Step 49: Confess (Day 2)

I just got word that an illustration project I've been working so hard on has had its original February 17th deadline pushed back to June. What a relief!

I'M FREEEEEE for now

Which means I can blog without feeling guilty for wasting time hahaha. Onward to Day 2 of #authorconfession:

What is the WORST thing you have written?

Since this is #authorconfession, I confess: A fanfiction.net account I created in 2001 is still in existence to this day. And before you ask, the answer is: No, I will never tell you what the account name is. I'm taking that shit with me to the grave. It's filled with a handful of Star Wars Expanded Universe fanfiction focusing on my favorite EU characters (Jaina Solo and Wedge Antilles) and one mushy Rurouni Kenshin fic. If you want to do the digging yourself and see just how bad of a writer I was as recently as 2008, by all means, go for it. But to quote the great Jedi Master Yoda: "If into the [depths of Shea's fanfiction.net account] you go, only pain will you find."

And that's not even the worst fanfiction I've ever written. When I first got into the Star Wars EU back in 1997, I used to write scenes featuring Jaina Solo by hand in the back pages of my notebook during class, and I'm sure I still have them laying around in a storage box somewhere because I'm a hoarder and can't bring myself to throw anything away no matter how awful it is. I'll give myself a pass on those ones, though, on account of my being 12 years old at the time.

Looking back, some of my writing at the height of my fanfiction.net days still retains some of its charm. I made a ton of rookie mistakes, to be sure--purple prose, beat tags with EVERY line of dialogue, repetitive adjective use (seriously how did I not know of the existence of a freaking thesaurus)--but I can see the influence of my favorite author, Aaron Allston, in those early works that I still carry with me in my writing to this day.

I also drew copious amounts of bad fan art, but that's another beast entirely.

On a more recent note, I was digging through my hard drive in search of who-the-fuck-knows-what and I stumbled upon my very first draft of my current WIP. NGL, I almost died of secondhand embarrassment reading just a few short paragraphs, and I cringe just thinking about the wannabe author I was trying to portray myself as in that early draft. Thankfully, I've improved in leaps and bounds in just a few short years I think, but it's humbling to recall just how awful a writer I was not even that long ago.

All I gotta say is, thank GOD for beta readers.

Step 47: Leave The Past In The Past

I learned a few tough lessons last year, and one experience in particular had me fleeing social media for months on end (hence why I haven't posted here in ages). The trust I had placed in people whom I thought I could confide in had been betrayed, and as a result I failed to uphold the trust others had placed in me. It was a lose-lose situation all around, and those bridges dumpsters have regrettably been burned.

An apt metaphor for 2016 on the whole.

It took me several months, but I've finally pruned most of my social media accounts to remove any vestiges of whatever might threaten to remind me of that awful period in my life. Not because I harbor any ill will toward anyone, but because I live in a perpetual state of anxiety and the thought of imposing my online presence on anyone who wants me to go die in a fire turns my insides into knots. If for whatever reason I unfollowed or unfriended anyone reading this by mistake, please consider sending me a message and I will correct my error.

Feel free to slide right on into my DMs.

Now that that's out of the way, I have... well, really nothing new to report. I'm working on another illustration project at the moment that will be announced sometime in the near-ish future, and it's all very glamorous work (and by glamorous, I mean me sitting in my studio hovering over my tablet for hours on end and drinking copious amounts of coffee). I'd like to think that I'll have much more to write about soon considering everything I have queued up in the pipeline, but we all might die in a nuclear fallout tomorrow, so who knows. At the very least, you can find me posting on Twitter and Facebook once again.

Still better than Donald Trump's Twitter account.

Step 42: Answer The Ultimate Question Of Life, The Universe, And Everything

If you don't get the reference to this post title, that's okay. I've never actually read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and I consider myself to be one of the foremost experts on geek culture.

Shame indeed, Septa Unella.  SHAME INDEED.

The Twitter event #PitchWars is coming up, which is sort of like a pre-published author version of The Hunger Games. Or Battle Royale, if you're an 90's anime weaboo like I am.

If you weren't ~*blessed*~ to grow up with Sailor Moon, I feel sorry for you.

