What I'm Playing - Final Fantasy VI

I recently picked up a copy of Final Fantasy VI off of Steam. I have a copy of this game for Play Station and somewhere I have the Super Nintendo version--you know, the one released under the title Final Fantasy III. It felt weird getting another copy of a game I already owned. However, it made some sense because my laptop is way more portable than either the Play Station or Super Nintendo. For example, I spend a little bit of time during quieter times at work at night playing. I can do this because I can bring my laptop to work. Although I would probably get no complaints if I tried to bring a TV and Play Station in, it wouldn't exactly fit in my little cubical work space. So, anyways.

I've been playing Final Fantasy VI. It has always been my favorite Final Fantasy title. A bit of history and yes, this will make me look old; don't judge: My first Final Fantasy was FF IV. I remember renting it as Final Fantasy II for Super Nintendo from the video rental store down the street. I fell in love with that game. After purchasing and beating FF IV, I scoured flea markets for FF I--this was also before Amazon, Ebay, or really any form of internet anything. I was super excited for FF VI (III), and purchased it as soon as it was released. I played through it several times until I went off to college, where my ability to play games like that diminished significantly due to the fact that the Super Nintendo belonged to my brother and I didn't own a TV. Anyways...

As far as Final Fantasy games go, the mechanics are pretty much standard classic jRPG mechanics. Each character has a special ability. Magic revolves around Espers and after a certain point in the game, you can equip Espers on characters. Some people may find this dull, but these are my kinds of game. This is probably why I latched onto Bravely Default and enjoyed it as much as I did. That game was a real throwback to games like Final Fantasy VI. As far as FF VI goes, I loved the story and the characters. It's been a treat to play through it again. I don't get a lot of time for games anymore due to, you know, working full time, being a full time homeschooling mom, and stuff like that. This is part of why having a portable system is good because that gives me more flexibility. So, on quieter evenings, I do get to play at work. I'm moving through the game super slowly. I'm posting periodically during my play on Twitter. Mostly, it's things like "Hey, I'm at this part of the game now." Sometimes I'll post commentary. It's usually only a couple of tweets a night because I am moving at a snail's pace through the game. I'm also sharing FF VI (among other things) related stuff on Tumblr.

WIP Volume 42

 This week's progress report: More progress on the Mermaid commission. This one is a little more detailed than what I normally allow for commissions. Usually I only take commissions for my chibi or 3/4 chibi styles, but this one is modeled after the Western Zodiac print set I did.

Remember that WIP post with all that fabric? That black and gray fabric at the bottom turned into this over the last week (yeah fuzzy photo sucks...):

 

I've been working on some new archetypes (Bounty Hunter, Smuggler, Princess, and Necromancer). They're inked and ready to color.

 And finally what I succeeded in finishing yesterday on the Tinkerbell costume I said I was going to make. I got Charleigh's measurements, put together the pattern, cut out all the fabric, and made some progress getting everything sewn together. She was really excited seeing all the pieces starting to come together, and I'm a little sad I couldn't actually finish it yesterday. She'll have it though in time for her birthday. =)

Overrun with Ponies

I noticed that a lot of what I've been doing lately has been very pony-centric. I really didn't intend for it to happen this way. I have long lists of things to work on in every possible category of craft (art, crochet, sewing, etc.), and for some reason ponies managed to make it to the top of the list in almost all of them. @_@

I don't really see myself as that big a MLP fan.  Don't get me wrong--I like the show. I especially love both Rarity and Fluttershy. Rarity is a favorite simply because it is not possible for me to not love a character who is essentially a costume designer. This goes back to Edna from The Incredibles. That movie made me all kinds of happy simply because of that one character. Fluttershy...well...if you get down to it, I am Fluttershy. I relate to her way too well. I feel incredibly socially awkward when I get around other people. Shy doesn't even come close to describing it. So, I love Fluttershy, and I love that a lot of other people love Fluttershy because, indirectly, it makes me feel more accepted as well. I realize that's not particularly rational. =P Of course, I never claimed to be particularly rational.

