sarracenian

its Shinguuji Sakura

Its Sakura Shinguuji

More of Yue Ying

More of her

Holidays at Shanghai Combat Revue

When you want to celebrate Christmas, but your teammates are mostly 1920s non-urban Chinese people

Happy holidays everyone!

Daranimaru Goryo - Commission

A commission I worked on. 

Daranimaru Goryo from Muhyo and Roji's Bureau of Supernatural Investigation ;

A rival character whose job is to be smug, rich and pretty and better than you. Seems to be a thing I specialize in now.

When you are an average, frustrated Chinese literati from the 13th-14th century

In an anime.

Yue Ying and the Robot - Shanghai Combat Revue 1927

This Sakura Wars fan team has really taken over a lion-share of my artistic output lol.

It is done, maybe. I'll probably have to adjust the colours later down the line. Painted backgrounds and cel-shaded characters anime characters is a fun thing to replicate. Getting the plum tree right was the worst part. Everything else went pretty smoothly.

As explained prior; The idea was since in my setting the Republic of China's Floral Assault Troupe uses tech based on German designs, specifically the Star Division and Eisenkleid, there's some subtle elements of it in these too, on top of the Chinese elements (Ming Dynasty arm-guards & traditional opera costuming & the Wushamao hence the black head & steam-engine).

The uniform is also similar, though only the belt is basically the same as the Star Division's. I prob could've included more elements from the Star Division uniform, but I prefer the uniforms from Sakura Wars 1 so I did it like this

Requests #4

As requested, here are the three characters! Did you know by the way that "Cwej" is apparently meant to be pronounced "Kweh-jh". Kinda wild.

• Nei - Phantasy Star 2
• Chris Cwej - Doctor Who VNA
• Vancey Fiore - Valkyria Chronicles 4

More Yue Ying and Qin Bailing

Sure, I can pump out more of these two in the meantime.

REQUEST THREAD #4

Wow damn, time for our 4th Request Thread! where you get to make an art request by commenting below! 

This has been quite fun way to draw stuff I usually wouldn't think of. 

As before, please keep them on the simple side, so nothing complicated like multiples of characters or backgrounds.

A new retro anime character has dropped

Got the permission to showcase something I had been working on for someone.

I was asked to design a VHS cover & mascot for a collaborative art project headed by Dan Fingerman, which was about VHS video mixes that had some anime influences and footage. 

Thus, this character, inspired by all the 80s-early 90s anime you know, is born!

Haven't come up with a name for her yet, or what her exact everything is. I personally like to imagine she's a space alien from the planet Abian (yes, the nonsense pun is the first thing I came up) who arrived to Earth as a reconnaissance scout, but is stuck using VHS as her data-collection medium. 

I definitely prefer the glasses in picture 2 than 1. 

(WIP 2) Yue Ying in uniform and the robot

Alright, getting somewhere with this one.

All we need is a appropriate painterly background and we are set. Do I go with a Mudan flower or plum flower? Both are considered the national flowers of China at various points in time. Plum flower is also currently the national flower of Taiwan, & I think Mainland is currently considering Mudan. Hmmm.

(WIP) Yue Ying in uniform and the robot

Finally can showcase the uniform and the mecha of the Shanghai Combat Revue! To think I've been doing this funny Sakura Wars OC designs for almost close to a year now hahaha

The idea was since in my setting the Republic of China's Floral Assault Troupe uses tech based on German designs, specifically the Star Division and Eisenkleid, there's some subtle elements of it in these too, on top of the Chinese elements (Ming Dynasty arm-guards & traditional opera costuming, etc).

Hopefully it'll look decent enough in colour.

A Kamen Rider story idea I once had, in 2018-19

Here's a funny story.

Now with the airing of Black Sun, I was reminded that oh wow I had a similar Kamen Rider story written on my back-pocket too! I had developed this at around 2019, after looking too much at news of the day and thinking about things.

