Song of the Week: 12/31/06 - 01/06/07

The Song of the Week is:

The Gunslinger by Demons & Wizards


This is one of the songs off of Demons & Wizards' second album, Touched by the Crimson King, which makes many references to the characters and events from Stephen King's Dark Tower series of novels. Perhaps of all the songs on the album, this one stands out due to its slow, melodic pace in the first part, which then opens up into one of their hardest, fastest songs ever. Also, the ending is one of the greatest I've ever heard; and this is definitely one of those songs that just seems to be made for playing in a concert.

Hear the song: Dark Tower music video

Meet the Band: Demons & Wizards official website

Buy the CD: Touched by the Crimson King on Amazon

Credits: Demons & Wizards, Stephen King, and "TehKashmirZ" for the video

Self-Portrait LOL

I was bored, so I drew this.

Also, I finally got a haircut and got rid of my 2-in. goatee... I am now in "Upstanding Citizen Mode!"


...God I'm such a dork! :-D

Have a nice day, everyone!

Remembering One's Roots

Ah yes, it's always nice to go back through one's old stuff and see what memories come up! I was digging through a bunch of my junk from my school years (ages ago, it seems), and found the very first form of the Unholy Paladin Project!

It all started as a concept for a card game, in which modernized versions of all sorts of Gods, Goddesses, monsters, and demons from various ancient cultures would duke it out in a battle system which was ultimately doomed to failure and incompletion... but it was a darn cool project at the time, and it brought enough attention to my humble little project to actually try to create a coherent story out of it, and take it seriously enough to make it into what I consider to be my life's work!

Craptastic scans of what cards I got completed follow... it is amazing how much the characters have changed; how much the project as a whole has evolved since then!


Hell, looking back, some of the names didn't even make sense! "Judicial Knight?" WTF? The most generic name I could come up with at the time I suppose... also there's the fact that the characters would have to get new Deities in order to progress in levels, even though their levelled-up forms didn't look too much different... how confusing! Man what was I thinking?!

Song of the Week: 12/24-12/30

The song of the week is...

Bouree by Jethro Tull

This has always been one of my favorite songs of theirs... granted, it's been around for longer than I have, but that doesn't keep me from appreciating the musical talents of this band. This song in particular shows off the extraordinary skills of bassist Glenn Cornick in the solo about halfway through the song.

Hear the song: The original music video

Meet the band: Jethro Tull official website

Buy the CD: Jethro Tull: Stand Up on Amazon.com

Credit: Jethro Tull

Finally!

Whoo... sorry for the lack of recent updates, but my P.O.S. D-Link Wireless card kept losing my internet connection (however, taking it out and throwing it against my big metal desk does seem to help it work better!).

I've finished the drawing of Justin with the Deimos Deity, and have scanned in some more sketches as well.





More on my DeviantArt page!

Bored at work

Blahrg.

I've got the picture of Justin with Deimos in the background almost done; it's inked and mostly painted now... I'll post it here and on my DA page when I get home.

I'm also probably going to start posting some of my song lyrics and poetry to my DA page as well, just to add a bit of variety to it.

Other than that, nothing new or exciting going on.

Drawing Personality Test

Just something interesting I found while surfing...



What does your drawing say about YOU?

My Results:
The results of your analysis say:
You tend to pursue many different activities simultaneously. When misfortune does happen, it doesn't actually dishearten you all that much.
You are a direct and forthright person. You like to get to the core of the issue right away, with few signs of hesitation.
You like following the rules and being objective. You are precise and meticulous, and like to evaluate decisions before making them.
You feel morose and are prone to lethargy.

Some new art; just one today (laziness, etc.)

I've got a couple of drawings in the works at the moment... I've just inked the one of Justin with the Deimos Deity, and have worked on a sketch for one of my other characters, Heather.

I really like how this sketch turned out, and am looking forward to finishing it!


Sex and Rock-and-Roll always get people's attention!

