Let's Talk About Immortal Fool

A few days ago, I just finished drawing Chapter 5 of a webcomic called "My Immortal Fool."  Most of the time when I talk about my comics to people who are NOT fans of Nintendo characters, I usually just refer to Highly Experimental, but on the side, I've been working on this one, too.  It's a fan comic of the comedy-drama type that follows the exploits of a few villains from the Super Mario games taking place in the Bean Kingdom from Superstar Saga in particular.

The comic itself began in early 2010 based on an unfinished fanfic idea I had six years prior that fans of mine had wanted to see revived.  I chose to make it a comic because I was afraid of making comics.  No comic I've attempted in the past had lasted long and I felt like my art would never be good enough to make Highly Experimental a successful reality.  For the most part, Immortal Fool had a story that was almost fully planned-out, so all I had to do was draw pages and see what my capabilities were. The comic was posted on deviantArt and had a tiny handful of responsive fans that made this project fun and kept me going.  Not to mention, I was able to try different line and coloring styles, try different perspectives and layouts- basically do anything that I couldn't get away with in a serious ongoing webcomic. I mean, it's just a lame fancomic. If a critic were to tell me to be more serious with this comic, they would more likely say "draw an original comic instead" rather than "improve this fancomic."  Anyway. Later that year, I finally had the guts to work on Highly Experimental and started planning out the story and concepts for several months, and in Spring of 2011, I finally launched the comic on the web.

From then on, Immortal Fool was no longer my main comic, but while it was updated less and less, I couldn't let it die.  I get the feeling that fan comics are pretty frowned-upon in webcomics communities, and honestly, I would have had time to shell out two HiEx pages a week if I would have just axed Immortal Fool altogether, but it just didn't happen.

There are two big reasons for this.  Firstly, the fanbase. I've mirrored the project at ComicFury (IF currently runs alongside Mushroom Go on that site) and the reader base continued to grow both there and at deviantArt. It's not a big fan base, I don't get a lot of fanart of this project, and the last Formspring question I've received for it was in mid-2010, but I still get feedback when I post pages.  When I return after a long hiatus, I get really touching comments from some people on how glad they are that the comic is still running, and a couple of fans have even mentioned the comic when I've introduced myself.   I find it to be a rather arrogant idea to put down a successful fan project because I'm suddenly an original character artist or something  now. I love my fanbase.  The comic will eventually come to an end, but not without an actual ending.

And secondly, I vowed to finish this comic. I think I just said that.  There's only three more chapters left.

When it's time to make HiEx into a book, there will be a long hiatus for Immortal Fool, but rest assure, it will continue.

Happy third anniversary, awful cesspool of headcanon in comic form!

Let's call this the "Adobe Mock Suite"

Adobe: Build Your Own Adobe Creative Suite with Free and Cheap Software(via @Lifehacker)

Adobe’s Creative Suite is one of the best software packs out there for professionals, but the suite is prohibitively expensive for most people. If you can’t drop the cash, you can still get a similar experience with free or cheap software.

As someone trying to get work in the graphic design field, I’m thinking of downloading some of these free programs to learn the basics (namely Scribus and Inkscape) and if I do that, I will let you guys know whether or not these freebie compensations Employers will bother to look at your resume or not if their job opening requires “proficient adobe CS knowledge.”

There are some Graphic Design jobs out there that just require knowledge of Photoshop. Like, if you can slap stock pictures and text on a banner or page and know the size you need to make it for print, you’re qualified.  My first job worked like that and a couple of IT companies had pulled out my resume and called me for a graphic design position instead of the IT spots I had originally applied for with them.  I didn’t get either of those jobs probably because I came off as a timid little shit in the interviews, but I think this might useful to know for all you photoshoppy artists looking for work.

Using Colorless Blender Markers

Yeah, these:

Some people know about them, some people don’t care, some people leave these to collect dust asking “how the fuck do you use these?!”

right?

This post is for the people who ask “how the fuck do you use these?!”
Sure, there may be lots of online resources for markers, but I feel like doing a straight-to-point one for my [tumblr] followers.

