Magi scribbles and The Sims 2 8D

Happy New Year! 8D I know it's super late, but this is my first post in 2015, haha.

I still haven't managed to draw much since last time. I got inspired once and managed to draw a sketch every day for 4-5 days in a row, but then I gave up and started watching anime and play The Sims 2 instead. The recent Levi drawing I posted on tumblr is from that random inspired time.

I did several practice doodles of Ja'far when I wanted to draw him for a friend's birthday in the beginning of February. Ja'far is her favourite from Magi and I dislike Nanatsu no Taizai, so Ja'far was the obvious choice for me, lol. Maybe I should have finished this one instead of the one I ended up finishing, but I didn't like how his face turned out here.

This is an OC doodle that somehow happened. I created this character many years ago after waking up from a movie-like dream. My OCs always change a lot in my head and I keep changing even basic stuff like their names, but I guess "Darshana" finally got stuck as this girl's name.

This is her old outfit which I don't really like anymore. :/ She had straight hair on my first designs of her because it took me forever to learn how to draw this wavy "flowy" hair. I wanted to make her feminine in appearance but masculine in personality. I often try to imagine her actions and interactions with other characters while imagining how an outgoing charismatic and overconfident male character would act. And I like it. XD I just had to create a male attendant for her who balances her out a little, he becomes nervous, embarrassed or worries in her place and makes her stop when she goes overboard. I'll draw him too one day.

Obligatory Sinbad scribbles, duh. I'm still so addicted to drawing him, I hate him so much ugh...

Really quick doodle I did after one of the recent Sinbad no Bouken chapters. OMG my baby is growing facial hair already?! XDD He's growing up so fast, jeez.

Aaand this is not my art. It's a birthday present I finally got recently. My favourite PH boys wishing me a happy birthday, yay~ <3 I'm posting it here because having it here may be safer than having it on my PC or my external HDD. (I apparently lost two or three months worth of old photos thanks to my external HDD - some of them were important personal memories.)

Okay, I guess that's all the unfinished stuff I wanted to post for now. (I have some more messy scribbles, but they are too shitty to post even here.) I'd like to finish at least one of my old Sinbad drawings this weekend. I'll pray to the animu gods to give me patience and inspiration, haha.

One of the many times the Reaper came

Oh yeah, and I wanted to write about a funny story that happened in my The Sims 2 game (I shouldn't have downloaded it last year when EA made it downloadable for free. X'D).
One of my favourite sims refuses to die. XD
He's a guy with romance aspiration and pleasure secondary aspiration. I created him as a university student sometime last year. He's now an elder who reached the end of his life (he lived a great happy life fulfilling his lifetime wants twice - reaching the top of the Athletics career and WooHooing with 20 sims), but when the Grim Reaper comes at 6 pm, he throws himself on his knees and begs for his life. Then the Grim Reaper offers to play a guessing game and my sim always wins. XDD If he keeps this up, he's gonna live forever, lol.

Wife crying on the right, but he won

Eventually, he managed to outlive his wife who was actually a couple of days younger than him (she died normally like every other sim). I also realized this is probably not a glitch. I saved the game before 6 pm and kept reloading a few times and one time my sim ended up choosing the Reaper's wrong hand during the game and died. But I didn't save the game when that happened, so he's still alive and keeps messing with the Grim Reaper every day, hahaha. After losing the game, the Reaper leaves and my sim doesn't get a day older. 8D
Update:
I finally figured out why he didn't die! Back when he was still in college, he randomly got a magic lamp and one of the wishes he made was being able to trick the Grim Reaper. I didn't consider this possibility at first because I thought the effect of this wish would "wear off", but apparently it didn't. Anyway, after losing to the Grim Reaper twice in a row, I saved the game and let him go. He was a fun sim to play, may his 4 children prove to be just as fun. RIP. XD

Okay, I'll shut up now. I also wanna ramble about anime/manga and the latest PH chapter (I'd like to draw Aliceee and Ozzz), but I'll do that on deviantART eventually. Now I'll go and work on the drawings I want to finish. Bye for now~

Last post of 2014: VinceAda Hell

Long time no post again. To be honest, I haven't been drawing much. I'd thought I'd be able to draw so much in December, but I failed. orz I'm trying to draw for at least 1 hour every day, though. But it seems I'm only getting worse and worse... ;___;

This is a scribble I did for Halloween. It wasn't turning out well, so I never finished it.

Very quick draft for a big picture I'd like to draw one day. Knowing myself I'll never draw it in the end, but I'm posting this here as a reminder because I may end up commissioning someone to draw it for me.

I was tagged with a kiss meme on deviantART a long time ago and this sketch was done for that meme. It's "kiss on the shoulder" VinceAda style.

