Triple whammy

Two composition sketches for future illustrations and then a doodle.

 

Have a happy New Year(s eve)!

What'chu wuhnt?

I enjoy Duscan and I enjoy hands.

12/28 + 12/29

DOUBLE PICTURE POST because I forgot to scan in yesterday's sketch.  It hasn't even been a week and I'm already failing at this.  I'm sure once I get used to the schedule, I'll be able to keep up with it.  Just need to get used to it.

ANYWAYS!!

The airgear female fan character again as well as a male one I came up with back in 2008.

I am totally capable of drawing obligatory-women-in-water-and-bathing-suit pictures as well!

Day 3(.5)

Well, it's still Tuesday in California, right?

...right??

Anyways, here's a character-clothing design I've had floating around in my head for a while.

Monday's Post 20minutes late

Oops.  I just didn't get around to scanning the sketch until late, I swear!

A fan-character of mine from the Air-Gear universe.  Wanted to play around with dynamic perspectives.

Now on to watching the third season of Battlestar Galactica while inking chapter 5 of OcculTango, hahaha.

New Beginning

It has been a long while since I posted here (oops), but that's all about to change.
From now on, I will be doing a 'sketch-a-day' post.  The subtext is that the sketch has to be something I'm actually satisfied with.
So, yeah!  Frequent posts from now on!
Maybe in a month or so, I'll start doing an 'illustration-a-week' post as well as recording myself working on them to make an sped-up video of the process for people to view.  The logistics of that will be figured out once I'm actually ready to do it.  I want to get comfortable with the sketch stuff first.

So, without further ado, the sketch to start us off!

A character I've been playing around with for a couple months.  Her outfit, so far, has remained relatively unchanged, but I will be changing it around a lot until I'm ready to introduce her (probably around the summer-fall next year).  Expect to see more of her from now on.

OcculTango Volume 1 is here!!

(11/5 -Price edit!)

I just received the books yesterday and I am really happy with how they've turned out!

 

The books are standard comic book size (NOT manga, as indicated by the size comparison).

The books feature chapters 1-4 as well as 4 exclusive illustrations, 3 sketch/note pages, and the 2-page comic that started this all!

I will be selling 16 of the books at MiX (Minneapolis Indie Comic Expo) on November 5th and 6th.  If you are unable to attend and want a book, you can reserve a copy by emailing me at cbutterbaugh(at)gmail(dot)com.

The book is $10 + shipping (which is around $5 for US residencies).  It will also include a personalized sketch of your choosing.

Alive!

I'm still here, I promise!
There hasn't been too much that I can talk about here since I'm only working on getting the first volume of OcculTango finished and nothing else.  I'll actually be able to work on random illustrations once this thing is finished.  It's going to be a super crunch, but I'll manage and get it done on time; there's no other option.

Here's a teaser panel from chapter 3 so that I'm not completely disappointing anyone.

Watch out, ladies!

OcculTango Ch.1 Book Sale

So, I was rummaging through my OcculTango stuff, trying to organize it, and I found the two chapter 1 books that were on display for my senior project. I'm willing to part with one of them if anyone wants to buy it for $5 (+ shipping costs if you're not close enough for me to hand it to you). I'll throw in a personalized illustration and sign the book (if you want). The covers are a little scruffed from being handled, but... yeah... I'm not going to print anymore of these.

If a lot of people want it, I may offer the second one as well and make this a random raffle thing...

Keep in mind that the 1st Volume of the series (Ch1-4 + exclusive illustrations and notes) will be available at the beginning on November.

OcculTango is finally here!!

Yup yup yup!
As the title suggests, the OcculTango webcomic sit is finally live!
I hope you all read it and give it a chance because I've put a lot of work and time into this project!
It updates every Monday, but it will switch to a 2-day/week update in about a month or so.

ComicGenesis is being janky right now, so to get to the second page of the comic (not including cover), you'll have to go through the archive page.  Sorry for the inconvenience :/

Aloha!

I just recently got back from a family vacation in Hawai'i!  We mostly stayed on the island of Kaua'i and it is so unbelievably beautiful and nice there.  I've made it a goal to find a way to live there for at least a few years before I get too old, hahaha.

Anyways, that's why there hasn't been an update for a while and I haven't gotten too much work done on OcculTango, hahaha...

My goal is to have the first volume done by the end of October in time for MiX.  I would have preferred there to be five chapters per volume, but because of my vacation and how long these chapters take to make, I think I will only be able to manage four.  However, I will have a good amount of bonus material in the book to make up for it :)

I guess here's a sneak peek for chapter 2 to tide you guys over:

Love All, Trust A Few

The title of the second chapter of OcculTango.
I should be able to finish the first 5 pages by the end of the day.
Because of my trip to Hawaii, and other unplanned obstacles, I probably won't be able to finish the second chapter by June 30th.  Instead, I should have it done before July 7th.
This is pretty frustrating for me because I like to keep to the schedules I set.  If I get behind, I get stressed out.  I'm trying not to worry about it too much, though, since I already have the 3rd chapter scripted out and can start thumbnailing it at any point (the time I set to figure out the summary is going to be used for finishing up the 2nd chapter.  Yay time management!).