COLORLESS BLENDERS DO NOT BLEND TWO COLORS TOGETHER.

Try all you might. You might get some that looks like two colors blended together, or maybe you just got a pale mess on your paper.

Colorless blenders DILUTE COLOR and PUSH IT AWAY

It’s basically… kind of… turning your marker into watercolor except the water is alcohol so it’s kind of becoming wateralcoholcolor or something.  Some people have used a trick where you dab the end of your colorless blender onto the ends of two colors and that causes the colors to mix when you lay it on the paper with the blender.  I haven’t tried this yet.

You can stop reading this entry now and toss those blenders out of they’re no use to you after all.

But what if you WANT to know what you can do with the blender???

0. Copic and Prismacolor have the same blender but different nibs to work with
I like to have one of each. The Prismacolor blender has sturdier nibs for details and texturing (discussed later) while the soft copic sketch brush nib is more comfortable for blending and gradients. If you’re a user of different/better/cheaper markers and they don’t come in brush nibs, I highly advise to add this one copic to your stash. 

1. Make pretty gradients.
 Mind you, this sample doesn’t look very pretty. Anyway, rub in some colorless blender over the edge of a light color and you can soften the edge into the natural white of the paper.  Repeat in layers if you want to add more gradient.

1a. Blend highlights
If the highlights are the natural color of the paper, again, rub the blender with the nearest color and this will soften highlights. If your highlights are an actual marker color, like yellow, use that color to blend instead of the blender.
If requested, I will go into this in more detail with a marker shading tutorial. In the future.  Maybe. 

2. Lighten up mistakes
It’s pretty inevitable that when you color an inked drawing, some color may spill outside the lines.  Rub some blender over it!

Dark colors will dilute into something lighter, and lighter colors will almost vanish. Make sure to direct your strokes towards the drawing. If you stroke your marker outward, you’re going to spread some faint color on the canvas.

Both Prismas and Copics can do this job, but the flat end of the copic does get destroyed a lot easier if you find yourself rubbing pretty hard, so go with Prismacolor or something sturdier, even if you’re an avid copic user. 

3. Make highlights
Take whatever marker tip you’d like and draw slowly over the color. It’ll look like shit when you first make the strokes, but it’ll look nicer when it dries.  You can run a little of a lighter color over the newly-faded area for some fancy effect or something.  

4. Make Textures
Because fuck photoshop (not really).  While the markers are still wet on the paper, take your blender and simply draw on the colors. tap in some dots, wiggle in some squiggles. Have fun experimenting. There was a lady at an Anime Expo copics class was able to make leafy textures on anime trees but I forgot how she did that.  This is where having blenders from assorted marker brands has the biggest use: you can vary your textures with what each brand of blender has to offer.

I never did this much since I do mostly character sketches where I can’t find a use for textures, but hope to start making a habit of texturing in future drawings

End of Tutorial

Full versions of samples can be spotted here (Amaaré), here (Burds), and here(Polish the Poltergust).

For my markered stuff, I have about 100 Prismacolors that are about 8 years old, and 27 copics that are about four years old and I use them both together.  Most of my art is digital these days so these things have been lasting me a while.

Rebloggable Tumblr version of this article can be found here.

New Portfolio Update

I decided to make a generic illustration one and for the most part, this is set up  You'll find this one at http://camelendez.blogspot.com.

I still have to watermark a few other PDC promos before uploading them, and then I want to add three more sections: graphic design/advertising, character designs, and sketches.  Those will come at a later date.

Highly Experimental's School Uniforms, Part 1

Reference sketches of two team uniforms in highlyexperimental.net
Both will be used in this current chapter, as well as the mechanics team jackets that come later.

Geno’s school, The New Generations Science Academy (or just call it Newgens) has most of their students split into teams of relevant study, with a teacher in charge of each team. Each of those teams have their own specific uniform which is to be worn at team gatherings (which happen twice a week) or certain events where they need to be.  Outside of meeting days, students wear the standard uniform of white polo/button shirts with teal pants/skirts/sweaters/ties/etc.

