And here it finally is! What's been keeping me busy for almost a month now! ~metalfighterriku's birthday present! You see... I know she loves Link but I didn't know which Link to draw and with which girl and whatever but I also didn't want to ask her and give away what I was doing so I decided to just draw EVERY LINK EEEEEEEEVEEEEEEEEEEER!!!!!!!!! Well.... The Real Links. Not the TV series or CD-i Links. [STABS DP]

Anyway, this works roughly in release order by epoch, not chronological order since I haven't finished any of the Four Swords games yet and don't know where they fit into the plot and I didn't have time to figure it out. It goes Zelda 1/2, A Link to the Past/Link's Awakening, Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask, Oracles, Wind Waker/Phantom Hourglass, Four Swords, and Twilight Princess.

I apologize in advance for the horrible Toon Links but they were the toughest part of the whole picture. Something about their perportions is fundamentally impossible for me to draw right. ;_; Also, I totally screwed up Majora's Mask too... :\ I should've just drawn one side and pasted it to the other side... :\

For best viewing, either hum or play an MP3 or Midi of the original Zelda's title screen music and start scrolling down slowly at the same point in the music where Zelda 1's title screen would begin its crawl. As such, I should point out I got the idea from the closing credits sequence for Harlock Endless Odyssey.

And lastly, as you can see, I kinda went crazy with filters, textures, and other odds and ends. Anyway, I hope the result is good enough and well received so... Without further adieu...

Happy Birthday Mindy! I hope all the effort I put into this shows how much you mean to me and I hope you'll be my friend for a long, long time.
Referenced Source: The Legend of Zelda

Tried to draw something to make me feel better but I'm not sure it helped any... Though, at least the fact I got it done means I must be feeling well enough to draw even though I still feel like hell... >_< Anyway....

This is actually a little ackward for me because this is something I haven't done since college--drawing a nude from a photograph, that is. When I first started drawing, I tried to practice figure drawing by buying issues of a photography magazine they sold at school with plenty of nudes in it and then finding a nice quiet area of the library in which to focus on drawing from the photos. Not quite the same as having a real model or even a virtual model but I thought it might be fun to try my hand at one of the various stock photos available on this other website.

I'm not sure if it's because I'm not feeling well or what but I had a tough time with her hips as well as her hands, what with the scarf blocking so many of the fingers... >_< And the scarf itself was a bit of a nightmare. As for the extensive cel shading, you can thank Photoshop's Adjustment Layer functions for helping to really bring out the shadows on her body from the photo to help me do more realistic shading on her.

And yes, I know her face looks stupid... I'll try harder next time... ;_;

Inspired by ~ShampooNeko's Go Nagai chibis... Except mine came out horrible...

In anycase, if you're a Mazinger fan, you're probably giggling madly right now, if you're not.. You need an explanation. The guy in the picture is Kouji Kabuto, the main character of Go Nagai's groundbreaking Super Robot series, Mazinger Z. The leftmost girl on the upper right (holding the chainsaw) is Sayaka Yumi--Kouji's self appointed girlfriend. Their relationship is.. Ummm... One of yelling and violence. As such, I don't think Kouji's ever considered her more than a friend, really. She, on the other hand is often jealous and vindictive over Kouji. Even to things that aren't even alive! Such as... Minerva X.

Minerva X was designed to be Mazinger's true partner and even came equipped with an AI system to take over for the pilot should they become incapacitated. However, she was never officially built because her plans were stolen away by Dr. Hell. Now, when Dr. Hell builds her to fight Mazinger Z, he stupidly includes the AI system which refuses to fight Mazinger and resists to the point of crying and overloading her own systems. Once taken in by the folks at the Photon Lab, since she's designed to react to Mazinger's pilot's brain waves, she immediately becomes taken with Kouji and it drove Sayaka NUTS!! Sadly... In the end, another of Dr. Hell's monsters destroyed her AI and she had to be taken down before she could Breast Fire a nuclear plant and nuke the city. Ironically, enough, though, Diana A seems to be loosely based on Minerva's design. And she still lives through Super Robot Wars and the manga, Mazinger Angels.

Then there's... Grace Maria Freed, better known as simply Maria. The girl on the right with the Getter Tomahawks. I don't know if she ever ran across Sayaka in Grendizer but I can't imagine it being a pretty sight. You see, Maria has it bad for Kouji and in SRW, they tend to fight A LOT over him.

