Pong addiction

Dev Meeting yesterday

Yesterday was the big deviantart-meeting in Berlin and man, I was so curious who would come. >_<>
I was so unbelievably tired the whole time I just wanted to sit down and sleep and crawl onto my couch. :( Dang! (that´s what I did today and I wish I could do it some more hours...)

I guess Angelo would make the best guru ever. I don´t know how often he explained the new features but seems like the sparkle-glow in his eyes wouldn´t stop... even if he had to explain it a millionth time again.
I just wish I could have stayed longer (couldn´t because of nasty cramps) and payed more attention to the new faces (didn´t because I was tired and thought all the time about memorizing the nicknames of the people who i was actually talking with.... don´t have to mention that I failed anyway even with that >_>; ).

I totally forogt to take some photos although my camera was in my bag (how stupid is that... Anne... come on... ) but I just hope Angelo or Heidi will upload some pics sooner or later.

What a week... won´t forget it. This won´t happen too often in life-time, i guess.

Things to do:
Les Dames (10 of 12 >_<)
three open commissions (still two slots open... uh)
trying to save up another 500 bucks... lottery? maybe?...
sleep
sleep more
finishing a new bao

I hope my normal happy mode will start tomorrow again (happy mode= annoy people with being unbelievably happy about everything... my regular 7-days-a-week-mode).

Before & After

Some things change..

My desk for the last six months. I cleaned everything today, packed the acrylics back into a box, ripped off the paper, scrubbed hours to get rid of the tape-glue and threw away old jars with old color. It was kinda sad.

That´s how my table looks now. What a huge difference. I haven´t seen the glas-inlay for ages and I have no idea if I ever gonna use it before I move. Guess not. Next additional table will be one without glas-inlay since it´s odd to have one without any possibilty to use it (PC equipment will move here next week... wee!).

So... I´m still thinking about a new book project. I guess I won´t do anything for the next weeks since I´m busy with agency work (christmas... now... well... >_>; )

My fingercups tickle. Every day I don´t work I get impatient. It´s like my muses are punching me every minute forcing me to move on. "Don´t wait, do it, do it."
Normally the months after a finished book are the most productive ones for me. It´s like all ideas are finally creeping back into my head where Kulla was for six month. So much space to fill.
And still.. I´m kinda sad. Five years with Kulla left a lot of traces.
I´m curious what comes next.

back to childhood

I visited my family over the week-end and it was cool to be there again for some days. Went to cinema with Nata watching "Slumdog Millionaire" (which was great but I shouldn´t think about the actors and real life), went to the park with my granny and watched my nephew walking around (he´s ten months old... unbelievable).
Sometimes I think: Ah, you painted the rasberry bush exactly like this and the tomatos look like this and there are the flowers I paint so often... so many things I keep putting into my book because I´ve been knowing those things for ages. I like my parent´s house and the land they have because normally gardens are small... but this garden is HUGE.
first thing I see when I step outside...

and second.. "Hello, Mr Gino. Good morning! :D "

the old vine (unbelievable sweet berries in late summer and attacked by many generations of cats... and still alive)

Kiki... still snorring *hugglesherawake*

a part of the garden... before you ask, this is NOT a farm, my parents just love the garden and try to grow everything there.. *really* everything (last fail were blueberries ^^; ... but the strawberries
*__* just LOVE those *yummy* )

house, walnut-tree, vine, Mr. Gino, potatoes and a lot of SUN O_O

my epic sun-fail is a sun-burn after sitting outside for 15 minutes after lunch. 15 minutes! Rahhh! I look hilarious... all red with a white shirt "on". CRAP! >_>;

Intuos... a matter of principles

weeee! My Intuous 3 arrived some days ago. It´s the same I have at work and I really love it. I just hope my second monitor arrives next week. I´m so used to work with two that it doesn´t make sense not to buy one (and since I´m going to work a lot more digital this year it´s useful).

(I should have cleaned up before taking the pic.. um...)

As you can see scrollbars are on both sides. I deactivated the left ones since I´m a left-handed person and scrolling with your amr while painting is really uncool. I use the right ones and honestly... I could go without those. Normally I work with pen +keyboard. And that´s enough.

Since my old graphire at home is okay but not that... let´s call it "perfect" as the Intuos which I have been using for 4 years now, I decided to buy a bigger one. The options where: Intuos A4 Number 3 OR 4.
When I saw the Intuos 4 I thought: "WTF?!"
Call me picky but have a look at this:

left side: The logo is on the bottom... When I said:
"I can´t use it, i´m left-handed o_o" the only answer was:
"But you can flip it, it works this way as well."

I´m not a graphic diva but for me it´s not acceptable that a left-handed person has to accept an upside down logo just because somebody decided that I´m part of a minority.
Yes, I CAN put it upside down. Of course it will work. Yes, it´s just a matter of principle.
Is it just me who thinks it´s odd?

I hope the design will be change when my new GT is broken... in some years. If the other GTs weren´t that bad I would decide to use another company´s product. I bought a classic pen as additional tool and the price was just ridiculous. 80 bucks for a pen made in China. Production price.. um.. maybe 20 Cent. The GT costs around 200 atm. See the point? It´s a bloody PEN, for 80 BUCKS! Rahh...

Only good thing I can tell you: My graphire pen plastic wrap started to crumble and harden last year. I wrote an email, attached a photo, explained the problem and got a new one. For free. Well, the service rocks. I never thought they would do it but wonders happen.

Crap! ;_;

small illustrations on 20x20 canvas (mixed quality.. bad decision to mix) done for my book. And just after being happy about having done everything ... one illustration is missing. I totally forgot to do one and this is so... just odd. I didn´t get my head ripped off but it´s not the best start to plan some *free* days. I guess I will spend my saturday evening @ home instead of being with my family and PAINT. Arg... Anne, how could you do it >_< *punching myself*

So.. this might be a happy message for all those upcoming illustrators: Even pros do epic FAILS. arg.. yes, you are allowed to laugh =_=;


Anyway, mah little bunny turned 5 today. Born in Vienna, growing up in Berlin, hopefully infecting the whole world with cheerfulness and red capes.
Happy birthday, Kulla!

Sunday Office Riot

**flying office chicken** (the one with the sign.. the other chick is engelszorn XD )

It´s Sunday and I´m in the office. Unkind me dragged engelszorn along since we need to get stuff done for work and as always -if you´re the first part of a very long chain- ... if you don´t get things done the others have to wait as well.
It´s annoying. I´ve been reading the same texts again and again while cutting material and sometimes the dialoges are so crappy you just want to throw everything at the author and cry: "Why´d you do that?!"
Some passages get better... some worse. But again: I love my work. ... most of the times.

Read:

Loved the book to pieces.... best choice if you like history, love and a lot of utterly disgusting medical descriptions.

I started "The Graveyard Book" (Neil Gaiman). I know you can´t trust "Best book ever" stickers but this book bugged me. I still think "Neverwhere" was one of the best. This is my personal opinion. I so much which they would make a movie out of "Neverwhere". Would be higly intersting. Combine Alice in Wonderland and Re-Cylce, shake and mix well ... man, that would be awesome.