Some students wear their team uniforms on non-meeting days to express pride of the team they’re in, but it’s generally considered extremely arrogant.  Terrie does not know this yet.  The teams can't compete each other formally for lack of common ground to compete in, but bragging points play a big role. The more your team accomplishes, the more you flaunt.

At present, Team Potpourri is an all-girls class and always has been an all-girls class, so Audrie blatantly kept the colors all purpley. the skirt is just past knee-length, but for someone as short as Terrie, it stops at her ankles.

Males can enter this class, but there aren't any interested yet at present. It actually isn't because of anything gender-related, but because the girls already in that class are pretty nasty and elitist.

Green popped up on Google several times as a relaxing color, so I thought it was a good choice for the psych team’s uniform on the right. Dark green dress shirts are default, but any non-revealing dark green top will suffice. Mary wears a skirt with the outfit, Kat wears whatever she feels up to (but she likes skirts very much).

The silvery blue colors are just reminders for me on the Mechanic Team’s uniform and the yellow is possibly for the Astronomy/space team.
There’s more teams than this, but none that the main characters are in so I haven't thought them up yet.
I’ll go into more details about the teams another time.

To script or not to script

"Also, since I’ve been wondering, do you use a storyboard/script to plan the plot, or do you make things up as you go?"

This was asked on the site around two months ago.
I have a written document of the main points that happen both in each chapter, as well as bigger events for the story as a whole. Sometimes I will make note of particular lines I want someone to say, but otherwise, this is just a list of actions with no words. … Except maybe, “they talk about science” or “riveting discussion about the clock”.

Then I draw the thumbnails of about 5 pages at a time to plan out how I want each shot to work, and then the dialogue is made up as I go.

Scripts don’t work for me because I hate reading scripts (nothing against them, just personal taste). I can’t imagine what’s going on as these guys are yapping because I’m just staring at the format and it’s hard to deduce what it’s going to look like as comic panels. If I draw the actions first, I can arrange the shots however I want, and this inspires better dialogue.

But as I said, it’s the main points that are planned out. I have a general idea for small happenings between them, but those holes are generally filled as I go along (usually by the time I get to those points, I have much better ideas for them). And sometimes things don’t work out as I’m drawing them, and I make changes as that happens.

Work portfolio blog coming soon.

In a hopeful attempt to increase my chance of job hunt feedback, I've decided to set up a Linkedin account and compile a portfolio blog of my works from Preferred Dental Care. I've gotten clearance from the previous manager last year just so long as I watermark the material.

And...

Well...

I have a lot of stuff to watermark. :)

The new blog will be found here though I may change the URL name when I think of something better.  ("Smilebaby" was taken.), as for why "Smile, Baby", let's just say that working in dentistry reminds me of one of the pause screen quotes from a Gameboy Advance game called It's Mr. Pants, though that saying is probably commonplace in  this world...

This week, I started Chapter 3 of Highly Experimental. I kind of don't like the fact that it took thirteen months to get this far, but I should be happy that I've made it this far at all. I've attempted comics, both fan and original since 2001, and I've always stopped after a few pages.  At Page 63 now, this is the longest running original project I've done, and while there's going to be, possibly a two-week break due to vacation and getting other needed things done, I do look forward to working on this.

There's also the print project: Getting HiEx published in book form.  Originally, this was going to be a novel, but then I decided to make it a comic even though I barely know how to draw anything in the story, and pretty soon, it will be a graphic novel.  I just need to find a good place to print. Lulu is too expensive and the format of these pages don't fall within Ka-Blam's standard or manga templates. The first volume will cover the prologue and chapters 1 and 2, which totals to 62 pages. I should put in some extras, yes? I have to decide on what extras they will be.

Hello again.

