something about happy endings...

So, there's a Kingdom Hearts 4 trailer.

I spent so many years just DEVOTING myself to this franchise. KH made me want to draw, it got me to draw, and that art got me through some stressful times, and in the end it got me a lot of places too. I can literally chart my progress as an artist through my KH art, it was really the first franchise I ever drew fanart for (I tried for FMA but the style was just a battle for me. KH felt easy and comfortable).

I handed over my wallet over and over and over again. I have multiple copies of so many of the games (in both JP and EN. JP copies helped me practice my Japanese :>). I have a display box of the KH things I've collected since 2006. But KH3 lost me. I couldn't get into it. Maybe it was actually Aqua's KH2.9 or whatever game where I gave up, bc I didn't finish that either. So KH4 is out there and the part of me that remembers having all that fun wants to get into it and I... just... can't.

I think its because the charm that drew me into it seems to be gone. I look at KHI and go THERE IT IS. Even KHII... but the childish, youthful design and charm that attracted me isn't there anymore. The graphics change also really threw me in KH3. And I get the "well our fanbase is older so we're maturing the style" approach, but like... it doesn't feel like a story that needs the Square Enix polish (it's way more intense in that KH4 trailer). And it seems like the Disney content is just 'there' now because that's the origins of the franchise. idk, maybe I'm just old and miserable now or something lol.

I'd still draw KHI/CoM/II/Days/BBS/3D stuff until the cows come home... and I still really want that Namine plushie they announced... but the charm that brought me to the series just doesn't hold me for the newer content. I had some of my best times playing the shit out of those games in the back half of the 2000's though (I don't care how much people hate it, I had an absolute blast with RE:CoM and it's the closest I've ever gotten to 100% in a game LOL).

I doodled up some FFIX's Vivi the other day. A couple of the sketches are pretty rough, but Vivi is fun to draw.

Vivi sketching led to a sketch of Vivi & Vivy (of her own show :)

( Vivi and Vivy )

Hello to the couple new folks following me here!!

Well, it was above zero finally, and the sidewalks were all clear, but winter's having one last gasp this weekend and it came with extra fluffy snow. So much for the sidewalks!

( Some pics from the ravine )

Snow back home never fell like this. This fluffy stuff still lures me outside to take pictures. This is thick and chonky and really wet (it's only -1C). Snow back home was dry powder and fell very fast, but very thin. It was also -20 all winter at home lol. Dry -20 is way easier to tolerate than damp -20 though. I'd rather have prairie winter than lakeshore winter, though it would be nice if prairie winter didn't have a life expectancy of 7+ months =A=

Apparently it was daylight savings time and I wouldn't have known if my stove clock hadn't been wrong '_'; half the people in my dance class this morning had no idea it had happened either. All the electronics just auto updated and no one knew a thing lol. The time change let me be very balanced and centred today at class it seems :D

My Sunday ballet class has been really fantastic this semester. New instructor has made a world of difference, but my goodness do I hate that it's on Sunday. Put it during the week when my body aches from being at the computer. The centre use to have the classes on Mon and Weds, but during covid the city took over their programing and now it's just one Sunday class. I don't think they know that there use to be 4 separate adult classes spread out over those two days. Pls, give me Weds back. Re-registration goes up Monday, I have to remember to do that.

I'm not re-registering for that Monday fitness class. It's murdering me. I skipped last week, I didn't want to be in pain all week. Yoga is so hard to do the next day. Wish the second yoga class during the week was Thursday evening not Thurs morning.

I've been on a quest for new shoes for about a month now. I'm on pair number... 4? Apparently I'm very fussy this time around LOL. I have to stick my own insoles in them and take the long walk around the neighbourhood once to know if they'll be good (and then scrub them clean and return them if they aren't, apparently). I actually got chatting with the cashier at the store and she suddenly decided to give me her employee discount! Thank you! These shoes better be it, I'm tired of buying/returning shoes. I just want to march around outside after work and not have my left foot be in agony (it has issues... long story). Or you know what, the snow can melt, and we can hit some decent spring temperature, and I can go out in socks and good sandals :''') (which seems to be a faux pas on this side of the country LOL).

