Havent updated since april 11th, holy smokes. 

Life has been good and busy! I dont have any new art to showcase as anything Im doing now is NDA. But I should be bringing on a new client shortly and I have 3 new books with my old client to wrap up.

I did, however, check out a local Japanese import market - Makoto. Theyre really close and Ive been wanting to go for ages just never had the time. It was a GORGEOUS day so I finally headed over. TONS of blind boxes, food, snacks, skin care, etc. I picked up some koala cream filled snacks, finally played a gachapon(Green ball) and got a pink fennec fox. I got Calcifer from the chibi blind box, one of my favorite characters. The Card captor sakura outfit stand figure was actually super cool and I used to watch that show as a kid, some of my early art was influenced by it. I ended up getting Sakura's school outfit. A recent Miffy fan, I got a Boris the bear keychain, some really cute office post it notes, pens and some nail art stickers that Im going to have put on the next time I get my nails did.

The packaging, real cute! I even added in my Rishi sweet matcha box because thats going in the sketchbook too. First time trying it!

The haul

The cute

I posted the boxes/tags because Im going to be adding these to my sketchbook. I love the artwork that some packaging has and I really want to save it in my sketchbook so I can look back on it and appreciate it again. I think mod podge is going to be the way to go!

 A very small update on the Mapcrunch Gamzigrad study, mostly on the left hand side. I didnt have a lot of time to commit to it, Ive got book boards in production, color rough mockups and final file formatting!

 Im hoping my production pipeline slows down at least mid may so I can participate in Mermay. I took the first half of this year off to focus solely on well being and art, and Ill be damned if I miss another Mermay!

Also also, Kaori pic never posted. Here she is, blue tortie <3 

 I figured I'd like to study film grabs , value and do some digital plein air paintings. This has more work on it, but I sent this over to me earlier and never updated. 

It was suggested to use mapcrunch. It gives you a random location in the world and I was very fortunate to get this shot here. Love the natural color palette, so much life ! 

Also , a snap of my bunny Kaori having breakfast . A natural composition and geometric lighting ✨️ 

 

Played around with some filters/textures in photoshop, nothing too crazy here. Just experimentation.

Also, I did craft up a little character for the Neopet, Stephan. I havent been able to find a good trade for him and I had an 8 bit lying around so he's now Stephan the bit with his crystal pal, Crysti (To be designed soon!)

 I put in an application for a character designer on feature for Dreamworks. Fingers crossed, I think Ive got some stuff that they would like. Hey Dreamworks, if youre checking this out, I think you'll like my stuff! 

Sketched out my Neopet, Mycinae this morning. Sometimes I just like to do a quick warmup before sitting down for the bigger projects.

I absolutely still play Neopets, and lately I have been enjoying getting to 120% and achieveing skill points in the Spyro reignited trilogy. One down three to go!

Ive had neo since I was like 13 and my account is extremely old so Im of course not giving it up. Im riding it til the wheels fall off. I probably should do more for these guys and draw them, Im more active now with the festival of neggs event they have but we'll see how long I stay.

My sister plays as well!

 Quick update before bed - played around to get a 80s Japanese anime watercolor look

 Oftentimes I find any delays in my production are my lack of thinking ahead. Im trying to remedy this, but sometimes a happy accident can be a solution to a problem.

Posting a couple of before/afters. The more tedious one was the city-scape. I realized the illustrations were progressing into more loose quality then I originally anticipated (I started this book at the tail end of 2024). I had gone back over the cleaner lines with a more loose/texture feel and I LOVE it. It adds so much more life to the comp.

Another shot of a page where a tourist is taking a snip of the cityscape view. I had removed the line on accident and really like the glow the city seemed to be giving off. This one might be more of a 50/50 but thought Id discuss it.

And just posting a small snippet of the magical book page - I added in some fairytale creatures due to context and the book spines/covers were a lot of fun to design and decorate

 

 My portfolio is now live but I am still adding more and changing up a few things. Check it out in the top navigation bar 

And some stuff that I hopped around in, these little characters are updated from a book I worked on about 5 years ago. These are much more stylized, expressive and frankly just fun. The black + accent colors have a nice contrast - I believe Im moving more into this technique everyday

 Trying to get away from the social media machine, Ive turned to blogging! This IS a form of social media, but I feel a bit more control and no pressure to supply the masses a dose of doomscroll but rather to provide a leisurely stroll through my mind.

Im a fan of the process of art over its end result, you could call me a post minimalist if youre so inclined. One of the many joys I have in life is sharing this process with student and non student alike, and so I created this blog. I have many irons in the fire right now and I wanted to use this space to showcase and share any contributions Ive been making to these endeavors!