Just working on some concept design for a project Steven is working on at school, creating a marketable tv series aimed at youth audiences, kind of the megaman/all that gimmicy anime shtuff going around on tv these days style (i luv anime, just not the "buy it, trade it" craze of shows going on today. Man I sound old. I need a walky...
Ah, good ol March Break. As a hiatus inbetween jobs I went home for a week where I got to spend much quality time with my family, sleep, saw Lu off for her "buh bye" party which started at a really nice restaurant and ended with me and some of the guys working slave-like and clearing out her appartment! Afterwards my parents and sis came back to Ottawa with me where we went to the War Museum (an incredible place, I highly reccomend visiting it to anyone stopping by in Ottawa). Anyhoo, I got lots to do today. Tommorrow starts the new Ben Bear posing job and I've a commission to finish. Laters!
This is a concept bg for a "tv series" Shagster is "pitching" as part of a university project. This is the first layout I've done in a while, the perspective needs work, I can never get the grids working properly. The bg is inspired partly from the Blacksad comic, but also from my buddy Marcel's living room.
Bluuuuugh, no more chocolates... I O.D'd on a box of assorted valentines chocolates that were 50% off... I can't help it, my mum taught be to keep an eye open for sales! It's in my bloooood!
I made this blasphemous comic as a special "thank you" to the folks at Deviant Art for helping my account reach 100,000 hits within 4 months. Not too shabby!
**At my mum's suggestion I've only posted the first panel so as not to ruin the gag, click the title/link to see the whole strip on my webpage**
... I seriously need to draw more layouts.
The end of my silly little Malfoy arc. Once again, click the link in the title if blogger opens this too small. Simple, simple stuff. But fun!
Just doing my thing over here folks. This week's Shrub Monkey I got the idea for after a conversation with Gerry: we all spend so much time watching screens don't we? Click the title/link and it'll take you to my page where the comic's posted, just cuz I think its way too big for blogger.
A V-day card for ma darlin', though I kinda "whoopsed" up on the perspective and some botched clean up lines. If you can't tell what's going on, basically the heart-demons are about to lower me into a bubbling cauldron of chocolate, when a lone hero charges in with a 2x4! Though... I don't think the wood plank is a proper 2x4 length... OH WELL!
I'm hungry now...
YES! Finally got to go on the Rideau Canal yesterday and it was fantastic! And such a beautiful day! Not a cloud, though the sunnyness made me wish I'd remembered the location of my sunglasses. We skated the whole thing from Dows Lake all the way downtown. I think we were on the ice for two hours or so (stopped for bever tails along the way). And there were so many things to look at along the way! Horse drawn sleighs, bed racing, ice sculptures, spectacular wipeouts... twas great! Now all i have to do is go skiing once and then I'm done with winter. Bring on the spring!
At the end of our journey: Gerry, Matt, Andrea, Oscar and Rod.
Me n' Ger.
I took this one for you, mum!
Geeze, I hate windy night all on my lonesome, they creep me out. What I need are a good pair of rattle-proof windows.
Blegh, I went to a party the other day (a fun party) but I can still feel my lungs coated with second hand smoke. It got to the point where I was getting short of breath at the party and had to step outisde, and I can still feel a bit of that right now. I don't understand how you smokers can do it, I hate that feeling.
Japanese live Spider Man tv show folks! The intro alone is worth many a laugh:
http://youtube.com/w/toei-spider-man-ep-1---fansubbed-in-english?v=LOHwSnAIVc8&search=japanese%2
Got this off Adriana's LJ. A Dark Crystal sequel directed by Genndy Tartakovsky? I dunno what to think! :D
http://www.iwatchstuff.com/archives/2006/02/dark_crystal_sequel_in_the_wor.html
And yeah... case in point, didn't wake up until 12:10... bah.
Man, Russell Peters.... man.
This I did as part of that LJ tag going around where everyone's drawing Bat Girls. EVERYWHERE! I figure, I like to be included in things so I've done one too. This one's Jet Set Radio inspired... probably because I was listening to the music while conceptualizing.
Geeze, try as I might I can't get to sleep before 3 (case in point it's 3:01 right this minute) then I get mad at myself when I wake up at 1pm. Tommorrow I'm gonna TRY REAL HARD to get on the canal... unless it's melted... then I can't.
Guess I'll do laundry instead.
Yeaaaah, I suppose I should call the survey people back. I'm just too lazy.
Winterlude is starting up here in Ottawa and I'm getting really excited! Can't wait to skate the canal and check out the ice sculptures and pig out on beaver tails n' hot chocolate!