Anyways, back on topic. Too many ponies around Gothic Panda Studios...Right now I'm working with some custom printed Fluttershy fabric to make myself a tote bag (and I'm severely tempted to splurge on some of the extra soft stuff to make some pajama pants out of). I am working on My Little Pony crossovers (or mash-ups; I kind of like this term better) (and also because MLP is so abusable in this way--kind of like Sailor Moon). I am working on a set of MLP plushies for the Animazement Art Show/auction (in my defense here, I started these about a year ago). Oh yeah, and I'm also working on putting together a set of geek-themed household management PDFs (you know like printable planner pages, maybe a menu/grocery list printable page, to do list printable pages, etc.) (and this is also because I have to write things down or I forget--I am very easily distracted--so I love things like this, but I have yet to find any with awesome cook geekish themes), and I just happen to be starting with ponies. @_@ I think for that one I'm starting with ponies because for me, they're a little easier to work with and I'm kind of new to the whole design process for these things.

That said, the MLP themed pin-back buttons are finished. This means I will be moving on from that--be prepared for a massive bombardment of Final Fantasy designs. Final Fantasy is by far my most favorite rpg game series in existence. There are others that I like, but Final Fantasy and I go way back. So yeah, I'll be drawing from Final Fantasy I, IV, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, X-2 (this one's a maybe), XII, and XIII. Yeah...I wonder if I'll be sick of it by the time I get to the end of that? Heh. I am using it as an excuse to sit down and replay through all the games. FYI, FF VII is really hard to get a hold of now. Why don't people carry used PS 1 games any more? Or, maybe it's just my area. I originally had the game for PC, and I can't get that copy to work, so bleh. XD After that, who knows. I'll pick an obsession; I certainly have plenty to chose from.

I also finished the Dark Mare Rises parody movie poster. I was sort of planning on doing a follow up to that one with Pinkie Pie doing the "Why So Serious?" line on that one poster of the Joker, but I haven't been too motivated to start that one. Instead I'm working on a Hobbit movie poster parody. Any guesses on what I'm mashing that one with? =P Mwahahaha. Alright, got that out of my system. Oh, yeah, and I'm also working on a new set of 10 What Would ___ Do? designs (I have a few I'm still waffling on, so if there's someone you'd really like to see, drop me a line; now's the time to do so). So, there are going to be some non-pony things coming up, eventually.

The jist of this post: For pony fans, there's more pony stuff coming. =D For non-pony fans, there's some other stuff coming. =D

WIP - Vol. 36

Final Fantasy I buttons (3 mages + 1 failed Black Belt design). At the top you can see sketches from the now finished My Little Pony button designs.

This is going to be a blanket for a baby in my church. He's just a couple of weeks younger than Sophie. =)

Up close of one of the blanket squares

It's my Fluttershy fabric. The print came out larger than I thought it would, but I still have ideas as to what to do with it. =D If I thought I could afford it, I would totally get enough of this fabric to make a pair of pajama pants.

I'm working on the new set of What Would's. Here's a preview of one of the new designs.

Really bad picture quality, but I was too lazy to dig out my flatbed scanner for this. XD The beginnings of the first set of My Little Pony mash-ups I'm working on.

Now For Something Different

It's been a little while since I've gone into any detail on any of my current projects. I've also never posted anything about quilting here--probably because I haven't actually done any quilting since several years before I started this blog. XD Clearly that's been an oversight on my part. Anyone who follows me here, on Twitter, on Facebook, or wherever should know that I usually only feel content when I'm buried under more projects than I can possibly handle. If quilting was missing from my list of projects, it wasn't from any sane thought on my part, I promise.

This is my current quilting project:

For those of you unfamiliar with the Final Fantasy game series, this is a moogle. When I drew this particular moogle, I was referencing Mog from Final Fantasy VI. This was one of many things where I declared that it would be the most awesomest thing ever if I made a quilt with a moogle on it, and not just a moogle appliqued on it, but a moogle built into the quilt itself. My husband gave me that look (I get it a lot, but that should be no surprise). I squeed, made a pattern, bought fabric, cut up fabric, and assembled the quilt face. All that took only about 2 weeks (surprisingly... of course, I wasn't doing much else during those 2 weeks). Then I added the batting and the back (plain solid black). Then, I packed it in a box and we moved. This was back in the summer of 2010. It stayed in a box until 3 moves and a few months later when I thought, OMG wouldn't it be the most awesomest thing ever if I actually finished that quilt. XD The above picture is the quilt spread out on the floor of the hallway outside my Craft Room. It is big enough to fit a twin-size bed.

