doomsdayforte

[doomsdayforte]

Happy birthday, Ken.  Also, a sale!

I think this is the best iteration of curly/messy hair I’ve done for Ken yet.  I even tried to use a reference image but that was forward-facing instead of a side profile, so it didn’t really help too much.  Imagine this is a Post-it Note doodle, even if the classic yellow shade’s not quite right.  I left the ‘pencil’ draft underneath this time to make it seem like I really did try drawing on actual paper. 

Today is Ken’s birthday, so on top of getting a little bit older, I’ve put Red Streak on sale for a whopping $1.50!  One week only, you know the drill. 

I’ve been drawing a bit lately, so I’ll have another post later on. 

[doomsdayforte]

Happy birthday to the Ingram kids.

I need a bit of practice drawing hands still.  And arms.  And...

It’s that time again, where I post just to tell you that my stuff’s on sale that you bought already.  You better watch them coming at you now! 

Red Streak is down to $1.50. 

27 Bullets is down to $1 (because I can’t go under 99 cents). 

Pandora’s Box is down to $2.  

75% off! 

I also did some art in the time between two months ago and today. 

This poor orc girl is embarrassed.  Drawn on my phone. 

Just in time for Easter! 

Now in caramel flavor. 

I guess I was on a demihuman kick for some reason.  Tried something new with erasing under layers for a change. 

I tried to add a collar to this porc but I don’t think it turned out too great. 

Ingrid is ready to strike.  I didn’t have the idea to actually define her chin until later, so here’s a quick fix.  

Decided to try a few doodles trying out different profiles and a new way to draw eyes.  Also drawn onward on my phone. 

See you in June for Ken’s birthday. 

[doomsdayforte]

The Humble Valentine’s Day Potato, a sale, and NSFW art.

well, there's a lot of reasons i mean, roses only last like a couple weeks and that's if you leave them in water and they really only exist to be pretty so that's like saying "my love for you is transitory and based solely on your appearance" but a potato! potatos last for fucking ever, man in fact, not only will they not rot, they actually grow shit even if you just leave them in the sack that part alone makes it a good symbol but there's more! there are so many ways to enjoy a potato! you can even make a battery with it! and that's like saying "i have many ways in which I show my love for you" and potatos may be ugly, but they're still awesome so that's like saying "it doesn't matter at all what you look like, I'll still love you"

I gotta post it every year. 

Also, I'm having a half-off sale on my romancey books.  

Red Streak is now $3.  

Pandora's Box is now $4.  

Prices good until next Thursday. 

Also also, I did some art.  Don't get too excited, I traced most of this.  I found a kinda neat modeling program on Android called Make a Pose and decided to do something...different. 

Do you know what the Virgin Killer Sweater is?  One of the more inventive pieces of apparel to come out of late, it's an armless sideless backless sweater that largely only covers the front, and supposedly it has the power to kill virgins (though I think it's funnier to consider it as the death to virginity itself).  

I feel sorry for Mag sometimes.  Not because of my art skills (please stop staring at her feet, I had no good references for them), but she must be really lonely even taking Eli into account.  Who could be her Valentine?  A woman who can form a hard-light hologram construct of herself, but then doesn't feel anything when touched would make for a one-sided experience.  If only there was a way for her to be human in body as well as every way she is now.  

[doomsdayforte]

Better uhh than err...

Well, I said I was gonna do it.  I never specificied a timeframe!  “Soon” is just open to so many interpretations...

Here’s stuff I drew. 

DESTROY ALL MAVERICKS...  Taken from the Zero ending of Megaman X7 that I never played, but here’s a screencap. 

Hey, it’s this little guy again. 

Now as a zombie.  With a few more horns.  Just because. 

I found a neat brush in Medibang, Speed Lines.  So here’s a bunch of things I made with it. 

Solar eclipse. 

Solar flare.  I forget how I did this, but I think I used not only the outer ring, but the inner and ‘partial both’ options. 

Naturally I had to make eyes too.  Eyes fascinate me, the way the patterns differ between people and all that.  I can’t really replicate that easily, unfortunately. 

Ol’ blue eye.  I guess our pupils are actually round but let’s pretend for a second, okay? 

I kinda wonder how much different sight would be with a pupil like this.  Maybe I don’t want to know. 

