Train Battle

This is a large file...but then the illustration itself is rather large, too. 14x17. And as you can tell, it was too large for the scanner at the shop I went too. Frustrating. A good two and a half inches or so of the top was shaved off.

And why is it that all my scanned images always look like crap?! It looks better in RL I swear!!!!

Anyway, this is for a contest over at the DA Risembool Rangers page; a place dedicated to the voice actor Vic Mignona and the characters he has, or will in the very near future, play. I've seen videos on You Tube depicting his interactions with the fans. Sometimes things get crazy... and I won't lie if I was in those situations I'd feel uncomfortable. Some of the questions he gets asked are ... well, inappropriate, I suppose? He takes it well though. He's very gracious and very straight up with his answers and very honest with things. That I can appreciate.

Anyway, this contest regards the recent Full Metal Alchemist; Brotherhood: Sacred Star of Milos, movie, which came out in April of last year and in Japan the year before. I have seen it online and I do enjoy it, but I'm still kinda half and half on the animation. There's some segments that were incredible and the effort that went in to studying human movement was very obvious, particularly with Edward in many scenes. However, other times it was so scratchy looking and so... well, NOT clean-lined that it irked me a bit. However, it was also somewhat reminiscent of the Studio Gibli films in the stylization of the character and world design so I had to give it kudos for that, whether unintentional or not. That was most apparent towards the end of the movie where one of the man characters, Julia Chirton, battles an enemy disguised as her brother, Ashley. (Yes, Ashley.) Her hair does this 'poof' thing I've seen in so many of the Studio Gibli films which depicts a character drawing on power or getting REALLY angry. The wolf chimeras were cool, too.

I loved the train battle, which is the scene I tried to depict here. It's not a prize winner by any means. The contest ends tomorrow so I've not had much time to work on it, so yes it does appear to be rushed. It was only my second time drawing Ed too so he didn't turn out so hot, but I'm still quite pleased with him. The wolf chimera, however, I am very pleased with. I was particularly happy with how his head and proportioning came out. Very fun character to draw. There's still some errors anatomy wise and that but not too bad with the limited time I had. I just wish I could start practicing with paints. I think they'd scan better....and maybe look a little less sloppy. Markers are hard in that respect. I tried so hard to keep it neat and to stay in the lines but it was difficult. Markers bleed easily.

With Ed's posturing I intentionally hid his legs because I was too stressed to try to get his feet right. I also didn't bother with drawing in the sword he can transmute on his automail arm for the same reason. His left hand I was going to do more with, but I decided to leave it hidden behind his famous red coat for dramatic affect... but I think it failed. ^^

Anyway, I had originally wanted to add more details in the background, such as the canyon and the bridge supports but I would never have finished it then. Even with the clouds I barely finished it yesterday and only just got it scanned and uploaded today. I would have done SOOO much more and tried to clean it up a tad more but there just wasn't time. So there's still some pencil lines in the cloud. Not a professional looking piece by any means. I do hope it doesn't burn anyone's eyes out. XD

Sooo....enough outa me. I've got, like, ten minutes to get ready for work...at my other job. Yes, I'm working two jobs now. Even less time now than before. Boo-hoo!!!

Ah well. At least I'm earning some mulah. XD