More VinceAda. This is almost finished, though still needs a lot of tweaking and amending. Whyisitsobrightasdds... I originally did the base scribble of this in October and it wasn't refined or anything, just two stick figures facing each other, but I saved it for some reason. So I opened the file a few days ago and turned them into Vincent and Ada. I hope I can post this somewhere today.

That's all I have to post for now. I don't even know what I'm doing but I somehow manage to waste my time pretty effectively... I guess I spent a lot of time on tumblr this year. I also keep watching anime and reading manga and talking to people on deviantART. I also started playing some computer games again. For example, I downloaded The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection when it was available to download for free during summer. I only started playing it in October, but Sims games were always somewhat addictive for me.

I love the evil snowmen grouchy sims build, lol. I think I've tried out all the expansion packs I never had (I only had the base game). The Pets expansion is probably the least fun for me even though I'd expected to like that one. But I really enjoy the addition of changing seasons, the new romantic interactions and I like sending my teenagers to university. And I suck at managing stores with Open for Business, lol. Anyway, now I don't know how I was able to play The Sims 2 without any expansions. One thing I don't like is how the game handles the personality points of sims who are born ingame. I usually get hyperactive hyper grouchy sims.

Another issue is the first serious glitch I've experienced. My teenage boy got 7,000 Simoleons of scholarship (+500 when I moved him in), all of his skills were at least level 8. But for some reason, there was a "cap" placed on the class performance meter thingy below the line and it stayed in the red zone no matter how many homeworks or essays he did. This means he cannot complete even the first semester and he'll eventually be kicked out and sent back to the main neighbourhood. Apparently, this glitch occurs if you put several valuable objects in your teen's inventory before sending them to university. (Since you can't give them money from their home household, giving them objects is the only way to raise their scholarship and allow them to buy better household items.) But if you move them to a dorm instead of a house, the class performance cap thingy doesn't appear.

Anyway, it seems I'm cursed with Sims glitches, haha. Or it's just that the game doesn't like what I want to do with it.

I don't think anybody is reading this blog anymore, but Happy New Year to everyone! I'll definitely try to do unproductive things less and draw more in 2015.

I'm drawing I'm drawing

Working on a bunch of things at the same time. I'm planning on drawing all afternoon today because of reasons.

I drew this in a rush yesterday evening when I realized that Vincent's birthday is on the 23rd. I drew him with a random flower crown last year and I went with the flower crown idea again. I originally drew little Vincent with his arms down but it looked weird (especially cropped - it would have been just his head lol), so I tried to draw him arms and hands hoping it wouldn't turn out like crap...

Retrace 97 killed me because of various reasons, one of them was Noise. I'm posting this drawing here because I'm not sure I'll manage to finish it by tomorrow.

I posted a rougher version of this last time. I'm still struggling with the umbrella tbh. XD;;; Also, I forgot to mention last time that the inspiration for this was this freaky rainy weather we had last summer and in September too. I don't remember another humid and rainy summer like this. We were often woken up in the middle of the night to thunderstorms. It rained and rained sometimes for 24 hours or more without break.

We had really beautiful weather in the past few days, though. It was that pleasant late summer weather. Still warm enough yet not hot. And everything is still so green and beautiful because it rained all summer. There were only a few days of really hot dry weather during all summer. So instead of the usual yellow dried out grass strands, there's beautiful green grass and little flowers everywhere. It's amazing.

This is my Sinbad/Kougyoku kiss picture I drew back in May. I had this idea to take a screencap from the anime and try to paint it as background. Holy shit, it's so hard. I'm switching between Photoshop and Sai using the screencap as reference and it has already taken me hours to paint this much. As you can see I'm not even doing the parts that will be covered by the characters, but it's still really time-consuming.

Anyway, the finished version will probably look like the cheesiest romance novel cover ever. XD;;;

I've also been working on this waka!Sinbad sketch and I must say I'm pretty pleased with how it's turning out. I refined his right arm so it doesn't look so big anymore and added a lot of details on his outfit.

Speaking of Sinbad and Magi... there are two fanartists on pixiv who keep destroying me with their drawings. Every time they upload a new art log, I feel like a little child getting a box of candy. One of them is 何某 and the other is 襲釗. I'm completely in love with 何某's art style and I love most of 襲釗's ideas. *A*

Okay, I think that's all I wanted to ramble about for now. I'll try to finish that little Vince + Noise sketch today~ 2-3 hours after lunch should be enough if I can manage to not get distracted...

