Thursday, December 29, 2011

Gift Art: Wash and Rosie by Amy M.

Here are a couple very cool pictures by Amy M. of Rosie Burgess and Wash Monahan. These two are particularly sweet, which really suits both the characters. I love the life she puts into the eyes!

I have a confession to make here. I didnt' realize it was Wednesday night until about midnight last night.  It was like waking up with the house on fire or something.

I swear I don't know what happened to the week.

Between the holiday and a variety of family things going on right now, I am simply not ready to finish this week's post up. Out of time and mental resources, I guess. Sometimes life catches up with you and can suck all the creativity right out of your head.   But I'm going to allow myself a few extra days on it and see if I can't get it out over the weekend. Sometimes it just helps if I just let myself take a mulligan every now and then, even though I dislike resorting to that. The husband's always saying "Just blow it off one week!" Well, I always feel like I've fallen on my face when I do that, so no. I have some airspace just ahead. Maybe. So I'm gonna try to use to get this week's post out. Watch this space. 

Did it just turn Friday?

Good Lord. 


12 comments:

Anonymous said...

No offense meant to Amy M, but I have to be honest when I BEG you to stay with your original artist. This current trend towards "ugly = beautiful art" is just so very wrong. Miss-shaped faces are miss-shaped faces. There is nothing beautiful in looking at cartoon art that makes one wonder why an artist has rendered a serial killer and told me to think it pretty.

btw if open ID is still not working right, this is Amy Simeister

Anonymous said...

Sure enough open ID is still on the fritz.

'gina said...

There’s a few things to be kept in mind here. First and foremost, art is subjective. Nobody will like all styles all the time. We have things we like and things we don’t. Be it music, writing, or graphic design.

Personally, I don’t like Jazz. That doesn’t mean Jazz is not a legitimate form of artistic expression. It just means Jazz does not resonate with me personally. Clearly, it does resonate with others.

I’m a graphic artist myself, and I dearly love a great many genres of artistic expression. I have a lot of artist friends, and my house is decorated with art running from professional work by well known artists to outsider art purchased from street artists to children’s crayon scribbles.

As sincere artistic expression, it’s all beautiful to me.

Having said that, there are two kinds of art on this site. The bulk of it is professional art...art I’ve paid for by artists whose styles appeal to me and who I think can express what is in my head. The difference in the styles also appeals to me...I like how, for instance, Diego and Liezl differ so much in their interpretations. Diego’s vision of Saint does not look anything like Liezl’s...however, they are both very much Saint.

But here’s the thing...neither of those artists are readers. They’ve only read a few relevant snips here and there so they can get the gist of the characters. And they’re trying to interpret what’s in my head, not theirs. And I am thrilled with their work. Seriously, they’ve blown me away.

But....

What I really crave as a writer is to know what’s in my reader’s heads.

So when someone takes time out of their busy life to give me a free, unsolicited gift of this magnitude...and make no mistake, I consider it of substantial worth...it’s huge. I can’t even tell you how huge. Put it this way...I could not afford to pay for what it means to me that someone would give me this sort of gift. I am moved on so many levels by this, that someone was prompted by something I wrote to interpret it themselves and then share it back with me.

Fan Art, Fan Fiction, even a comment or two every now and then. It’s the fuel that keeps the engine running and the wheels spinning. So thanks to all of you for that, even the personal emails saying “I hate the Bender picture” and “that last chapter was kinda weak”. ;-D

So, no worries about the old art going anywhere. It’s not. It’s art, and I love it. In fact, I’m sitting on a series of scenes Diego has done for a stand alone story I hope to include in the finished book. Also in that version, there will be a bonus series of character sketches by yet another artist I think you will recognize.

Happy New Year to everyone and be safe.

‘gina

Anonymous said...

Not how I see the characters, but it's good to see different interpretations. They don't look miss-shaped to me at all.

- Vidra

J. Sizzler said...

I like the sweet expressions captured on their faces, especially Wash's. Always fun to see how other readers interpret the characters.

Falberry said...

Everyone has to start somewhere. I don't mean to get snappy, but who are you to judge? This person obviously worked their ass off on these, and they look damn lovely. That's a lot of hard work there, and it's wonderful to see that anywhere and everywhere, there's still people out there who put down whatever they're being paid to do, and just do what they love, and spread the joy to another person. That's beautiful stuff just on it's own.