Also, I'm gonna soon start up on a short one-off comic concepted by my aunt (the young one.. who's also recently engaged! YAY!) so keep a look out for that over the next couple weeks. Ciao!
**Once again blogger posts these too small, or at least that's the way it is on my browser, so feel free to check this out at its source:
http://www.closet-space.com/comics/originalcomics/shrub-monkeys019.htm
Yay! My flowers aten't dead! Well... technically they are, but I mean they're not drooping sadly anymore since I've got them in the sun. Nat, Marcel's fiance, gave me these to cheer me up since I'm all alone and afraid this week while Andrea's in florida. Seriously, I freak out when I'm on my own, the slightest creak or crack gets me all nervous - wait, what was that!?!?!?!?
Also, I've finally been moved on to animating Carl Squared (the whole reason I came to Ottawa in the first place, augh!) so I should be starting scenes soon. And my neck aches something fierce these days! I'm in great need of a good massage.
Corpse Bride's namesake is such a stunningly beautiful character and I'd been meaning to do an illustration of her for quite a while. This is also an attempt to spruce up my tablet skills but I fear the clean up is going to take foreeeeever because I'm used to doing it on paper where I can shift it for easier wrist manuvers. Ah well.
In other news I'm stuffed to the brim with all-u-can-eat chicken wings (i ate 19, beating Justin and possibly Mike and Tony, though Marcel beat me by about 5... uuuurgh, I can't do that too often).
I've revamped my online portfolio (linked to closet-space.com's home page), given it an actual "closet-space" design and got rid of all the clutter; I had so much on it before, I wasn't listening to the age old proverb "Less is more." But now it's all tidy and neat... I just havent put any of my animation up yet, ehehhe. That's tommorrow's job.
Now, I SLEEP!
In respose to Lu's post quite a while ago about us all posting up kids picks of ourselves, here's lil ol' me. Kid's pictures crack me up because while I can look at anyone's baby photo and pretty much recognize that it's THEM as a child, I can't really recognize myself at all. It's like we have albums of my family but I'm not in them, this goofy blond kid is.... with 60's lady hair as Gerry has repetedly pointed out. -___-
In more current affairs I am on my last can of soup. After this my only sources of food will be a soon-expired squeeze bottle of miracle whip, a dry block of cheese, and a tin of shotrbread cookies that I cannot touch because my grandma gave them to me to give to my great aunts who live here in Ottawa. Work's been awesome, I blasted past quota and had a lot of fun chill-time with my work buddies.
So... yeah! Soups on!
As always, all Shrub Monkeys strips are autobiographical, which means 15% percent truth and 100% fiction. I love the freedom of slapping down rough sketches for these comics without even worrying about clean up.
If for some reason internet explorer is being a putz and making these SMALLER than I intended, which it tends to do, today's strip is also posted here:
http://www.closet-space.com/comics/originalcomics/shrub-monkeys018.htm
Shagster (or Shaggy, as people call him... me, I just call him Steven) is finally finished his anime parody dub "Orgus Intergalactic Space Crap"!!! For those of you staring at the screen blankly, it's a re-edit, re-voiced, re-casted, re-plotted version of a hoooorible 1980s space anime that we bought at blockbusters for $1. The plot is simple and silly, the dialogue Steven's usual tongue-in-cheek cleverness, the edited sfx and music AWESOME, plucking tunes from Saturday Night Fever, Princess Mononoke, Last Exile and Star Wars to name a few. He did such a good job with this I highly reccommend anyone looking for half an hour of entertainment (yes, 1/2 hr) to download it and check it out. The file's 70 meg, so if you're unsure whether you want to bother downloading, check out the sample clip Steven provided of a particularily ridiculous scene.
Voices done by Steven, me and Selena.
http://voiceactingalliance.com/board/showthread.php?t=10389
It's been an incredible holiday, lots of fun things, plenty of rest, saw a whole bunch of wonderful friends, and spent every day with my family whom I love so very much! So, having my holiday-fill I'm looking forward to starting work again rather than the expected "aaaaw MAN I wish it were still the holidays!" I did get a little emotional on parting with my family who all came to see me off at Union in Toronto... but that was partly the fault of the Narnia soundtrack I was listening to, song #2 brings me to tears every time, it's the score with all the children having to leave WWII London to go live in the country. But, here I am back in my comfortable little appartment and... there are SO MANY THINGS I HAVE TO DO NOW! AUGH!!!
Also, here's the completed Teen Titan illustration I gave to my lil sis for Christmas... she loved it! 
And also another christmas card/water colour attempt. 
