Such a headache

It's been lasting for... oh about 3-4 hours now. The pills haven't kicked in and I just want it to stop so I can get back to work. So, while I wait for that to happen, an update.
Amanda and I finished and updated the admittedly not beautiful comic review of the Bioware dinner last week.

Think Ink has an exhibition coming up on the 28th (more about that here, Swedish only though) and so I sat down and finished that Shmil piece in a hurry, before sending it off to the printers and... it's possibly the source of my headache. But it's done! With a background!

Now... I should probably cook something. Maybe that will help.

Bioware dinner and Gamex 2012

It's no secret that I'm a huge Bioware fan. Baldur's Gate was the first game I really loved and it sent me headfirst into fantasy and Viconia and the trip into the Underdark in the sequel made me fall in love with drow for what seems to be for life. Neverwinter Nights, Dragon Age, Mass Effect and Star Wars the Old Republic have eaten large chunks of my life (I regret nothing).

Three weeks ago Amanda and I got invited to a Bioware fan dinner by Lion Martinez. I reacted like the mature adult I am (read: got silly excited, climbed walls and ran to the cloth store for cosplay materials) and tickets were ordered and preparations started. So, despite both of us studying full time and having such a short deadline we sat down and made Mass Effect costumes. I once swore I would never do a cosplay on short notice ever again. Well. Let's not go into the stress level any further than that.
Amanda went as a random scientist and I went as Shepard in her dress blues because I absolutely adore that design. Granted, I love it somewhat less after making it. Easily the most complicated piece of clothing I've done due to the two different cloths and the folding overs and the gold bands and... yes, yes, carry on. I will say this though: it is probably the most comfortable cosplay I have made in a very long time.

And comfortable clothes that look nice are awesome. I wish to extend my 'thank you's and 'good job' to the artists here. I'm not certain about how easy it would be to mass produce though. Still. I've cosplayed Orochimaru. Any cosplay that doesn't cause me pain and prevent me from moving brings me joy XD

Having been so focused on getting the cosplays ready in time, we were completely oblivious to the fact that SM in cosplay was taking place at Gamex and ended up getting dragged in while utterly bewildered. Either way, lots of fantastic costumes! It was wonderful to see such a high standard wander about the building. Sadly no pictures, because I didn't bring my camera.

We also met up with the rest of Svampriket (at long last!) and made some videos with them which are up on the site now.

As for the dinner itself we were lucky indeed. The Skype connection was unfortunately not the best and Amanda and I ended up being the last who managed to get a reply to our questions to David Gaider and Mike Laidlaw. The connection with Mark Meer was better, and by then the speakers were working well enough that we could hear most if not all even in the back of the room. Not going to deny that I smiled a bit extra, hearing his preference for dressing as villains and history of D&D playing XD

The locale (Sjätte tunnan) was oozing with charm, but sadly was not the best for such a large crowd to have conversations in. Throats were sore at the end of the night, but plenty of game discussions - mainly Dragon Age and Mass Effect - were had, from whether or not the genophage really needed curing to tips on how to beat Loghain in a duel (with added pleading from me that they at least consider sparing his life).
We got the request that we'd draw something while at the event, and we were only too happy to agree. A comic diary of the day will be up... maybe next Monday if all goes well (I need a scanner that works with my laptop. Garrus the ever calibrating scanner is too old and incompatible with anything younger than ME1). Until then I just want to add a thank you to the lovely people we got to meet, the people who surprised us by being familiar with the Champions and Heroes comic, Lion who invited us, Jessica Merizan and Chris Priestly for coming, and the Skype guests too :D I would definitely do this again, and I hope that this sort of thing is something that Bioware continues to do - it was great and I saw nothing but smiles.

We came home from Stockholm again last night, having had a wonderful time and having met a lot of wonderful people. I think we've earned some extra sleep, but I've got catching up on Maya to do and NaNoWriMo has started without me for the first time since... 2001. This will not do.

But yes, as earlier stated, no pictures of the actual event - sorry. Have some strong female Dragon Age poses.

It's part of a bigger picture where I abuse the spines of male Dragon Age characters. I lovingly refer to it as 'the butt picture'. More of that in the future.

One month in

And the Game Assembly is... so much work. Rewarding work, but so much work all the same. I am so very, very tired when I get back home and just want to go to sleep. Suffice to say, I can think of very little to say, other than, here is a completed former WIP and some new WIPs.

Dasin and Thendys Noori, all done. All cheesy. But all done, just before the course started I think. Something like that.

Then we have Orianne, a roleplaying character in a Vampire: Dark Ages game, just the quick sketch of the base. The hand got fixed pretty quick XD But it's the first time I've actually liked a quick digital sketch I've made, so! Here it is! I've gotten further on this but... it still needs a lot of work.

