“Tales of the Dust Bunnies” commission, Ready to Roll Character sketch & Giftart for Kristy

** This post is a 5 minute read! **

In this blog post:

Tales of the Dust Bunnies designs & illustration
Ready to Roll character commission
Giftart for Kristy
Personal update & ramble about boundaries

Tales of the Dust Bunnies Splash Image for Game Development Explained With Sock Puppets 🐰✨

Commissioned for Emilie Poissenot (emiliep.net)‘s NZGDC talk and PAXAus panel! (her twitter @aheila_)! I started the commission while I was still sick last month but yay it’s done!

Meet the dust bunnies! Character designs!

We worked through some of the designs together along the way and she gave me lots of helpful and encouraging feedback! Emilie is wonderful, thoughtful, understanding, easy and lovely to work with! (:

It’s amusing how I’m not keen on calling myself character designer anymore because I put too much pressure, stress, expectations, standards and anxieties on myself in that area. Likewise I am afraid to call myself a concept or game artist. I’m more of the “learning in my own way”, “trust in my process”, “interpreting things in my art style” and “iterate until I like the design, illustration and art that works for this purpose” artist. For now I’ll be whatever I’m doing professionally and I’ll gain confidence through practice and experience :’) Maybe I’ll get to do more good character design projects and I’ll feel more confident going under that umbrella again one day. Maybe.

Digressing. I’m still grateful and happy to do some rare character design and illustration work with great amounts of creative control like this! I got to design accordingly to one of my own aesthetic tastes for the project. And it feels nice.

Goodness imagine actually enjoying art making a bit more again :’)

Anyhoo I’ll keep learning and I’m open to collaborate with cool peeps on freelance character illustration projects if they do come up. 😀

Ready to Roll Character commission for Blind Sparrow Interactive [instagram] [twitter] [their follower milestone tweet]

For this sketch commission I did in May, I was to design and sketch the rest of her body, based on her existing character design from the shoulders up. Essentially it’s the full body sketch, design and colour block in for the Ready to Roll character in a more fantasy comic art style (which I don’t really do so in that light, this was a paid sketch/art test). I had a stealthy, nimble, calculated, wise, practical, resourceful, lightweight and minimalist character in mind.

I noted that there was a lot going on with her bust design and patterns so I worked with what I had. Her earrings are not clearly visible since it’s a full body sketch. I balanced it out with more simplified patterns, chain-mail and clothing for the rest of her body so visually, the focus and detail are mostly on her face and shoulders. Otherwise there was no time to iterate on the sketch/illustration. Goodness, fantasy costumes love their details don’t they haha

Please note that I’m not a D&D or tabletop person because I don’t have such friends and I don’t fare well in social groups. Because when I actually do play board and/or social games, I get overwhelmed between playing the game to the best of my ability and the social aspect. I either I just focus on the game with my one-track mind or struggle to both socialise and play the game ;P

I digress, it’s great that Blind Sparrow Interactive is helping accessibility in games better!

Giftart with Kristy taking over the skies on a dinosaur! 🦕✨

Thank you Kristy for being a kind, wonderful, supportive friend who will one day build an empire of cute things! (: Did this doodle while I was still super sick so it turned out okay :0

Personal update and I ramble about boundaries!

I took a peep at my twitter feed and there were many tweets about game developer boundaries from the generous Emily Grace Buck‘s NZGDC19 talk.

Sidenote: it seems that NZGDC19 ended up being pretty great with good people. Not surprised! (: I will always remember how someone disliked my video when I talked about my last visit for NZGDC17 – oof that hurt! NZGDC is lovely but not possible for me anymore. Instead I hope to visit New Zealand properly as a tourist one day :’)

Digressing! A lot of food for thought from Emily’s talk about healthy habits in order to turn off from work and the difference between coworkers, acquaintances and friends. And making sure you have friends and hobbies outside of games altogether for more healthy and well rounded friendship circles. Guess I have to mostly avoid and be more mindful of my twitter feed since they’re usually game related ;P!

Goodness I remember my past posts reflecting upon what friendships and socialising means to me – I’m still very much learning in my hermit bubble haha :’)

To reflect on this today – I’m just doing the best I can with the finite energy and resources I have, and maintaining the few friends I do have. I’m usually more inclined doing my own solitary thing as the low-energy, introverted homebody and turtle that I am ;P I do agree that a lot of my current few friends was due to going out of my comfort zone and having good 1 to 1 quality time but most are nevertheless from the games/entertainment industry.

I guess that’s why I don’t have lots of games industry friends in general because it’s mostly professional, polite and surface level. As much as I enjoy games, career wise I’m more art-making focused than gamedev focused. And even then I don’t feel like I need to have many art friends. Realising that I tend to keep it professional and/or acquaintances level unless I really like you as a person and want to/already get along with you – and that’s a slow process of the organic, mutual give and take and common interests. Naturally most don’t really work out *and* it depends on whether I’m invested enough to leave the house and deny my solitary/hermit/recovery time (and if people respect my introverted boundaries).

Plus I don’t want to deal too much with the messy overlap between “being genuine friends!” versus “maintaining professional relationships”. Different approaches, boundaries and emotional labour are involved with each!

It’s tricky when people advise “networking” = “making friends” when it often doesn’t work that way for me when I don’t see people often enough for substantial quality bonding time. Or they have a bunch of friends they’re already closer with, other priorities or they just prefer group activities. Maybe I’ll have the rare good conversation if I’m lucky! It’s weird that when I’m in a situation for “making friends”, it doesn’t often work that way for me. Maybe when the event is over and the crowds and groups are gone ;P

I just feel like an energy conserving, observing, overwhelmed, quiet alien instead and I’m not outgoing or interesting to talk to with the limited topics I know. Ah well I’ll just exist over here :’)

Human relations are messy and I’m learning to not to over invest emotionally into people where I am only just an option, distant friend and afterthought for them. Easier said than done of course because risk taking is part of the journey too! Gah hoomins!! :’)

Oddly enough I don’t mind feeling disconnected and at a distance from the games industry and community. Perhaps over the years I grew tired, I want to do my own thing and need to keep away from industry social dynamics and public personas for a clearer, healthier perspective on my life, friends and art career. Striving and keeping connections that don’t constantly revolve around forwarding each other’s career and just be present, supportive and accepting of each other’s journeys.

I’ll keep floating around the edges, focus on the positives, give ninja, supportive likes on social media occasionally and be inspired by other people’s great work and kind deeds instead. Focus on things that I can control and keen to learn and help out with good projects!

Anyhoo, thanks for reading and thanks so much for the ninja likes here and across social media. I’m just grateful to know that someone is listening and acknowledging while I’m here, rambling and reflecting on my own.

Thank you :’) 💙

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