2010 you’re sucking.
Falalalala new year is here! It started nicely, right? dozens of dead people in Pakistan, hundreds of dead people in Haiti, Italy is going crazy, people is poor but they’d kill to buy an X-BOX 360 on super-sale, I have no clue about what I’m going to do with my life and I need a new home.
Musicwise, these days I’m having sex with Tori Amos’ From the Choirgirl Hotel and with the live cd Still Orbiting (2nd disc coming with To Venus and Back), especially with the track Cruel from the latter. The only comment I can express is OMFG THANK YOU TORI FOR THIS. It’s really gorgeous, her voice was amazing, her music was passionate and visceral as any other. I love it with all myself.
Last december I enjoyed Midwinter Graces, her winter album. Winter’s Carol (listen here) is a little masterpiece, I warmly recommend this cd for the next christmas, is very intimate and interesting.
You know, I hate shopping. Or better, I like to buy stuff, but I hate crowds and people who goes to outlets and goes out for shopping only because they don’t know what to do. When I have to go for shops I like to walk and to look at the products relaxed and calmly, without worrying about people crashing on me, screaming abandoned children whose parents are talking with other people ignoring them, human walls of girls, scared dogs, people standing still in the middle of the way, 12 year girls dressed like they’re Paris Hilton and so on. Last saturday I went to IKEA in Florence to buy some kitchen stuff and a book shelf. I love IKEA so much, they have a lot of nice stuff and their customer service is just AWESOME (and always makes me think I better go to live in Sweden, there’s no other place in Italy with such a caring customer service - and I love their meat balls), but…there were millions people, kids, it was almost impossible to walk across the corridor without being killed by the crowd. I was so damn nervous and I forgot to buy some things 
Next time I’ll go on thursday.
Another place I love is a virtual place and it’s called Etsy (www.etsy.com). I discovered it thanks to some links on DA, and it’s a wonderful website! They sell only handmade stuff, from soap to food to furniture, clothes, jewellery, pottery and so many other things! Sellers are mostly from the US, but you can find even some shop from your country if you look for it. I found some awesome bio stuff (I’m entering the “go green where you can” mode - why should I remove make up with chemical stuff when olive oil does the same thing just better?), I’m waiting for my first orders to arrive :3 Try it!!
Some days ago I started to draw the first effective page of my comic, the one introducing Gaeda. I’m pretty satisfacted for now, when it’ll be ready I’ll publish it here.
With my boyfriend I’m planning a couple of funny projects, a strip comic called Geeksus and a full-page comic called FIENDS. The first one is supposed to be something geeky, the latter is geeky too, it’s some kind of “Dungeons&Dragons” version of the sit-com Friends, only with devils and demons as main characters. Let’s see what will come out!! (even because I’m SO SLOW - SO FUCKING SLOW AND LAZYYY!!!!!)
I worked a lot at the bar this month, a couple of people have been sick so I had to do extra work, but I’m pretty satisfied, I earned some plus money. I like my work, the only issue is the distance, I live 40 km far from Siena, and travelling by train two hours a day is tiresome…even because I work part-time 4 hours a day. But working as a barmaid is funny 
LOGO (and other stuff)
Every time I write a new blog entry I’m here telling myself “so, yay, I have something new to tell to myself! But what’s the subject of my post? What shall I put in the title?”. My brain always answer with silence. No life signs from the inner rooms.
I have a few things to say and I’m pretty sure no-one will read them, but I like to repeat stuff to myself:
-first, I’m trying to make up a new portfolio with some fresh stuff, I’m sick of these 2005-2007 works. That’s why I’m working a little on graphic stuff as logos and so on. I did an imaginary logo for exercise:
Hope you like it. It’s done in 3 hours, in Photoshop (I haven’t installed Illustrator on my PC after the format yet).
-All this blabbing above was apparently useless, because I’m still working on my comic’s logo and I keep on choosing a cool font and leave it as it is. Some logos are done this way too, but that’s not what I call a creative work.
