rynris

[rynris]

So somewhere in the grapevine someone said they were making a Bloodborne movie... (haha I WISH... unless?)

Credit to Late to the Party (youtube) for the audio edit. I added a few more SFX and cut it down to under 1 min. The scene was based of the french movie Brotherhood of the Wolf... which had some good ideas but some room for improvement.

Thanks Warrior Art Camp and Matthew Bordenave for being an amazing teacher and inspiration. This was his final assignment for his class, Storyboard Revisionist Bootcamp. Highly recommend the class!

[rynris]

Hello hello. It's been a while since I've posted anything. But I"m working on this and then another... and between life, and something of an art slump, I don't know, i guess it's kind of miracle that I'm almost done with this. I think I'm somewhat satisfied with this one and have learned a lot. Back to crunching...

[rynris]

Dungeon Meshi: Thoughts and Impressions

I've been thinking about how quickly I consume media these days and I feel like I've been desperately binging shows in order to keep up with the times. I hope this will be a series where I can thoughtfully absorb everything from a show that made a lasting impression on me and have something to come back to and review. This is more for my own fun and journal keeping - all thoughts are my own musings and can change over time. If there's something you'd like to add, please do! I'd love to hear your impressions as well.

*Minor spoilers below*

Overall Impression

What a well thought out and interwoven story with fairly interesting characters and a great hook/ mystery! I think rescuing Falin as a plot device works really well because the heart of the story is about relationships and everything around it caters to the journey and development of these characters and how they work together.

Cons/ Issues

I still don't really buy the world building, the dungeon idea seems a bit weak, but it's anime, so some plot holes are forgivable. The beginning felt weak, it was hard to buy into the stakes of losing Falin without knowing the characters but thankfully the exposition was rather quick (1/4 of an episode it felt like) which is good. The dragon fight scene seemed a bit off. I felt like the shots were framed too close - probably to emphasize chaos and keep the red dragon mysterious until the final reveal but with my tunnel vision, it felt messy.

Ok one big con is the character tropes. They sort of make up for it in the middle, but it was enough to make me want to stop watching. I've seen these tropes a million times now and am TIRED of it. And there's so much good stuff out there that it's so easy to dismiss shows these days.

Pros/ Love

CHARACTERS! I was surprised to see more depth in the characters and I love how the mysterious were presented depending on the encounters. Thought each scenario were expertly crafted and it didn't feel too forced.

FOOD! Besides the glorious food p*rn, I was definitely taken aback by the later recipes. I didn't expect food to be woven in during some scenarios, but when it was, I was very pleasantly surprised!

At first I thought Laios was kind of unrealistic, but then I remembered that my ornithology prof was passionate about eating every single bird in the world at least once and I was like... this is real. There are DEFINITELY people like this. +1 for the representation!

On representation, I like the potential LGBTQ representation and was surprised the show took that route. The show itself is coded to be super straight so I wasn't expecting it. This is a con, but it does feel a bit like queer baiting or for the male gaze unfortunately.

Later action scenes were good/ interesting.

The pacing between comedy and darkness was well done, Trigger never fails with good comedic timing.

Shots economy is good, I feel like there are not a lot of unmotivated, extra shots, and talking/ dialog/ exposition were all well done. The used the same layout for the exposition scenes from the manga and the added animation punched it up and mode those scenes interesting. - **I'd like to study these scenes in particular more.**

Final thoughts

I think this is a great show to study how you can make a slice of life comedy and weave in some darker themes without overwhelming the audience. A lot of shows usually stay in their chosen genre, or lean very heavily on the dark/ edgy themes. I like how this show isn't reliant on solid world building, but focuses on creative storytelling to keep audiences coming back for more. Overall, the design/ setting feels basic, but it is the creativity behind the idea of monster food and how well thought out every dish is that makes this show shine. The manga and show have pretty good pacing and doesn't linger too long on mysterious or draw things out, dropping enough tidbits and lore to keep you watching/ reading.

TL;DR I think this is one of the better amine series I've seen this year and I love that this show feels refreshing with very creative storytelling. The concept is feels surprisingly unique and original but you do have to commit to a few episodes before it kicks in.

**I only read a few chapters of the manga so my opinion is not 100% and may change if I have time to read more.

[rynris]

Recording some progress here!

I feel like I've kind of word bombed on instagram so I'm just kind of too tired to do this here.

I tried to be a little bit more original and see if I can hit a cute but graphic style, but in the end, I didn't do as much exploration as I liked and just went with whatever was the first choice.

[rynris]

I moved! After 20+ years of being in the same place, it's hard to say goodbye. But here's to new beginnings and a fresh start.

[rynris]

Let’s go gurlz! ✨

The DnD besties taking a break from the adventuring life to get their hair and makeup done for the most extravagant fantasy bachelorette of their lives!

[rynris]

This year is about manifesting strength and courage. CNY is over, but I hoped the reflection about the dragon year would continue with me and guide me through whatever is in store for next. May we all find the fire within us to continue to fight for what's right and protect our worth.

I wanted to give up this drawing because Chinese New Year is technically over. But I'm glad I persevered. I learned a lot but also wrestled with this one a lot mentally. This fear of this drawing not being accepted, not able to post this when everyone else is, and just having so many doubts on whether it's "good". But honestly, screw those fears, just create what makes you happy and move onto the next! I did learn some things about motivation, about what works for me and what doesn't so I believe I am just a smidge more in-tune with my process. But man yea... over 50 hours just to finish this... is kind of insane.

I'm also never going to record a timelapse within clip studio again. Thing took like 5 min every time to save, and I had autosave on too. But the tool is nifty and I enjoy watching the video and looking at my thought process!

