"I blame cooking jesus for the puns" Monday July 30th, 2007

Well with family invading the Daniels household I had little time to devote to drawing. This filler was actually a sketch of Key I did about a month and a half ago. I had intended to post it to the sketches portion of my DA page, but never got around to it. I quickly scanned, redid lineart, colored, shaded, and highlighted it in record time. That was when I thought I would do something crazy and actually draw pupils in the eyes. For those of you who don't know me, the pupil-less eyes were a stylistic change I made to do the Ninja Spirit comic. I usually do draw pupils, but I wanted to do something different for the comic as well as simplify my style to speed up drawing to do a comic in a timely fashion. I like the pupil-less eyes even if there are times I really wish I could use them. What I found though is that drawing eyes without the pupils made me become better with my proportions and using different body and head angles as well as perspective  to convey diffeerent things like emotion and eye direction. However since this was a piece of filler art, I figured I'd give you a mock up of what Ninja Spirit characters could've looked like.

I did go see the Simpsons movie and I thought it was really good. Would I say it was the best movie ever made? It wouldn't even come close, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a funny movie. Keep in mind that I am not a diehard Simpsons fan. I enjoy the show and I watch it every time it is on, but I am not one of those guys who know every character and what happened in every season of the show. My honest opinion was that it was longer version of the tv show with amped up animation. Again keep in mind that when the tv show in question is one of the best tv shows in the history of tv shows, that's a pretty good thing. I think the Simpsons team did a great job of throwing things in that referred to past episodes of the show that should tickly every Simpsons fan's funny bone. Overall I'd give the movie an A- for doing exactly what you wanted it do. The only reason I can't give it anything higher is that you can only do so much with the Simpsons to make it into a large screen extravaganza. As a side note I noticed that when the credits ran that they listed Kang in the cast, yet he never appeared in the movie. I sense some deleted scenes for the DVD.

I also wanted to ask you guys what you thought of the Nintendo DS. I almost bought one a few months back, but stopped myself. However after seeing it action when I played Mike's at Otakon, I thought it was a really neat system. I still like my PSP since I use it to watch tv shows and movies, but there are quite a few games that look interesting that are DS-only. Although I don't know if I should skip it and save up to get a Wii. Out of you guys who have either or both what do you think?

I should have a normal comic up for the Thursday/Friday update do bear with me. To those of you who missed the announcment from last Thursday's comic, I am running a contest to give away a few prints that I had left over from Otakon 2007. Read below for the rules and how to get a free print signed by yours truly.

"Where in the World is Misaki Yuki?" Contest Details

1. Here is the link again to the Misaki Yuki picture... High Res or Low Res. Download it and print it out. It should fit on a regular sheet of paper.

2. Take a picture of yourself or some friends with the Chibi Yuki  or just the Chibi Yuki in front of a local landmark with signage clearly visible.

3. Email me the picture at River@ninja-spirit.com.

4. If your entry is picked as a winner, I will contact you and ask you for shipping info so I can mail you your prize.