All Our Scattered Remnants

So, I wasn't going to do a second illustration for the most recent chapter of Fortune's Rule, but it demanded to be done, and consequently I ended up doing it anyway.

Used the same technique as last time with an even base layer and then colored pencil over it, but this time the base layer was watercolor, instead of marker. Wasn't sure I had enough ink left in my grey marker for Vader. The background was also done in watercolor this time, and then I added pencil to enhance. No pen lines in the background this time, because I realised that the background pen lines are one of the things I don't like so much about the Ahsoka drawing; they make it look too busy and choppy, or something, the horizon line in particular.

I originally used a reference pic of Obi-Wan fighting Dooku, substituting Vader for Dooku, but ditched that because the stance didn't look aggressive enough for Vader. The perspective/angles aren't perfect; arms seem a little wonky, still not sure I got Obi-Wan's legs right, and his head looks a little too big?

The pencil worked really nicely for the flames, which just looked extremely blobby when I only used paint. Pencil also gave the smoke a nice opacity that I wasn't sure how to achieve with watercolor.

And my favorite thing about the whole process.... After finishing up and taking a pic, I realised that behind Obi-Wan, there's a shielded fortress, while behind Vader, there's a flaming wreck; kind of some fun parallelism going on there. And the way the building is on elevated ground, while the wreck is at the bottom of an embankment, also makes for a nice little "Mustafar-reference-if-you-squint." All the symbolism works out super nicely. It was also super unintentional. 😂

Fortune's Rule art: Chaos Twins!

A bit of chaos twins mischief for the next chapter of Fortune's Rule! (Which is currently in the process of being written.) Was the paint supposed to end up on Luke and Leia's faces? You bet it wasn't. But we can't let extra paint go to waste in the middle of a Rebellion, now, can we?

It was hard to decide whether I wanted to make this a nice, sketchy pencil drawing or go with clean pen outlines and a bit of color. Pen and color won, because I haven't used that style yet for an illustration in this fic. Plus, it's been a while, and seemed like a good challenge!

I'm mostly pleased with how the illustration turned out, especially the way the fabric wrinkles around the sleeves! Surprised myself with that one. The hands, though... oof. Hands. Why so hard to draw.

A lovely evening, cozily painting on the floor! (Oh, that sounds kinda bad, actually.)

Anne Shirley in the GFFA

Yes, you read that correctly.

You see, a very strange plot bunny has been lurking in my brain for months, now.

What if Anne Shirley, and maybe someone else from the Green Gables books, somehow ended up in the GFFA toward the end of the Clone Wars? Thinking maybe Anne of Avonlea-era Anne, when she's a teacher and Marilla takes in Davy and Dora Keith.

I just think it would be really funny, because of how Anne is always encountering twins, wherever she goes, and then Luke and Leia are born while she's in the GFFA, and... yep, checks out.

I wonder who Anne would find to be a kindred spirit. If she got to see Yoda's whimsical side, I almost think she might find him to be one? And possibly Padmé? I see a lot of Anne's idealism in Padmé.

She would get to the SW galaxy through the Haunted Wood, one dark and misty night when she's taking the twins back home after a visit to somewhere, perhaps.

Anne would find plenty of "scope for imagination" on Naboo, she'd find it absolutely delightful. As for Anidala and the Set and Veré scheme, she'd be in raptures over the romance of it all.

Oh Force help us, if Davy and Dora happened to be along for the ride.... "Davy Keith! Don't walk on the edge of the veranda, or you'll fall to your death!"

Davy's opinions on kriff, kark, fierfek, etc.:

"They're the bulliest swears, Anne, and they ain't blasphemous 'cause there ain't God here, so I guess it can't offend him."

"No, Davy, but they're coarse and vulgar in another way entirely, and little boys still shouldn't say them," Anne admonished.

And Dora, remarking on some of the people they meet:

"Mrs. Rachel would say they're ungodly and wicked heathens," Dora observed, primly.

"Oh, Dora, I don't think anyone can be wicked who's kind and wise."

If Anne is dropped onto Coruscant, Padmé takes her in, she becomes some sort of aide, goes to the Senate with Padmé. "I don't like that man," she told Padmé, watching the Chancellor. "He is NOT a kindred spirit. Something in his eyes reminds me of [Mrs. Blewett, or someone else unpleasant like that]."

Her patroness' wardrobe would also send Anne into raptures. "Why, it's just like the wardrobe of a princess from one of the stories the girls and I used to write! Oh, Padmé, I could live in here for eons with no sustenance but to feast my eyes upon the splendor!"

Nightmare night. Mid-conversation, Padmé and Anakin hear a crash from outside. Anakin immediately ready to fight someone, Padmé's just like "Davy!" Living room or kitchen, find Anne and Davy. Who's broken something or other on a midnight foray for food. Could lead to a more productive conversation that leads to Anakin being a little more rational.

Also, Padmé and Anakin get a preview of what the next several years of their lives will be like, with a child in the house. And they're like, "Oh, thank goodness we'll only have the one." (Joke's on them there, of course.)

