corvarrow | Entries tagged with project log

tumblr completely fucked up my vibes the last two days with that update debacle, which also kinda fucks with my ability to draw. I'm trying to counter this by working on some text based stuff instead (website, this blog). This post is now way out of my normal dreamwidth posting hours, lmao

Website Stuff

Finished reuploading Lost Kingdoms art challenge 2023. The little thumbnails look super satisfying all together, including the one that just links to the list. I'm very happy with how that looks.
Finished changing all internal links to relative. I would like to go back through and update some of the formatting HTML like "i" -> "em" and "b" -> "strong" but it's less of an annoyance so thats kind of a "whenever" project. I know these tags are antiquated though I'm not exactly sure why/why the longer tag is preferred over the shorter one. Oh well. I'm just trying my best to make it sort of correct.
Going back to working on the Places page though I am half tempted to start throwing out character pages at this point too. A lot of the more minor character ones should be fairly short; I'm not doing full writeups on anyone here o_o a
There is also even more stuff I wish to drop hints about but I do not know the best way to do this very specific one I have in mind. At least, not without potentially hinting something thats easy to make the wrong conclusion

Art Projects

Got a really stupid doodle of Thynarail from the other day. I was having this thought about xem getting a communication from an Elder Wyrm just to check in, and just continuing to be kind of a shit about everything. I don't know why, but I just feel in my bones xey would answer a phone with "Moshi Moshi", so its a picture of xem yelling into a phone. What a mysterious piece of art
Otherwise I am feeling plagued by this sketchbook I don't like but feel the need to finish. It's got like 40 pages left. Really, really need to think of a way to burn through these.
Even like a mini challenge would be okay, at least its something

Worldbuilding Stuff

More details about canon AU have been hammered down. It is definitely frontloaded with angst stemming from the events of the original timeline past and present, though it gets much better later. There are now characters that exist specifically in this AU and have defined names and personalities (such as Temporal Wake, who is one of Aki's daughters.) What have I done
Well anyway the main worldbuilding ponderings are going fine as usual. There is so much going on my general approach is different stories that take place in different locations and periods of time. Some of them are connected and some aren't. There is a bit of a through line but its not like a big one and done story
I also usually stew for a bit and then suddenly write like I have been possessed.

Current Music: Bleeding Binary ~ NoRinTon

Website Stuff

In the middle of reuploading my Lost Kingdoms 2023 art challenge! Took a while to get the pages staged but finishing them off and posting is going fast
Also doing a general maintenance update and fixing all internal references to relative rather than absolute. Basically the headers and navbars were hard referencing the neocities.org pages and there's no reason to do that. I work on my PC and then import them, and the folders have the exact structure as the live site so. Doesn't need to be looking at online stuff until it's actually online.
Got ANOTHER curio idea... this one is probably the easiest on a technical level but it would be one that would basically go up and be ongoing/open forever. (I will spoil it slightly and say it's basically "where selected writing snippets go and where future ones would be stored")

Art Projects

Managed to color in Thynarail without ruining the drawing (which was an actual concern) aaaand now I'm back on the "What do I draw" path. I did at least determine that Thynarail is kinda rancid LOL. Kind of dig it because I don't have a lot of shit personality characters. Not a full antagonist (I get bored of Big Bads), just a rude-ass person.

Other Stuff

I got an extremely Big Brained idea last night. I have tons of writing stored online between Ellipsus and LegendKeeper. I also now have the power of HTML and CSS. There is really nothing stopping me from making an offline worldbuilding/story website for my use only with full details and organization. (as opposed to the stuff I pick and choose to put online). BUT DO I HAVE THAT KIND OF MOTIVATION....? that is the true question.
Video games! Playing two at once right now. #1 is Boyfriend Dungeon, which is...okay. I like the characters for the most part but the pacing is strange as fuck. There are three dungeons, I'm not even done with the second dungeon, but it seems like I can go see the final boss now, on the overworld, if I want. okaaaay. Game #2 is Lushfoil Photography Sim. Basically several locations IRL have been recreated in LAVISH detail, and you just walk around in them, taking pictures. There are challenges where you are presented with like 6 pictures and you have to go find those spots and take the picture, but really the main point of the game is just wander around and try to get pretty shots. I had bought it to take my own "reference photos" where I can control the lighting, but it's just very relaxing.

