I was slightly ill last week with problems with my thyroid. I have Graves Disease which has caused me some problems in the past, but for the last few years I haven’t had too many issues after finishing a program with my doctor. Now it looks as if things are active again and I’ll be checking in with my doctor more to make sure things are going smoothly.
I have been streaming a lot more which is something I really wanted to get back into doing because it’s a great way to get focused and work on a few painting projects I need to finish for the holidays. I also have been asked to do some really neat things with my art recently so as soon as those conversations and deals work out i’ll let you know whats going on with my art once I can talk about it. It was my friend Sarah Joncas’ birthday this week and since she’s such a huge fan of Zelda games I painted her on my stream as a cute Link. Sarah is an amazing artist herself so please check out her work!
In the little spare time I actually have I’ve been exploring my options with the PC Engine and PC Engine CD as it’s always been a system thats eluded me over the years. When I was a kid the local Radio Shack had a demo Turbo Grafix 16 next to the Genesis system and that was the only place I would see TG16’s for sale when I was a kid. I’m using OpenEmu to play thru & stream a bunch of the games, though not all the roms are the best and I need to download more of the box art to make my collection look the best. When I stream emulated games everyone always comments how nice looking OpenEmu is and I need to use it as I am on a Mac and this actually works for a bunch of different systems. I highly recommend using it only because its beautiful and you can keep images of the box art which is a lot more satisfying to browse through then just a stale list.
It’s almost a perfect system though everything that is wrong with it is everything the marketing team did to localize and sell the system to a North American consumer. I write this with the knowledge of being 10 when the system was in stores and when I first noticed it. It was an ugly looking system with an overall ugly design. I wouldn’t be proud to cut out the box art of any of the games to stick up on my wall or to shove in my bike spokes (yes that was a thing when I was a kid). Despite being an overall ugly hunk of junk, the TG16 had some really beautiful looking games for it that were bright, colourful and stupid cute. The was the huge selling point and still stands out for me about the TG16 as its very distinct to the system and it’s super inviting to pick up even the crappiest of games and give them a chance such as Kieth’s Courage. Over the next few weeks i’ll be focusing on going thru my PCE library and making my official list of whats good, whats bad and whats wrong for the system so make sure you catch my streams.
I’m trying to figure out space issues in my apartment as it’s a project I started to pick up over the summer but fell back on because I got too busy. I need to move out a bunch of older furniture and bring in a few more sensible things like bookshelves t0 keep my collections cleaner and away from things that might hurt it like my pets sitting on it. I’m also in the process of going thru my belongings and pairing down what I don’t want or need anymore, mostly in my book collections.
I’d like to get my books more out and on display in my apartment so I can revisit them and start reading them again. I understand that in this day and age I can simply download books to any of my mobile devices, but nothing is ever going to make me get rid of the existing collection of books I have been carrying with me since I was a child. A lot of my books were once my mom’s so theres a lot of sentimental value to my collection.
A Week in Dank Art
I always have a lot of things going on in my life the one thing that always helps me to find balance is working on my art. Part of the biggest reason I like to make art to streams is I am putting time into using my skills as an artist and try out new things to see what works and doesn’t. That doesn’t mean just using the medium as it is, but also getting into habits of “seeing things” differently. Thats the cool thing about doing “Fan Art” because theres already some sort of element you are taking from the source (such as a character or a story idea) but what brings a personal touch to it is how you use that stuff to make something original. There’s just drawing a character straight as it is or challenging yourself to see something further or more may it be for humour or to0 press a point. I like to try out things in these smaller Dank Arts so when I go to do something larger I already have an idea of what works, what doesn’t work and make the most of painting time.
Lord BBH’s randomizer is great for starting off an entire week of Dank Art because there is the possibility of drawing a lot of work and really putting things like “How should I go about this game” when trying to draw it. I won’t draw something for each game but if something calls for Dank Art it will happen. However not every game in a randomizer calls for Dank Art. It could simply be that I don’t like the game to I have already drawn enough art for a certain game and I am tired of it. If I am having a very busy week I won’t be able to get many done. However as long as BBH is playing arcade games on a Monday I am sure to show up and draw at least one Dank Art for the occasion.
I’m always looking for new Streams to do Dank Art to however conditions need to be just right. Not every streamer likes the idea of having Dank Art to go with their games and thats perfectly alright. I’ve had people tell me it takes away from the actual game itself, that selling the work is wrong and I have no business doing what I am doing. That’s alright because I can understand and I’ll back away since there is no reason to fight someone who’s already made up their mind. However, most people are very happy to see that what I am doing is more for the love of the game & the only hidden agenda I have is to get more hours in painting then to really turn over a profit from Dank Art. I do sell the pieces for those who really want them however I also give away some over twitter to the people who are not only my fans but fans of the games and the streamers themselves.
Every now and then someone will ask me over twitter or in chat to do a special request. One of my followers asked me to make some Dank Art for Breakers Revenge and I jumped at the occasion to do so. This was a wonderful piece to make and I am so glad it’s gotten a lot of positive feedback from the fans. Taking all those small risks really pay off when you go for it in a bigger piece.
BBH is also on the cusp of reaching 1,000 arcade games played in his roulette streams and last Saturday he had reached 800 and had another 12 hour viewers choice extravaganza. I always love the Viewers Choice events BBH does because often people want to choose really good games instead of the regular crummy ones and we get to see BBH torture himself playing them. Some of the better Dank Arts I make come from these streams so I always look forwards to taking an afternoon off so I can be there to paint for a viewers choice.
Winter is coming in. All the leaves are suddenly falling like crazy around here and soon there will be no leaves left on the trees at all. The two most scariest months for me are always January and February as the real test of my saving and preparing always seems to be in those two months. When most people fly away for a nice vacation I am hunkering down in my apartment trying to figure out what I am going to do for the entire year and if I am going to be alright with my loans and bills.
I have many jobs, but one of my favourite jobs is being a freelanced photographer and during the months of November and December I enter my busy season. I’ve already had a huge children’s christmas photoshoot over at a friends house this past weekend where I photographed 23 families.
I used to be a family portrait photographer for seven years of my life with a large corporate studio in my home town. I left that place at the beginning of 2014 under bad terms, mostly on how I was treated when I worked there. Even though it’s been 2 years I still get people wandering up to me saying “You took our photos”, usually when I am working one of my other jobs. It was a good job and I was really good at it, which is why it really pained me to leave it.
I’m probably never going to have a family of my own so sessions like this are really rewarding for me as it’s my moment to be around other people’s families. I like being around kids and I have this way with them thats really hard to explain unless you there. My vision when working with families is to try and capture those real moments with them and see if I can get them to be goofy, be silly and just enjoy our time together when we do photos because there are too many people out there who stress way too much over photos.