It's tough to work freelance at times. When you're between contracts, twiddling your thumbs and drinking endless amounts of coffee to try and inspire you to work, it's shit. Really shit. But then, what happens when you're smack bang in the middle of a good paying contract but the people dictating to you act like... wankers? And then you get another contract on top? And the one that is being pissy is the one that pays less but demands more?

I shouldn't complain. I really shouldn't. Contract > No contract - PERIOD. But at the same time it's very difficult to deal with an Art Director that is incapable of envisioning anything more complicated than a happy slug/cannot plan ahead at all. And then all the work gets dumped on me, specifications get changed for diabolically poor reasons, and work is re-done over and over. And then over again.

But I should be rejoicing, right? Making me do the same thing over and over is just going to pay me more in the long run, ins't it? In theory, yes, I should be over the moon. But I'm not. I'd much rather be working on my Visual Novel which pays Jack Squat at the moment than have to deal with the constant whining from a client who couldn't make a decision over feeding the bondage slave Malteasers or a Snickers, let alone the look of the artwork. What makes my blood boil the most is the suggestions I make (which inevitably get ignored to start with) eventually get used at the end of the process except someone else takes the credit for them. All I can do is do the Nodding Dog routine, fixed smile, glazed eyes, agreeing with anything thrown my way.

Speaking of my Visual Novel, it's called Bells and Spires. Find more information at:

http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=8615

I put the 'I think' there because I'm still not 100% sure if I'm out of the woods with this art block, and I don't want to jinx it ¬¬

Soooo I'm wondering whether or not I should do a sketch-a-day thing. It'll be hard what with all the other bits of work I need to do, but I think it'll be good for me to help ease me out of the rut. Blergh.

Posting character sketch of a future project ;)

Attempting to get out of my blocky-as-hell mood. I feel like I just can't do it. I bring myself to draw the things I see in my head and I pick up the pen and SLUMP, the energy, the idea, the spirit, is just dead. But I think I've made a little headway here, I think using SAI again is making me feel better, plus it was just a no-brainer tits+booty+bikini=NOM image, so not really much to think about art-wise. I'm just gonna try and keep doing this day by day, knock a doodle out where applicable.

If anyone's got any good suggestions with how to cheer yourself up/pick yourself out of a block, I wouldn't mind a few thrown in my direction ^^;

This hasn't happened in years I think. Not to this extent anyway. So pissed off about it. I'm looking at inspiration to push me into action which has always worked in the past, but this time I'm turning up bopkas. It's about as infuriating as thinking you know how to spell a word and then doubt yourself, go spend time checking to see if you're right, only to find out you were right all along and you just wasted a good 2 minutes of sleeping/eating/gaming/cleaning time purely out of self-doubt. Actually I take back the 'about as infuriating' and replace with 'WAY FUCKING MORE'. Drawing was one of those things I could rely on in the morning. Bored? Doodle. Got an idea? Sketchpad's right there next to you! Inspired? Mechanical pencil 0.3 raring to go! Now it's 'Wow, I'm awake. Time for a coffee' and maybe a 'I need to serve up that Triple Berry Cheesecake I started cooking on CaféWorld last night'. I'm trying to push through it, do a doodle here and there, still going for the inspiration books. I don't want to give myself a break because a break means you're falling behind, you're dropping down the ranks, losing your leg right before the 'Who has two legs?' competition.

Anyway, just to prove the extent of the Art Block problem, here is a picture. I'm almost pained to post it because it falls so below my standards. I mean, it's not even finished for one. I don't want to even go into all the other facets of why I think it's shit.



And Expo was very good. Finally got over my body hangups and decided to cosplay Yoko.

HOMG! Cannot believe for the life of me how long it's been. And how freaking censored I've made my LJ *owning up to deleting previous potentially-bad entries*. Time to open up again? God. That just sounds so melodramatic. As if I'm going to have some kind of outpouring of emotion. Like I would ever do that. EVER. I am a beacon of non-emotion. Ho-hum indeedy do. Except when I'm angry. Which I'm not now.

...I'm starting to think this update is a little pointless. Saying that, quite a bit has happened since, you know, last year. Firstly, I finally graduated from University. Took me bloody long enough is all I can say. Not to say it wasn't fun, ohohoho, it most certainly was on the high-end scale of fun. Just tumultuous. Grand total of four boyfriends in five years. Go me.

The latest of Things That Happened - I joined Sweatdrop! ...4 months ago. Old news now.

I think I'll just leave a sketch here and get on with melting my mind a little more playing this addictive pop game thing. Please GOD this better not be a Bejewelled or Spider Solitaire addiction again. It's of Trixie by the way. Of my newest project...BWHAHAHAHAHAA!!

Well, I've been told by a lot of people that I should:

(1) Have a LiveJournal.
(2) And update it.

While I had the first one down, the second is a little harder to do. So I'm making an effort to update with more stuff. Firstly, the London MCM Expo.

I had a great time! Waking up at 6.00am to get everything packed into the car and off to London wasn't exactly brilliant with only 3 hours sleep. I'm shocked that Jason even managed to drive the car out of the driveway at that time let alone for an hour to get to the centre. But, we arrived, managed to snag a brilliant parking space in the carpark below so we didn't have to walk miles and miles with heavy boxes :D

Setting up was semi-fun. I nit-pick and loiter for too long on the setup and end up blaming the layout if some things sell and other things don't. I didn't really get to see anything on the Saturday, it was just so busy. I had to send some people away who wanted to have their portraits done because I had too many on the go! But I think everyone got what they wanted.

Sunday was quieter, but strangely I sold more T-Shirts on the Sunday than the Saturday. Maybe Sunday is T-Shirt day. I thought I might have more space because the people next to me turned up a few hours late, so I was going to seize half their table and act none-the-wiser.

I met some amazing people whilst I was there. So thank you to everyone who came to my stall and extra thanks to anyone who bought anything!!

Faffing about just refers to the CSS on this page. I'm experimenting.

Impatience for the Manga Jiman Competition results. I want to know NOW!!!!

NOW! Expo Leftovers!!

I am phasing out all the little bookmarks and keyrings and bits. I just don't have the time to make them anymore and so need to focus more on books and t-shirts, so I'm having an Expo Stuff Clearout! Photos time!

Gurren Lagann Chibi Keyrings:


Now down to £1.00 each!

OS-Tan Bookmarks:


Only £1.00 each!

Lilah Bookmark:


Only £1.00!

OS-Tan Stickers:


6 in each pack, only £2.00 per pack!

Death Note Birthday Cards:


Only £1.50!

I won't be making any of these again so once they're gone, they're gone!