It's been about four years since I've updated this blog, maybe more. It's been an amazing adventure full of trolls, artists and dentists, slapping pictures on tumblr, and I've launched a webcomic, but right now amidst my adventures of job-hunting with the experience I've juggled at my last position, I found this really nice calling for social media management, but realized I haven't had a blog with with significant text content more than 160 characters long in quite sometime, and with my tumblr being too much of a flashy obnoxious image dump to be taken seriously, it's time to re-open this one.

It's also a pretty cheap move to do this when applying for work instead of having a blog already active when doing so. If I don't get the job, at least I can work on my blogging some more, right?

And let's keep it about stuff I like: Art, video games, and webcomicking. Maybe also what's gone on in my life these past two years. Right now I have a comic page to finish.

And remember the baby I posted pictures of in the old days? He's now four years old and playing Mario Galaxy on his own! :')

I was hoping i wouldn't go this long without updates again.

So here's Mr. Fit from Banjo-Kazooie and Dr. Saturn from Earthbound!

More gamer stuff in an art blog

I should start a gamer blog, but who the darn would read something they've already read in every other gamer blog on the internet.

But anyway, some quick notices on gaming news that I actually care about:

1.

While a preview isn't availible anywhere on the internet right now, I recently came across some CHOWDER gamer pictures over at the Xbox Live Marketplace. I love Chowder and this made me very happy inside. For 100 MSPoints, you get six gamer pictures featuring those of Chowder, Mung Daal, Shnitzel, Truffles, Panini, and ENNNNDIIIIIVEEE.... >B[ Just check under the Cartoon Network section of the Gamerpics marketplace. Flapjack Gamer pictures can be found there, too.


2.

Banjo-Kazooie's enlarged text is now availible as a downloadable patch for the game. See the BK Blog for details.

I still haven't drawn in a while and .... if I do shell out a christmas pic, it'll be late, so for now...

Have some mail-ordered Chowder i drew for Tora's package last year!

Nothing for show today, but I promised my aunt Medi I'd show off more pictures of little Mikey. Where are my others?

Xbox 360 Achievements

I was going to put these on my DeviantArt blog yesterday. Forgot to, of course, as I actually went back to some of my older games

Banjo-Kazooie 8/12
There's an achievement I can't get now because of the Bottles' Bonus problem, but given this game file has 11 hours of gameplay clocked in (4 hours tied to Mad Monster Mansion alone), it's best if I started a new game anyway, do a proper speed run and get myself somewhere higher than 3000 on the leaderboard once I do collect everything.

Jetpac Refuelled: 10/12
All that's left is to complete all 16 levels of retro (made it to 14 at most) and all levels of the Refuelled mode, but I keep dying at the Outpost Kazooie (level 93). It feels impossible! XD

Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts: 33/50
Some of these are wierd, the rest just relies on more game completion and multiplayer whoring. The whoring I'm not very good at.

Viva Pinata Trouble in Paradise: 7/50
I should really try sprucing up my babies for the challenges rather than complaining about having to master-romance all mother of Flutterscotch varities again! Something I've still failed to complete in the first game!

Viva Pinata: 44/50
I still need a single pinata to be worth 10,000 coins and the rest are SECRETS

Bully: 21/38
Perfectionist, clearing side missions, and pulling hundreds of each kind of prank. All doable, but will take a while.

Crash of the titans: 47/47
I'm very proud of this. I really am. Still the only Xbox 360 game to date where I've nabbed every achievement.

Mind over Mutant: 19/48
Minigame arenas, voodoo doll collecting, and I have to fully upgrade everyone. I'm missing a Wumpa Voodoo doll and I have no idea where it is despite circling Wumpa Island a lot more than I already have to for storyline progression!

Aegis Wing: 10/12
Need 185,000 points and to clear all the enemies in a single stage. what?

Kameo: 21/50
A-ranks? Expert Mode? Co-Op A-rank? Multiplayer whoring? PFFFF!

Castlevania: 2/12
I'm still stuck at the first boss.


Other games I play on the system are:
Grabbed by the Ghoulies
Psychonauts
Freaky Flyers.

If Ghoulies was ported to Xbox Live Arcade, I would totally buy it again.

