FrozenDeath

Hey guys,
Been too busy to get the livestream thing worked out. Was going to do one tonight but I'm going to wait till next week.

You bastards are killing the romance!

Egh have to cancel tonight. Livestream is borked again and I can't get any sound. Will try to have it worked out for next wednesday.

Just a reminder, I'll be broadcasting on Livestream at 10:15 EST, tonight.

Old debt


The hideout was situated in a fashionable French Bistro in an upscale neighborhood in Founders Falls. Mogo Looked at the menu in the window. He'd actually read some good reviews about the food. They'd done a good job setting up shop there, it certainly wasn't easy to find.

He walked in and made his way immediately back towards the kitchen. There were frenzied footsteps following after him.

"Excuse me! Excuse me sir! You..you can't just walk in here. Do you have a reservation?" The maitre d clutched Mogo's jacket sleave trying to stop him. A thin, nervous looking middle aged man in a black suit. "I'm sorry, we're very exclusive. We don't just let people wander into our kitchen without an appointment."
"Are you in on this?"

The man smoothed the arm of his suit coat. "In on what sir?"
"Nevermind." Mogo extended the taser in his hand and shocked the maitre d's midsection, causing the man to spasm and fall in the space between tow tables. Mogo wasted no time and slid into the kitchen before any of the clientele had time to take notice. Once in the kitchen he nodded to the big beefy chefs hovering over steaming pans, but they shrugged and went about their business without concern.

There was a passage way in the back lined with metal freezer doors. He'd studied the architectural plans to the building. He knew it shouldn't be there. He walked along the way until he came to the fourth freezer entrance.

"This is the one." He grabbed the lever on the face of the door and pulled it open. Inside was an elevator. He slide the metal gate open and stepped inside, taking a deep breath and pressing the down button. "Here goes nothing."

When the elevator stopped, the space was extremely dark. He could hear things moving. By the various clicks and sliding metallic noises, he imagined that there were quite a few guns being pointed at his face. There was a voice in the background. He winced and threw his forearm over his eyes as the room filled with light. When he was acclimated enough, he peered over his sleeve and saw six large, rough looking men sitting at three different tables. They were all armed with pistols and machine guns. And they were all dead. Dessicated corpses given the semblance of life. Watching him with the empty holes in their skulls.

Then she appeared in a doorway on the other side of the room. Marianne, his old lover. She was beautiful in a silver cocktail dress, her copper colored tresses spilling over her bare shoulders. The sensuous curves. The pale skin. The sprightly blue eyes. And in his mystic vision: a withered corpse. Ashen flesh hanging off it in strips. The collar bones poking through the skin on the right hand side. Feral green light pouring out of the sunken eyes. His former friend and lover, now a lich in the service of his enemy. He shook his head slightly, trying to blind himself to the truth and see the illusion once more. The girl of his memories.

She gave him that look. The one he'd always gotten when she'd gone against his wishes. As if he were simply a child that did not--could not undertand her. She crossed the room to him, beckoning him out of the elavator shaft. There was smoke, darkness stirring at her feet.

"Well? Have you finally lost your mind? Are you stupid?" He laughed sheepishly, looking at his shoes.
"Hello M. Part of you...you've never looked more beautiful..."

She sighed and fingered a loose button on his coat. "Where's your back up? There must be a plan. If you wanted to commit suicide...you didn't need to come here and involve me."

"Nope no backup. No fighting. I'm not here for that. I'm here to call in a favor."
"A favor? What kind of favor are you looking for? You want someone dead or something?"
"Yeah. I do."

Her eyes narrowed, trying intently to read the expression on his face. "Oh..." She looked around uncertainly. Suddenly that loose button snapped off in her fingers. "Oh..I'm sorry."

He closed her fingers over it. "It's alright. Keep it." Marrianne's eyes rolled back in her head and she started mumbling. Mogo knew she was communicating with her master.

"He's ...intrigued. He will honor his word. But first I need to take the hat and the coat." Mogo handed them over, sliding them on to her arm. "Where is Fibbs? And the case with the others?"

"They wouldn't come. They didn't want to be here. And I didn't want to involve them."
"I see. Well come with me. I'll take you to him."

Alright, well I seem to be losing a lot of people to Thursday night commitments. I'll do the one tomorrow and then next week I'll try Wednesday.