This video on the angry bird app found its way to me. A boy gets to meet his hockey idols and THE LOOK ON HIS FACE LMAO... aw, son, I feel that. Good for them (damn Getzlaf's been around forever, he might be old enough to be some of his teammate's dad LOL). I love the vids with kids and the one with Jordan Tootoo might always be one of the best.

Yesterday a friend helped me move some stuff into a storage unit (I had it in a previous storage unit, but they went out of business and I needed a new one). And just as we got underway, the blizzard struck :'') thanks blizzard, that wasn't fun.

We couldn't figure out how to get around to the back of the building because half of the outside lot was under construction. The snow had covered everything, the lighting was shit, so we accidentally drove somewhere we shouldn't have been and nearly ended up stuck in a swell of mud. After a lot of panic we managed to reverse far enough to get enough momentum to get out @A@;

Actually moving my boxes was fine though lol

We were supposed to go check out a new confectionary store that opened up north of me (selling sweets too cute to eat!), but apparently everything in the city closes at 7 now. I swear the mall at least closed at 8... nope 7. Restaurants were open, so we went to a Japanese restaurant a block or so from the storage place. We thought it was sushi :'') no, it's was all you can eat JP BBQ. We sat down and went "ACH this is expensive..." and neither of us were dressed for a nice restaurant. We didn't know how to politely excuse ourselves from this gaffe, so we just had expensive BBQ. It was actually a really nice dinner. We had no idea what we wanted to eat and the server was excellent helping us figure everything out. I like being able to tip a server well because they gave top tier customer service. It was so nice that we're going to forget about that bill and haul a friend there on our next adventure lol.

Also yesterday I had someone ask me if I knew Flash. My first thought was "... do people still work in Flash?" LMAO. Obv they do or the question wouldn't have been asked XD; but no, I touched Flash once in 2012 and that was enough for me thanks :')

Lastly, some neat art things from the bird app:

Facinating animation cycle with some little morbid details

Gorgeous Sleeping Beauty OC design

Ooo I found this comm thefridayfive and its 5 random questions every friday. Simple and fun!

1. What's your favorite candle scent? This chonky Bayberry yankee candle I've had for *checks calendar* 17 years has never been surpassed. I don't light it very often, because I can just pop the top off and it does its duty.

2. Do you have an artistic or crafty hobby? What is it?
I draw. It's very basic haha. I use to love sewing (read: cosplay) but life/time doesn't lend to that anymore.

3. What's one weird way you save money on food?
Is it weird that since Covid locked us down early in 2020 I've prepared/cooked nearly every single meal? I had a cheeseburger happy meal on my way home from work the day we got sent home in 2020 and I haven't ordered a thing in almost 2 years - everything I eat comes from the grocery store. Well, except 2 pizzas and 2 birthday cakes lol, and the odd dinner out with friends when things allow. Perks of working from home. Now, I just need to up my coupon/sales game.

4. Do you collect anything weird or unusual?
Currently no? Very standard anime collector. But I use to collect animation cels/bgs/production materials (when they were affordable) which seems to raise eyebrows now haha.

5. Do you fear the deep ocean, or does its unknown depths excite you?
Ooooo excite. What weird, terrifying, and wonderful things are down there.

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I got my booster yesterday and I'm doing phenomenally better than I did with shot #2 lol. I couldn't get out of bed after shot #2 (slept all day... great sleep, A+). My physiotherapist suggested I down a bottle of Gatorade after the shot and it seems to have worked!

I'm so glad it's Friday tho =A=

I'm back to cry about a show I don't watch (but really, my friends do, why aren't I?)

Twitter thread of an artist from Ousama Ranking showing off painting a background

Who tf paints BGs in 2022? That's BONKERS and I love it with all my heart.

Some of the comments I've seen are people saying they're watercolour BGs. They're not! They're gouache. There's like a 10% chance it's water based acrylic, but industry standard was/is gouache. Gouache can do both the transparent watercolour look and also be completely opaque as well. Watercolour isn't an opaque paint by nature and doesn't hit the rich colours needed for anime/cartoon BGs (unless you're going for a very storybook/dreamy look with your BG style, then watercolour). I use to try to mimic painting BGs with watercolour when I was younger and I could never get them to turn out. When I got a teacher for it he was like "so gouache" and it was a gamechanger LOL. I didn't end up being very good at it, but it was fun (and I did make one very decent BG once haha).