New Art Supplies

New Bristolboard and pens sent to me as an early Christmas present from my friend Elegance Liberty

And a new tablet from my mother.

Now I'm just like, stumped at what to draw. I tried out Tegaki with the tablet
I'm happy that I don't have to rely on anymore pen-mashing to swap colors and pen sizes. I'm also greatly amused that in Banjo-Kazooie, everytime I go into the Mad Monster Mansion bathroom, an epic Stop-n-Swop fanfare ensues. I paid little attention to the hack spoilers back in the day, so this came as a total surprise. And given I spent four hours in gameplay looking for the four missing notes in MMM that the Bottles Bonus challenge took away, I made more than ten trips into that bathroom. Fanfare after Fanfare after Fanfare even with the egg long gone. All that's there is a happy toilet. Maybe I'm too easilly amused!

But yeah. Bamboo tablet's doing good so far but I should try it in a real art program before really deciding if it does me justice!


Oh, and for the relatives, here's an update on my nephew.

Comic-Con Portfolio Reviews

I had these written down on my cellphone back when Comic-Con International was held at the end of July, but never got around to posting these. I probably have somewhere ............. pfft!

Part of my time spent in Comic-Con that weekend was at Portfolio review sessions. I'll be quite honest, not only have I had no idea what I actually want to do with my art, I didn't get around much to improving my art to more professional standards nor teach myself 3D as I had wanted to this past year, mostly for lack of time and concentration which lead to lack of motivation. So my portfolio had... whatever I could dig up from from my pile of concepts and blatant fangirling, which is kinda shameful coming exactly one year after I sent another of my portfolios to get reviewed by a game company just to see if I had a chance at becoming an artist in that industry.

One piece of advice is to have an idea of where you're going. If you don't, let the reviewer know so you two can discuss options. If you don't know where to go, the reviewer won't know what to suggest and you'll just sit there in front of thousands of other applicants just derping around like.... what?

Also, if you're more of a cartoony artist, don't go to a company that dishes out the complete opposite or vice versa. It's wierd!

I did learn through the reviews that I'm into storyboarding. I just need to come up with material to practice my storyboarding on and I'll be more prepared for reviews next Comic-Con. I'm no writer, so this is kind of hard! c:

But anyway, the reviews:

First one I went to was a company called "Secret Level" which is a part of Sega. I didnt know until the actual review that these people did fantasy fairy painty stuff, hence my advice as to carefully choose who to review you.

According to my notes:
So... my first portfolio review at Sega's Secret Level booth. My style is very fun and very manga-influenced. The guy told me that I either have to be more varied in style to be able to work at a game company, or find a company that my style would fall into. He also told me... To get a book called "Scripts to Screens" And to take up on webcomics. He also told me twice my style was perfect for something like Gaia. But he said to keep having fun what I'm doing.


I'm still lolling at the Gaia part. I know he meant well, but it still felt a bit insulting! Seriously.... GAIA ONLINE!


My second stop was good old Cartoon Network. I seriously have NOT drooled with this much anticipation since I sent my stuff to Rare last year, and I wasn't the only one with the rediculous line I had to sit through.

Notes:

Cn's feedback: I have lots of potential. My stuff is fantastic for someone mostly self-taught. Keep at it. "Your stuff is not quite what we're looking for." Read books And I was handed a portfolio advice pamplet and a doodle sheet to draw some of their characters. The guy wrote down a phone number to someone who he told me to call once I refine my portfolio for another review.

That went well! And no gaia directs!

The major downside of that review was that Chowder creator Carl Greenblatt was the one doing the reviews on Friday, but then two turns before mine came out, he switched out for someone else and my portfolio was reviewed by an artist for Ben10 Alien Force. Not to say he wasn't a nice guy because we had a really nice review session going, but he told me more than once that Mr. Greenblatt was better-suited to reviewing my art.

I saw Greenblatt again at the booth the next day, but I was sure CN was still backlogged with reviewers until next doomsday.

