Commission : Aion Fan Art

Commissioned work for Fabrissou. It's his character (Analdur) in the MMO game AION :

Love this, Love That : KN'K - Start Something

I'm not used to talk about music. I'm not an expert, but a friend of mine made me listen to the band, he plays in, for live sessions. Which is was totally fortunate, because I was looking for a "fetish" album to listen to, to motivate me while I work. I found it.
The band is called "KN'K" and the just released their first album and generously shared it on SoundCloud.
This is typically the kind of music I can listen all day, shaking my head, and bouncing all around my bedroom, or make me work faster and help me being creative. We can say that it was "love at first sight (or listening)". This is rare to listen to some music that resonates instantly in yourself (that can happen if you put your IPod in the wrong place, though).
So this first album is called "Start Something", and we can say they started and achieved an awesome something. If you're into Electro Pop, if you love Depeche Mode (the voice of the singer is sometime very close), and fun and smart music like Hot Chip, but with a more dramatic, "heavy" and "tough" sound, listen and love it now .

Fan Art : Tangled

Fabrissou told me about this movie. It seems really fun.
So here is my rendition of Flynn Rider, and, well... a bara version of Rapunzel (let's call him Rapunzek).

TERAAAAA !!!

Tera is another korean MMORPG. I might seem a little bit obsessed, but it is not my fault if this country has the best artists in the world. So Tera is another beautiful korean game. Open Beta has started in korea, and has a lot of (deserved) success. For those who never heard of it :

lots of videos on youtube :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rr_xLMaW--E&feature=related

korean website :
http://www.tera.hangame.com

US website : (beta will start around summer 2011)
http://www.tera-online.com

I was planning playing it tonight. But the servers went down for maintenance. So I decided to make a fan art of my sorcerer character :

Love this, Love that ...

Ooouh, I love that ! A lot... It's a shame this blog isn't updated very often. But you should check this out, mostly for this awesome illustration. Link has never been sexier... Colors and anatomy are amazing !

http://rocketmenstudio.blogspot.com

And that too : Logan, the god of all the gay illustrators, posted some awesome studies for the short comic to be published in Dokkun 3. It looks like it's the direct sequel of the previous amazing comics he did (in Dokkun 2). Logan seems to have a lot of fun with the watercolor brushes in Photoshop. And it looks like he read Hellboy a lot, too (the flying heads), uh uh uh uh...

Happy New Year !!!

I finally found some courage to make a greeting card for my blog. That's weird, because I didn't plan making any greeting cards, and I usually don't....
But this year, I ended up making 4 different ones... One for my friends, one for my boyfriend's co-workers, and this one for you, little perverts...

I wish you all the best ! Thanks for all your support ! Have fun ! I love you all (and I'm not drunk) !

Vindictus US Open Beta

As you may already know, when I got time, I play Vindictus, the latest online game from Nexon. I used to play the korean version, but it was frustrating as I had no clues about what the story were about. This game is really addictive, and to be able to buy underwears is a nice addition to the game :)

This game is an instance base action RPG, and play a little bit like Demon's Souls (best PS3 RPG), and Monster Hunter. Player skill plays an important part in the character progression, as the combat system is real time. The player has to learn how to dodge, block and launch powerful combos. The skill training is very similar to Mabinogi (an open world MMORPG), player has to pick a skill to train, and spend AP to level up this skill. Player cannot train several skill at the same time, so he has to choose very carefully what skill is the best to learn at a given time.

AP can be obtain when clearing dungeons. Dungeons (or Battles) are the core of the game. In these Battles, player can do quest and harvest materials (killing monsters, or using mine bomb on special rocks). Material are used to craft armor, weapons, potions. Crafting is vital. Most of the items must be crafted, and can not be purchased from NPCs.

This leads to the Marketplace, the feature you'll probably use the most. The Marketplace allows you to sell your items, or buy them. The interesting part is that if you don't want to farm over and over again a Battle to obtain a rare quest item, you can buy it there. Quest (Story) system is interesting too. Doing quest is really important too, they are mostly quite hard to achieve, but they are very rewarding. Stories give you Gold and Xp, of course, but they give you also : "Titles". Titles are small text that can be displayed in your char name to show off. But in Vindictus, Titles give you permanent statistic bonuses.

At the moment only 2 characters are available (Korean version will soon have 4) : Lann a warrior who can uses 2 weapon at the same time (damage dealer), and Fiona, a warrior who uses a shield and a sword (tank), and who has the ability to block attacks.

Graphic-wise, Vindictus is gorgeous. Art direction is one of the best at the moment. It may not be the most technically advanced game, but it doesn't need a very big comp and the Source Engine delivers. The characters are beautiful (specially the faces), shaders are used very thoughtfully. The UI is smartly done and not too invasive. Sounds are great and add a great violent feel to the fights.

They are so many things to talk about this game. I can only recommend you to try it.
If you want to play with me just add me to your friendlist ingame (Silencio, west server).

I was planning to make a real (drawn by hands) Vindictus fan art, but I din't have the time.

But I found a very interesting tool : 3D Ripper DX, which works like FRAPS but in 3D. This tool can grab DirectX informations, as meshes, textures, shaders, when a DX9 app is running. So basically, with it, you can, import almost any game models into some 3D packages like 3DS MAX. That's what I did with Vindictus.

So I had fun exploring how the models where made, and building a 3ds Max scenes with ripped Vindictus assets. I played a little bit with Mental Ray, and tried to make a sexy rendering of Lann one of the playable character. Hair have been added in Photoshop, I couldn't find the hair meshes and textures that haven't been imported properly into 3DS. And I slightly corrected the neck and the underwear of the character. Everything else come from the game.

As soon I got time, I will definitely make a real 2D illustration.

Enjoy.