So if you overlay a circle on top of the speed lines, it looks much better overall and somewhat closer to how a real eye looks.  Can’t make an omelette without pissing off the god of the sea, who then ensures that you spend ten years not going home where a bunch of dudes are trying to muscle in on your wife and home while you’re presumed dead. 

Odysseus really liked omelettes is what I’m saying. 

Primary eye. 

Apart from the few errors, I think this one is about the best of the lot.  A bit more work with layers could make a better one in due time.  

Okay, the next batch...  I was bored one day and decided to draw heroes from Heroes of the Storm, Blizzard’s answer to DotA and LoL, with characters from their IPs like Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablocraft.  I did pretty much all of these from memory, so that shields me from any criticism!  Some were inspired by current outfits, while others were takes on new ones.  They’re all headshots because screw full-body art. 

I actually entered these into a contest on Reddit for a chance at a skin for a hero I didn’t even have...and I won.  Not like there was only one prize but still, I’m impressed! 

D.Va but as a D.Mon instead.  I screwed up the horns because I originally had them looping behind her ears but I had saved it this way.  I tried something different with the lips this time and I didn’t really stick with it despite it turning out fine.  Appropriately enough, the skin I won was this one, D.Va merged with Deathwing or something.  You can tell I know my Blizzard IPs. 

Li-Ming has the most outfits out of any hero, and she recently (at the time) got another one that imagined her as a Templar from Starcraft.  I like what I did with the globe, and the lip thing showed up here too. 

Zagara is a big Zerg and one of her skins makes her a human-scorpion hybrid in a way, so I tried to recreate that with my own take on the skin.  Her hair is fed through the headpiece and comes out of the scorpion’s tail too! 

I had the idea for the football helmet on Sgt. Hammer anyway, but I needed an idea for color.  Instead of going with one of the color schemes already in Starcraft, why not go for something in an entirely different IP like Commander Keen?  Bama Hammer in...Goodbye Galaxy!

I made another Li-Ming one, this time as an ashen demon whose hair is a raging fire.  

I was going to make this something of an Assassin's Creed reference for Valla given the hood, but the bird wings didn't really turn out and instead I made it into an Odile/Odette reference instead.

What if Sonya was a roadie for ETC?  There's a band already and every band needs a badass roadie.  So here's a neon punk rock Sonya.  First time trying eyeshadow and it kinda turned out all right I think.  

I don't know what the hell I was thinking.  Zul'jin crossed with the guy in the weird Dole bananas commercial from Japan.  This is clearly the one that won me the contest, I can feel it!

Also in slightly-spotty aged flavor.

In the name of Elune, I shall punish you!  Why shouldn't the moon priestess Tyrande instead be a magical girl?

This was seriously meant to reference the human disguises the 80's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoons used, but I could never find anything about them and if they were a toy-only thing, then maybe that's how I remembered it.  Tassadar blends right in with the rest of us.  

And for this next one, it's a monster from the God Eater games, Sariel.  The image I used as reference from the game's codex had a more saturated skin tone than this image, and I took liberties with the corset I guess you'd call it?  And I guess the headdress too, even though it's actually a part of her body as are the 'clothes'.

And as a well-endowed human woman. 

I was originally going to post this on the Warframe subreddit, something about how the initial Amp you use is weak and the first one I actually built felt like using the X-Buster, but this one didn't turn out very good to me.  Don't take months off of drawing.  

Much better.  Medibang unfortunately doesn't have a layer rotation feature so the arm is kinda awkward.  That feeling when you draw something great and it's just not a good fit for the rest of the image kinda sucks.  

And here's the apex of this idea.  I used to be a tracer but I'm trying to get into the groove of doing reference drawing and I think it's working out all right. 

Okay, that's all the art I have.  Whee!  

[doomsdayforte]

Wait...they went up???

Yeah, I increased the prices of my books.  More than just the one cent to round up the dollar this time.  I'm greedy and this is the best way to show it.  But seriously, I've heard that you need to price things smartly because otherwise people won't give your works the time of day.  You might see a book for $3 and think "wow, the author must not really have confidence in this work" and pass it by to buy something that's $22.  "You get what you pay for" is in full effect.  I could honestly set my books to that level but A) I wouldn't pay $22 for one book (anymore), and B) I can still offer my books for a 'low' price without seeming like it's a cheap paperback sold in the check-out lane.  

Granted, tabloids being sold there for more than what my books are is kinda staggering, but at least we're both fictional!  Aha.  