Current Music: Brand New Phone - New Arcades & The Bad Dreamers

Website Stuff

More or Less finished the races/species section for the moment. Lots of shenanigans to be found in those pages actually! Some more obvious than others. Much I did not even get into 8D
So yeah started the Places section! I am hoping most pages will also be quick but we'll find out.
I may also start reuploading more old art soon, like my ink challenge... maybe even add directors cut notes
Also thinking about adding a misc page with a bunch of art reference links. I have a lot bookmarked in my browser but having it organized on the site would actually be more convenient for me. plus others could use them!

Art Projects

Much I want to work on but feeling kinda tired/uninspired at the moment 😅 Trying not to force myself to do anything but it's hard
Hopefully I can finish a doodle I have going on tonight...Thynarail redesign. I have decided xey were not weird enough for fungal space dragon so I gave xem more flesh ribbons and mushrooms 🤣 and a new muzzle so they look more consistent with Nybrieth. Also: upgraded the pronouns. the old ones were not feeling correct

Other Stuff

Played two different Nancy Drew games over the weekend! 🤣 That is two more things off the backlog. Thankfully those games are usually pretty short
Fell up some stairs and bruised both knees and an arm. Currently super sore and kind of stiff

Website Stuff

Nearly done with phase 1 of the races/species section! Just need to do Sovereigns and then I'll move onto another section. I may do some of the locations next. I think those pages should be relatively quick since I'm not really adding a bunch of new art right now. Like the some of the other pages a lot of art DOES exist but I don't want to add it at this moment. Along with wanting to make some new pieces anyway it's way too easy to get caught in the weeds digging though my files.
The sion pages were tricky since my note documents on both ancient and modern are HUGE. There's a lot I left out, like ancient sions also having internal organ shenanigans going on. I just really did not want to play Compare And Contrast with both sion versions as I don't think that type of presentation is particularly interesting, and they are separate peoples anyway...
I had a list of new Curio ideas going but I thought of a new one this morning...I don't want to reveal what it is just yet but it is my FAVORITE so far, and unlike some of the other ones I don't have to go on a coding dive to learn how to do it; I already know. The only downside is it too, will once again require a shitton of art, and probably of different styles this time, so I'm like....HmmmMMMM. big think.

Art Projects

Just did a bunch of meme redraws over the weekend. Really happy with those, got them done fast and they're very silly. Probably going to do another batch before I move on to something else
That something else is TBD. Still wanting to make a nice painted piece of some kind but I'm also half tempted to see how fast I can pull together some new critter species refs. When I was putting the Bolt page together on my website I realized their original refs were old enough to drive a car 😭

Current Music: Where We Go - New Arcades

Website Updates

In an attempt to """procrastinate""" the sion info pages I ended up writing all the other initial species pages...it was like 8 of them in a couple days.
I did end up STARTING working on modern sions today and ooohhh boy. I have pages and pages and pages worth of notes so I was just going to do a summary. I thought I was going to be clever about this though, because MANY years ago I did a little species sheet which summarized them at the time, so here I was thinking I could just crib my own old summary. It turns out, because I'm not super precious about my lore and revise stuff that I don't like anymore or doesn't work, it has been revised so much that barely any of the original ref sheet is usable. Whoops.
Oh Well. I'm looking at this again and I agree with all the stuff I dropped, lmao. They are much more interesting now, to me. Just stinks that I am going to have to freshly attempt to summarize things without getting too far into the weeds or like, spoilers. There's so much stuff that I just have to dodge writing about. Like a couple extra secret subtypes besides just Architects! I just hope that I can drop enough hints throughout the whole website for people to pick up what is actually going on as far as Ahveph and modern sions go

Other News

Well In other news I have been working at it all month (January) but I finally finished BALL x PIT and got all the current achievements! It just got a free DLC update with new characters, but there aren't any cheevos tied to them.....yet. I played them a little bit (Falconer is S tier omg) but I don't think I have the strength to go through all the levels again right now. Great game though
Need to finish Lies of P next. I got mostly through the DLC but stopped at the secret boss to obsess over BALL x PIT. I am not super thrilled by that boss so I might just skip it. Otherwise I think its a cool game. Really dig what they have going on with the narrative and can't wait to actually finish the game just to see where it goes.
Unknown what game next! I want to work through some of the stuff I already have installed but I already forgor