Now, onto the details. Most of you are familiar with excited fangirlish type squeals so I don't need to go into the squee-ing part. =P For the pattern, I used an existing quilt pattern (that I have since lost and no longer remember the name of... failsauce)--the same pattern I'd used to make a quilt for my 3rd son's crib only made larger. Normally the next step is to select fabric, cut said fabric, and  assemble the cut fabric into blocks. Then you would lay out those blocks and arrange them until happy with the overall effect. In this case, I started by sketching my moogle on graph paper with lines marked off to represent the size of the quilt I intended to make. I then divided the graph paper into blocks and assigned a specific block to each space--this particular pattern had 3 different block designs. Next I cut squares out of poster board measured to the size of the block. Then I transferred my moogle sketch onto the blocks, cut the blocks and labeled which side belonged to the moogle and which side belonged to the background. After all that, I determined how much of each color fabric I'd need and approximately how many different prints I wanted for each color. Only then did I actually go to the fabric store and buy the fabric. I think the most difficult part was finding white printed fabric that would still look white when pieced into the quilt and also look distinct from the other pieces of white fabric in the quilt. I chose a deep primary green for the background because I thought it went well with the whites, golds, and reds I was using for the moogle and would really make the moogle stand out.

The next big thing with this quilt was piecing together all the squares. I designed the quilt so that the overall pattern (at least as much as I possibly could) of each block stayed continuous.

If you look at the lines I drew on the quilt above, you can see the blocks, and where I tried to keep the pattern the same even when I changed colors. For me, this was the really fun part of the project.

Right now, all that I really have left to do is quilting. The thing is way too big to run through my poor little old sewing machine, so I am hand-quilting the whole thing. Most of the quilting is going to be stitching in the outline of the moogle and the lines for his arms and legs and such. In the green background, I am going to stitch a leaf pattern--keeping it fairly simple. Below is a picture of one of the quilted leaves and a picture of where I'm quilting right now.

This has overall been a fun project. I look forward to seeing it finished. I am considering making more of those, although much smaller. I'd love to do a Full Metal Alchemist one. A lot will depend on interest in these. =)

Wednesday WIP: June Part I

It's been a crazy month since I last posted a real WIP post, and sad to say, I don't have a whole lot new to actually post here, especially considering how much time has gone by since the last post.

Anyways, let's go with some updates to what I've been working on--much the same as what I was working on last time. Let's start with the plushies. Last month I started working on a set of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic plushies for Animazement's Art Show. We did not make it to Animazement, mostly because of little Sophie, but also because I spent so much of May sick that I wasn't able to finish either the plushies or planned costumes for the convention. The weekend before the convention we decided to cut our losses, canceled the hotel room, and stayed home Memorial Day weekend for the first time in 13 years (this will probably be a post topic for another day). I am still going to finish this set of plushies. They are still going to be one-of-a-kind. I will probably put them in Anime Weekend Atlanta's auction or maybe I'll do something online. In any case, here is a photo of the progress on that project: Twilight Sparkle is finished, although I may go back and redo parts of her mane; the other six planned ponies have most of their parts made--I still need to make their eyes and cutie marks, assemble the pieces, and add their manes and tails.

 
Along with the My Little Pony plushies, I was also working on a set of Soul Eater costumes for my family for Animazement. Once it became clear we weren't going to make it to the convention, I slowed down work on these. Generally speaking, most of these costumes are still piles of fabric. I have started Soul, although so far, about all I have is a little bit of progress on his jacket. I might have these done by the end of summer.... Maybe. XD

Then, I was working on that epic noir-themed Final Fantasy VI poster. That's still not finished. >_< It's really close though. My biggest problem right now is Photoshop. For every minute of decent work I get, I have to spend 5 minutes waiting for Photoshop to reload the file because it crashed and then I have to redo that one minute of work, or I'm waiting 3-6 minutes for the file to save before I can move onto the next minute of work. You'd think this was exaggeration, but sadly it's not. We thought we'd fixed the problem, but for whatever reason it reverted back after one session of good behavior. It's been incredibly frustrating. On the plus side, this project is almost finished. I need to add the rest of the color behind the picture and then do some minor touching up.