-I decided I WILL NOT INK my comic, because I found the strenght to admit that I HATE INK, INK HATES me, and I’ll be faithful to my beloved mechanical pencil. Meybe I’ll go with some markers for the color illustrations. The concept for the first page is completed, now I have to refine it a little more, then I’ll make the final artwork and I’ll publish it here
-I own Tori Amos’ new album MIDWINTER GRACES, and I’m really loving it! Despite of the awful artwork and the bad mixing, the songs are better than I expected. This is for sure her best album since Scarlet’s Walk, the real gem is Winter’s Carol, if you have the opportunity just give it a listen, you’ll love its magic, oriental and wintery mood!
The album is so badly promoted, it’s hard to find it in stores even if it’s been released around November 20. You won’t find any official video around, aside of this supernice live of Pink&Glitter
So, listen to it, and if you like it, buy it Just ignore the cover artwork.
“Imago.Vocis” progress and TUTORIAL!
Weheh, I’m pretty confident these days. I bought two awesome books written by ScottMcCloud: “Understanding Comics” and “Making Comics”. They’re so nicely done, since they’re in comic format and they explain you clearly the things to know to make good comics. I really recommend them if you want to try comics too.
Then I bought the 2nd issue of ImagineFX (italian edition) and I found a lot of useful advices, especially about colors and composition.
Yesterday I was trying to use the nib pen. I found I like it, even if I always tought I didn’t. Probably, I’m gonna draw my comic traditionally, with ink and pen, but I need to check some waterproof ink and the right paper, because I want to make shades and greys with faber-castell’s Pitt Pens. If I’ll change my mind about this greys issue, I’ll make them digitally.
I’m still not sure about color stuff. I own ecolines and letraset markers (a few ) but I don’t feel I can handle any color medium well. I check tutorial and stuff, but I miss practice. And now I wave brick dust falling on the glass surface of my desk from the ceiling -.- One day I’ll get my awesome drawing station.
Anyway, the whole story is developing well, every day richer ^^
Some days ago I did my very first tutorial about drawing, here it is:
How to make a comic.
It takes very long, even to make a single page, especially when you’re not used to it anymore. And when you come home every evening more tired.
Doing comics is an art, and I have to learn this art. I’m going further with the story. Now I know how I’ll begin! It will be like:
*nice view of a sunset over the city”
“So, magnificent, I’m here because I blah blah blah blah! I’ve been wronged!”
“Uhm, yeah, that’s cool but I can do anything about it. So shut up and leave my office, lady.”
“…but!!”
“I said, please, STFU and leave because I have to go home playing Wii.”
“Ah, ok.”
If only I could have some holidays I could use them to start the final phase of drawing, but I HAD NO FUCKING HOLIDAYS So it will take long…but I’m creating characters!! I’m even studying physics to make some nice abilities for makers 
Whee! Physics is so fascinating!
Oh, and I’m gonna make a better logo for the comic, something steampunkish, left aside that my comic will not be THAT steampunk. Honestly I’m still confused about its level of steampunkishness XD
Imago.Vocis
Yeah, I’m going firther with it, now I have a logo too XD
There is a sort of secondary title, “The white path”, it’s a thing I can’t explain now, it should be a surprise when the first half of the comic will come to an end. I like this secondary title because it’s full of symbolism if related to the happenings in the comic plot.
I’ve written the storilyne 1.0, the undetailed version. Now I’m writing the 1.5, where I add details about the development of the plot. I decided the alphabet used by my main character’s realms will be similar to the gothic alphabet , and read bustrophedonically. At first I thought about it to be read from the bottom to the top of the page, from left to right, but my boyfriend objected that the gothic alphabet wouldn’t fit that system graphically, and I agreed. Then I found this cool thing that is boustrophedon
Sometimes I wander if I’m thinking too much about the setting of the story, but I’m enjoying doing thins work, it gives me more stuff to use to built the plot.
I think I found a nice way to begin, the only problem is that I’m forgetting that my characters have a sort of magic ability XD I made this abilities to be limited, not too strong and not x-menish, not heroesish, not d&dish. They’re less powerful, less spectacular but more intriguing and complicated. I have to learn something more about magneticism, optic and that stuff. And yeah, one of my main character’s ability will be ruled and determinated almost completely by will and fortune, especially the last one. So we’ll see a lot of nice failures by Lillie. I love flaws.