Here's a crappy webcam photo of part of my workspace right now!

My cup of water and blue tape are hidden in that dark void there, ahaha.

Regret by Mai Hoshimura

One of the ending songs to the anime D.Gray-Man.  An absolutely fabulous manga and anime.
I'm listening to part of the OST while working on my new project:  Fanart of Lavi from said story.

 

D.Gray-Man has always been one of those comics that really inspired me.  I am never disappointed by how the storyline progresses because the writer really knows how to get you attached to the characters.  You feel for them and hope for happy endings; even though the story is relatively depressing.

Gift Art 2/3

I'm really really happy with this piece.
Like.
You have no idea.

Gonna have my bluelines for OcculTango printed out and ready to ink by the end of tomorrow/today (Thursday).

Art Cram

I was super productive today, guys!
I got two illustrations finished.  Just in time to work on mooorreee~

A gift for Tris on the irowiki forums:

 

And a Bryna cover illustration.  I will, hopefully, have at least 3 volumes worth of chapters of OcculTango by the time I finish it so that I can have each of the main characters on a volume cover.  Bryna will be volume 2 and Duscan volume 3.

 

I'm also almost done with the pencils for chapter 2!  Then I can scan, tidy up, print bluelines, and start inking!  You're going to see a lot more of Bryna in chapter 2 and Duscan will be making silly faces.

Bryna WIP

Since I'm a little ahead on pencils, I decided to take a break and work on some digital stuff.  I need to start working on posters, illustrations, and other collectibles to sell at conventions and such anyways.
I decided to continue the cover illustration of Kael into a series with each other main characters.  The one I'm working on now is Bryna's.  I'm not quite sure what I want to surround Duscan at the moment and so that one may be a while before getting done.
Anyways, a work-in-progress screenshot:

I've also got some ideas for bookmarks, but I have to plan that out a bit more before more information is available.

Fan-Art and WIP

Some fan-art for a friend.  He was requesting we draw some fan-art so that he can publish it with his comic once it's done.  I wanted to color it, but my friend only has inks and stuff :c

 

I also have an in-progress illustration I've been working on for a while.  Here's a screenshot:

 

I'll be adding a nice, forest-y background to it as well.

Animatic, Ankle Boots, and OcculTango Ch 2!

As promised, here's the animatic I created for my storyboard final:

And here's a sketch of what I would look like in the Panty&Stocking universe.  My name would be Ankle Boots, I think.

I want to make a short mini-comic in this style some time.  Just have to figure out what it would be about!

I've also started penciling the second chapter of OcculTango!  Once I get this chapter complete, I'll finally be able to go live with the graphic novel on the web!  I'm really excited about this story and hope you all enjoy it!

OcculTango Storyboards

A few boards from the storyboard animatic I'm working on featuring my OcculTango crew.  The animatic is about one and a half minutes long.  I'll post the entire thing once it's completely finished.
I've been really excited about anything that has to do with my OcculTango story, so I hope you guys will enjoy it just as much once it finally goes live!

Reminiscing

An illustration inspired by the song 'Your Hand In Mine' by Explosions in the Sky and the word 'reminisce'.

The overlay paper texture can be found here.

Page 10 Process: Base Inks

Here's an image of the 'first step' of my inks.  I basically just get all the lines down before blocking in major blacks.  Depending on what the black spotting is doing, I may just lay it in as I drop the linework in (i.e. shadows on clothes/hair).  I guess it depends on my mood?

Page 10 Process: Beginning

Here's a webcam photo of page 10 of my senior project.  This is what my finished pencils look like right before I put ink to paper.  I add cleaned up word balloons and text in photoshop before printing the pencils out again and adding additional details in pencil.  The font I'm using for the dialogue is called Mighty Zeo Capitols.  I got it from one of the free font sites.  The shape and visual characteristics of the letters fit with the feeling of the story and complimented the font face used for the title.

The next post will be a 50% done inks photo.

Say 'Hello' to the Hero

Here's a sketch of the main character of OcculTango.
He's shirtless because I can.
I might finish this one day when I feel like I have free time.

 

He's supposed to be of Korean descent.

Sometimes he looks it, other times, not as much, haw.

I sketch in blue pencil, so that's why everything is going to be blue.

Introduction

I guess I should give some sort of introduction to myself before making "real" posts.  Especially since this blog has been sitting here for about a week with nothing on it.  I'll get around to editing the layout and what not later when I have time.

Since the temporary site all students are given at my college will be disappearing upon my graduation this May, I figured I should set up a blog to act as a transitional website until I can afford my own domain.  I will still keep the blog once I do get my domain, so there's no fear of this being abandoned.

This blog will be an archive of my processes for illustrations and comic pages as well as a dump for stupid--but hopefully amusing--sketches.

My senior project is currently taking up almost every minute of my life, and so that will be the main focus of this blog for a while.  It's a 20page comic (with an added inside cover and splash page) that will be finished around mid-April and--hopefully--be in print before May.  It's the first chapter of my story titled 'OcculTango' and will be continued via webcomic after my graduation; so look out for that!

The next post will have sketches, or something, so stay tuned.
I hope to entertain you readers.
Until next time!