A few rough scribbles

Hello again my personal blog. Thing is, I'm jobless again at the moment, which means I have a lot of free time when I'm not too busy worrying about my future... But still, I'm not too inspired to draw. I finished the palette challenge I was doing on tumblr and now I'm like "NOW WHAT?". I have ideas, but... shit, I'm only getting worse. I find myself looking for references even when I want to draw the simplest things. orz

Here's a scribble I did after first seeing Pandora Hearts Retrace 97 (mannn that Retrace was the best thing). I drew this in a few minutes before we went to watch the fireworks and I haven't touched it since then. I may or may not do something with it later.

Sinbad is a compulsory addition in all of my entries lately. -___- Maybe I should do some decent finished work of him. Perhaps then I would be satisfied and stop getting these urges to draw him.

Today's scribble. I've had this idea since I first saw the "Special Feeling" meme. (That was quite a long while ago, yep.) Riza and Roy in the rain instead of snow. I kinda sorta gave up on this because I have no idea how to draw a frigging umbrella. Refs don't help. *sob*

Okay, that is all for now. I'm still pretty uninspired and I seem to give up working on everything faster and faster... I'll try to draw every day now that I have time.

I don't have any new music to listen to either. I'm currently listening to old anime songs I downloaded years ago.

Oh well, hope next time I can post better things~

A small update

Heyyy. I haven't updated in a while again. It's because all I've been doing lately are the palette requests on tumblr. (I've done 12 so far!) Plus one commission.

The birds are still coming. They even fly into the apartment through the window sometimes. It's crazy. I guess mom turned this place into a paradise for the chickadees.

Anyway, let's post some shit I forgot to post last time:

Actually, this was the very first colour palette thingy I've done. Gil in palette #7.

So this is how the full version of this Oz drawing is supposed to look. It's still a wip of course and I've changed his face again since I saved this, so it doesn't look like this anymore. No, I haven't given up on the Tarot idea yet. Actually, the person I originally got the idea from put Oz as the Death card and young Vincent was The Fool, but I went with beginning-of-the-series Oz as The Fool. It's just more fitting for me than young Vincent since Oz is the main character and the series is about his journey and all.

The initial sketch for this is OVER ONE YEAR OLD and the idea itself is even older. This is a huge drawing and the border alone has taken me hours to draw so far (I drew most elements by hand and then did lots of copy-pasting. I created the chains from scratch too, they are not a brush). I want to finish this simply because I've already worked on it for too long to abandon and scrap.

I haven't posted this last time either. My byoootifoool Sinbad. I ruined him by turning half of him into cursed Focalor, hahah. (I still have the normal version underneath the Focalor layers tho.) Pretty much everyone who has seen the normal version so far told me he was gorgeous. I'll probably finish it up but I haven't touched this since I started doing the palette meme thingy.

I should be working on 6743534 other drawings instead. Go away Sinbad.
Doodle inspired by a "waistcoats are God's gift to all women" post on tumblr and Ohtaka's recent artworks of Sinbad and Alibaba in suits. Sinbad is totally the type who doesn't understand neckties and can't button his shirt all the way up.

And this is a little Ja'far doodle based on 3cloudy doujin circle's stuff. I was very unhappy with the Ja'far drawing I did for the palette challenge, so I'm now trying to find my own style for drawing him. This involves copying how others draw him. Maybe I should just learn how Ohtaka draws him, though...

I guess that's all I wanted to post now. I downloaded The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection last week because EA made it available to download for free. But I can't really seem to get into that game anymore (despite all the expansion and stuff packs I'd never had before), which is a good thing.

I've been listening to the Miracles album by Two Steps from Hell a lot lately. It might be my favourite TSFH album so far (but I love Skyworld too). Lots of songs with female vocals, they even included some older songs I love, such as Eria and Wind Queen (though the ending of this one really annoys me because they cut the last few epic riffs from the original version and I keep anticipating them every time). "Compass" is simply amazing, both the instrumental and the vocal version.

This track is not from Miracles, but it might be the most inspiring instrumental song I've ever heard:

Some PH and lotsa Sinbad

Ok, I promised some sketches, so let's post some sketches!

One day I will draw a beautiful Oz. Today is not the day.

I've been wanting to draw a sleepy Gil ever since I saw that still in one anime DVD extra. Gil is just... the cutest thing. Also, I'm not making my sketches gray, Blogger does that to them when they get uploaded.

This wasn't gray'd because of the black, ha. Daily Sinbad doodle. The full thing is bigger, but I cropped the hands because they were super sketchy and shitty.

Wow look, it's a Magi character but not Sinbad! Hot little Solomon this time. I actually changed the eyes a little and coloured this, but I'm too lazy to save and post the updated version. I think Solomon is the prettiest guy in Magi. Although there are lots of pretty boys (and girls) in Magi. And no, I'm not "cheating on" Sinbad. XD But you know, Sinbad has a different kind of charm, you can't really mistake him for a woman.