Current Mood: sleepy
Current Music: ラブレスナイト (Loveless Night) by Dan Mason

Website Updates

Finished phase 1 of several character pages (Tower, Torch, Cavi, Aki, Sy) and am currently switching gears to work on some other worldbuilding pages
Phase 1.5~2 is going to include adding a "guest art" section for trades, commissions, etc. I'm still deciding where exactly it's going to be. Currently the galleries are in the middle of the page so people I'm getting art from don't have to go that far to find it. I could either add a section there or stick it at the bottom to break it up a little. Still pondering.
I am also specifically thinking about Sy with this issue. Being such an old character whose design has not really changed, he has an absolute fucking shitton of art, by me and by others. I'll pick and choose my art to re-upload but I'm not sure how much other's art to do 🤔
I got some of the species pages done yesterday and am currently working on some more. Doing my best to procrastinate the sion pages even though they are probably the most critical ones 🤣🤣 The reality plane page is also going to be short so I'll probably end up doing that first too

Current Art Projects

Been sorta tired this last week so I've been focusing more on writing + neocities rather than drawing
Yesterday when I was writing the page about Bolts I had a Vision of a hairless breed bolt. Wrinkly hairless creature as big but much longer than a man, and its blobbed all over your couch. Truly awful. Love it, might need to draw it now

Current Music: The Slayer - StreamCatcher

Website Updates

Added a bunch of worldbuilding pages and put stuff ON them ~ they're mostly lists for now and will need to be rearranged but at least it's SOMETHING to look at in that corner of the site.
Took a while but I also finished putting together a template page for the character pages. I don't think it's going to be too hard to adapt it for other pages (like species). The most challenging part by far was making the flexible image galley with captions, lmao.
On that note I put together Tower's page! The majority was simply transferred over from toyhouse, and I want to add more images and stuff later but it still looks soooo fancy. The one Not Found placeholder image is planned to be a portrait in the same color scheme as the rest of the site, but since I don't have any of those done right now I thought it would be cool and mysterious to leave them in place.

Current Art Projects

My Aki color test looks pretty good! At this point it's basically going to be turned into a ref sheet. I figured that there is so much going on with this canvas it would be silly not to. I need to ponder over a couple more things but otherwise I think everything is pretty much ready to be rearranged and typed around.
Next projects - uhhh, get back to doing some traditional sketching, need to get the character portraits on the radar. Also want to do some location doodles and general finished pieces.

Worldbuilding Stuff

I think I just cursed myself yesterday. Right so I had the two main settings, which was the ancient world and the modern world. The ancient world basically had one event that set off a series of events, eventually leading to a cataclysm and that's why we have the modern world.
HOWEVER ☝️ I had a side AU going where things did not completely go to shit and things can be cute etc
HOWEVER HOWEVER!! ☝️☝️I realized yesterday that I have enough Time magic bullshit going here that I can make this completely plausible as an ALTERNATE TIMELINE. Like actually an alternate timeline in another universe. The ancient world happens, then the modern world happens, then Aki (don't worry about this lol) gets catapulted into the other timeline but before any of the bad stuff happened. Except that he does still remember the original events and can stop them.
So now we can have that setting with all the cute for reals, but now. Additional angst. That Aki seems a little different (to everyone else) and they can't put their finger on why
This is also why I love original worldbuilding. Anything is canon if you just try hard enough lol

Current Music: One Million Voices - Thomas Bergersen

Website Updates:

Almost done uploading 2024 Art! Took a while but I think I'm getting the process down. Slowly working out how to do lots of alt text.
2023 and older art is going to be lumped on one page. I will once again share the 2023 ink challenge I did but this time it gets to be in its own section
However I think I'm going to pause on the art section and start working on the worldbuilding pages a little, especially the character pages. I want to link to mentioned characters ON the art they are in and I really want to get those going before I have a million art pages that need correction later.

Current Art Projects

Finally made a new icon! Made several different backgrounds actually. As predicted long ago it didn't actually take that long; I spent waaaay more time thinking about it than actually doing it.
Aki outfit ponderings - Got sidetracked trying to do the new icon before the new year, and also tired from lots of furniture moving (no new renovations for this year THANK goodness). But! Still in the works. I need to come up with a good pose for the last one. Kinda want to do a sword drawn type of thing so we're in the Pose Research phase.
Want to start another art challenge or a mini prompt challenge or SOMETHING but haven't fully decided yet. Some sort of "project" is brewing.
On that thought I would like to finish more character art this year. With "Cool Lighting" ™️. That's all I got so far.