Some writers are pimping out their Author Bios under the cleverly-titled hashtag, #PimpMyBio. So I thought I'd throw my hat into the ring, even though for me writing a personal bio is about as much fun as jerking off using a hedgehog.

On the one hand, ow. On the other hand... I mean, you're still masturbating. /letscallitadraw

Shall we get started?  First and foremost, here's some basic stats.  I am:

• 31 years old but forever 17 in my head
• A cisgendered female
• Happily married to a man but would identify myself somewhere on the queer spectrum
• A San Diego native
• A 2007 alumna of the University of California, San Diego with a B.A. in Visual Arts

I've worked professionally as a freelance illustrator in the comic book industry since 2009, but my real passion has always been in graphic novels (Blankets changed my goddamned life--seriously, go read it right now). My short graphic story, Strawberry Wine, was a winner of TokyoPop's 2008 Rising Stars of Manga contest and was published nationally in their anthology book. The manuscript that I am currently peddling about, Defining Lines, actually started life as a graphic novel, and I would love to revisit the medium one day (time and finances permitting).

And so long as my drawing hand doesn't fail me.

At any rate, this little spiel of mine is starting to sound suspiciously like a query letter, so lets move on to the fun stuff.  In my spare time, I like to:

• Cosplay
• Draw
• Read
• Play video games

Pertaining to that last one, I am an especially avid fan of the Final Fantasy franchise. My all-time favorite game is Final Fantasy X, and I will fight anyone who says Final Fantasy VIII is a shit game and not worth playing.

Take your FFVII superiority complex and shove it.

I also enjoy decorating my Lakeview Manor house in Skyrim with the bones of fallen dragons I have slain:

Unless they slay me first.  It happens.

And to round this post out, I'm going to link to a few random .gifs that are relevant to my interests:

When u sneeze so hard u regenerate

Exhibit A: My first sexual awakening

Real men wear pink.
(Alternate caption: Bye Felicia~)

Data with his emotion chip is just the best I can't even

Welp, that about sums it up!  I hope you enjoyed this little stroll down .gif lane, and I'm looking forward to #PitchWars! May the odds May the Force Live Long and okay whatever good luck everyone!

EDIT:  Most mentees appear to be including some info about their manuscripts along with their bios, so here's mine in a nutshell--

DEFINING LINES is the story of an awkward girl who suddenly becomes popular and--hahaha just kidding, awkward girl stays totally awkward and unexpectedly finds her Prince Princess Charming! YA Contemporary LGBTQ+ Romance with a sprinkling of David Bowie and pop culture, complete at 92,000 words.

Step 41: Life Goes On

I feel my crippling grief starting to ebb. I've made it a couple of days without crying, and while it's still hard to look at photos of Niles, I don't fall to pieces in a puddle of my own misery upon viewing them. Which is a good sign, because I really don't have the time to come apart at the seams right now. I've been hired to illustrate five detailed drawings on an incredibly tight deadline, and I really shouldn't even be taking the time to write this blog post unless I'm in the mood to pull an all-nighter tonight.

This is fine.

I'm certainly not complaining--while I can't talk about what I'm working on just yet, I can tell you it's a licensed franchise that I'm a big fan of--but boy howdy, it's been a chore. I'm starting to get the feeling that maybe I'm not cut out for this type of work; deadlines are not particularly lenient to the whims of creativity.

“I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.” -Douglas Adams

Still, I don't have much else to keep me busy. On the literary front, things are progressing about as quickly as can be expected (which is to say, not that quickly). My full manuscript is out with two agents at the moment (and a partial with a third), but I've played the waiting game before so I know how the process goes. Interestingly, one of my characters from my book visited me in a dream during my mid-afternoon siesta today; it was strangely comforting to be able to interact with them as if they truly existed. We drove together down a road, chitchatting about what we meant to each other, and headed off to explore the basement of my old high school.

Maybe I shouldn't have eaten that cold pizza right before I fell asleep.

Step 34: Be Inspired

I had somewhat of an art meltdown earlier this week. I wholly admit that coloring is not my strong point, but part of the reason I have such an aversion to it is because I just haven't found the right style for my line work. Realistic rendering looks weird with my bold penmanship, but I can't seem to hit the sweet spot with minimalist coloring that so many other artists make look easy.