The guitar she's holding (not like anyone's looking at that!) is actually my own Yamaha RGX612A, if anyone was wondering... it was bought secondhand and is not in the greatest shape (sounds terrible, even after taking it to a shop to get it looked at, the guy said I might as well get a new one)... but it does make a good drawing reference and prop for one of my characters!

The Song of the Week 12/17 - 12/23

The song of the week is:

The World by Nightmare

This song is the intro to the anime Death Note, as well as one of their best songs. Nightmare is a great band that's been around for a few years, but for a lot of people outside of Japan, this is their first exposure to their music. Hopefully, they will catch on over here if/when the Death Note anime gets released in America...

Hear the song: The World music video

Meet the band: Nightmare Official Website

Buy the CD! Support the Artist!!: The World single at CDJapan

Credit: Nightmare

Work Sucks

I need to be able to do my art for a living!

Recently, things have not been running so smoothly at work. Our QA Department (who grades our calls) was moved to the Phillippines, some new call centers just opened up in India (what happened to our policy of "All-American customer service?"), and our Operations staff (the ones that supervise the day-to-day running of the center) was all demoted and control was given to one of our other centers, who promptly forced our center to be closed on Sundays and put up a "schedule bid," where all of our schedules will be completely messed up, and we are forced to take whatever new pre-made schedules they have available to us, picked at random, regardless of our circumstances. Last month, they were even forcing us to clock out, but stay at work to log back on to take a call or two, then clock out again. How is it morally or even legally correct for a company to do things like this?

And as far as the new QA staff is concerned, they are the sorriest excuse for QA I have ever seen. They change our call notes, lower our scores for things that shouldn't be counted... I had a call a couple of weeks ago from a TECHNICIAN FROM OUR COMPANY, in which situation we don't even have to record a ticket for the call, and cannot be graded on it... one of these idiots in QA actually scored it and CREATED A FREAKING TICKET for a call that should never have had one!

Technically, I don't work for Verizon, but Teleperformance. Verizon itself seems to be a decent company, but contracts their tech support to this company. I've been with this company for almost a year now, and it was a decent job, but it managed to all fall apart in just the past month or so...

Man I need a better job.

My DeviantArt Page

I decided to create a page on DeviantArt on a whim...

Within 10 minutes of posting one of the color illustrations of Nemesis, it already had 25 views!

...I feel popular... *sniff*

Web Publishing

I've come to the conclusion that I need to create an actual website. This blog was set up mainly just for practice in preparation for a real, fully functional site, but I really need to get a domain of my own for more publicity....

...However, my knowledge of HTML and web publishing are severely lacking (Pretty sad, considering I work for an Internet company). I've seen programs like EZ-Generator by Image-Line that allow one to create web pages in a completely WYSIWYG environment (imagine building a site in PowerPoint) that could be very useful, but I need a little more information (and money) before I make such an investment.

I could also stand to learn more Flash...

Color Character Illustrations II: Nemesis

The featured character for today is Amanda as Avatar Nemesis. My art style and sensibilities have evolved quite a bit since when I drew these, but they are still pretty good, I think.

Comments, suggestions, and feedback are welcome.

Great Image Macro

Reminder to self: I need to set this as my desktop background at work.

Color Character Illustrations

Today I decided to put up some of my color illustrations. These are mostly going to be older drawings, and so, not quite up to par with what I can do now; but are decent enough I suppose.

The Featured Character for today is Justin as Avatar Deimos. As always, comments and critiques are quite welcome.

The Song of the Week

Hello! I have decided to start a new feature on here, the "Song of the Week!" Every Saturday, there will be a new one posted. I am not going to be posting the songs themselves, but rather, links to where one can hear the songs in a legal but free manner, and spread some awareness of the artists and their works.

Okay, so the song of this week is:
Man Made God by In Flames

This is a monster of an instrumental metal song, which displays the technical prowess and melodic complexity that can only come from a band of this much talent. This song is only available on the limited Deluxe-edition remaster of the Colony album.