Anyway, I'm still gonna have periodic sales and because Amazon has to be difficult, it's not going to actually show on their side still.  You're not gonna be buying my stuff for 99 cents anymore for a while and unless I put out another relatively short book, you're probably looking at $9.99 for new books.  Assuming I'm going to continue writing but stranger things have happened.  

I might do an art dump post soon too.  

[doomsdayforte]

Been a little while.

Remember me?

It’s that time of year again.  Time to put books on sale! 

Red Streak is $1. 

27 Bullets is also $1. 

And guess what Pandora’s Box is?  $1!

I honestly gave up on writing for a while.  The sudden spark of interest I had in a new project didn't last.  I'm not sure if I want to quit forever though.  It sucks to get no return on what you've poured so much of yourself into, but why throw yourself at the wall hoping you break through it this time?  

Anyway, my stuff's on sale for a week.  Happy birthday, Charlotte.  

[doomsdayforte]

...so, last night. 

For the first time in over two months. 

In a cave, with a box of scraps

I wrote something.

Something unrelated to what I was working on before, though. 

Let’s see how far I can take this idea. 

[doomsdayforte]

Just ranting.

I don't have anything to add this week either.  I've been thinking about the blog here.  While it's nice and I shamelessly stole the design from someone else and tweaked it to my needs, I'm not really reaching anybody.  I don't even get a pity like from friends most of the time.  That and I'm not sure how long Tumblr is gonna last given the sale of Yahoo to Verizon and the formation of Alta Vista or whatever it is now.  I don't have anything against this place but you know how the sales of businesses go.  "Hey, we're your new owners and we're gonna see what we can do to streamline this place!"  Yahoo's relevance has dropped hard over the years, so...  But what do I know about that?  I'm a shitty novelist, not a shitty business speculator.  

I've been backing up my posts.  Well, not recently but it's something I started.  I'm expecting an instantaneous "sorry we're closed" with zero warning kinda deal.  I could be wrong, but in the event that it does happen like that, I'll have all of the things I said saved.  Well...hopefully, if I'm doing this right.  

I just don't use Tumblr.  My net sucks and all people do is post images and GIFs and shit, and while that's nice, I can't stand waiting for everything to load and then having to do pages and pages of that?  But tell me what social media platform doesn't do that.  Facebook's the same way, Twitter sometimes has text but people still post images and so on.  Uh...those are the only social platforms, yep.  I'll keep posting posts that nobody reads for the time being but I need to find another place just in case.  

It was nice to go a week plus without writing, though I know that's not really productive.  It's going on two years since my last published book and all I have is a tiny story with a name I need to change, a first draft that I've demolished, and a first draft of another book that still isn't finished yet.  And ideas that aren't getting made.  It's discouraging but what support do I have?  I don't reach out to anyone and that's kinda dumb for someone who kinda needs the help of others to do anything in this field.  The one person who doesn't want to be an attention whore went for the work that necessitates it.  Great!  

I'm not giving up on it but it doesn't feel fun anymore.  And that's not cool.  

[doomsdayforte]

Blank stares and blank pages.

I kinda wonder if I should start a mailing list.  It'd mean I'd probably have to update the Tumblr less, but hey, at least that'd be a good way to gauge interest and all.  Just having a site doesn't mean people are gonna go visit it, and I could just bug people over email instead of having them passively ignore me here.  

Something to think about, really.

No status update because I haven't been doing very much, and I'm sorry for that.  I'm starting to think I need to change up how I'm writing.  There's a...not so much technique but way to power through the first draft.  If you're stuck on a part and want to move forward, just write a placeholder and move onto the next scene/part.  Not something you can do for every draft but one way to combat getting stuck.  Another way of doing it is to just write the scenes and parts you want and then link them together later.  Unorthodox, but if you're going to spend several days stuck in the mud, you may as well...uh...create characters and events on up the road who can come back and winch you out?  Yep!  

Tomorrow is Ken Ingram's birthday, and 27 Bullets is gonna be on sale for 99 cents for a week again.  

Also, congrats to the Warriors for finally winning the NBA Finals again.  

[doomsdayforte]

May be not.

Not the best month, but I don't think there's been one of those in a while.  

As for this month, off to a great start!  

Don't have much to add this time around.  I don't even have art again!  How sad.  I need to get my chops back on drawing sometime.  

Take care, now!

[doomsdayforte]

21.3rd Century Phones.