I have plans for a few other odd things. I am working on a set of My Little Pony human-form badges. I started this back at Anime USA last year, and I added two more character sketches at Magfest. These aren't necessarily new WIPs, but it's a project I'm going to be trying to finish up this summer. I'm also going to be working on finishing the Hunger Games bookmark and postcard set I started before we moved (for the last time). I've finished the designs for Katniss on the chariot debuting as the Girl on Fire and Katniss at her first Interview. the next one I am going to work on will be Katniss at her interview after she one the games in the first book. I've got a really cute design in mind, and I can't wait to get it down on paper. On top of those fanart projects, I am also working on a new original art set for Anime Weekend Atlanta--all I have for this set now though is scribbles and ideas, so no pictures to go with it yet, but I'm hoping that will change by next week. =) These are the main projects I'm working on (well more like my main secondary projects). There are also a myriad of smaller side projects that I'm kind of playing around with--as if I don't have enough to work on, but this kind of thing really suits my short attention span. This means though, now that I'm mostly settled, mostly well (and hopefully that stays that way), no longer pregnant and exhausted (believe it or not, even with reduced amounts of sleep being up with Sophie, I still have more energy), and done with distractions like travel and family events, which although fun, don't make ideal times to get work done, the Wednesday WIP posts for this summer should be filled with all kinds of fun and exciting things. =)

Wednesday WIP Posts Are Back

Now that I'm back to writing on this blog, Wednesdays will once again be dedicated to stuff I've been working on. Being that this is a convention month, I have a ton of stuff planned for this month. We will be attending Animazement in Raleigh, NC Memorial Day weekend; I believe this will be our 13th year going. Boy does that make me feel old. I will not have an Artist Alley table there this year. I am not particularly sad about this, since we will have a couple week old baby with us. I am planning on submitting some plushies to the Art Auction, participating in the artist charity event (if they hold it--which reminds me I need to email someone about that), and hanging out with family and friends (while cosplaying of course).

Let's start with what I have planned for the AZ Art Show. Technically I have lots of things I'd like to do, but given time constraints, I'm going to keep it to one set of things. As you might know, I like to make little chibi amigurumi plushies. I also happen to really like the new My Little Pony: Frienship Is Magic show. I've been wanting to try my hand at making pony plushies for a little while now. I've debated whether or not it was something I wanted to make available on my tables and in my Etsy shop. I've decided to go with the "not" answer. With the manes and tails and some of the details (like cutie marks) I think they will be more involved than the plushies I normally make for my table. Considering I have a hard enough time keeping plushies in stock for that as well, expanding that inventory just doesn't seem like a great idea at the moment. So, I am putting together a set of one of a kind pony plushies just for the auction at AZ. I have seven planned: the main six plus Derpy. Given that I have about 2 weeks left to get these done, I guess we'll see whether I make that goal or not. Today's WIP photo features the bodies and appendages for Twilight Sparkle and Rarity, although Rarity's body is still missing it's stuffing. =P I will hopefully be finishing those two up in the next day or so and be moving on to the rest.

Next up is costumes. AZ is the one convention where we really focus on cosplay. We have participated in the cosplay Masquerade Contest every year for the last 12 years. This will mark the first year that we are not planning to compete. I imagine it is going to feel weird not spending most of Saturday on that. However, we are still planning on cosplaying. This year's costume set will come from Soul Eater. I have wanted to dress my 3 older boys as Death the Kid, Black Star, and Soul for a couple of years now, and now seems as good a time as any to try that. My husband will be going as Stein and I'm planning on going as Marie. Originally I was going to cosplay Blair--I really like her witch outfit and it didn't seem like there was any real "pairings" (romantic or otherwise) outside of the main 3 characters and their weapons--given a choice, my husband and I like to do "couple" cosplays or at least cosplay characters that have a connection with each other. Having watched more of the series since then, I decided that maybe I could do Medusa or Marie since both of those ladies have clear connections with Stein. I've picked Marie because I like her, I happen to already own shoes for her cosplay, and she's a giant hammer.... I have a big thing for giant hammers. XD This is probably why I gravitate toward paladins and clerics in fantasy rpg games. Anyways. That's our cosplay lineup. We are still debating on what to dress the new baby as. I am still leaning toward Blair cat if it's a girl. I'm thinking maybe the priest Death Scythe character whose name is completely slipping my mind if it's a boy. Current progress consists of printing out references and digging through my scrap fabric drawers to see what I can use from what I already have for these costumes. Amazingly, I am only going to have to get a little bit for my costsume, stuff for Stein's sweater, and the yellow on Soul. This is cool because it means my fabric shopping bill is going to be almost reasonable--this very rarely happens when you're making this many costumes. Today's WIP photo is a pile of fabric that will eventually be costumes.