Damn you talented artists! God damn you all to hell!

Speaking of artists, there are a couple out there that I've been positively obsessed with lately, to the point where I've been trying my hand at emulating their style. Phobs, a Russian artist I discovered some years ago on DeviantArt, creates brilliant sketch dumps that I can get lost for hours in. The images are too large to do any justice posting them on this blog, but a few of my favorites can be found here, here, and here.

Claire Hummel--better known as "shoomlah" on Tumblr--has a distinctive, whimsical style all her own, and yet her line work and coloring is very much in the same vein as Phobs. I think more than anyone she has mastered the art of "less is more" when it comes to coloring. Just look at her A New Hope tribute piece--all flat colors with very little rendering, and she still manages to capture the hustle and bustle of the Mos Eisley Spaceport.

Mos Eisley Morning by shoomlah on DeviantArt

At any rate, I tried incorporating some of their style into my own sketches. They both work the "cartoony" angle more than I'm used to (at least, since I've moved away from my original manga influence), but I love how expressive all of their characters are, so I'm willing to make the trade-off.

My hand was not prepared for actual pencil-on-paper contact. Ow.

Step 31: Stop And Smell The (Blue Winter) Roses

I decided to work through my art slump by picking back up a piece I had started a few months ago and never got around to finishing. Before I post the image, a little context: I am a HUGE A Song of Ice and Fire fan. I read the first four books in 2008, and waited patiently with everyone else for A Dance with Dragons to come out in 2011.

Me waiting for The Winds of Winter.

I even got my copy of A Clash of Kings signed by George R. R. Martin at a book signing, and got to hang out with him at a fan-run moot right before the HBO show came out:

Back before he was an untouchable mega-star.

Which brings me to my latest piece. When I told George that my favorite character was Lyanna Stark, he looked me dead in the eye and said, "Your favorite character is a girl who died fifteen years before the events of the first book?" And I replied, "Well, yeah--she was a strong-willed young woman, and an expert equestrian like me. What's not to love about her?"

Joke's on you, George--you can't kill off my favorite character if she's already dead!

There's obviously a lot more to my interest in Lyanna Stark than what I could convey in five-seconds of face time with George. Lyanna is at the center of a very intriguing mystery that, up to this point, has not been revealed to readers of the books (or watchers of the show). Everything we know about her we've learned through the eyes of often untrustworthy narrators, so what little we're able to piece together about her life is seemingly contradictory. Did she love Robert Baratheon? Was she kidnapped and raped by Rhaegar Targaryen? What exactly happened at the Tower of Joy?

At the rate of George's writing, we may never know.

That's not to say there aren't any credible sources. Ned may have been biased towards his sister, but he didn't seem to have any ill-will towards Rhaegar Targaryen considering the hefty allegations. And Ser Barristan Selmy, Lord Commander of the Kingsguard and arguably one of the most honorable men in Westeros, straight-up says "Rhaegar loved his Lady Lyanna" in ADWD. So, forgive me for stating the obvious, but I'm 99.9% sure there's a little more to the story of Rhaegar and Lyanna than just Grand Theft She-Wolf. And because I'm mildly obsessed with the mystery surrounding her, I put together this Mucha-inspired piece:

"Beautiful, and willful, and dead before her time."

The art is a direct appropriation of Alphonse Mucha's Primrose and Feather. The plan was to create a companion piece featuring Rhaegar Targaryen, but I dunno if I'll ever get around to doing it. Coloring is really not my forte, and after working on the colors alone for two days straight I eventually threw in the towel and said "fuck it", the result of which you see before you now. I will say, I enjoyed incorporating Stark symbolism and Lyanna lore into the piece, like the dire wolf and weirwood leaves of the North, and the Knight of the Laughing Tree shields behind her. We'll see if I can gather the energy to draw her beloved (???) dragon prince.

Step 30: Run Out Of Steam (Momentarily)

Blarg. I got another rejection letter yesterday on an old query that I had nearly forgotten about. For whatever reason, this one stung more than the rejection I got on the full manuscript last week. I would have thought by now that my skin would have gotten tougher, but clearly I'm a little more emotionally invested in this story than I ought to be.