Hear the song: (given the song's rarity, there is not an actual music video of it, and there is no sample at the official site, so...) Kick-ass AMV featuring the song

Meet the band: http://www.inflames.com/

And of course, to BUY THE CD!!! SUPPORT THE ARTIST!!!: Colony Deluxe at Amazon

On the CD, you get to hear the song in all its full glory. The rest of their music is incredible too!

Credits: In Flames for rocking hard, and MesmericX for the AMV.

The first Unholy Paladin Garage Kit!!!

I have decided to try my hand at starting a line of original figure kits for my series. The first one in the collection will be Amanda in the form of an avatar for Nemesis. As I have not done seriously detailed sculpting before, this will be quite a challenge... I have a fairly good idea of how to start, but the first test build was less than successful... I was not using the proper materials, and was unprepared for the project, so I decided to start over at square one. Here are a couple of "blueprints" for the upcoming project.

The materials I will be using are:
Marblex self-hardening clay
chopsticks
wax paper, or something to put between the sections to keep them from sticking during the sculpting process
and of course, the usual sandpaper, files, glue, etc.

As always, comments and suggestions are welcome!




Of course, I would also post pictures of the W.I.P. on it, but I am lacking a digital camera at the moment.

Phobos

The character for today is Richter Mitchell, Justin's older brother and the original main character, and his Deity Phobos (the God of Fear). This character was meant to show the reality of what happens to the typical agressive lead character in a more realistic story; he is missing his left eye, and the arm is prosthetic; he willingly throws himself into danger, but definitely does not come out unscathed...

This guy was actually a fairly popular character among my peers, perhaps due to the fact that he really doesn't just come back each time with all of his wounds healed, but he keeps fighting for his beliefs anyway. He is younger at heart then his brother, and tends to rush in head-on instead of thinking things out thoroughly. This is the type of character that makes split-second decisions and never looks back; and may actually have too much confidence.

His Deity Phobos allows him to channel spiritual energy. This ability allows him to take a more active role in a fight, by charging up his fist and feet with energy to inflict extraordinary damage. The stronger his feelings / convictions are, the more power he can channel.

Nemesis

This character is Amanda Owens, with her partner Deity Nemesis (the Goddess of Wrath). I based her on a friend of mine who helped me out a lot at the beginning of the project, and whom this project truly wouldn't exist without. She seems to be more of a supporting character at first, but as the series goes on, she actually becomes a better protagonist and more likable character than Justin!

In the story, she is the oldest child in her family, and is a very generous soul who enjoys taking care of others. She has a part-time job volunteering at an orphanage, and sort of cheers all of the other characters on until she gains the ability to summon Nemesis, at which point she becomes a strong defensive player in battle.

In addition to being a fast attacking aerial Deity, Nemesis has a secondary ability that allows Amanda to heal others, which is an appropriate power given her peaceful demeanor and protective nature.

Thanks to Baxojayz

Heya! I have recently had the honor of being featured on Centricity, the blog of Baxojayz, a fellow hobby enthusiast I know from the hobby forums.

http://baxojayz.blogspot.com/

His blog is one of the most entertaining reads around; updated daily with all kinds of news and trivia. Be sure to check it out!

Deimos

Here is a rough sketch of the main character of Unholy Paladin, Justin Mitchell. The mechanical beast behind him is his partner Deity, Deimos (the God of Panic). I based his appearance on my own, so no one could say that I stole the design (lol). For his personality, I decided to make him a man of few words, seemingly shy, but with more than enough confidence to face a difficult problem. Most main characters in an action series are brash, impulsive fighters, but I decided to make this one calmer and more intelligent.

This character is much of a loner throughout the first parts of the series; a quiet, serious individual who has a strong sense of justice and fights when necessary to protect anyone who is in danger, but never boasts about his fighting ability. His full potential is truly unknown...

Each of the Deities, in addition to being summonings capable of supporting their users in battle, also are capable of granting a special ability to their user. Deimos gives Justin the ability to interact with spirits. While this ability doesn't really help in combat, it is highly useful for the gathering of information.

Unholy Paladin

Hello!