Finally, I have been working on a massive commission project I picked up at Magfest. This has been an incredible challenge--in a mostly good way. I was asked to draw the entire playable cast from Final Fantasy VI as a poster in the style of the Nintendo Noir badge set I put together. Originally my customer had asked for a movie poster style picture, but after some brainstorming, I included a mock-up of a club scene with all the characters in it along with a couple of movie poster mock-ups with the first set of WIPs I sent and he really latched onto the club idea. In hindsight, I probably made more work for myself, but it's been a fun project, so I'm not going to complain--my only real frustration is that it's taken me so long to get it finished. Of course, realistically, I was putting fourteen characters into a picture, each of which had to be redesigned for the noir setting plus there are more background details to add and so on. It is a large project, and that, combined with the moving mess, means that it was going to take some time to finish. That said, I'm definitely on the home stretch now. The character redesigns and sketches have been finished. Everything has been scanned into the computer, and I am nearly finished with the lineart, which is where the bulk of the work for the noir pictures is. Everything gets shaded in black, and color is added behind that to keep with the noir style. Since this is a poster, and not a small badge, I have used several shades of dark gray for shading to give it more detail and depth as opposed to the solid black I used for the original badge set. I have a little bit to add to the background in the top and bottom corners on the right side of the picture, and then I need to put in the carpeting on the floor. That will finish the lineart phase. Then I will fill in the color behind everything, clean up the lines, and everything should be done then. So far, I am very pleased with how it's coming out. =D

Wednesday WIP - Commissions

It's been a slow week for work on art stuff between driving all over the state of North Carolina to my cousin's wedding to continuing to unpack and try and remember what I've done with things. However, there has still been some progress. =) I have spent most of my art time working on commissions--these will always take priority over projects for my Art Tables or Etsy shop.

First up is Squall: since last week, he has been line-arted (is that even a word?) and has a base layer of color. I like going through and flat coloring an entire character before I go back and add shade. When I started running tables in Artist Alleys I would color and shade all at the same time, so I'd start by completely finishing the hair, then move on to the skin, then the eyes, and so on. I don't remember when this changed exactly, but now I flat color the picture, then I go back and start working on shading.

Next up is She-Ra: I have made the most progress with her. I have finished the line art, the flat coloring, and I've started shading her. It took me a while to get the shading on the skin to a place where I was happy with it, and I'm still not sure I'm 100% pleased with it; I might have to do some more tweaking later. The first picture is the line art and flat coloring. The second is the shading I finished earlier today. The third is a close up of some of the shading.

Finally I have a sketch finished for a "special" badge project I'm working on. I'm not going to say much about this one--I'm allowed to post some WIP pics and hint a little at what I'm doing, but you'll have to wait to see what it's for until the project goes live at the end of this month. ^_^

Animazement Artist Alley Loot

Today's blog is to show off all the awesome art I got from Animazement's Artist Alley. =)

I'm going to start with the buttons. My good friend, Melissa, bought the top two for me. The first one is China from Hetalia--he's a guy with long hair and a panda, what's not to love? The second is Mai from Avatar: the Last Airbender--she got the trio of bad girls, Azula for herself, since she was supposed to have been cosplaying Azula, Ty Lee for my cousin, who was cosplaying Ty Lee, and Mai for me since I was cosplaying Mai. Sunday I went back and got the bottom two buttons + an Aang. I gave the Aang to my other cousin who was at AZ and cosplaying Aang. The Zuko is for my husband, and the Iroh is for our friend who was cosplaying Iroh, but he left the convention before I could get the button to him. So, it'll just hang out on the yarn braid here (made for me by Ty) until our next D&D game.

