SPOOKTACULAR!

As any forum lurker (like myself) would know, the Halloween competitions are back this year and there are categories for everything. I wasn't planning on seriously joining, but impulse, and a remaining one month before the new semester starts, made me rush to get a short spooky animation done.

Watching too much Madness this weekend makes me think of red skies as default.

Best part is that it's a spinoff from my Insufficient series so I don't feel like I'm procrastinating and/or trying to abandon yet another project. I've also got other plans to further celebrate the event because a) I rarely get hyped enough to do anything b) I missed Robot day and that sucks. I don't have time to think of any complex horror sequence so cheap jumpscares and prolonged silence are most likely the only things on the menu.

Insufficient: Progress Report

In other news, the animatic for the next part of the Insufficient series is (basically) complete! I'll go over it again to make sure the plot is sound while looking over the critiques on the last one. With the first I only wanted to test an idea; this time I'm trying to make a (somewhat) clearer narrative with better and smoother animations. Wish me luck!

Part two will be titled Insufficient: Soul.

Despite what the gif looks like the final animation will (probably) be cleaner. It's expected to be almost 5 minutes long.

University is sapping my arting time.

There's a problem in my part-time job that may require me to quit. To avoid begging my blood relatives to pay off my rent and food I am opening commissions (explanation is in this edited news post). I'm also up for freelance work if it's short term (say a few weeks at most).

In other news, I am still working on the next part for Insufficient. The animatic is almost complete. I'll work on it until October when I'll probably join in on Inktober, hopefully finishing it this time.

Hope y'all have a lovely day!

Edit: "Club Par" (left-most) got in at 3rd place. Many thanks, love you Newgrounds!

See, it's not even my birthday... but blessed be Tom and the NG staff responsible who featured all three of my Pico Day submissions on the Frontpage.

I'm shaking and crying right now, have been for the past few hours. I need a doctor, is it too late to join the Church of Fulp?

Jokes aside, thank you, seriously. It's a great honor. I hope everyone had a great Pico Day!

I'm excited for the weekend, are you excited for the weekend? I'm mostly just curious what kind of things people like these days. Is Madness allowed for Pico Day since it has its own day? Will Pico and Tankmen even be there since the submission theme became more inclusive? Are new artists going to participate at all?

Sorry for the spam. I just wanted to use the news post more often :/

As of the time I am writing this, my first movie submission, Insufficient: Tear, has just passed 1000 views on top of obtaining daily fifth a few days back, right after submission. I still can barely believe I finished an animation and people liked it.

It isn't much and it's just a number, but thank you, people who clicked and watched the animation. Thank you, reviewers who provided such in depth feedback (or cracked a joke or left a nice comment). Thank you, @Karsys and @OfficialHenyx, without whom the animation would be bare of sound (ironically). Thank you, too, 67 people who appreciate my work enough to put up with everything I upload, good and bad. All of you, the community, is what made me love Newgrounds so much and made me stay as an artist.

Art is not my profession. When I graduated from high school and must decide what to do for the rest of my life, I told myself "You're no good at this. This isn't how you help people." So I went into engineering school. I don't regret it, but I find barely any joy in it. I chose to be there, but I wasn't the smartest nor the most diligent, and classes become nothing but a chore I must complete.

I started seriously learning art. Alone at nights between exams and part-time work, I put effort into studying something I truly enjoy. I spent money on tools and resources. I treated it as an expensive hobby because I always thought "This is an indulgence. You're never gonna get good enough to make it a living."

See, insufficiency is my greatest companion. I've got a terrible case of inferiority. It doesn't bother me much anymore, but it's still there and persistent. I make art and tell stories mostly for myself, sure, but also to seek approval. If I can inspire you then that is enough.

That's a flaw I'm willing to embrace. I'm not the best one to preach life lessons but no one really is. We're all imperfect.

Thank you for helping me find joy. There is much I want to share and I'm happy to know you will listen.

