[Showcase] Ray Posts Art Sometimes

Pokémon White LP Thumbnail Junk

The first picture I drew of Hilda just before I started the LP, which would be about 3 and a half years ago by now I think

Not much to say, just wanted to try drawing her in my style at the time. Used it for the thumbnails until I hit Nimbasa City.

Poke Victini?

Just before I switched the format of my LP to use my actual copy instead of an emulated one(as well as the format of the LP in general), I wanted to draw something special for the Victini event on Liberty Island.

Thumbnail V2

Example image of the thumbnails I used after defeating Elesa; before it was just the earlier version of Hilda against a plain image of Zekrom. A year had passed so I felt it was time for a change, so I decided to draw the Gym Leaders as well, adding each one to the thumbnail as Hilda defeated them in turn.

Thumbnail V3

Another year passed and, with me starting to refine my art style into what I use today, I redrew Hilda on physical paper rather than digitally, then used that over the older one. This is the current thumbnail style used with all of the Gym Leaders present this time. Below is the unfinished version of the sketch I did. (WARNING: very big image)


The Blue-Eyes White Dragon, Reshiram

Something I did for the Reshiram encounter in Dragonspiral Tower, a terrified Hilda witnesses N befriend the legendary Dragon-type, and N is looking decidedly crazy here due to the LP headcanon I have of him currently. This one took several months to finish and is one I'm quite proud of.

I don't have anything else after that because at the time of this writing I've only just now completed Victory Road and am eagerly anticipating the end of the game. However, I do have a picture of Hilda I finished drawing very recently, one I did just for fun to see how well I've come with my art style. You see it as part of my avatar, but here's the full version!

And I can definitely say that I'm proud of this one, too.
Here's a version without her hat as well, for kicks!


And this isn't even counting all of the sprites I've done for the LP, there's simply too many to post! but maybe one day, when it's all organized...

Fire Emblem OC stuff

I've got a lot of these but I'll only post the ones I like the most for now. These are characters that were meant for the ROM hack that I was working on until a few years ago, but still do art for because I felt like it.

Julie

The central protagonist of three, the story centers largely around this young regular girl and how she comes to grips with life whwn she and her family are caught up in the embers of war. A sweet kid.

Ruby

The second of the three main characters, a court mage of her home nation. Many people look up to her and as a result is plagued by an enormous amount of pressure to live up to their expectations, as she has to learn how to deal with it. first image is in her Magistra outfit, second is her in a casual spring dress.

Iris

One of my favorite OCs in terms of character and design, she's a rookie knight learning the ropes on what it takes to be great and live up to her mother's reputation. A flirty girl who's also looking to impress a few dashing men.
(why yes, her facial and hair design was based off of the FRLG Lass, why do you ask?)

Carol

A young thunder mage who's got energy to spare, she's a cheerful young lady who likes to study monsters and is more than eager to see the outside world. If only her mentor would see things her way... Outfit on the left is her normal outfit, the right one is an outfit she wears when there's warmer weather.

Dana

An introverted but exceptionally talented fencer and magician. She was living a life of seclusion until recently when she decided to tackle mercenary work and help her better understand people in general. Was actually an OC I designed for Final Fantasy VIII in mind, but I readapted her with a Fire Emblem style outfit because I wanted to see how it'd come out.

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Speaking of Fire Emblem, here's Linde! She's one of my favorite characters in the series and I've always loved her design. I've tried drawing her many times before, but here is where I finally had a result that I was satisfied with.​

Lauren

This one was finished a few months ago. Like Carol, she's another thunder mage. She's confident, bold, a touch cynical, and always has an opinion on something, but still ready to prove her worth as a mage when push comes to shove.
I had designed Lauren for my project when I wanted to bring some more characters in but couldn't use Carol for plot reasons, so she'd fill the same combat role. I'm a big fan of mage girls in FE if you couldn't tell, and wanted to try and go for a classic series design.

