#avery_does_art

Check out my new video where I talk about my love for the How to Train Your Dragon franchise!

Look, I'm trying, okay? I didn't get anything done in February due to horrible mental health and an absolutely barbaric and unpredictable schedule. I now have two jobs, one full time and one that gives me some side-jobs for extra cash. It's hustle time guys.

Plans for April

Start reactions videos (some with Fox)

One YouTube Video

More streams

More character portraits

Keeping it small to fit my busy schedule. Less is more folks. Onto what I got done these last two months (not a lot).

February Projects

Video: Caleb Hammer vs. D'Angelo Wallace

This video was fun to make mostly because I was able to complain about another creator for 30 minutes. It's become my second most viewed video. I like it and I was relieved to have a say in something current for once. I'm glad it reached a larger audience and I'm happy for the comments I got on this one. Hopefully I can get more mini bangers in the future.

Caleb Hammer is a dick who likes to use slurs and outrageous content to make himself and his employees richer by putting mentally ill and (admittedly) dumb people on blast for their shit finances. I don't like the man, but I like his podcast, so I had some interesting takes, in my humble opinion at least. Enjoy.

March Projects

Video: Attack on Titan is Antisemitic?

This was an absolute pleasure to make. I love mixing my love for film and my passion for German history/language together to create something unique such as analyzing the hell out of my favorite piece of media. If I go to graduate school the thing I'd like to focus on most is German history in film or the history of fascism in German films. There's a lot to talk about with just those topics alone. Now imagine how complicated it gets when you throw in another country that was allied with Germany during its fascist regime.

This video is specifically picking apart the fascist elements in Attack on Titan and basically trying to prove that it's not an antisemitic series, but one that portrays antisemitism through its themes, aesthetics, and of course characters. It took a long time just to make the script and even longer to edit everything. My poor laptop was screaming and I had to take multiple breaks editing lest it explode and I can't afford another one right now. I'd really like to do more videos like this, so give me some suggestions via my Tumblr ask box if you have any!

Character Portrait: Grayson Troy

Grayson is a character very near and dear to my heart. He's one of the first original characters I created and over the years he's probably become my favorite. If I could give him more screen time in my comic I would, but unfortunately he's just one main character from a larger cast. Technically he's the secondary main character. Anyways. I wanted him to be handsome with curly, fluffy hair. I just wanted to focus on his looks and especially his eyes. Let me know how you like it.

Character Portrait: Odahl Hoverson

Odahl is one of my favorite characters to draw. Like Parisa, she has a very fun and different color palette from the rest of my characters. She's not just a blonde, but a blonde who also has blonde eyelashes. Compared with her bright aqua eyes, her palette is one of my favorites to color with. I especially like the challenge of her being a 9 year old girl who's developing just a bit faster than her peers, which is something she has in common with me. So she still has a chubby baby face, but her body is growing a bit awkwardly since she's developing at a faster rate. I'm really happy with how her lips turned out, too. I tend to give all of my characters the same faces, so I'm trying not to do that. I have to remind myself that not everyone has full luscious lips. Some people, especially a lot of children, have thin lips. So, I've been careful to try and portray that.

Character Portrait: Roberto Suarez

Roberto is a good boy. He's mute, and hardly ever communicates with anyone but Annie. He does know Korean Sign Language, but almost never uses it. He prefers to keep to himself, which worries the others considering his past. I based him a bit off Alex Lawther, which is a pale ass British actor, but he had the eyes and hair that I was looking for with Bert. At first, when I first came up with this world, I wanted to make everyone have realistically colored eyes unless they were using their powers. So, Parisa originally had more brown colored eyes and Roberto had darker brown eyes. I decided against it a while ago for the sake of my characters having more interesting color palettes. Anyways, for your reference, Bert's father is Dominican, and his mother is Puerto Rican/Spanish, and he is 11 years old.

Art to Make My Life Easier: Eyes

While making Roberto's portrait I had the idea to create a base eye for my character arts. Mostly because I was afraid of running out of room on my palette and I wanted consistency for my characters. So, here are the detailed eyes of all of my characters so far (there are more to come) with their names on each one (two for Ruddie).

Okay, so here's what's happening. I had to postpone working on my video because life gets in the wat sometimes and I've been working like a fucking dog. I've decided to also limit my videos to once a month, since that's the schedule anyways. I didn't post a new streaming schedule because until I know how this new job's schedule is going to work for me, I won't be able to predict or initiate streams. I also have to start packing so that I can move out of my mother's house by the 1st of April at the earliest. My new video is also longer and more in-depth than my usual ones, as the subject is very dear to me (a subject I studied in school and plan to get at least a master's degree in). So, in conclusion, I have a lot on my plate at the moment and absolutely no free time. The good news is, I've been able to get my artsy groove back, so there will be an actual blog post this month.