Okie, I'll plan to be there and see who shows up. Will probably be a more informal recording of me working on stuff, I've got a bunch of different things started.

Here's an updated sketch I'm working on for the book:


Grey Huntress and Jackalynn.

Well it's Wednesday. Kind of late notice, but is there any interest in me doing a Livestream tomorrow night?

Lol yeah it sucked. Having to erase and redraw things when it would take 10 seconds to just select and resize something on the computer.

I got a box set of small artbooks called Sparrow. It has 2 books by Ashley Wood, 2 by Phile Hale, 1 by Kent Williams, and 1 by Shane Glines. So by itself, a really cool buy.

There were a lot of convention sketchbooks. I got a rare one by Terry Dodson, and the most recent one by Adam Hughes. I got one by a French pinup artist named Buchet, and a couple other small sketchbooks by people who are in the concept art/game design spectrum.

I got 4 larger books:
One of pinups and marvel comic art by Frank Cho.
One called Devilish by Mark Brooks, mostly Marvel comic art.
One called Trans Am Champions by an artist named Phil Noto. Really cool pinup work that has a kind of minimal, sporty 70s vibe to it.
And then a pinup compilation called Vernaculis by an artist named Ragnar. Really crazy stylized work with pulp and B horror movie influences. Great layouts and design.

Hey guys,

This is a group commission I wrapped up for Shades of Grey right before leaving for my vacation, so I guess I'll post it here now. Hope you like.

http://battlewraith.deviantart.com/a...-Pic-159045320

Hola,

I'm back from Cali. Here's a few sketches while I was on the plane, riding around in the car, etc. These are mechanical pencil on sketchboard:





Pinup Girl getting the what for from Proud Hubby for trying to crimefight while sick with the flu. I didn't ink this one because I'm going to take a more painterly approach in the render, so it's a bit murky in the scan.



Costume redesign for Larissa Rasputin.

I'll take a look at it when you're ready, if you like.

Lousy,

Go ask Robert Chang if I can copy one of his paintings for a commission I need to do. Or go on to Conceptart and ask El Coro or Android or Jason Manley if me copying their drawings is fair use of reference. I think you know the answer. And then try not to laugh when I tell you its because they don't like me and their comments are uncalled for.

Juggy wants people to think that I hate him and have this big vendetta and that's why I call him out for copying. Not even close. I'm not even calling him out for copying. I'm calling him out for copying AND claiming that what he did is proper use of reference.

I'm sorry if people think I have an attitude problem and am bullying him or whatever. All I can say is that I'm not asking you to take sides. Believe what you want about my motivations but try to grasp the point I'm making and consider if it was happening to you.

Hey bro,

Good to see you around!

Are you an artist? Do you do anything to educate people about art? Do you have any stake in people copying the work of other people and using it for their own?

I do. I'm tired and turned off by seeing people inappropriately take things. And you can drop that counterpart jazz. Suichi has his viewpoint, and I have mine, and we clearly agree on some things and are vocal about it. All I can see you doing here is cheerleading.

And complaining about threadjacking? You're from Protector. Give me a break.

When I get back I'll dig up all the reference I used for that piece if you want. I looked up images on speedskating, not stock inline skating pics.

The point is not that you shouldn't use reference. The point is that you did not use reference--you copied. There is a difference, which you refuse to acknowledge.

LOL, why don't you just wait till I get back and make the post. I'll have examples that cover flat out copying of other people's work ala Juggy.

The image posted above is just so weird. It's like..is this guy trying to just cloud the issue or does he simply not get it at all. You're apparently thinking I used reference for that figure--which is not the case because so much of his body is obscured by other characters, it wasn't really necessary. I used more reference for the woman.

Then you have 3 darkened sillhouettes of...in-line skaters. Which don't match the figure in the picture anyway. And if you had done that, I wouldn't have made an issue of it anyway since you would have had to draw the actual details of the figure.

To answer your question: no, not like that. More like someone pausing their video and copying another artists drawing. That sort of thing.

I don't care about your art. I'm not out to bash it or pressure you into developing some skill set that I think you should have. Its simply that direct copying of someone else's work is art theft. I don't want to be ripped off. I don't want to see other artists ripped off. I don't want people who are getting into art to think that's acceptable. It's not.

For an artist, understanding the difference between using reference properly and just hacking someone else's work is fundamental.