I don't even know what's going on in this gif but it's strangely indicative of my feelings right now.

I'm also running out of momentum on my art, which is frustrating because I had been churning sketches out so regularly that I was starting to feel like I was actually being productive towards something. I know you're supposed to plow through writer's/artist's block even when you aren't feeling motivated, but I just can't seem to inspire myself. What's the freaking point of creating anything when no one is interested in what I have to offer?

At least until tomorrow.

I was digging through my old art files on my computer the other day, and I'll admit it was kind of fun. Some of the illustrations are pretty dated, but there's a few gems in there as well. Maybe revisiting them here will inspire me to push onward.

Unfinished Rhaegar Targaryen/Lyanna Stark piece from A Song of Ice and Fire

Random doodle from my old sketch book

My love for Davie Bowie knows no bounds

Step 29: Dance Like No One Is Watching

Despite being rhythmically challenged, I love to dance. I dabbled in it as a child and later got a little more serious about it in college, until I was finally able to put my meager skills to use when I was cast in a local theater production of CATS in 2009.

Green top, can't stop.

I didn't (and still don't) have a great physique, nor did I have the long, elegant lines of a true dancer, but I always gave 110%. I loved and absorbed all the different facets that went into creating a moving piece of art--the music, the emotion, even the clothes I wore. Donning my dance tights, jazz shoes, and thigh-high leg warmers (which don't actually do anything but HEY they look cool) never failed to make me want to pop my leg up into an arabesque.

Can you guess which cat I am? I'll give you hint: I'm on the left. :P

In my book, Mohawk Girl is a former ballet dancer. It's not a big part of the story, and dancing is ultimately a source of great grief for her, but I thought it suited her. I imagined a lithe talent hidden behind a carefully-crafted, gruff exterior. And because I love dance and drawing beautiful women, I put two and two together:

If you haven't figured it out, I have an unhealthy obsession with the pen tool.

Step 27: Hate-Watch

The other day I talked about hate-reading the Kare Kano manga; last night I hate-watched an anime titled Say "I Love You". In my never-ending quest to find a good romantic series to sink my teeth into, I stumbled upon every cliché high school trope known to man (ugly girl attracts the most popular guy in school, violently possessive boyfriend, girlfriend with a major tsundere complex, etc.) all rolled into one goddamned train wreck of a show--and I'm only four episodes in.

*urge to throttle main character rising*

And yet, Say "I Love You" is just endearing enough to keep me interested. I feel like I ought to turn in my feminist card for being even remotely charmed by its ridiculous premise, but I'm such a freaking sucker for anything that tugs on my heartstrings that I can't seem to peel my eyes away. It's stories like this that probably give women the wrong idea of men and relationships (because seriously this shit does not happen in real life), but come on--what girl who has ever struggled with self-esteem issues didn't fantasize about catching the attention of someone as hot as Kurosawa Yamato?

Y hello thar.

Even though I indulge in the occasional guilty pleasure, I've always tried to keep my own ideas as grounded in reality as possible. The very first story I ever wrote featured a totally average, relatively unpopular high school girl who finds love--not in the star quarterback, but in a fellow nerdy student. And you know what? She comes to appreciate her averageness, and embraces her relationship with her average boyfriend wholeheartedly.

Art circa 2003.  I may have to revisit this someday...

I'll be the first to admit that my book isn't entirely absent of clichés, but I tried my hardest to give them context, or at the very least hang a lantern on them. I feel like Defining Lines would be a perfect story to adapt in animated form (more so than live-action for... reasons), and sometimes I wonder if there is someone I could sleep with talk to about getting it in front of the eyes of an animation director. Perhaps there are too many cultural differences for it to be appealing to a Japanese studio, but still... *sighs dreamily*

C'mon, Japan--I know you want a piece of this shōjo fluff.

Step 26: Dress Dapper

One thing that I really love about Kare Kano is Tsuda Masami's attention to fashion. I have about as much fashion sense as a bridge troll (and live approximately the same kind of lifestyle), but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate beautiful clothes. Tsuda makes some questionable choices when dressing her characters, but generally speaking, her sense of style is on fleek.