As promised, today I am going to discuss the other series of mine, which I consider to be my life's work, Unholy Paladin.

First though, some background... the series began as just a project back in high school in which I was "modernizing" some of the Gods of ancient societies to create a sort of "superhero" fighting series which at the time was intended for a video game which my friends and I never got around to making. After the game project fell through, I decided to develop the characters and their stories to attempt to create an epic series not just about their fighting, but their daily lives as well. With nearly 30 major characters, coming up with unique stories for each of them has proven to be quite a challenge, but it is definitely worth it.

The basic plot revolves around the existence of "Deities," ancient beings which are capable of granting their abilities to a human whose soul is compatible with the Deity. The Deities return to Earth every so often whenever there is a major catastrophe or a need for their abilities. Usually, the users of the Deities do herioc deeds, and in ancient societies were worshipped as Gods; however, there are some Deity users who have abused their powers to gain power over normal people. The story involves a group of Deity users and their struggles against other people with the same type of power.

I can not reveal any major details about the epic story of this series just yet, but I can at least post information regarding a few of the major characters over the next few days.

Two series in the works at the moment

Hello! I felt it was time to start putting in details regarding the two projects that I am currently involved in, Trooper Blaze and Unholy Paladin.

Trooper Blaze is something I had been working on as far back as middle school (10 years ago, wow) and pretty much scrapped due to lack of interest / drawing ability. I decided to pull it back out from the archives and remake it due to the decent story and the potential that the story really has...

Trooper Blaze
It is the 23rd century. The Earth, after a series of wars that nearly destroyed the planet, has been unified under a centralized government, the Global Union of Nations (GUN). Humankind has begun expanding out into space due to the overpopulation of the Earth, and the world is nearing a socio-economic crash due to the lack of resources and space. A group of scientists notice an asteroid approaching the planet and attempt to warn the population. The GUN recieves the reports first, and decides that this would be the perfect means of controlling the population. A space mission is sent out to "deter" the asteroid from its course; however, the true intention of the mission is to steer it toward the planet. The general populace is told that they have been saved, and the GUN, in secret, begins a mass migration to the various space colonies; only taking important government officials, their families, scientists, and anyone else who they deem important enough to save, or has enough money.
After the disaster was to take place, the GUN was going to return to the planet and restore order; rebuilding the world and having less mouths to feed, thus leading to a happier global society. However, the consequences of the catastrophe were such that no one could forsee... over 80% of the human race on the planet was wiped out in the aftermath of the impact, and the climate of the planet has been so drastically altered that the Earth will become inhospitable to humans within less than a year. Also, without a significant government presence or any form of authority, those that remain have taken to struggling amongst themselves for what few necessities of life remain.
In the face of this disaster, the GUN decides that in order to restore order to the Earth and make it livable again, they would have to force the evolution of the human race in order to be able to adapt to the rapidly changing climate. Thus, the METAhuman Research Administration began (Mutation, Evolution, Total Adaptation of the Human Genome).
However, the experiments did not go as planned. The test subjects were culled from among the regular citizens aboard one of the space colonies; kidnapped and subjected to the genetic experimentation against their will due to the severity of the emergency. Some of the test subjects, whose modifications gave them excessive physical strength and endurance, decided to revolt against the GUN and its scientists in order to avenge their fellow test subjects who were failures and were eliminated as useless.
Shortly after, that colony begame overrun by inhuman monsters who declared their independence. The story begins when "Blaze," a soldier working for the GUN, is sent in to reclaim the colony and retrieve the research materials so that the human race can be saved before all life on Earth dies out.

The synopsis of Unholy Paladin will be coming soon!

Hello Everyone

I am Christopher, amateur musician and the creator of the independent comics Trooper Blaze and Unholy Paladin. I have made this blog as a place where I can come up with character and story ideas and whatnot and access these pieces of information from wherever I'm at, and to share the progress of my works with others who may be interested. I may also, from time to time, create posts where we can all complain about our dayjobs, share stories of ordinary life, or just discuss whatever comes into mind (it is the whole point of these things, afterall...).