Be forewarned; This is barely a script, more an elaborate, kinda half-baked story-pitch & basic plot organized into acts (I like using the 起承转合 to organize my story beats). More so done just to put miscellaneous ideas on paper than anything else:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/16gUO0-zJlN11okb9Vuj0_nMNxEKHZqO0/view?usp=share_link

Looking at it now, it is eerie how much certain things do kinda match with how the Black Sun show turned out, down to the character setups and general motifs and mood. Though with my plot, I wanted to make a sort of "epilogue" or distant sequel to the events of "A Kamen Rider story" that likely went south, with some light references to modern horror motifs like cryptids and "innawoods" kind of things
(one thing I didn't emphasize enough, among other things, is that my designs would've likely been more horror-based. Kamen Rider in the way of creepypasta, those 90s fan-made Kamen Rider designs, or Trevor Henderson, I suppose)

Now obviously I don't have the ego to claim the creator behind Black Sun to have actually ripped off little ol' me with my non-existent, literally unpublicized story idea, let alone which is better.
More so its kind of funny coincidence, borne out of similar place of being Kamen Rider fans, especially into its Ishinomorian source material, and are concerned about current sociopolitics.

I'm sharing this now since, to be frank, I dunno how likely I am to ever even develop a proper comic out of this, and with Black Sun around it would just be a bit reduntant/seem like a ripoff anyway. More just a (hopefully) fun look at something I had going, even if half-baked hahaha.

What was once a (accidental) Hourly Comic Day

Have you ever made the mistake of mixing up 24 Hour Comic Day with Hourly Comic Day and spent time drawing 4-5 hours of your day before realizing the problem, how embarrassing.

Anyway.

Comic draft script: "Adult/Child

As promised in previous post; Here's one I can share. 

This is a draft of a short comic I had written a few years ago, inspired by a dream I had. I never got around drawing this, but I honestly can't remember why anymore. I think I was busy doing something but can't recall anymore.

I had actually originally wanted my pal Brian Naughton to draw it, but we decided to change course. You'll see what we've conjured up hopefully soon.

Not much else to say about the comic, I think the sort of adults & nerd-culture & the whole "adult-child" discourse was on my mind. Remember when that was a conversation? I didn't until now looking at the comic hahaha.

Perhaps one day I will come back to this, after I get stuff cleared up.

Please also keep confidentiality in mind and don't share this freely with people. This is after all something I want to share with you guys only :)

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tDdAnRoGQwXvp_Lr4EtB2SY3KwwO5WTmmLhyRB5al0s/edit?usp=sharing

Qi Dandan traumadumps on a ten year old

It's OK, Xiaocang is blissfully too fascinated by dead animals to know.

-

Before you know it, it's already near the end of the month :grimace:

As Master's Degree and other tasks have taken up most of my schedule so I haven't been as active here as I would like. And due to confidentiality I ofc can't share any of the stuff I've been commissioned to draw without express permission.

Still, it'll be over soon, once Thoghht Bubble is over as well as sending out the draft of the Master's Thesis I should be free and available to post more of my artwork more often, and get to do polls and other activities once again. Plus getting that art booklet done.

To make up for lost time, I do have an idea for something I can post for the coming days, mainly comics drafts that have been sitting in my computer that I have not been able to do anything with. Most of them only exist as scripts and very rough thumbnails, so I can only promise their exclusivity over their quality. Though who knows, perhaps I might finally get to finish one day.

Please do tell me if you are interested in seeing those.

Qi and Mo

This took simultaneously less time than I had anticipated, and about as much time.

Going for that specific old-school anime magazine promo (the ones where they also include the background was... not easy. I'm still not sure I got it actually right but hey you live and learn. At least I got to draw these two together! 

I like to imagine Qi Dandan gets along with Mo Xiaocang the best, mostly because she's a kid who has no awareness of Qi Dandan's morose vibes and is genuinely excited to spend time with her no strings attached, while Mo Xiaocang likes having an older person around who isn't patronizing in anyway (mostly 'cause Qi Dandan is kinda too busy disassociating to even bother lol).