Since I have no progress report due to playing caretaker for family, I’ll finally post this.  

...

“Vegeta, what does the scouter say about his power level?” “Uh...hey, you wanna check out this cat video I saw?”

Even in the early-mid 21st century, cell phones never really fell out of use.  Their function is still largely the same as we have today, just their shape and forms have changed.  

I took a lot of inspiration (not that it shows up in the stories proper but this is worldbuilding) from VR headsets.  They're great technology and the visuals are amazing...but they're also isolating.  You can't really show someone what you're looking at unless you render a third screen for them to watch, and then you lose the 3D effect.  So I went with that for phones.  Things like Google Glass actually caught on and that revolutionized what phones were.  Instead of this handheld computer, you had a small device that connected to a monocle or pair of glasses and it displays information to you on those.  But it's isolating.  You can see through the glass but if you wanted to show a friend a funny cat video you saw, you either have to give up your lenses or just NFC it to their device.  Three guesses which people trend towards doing.  

Of course, flip phones are still being made.  Those will never die out.  I'm sorry.  

I took some ideas from augmented reality too.  Just by looking at things, you can get information about whatever it is, be it cost, the name of the building, historical information, etc.  If you're driving, your phone can connect to your car and it'll display things like current speed and the current speed limit, and you can swap to gauges like oil pressure or current miles-to-empty.  When you read a book, you can get articles from Wikipedia about the book or notes about the character or current chapter.  If you look at packages of chicken, you can get recipes to come up and you can even mark them off of a checklist while you shop.  Or while you're out, you can ask your phone if you need anything since it's already scanned everything you've put into your fridge and pantries.  All these and more in handy little overlays so you aren't taken out of interacting with the world at large.  

Since you no longer have a device with a big touchscreen, there are three general ways to control phones:  The oldest is by voice, something we have already.  Ask your phone to do something and it'll respond.  The second is by looking at something and winking, and this is something we actually have today too.  I remember reading a story about a disabled person looking at letters and winking in order to type, due to having no movement in their limbs.  Of the three, it is probably the least-used but there is a strong cult following for it since you don't flail your arms and it's totally silent.  The third way is using your hands to control what you see, Minority Report style.  Through the use of either a minimally-invasive 'glove' or implants, you can contort your hands in a variety of ways so that your phone knows when you're intending to use it and when you're using your hands for whatever else.  Index and middle fingers up with ring and pinky down for example will let you slide screens out of your field of view, without you actually bringing your fingers to your face, I mean.  The phone knows.  

Some people are literally bonded to their phones, though those with mechanical augmentations sometimes have phones installed in available space just for convenience.  Those having surgery to install their phones in their own bodies are seen as crazy by some, especially since these same people tend to have the old tech replaced as soon as possible, but there will eventually be a time where the phone fully integrates into the body.  Imagine having something a few steps beyond Fitbit, something that can monitor calorie intake, organ damage, blood loss, vitamin deficiency, etc.  Imagine having something that can diagnose you without needing to go to the doctor.  That tech will catch on in the later 2040s or 2050s I'm sure.  

And speaking of tech catching on, phones that project images as opposed to displaying them on a screen are very rare due to technology's advances.  They never progressed to creating 3D images, creating a situation where the tech stagnated due to nobody showing interest in it, leading to it stagnating.  Thus Charlotte's surprise at Eli having something like that.  

[doomsdayforte]

Break down.

All right, guess I'm in debt by one update.  Only two days late!  But I have a good reason.

So, my workstation computer is running Manjaro, a fork of Arch Linux.  I have a bit of a bad habit in not updating things because "if it works fine, then why change that?"  I had the bright idea of trying to install VNC on my laptop so I could manipulate it while I'm out and about.  That installed a new version of OpenSSL and that wound up breaking quite a few things.  So why not update then?  Nope, sorry, pacman (the package manager) broke.  I did a little bit of research.  I could fix it.  I'd get my old Manjaro CD out and use its pacman, mounting my install so it'll update my files.  

I let it download all the shit overnight.  Results:  Fucked.  It was better before because at least I could get online with ethernet instead of WiFi.  I didn't stick around to see what other stuff broke before, but after my attempted fix, it didn't boot past the Manjaro loading screen.  

So now what.  

I had downloaded an ISO for Arch Linux.  I figured I was going to lose my system (but managed to backup my files), so why not take the opportunity to learn?  Results?  

