If it looks like a Duck and Quacks like a Duck, it's probably just some fairy tale themed conspiracy

[secondlina]

 

Self-inflicted pain, as usual. After still being sick after a week and half and under (almost) no pressure from a choice few people, I went to the doctor's. Apparently, I don't have the flue, swine or otherwise (insert american paranoia joke here). I'm sick because i'm poisoned and my body (specifically my lungs and stomach) are trying to work out the toxins. Poisoned! Shocking! And by what? Bad food? arsenic? Nope.

Sharpies.

I wish I was joking. 

I use sharpies to draw Rose. Every night for 4 hours, I inhale Sharpie's toxins while I lean over my comic pages. Wanna know how much sharpie is bad for you? 4 hours on a daily basis, that's how much. I remember feeling a similar sickness when I was working on my huge drawings for my graduation. But on those drawings I switched fairly quickly from sharpie to india ink, which as less fumes. So yeah...2 months of daily sharpie inhalation will make you sick. The doctor wants me to wear a mask when I use them. She says it might be something else but since I don't have anything else toxic that made an appearance in my environement lately, she blames either the sharpies or bad air at my job-or-house.

so....Yeah. Weird.

She says I should be feeling better if I start wearing a mask, drink more water and etc. 

Anyways....

PRINCESS TUTU FANART! (Ironically, inked with Sharpie before I knew it was bad for me.)



Princess tutu is a weird anime with a ridiculous name. It's kindoff a mix between Utena, Sailor Moon, Grimm Fairy Tales and Card Captor Sakura. You spend the first two episodes wondering if you want to dedicate time to this series. But after that, if fairy tales is your crap, you're going to get hooked, like that! Of course, it's still girly and cheesy, but it's got all sorts of awesome to it too. I especially like the short fairy tale story told at every beginning of episode. It's awesome.

As I mentioned before, it quotes ballet and ballet stories (which are much like tragic fairy tales). I like ballet dancing, contemporary or otherwise. It's fun to draw and full of symbols (some poses mean certain things, types of dances and even music alterations too). lycorne , I blame your fanarts and the army of techno music on my computer for the following fanart:



Yeah. that's right. Feel the pain.

So, for new series to watch I recommend Princess Tutu and Avatar : the last airbender. Tons of fun.

p.s. Anime northers? TWO DAYS!

p.s. 2 eveshka  - I did not forget you. Jedah is still on my desk, waiting for his facial alterations. :)

-Isa

Comments

[digital-eraser.livejournal.com]

Random question: are you using the Sharpies for drawing lines, or just for filling in large areas of black?

[ichiban-victory.livejournal.com]

There has to be slight relief that you don't have a virus, although poisoning isn't exactly much better! o_O Artists have always suffered for the sake of art; yours is more the modern variant on it. But yeargh... I don't use Sharpies often enough, I guess, plus I try not to breathe in the stink when using them anyway. Now I'll have even more incentive to avoid doing so!

Wearing a mask is a good idea, unless there are other markers out there that are non-toxic. Somehow I doubt it... In any case, breathe the sweet, sweet air and get those toxins purged from your system! Anime North awaits!

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Large areas of black. I use fineliner for the larger lines and sakura pens for the itty bitty small ones. But the comic pages I work on right now are basically pretty much half-black. so...yeah.

[elfgrove.livejournal.com]

Ack! Sharpies scary! I use F-C PITT pens myself, but it's probably almost just as bad for you in that kind of dosage.

Bwahahaha. You have no clue how happy/amused I am to see you enjoyed PTT. XD
The first fanart is really cool. I love the details that cover the entire series. And all in the gear style. I think I love the raven!Mytho best. Very nice.
And OMG that second art piece... I just about spit out my water all over the computer screen upon sight trying not to laugh. Sheer awesome. ♥ I am happy to be partially to blame there.

Now you must post these to the comm. >:D

[digital-eraser.livejournal.com]

A tip you may find useful (I hope):

Got any Q-Tips? Take the end of one and dip it into your thing of India ink. You might not even want to submerge it all the way -- it fills up pretty fast IIRC.