Now... That you know the characters... The scene's pretty obvious. Kouji's out with Minerva (I have this picture in my head of a comic where Sayaka and Maria are fighting over him and Minerva comes over and uses Breast Fire on them and takes off with Kouji) and its a nice, happy picnic they're having! But ... Sayaka ... And Maria... They aren't happy. They feel like... PAYBACK!!! Also, Dr. Hell's Air Fortress, Ghoul's there to help exude extra evil!
Referenced Source: Mazinger Z

Well, here it is. I said I wanted to draw a nude as if drawn from life and I did. Sadly, there was no real model... ;_; I used Kuo's oft suggested Pose Maniacs website and chose a random virtual pose and drew from that. I wonder if a real model would look this good, though? Still... I'm TAKIN' volunteers!! .............. Yeah, right... Anyway...

I should also mention that this was also the FINAL test of Open Canvas to see wether or not it really is of any use to me. Actually, ~StaciNadia wanted to test it herself with a picture she's doing now but when I opened OC last night, I saw it was the last day of the trial soooo... She's not going to be doing that. But as I was saying, this was to test not only how I'd be able to do a nude in OC (since Rydia was fully clothed) but also to see if my original impression of OC was correct. That being that it was much easier for me to draw clean lines in OC than in Photohshop. And, just LOOK at the line art on this baby! A lot of it was drawn in ONE pass with NO retouching and NO mad scribbling! Perhaps THIS is the secret of the great artists I've been missing for so long? In anycase, the final verdict is that YES, OC is useful in providing clean line art. So, as soon as I get paid again, we're going to buy OC! I can't wait to see how nice it'll make my comics look...! ^^

As to the background and lighting... This... Is supposed to be based on the class I took Figure Drawing in, back in school. I say "based" because my memory sucks and it's been about eight years since then. I put in two light sources, the windows on the side of the class and the overhead lighting. Is there actually a chalkboard on that side of the class? Was it truely chalk or maybe dry erase? I have NO clue! Ask *metalfighterriku. She might know.

So, in closing... Drawn on OpenCanvas, colored in Photoshop.

This is mainly for =t3h3r3ee (how do you even pronounce that?) whom agreed to do an art trade but needed references for this character. And sadly... Since she's only appeared thus far in the Next Episode preview page at the end of Chapter 1, there wasn't much else in the way of reference material... But then I remembered that I DID have some drawings of her at the design stage that could be used for this purpose but... I couldn't find the sketch book it was in and it took me all week but at LAST, here it is! Sadly, I sketched it a bit light in some areas making it hard to see where her dress began and her hair ended. I went over it in Photoshop for clarity's sake.

This is actually a good opportunity as I really need to put data sheets of the characters up anyway for both reference and hopefully to drum up readership for the manga (assuming I ever draw more pages...! ).

So without further adiou (sp?)...

From Dynamic Destroyer Dyzenos

Tara Young (Character Description)

Dyson's older cousin, they grew up together near Las Vegas, Nevada until Dyson's family moved to Pine Corners. A free spirited devil's advocate, her breezy, outgoing, and slightly sleazy demeanor bely her true stengths. In truth, she's a lot smarter and a more prudent girl than she lets on.

Relationship with Dyson

Growing up so close, their relationship is more like that of brother and sister than mere relatives. They fight like crazy but deep down they do love each other, a fact that becomes more and more evident as the story puts them in extraordinary circumstances.

She enjoys constantly getting a rise out of Dyson and always has. From simple teasing when they were kids to flaunting her wanton sexuality in his face, generally anything that makes him mad, embarrases him, or otherwise drives him nuts, is pure entertainment to her. [CUE TRADITIONAL EVIL ANIME WOMAN LAUGH HERE] Granted, she thinks it's all in good fun. Dyson, on the other hand...

School, apperance, and other stuff

A student at St. Mary's School for Proper Young Women, somewhere in Nevada, she comes from a highly conservative and religious part of Dyson's family. Her mother, Ester, Dyson's aunt on his mother's side, was never fond of the direction her sister went in (being a showgirl and all) and wants to do EVERYTHING in her power to make sure her little Tara doesn't turn out the same way. Unfortunately the pressure she's put Tara under has made her react in an opposite manner, becoming less and less the proper young woman that her mother desires.

Known to be a legendary partier around town and also well known for holding her liquor, though she doesn't smoke or do drugs. Also said to be highly promiscuous though her actual sexual experience is not actually known.

Relationshipwise, she likes to mess around and have fun with different guys but she's not looking for a serious relationship yet.

All in all, she's not a bad person but like Dyson, she has her own growing up to do.

How will she fare in the gathering storm?