Thanks for reading!

[rynris]

something quick and stupid. my friend is definitely not going to let me forget this candied orange vs tomato incident lol

[rynris]

Drew my Uncle's cat Kuta!

You can really see me struggling here lol. This is my 3rd/ 4th ish time attempting this drawing. Things went more smoothly when I pulled up style references.

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Thoughts on the process

I'm getting a bit more comfortable in procreate and really wanted to try to achieve that "procreate look". Really struggled to do anything satisfying until my friend very generously shared some brushes with me. I tinkered with the sensitivity and it's so much better. But I still haven't successfully duplicated my favorite clip studio brush. Soon....

I don't know if it's my settings but the most annoying thing is the canvas jumping whenever I rest my hand on it. And, the drawing feel is not quite as smooth as I expected. Procreate does this weird dragging thing when you try to add more stabilization. I think I'm making some progress though.

[rynris]

Girl, don't overthink it.

[rynris]

I love Alisae so much.

[rynris]

Happy Anniversary FFXV!

[rynris]

Happy belated birthday Mu Tian Ming! She's holding a Taiwan whistling thrush, an endemic bird from Taiwan.

I rushed this one quite a bit, so it's really messy and I wasn't sure about the vibes I wanted for this. I think I was originally going to keep it black and white and then ended up slapping some color on. Not sure how I like that, maybe I'll redo this later.

That aside, I'm really, really excited for the next Thunderbolt Fantasy sequel!! I'm starting to feel the fire in me again for this series, it's so unique and a beautiful celebration of modernity and traditional culture with a wonderful cast of characters.\

Oh and I was thinking I could do a TBF series with endemic taiwanese birds! The Taiwan whistling thrush is so fitting, with it's dappled breast mimicking Tian Ming's fabric pattern and it's red eyes. Plus with "whistling" in its name, I thought this bird was perfect for her! Haha we'll see we'll see. I'm not sure if I can juggle so many projects at once;;

[rynris]

Thoughts and WIP

Sometimes, I wonder if these thought blurbs are worth putting out there in the world, especially when there is so much tragedy happening at the moment. I remember talking to some friends about "keeping your head down and doing the work" and how that can be bullshit sometimes. But after thinking about it, I think there is some merit to it.

As an artist, people won't really give you second thought if your portfolio is not up to speed with the competition. And I know that I still need a lot of work in that department. Because the recent climate is more dire than before, it is even more crucial to try to catch up with the rest of the crowd. At some point, I do need to cut the noise and keep my head down and concentrate on my work.

That being said, I sincerely want to try to be more open about my progress. As little as it is, an hour a day helps me move forward and I want to try to celebrate the little things I learn along the way.

After going to LBX and watching a storyboarding demo, I realized I had a major setback in my own process: insufficient preparation. Such things like understanding the story tagline, the emotion you're trying to make people feel, as well as the individual microarcs of the characters within your story are crucial to hammer out and think about. This idea didn't' fully sink in until recently, from my own struggle with my big personal project. In a way, I needed that messy, unplanned, imperfect fist board to figure out what I did wrong and how to best approach it again. But as always, the progress is hair-wrenchingly slow and it's always frustrating to come to terms with my own speed.

I hope that keeping my head down these days will yield something I'm proud of! I want to take the opportunity right now to stretch my skills, learn new things, and ultimately create something pretty cool. But I know that interpersonal skills are still just as important, and it's definitely something I want to prioritize now.

All in all, I'm back to the drawing board! Diving back into books to try to help figure some details out, watching shows, taking notes, thinking in the shower, and re-writing my script. I'm very excited to work on this, but emotionally, there's been very little room. One is the guilt of working on a personal project that I know would make very little waves. It's really something just for me, and maybe, hopefully, land me a job. But knowing my skills, it might take a couple more personal projects before I'd get anywhere. With this, I hold onto hope that the lessons I learn working on this will make next year fly by a little better.

Anyways, I leave you all with a little screenshot. The intro is very uh... unpolished, but it's new and I like where it's going. The story is tied together so much better now and knowing that, I'm feeling a lot of drive to keep going. It's hard to want to give up on animation now... it feels tough to step away when I have got the ball rolling again. But life isn't fair and you have to make do and adapt.

I'm also feeling kind of stagnant on fandoms. I just haven't found anything I could hold onto tightly and adore. I like a lot of things, feel a lot of things, but unlike my friends, never stuck with anything. I wish I could find something to obsess about but I find that I can't really. Maybe it's ADHD. Maybe it's depression? Or maybe it's lack of discipline. I don't know.

[rynris]

Happy Halloween! 🎃

My friends and I dressed up as The Owl House characters for Halloween weekend and we had a ton of fun acting totally unintentionally in character lol. I love it when this happens 😂. Hunter tries corn (it’s got the juice 🎵), Willow buys a Witcher sword, Gus gets a cool kilt, and Lilith drinks cider to keep up with these hooligans.

[rynris]

I've been rushing to get this story to the second rough stage and managed to create this short clip! The storyboard is still a WIP but I was so excited to share @/stelanox 's (insta) beautiful singing. We're both huuuuuge Centaurworld dorks so it was only fitting to have her be the voice of Plum!

[rynris]

Catober Day 10: Forest Cat.

I struggled with this concept. not that happy with the final image but it is what it is. Moving onto the next!

Not pictured, I did end up digging up a lot of references for cat skulls and also asked my friend to give me second look. She helped to point out a lot of flaws so I ended up redrawing and liking it a bit more. I always forget how valuable it is to have feedback during the process! I'm always so scared to ask because I don't want to bother people.