When you start rubbing it on the area that needs to be filled with black, you'll notice using it has a very familiar marker-like feel to it. Yet it's India ink, so it won't fade or turn strange shades of purple or yellow after five to ten years like Sharpies, and doesn't end up applied as too thickly as sometimes happens when filling blacks with a brush. Give it a try and let me know. :-)

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow, thanks for the tip! I don't really know much about inking since i'm mostly self taught. This will help a lot! Thank you!

[digital-eraser.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how well known the trick is...I was shown it in college, but I still see a lot of longtime pros either laying it on with brushes, or in rare cases using Sharpies (some years back at a convention I saw some JRJR Spider-man pages from the mid-90s, during the whole clone era, that it turns out he'd partly inked via Sharpie...and it had since turned very interesting colors indeed!).

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

I don't really want to work with a mask... maybe i,ll get a softer, less platic smelling fabric mask...

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Posted to the comm!

C'mon, you had to expect me to draw something weird. I AM the artist that brought you such hits as "Harry Potter in five minutes" and "Zel x toaster OTP"

Tutu techno mosh pit is calling to me!

[dqbunny.livejournal.com]

*is just goggling at you* First, Stef turns back into a major klutz (ducks thrown objects) and you poison yourself with Sharpies. It's a mad, mad, mad, mad, mad world. Mad.

*shakes you slightly* If you die from Sharpie poisoning, I am SO doodling all over your grave. With Sharpies.

But, seriously, the Q-tip idea sounds really good.

[ichiban-victory.livejournal.com]

I can always see what I can create with the sewing machine. ^_- Having a plastic-smelling mask would defeat the purpose of keeping out toxins since breathing plastic fumes isn't any better than marker fumes.

We live in a stinky world. XP

[ozma914.livejournal.com]

Sharpies???

Can you put a fan in a window, or anything else to increase circulation?

[earthstar-moon.livejournal.com]

Wow! I never would have expected sharpies either. At least now you know what the problem is and how you can fix it.

Princess Tutu is an odd anime, but it's a cute/good anime. You might want to check out http://amako-chan.deviantart.com/ She does a lot of Princess Tutu art, incuding some funny ones.

Anime North!! EEEEE!!

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

oooh, would you!? I would love having a Diane (tm) cloth mask. Either that of i'll buy a hospital one...

Stinky indeed! They are re-doing the asphalt on my street too. Ack ack.

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

You just want to make a mockery of my death don't you?

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Fans make papers fly, so not. I open my windows now though, which I could not do when it was colder.

Maybe I just have really horrible air circulation in the appartment.

[secondlina.livejournal.com]

Sharpies, the other, other, other secret silent killer. (so far: mimes, ninjas, carbone dioxide and estrogen.)

ONE DAY!!!!

[dqbunny.livejournal.com]

Would you prefer for me to stand over your grave, sobbing buckets over how you've fallen before your time, or would you rather me doodle on your grave? XP

[dqbunny.livejournal.com]

If you somehow put work creatures on it, Diane, I will gladly contribute money to the cause!!!

[ozma914.livejournal.com]

Guess I should have thought of the papers, considering the disasterous blizzard of just-stripped wallpaper that hit my house when I opened the windows for the first time this spring!

[brendala.livejournal.com]

Wow, I've never heard of people getting sick from Sharpies! But it does make sense. I rarely use them since I don't ink my pencil drawings all that often (even though I know I should ^_^;;) and when I do I typically use Micron pens since Sharpies leak through the cheap, thin paper I like to use.


And funny you should mention the American paranoia regarding Swine Flu. Some of my employers and co-workers back in Denver freaked out and insisted on stocking up on mini hand sanitizer bottles when it first broke out.
And, to be honest, I got a little scared when I heard the story about the infant who died here in the USA after a family trip to Mexico. A lot of the kids at the Denver schools travel in-and-out of Mexico frequently. Even though I knew logically that the odds were way in my favor, I couldn't help freaking out a little. :P