The next part of Insufficient is being worked on. A lot of the reviews voice confusion and curiosity as to the why and the where. I'm planning to make scenes clearer and details better in the next one but I invite you to have fun with your imagination! Think what you want to think.

Some questions I do want to answer though:

-> "Who is this? How did she get here? What is this place?" (from EpikHellSword)

• In my scripts, I refer to her as Green but she's nameless. Right now, I've no clue either. That world however, shouldn't be unfamiliar. It's not a matter of where, but when.

-> "Towards the end I'm not sure if she greets the monster in naivety, or raises her hand in fear?" (from Cyberdevil)

• Having no dialogues do make ambiguity an issue but I find it forces creative ways to play with expressions and gestures. In this case, she was smiling as if greeting the monster. Naivety is her biggest flaw, not silence.

-> "Did you use flash for this?" (from Spedmallet)

• No, I did not. I use Krita for everything now. I urge anyone trying to find a good art software to give it a shot. Not only is it optionally free (you can buy it but it's exactly the same) it works perfectly for painting, sketching and animating. Don't go broke just for Adobe y'all.

That's it for the deceptively long post. As the series is fairly new (the concept for the world is old, but the characters are fresh born) I'm happy to hear any inputs or comments. Stories are meaningless after all if they can't connect with the people.

F to pay respect

Tbh this was hilarious.

I have a website now!

It's nothing professional, just a blog kind of thing I want to use to put stuff I might not put elsewhere for random reasons. Also still very much a work in progress so there's not much there yet.

Link!

Recently I finished this animated loop for my NG signature. Fun but exhausting to make. I'm up for a commission like this if anyone has a spare 100 bucks or so.

Two weeks late to the party, but Happy New Year everyone! It's been a strange few weeks for me but I think I've gotten it out of my system. I went against my original schedule, dropping a lot of plans, and went on a creativity break instead. Physically did not touch the Wacom nor the sketchbook until quite recently. It was quite a cleansing experience, like a good clean break.

Anyone failed their New Year's resolutions yet?

Funnily enough, for me, I decided to start picking up old things instead of new ones this year. For the past two or three years I've sacrificed most of my free time (and one or two university courses) to get good in art. The highlights of 2017 and 2018 has been mostly my own art progress but in doing so I've dropped a lot of different things I used to enjoy or was interested in before: specifically writing and, as I've rediscovered a while back, game developing for the latter.

So this year I've made a more thought of schedule of projects to "get back into shape". Some will take a longer time, some will take shorter. Regardless, I plan to fix my biggest mistake in 2018: undisciplined schedules and procrastination. I hope 2019 will be a year of action and not false hopes.

Best of luck to everyone!

A "New Year" painting I never finished. Perfect conclusion for 2018

---

Summary of 2018: Got a working game but is yet to be fully finished until the next long vacation, designed a little website but is still too broken to use, engaged in community art projects (namely Inktober and about halfway for OCember here)

Expectations for 2019: Get started on a new game (there's an actual team now), rewrite an old story into a complete book (not for publishing), start finishing things on time with better schedules.

Yes, like the title says, I need alpha testers for my first big game, "In Sheep's Clothing", a horror-esque visual novel on the exploration of oneself.

I've previously released a first demo on Game Jolt (https://gamejolt.com/games/In_Sheeps_Clothing/321393) but now a second demo is close to finish and the full game (or at least a playable build with one or two actual complete playthroughs) is expected to finish before New Year (like I metioned in the previous post). With my focus entirely on the development aspect, I need some help in testing out the game and finding the bugs! Therefore, if you feel you might be able to help in ALPHA TESTING, please, shoot me a PM. I'll send over a version within a few days.

Also, slight update: I found a game engine that could more easily allow for ISC to be uploaded to NG. I'll definitely try to put a version over here (please don't blam it to oblivion) in a month or two.

Thank you for reading!

*old game thumbnail art, soon to be replaced