Secondlina's Panels

Again, I was sick for like a week! And apparently it's not over yet. Body, why do you hate me? My lungs are still giving me trouble. Jeez. I wish I was healthy right now. I want to go out biking so bad!

Despite the illness, I still got dressed up and went to see Wicked last Thursday. Me and my friends Lily and Fanie got all dressed in green just for it. I was originally going to have more bling and high heels, I but I decided to forget about it on account of sick. The show was pretty good, although a bit different then what I remembered. There was some tidbits of added dialogue that weren't there in the version I saw 3 years ago. 



The show itself was good. It's as disney-esque as I remembered. It's funny - 3 years ago, I loved the actrice who played Glinda and didn't really like the one playing Elphaba. This year was the opposite - I loved the Elphaba but didn't really appreciate the overly zany Glinda. My friends really loved the play though. I hear they are speaking of making a movie based on this again. although I didn't like the book that much, I do hope that a film would burrow a bit more of the serious tone of the book, sorta make a nice book/musical hybrid. 

Also, I now own a flying monkey.



Speaking of the land of Oz in the entertainment world, i'm amazed I haven't yet squeed here over the fact that Disney is making a movie about the arrival and rise to power of the Wizard of Oz. Again, the film looks a bit fanfic-y (i'm REALLY hoping they at least used some of the original book's ideas and not just invented the whole thing), but the visuals look amazing! I'm disapointed that the army seen on screen seems to be composed of dudes, when the most powerful army in Oz is technically female. I'd pay good money to see the female army of Oz on the big screen. Those ladies are flawless. 

Good to see Oz is inspiring so many people to be creative (including myself). Although in my case, the "Oz" themed segment of Namesake is soon to be over. Onwards to other words!

I'm going to go back to nap now. Tired sicky Isa needs sleep.

- Isa

 So, right now, in my house, i'm pretty much watching girly animated shows. The card captor Sakura Dvds I ordered got in. And... Yeah. It's getting girly in here, with the ponies and the Sakura and the Disney and the stuff... But that's cool. Because all the girls in my animated shows are badass. :D

And thus, this is cool.

I pretty much spend all my time drawing for the Namesake book. I still take a break to do a little sketch here and there. Mostly to draw my dreams. I'm getting some interesting dreams right now. I think my brain is trying to decide what my next big project is going to be, so it's brainstorming in my sleep or something. I really love my dream comics. Usually pretty awesome :D 

Oh, oh, ooooh, the Namesake kickstarter just reached 10 000$. SHABAM!! I feel I should do something special for the fans. Free wallpaper of awesome perhaps? What do you guys think? Suggestions?

I was identified as a mythological creature by Link's twin brother yesterday (I think he may have been a bit drunk and overly happy). He seems to like us a couple. Says he admires us for never really having fights and being always kinda like a team, which apparently makes us "legendary"? Which is cute of him to say, he was always a really nice and supportive guy. I do love being in a team with Link. Like right now, he's helping me re-color all the Namesake pages for the book. It's like... projects like these, I can't do without my team. Meg and Link. I know a lot of people like to work on their comics alone, but I think that if you find the right people, it just makes projects more awesome, especially long-winded ones. You can do more with less and have more fun.

Oh, I also dream Mary Poppins with the Eleventh doctor from doctor Who. Because there's this thing on the internet claiming Poppins may be a time lord because of her super cosmic powers. I maintain she's a witch or a genie. But I like the idea of her mixing with the doc. It's adorable.



In final news, did you guys see the latest trailer for the witches of Oz? I feel... Disappointed. This looks like TV movie quality. Yet it gets a cinematographic release. If it was a TV movie, I think I would have expected less? Plus, it doesn't look like it's taking that much from the books (evil witch does have an eyepatch though. Props for that). And Glinda looks amazing. But the rest? Meh. I'm much more excited about the Hunger Games trailer. Holy fuzzballs.

Back to drawing solitude.

Over and out. 

- Isa

ilikebigtoes  and elle_white  have already posted this, but since this journal is pretty much a dumping pile for all fairy tale things and animation things I find awesome, i'll post it too.

Ex-Disney employees (EDIT : They don't work there. But they are clearly talented enough to do awesome stuff) made a video  "animation" of a storyboard for a scene from a potential "Wicked" animated adaptation. This would be an adaptation of the musical or course, not the book per say. First off, I love this video and this idea. "Wicked" the musical had a very Disney-esque quality to it (despite the storyline itself being more the type of scenario Dreamworks would pick up). This would make a great animation. And the people who did this story board clearly know that. The tracks used are from the "Hunchback of Notre-Dame" and "Wicked".

Click image for video.



I love this type of thing. Animated storyboards? Love it. I adore this type of crude animation with a voice-over. It's so simple and beautiful. "How to train your dragon" had 3 animated storyboards and I think i've watched them all 10 or so times. The worse part is, I could totalyl make this type of thing. This requires no knowledge of animation programs. Just some good old pencil drawings, a basic editing program and a soundtrack. So why didn't I EVER do this? I guess I need an idea and a song/dialog.

I'm kinda amused by how many guards Elphaba is tossing aside with a BROOM. One of the recurring gags in the Oz books is that fact that the Emerald city has barely any guards. I guess they all quit after getting their ass handed to them by a broom. It's pretty embarrassing.

Aside from that, what is new? Well, I pretty much spent the weekend recovering from my horrible, stressful week. I'm never doing that much stuff ever again. I also realized i'm way behind on stuff I need to do, emails, rps and coloring drawings. I need to make a to-do list again. I want to try dividing my time more. I want to see people (so i'm not quite so horribly lifeless and boring) while still keeping enough time to draw.

Pascal really wants me to find a part-time job and invest more time into becoming a comic artist. It was a plan I had formed myself, but like most plans I make, this one seemed to translate into a bad idea. I didn't really like the idea of cutting back on work. It made me feel like I was irresponsible or ungrateful, since so many people seek full-time work. But Pascal says I should try to develop my artistic career while I can and make the monetary sacrifices while it's still actually possible. He's right? I'm right? I don't know. I would love to be able to draw more and focus on really getting into the comic world. Maybe i'm afraid to take on the part time job because i'm also afraid it officially means i'll have to really start being a "professional" artist. And that's a lot of work and scary things.

What do you guys think?

Well, as a random finishing touch, I drew some sailor moon. I'm really unhappy with these sketches... But I like the feel of them, so i'll post them anyways. For some reason, I seem to adore the pre-destruction-silver-moon-millenium-kingdom. Why could they not give us more scenes from that?





Over and out.

- Isa

Reason #1 why I love working on Namesake :



Yes, the Fairy-tale themed illustrations :D

I kinda missed drawing these. I took a giant break for a while. Fairy tales are awesome.

Today, I was looking for reference shots of various versions of Munchkinland and I discovered there's a wannabe-real-munchkinland in China.  No, really. It's a full village in China with nothing but dwarves who train to sing and dance and perform various tasks. They basically formed their own tourist attraction. And the images of this village are kinda mesmerizing.









At first I was all "cool!" and then I realized the horrible social implications around physically different people being forced, or feeling like they are forced, to go live in a place that turns them into a circus show. A high-quality circus show, but a circus show none the less. It's a bizarre situation that can be seen as good or bad depending on your angle (some of the artists seem to like being there, others think it's a symbol of abuse).

Still reminds me of what a real munchkinland might look like. And heck, I think a real munchkinland would have a lot of social abuse. Maybe not as much as in Wicked, but it does hurt to be at the bottom of the length chain.

- Isa