Well folks I'm safely back in Mississauga and ready to recharge! I'm soooo very happy to be with my parents and siblings again, and the house looks as awesome as I remember... 7 foot tree assembled soley by my 10 year old sister, garland on the doorways, flickering flames in the fireplace... And so many snacks! Myeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! ^_______^
So, now to sleep after the long but fun trip. Merry Christmas y'all!
KT
Well, Christmas fast approaches and I am sooo excited to go home on friday. Though it doesn't feel very wintery in the appartment at the moment as I'm boooiling with our huge windows and the sunlight, gosh, if our heating was actually working me n' andrea would fry in here! This'll be my last posting for the year, I'm going to give Mike @Pip my computer over the break and he's going to reformat so hopefully all my computer woes will be fixed. this probably means all the pictures I've posted on blogger will vanish, but I'll try uploading a couple again once I get the computer back.
This pinup is one I promised I'd make my pal Shawn a little while ago. I've finally racked out the watercolours! Woo! But dang, now that I look at it her left leg is stupid... why do I never notice these things before cleanup???
Anyhoo, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year everyone!
~ KT
Done and DONE! I've finished Peter's family characature portrait! WOOOOO! The prints turned out awesome (I love my printer, she's such a sexy, sexy beast) and tommorrow I'll try to trudge through the snowy tundra that is Ottawa to get to the post office so I can mail these suckers a.s.a.p.
Seriously though, you see the size of snow clumps blowing around? I live on the 11th floor and those fluffs are as big as eyeballs!
So I feel a lot less stressed, but in need of a HUGE massage *oh Adriana I'm missing you so dearly right this moment!* And now I've only two more illustrations to try and finish before home time... well three if you count the sexy pinup I promised Shawn... maybe four if you count the ninja-tag I promised Tony ... ehehehe... I'LL GET ON IT! YES! But, LATER! First sleep. Or reading in bed, I'm finally reading the biography/picture book of J.W Waterhouse that I picked up this summer at the Ottawa Art Gallary. I love his work, definetly amongst my top 5 favourite artists!
~ KT
Gosh, I've been a shut in for the past week and a bit! There's so much I need to do for Christmas!
Weird recipe: Also, while making my scrambled eggs and mushrooms this morning I decided to be adventurous and add egg nogg to the mix. At first it was enjoyable, nice sweet smell and eggnoggy aftertaste, but towards the middle it just got nasty so I smothered it in HP sauce as usual. *urp*
Anyhoo, I'm gonna try and clean up and colour the last characature before work. Later, my duckies.
This Shrub Monkey was inspired by a phone call with Steven this evening in which while holding the phone beneath his chin I thought he sounded like a fat man. If you can't click on the link (because blogger seems to get antsy with files bigger than a certain size) check it out on my website through the link provided above. Yeah, I think you hafta click on the entry title. There you go.
Man, I must press REALLY hard when drawing with the tablet because my hand always aches after doing one of these.
This is the first part of a commission for Steven's friend Peter, it's a characature of him and his sister up to some shenanagins. My plan is to have commission #2 completed by thursday so I can ship all the prints out by friday.
P.S> As Mr. Barth's already noted, this pic seems to hold some resemblance to me n' Gerry, though I didn't notice til after I posted... hmm... I think I need to work on my characatures so they don't look so generic, but it DOES look like Peter and his sis! If i HAD done a drawing of me and Gerry he'd have his orange hat and I'd be the one holding a sword and chasing him screaming around the castle laughing maniacally to myself... muahaha!!!!
hammina hammina
KT
Today was awesome, lots of fun. Chilled all day with Gerry, we went to Wallaks where I FINALLY picked up a paint pallet for my watercolours I keep promising myself I'm gonna use... someday. Nyeeh. And I went bowling in the evening with Andrea, Justin, Mike, Ray and Tony and it was soooo fun. Though we ended up going all the way to the quebec side for some reason because they "had to have a 10 pin game!!" But it was a lot of fun! I started out strong too, but beginners luk always dies for me after about three throws. *siiigh* The gross thing is I reek of cigarettes from the 3 minutes I spent in the bar pulling out cash. BLAUGH!
On a completely different topic, it's interesting to note that for some reason the "a" "s" "e" and "n" keys on my keyboard are completely gone. Like, what do I keep typing that uses these letters??? "asen"? "esna?" "sane?" ooh, "sane!" hmm... that's kind of creepy....
The gang trying to figure out how to get names for each player... needless to say my team didn't figure it out...
And Mike says donughts are A-OK!
Aww how nice! Todays been a nice relaxing day, and now a brass band is playing Christmas Carols across the street infront of the Salvation Army! I feel so peacefull...............
........now to go oblitorate some tiny white pins with a massive bowling ball!!!!!!!
