is supposed to be bay, but she is some awkward color between bay and sorrel. :P I realized after I was done that I had forgotten to make her legs black. I attempted to darken them, but it just muted all the details and makes the legs look flat. :( So, I shall have to experiment. The good thing is she's DONE!!! The bad thing is that in Photoshop, all the colors and shadows/highlights look great, but once it's on the web, all the colors are dark and yicky. Bleh. Another bad thing is this took 25 or so hours to do...soooooooooo, I kinda need to learn how to color quickly. O_o

If you're reading this, DancingFoxie, thank you sooooooooooo much for the stock!!!

Ohmigosh...PINK DOLPHINSSSSS!!!

I luff pink dolphins! I shall leave the picture Dougy posted of ze pink dolphin on meh blog for its randomness and awesomeness. :D

Character Style

I'm still trying to find my style with drawing the human characters of the comic. I don't want it to be terribly realistic, but at the same time, I don't want it to be in an anime or manga style...I'm trying to find a happy medium between that is slightly cartoony, but still semi-realistic. It's tough...I don't want to copy the styles of others. It's gonna take me a while to develop a style of my own that I actually like, but I just need some practice.

<3 Fearless

Testing Testin 1...2..3...

Second Chance by Shinedown

(a.k.a. the Halley's Comet song)
In case you were wondering where the inspiration came from for the horse, Hayleigh's Comet...

The majority of horse names for my comic have been inspired by something, whether it be a flavor of lip gloss, a phrase from a song, or a metaphoric representation of something in everyday life. About a month ago, I was on the prowl for horse name inspiration. I just so happened to be in Pittsburgh, at the Hard Rock, eating an insanely delicious bacon cheeseburger, when all the sudden this amazing song came on: Second Chance by Shinedown. The instant I heard the line about Halley’s Comet, I knew that had to be her name. A couple spelling tweaks and it was perfect. Even the title of the song, “Second Chance” perfectly sums up the main theme of my comic. :D

Here are the lyrics to Second Chance by Shinedown from azlyrics.com:

"Second Chance"

My eyes are open wide
And by the way, I made it
Through the day
I watched the world outside
By the way, I'm leaving out
Today

I just saw Hayley's comet
She waved
Said why you always running
In place?
Even the man in the
Moon disappeared
Somewhere in the
Stratosphere

[Chorus]
Tell my mother,
Tell my father
I've done the best I can
To make them realize
This is my life
I hope they understand
I'm not angry, I'm just saying...
Sometimes goodbye
Is a second chance

Please don't cry
One tear for me
I'm not afraid of
What I have to say
This is my one and
Only voice
So listen close, it's
Only for today

I just saw Hayley's comet
She waved
Said why you always running
In place?
Even the man in the
Moon disappeared
Somewhere in the
Stratosphere

[Chorus]
Tell my mother,
Tell my father
I've done the best I can
To make them realize
This is my life
I hope they understand
I'm not angry, I'm just saying...
Sometimes goodbye
Is a second chance

Here's my chance
This is my chance

Tell my mother,
Tell my father
I've done the best I can
To make them realize
This is my life
I hope they understand
I'm not angry, I'm just saying...
Sometimes goodbye
Is a second chance

Sometimes goodbye
Is a second chance [x2]

Sudden Productivity...

So, I was on a productive "high" yesterday as far as art goes. Worked a toooonnnnnnnn on Hayleigh's Comet. :D I'm doing Fearless's Version of Grayscale shading, which consists of about 8 layers all set at different blending modes, plus re-colorizing once the image is complete. I cannot figure out grayscale shading the right way, so my way is okay for now. She looks great so far. I can't figure out what color to make her though. Me thinks she shall be bay, since she looks sweetness as bay.

Images Aren't Loading

Okay, so images aren't loading for me. I tried HTML and I tried the "add image" option for posting. Neither show the image. :P Major set-back, considering that's the whole point of this blog. Gonna try to fix it with Doug's help. But, on the bright side, I changed the colors of my blog. Looks nice now. Although, it's not letting me create a fixed background, which sucks. D: But, hey, it happens. *shrug*

TBs

More TB lineart. (TB=Thoroughbred) :D

My Artwork

Now that I have artwork uploaded, please be considerate and follow copyright rules. Read the text at the bottom of this page to see the conditions behind my copyrighted work. Thanks! If you have any questions, feel free to comment!

Hayleigh’s Comet

Hayleigh’s Comet is the main horse at the beginning. The comic opens up with her in a horse race. She’s one amazing filly. :D Although, I absolutely can’t figure out what color to make her: bay, black, or chestnut. I’m having trouble with grayscale shading, also. I can’t get the colors to turn out right. I make about 5 different layers with the same hue on them and set all the blending modes different just to get a relatively nice color. Then I have to re-colorize the merged layers with Ctrl U. It’s a bummer. Anyway, here she is! Critique is welcome. :D

Whew!!!

Whew! All my previous posts are now published! *happy dance* All of the posts were simply babbling about horses, but soon I'll be uploading art. I'm almost done with my second TB line art. :D I just have to draw the jockey. I haven't drawn people in a while, so that should be interesting. :)

...