I think we've all just stepped out of that doorway once or twice, wether it's literal and you're interning for your first real job, or it's metaphorical and you just lowered your pen to paper for the first time. This person is off to a fantastic start, and it's more than a little hurtful to read your comment.

I understand that it's not your favorite, but please don't shoot someone down like that. I've offered up fanart and fanfictions multiple times, and it's a little like a blow to the heart to see anyone blow it off.

....Sorry for the minor explosion. Please keep your personal acidic opinions to yourself.

<3, Erin

Anonymous said...

Believe it or not, I did not make my comment from a place of acidic nastiness. I made my comment from a place of open discussion. Having long ago formed the thought that a blog that has a comment section would be open to such things.

I am sorry if I offended anyone. That was not my intention.

I know that there are many forms of art and that not all forms appeal to everyone. Yes, Amy M was very kind and loving to make and send in her pics. No argument!!

But as a writer of songs and poetry myself, I fully know that once my stuff is out there, I and my creations are subject to criticisms as well as praise. & I personally would rather get Negative feed back that helps me see how others view my efforts, than have someone be "politely silent" when they dislike my creations. Feed back is good. as long as it is polite.

I honestly meant no insult. I was giving Feedback. Now that I know that my feedback is not desired. I will simply read silently.

-Amy M Simeister

Anonymous said...

I apologize my last reply was a bit reactionary. I will not act like a pouting child that is beneath us all.

So I will not sit and read silently although I do stand by every other aspect of my above reply.

I know it hurts to get negative feed back, but it honestly is the only way that any one grows as an artist of any kind. Praise is nice and wonderful. But it does nothing to help us see where we might need improvement.

As a personal note to Amy M. -- I am sorry if you are hurt by my honest opinions. Hurting you was not my intention. I do think that your use of coloring is wonderful and realistic.

If I was overly blunt in my first posting, I can only blame myself for being foolish enough to try and express myself while exhausted.

-Amy M Simeister

who is still having trouble with open id on this site

'gina said...

Hi, everyone. Sorry the ID is acting up. I don't really know what to do about that, sometimes Blogger is buggy. I love the service, but it does have some inconvenient quirks sometimes. And it works better with some browsers than others.

I'm really glad to be able to come on here and see that hopefully, feathers are being smoothed over. You all should be able to give honest feedback here. And I will say we all (including me. Maybe especially me.) need to keep two things in mind:

1. Writers: folks are going to add "tone" you didn't intend. It's human nature. Keep this in mind when you write.

2. Readers: Consider that you're possibly adding "tone" the writer didn't intend. Keep this in mind when you read.

Honest, constructive criticism is always welcome. Comments are always welcome. Everything on here is open for comment. Even the comments. ;-)

I think (I hope!) that everyone's cool at this point. I think y'all are a wonderful bunch for keeping this civil and coming to a peace about it. Thank you.

Falberry said...

Then I'm sorry as well. I spoke rashly, and for that, I apologize. It was your right to say as you think, and I envy and appreciate that. But I'd also like to point out that this blog is not a procession of booths at a fair. If this was deviantart or another open artist's website, I would not have protested. But it's not- this was fanart, delivered specifically to the author as a gift and shared with the artist's permission. So yes, I'm sorry if I unintentionally judged too harshly. But I also stand by my point.

My apologies for any rising tempers.

Anonymous said...

~TheOne, I accept your apology for asigning me motives and feelings that were never mine, I can see how my first post could seem harsher than intended.

I will also respectfully agree to disagree with you on our points of view.

In my personal world view, Anything I create and put out there ANYWHERE is going to be subject to the opinion of others. Even the fan work that I do. Such as a pic that I drew by hand and submitted to Kadanzer Weyr, or Haiku that I submitted to Shirley Meier who writes Eclipse Court. If it is posted in any kind of public forum it it by nature of the fact that it is a public forum subject to the opinions of others.

-Amy Simeister

open ID seems to hate me here...

Falberry said...

Well. In that case. :)

http://m.youtube.com/?dc=organic&source=mog&hl=en#/watch?v=riDsoQFHPWM

Thank you, and I wish you the best! To a good new year!

~Erin