Shanghai Combat Revue WIPs

Hey!

I guess this is both an announcement as well as a WIP showcase.

In advance, I have to apologize for the tardiness of how I've managed my patreon. I've originally wanted to actually hold another drawing poll, but unfortunately as I've looked through next month's schedule, I realized my time would be almost entirely reserved for both have my Rescue-Knight comic to be finished before Thought Bubble (oh jeez) and my Master's Thesis (:/), plus also some commission work I have lined up, which means I won't have the necessary time to squeeze much else in between if I want to complete things in a timely manner.

 
I've thought about perhaps doing a semi/quasi-regular inktober, and perhaps have All of you guys regardless of tier to suggest topics for as an amendment, but we'll see if that's something I can have the energy for. 

As well, now that Gumroad is basically off the table, I have to come up with a better place to sell some of those Retro Anime Gals booklets + get some more characters in so that it isn't disappointingly too thin considering the postages, so that is still in the cards!

To hopefully appease you guys, I showcase these three Shanghai Combat Revue related illustration WIPs I've been working on in the background, chipping away slowly. Hopefully I can continue chip away at them so I can show these to you guys as finished pieces in the near-future!

Qi Dandan 戚旦旦

When you are disassociating but also are a renowned actress so have to look good all the time.

Drew for fun.

Request #3

As requested by my Tier 3 Patrons! Three this time, three characters I never thought I'd ever draw. Remember when I used to draw tiger girls? Feels like a lifetime ago... 

In order:

• Bernice Summerfield - Doctor Who / Bernice Summerfield
• Setsuko Ohara - Super Robot Wars Z
• Waai Fu - Arkknights

Xun Guan 2 - "On the lead"

This became more ambitious than planned. Not super happy with the result but hey its experience either way. Should practice drawing more battle scenes.

REQUEST THREAD #3

Greetings everyone!

Time for our 3rd Request Thread! where you get to make an art request by commenting below!

I shall once again fulfil all your requests! As before, simple requests only!

This time, I can also do simple scenarios for the character of your choosing to do 

Xun Guan 2 - "On the lead" WIP

Trying to go for something, and its getting a bit unwieldy.

Xun Guan

Finally got to finish this one.

Xun Guan is a minor yet fun footnote of history. The magic of Chinese history always just having a female warriors/army generals sprinkled throughout all eras. 

This video explains her story quite well!

(Second one comic soon)

RAG-art booklet proto

No requests or polls this month I'm afraid, as working to prepare for the Helsinki Comics Festival

However what I can show is this upcoming collected physical art-booklet of all the retro anime gals I've been drawing over time, with a couple of new ones whom I haven't shown in public! Still prototyping this, as by TB I might add more characters later.

Would you guys be interested in acquiring this physically too? Depending on the interest I could see if I can work out something...

Xun Guan WIP2

Unfortunately still only chipping away at this, as I am also occupied on preparing for the upcoming Helsinki Comics Festival, so it'll still take a while until I get to finish this one (but hopefully not too long a while!)

My sense of timing & scheduling still needs to be worked on.

Sportswear(?) Yedocia

Saw another draw-meme which was putting your character in a camisole or sports-bikini, which I thought would be kinda fun to indulge in, but now I'm too embarrassed to actually want to post these online publicly so I'm just going to post it here and hope it is OK

Xun Guan 2 WIP

Finally figured it out! Instead of one picture, now we have two! (as the images of historical battles of YAS' manga & Berserk still occupy my mind)

Will this be too ambitious and bite me in the ass later? Yes.

Will it be fun tho? Hopefully!

Xun Guan 1 WIP

as voted by my Tier 3 Patrons, ask and ye shall receive!

There is another illustration too, but still figuring out the composition of it rn

Yue Ying's haircut followup

The deep lore backstory of Yue Ying's new hairstyle, now complete.