On a side note, I got to meet Greenblatt twice on Sunday- during his autograph-signing and outside the con when he was on his way home. I was happy, needless to say!

But more Comic-Con Fangirlery will come in another post!

I had also signed up for Nickelodeon on Friday, but they were so backlogged that my turn didn't come until Saturday afternoon.

Notes:
"I see you draw anime!"
And he spent most of our time obsessing over my use of prismacolors and how I used them to make a comic.
Took my business card and resume print, scribbled notes all over and kept it.

Overall, we had a nice discussion of stuff.


But it had me thinking...
... Sega told me to read books on Storyboarding (and I would be good for Gaia)
... Cartoon Network told me to be cleaner with my comic inking
... Nickelodeon suggested nothing to me. The guy just spazzed over my marker usage.

Part of me feels that was too easy for comfort.

I wish I could do one more review tomarrow after the Chowder panel, but everyone is still backlogged from Friday/Saturday. I checked out the indies at the exhibit hall but it didn't look like anyone else was accepting portfolios.

So I still have all my CDs. I'll probably trash them in favor of making a better, NOT-RUSHED portfolio over the next while. I did learn a lot. Not so much as to how to improve my art, but how to set my direction when I decide what specifically I want to do in the industry.

That's about it. In the end, I'm glad I did this no matter how much I complain.

And that ends my portfolio reviewing adventures. Photos and stuff will come in the future. For now, here's some of my portfolio entries. Like I said, I didn't know my direction, so a good friend of mine told me to cover as many corners as possible with what I had since I didn't have a lot of time on my hands to draw fresh material.

The Truth to Stop n Swop

What? No.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

They're not the most flashy, but they do the job!

I've been playing Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts since it's release date. Funny that this game is cheap at $39.99, but then I also spent $20 in an S-Video cable because the text was unreadable on my SDTV (It makes such a difference), and another $30 on a Messenger Kit after I stressed out for days using the damn Xbox 360 controller to type blueprint and photo information! These purchases feel like such rubbish in the long run buy my gaming has been much more enjoyable! HUR HUR!

But anyway, I was asked by my friend Katzii on Xbox Live to offer some advice on vehicle-building for the game. Given what I DO know would be a TLDR, I decided to dig through my pile of 48 blueprints for some of my more used contraptions and explain what makes em tick!

Or fail!

By the way, I'm 100 jiggies into the game! HEEEYAH!
This is a slightly-modified version of a bike I made in the demo: The Rubbish Arrow. With just the arrow and seat, it runs ok. The addons made it a wobbly pile of junk. Either way you do it, it's best not to ride this thing up hills, hence why this is rubbish.

My first main vehicle here. The Strawberry-Banana. I have a wierd thing with naming things in video games. My Pokemon are named after my dead pets, my Harvest Moon/Viva Piñata sheep are named after Mexican foods, my Viva Piñata Horstachios after characters voice-acted by Dan Green, my Disgaea 1 soldiers are named after characters from Rareware games (except for my throwaway magic users who were named after condiments) and my Disgaea 2 soldiers are named after my original characters, it goes on. For BK:N/B, I decided out of nowhere to name all of my vehicles after dessert flavors, and Strawberry-Banana was born. This was a simple racer built from the Land Chasis 1 with some fuel jars, high-grip wheels, and an egg gun in case needed.

I used this for a lot of my earlier races and general driving around. The balloon is there became completely useless, but I didn't bother to get rid of it.



L.O.G KICK
This is merely the LOG pusher with a boot-in-box addon (two is pictured now but before there was just one, so this is actually LOG KICK 3.0). This simple modification has gotten me through many Jinjo Brawling/Hurling challenges with incredible ease. Just have it in your grasp and launch that kick to see that Jinjo fly!

Later challenges will require power upgrades, so just change the engine.

This vehicle also works well in the Stony Kickball challenge.


Water Polo
Lacks a real name because this was originally a throw-away vehicle assuming I'll never need it again after the Water Polo challenge at the Jiggoseum. This is a water version of the LOG KICK built from the Boat Chasis 2. Works the same way, but with extra space for the Jiggoseum's huge balls.