~KT
Oh yeah! I forgot I South-Park-asized myself! So here's me!............... as a crack whore it would seem................ what the heck was I thinking when I made this!?!?!?
Hey guys, if you haven't checked out Cartoon Brew (http://www.cartoonbrew.com/) lately, go check out their November 30 posting and click on the "The Return of Hand-Drawn Animation" post with the animated eagles. S'great.
Humminahumminahummina I cannot WAIT until Narnia on Saturday! Squeeee!
I like absent minded doodling, just putting the pen to paper and moving it and see what happens. What I draw is usually influenced by the music I'm listening to on the lil pink ipod, if I'm not listening to music then it's anyone's guess what I'm gonna sketch next... usually the guys in my quad. WHOO! "Sheridanc Quad!..... and Marcel!"
Myes.
I suppose I'd better finish off all the rest of the illustrations on my to do list. But first I'd beter do the dishes because they're shutting the water off in our building AGAIN tommorrow. Hope I don't cut myself on that carving knife again... the thing has a taste for my bloooood!
A whole jubilee of sketches, and below is my creepy page!
This is Mister Barth and his extremely proper sitting posture. :P
If you read Hans Bacher's blog you'dve probably checked this out already, but if not you HAFTA check out this film http://www.aantin.com/films/lepapillon.php he has a link to. It's so beautiful!
WHEW! One holiday project DONE! But I can't post it in case prying little eyes see it before Christmas morning, so you're gonna have to try and imagine I made something wonderful and be content. HA!
I'm glad I went out every chance I could during summer and autumn. If I felt guilty about putting projects aside I reasoned I'd just be a shut in during the winter and make up for it. WELL! It's winter now isn't it!? Thanks a LOT KT-of-the-past for making me a shut in!
Here's a page of flash doodles I did rather than working as I shoud've been. 
GRAAH! Christmas is coming and while I'm UBER happy and excited at going home and visiting my loved ones, I'm also ETREEEEMELY stressed as there are maybe 20 days before I leave and I'm still not done with my xmas presents, haven't started my portrait commission yet, am still having net issues and wil probably have to reconfigure my computer, which means starting EVERYTHING from scratch, but I don't want to do that until after I finish all these illustrations I need to do.
*guh!* I also haven't gone to kick boxing in a while, and I have to go find a way to get LUCIA'S DVD back to the Rogers half way across Ottawa! *shakes a loving fist at Lu*
I'm just a wee bit stressed out at the moment, I think I just need to get some sleep and I'll be kokai... "okay"... what the heck did I just type!?!?! 
I went to Everett's screening yesterday (friend from work for any non-Pipstars reading this) and I really enjoyed his film, so campy and fun! It was fun being an extra in it too and I got all big headed and giggly everytime I saw myself on the big screen. Ahhh, my first screen role... "clipboard girl!"
I've added on a couple doodles I had laying around my desk at work for when I need a break from the computer screen. At Pip there's all these extra papers lying around for the purpose of doodling (well, whyever not?) and I enjoy using my priveledges.
I think I'm going to sleep now. I've got a whole cabootle of laundry to do tommorrow. GYEAGH!
Just for you Tony, I did Robin next. So ENOUGH of your wiley ninja tricks! *ducks* Just one more character to go, then I can piece it all together, make a cool abstract BG, and then I'm DONE. Next I'll probably start on the family portrait commissions that Steven's friend asked me to do.
OOOH! Best thing in the world! I keep forgetting my family sent me some left over Halloween treats from Heather's swag! And it's awesome because I always forget I have it just until the point where I muuust have chocolate, then I remember and I have chocolate!
Ahh, life is sweet. But now I'm tired and I wanna get up early-ish tommorrow to go see what the mailman tried to deliver because they ALWAYS SHOW UP WHEN I'M IN THE SHOWER AND CAN'T HEAR THE DOOR! *wheeze wheeze*
Oooh man, I've been watching the Ren and Stimpy dvds Rod leant me like crazy over the past few days (cuz he's leaving soon and I'd better return them before he does). There's some nutty stuff in there I hadn't seen before (i loooved the cowboy/horse theif one and the Powder Toast man short) along with the classics (my favourites that my dad showed me when I was a kid) like Cousin Sven, Space Madness, the Army One... The Happy Helmet... Good whacky fun. I love the style of John K.'s lady characters, I'd love to see more of that kind of thing too.
Uuuuhm... what else. OSAP starts collecting today. Whoo. Aaaand... tommorrow's pay day! *cheers* I suppose I should get to bed PRONTO because I promised myself I'd go to Kick Boxing tommorrow, and I've been such a lazy bastard this past week.
Nite all!