Cassidy

Completed two weeks ago. She's a sweet as can be country girl who recently enlisted into the army to prove herself capable, although she's a nervous wreck sometimes and constantly looks down on herself, despite having great potential.
Cassidy was intentionally designed with other cute growth archer girls of Fire Emblem in mind, such as Rebecca, Neimi, and Norne, so I tried to make her as adorable as possible. I really like how the design turned out and think I hit the mark, but it never hurts to have a second opinion.​

I just started recording a Pokémon Crystal LP and went to do something for a quick thumbnail, so I just drew Kris and Cyndaquil, as the player and starter of my choice. Went with a sporty look after looking at one of the old Sugimori pictures of Kris without her jacket and cap, so I sort of adapted it. Really like Kris' design so it was easy to do.​

Pokémon White LP Finale Junk and others
Going to showcase these in order. First off is the thumbnail used for the episode right before the final one - Hilda vs. the Unova Elite Four


Like with the Gym Leader one before it, felt I'd go full ham on this and put the foursome side-by-side against our heroine. Tried for a bit more contrast with the lighting between the characters - didn't get what I was shooting for but I ended up liking the result all the same. With my style improving, it was fun trying to draw the E4 in said style, though the women had to take some sizeable hits in their designs!


Truth vs. Ideals - The Finale

This is the thumbnail used for the final episode. By far my favorite piece that I've done so far, tied with one other. My first time trying to be artsy, since I'm usually not the type, but the end result surprised even me, even if it did boil down to "which effects will look the best for these darn dragons?" on GIMP. Also only the second time I've drawn N in a not-crazy look.

Here's where we get to the pictures I drew for the finale itself - Hilda speaks in this LP, and I wanted to make sure she had some choice words to say at a few points, so I took some liberties with a few scenes.

"How Dare You!"

After the final battle with N, he recovers fairly quickly from the fact that he could be wrong in his beliefs and very quickly changes his opinion saying that "there is no right or wrong" rather smugly.
Hilda responds by slapping him, then proceeds to go into a long speech about his shifting beliefs on a dime is nothing but bunk. This was something I wanted to do for a while, as I personally, think N is a big hypocrite during the game, and I wondered what if the player could call him out. I took my chance with this one.

And these are from the ending of the LP itself, just after N's Farewell, but right before the credits. I'll put 'em all together.

Long story short, Hilda witnesses N fly away on Reshiram, collapses to the ground from her harrowing ordeal, and begins to cry with the realization that Team Plasma's out of her hair for real(for now, anyway). Only to be then cheered up by the player(myself). Roll credits.
The vanilla ending by itself would have been enough if not for the format of my LP, so I had to improvise with something suitable to match, and after a teenager who's gone through an enormous amount of stress in-universe to get to this point, what better way to end than to let her cry sincerely with the pressure lifted? Those are 17 variations for the crying image, by the way. I wanted to make sure I put in the work.

Finally, after the credits were finished, I put in this one last image over THE END.

After a long journey - both in-universe and for myself for this project, Hilda says goodbye to the viewers. This is my other favorite piece - I'm super stoked at how well Hilda came out here, in addition to her hair being loose, which was something I added because I wanted to see how it'd look in my style... and I think she looks pretty good like that, wouldn't you agree?

But sometimes it doesn't and you just wanna throw giant stones at people...

Big picture of my OC, Iris(shown on the first post), drawn in casual clothes sitting on a bridge over a cliff view. Did this a few months ago during my down time while trying to iron out potential designs for a paladin armor set.

Posted that to show off...:


...this piece of work. I was drawing so many things, including the Pokémon White stuff, in such a short amount of time, but never really finishing a lot of them, and trying to go back and pick one to finish caused me to feel overwhelmed. I was risking burnout, so on New Year's Eve I decided to back off and cut loose drawing something - so I picked Iris again. This time wanting to go for a pose that better pegs her flirty personality.


I was stuck in my room drawing this for close to 11 hours, while my family was partying outside; it was the only way to block out the noise and pass the time. Kept going until 7 in the morning, when I finally went to bed after they had stopped. Finished this drawing yesterday... in total, only 2 days to do this. 2 days, where my average is 2 weeks barring distractions(the above image took that long, when I started realizing how useful the airbrush tool on GIMP could be). I wasn't going to post this now, but considering how well it came out in such a short time, I figured "What the hell?".
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A quick sketch I did, still unfinished; a friend wanted me to try out PaintTool SAI and mess around with its brushes as GIMP isn't so great with outlining sketches from my experience. Hard to get used to but hey, it looks nice.
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