The people of Ua (part I)

[pyraxis]

(click to enlarge)

From left to right:

Ua'roké - Head of the Temple of the Elements. The Raba Ua'lin's closest personal advisor and martial arts trainer. A force for sanity and balance amidst the Raba's cruelty.

The Raba Ua'lin - Head of the house of Ua, the newest and most prosperous house in the nation. Lin took the sagama at thirteen, when her mother Mai disappeared under suspicious circumstances.

Anza Ua'qi - Ua'lin's right hand and sometimes partner. Qi was first in line to inherit rulership of the rival house of Uz, but she walked away against all good advice to join Lin in the house of Ua. She is as gentle and kind as Lin is ruthless, and many suspect she's been coerced against her will by the Raba to serve her. Her mother Uz'jef worries constantly but can not force her daughter to return home.

Ua'vic - Vic was adopted into the house of Ua by Mai when Lin was young in order to block her daughter's growing ambition. Vic was trained to become Raba, but only women are permitted by tradition to rule. Vic refused the magic that would have changed his body to a woman's. He became an ascetic priest and disappeared into the desert, returning only recently.

The Raba Uz'jef - Head of the house of Uz, Masta Ua's main rival. Mother of Qi. Her royal garden is the most beautiful in the nation.

Comments

[jimnightmare.livejournal.com]

Hey, Lin? I'm just wondering why everybody keeps calling you ruthless. What are you trying to do?

[pyraxis]

*smile* They are trying to make people dislike me. I think they're doing a rather clumsy job of it. If they had any specific accusations, rather than spreading vague misinformation, they ought to use those.

[jimnightmare.livejournal.com]

Okay. Pyraxis, I've gotta ask, because I'm confused. You're like "Oh, Lin is totally evil and ruthless and the bad guy and people shouldn't like her". But if she's so evil, WHY ARE YOU USING HER AS YOUR DAY PLANNER OR LIFE PLANNER OR WHATEVER YOU CALLED IT?!?

[pyraxis]

Hahahahaha! ...Short answer: because she's smarter than me, and nobody says I have to take her advice. Long answer: I'd actually rather not get into it here.

[yonjuunana.livejournal.com]

Nice drawing! It's always cool to see more art from you, I'm all curious about what everybody looks like. I especially like Lin and Ua'vic in this. You're definitely getting expressiveness across in the postures.

I hope I get to learn more about Ua'vic sometime, he sounds like an interesting guy.

One critique- What's your system for deciding which lines to draw heavier than others? I can't figure out what you were doing there. But then I tend to be pretty obsessive over inking and line quality.

[pyraxis]

I didn't have a system, beyond vaguely thinking I should emphasize the lines I want to draw attention to, and I should sometimes use the thicker lines to create shadows. How would you have done it? What's your system?

I would love for you to meet Ua'vic. He's one of the most interesting people I've ever met. He's also one of the hardest to capture. He cares for very little. There's no way I could go to him and say, "Come to yumeza," or "Come meet my friend yonjuunana". There was a hint that he had a vague interest in yumeza at one point, but nothing came of it.

I'm glad the postures are coming through. I had a hard time with Qi. My women always come out looking androgynous to a fault, so I tried to make her as feminine and attractive as I could. I'm not sure it worked. I think I went overboard with the eyelashes, and she was supposed to have more of a smile. Her body was more shapely before I put the clothes on it. Maybe I should have given her wider hips.

[yonjuunana.livejournal.com]

My system for line thickness: Three things. 1. It's mostly like shading. Choose a light source, have thicker lines away from that light source. 2. Things in the foreground get heavier lines, things in the background get lighter ones. 3. Larger and heavier objects get thicker lines than smaller and lighter ones. That's pretty much it. I learned it from an art teacher back in early high school and I've heard a few other art teachers mention similar things since then.

Hahaha, women are hard to draw! I actually think one of the main reasons I have more male characters than females is simply because I like drawing straight lines more than curvy lines, so I doodle guys more often. (I'm currently trying to draw Ann... I'm lucky in that she's pretty tall and skinny and angular.) I think you did a good job making Uz'jef look feminine. Ua'lin, too.

[tigerweave]

I/Imoh totally LOVE your cartoon/line-drawing style :-)

[pyraxis]

Really? :D It was kind of frustrating to do, so I never went much further with it than this drawing. I was trying to learn from a lot of professional examples I saw in college that seemed effortless, but it was much harder than it looked. Maybe I should play with it more, it seems like it would be good to have a variety of styles. Like if I could get so I could do it quickly, so I could illustrate concepts fast when that was needed.

[tigerweave]

Yeah it is very evocative, in a way that your coloured work isn't necessarily.
I think it is the simplicity of it. Like you can evoke a few things really effectively with the cartoony stuff. The coloured stuff is rich and intimate and draws you in to explore.

I/Imoh prefer black and white drawing myself, so I could be biased as to preferring your cartoons :-P Not that your coloured stuff is too shabby, mind...

:-)

[pyraxis]

Oh interesting....

I'm supposed to be doing some black and white illustrations for Wolf, but I haven't found any inspiration for them at all. He wanted me to do cartoon versions of a couple characters, but the results were, ugh. I need practice.

[tigerweave]

Lol I read that and think "Yeah no wonder you aren't inspired. You seem to be so much more about the colour as well as basic form."

Try them in colour? Have you ever done colour cartoons?

We've barely ever done cartoons. Closest we came was when Indigo Elf drew the rat-monster story that so closely paralleled the owl and the pussycat LOL!

She did it really well though, we were surprised, considering we'd never done anything like it. Well we thought she did it well, at anyrate!

[pyraxis]

She drew a rat-monster story? :D

I don't know the story of the Owl and Pussycat except that they went somewhere in a boat. So it would even be a new story.

Oh wait, I remember a long time ago one of you drawing a cartoon of an owl and a pussycat in a boat, and it came out quite good. Is it connected to that?

I would like to see it sometime if she wasn't too shy.

[tigerweave]

I don't think Indigo Elf was shy about it. I will fish them out. I don't think Jimnightmare will be distressed, as it was a very sweet story :-)

So you don't know the entire Owl and Pussycat poem? Well we must formally introduce you to that too!

[pyraxis]

As long as the ratmonsters get to be good guys even if they're weird and people don't like them. That's what would make Jim ok with it. That they're not made into bad guys just because they're rats.

:)

[tigerweave]

Yes. I think the ratmonster was a girl who kissed a toad, and found Twu Wuv. So it is a bit girly, but I daresay Jim can cope with that :-)