Uh... generally speaking.

Fashion is one thing that I've always struggled drawing without reference (I would have made a shit fashion designer). I have to scour Pinterest for hours on end if I want to put my characters in anything other than leggings and a t-shirt. That being said, it's not like anyone has to twist my arm to get me to look at pretty girls in cute clothes! My very favorite is when women are dressed in suits; it doesn't matter if it's a feminine or masculine cut, or if the models embrace their long locks or have it cropped into a more boyish style--it just stirs something inside of me. I love androgyny and those who are brave enough to push the boundaries of our binary society, and as far as I'm concerned, ties look great on anyone and everyone.

Preach on, Doctor.

I played around with dressing one of the protagonists of my book in a suit. Red is extremely girly, so I'm not sure if a suit would--ahem--suit the character, but I think it looks cool. It was also kind of an exercise in messing with negative space, so for a couple of hours of work, I'll call it a win. I've been drawing Red with bangs up to this point, but I'm just going to pretend they're slicked back.  Because, fashion.

Haute couture, y'all.

Step 24: ...

Another day, another drawing. I finished the rest of the piece I had posted a preview of last week, and here it is:

The Monochrome Army.

It's the same three characters I've discussed in previous posts. I wish I was better at coloring, but alas, I haven't developed a style I'm sold on yet. Realistic rendering looks a little wonky with my stylized linework, and cell shading looks plain lazy.

Coloring is overrated anyway.

At any rate, it's good that I've been keeping myself busy, because that request from an agent for my full manuscript was rejected. They gave me some good feedback, which gives me hope that my story isn't quite the hot mess I think it is, but I'm still back to square one.

Congratulations on accomplishing exactly nothing!

I'm going to try to keep up my illustrations. Even if they're all for naught, drawing has had a therapeutic effect on me as of late. If I disappear for a few days at a time, look forward to a new piece!

Step 23: Dig Through The Archives

Those pages I drew to send to the agent really primed my illustration pump, and it feels good to be inspired to draw again. I've been doodling more sketches of the characters in my book, and I whipped this one up last night of Mohawk Girl:

Spiked hair, don't care.

It's actually a part of a larger piece I'm working on, so hopefully I'll get that up eventually. I feel like she ought to have tattoos, but after spending way too much time with the pen tool drawing each line of her fishnet stockings individually, I said "fuck it" and stopped there. Most of Defining Lines takes place in the winter, so she's usually bundled up like an Eskimo anyway, with little exposed skin to speak of.

My hand thanks me.

Interestingly, as I was drawing it I had a vague recollection of drawing the same character many years ago in a similar position. I scoured the depths of my hard drive, and this sassy figure revealed herself:

Not proud enough of it to slap my signature on it.

That file was dated April 25th, 2007--nine years ago almost to the day. I have a love-hate relationship with looking at my old art; while it's fun to see how far I've come as an artist, I still cringe when I remember how good I thought I used to be.

Uh, you do you, 2007-Shea.

Step 19: Waste Time

Heyo! Sorry for running off for a few days, but I'm back. I holed myself up in my studio working on another page during the week, and I only just now have something to show for it. So, without further ado, here's both of the pages I put together (first one slightly modified from the original):

I'm not really sure why I wasted time doing these, but they were a fun little exercise regardless. It's kind of neat for me to see my book unfold visually, and it makes me wonder what the story might have looked like had I chosen to adapt it in graphic novel form.

Shiny and chrome!

Still, it was more work than I care to admit, and I often wonder whether the physical labor of drawing is worth the trade-off. The rub with illustration is that there is no way the viewer can ever fully appreciate the finished piece when all is said and done, and it's doubly true with graphic novels--I mean, how long have you spent staring at any one page the last time your read a comic book? I try and make the effort when reading comics to really savor the art and absorb each and every pen stroke that went into such a monumental task, but even knowing and experiencing the effort myself, a drawing is only considered "good" if there aren't any flaws for your eyes to get hung up on. It's when spotting a glaring mistake that most people take more than three seconds to inspect the image closer.

Just how many legs does that person have???