Website Updates

Finished catching up the 2025 art page for now, now I can do the 2024 page, then I can do anything older on a catch-all page. I just don't like huge walls of images so this approach works pretty well for me.
The whole website is starting to look pretty respectable now! I am pleased.

Current Art Projects

Working on drawing Aki's different clothing layers so that I can get a better idea of what he's actually wearing as well as do a proper color test. I'm REALLY happy with the main drawing, probably the most accurate one of him so far.
Need to think about finally updating my icon art... 🤣 It always doesn't take very long I just need to sit down and do it. Plus I already know I just want to do the exact same thing but with my new sona instead.
I don't really like my current sketchbook at all (it's a leuchtturm) but I hate just abandoning sketchbooks, especially since it's already halfway filled. Trying to come up with something to do that will start using up pages quickly.

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Stranger Days - Midnight Danger

Busy couple of weeks! Finally signed up for neocities and started building my website up. Still needs a lot of work but at least it looks really pretty!
https://corvarrow.neocities.org

Curio #1 Progress

This is finally done! I can now reveal that I was painting a first-person maze, and strung it together on a bunch of webpages so it would be navigable.
Basically no-lifed the whole last week working on the last stages
Took a long time overall but I'm really proud that I Did It and it looks cool.
https://corvarrow.neocities.org/Main/Curios/C1Tunnels/Intro

Website - Next Stages

Definitely have ideas for more curios (next one will not be a maze, lol) but they need to stew for a while, plus it's stuff I Definitely don't know how to pull off without a lot of research
I want to work on the character pages but I feel like I should do the Art page next as it's prooobably less work to make it look presentable
At some point I want to make some worldbuilding graphics in the same color scheme so it matches the rest of the site, though I don't want everything to be in the same colors

Other Projects

Now that I've finished that big thing I think I should treat myself. Time to draw a bunch more Aki's
Need to finish the outfit exploration/breakdown I started before forcing myself to prioritize the maze
After that I think he needs a ref sheet, for Reasons

Site Entry Art

After many, many thumbnails and ponderings I FINALLY came up with a satisfactory image. It's going to be one of my Citadelean Questing Beasts sotting near a sign
Looks pretty good so far! I decided to try to mirror the pose of the 404 art so they'll hopfully look nice next to each other.
Initial lineart is done; next step is to do a quick layer in ink and then start painting

I then made the mistake of announcing "this won't take as long as the 404 art! I don't plan on pausing for video games!" and then a monkey's paw curled somewhere and the universe bestowed upon me KITTENS
Like
We were planning on getting some new cats later because my boy Mister has been lonely since his sister passed away but I guess the cat distribution system decided we needed to have them now. Anyway we now have 12-week-old Iris and 6-month-old Lily. They're both tuxedos but Iris seems to be a domestic longhair, and I think Lily might be an oriental shorthair or a mix of one. Lily is possibly the most laid back cat I have ever personally met; she is completely unbothered by everything and loves to cuddle and gently touch with her paws. Iris is microscopic; probably weighs less than an average tissue box, is very much "I'M BABY!!" and alternates between being a little fairy princess and being a menace, and needs a lot of attention either way. Mister is scared of them both but we're hoping he'll warm up sooner rather than later. Otherwise they have been settling in very well!

Bummer that I haven't been able to work on anything the last several days, but that's okay C: it will still be there.

Current Mood: chipper

Update time! I feel like I should set a timer for every two weeks or something but I just have so many timers

Banner Art

Completed, final title is Unknown Territory
This went through sooo many iterations before I landed on that design, which was one of the first ones I came up with. However once I committed it came together really fast and looks soooo sick IRL. Very proud of it

Site Entry Art

This is the last piece I need to do before I'll be satisfied enough to start actually building the website (and move on with Curio #1, stuck in it's holding pattern lol)
Basically the image that's going to serve as the entryway page/ click here to get into the rest of the site. Not a strictly necessary thing but. I wanna.
Color scheme is going to be consistent with the banner and 404 art, and the overall shape and size being close to the 404 art
Still working on thumbnails...I had a couple of older ideas but I really want to try to continue the vibes of like, just really eerie dreamy spaces (my beloved)