Strawberry-Banana 2.0
When the races get faster, you'll need a faster car. This one was upgraded to one medium engine and later on an extra small engine was added on. The balloon was replaced with the spec-o-spy to look for Jinjos, the Radio came from Jingaling's Bingo Hall and some blocks were altered to compact the car a bit.

Rubbish Delivery Service
Good for quickly hauling lots of small things around an island. Bad for lugging giant coconuts. Modified version was never saved because I found a better way to complete that challenge.



Hardcore Lime
Building this thing felt like an Xbox plane. Originally built from an Air Chasis 2, I needed something that would race to the air where I'd finally stop leeching and modifying LOG's Trainer Plane with more engines. Spec o Spy was added for above-ground jinjo searching, but otherwise, the back of this plane was so clunky and pointless. It felt like I was flying a garbage pile.

Still, it won me plenty of air races.

Hardcore Lime Bomber (Hardcore Lime 3.0)
Loaded with tons of weaponry to pop some patches on Mr. Patch. BAD IDEA as it was too heavy to fly decently and adding more engines, fuel and ammo just made this a larger pile of garbage.

It was after this that the my Hardcore Lime series was retired.

Strawberry-Banana 3.0
Faster! We need faster! AAAAH! TOO MUCH JUNK IN THE TRUNK!

With no more room to load on anymore power, The Strawberry-Banana series was also retired, but not before Strawberry-Banana Flyer (4.0) was developed to take to the air with folding wings. That was a failed upgrade.

Strawberry-Kiwi
Also built from the Air Chasis 1, I made this one as a lighter, faster alternative to the Hardcore Lime to be used specifically for races. I had just then got my first small Jet so that became the power source.

Speed is not a problem here at all. However, try racing through the LOGBOX 720 stage without crashing about in every manner possible over the course of five seconds.



Barbo Kenkiller 2
Pink, girly, and will fill your intestines with all manner of launchables. What?


I like Frozen Yogurt!
Folding wings allows this to convert from car to plane while grenade guns shoot targets, floaters give sailing access, and large box with rail add-ons for carrying extra large rubbish.

A 2.0 is in the works


Box O' Chocolates 2
It has clockwork Kaz bombers, homing torpedos, a laser, grenade guns, two small jets, one large jet, large engine, energy shield, many many fuel and ammo canisters, and two foldaway propellers to fly when needed. After I took that picture, I upgraded it to have a Spirit of Pants and replaced the floaters with more ammo crates.

Guaranteed to knock out some teeth.

Upgrades are also in the works.

Mixed Berry (1.0)
With the game beat and upgrades to all basic parts availible, it was time to create a new main. Now it's possible to create the compact car of my dreams without the weighdown of tetrising engines and fuel tanks that so slaughtered my Strawberry-Banana baby. This one was built completely from scratch by stacking together just the bare necessities: Seat, wheels, engine, fuel, folding wings, floaters, and Fulgore's Fist. A total of six blocks and four poles were used for cosmetic appeal while two L-poles held together small frontal propellers.

Unfortunately, racing is impossible on this vehicle since its excess speed and lack of weight will have me flung into the air at every tight corner and hill slope, so right now it's just an explorer vehicle.

Wings spurt out when you believe it can fly!

There's also not enough floaters to keep the car completely high and dry, but it serves it's purpose nonetheless!

Moral of Mishaps:
When building go-things in this game to serve a purpose, stick with what you absolutely need and use as little else as possible. If anything, you'll probably make fifty mods on any single vehicle until it runs absolutely perfect for a challenge. That's always been my case.

???

Fwarrgh!

No updates in nearly six months here? That's terrible! Huge slump is definitely one of them, but if there's anything I need to make posts of when I get back in gear is of the following:

Comic-Con 2008 and the portfolio crits I've endured
Crash: Mind over Mutant
Anything that looks like art that I seemed to have vomitted out over the last five months

And stuff I don't remember.

But today...

You'll see...