Parrot warrior girl

A lineart of a parrot girl. I never got around to coloring this for whatever reason. Might have to revisit this at some point because I like the idea behind it. Just imagine the colors!

A very shojo romance~

Marawe c. 2006

Enci Soro c. 2006

Marawe (now Herrington) and Enci (evolved into Mr Cass) used to be love interests, as well as the same age. The names are made up and not based on anything.

They're speaking a made-up language, Tellissian. It doesn't mean anything.

I love that this is supposed to be a sexy shirtless scene where he's all wet, the girl is blushing, etc. 

Now kiss!

Here was my attempt at drawing a romantic scene between them. There was never a plot or any context. Writing stories has always been difficult for me. Can you tell I read a lot of Yuu Watase?

Kenoko 2006

That watermark takes up so much space! Why!!!

A detailed artwork of my magical cat angel OC, Kenoko. I was getting more confident with Photoshop. I was in a bit of a slump and my artworks looked stiff and overworked. Interestingly her design has not changed that much since then. Hopefully my anatomy looks a little better now at least! Do you think those shoes are comfortable?

I don't care much for this picture but I do think it makes a fun set piece - I like the floating bricks with patterns on it and the shooting star. This might be fun to revisit someday.

Thank you, 13-year-old Mel, for saving the lineart!

The Epic Summer of Photoshop

The Epic Summer of Photoshop. I was on a roll with learning digital art. I was still a Deviantart newbie and wanted my art to look as good as the cool kids' pictures. At the time I did not have a tablet, so everything here was drawn, scanned/photographed, then colored with a mouse. 

Marawe gives wise advice.

I love this picture just because of how casually I mentioned a list of things I hate. I think she hates wearing clothes.

Kenoko the magical cat angel. I will always have a soft spot for this artwork. I love the colors and her character design, and it must have been so fun to work on this one too.

One of my older OCs, Naoyo Rakuen. (I recently changed her name to Naoyo Rakugaki.)

Random angel girl.

My Inuyasha fan characters Sakura (left) and.... I have no idea who the other girl is. Also, I like the background because I have no idea what's going on. Half forest, half sea? 

Random girl in a school outfit. I loved messing around with the different brushes in Photoshop. They were so sophisticated compared to OekakiBBS that I couldn't help but go nuts!

Me, my cat, and my younger cousin. We would browse Deviantart together and squeal over pretty anime artworks.

My eponymous OC Steimei. The fashion was inspired by Fushigi Yugi. All of my coloring was done using burn and dodge because that was the advice I got from my favorite artist. I actually really like how this one came out. 

A sun and moon themed mermaid. I think this one is really cool too and it would be fun to revisit. I had a thing for sheer fabric and gold trim.

First pictures in Photoshop

This is my very first picture done in Photoshop, featuring my eponymous OC, Steimei. I went wild with the various features that weren't in OekakiBBS. Looking back, it's interesting to see how I tried to transfer my Oekaki coloring style into a different software. Also, I couldn't figure out how to make the lines transparent.

I went completely buckwild with layer styles and special effects. That's what Photoshop's all about, baby!

This is my OC, Ebak. (Pronounced E-bake) She is a primordial version of my OC, Emily. 

Fun fact: unbeknownst to me for many years, "ebak" is a Filipino slang word for evacuating the bowels. Be careful about making up your own names and words... you never know what it might mean in a nother language!

I loved coming up with those fancy dress designs. I was obsessed with Fushigi Yugi at the time and all the fancy outfits.

This is my OC, Marawe. (Pronounced MARA-way) 

She is the original incarnation of what is now Herrington. They are so far apart they are completely different characters at this point. Marawe was a priestess. I borrowed a lot from Fushigi Yugi.

Mermaid warrior. Honestly? I still absolutely love this one because of the the design and the colors. I'd draw her again.

Another mermaid warrior. I loved giving people and animals wings, even if it makes no sense. The only other explanation is that they're actually space mermaids. Which is actually a lot cooler in my opinion.

One of my favorite things about being an artist is the memories associated with each picture, even if it has nothing to do with the picture itself. I was just wrapping up 6th grade. I was just starting my art journey, spending lots of time on Deviantart and drawing in Photoshop. Summer of 2005 was epic. (As I would say.)

I love this one because it's such a bad artwork but so honest and free about its intentions:

• Obnoxious lens flare
• Illogical color choices
• Random rainbow
• Badly drawn background
• Liberal use of textures and effects

It's a bad picture, but I miss the experimental freedom that came along with it. Childhood is magical!

Here's Ebak again. I entered this one into a contest for something and genuinely thought I would win. Can I have some of that naïve confidence back?!

Starry Hair

Ahh, these drawings make my heart sing with nostalgia!!! They were done in the now-defunct OekakiBBS. This online drawing app was my first serious foray into digital art. It helped me make a relatively easy transition into Photoshop.

OekakiBBS was the bomb. You could have your own website where people could draw and post pictures they did in Oekaki, and others could comment on it. It was basic HTML coding but highly customizable. I'm so sad this isn't a thing anymore. Communities were so much more tight-knit back then. There was a tremendous overlap with Deviantart and (the also defunct) Sheezyart. What a time to be alive that was!!!

Memories of OekakiBBS

This was one of my most ambitious artworks in OekakiBBS. It was directly inspired by Yuu Watase's dramatic group portraits.

Let me just say I have no idea who half of these people are.

This one was inspired by a shot in the Fushigi Yugi opening. 

My girl's got calves for days.

This ish MEEEE! ^_^

You gotta have rainbow hair otherwise it's not a proper Mary Sue.

These names are all Inuyasha fan characters and I have no idea who most of them are.

My cousin made fun of this one because the girl looks muscular. 

I like the experimental colors for this one. She's red and purple because why not.

An early attempt at photo realism. I was inspired by the awesome artists on the Japanese OekakiBBS site. It still blows me away what other artists could do in this little web-based applet.

I drew + posted this to somebody else's Oekaki board. I still vividly remember one of the other regulars commenting "her face scurrs me o.O" I was offended, but... yeah...

I still like this one quite a lot. I just wish she had a body. Poor thing.