Other Art

Giving myself a quick break from the website assets and having an OC interlude
I DECIDED...I fucking love Akiyohm but drawing them has been a chicken/egg situation. I don't draw them that much because IDK what's going on with the bangs, and IDK what's going on with the bangs because I don't draw them that much. SO. *slaps hands on the table* I started a page in procreate where I just drew them a bunch of times to try to work it out, and do some expressions while I was at it. I don't know if it's still 100% where I want it but I definitely got closer to what I was feeling, plus it's not really that far off from some older attempts
Plus, I just really, really like how most of these expressions turned out xD so silly and cute
Aaand on top of that I decided to throw some loose color on because working in their color scheme has also been on my list, so I'm feeling better about that too. I still need to play around with the outfit design but that's for another day

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Entropy - Dos Brains

404 Image Progress

Completed, final title is "Are You Lost?"
Cleaned up, prepared for website

Banner Image

Worked through a couple different thumbnails, think I have one that's going to work.
Ideally I'd like to be able to resize/reuse it for multiple places (DA banner for example)
Trying very hard not to overcomplicate it though. It is probably going to have a bunch of leaves on it; even more so than the 404 image lmao

Other news

Apparently my salt was so great that I started on and off playing NG+ on FF14, starting with ARR. Yes, all the way to the beginning lol. Actually, its extremely enjoyable at x10 speed when you can fly everywhere and solo all duties they give you in 3 min or less. I now remember why I liked this game. I feel like I can focus on the story more, they really throw a lot at you while expecting you to Vibe for a bit on the different maps.
Felt like playing an FPS so I picked out Singularity from my backlog. Aside from no subtitles and some weird control mapping (which you can rebind), I like it a lot so far. Too bad it undersold when it was released!

Current Music: Peacefulness ~ Sibewest

Curio #1 Progress

Finished the intro/outro panels and scanned them
Whole project is now just waiting to be cleaned up
Still need to work on the writing but that's less of a Task than drawing all these out imo

404 Image Progress

This wasn't part of the original plan BUT there is a reason on Curio #1 you could end up on a page that doesn't exist, so I thought I'd better design a custom 404 image
I love the "abandoned computer in foliage" aesthetic so I went with that but used Torch in plant dragon form instead
One pass of lines is done, just enough for me to be able to see what I'm doing in ink.
Also did the initial wash this weekend and remembered why I don't like the purple Scotch brand washi tape... it's only good for basic masking, you can't tape down paper with it as it can't handle anything that buckles. Boooooo

Current Music: Patience - Exapunks OST

Project Update: "Curio #1"

Panels have been scanned and moved into the project folder. Just awaiting cleanup and resizing
Still need to do the intro/outro panels but they are planned for after artfight currently

Other Projects

Currently still engaged in artfight. Goal this year was "more than 5", currently ON #5 so we're on track for meeting it. We'll see what I end up doing because...

Other News

Received some bad news about one of my cats today. She... might not have much time left so I'm still trying to process that.

Current Mood: sad

First Post! I've been meaning to make this journal for a while. Ideally I would like to use this to documents thoughts/projects a little more. I do tend to do this on my tumblr but I don't like rambling there that much. Since this is a journal site I'm going to take advantage and. Ramble in my journal. In the future I'd also really like to integrate this into my future website but we'll see!

Project Update: "Curio #1"

This is also for my eventual website and is...I guess it can be classified as "experimental web art" for now. The actual content is still a secret, BUT
As of last night the bulk of the art is done. I still need to do intro and outro pieces (as well as scan and clean up everything) but this is still a huge milestone as I've been working on those for weeks now. I think that turned out really cool so I hope others like them too! (my brother does so I guess GOAL ACCOMPLISHED lol)

Other Projects on the Radar

Website is still going to need the intro image/"spash page" plus a banner image. I'm thinking about making the banner a horizontal repeat thing but I haven't fully decided
Still need to redo my icon since I made an actual sona. This is going to take me like...an evening at most, the buildup is so, so much longer than the actual creation time will need.
I would Really Really like to get some kind of ref sheet done of poor Akiyohm this year. I really want to get some art commissioned of him but I've really been waffling around on his hair and outfit. You wouldn't know by looking at my current stuff but he's been wearing the "best boy oc" ribbon for a while so I feel really bad not making as much art of him and showing him off as I'd like. ^^;