My paint teacher years ago told me whenever he saw BGs come in that had frayed paint edging like this, he always knew they'd been outsourced to Japan lol. They were the only ones who did that. NA and EU painters taped off their edges. I've seen some NA painted BGs with the tape edges and they're so clean cut lol. I love the messy paint edges, adds personality to the art.

( I suppose this is an excuse to share 2 favourite BGs that I have )

Woof. Medication knocked me out for DAYS. Please, prescription, cease and desist. I like existing. But, I finally was able to book my booster shot! There was a shortage for the longest time... glad it seems to have eased up.

The last couple AoT episodes have been WILD and tonight Mocha and I are doing the latest one. Somehow making 20 minutes of content feel like 5 minutes should be a crime (even if I enjoy it lol).

Work gave me a raise and I returned the favour by upgrading my internet lol. Now I can work on a remote system, rather than dl/ul my work (which they didn't like me doing). They were so not pleased with me that they were going to send me a work PC + monitor setup to make sure their IPs stayed on office machinery... but where the heck am I supposed to put an ENTIRE new desk arrangement?? Upgraded internet life here we are. I don't online game or anything, so they're the only ones benefitting from this lol.

A couple weeks ago chrome updated on my laptop and it's been a NIGHTMARE since. After an hour of typing in googledocs it starts freezing the system. I have to close out chrome and relaunch it. idk what all happened =A=. They DID add this popup that comes on constantly asking if I want to switch to British English. Like... I would, except then all of my American English spellings will be flagged. Incorporate a Canadian dictionary for the happy medium please... Word has one :< it's not that hard. I actually had to go back to Word because googledocs was driving me bonkers.

I should probably get a new laptop, this one is over 10 years old. But, money. I'm also scared I won't be able to install my Adobe suites on a new system. I've heard that Adobe is defuncting previously purchased licenses to force you to pay for the monthly version. I have legit licenses for both the CS5 & CS6 suites :< don't take them from me.

PS, Lucifer is still fun. It knows its audience lol.

I don't watch Ousama Ranking... I might someday, but its not something I'm looking at rn. But oml they are *painting* their backgrounds. Not Photoshop or any other digital method, they're traditionally painting their backgrounds and I just want to scream at how gorgeous they all are.

I mean, look at this.

https://twitter.com/WIT_STUDIO/status/1484164413678661637
https://twitter.com/WIT_STUDIO/status/1481627684010708996
https://twitter.com/WIT_STUDIO/status/1479090935380299781

For the aesthetic the show has, painted BGs punch up the look perfectly. Traditionally painted BGs were fazed out in the 2000s, because digital offers so much more versatility (and an undo button...) so for them to go this route, for me, is *chef's kiss*. It's a lost art imo. I use to collect traditionally painted anime BGs and, well, 15-20 years ago, they were cheap. WIT knows what they're doing though LOL. If any of those go on sale, I expect them to be out of my price range.

I wish I could paint... I'd just paint pretty scenery every day, all day. Alas.

The man who did /try/ to teach me to paint use to paint animation BGs for a living (still does PT), so when I showed him my collection (I brought in some that were full of trees and painted foliage) and I remember him dissecting the BGs and going on like, whoever painted them was very, very skilled at their craft, had been doing it forever, every stroke they laid down was knowledgeable, etc, etc... my art envy was so strong.

So now every time WIT posts a new painted BG I want to scream with art envy LOL

Some things I had up on eBay popped off over the weekend. Good bye stuff! Pls leave my home.

I tried to sell a friend on Vivy and I might have been successful or I might have to drag her over and do a weekend of it. I'll find out if my messages start going off about it LOL.

I'm still disappointed that her building threw out our charm order during Covid in 2020. It was my first/only time doing charms and I never even got to see them :/. She wasn't in town to collect them and had to stay where she was, they said they'd hold it for her but some clown threw them out. Then they claimed ignorance and some other bullshit. They turfed a $700 charm order (mine were only like $100 of that) what an absolute waste =A=. Still feel bad for her.

Some anon has been dropping a kudos in my inbox the last few nights ;A; they're nice to wake up to.

I haven't been here in nearly 10 years... I don't know why I thought of dropping by, other than I kind of missed this sort of social media (most now are exhausting).

I'll browse around and see if there's anything dw has for me.

I should probably change my handle though haha... it's really dated :')