Music is helping me so much, I’m finding that I can interpret some songs to make them fit my story, like Porcelain Heart from Opeth, Everdream from Nightwish, Strong Black Vine and Starling from Tori Amos (but she’s so damn inspiring anyway…oh, I love you damn, damn Tori!), Illusion and Dream from Poets of the Fall and so on.
And I have to fix in my mind that my story is NOT medieval. It’s AFTER their medieval age.
Oh, and I want a new job, I’m sick of being cheated. Here is full of people weeping about thiefs, but they’re thief themselves. I hate hypocrites.
Tori Amos and comic progress
I just love Tori. She’s always inspiring, once you get to know her music you can’t leave her. Last month her 10th studio album has been released, the title is Abnormally Attracter to Sin. After several listenings, I dare to say this is WAY better than her 2 previous albums, The Beekeeper and American Doll Posse. Here I can recognize Tori Amos once again, maybe an opaque Tori, but it’s her indeed. Her voice isn’t fresh as it was 10 years ago, her face is full of botox and so on, but I feel her in this album, after 5 years. Here you can find some samples of her new songs (but do not forget to listen her past albums, all of them are musical wonders): http://www.imeem.com/dialogs/standaloneplaylist/?k=X870P_iBZH
From AATS I can recommend the following songs: Give, Welcome to England, Flavor, Curtain Call, Lady in Blue, Abnormally Attracted to Sin, Fast Horse, Starling.
I think Tori did some marketing mistakes this time. If you browse Youtube videos, you’ll never find any video of one of her new songs, except of the singles. They say it’s copyright. But how can I share your music on, let’s say Facebook or my blog if I can’t find any link to your music to share?? That’s just stupid. How can people will “accidentally” listen to your music (without seeing that shitty WTE visualette)? AATS has sold less than ADP, and it doesn’t deserve such poor sales, because is a very good album.
Talking about me, I finished the map for my comic (you’ll find it in the Exposition section, under the comic category), I’ve found a name for it which will be IMAGO VOCIS, and I’m trying to write the storyline. I hate beginnings. I hate them so so deeply. I’m starting to becoming confused, because there is a lot of stuff going on, I’m thinking about plot, storyline, geographical issues, situations, religions, systems, rites, blah blah blah…it’s too much @@ I have to find some priority. I think I’ll start sketching some page this week. Let’s see.
Cersei Finished!!
Yay! Now the finished pic of Cersei is uploaded in the “Exposition” section, under “Commissions” (follow this link: Cersei Lannister ).
These are the main “work in progress” steps : WIP
It’s weird to look how the final result looks different prom the previous step!
And this is a closeup of the face: Cersei closeup
Cersei progress!
Oh!!! And now she has an expression!!!!!!!
Cersei/ArtRage
I think I’m going to leave Cersei aside for a while, until my sense of detail improves. I’m quite happy of how it’s turning out, but I don’t want to hurry and risk to finish it badly. The jewels will be a challenge!
I tried to place something on the background, such as Taena Merrywaether, but I like the empty space with the write 
This is a free commission for the pople who voted me for “Miss barriera 2009″, not a wannabe piece of art.
I recently discovered the painting software “ArtRage 2″, I found the essential version on a cd coming with a magazine. I-LOVE-IT! It’s a sort of simplified Painter with an intuitive and good looking interface, the full version is pretty cheap (the download version is 25$). At a first try I was in panic because I couldn’t find the way to save pics in jpg o bmp format, but the I discovered the “export as image” feat…
This is a picture I started yesterday; it’s not finished yet, but I’ve adjusted the colors in photoshop to make this jpg for my blog (the original version is a little less saturated):
Anyway, I love the way colors blend together!!
I’m afraid of becoming addicted to software, leaving aside traditional medias I’ve always wanted to use, such as ecoline, markers and watercolors. But, maybe, if I improve my color sense with digital media I’ll do a better use of the traditional ones. Who knows.