Anne gets through to Anakin about Obi-Wan. "Maybe he's like Marilla. She's... well, I suppose she's most like an aunt. She adopted me, but I could never imagine thinking of her as a mother. She isn't at all the motherly sort. She's prickly as a thornbush, and she seemed oh-so-stern, austere, really, and it took simply ages to thaw her out. She was always disapproving of my messes and scrapes--and oh, there were a lot of scrapes, especially early on--but... oh dear, I'm rambling on again. Anyway, Marilla is not what one would call an affectionate woman, but I just know she loves me, because she's put up with all my scrapes, and if she does correct me, it's because she cares. She didn't care at the start, you see, not that way. She only cared enough to keep me so that horrible Mrs. Blewett wouldn't take me instead, which is really just what any good, upstanding person would do. And I think maybe your Obi-Wan is the same way. After all, it's a pretty difficult thing to raise a child and not come to love them in some way."

Somehow, this all leads to Anakin not falling and Palpatine being properly disposed of.

I may actually try writing this one, because, weird idea though it is, I also think it could weirdly work. Anne Shirley has this way of improving all the lives she touches, and I see no reason why that wouldn't continue in the GFFA.

Any opinions on who Anne might find to be kindred spirits in the GFFA? I'm leaning toward Padmé and maybe Yoda (maybe), but I'd love to hear any other suggestions!

✧₊⁺⋆.˚₊✩∘ Through time and into darkness ∘✩₊˚.⋆⁺₊✧

An artwork inspired by a prompt by @wendingways through an event by @vaderkin-is-a-lightning-rod yay! Hope you like it and the adjacent writer does too

Crossposted on ao3

"Wrongful Death"

Finally sketched out the scene that pops into my head every day on my commute!

There's this billboard on the way to where I work, advertising an attorney who deals with wrongful death cases, and every time I pass that billboard, I see this poor, bewildered attorney looking on as Padmé, Satine, Fives, and a whole lot of other clones and Jedi pack into his office, shouting and jostling and trying to get him to take their case. It's been months since the billboard first went up, but I finally managed to remember it when I was at home, with access to art stuff, and in a sketchy mood!

Inspired by a "redraw this as your ship" screenshot I saw on Pinterest, and while I wouldn't exactly call this my ship, I thought it would make for a fun, dramatic scene!

And I'm discovering that I be slightly addicted to drawing Rebel graffiti in aurebesh.

Aurebesh font files downloaded from AurekFonts, Boba Fonts, and Pixel Sagas on fontspace.com

Noticing something funny about my fanart

So, a few weeks ago, I did a drawing for one of the chapters in Fortune's Rule—a little digital sketch of Padmé and Luke. And then I'm looking at this drawing, and wondering why the heck does something about this picture look familiar, and then I realise:

It's Star Wars meets Mary Cassatt.

My sketch:

A couple of Mary Cassatt paintings:

Young Mother Sewing

Mère et enfant (Reine Lefebre and Margot before a Window)

And then, last week, I did another drawing, to use as a sort of banner-thing for the story. And I'm looking at it. And looking. And getting this creeping, yucky feeling that a certain painting style always inspires in me. And asking myself why I've just created Star Wars meets Hudson River School, because something about the lighting and the semi-desolation of the landscape is very reminiscent of that style.

My drawing:

Hudson River School paintings:

A View of the Two Lakes and Mountain House, Catskill Mountains, Morning, by Thomas Cole

Mount Washington from the Valley of Conway, by John Frederick Kensett

Seriously, why does this keep happening? Have these things have just been lurking in the brain since middle school, waiting for an excuse to escape? And what the heck is going to be next?

Was supposed to be writing, but oops, I got distracted. (Am I procrastinating working out Vader's reaction to what he discovered in the last chapter of Fortune's Rule? Absolutely.)

I had the rough sketch of Luke, Leia, and Mara (as kids) playing with glowsticks in Krita, and decided to see if I could make something that looked a little nicer. It worked! The clone layer + Gaussian blur filter worked quite nicely to make the sticks glow, too, and I had fun playing around with highlights to make the figures show up better on a dark background. Leia and Galen's hair could use some more highlights, but I'm quite pleased with how Mara's turned out!

Luke is supposed to be included in the detail picture, as well, but that will have to wait until another day. Three children in one day is enough.

(What the heck, Galen, really? Four glow sticks at once? Is that absolutely necessary?)

Midnight fluff-drawing strikes again!

I used an old picture of a WWII soldier and a kid as a reference for this one (see below). I cheated a little by using Krita to create a basic sketch directly over the photo. Then I used that sketch as a reference for the actual drawing, which I did freehand on paper and colored using alcohol marker, with the addition of colored pencil for some depth and texture.

When two straight hours of sitting and listening to presentations at a conference starts to wear on you...

Drawing lightsaber blades with just a black ballpoint pen was an interesting challenge!