And finally we have a Shmil WIP. Shmil who is a character in my continuing NaNo fantasy story. He'll get hair, I promise. And a body too. Maybe even a background (gasp!). I only just started on him last night though, and managed to sneak in some fur and seams work during breaks today, but I'm liking his angular face. And I'm looking forward to November and NaNo, because he's finally going to be a point of view character, bumbling around the Heartlands being socially awkward and eating babies. As you do.

New tablet and other things

As I've gotten accepted to the Game Assembly (hooray!) I've been left with no choice but to buy a new tablet. Cdon was awfully efficient, having it arrive less than 24 hours after I ordered it, forcing me to leave the apartment when all I wanted was to slouch about. Oh well XD
So, evidently I'll be spending the rest of august getting to know the new tablet. As it is, it's... huge. And not as smooth as my old tablet, which sadly seemed to get screwed over by the installation of the new one. Your tablet is old indeed when Wacom doesn't even have a picture of it on their site... That mess got sorted out though, and now it's up and running again (it's small and light and I'm considerably less afraid of damaging it, so it comes along for trips while the new one gets to stay shiny at home).
So! Some WIPs are in order, I believe.

Dasin and Thendys Noori, an npc in Star Wars the Old Republic who I really liked and had high hopes for. In cheesy pose. Originally meant to be little more than a sketch but it's escalated and... yes.

Her gear took forever, but I recon it's his that's going to be a nightmare once I get into the shading and detailing stage.

And then there was this Mass Effect 3 comic thing that I started to work with before going to Scotland (which is absolutely beautiful, and with temperatures and a sun that even my pale skin could handle. Hooray!). 8 pages, trying a new 'sketch all pictures separately traditionally, piece together, ink and shade digitally' way of working and I'm liking it.

And those of you who have played Mass Effect but haven't heard Reignite by Maluka, well. I suggest you do something about that, because it is a beautiful song.



NaNo and swtor

June disappeared far too quickly, while at the same time seeming to drag out forever. Let's just say that writing NaNo in a month that was not November was more difficult than I would have guessed. The fact that camp NaNo divied you into groups of six or so, rather than letting you see how everyone were progressing didn't help. I compete when I NaNo-write, and when I have no competition... well, my progress slows down. I managed to reach 50k, though the good writing only came the last 3k or so when I completely gave up and handed things over to my oldest character. At least he knows what's going on here...

I also updated my Star Wars: the Old Republic account, because I missed Sha, my chiss agent, waaaaaay too much to be healthy. I mean, way too much. Like, I spammed art with her and Amanda's Sullivan like no tomorrow for a moment there.

I had previously gotten stuck at the final battle for the agent's story, which I am now past with a little help (the game is not kind to snipers, let me tell you, everything is more difficult than it should be). I have since then made a chiss bounty hunter (the chiss are more commonly referred to as 'my people'), Dasin, who is set as the brother of Sha. The game has a 15 character limitation on the name of your character, which doesn't seem like a big deal until you research chiss names and realize that they are typically at least 17 characters. So, Prard'asi'nuruodo is now a mangled mess of letters with nothing to hold them apart, and spoken of as his corename Dasin. I absolutely love the name system of the chiss and how different it is.
The bounty hunter's story is not as engaging as the agent's I must say. The male voice is so over the top butch and action hero-like that it clashes horribly with Dasin's cuddle-foo, über-lightside nature. ALL the flirting options are painful to watch, either because they are so awkward or because they are wandering into sleezebag territory, but luckily most women react with that genuine "uh, no, ew" to them. As they should. Only sith seem to be ok with this, but since they are sith I suppose they get a freepass or something XD

For the Empire! (but really, for the Ascendancy!)

Camp NaNoWriMo

Speaking of original characters... 10 hours to go until Camp NaNoWriMo 2012 starts!

First time writing NaNo outside of November (people who know me: I am sorry for disappearing/becoming too involved in a world you find confusing again), but my eternal fellow NaNo-er Bre dragged me into this. Obviously my response was not only agreeing to do it, but to drag others with me. Duh. Misery loves company. So does wordcount competitions.

I am going to continue the novel from NaNo 2011 rather than start something completely new (big old cheater, yes, whatever) because I need to continue it (of course, it is a continuation of 2010's No Coffin Needed, and uses 2001 and 2002's NaNo novels as a background, but shhhh). I need to continue and eventually finish it. It still doesn't have a proper title, though the working title has changed from Pieces of the Empire to A Murder of Swans.
Now, I do believe there is some plot I need to sort out before all of this gets moving.

Working digitally

So, yeah, I've been doing some digital coloring lately, and primarily using original characters for practice. Because they need love too.
So here's Vadoma from the Vampire the Masquerade roleplaying game I'm running:

I mainly colored her for the dark skin-grey eyes combo, so I did get a bit lazy on the hair and clothes... if you can even call it clothes XD

I've also done my NaNoWriMo novel character Nasreen, after a description of her traveling clothes in the novel that I worked on last November. I then did some variations on that, and... I think I'll be doing some regular clothes too for her (and others) this way. It gives me a better idea of what I'm writing, if nothing else.