Hahah, oh lord.  Arch sucks.  I mean, the people who can handle it have my respect and no sarcasm at all there.  I put in a good, what, eight hours or so fighting it.  Wound up reformatting it again in the process because I didn't install NetworkManager, but I didn't think to just do the above with mounting what install I had and just load the NetworkManager thing there.  I got as far as loading X and a display manager/window manager/GUI.  X failed to load but at least I had net working fine!  

I gave up.  I had ten tabs on a tablet going at one time and it just felt overwhelming.  I'm sure an Arch setup is amazing but that's a level of work beyond me.  So I guess I now can add "knowledge of software" as one of the things beaten out of me.  

So I didn't write at all for the past few days!  Considering during my broken install, I couldn't even write in my actual file, I decided not to mess with it.  So instead of laziness, I had external things at work here.  

Not that it's a PSA but still back your shit up, people.  

Writing is probably going to be a little light for tonight at the very least because I need to sleep soon to wake up early in the morning again.  Lot of stuff happening in the real world on this end.  So I'll leave you with that much.

And uh, guess I'll do the world-building thing on Monday?

[doomsdayforte]

Stumble.

Damn you LP Archive!  

That thing I mentioned last time, I never got around to writing.  But I'll have time (but then, when don't I?) and I already have some of the art made up for it.  

And speaking of art...

Hey, we haven't seen the wyvern for a while.  More pixel art!

We made cupcakes so I decided to try drawing one (it’s not pixel wtf).  I hope you like a blob of icing on top because that's the only way they come.

Oh God I've done it this is now the mascot for the series I'm writing what was I thinking

It's probably not the most terrifying thing I've drawn.  Maybe.  

Right, things to do.  

[doomsdayforte]

Trip.

Got one zero already.  Damn!  Better keep them to a minimum going forward.  

Not much to say right now since I was busy, but I'm going to write up something soon.  More worldbuilding!  

Also, turns out Medibang has a pixel brush.  

[doomsdayforte]

New Moonth.

Well, April turned out to be better for writing, even with me taking off over a week total. Didn't end up with a very high average probably due to that, but better than taking off half the month like last time. I can't guarantee that I'm gonna get a solid streak through May though. I had a slight idea where I'm taking the story but then I got a bunch of words down oust with dialog instead of plot. Honestly though, you're not gonna get plot with my works. Just talking. Lots of talking.

My net is back too. I probably should've said that first. Whoops. And with that, Pandora's Box silently goes off-sale once more.

Since I didn’t get to share last time, I drew more stuff. A couple of things are kinda minimalist, something I'm copping from some sprays from Overwatch. 

Like these.  

Need to figure out how to show the chin without all of her head awkwardly connecting to her neck.  

Took more time figuring out how to do the spatter tool for the shaved hair (using different program) without needing to judiciously erase.  Took five minutes and it shows.  

Oh look, it’s this again.  Looks better than the last attempt too.  

Something I want to do is abstract kinda covers sorts like Pandora's Box, but I'm working on this as a backup idea. Or just for fun.

And speaking of Overwatch, here's Zenyatta drawn from memory. I played around with the cloud tool here, you can see.

And here's a simple black rainy picture to show how I feel. Rainy soul miasma.

[doomsdayforte]

Update on hold.

The power cord to my router decided to die, so net is not exactly something I have right now.  Ignore how I’m posting this.  

This also means the sale on Pandora’s Box is extended for hopefully not too much longer!

[doomsdayforte]

Three years, eight years.

I think I’m doing better than the first week of the month.  Isn’t it nice when you feel depressed and end up being productive?  Misery loves the company of words, apparently.  

I might be getting back into the groove.  I’m not feeling like shit (except I’m actually sick right now so isn’t that nice), so now I have to soldier on with pure willpower instead of mopey sadness.  How hard can it be?  

Oh, everyone loves art.  

I might start to look at different drawing guides.  I mean, this is nice and all but I think I’m doing more copying versus learning what the material is showing me.  And I’m pretty sure Forrest’s hair doesn’t spike that badly.  Might need to dig up that Saints Row picture for reference next time.  

I didn’t exactly set out to draw an alien, but this is how the proportions ended up working for me.  

The twins are three years old today.  And I have apparently been writing (or at least seriously started to write) eight years ago too, which is why this date is so important.  I removed the guidelines but I used the same as above...to a degree.  So yeah, I think I’m gonna try something else next time.