Continuing the sleepy theme, here's a messy little sketch of Sinbad sleeping. Sinbad is like the sweetest baby when he's asleep except that babies don't snore. He is the kind of guy who can be hot even when he's drunk and passed out, though. Sleeping people are diffucult to draw because I suck at horizontal poses (hahaha) plus I can never get the angle of their face right for some reason. :B

I haven't posted this wip yet, have I? Young Sinbad is a babe. Not that the older one isn't, but this hairstyle and this freaking outfit is amazing. Too bad I haven't finished drawing it yet...

I don't know what to say about this. I don't know what happened to my style while I was drawing this, all I can tell is that the fangirlism is strong on this one and I was listening to Defying Gravity while I was drawing it. I originally wanted to make it cursed Sinbad, this is why I did the 2nd wip, but I'm not sure I want to ruin his byoootiful faisu with the shitty chocolate thing. I was also thinking of turning him half Focalor on the cursed side. Idk what I'll do with it, but I should do something with this...

I saved this for last because I want to ramble about this pairing a little. I drew like 2 pics of these two together and they weren't even particularly shippy pics, the 2nd one wasn't even meant to be shippy at all. Yet there were a few people who found me because of those fanarts and even asked me to draw more.

But there are lots of people who dislike this pairing and it's a big NOTP for them and I can see why. I cannot see it working either. Kougyoku's crush on Sinbad is very cute, but Sinbad doesn't care for her. At first, he saw her as someone he could use for settling things in Balbadd, then he sees her as one of his pawns he can use against Kou. And that's it. That's all there is to them. Period.
(However, because I'm a twisted evil person... I LIKE THIS.)
Kougyoku is the character Ohtaka often uses in the later chapters for bringing out Sinbad's "dark" side. His charming smiles and gentle words to her are the most obviously fake and manipulative interactions we've ever seen from Sinbad. He tests her, he plays with her and secretly puts her under the spell of one of his djinns and we still don't know what kind of consequences this will have later on in the story. Of course Sinbad wouldn't want Kougyoku to get hurt. But if he had to choose between Kougyoku or his country, he wouldn't hesitate. (Though he'd probably try protecting both.)
I could actually see Kougyoku on Sinbad's side as a great queen, but she deserves better. Someone who would love and cherish her. I honestly don't think she could be happy with Sinbad.

Still, I guess the little devious fangirl in me ships it. Because it's wrong, yeah.

PSA: I know it's utterly ridiculous but I don't think I can stop drawing Sinbad. Kill me plz... *submerges into fangirl hell*

More birdy photos and stuff

Mother managed to make my digital camera work and I'd thought of editing the previous post to add more photos, but then I ended up procrastinating and thought it would be better to make a new post for more photos. So yeah...

I also thought I'd post more photos online because I put about 5 years of photos on my external HDD last summer and I recently discovered that several of them are corrupted now and I can't view them anymore... D:

This year there was a baby boom for the chickadees! There were at least 8 young birds + the two parent birds. The parents were feeding them in the beginning, but they learnt to manage by themselves fast.
Also, they bring dead mosquitos. Those are probably the sparrows who bring them, but it's funny when I find some random giant dead mosquito in my window. XD

Look at this photogenic little guy! Or gal. I made some better birdy photos on May 16-17 and this was the first one.

"Feed me, mommy!"

They are so adorable, aren't they?

Even a goldfinch came on May 16!

I managed to get some pretty close shots of them. The only distracting thing is that the curtains were reflected in the window a little.

4-5 birds is the most I managed to capture in one photo, but we counted 8-10 of them at times. Sometimes there were 5 birds at the same time in one vessel. They move really fast, so it was hard to count them let alone take a photo.

And here's something we woke up to on the 25th of May. It was raining and there was this beautiful rainbow in the sky. Unfortunately, it was behind some clouds and you can't see it that well on photos, but it was awesome in real life.

View from my window with the rainbow. This was the 2nd time in my life I've ever seen a rainbow from my window.

Casual sight in my window at 5:30 am. This was taken after taking some photos of the rainbow.

Just a random shot. We had lots of rain in May and it looks so beautiful when there are dark clouds in the sky, but the sun is shining.

This is an older sunset photo from last November. I don't even have to leave my home, I can see all these beautiful things from my window, lol. I love nature.

Ok, that's all for now. I have some scribbles I'll probably post later, but I wanted to make a separate post for photos~

Also, here's a song. I saw a gorgeous AMV of various Makoto Shinkai anime with this song once and it's a shame it was deleted from YouTube.