Please be patient with me as I try being an actual adult for the first time,

New video out right now!

It's a different topic from my usual videos and it was really fun to make! Enjoy!

All WIPs this month but better than nothing.

Well... This feels a little bit awkward for me to write. I had a lot I wanted to do, but I guess I didn't get much done. Between my new job, the severe depression and anxiety, and my birthday I've done nothing for most of January except for cry, panic, and cry some more. I've been trying to stay on task with my projects, but I can't seem to get the motivation. Let's see if antidepressants can help with that.

I wanted January to focus mostly on the 3D stuff, and that's what I did! The thing is, well, 3D takes a long time and I'm still not confident in myself now that I'm doing everything alone. I with I had the confidence, but that comes with experience.

February Plans

For February I hope to have more time to finish current projects and start new ones. I just need to stay motivated and organized. My February plans are:

Stream again

Finally finish the cafe set

Completely retopologize and rig at least one 3D character

Draw some more

And honestly that may be a little too much for me to focus on, but that's my plan.

January Projects

Finished 3D Character Sculpt: Tween Annie

When it came to tween Annie, I wanted her to look a little more developed than the other girls her age, but I also wanted her to still resemble a young teen. I also wanted her to be a bit... "chubbier" for lack of a better word, than the other girls around her. This decision was made to subconsciously remind the audience of the difference in physical expectations between American/European and East Asian beauty standards for women and young girls. In my own experience, having made several Korean friends and acquaintances, I was told it was freeing for them to be in Europe (specifically Germany) and the US because there wasn't nearly as much pressure to dress or look a certain way like there was in South Korea. The women felt much more comfortable in their own skin and wearing more revealing outfits. I also wanted to point it out because of Annie's more blunt and independent personality, compared to the conformity of East Asian cultures.

(Mostly) Finished 3D Character Sculpt: Chin-sun

I wanted Chin-sun to have a prominent, straight nose, and I think I accomplished that pretty well. I'm trying to decide if I want to model her hair in Nomad Sculpt, or if I want to model it in Maya, and frankly I can't decide. For now, until I learn exactly how to do hair dynamics in Maya, I think her hair should be stiff, but I'm having a hard time modeling it in Nomad, so I'm going to try and make a sort of wig for her in maya and attach it to her body, that way I'll have an easier time re-topologizing and rigging her. Her model may still need some adjusting before I deem it perfect, but for now, it'll do. In fact, I might re-sculpt her entirely.

Character Reference Sheets:

During my downtime at work I've been creating character reference sheets. I almost have one done. These reference sheets are going to be a more detailed and artistic version of each of my characters. I hope I can get my points across in an adequate way. I've been having fun with the first one so far. The sheets for each character will include a full body front and side view, a front and profile view of the head, one or both eyes open with their iris colored, one or both eyes closed, the color palette of the eye or eyes, a sample of their hair color and its palette, and any noticeable details about the character's physical appearance. Unlike my other arts, these design sheets will be completely in sketch form with less clean linework. Let me know if you think of anything I should add to the sheets. I'm sure each one will be a different size, since each character will have a differing amount of details.

Set: Cafe

The cafe is honestly still going well, but I've had to take breaks from it for work and other important things (like not trying to kms) so I'm going to save the full explanation of how and why I did the set for when it's finally done, which should be by the end of next month. Excuse Max in the background of the third image, he was being used for scale. Some of the items are either invisible, dark, or weirdly colored because I've been putting their skins on, which I probably shouldn't do until I have everything animated. I plan to do a preview animation with various Maxes when I've got the script written out and I record the lines myself.

Starting the re-topology:

I know that probably isn't the correct word, but I'm gonna role with it. I have to basically rebuild the models for my animations since the poly count is a too big. This is a very common practice in the industry, especially when sculpting in apps like ZBrush. I don't remember if I've ever fully re-topologized a full figure before though, so we'll see how it goes. Hopefully it won't take me long.

3D Model: Grayson

I haven't worked on him much, but this is another sculpt of one of my characters from the comic. I know he doesn't look like much now, but I'm still working out what he looks like, which is why I took a break from him. I wanted to do a few sketches of him, a design sheet if you will, to get a feel for how he should look at the front and side angles. It's on my list to do for February. In the meantime, enjoy these WIPs!

Video: My (Kinda, Sorta) Former Obsession with How to Train Your Dragon

Long title, I know. This one was particularly hard to get out on time considering how depressed I've been. I talk about that a little at the end of the video, but the rest of the video is basically going over what it was like for me to grow up with the franchise. I don't delve into the franchise as much as I had wanted, but this video is a good representation of my feelings for now. More HTTYD stuff coming in the future.