Next up is this amazing print of Terra from Final Fantasy VI. I loved the coloring especially, but the whole print is just plain awesome. I had to take it home with me. XD I'm thinking the artist was just trying to get rid of these prints since she was selling them for only $1. Honestly it's worth a lot more in my opinion. I also bought a key chain from her table. It had Lina on one side and Gourry on the other. <3 Slayers!!! There aren't any pictures of the key chain because it's attached to the car keys which are in my husband's pocket. XD I really liked this artist; she had tons of non-mainstream stuff.

Dumb flash on the camera wouldn't function properly this morning... During our wanderings of artist alley, Ty made sure we found every artist selling Pokemon stuff. This one had a set of bookmarks to go with the various Eevee evolutions. She was out of my favorites, but Ty liked the water one, and the fire one is one of my runner up favorites, so I picked out the set of 3. The water one will go to Ty, the electric to my mom, and I'll either keep the fire one or give it to Luke. I want to laminate these so they're usable without risking tearing them up--this is why I laminate all of my bookmarks in really thick plastic.

This artist had a lot of cool Sailor Moon stuff, and it was tough to narrow down which prints I wanted to buy. With the chibi Sailor Moon set, I got all of the inner scouts, so I didn't have to pick which one I liked the most. =D I got the Ouran Host Club print because 1) they were on special if you got 2, and 2) I've been more than a little obsessed with Ouran High School Host Club lately. XD I really liked these chibis though; they pretty much nailed the cast and their personalities.

Finally, I got 2 badges and 2 magnets from Mystcloud (the one artist I actually have a gallery address for). I got the Sailor Venus because she's one of my favorites--love the color orange (purple's my second favorite color, but it's on my sites because purple goes better with a Gothic Panda than orange). The Nekozawa badge and Kyoya magnet go with my Ouran High School Host Club obsession. Kyoya's my favorite host, and Nekozawa is just plain awesome. The James magnet was for my kids to go on our fridge--they're all obsessed with Pokemon. The camera would not cooperate with getting pictures of these. Flash on: there's a glare. *fail* Flash off: the camera won't focus. I'm posting 3 picutres, 1 with flash, 1 without flash that's almost not half bad, and 1 without flash that reflects what pictures taken indoors without a flash usually look like. XD

Flash: Horrible glare on Nekozawa.

Almost not bad; Sailor Venus and James are ok at least.

This is what my camera normally does w/ no flash.

Wednesday WIP - May III

A lot has been going on this last week. This is one of those instances where I'm glad I'm doing this on Wednesday. I was feeling buried, but putting this together makes me see that things are getting done. =)

Moogle:  Finished. See it here: http://kasumiangel.deviantart.com/#/d3g3nwf

After

Before

Cosplay: Sometimes I forget why I like doing this. XD So, let's go down the line-up. Mai: I started the wig. I've included before pictures and "after" -- try and keep in mind that the final version should look a little better. Right now a lot of the hair has just been partitioned out for the 3 buns or various pieces hanging down. I am so glad I did not try styling my natural hair like this--it's doable, but it would have been such a pain in the butt, plus I don't think it's long enough anymore right now (I got mad at my hair back in February and chopped it all off--it went from waist length to shoulder length). Zuko: I've got a pattern mostly together for his boots? Nothing new worth photographing though. Jet: Mostly done except for details; I need to get supplies for the armor and leg wraps--I will be going out next Monday for that. Random side note: It's an hour each way to get to the nearest fabric store and another 15 min from there to the nearest craft store, so that's 2.5 hours driving just to get supplies; it's been weird because that means I have to plan a whole lot better than I'm used to since last minute trips to the store for little things just aren't going to happen with gas prices like they are. Momo: Hahahaahaha... yeah... nothing here, still a pile of fabric. Azula: Pants are finished, shirt is in progress, mostly still a pile of fabric. *fail* XD Props: They've been sanded, have a layer of primer and been sanded some more. I'll paint them soon. 
 