There was a really bad storm the night I was supposed to go to my aunt's. So, no horsie pictures. :(

I have been soooooo busy lately. I've had hardly any time to get comic-related stuff done. I have been thinking about it a lot. Right now I'm thinking of character names for the jockeys. I've been browsing stock like crazy. I have a lot of QH and TB stock, so the majority of my horses will be those breeds. I've found a good bit of Arabian stock, just hardly any jumping shots. :( Luckily, I can now make a minor horse character be a Morgan, since I found some jumping and running stock photos of Morgans. :)

QHs

I'm back from vacation! The beach was lovely, except my little sis accidentally broke my camera. So, I got a new one. I'm hoping to test it out today. My aunt has two quarter horses and I might be able to go see them today! Hopefully I can get lots of good pics.

P.S. I kind of dislike posting now, since that Selle Francais on the cover of my page looks so dang smexy and I'd hate to move him out of sight with my rambling posts. XD I'll have to find a way to make him the background of my page. *runs off to fiddle with the HTML*

~Fearless

Bit of a Delay

You won't hear much from me for a few days. I'm going on vacation. Then, after that, I have to play the flute and piccolo a lot so that I can get one of the piccolo parts for marching band. *crosses fingers* I really hope I get the part. Which reminds me, you probably won't see a lot of comic-related art the first three or four months of school because of marching band and regular art classes. Plus, band camp is next month all day for 2 weeks, except weekends. Maybe I'll babble and blog about the comic on weekends. ;)

More Lovely Breeds…

One of my friends on deviantART just told me about her favorite breed, the Selle Francais, which is good at steeplechase.

Selle Francais-

Image From: http://www.dkimages.com

Since Arabians are also speedy horses and a popular breed, I will probably include some Arabians in the comic. :D I dunno why I didn't think of Arabians before.

Arabian-

Image From: http://www.horsesden.com

Breeds

I was reading about steeplechases, and there are some that have breeds other than just Thoroughbreds. :) Which is fantastic! So, now I can have all the breeds I just mentioned.
In case you aren't well-versed in horse breeds, here are some pictures of the ones I want to include:

Akhal-Teke



Image From: http://www.homozygous-horses.com

Thoroughbred



Image From: http://www.theequinest.com

Trakehner



Image From: http://www.best-horse-photos.com

Budyonny



Image From: http://www.sidelinesnews.com

Quarter Horse


Image From: http://www.cotesbachquarterhorses.com

Any other horse breed suggestions?

Sketches

Started to do some loose sketches today for the comic. I've found some really nice Thoroughbred stock photos. I tried looking for Akhal-Teke stock photos, but I can't find any. :( Can't find any Budonny ones either. I'm gonna look for Trakehner stock photos sometime soon.

Babbling About Names and Breeds

I'm still thinking of names for the horses. Anyone have any good racing or steeplechase horse names? They can be total randomness. I have a racehorse named Serengeti Sorceress. Luckily her name is exactly 18 letters and 1 space! (Racehorses can't have names longer than 19 characters, including spaces.)

I just read that Steeplechase horses all absolutely have to be thoroughbreds. I hope this isn't entirely true. I have to look into it more...If it is, it ruins my hopes of having Akhal-Tekes, Quarter Horses, Trakehners and Budyonnies in the comic. :( Arg. Akhal-Tekes are gorgeous and have amazing stamina. They would be wonderful for the comic. I even planned on making Ghost Dancer, a gray horse with a wall eye, be an AT.

Horse Names

Basically, what I'm doing now is just coming up with horse names for all my horse characters. Later I'll come up with names for the jockies and riders. I have a good bit of names so far. I'm making a chart that has all the specifics like name, gender, color, markings, etc. I'll upload it later. :)

Hi Everyone!

For everyone who doesn’t know me, I'm FearlessFilly! I love drawing horses realistically and I just recently decided to start a horse comic. My horse comic will be on my deviantART site in addition to this blog, but I want to be able to blog about the progression of the comic.

Doing a comic will be a huge challenge for me. I've made traditional art all my life, but I'm interested in learning how to create better digital art. The comic will be drawn traditionally and colored in digitally. Plus, I'll have to work with putting a lot of emotion into the horses, which is not something I am very good at.

Check out my art at the links below and if you like my art, even if you don't love horses very much, please follow my blog and read the comic when it's finished.

Click here for my horsey deviantART site.

Click here for my other deviantART site that has more than just horses.

~Fearless

Copying and Pasting Posts

Be patient while I copy and paste all 9 of my previous posts into the new blog. :) Hurray! I’m excited about the new blog. I can’t wait to make a header image. :D

The only bad thing is, Blogger is evil about copying and pasting from MS Word since it screws up the HTML. Luckily, I know some HTML, so I fixed it. :D (Or at least I hope I fixed it… :P)

Importing My Blog

I used to have a blog with blog.com that I recently started this past month. I’ve found out that Blogger is a much better site and is more flexible. I need flexibility more than anything. :D I already love Blogger. I love arranging my blog and fiddling with the HTML. It’s great. There are so many great widgets you can put on your page. The only bad thing is Blogger is being uncooperative with importing the blog file, so I have to copy and paste all my posts in from my blog at blog.com.