 Nine and Ten of Wands: So I did stuff that wasn't cosplay this week--I liked that; I was getting a little burnt out on the costumes. Here is the lineart for the Nine of Wands--Witch Hunter Robin, and a sketch for the Ten of Wands--Wolfwood (<3 Trigun). 

 Mages: This is a project I actually started about 2.5 years ago, but they sat as sketches for about 1.5 years. I then scanned them in and put a base layer of color down and let them sit for another year. XD I'm trying to get them finished now to go in Animazement's art auction. For the auction they will be printed as 11x17" posters and framed. I think I've really drug my feet on these ladies because this isn't stuff that I normally draw--it's not my style. They were started as a challenge at AWA 2009. The guy at the table behind me had nothing but fanart posters of pin-up girls like this (a few guys). They all had the same vacant (I guess sexy) expression. So, I was like: "Pft, I could do that; I just don't want to." Friend and husband: "Really?" (skeptical) Me: "Yes... >_< ... Fine I'll prove it." This is the result. I refused to do something like this with straight-up fanart--I did pin-up girls based off the Final Fantasy I mages instead (yes more Final Fantasy, I know I'm obsessed). This made it more interesting for me. Currently trying to finish up White Mage, then I'll move to the other two. The black background is there to help me fill in the color and find where I'm missing stuff.

Toothless: My newest plushie design-in-progress. Right now I'm debating what parts I'll keep and what I can get away with leaving out. Since it's a chibi version, I can't include all the little ridges and horns and stuff. Right now I have the legs finished, and one "ear." I will definitely include the 2nd ear, the tail and the wings. Once I have those pieces pinned on, I'll see what can and should be added.

The Evolution of Anime Tarot

 The process of deciding what characters to put in each slot for the Anime Tarot set has been ambiguous at best. It is something that has been in a constant state of modification--at least until a card is finished; then, for my sanity, the card is set in stone. As most good writers can attest, you can go back and edit and tweak stories (or in this case the card list) endlessly. I drew the line at the point a given card is finished.

Originally my husband and I had brainstormed a long list of characters and just pulled from that. We were just trying to find enough characters to fill all the slots. At this point the list consisted of primarily characters that we liked (which means it was at least 75% Bleach, Full Metal Alchemist, Final Fantasy, and Clamp). This more basic goal changed. After the Major Arcana and the Swords sets were finished, I started reanalyzing the character list I was using to assign slots for the set. Instead of keeping to the original list, I decided I'd rather see how many different series I could represent in the set. There are some cards from the Majors and Swords I would have changed out, but they were already finished, and I wasn't about to touch that. So, I highlighted all the characters from series I had already drawn from or had multiple characters (exceptions being the Kings and Queens). I sat down with a committee of friends and we rehashed over the remaining three suits.


Some characters stayed the same--for example the King and Queen of Cups, Sakura and Syaoran from Tsubasa Chronicles. I already had Fai as The Star and Kurogane as the Eight of Swords, so Sakura and Syaoran were high on the list of characters I wanted to take out. I spent a lot of time looking for replacements. However, the King and Queen of Cups represent an emotionally mature man and woman--anyone familiar with anime can relate to how difficult it is to find one character with that quality, let alone two from the same anime. And so, Sakura and Syaoran remained the Queen and King of Cups.


For a lot of the slots, we did find adequate alternatives. For example, the Seven of Wands was originally going to be Light from Deathnote. He had been highlight since I had already drawn L as Death. Several suggestions came up while discussing this card. The first replacement for Light was Kamina from Gurren Lagan. Kamina eventually moved into the Three of Wands (leads by example) replacing Hikari from Magic Knight Rayearth--it was determined that I had way too much from Clamp even if they were spread out over at least four different series, and I'll admit I'm guilty there. What can I say, I'm a big fan of Clamp's stuff. Heero Yuy was suggested along with some explanation for how he fit the card from a couple of friends who had seen Gundam--as of yet I still have not watched even one episode of any version of Gundam.


In conclusion, we tried to put a lot of variety into the Anime Tarot set. The choices were, in the end, still limited by what we (myself, my husband, and a couple of friends) have seen--I will be the first to admit there are many anime series out there that I have not even heard of. Then, the selections were also affected by my personal tastes--when there was a choice between several characters, it frequently boiled down to the one I liked best, or wanted to draw the most.