Original DA Upload Date: December 30, 2021
Wow, this is my fifth one of these things? Damn, it feels like just yesterday it was 2017 and I decided to do one of these things, just because I managed to make at least one artwork every month that year. I’ve managed that output for half a decade now! Whoa!
Anyhoo, let’s continue the formula.
Just like the last four years, I’ve managed a consistent monthly output of art. Which isn’t really that impressive anymore, since I’m now working on a graphic novel, i.e. something that requires hundreds, if not thousands of drawings. I can manage it, though. The graphic novels as individual stories are gonna be released in black-and-white, which simplifies things tremendously. The colorized editions will come when they’re compiled into books.
I even have an idea of how to market and sell my graphic novels. I’ve told you all before that I’m gonna do the diagonal billing thing with my characters; Gilda to the left and Margo at the front. But I also took some other details into account. For instance, I’ve talked with JFMstudios about commissioning him to draw the covers to the books, since I feel he’s more talented than I am in making artwork look… um, how do I put this, cinematic. He’s better with things like staging and lighting. My approach to both is pretty simplistic; my characters mostly occupy the same horizontal plane or two of 3D space, and my lighting, aside from the inner shadow/inner glow effects generated by ASP, is mostly just blobs of a single color with a gaussian blur and a blending effect. JFM is better at both those things, plus, he has an ability to take the art style of whatever thing he’s making fanart of, and make it his own. With that in mind, I feel he can do wonders with Grunvale/OTOG, and I can’t wait to work with him when it finally comes time for designing the covers to my work.
In addition, I know what prices I feel my work would sell best for. In terms of the first six stories, I’ll be selling the individual, black-and-white editions for $5.95, and the colorized compilation, the actual book for which the stories are intended, for $25.95. So, six for the price of… just over five.
Oh! And while I’m still talking about OTOG, “Trivia Tussle” is scrapped. In the process of writing “The Swamp Witch Hagatha”, I’ve found it to be more of a Wendy chapter than an April chapter, largely due to her taking charge the most during the story. And because I want to keep to one chapter per Tetrad member, and also because I didn’t have any good ideas for “Trivia Tussle”, I decided to scrap that one, and give April a proper chapter called “Elect-ric Chemistry”, where she meets Jazz in an elective tennis class, and Margo and Wendy help her out on her first date with her.
“bUt WhAt AbOuT gIlDa?”
Oh, you mean Gilda the aromantic?
Well, I’ve said all I should about my graphic novel for now. Let’s talk about 2021.
“You know what’s great about hitting rock bottom? There’s only one way left to go, and that’s up!”
– Buster Moon, “Sing”
I knew 2021 could only be better than 2020, after the announcement in December of last year, that the COVID vaccines were starting to ship out. I wasn’t expecting it to be a good year, and… well, it wasn’t. There’s no such thing as a good year when a deadly pandemic is still going on. That, and this year also saw its own share of shitty events, most notoriously the Trump administration going out with a nasty bang as thousands of his supporters raided the US Capitol in an attempt to overturn the 2020 elections, which BIDEN WON FAIR AND SQUARE AND THE ONLY POSSIBLE CORRUPTION THAT OCCURED WAS FROM RIGHT-WING VOTING DISTRICTS SUPPRESSING VOTES FROM THE ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED, BECAUSE OUR GOVERNMENT IS CONTROLLED BY THE BILLIONAIRES, WHO HAVE AN OBSCENE AMOUNT OF INFLUENCE OVER WORLD POLITICS AND WILL DO ANYTHING TO KEEP THEIR POSITIONS OF POWER SECURE, EVEN IF BY IMMORAL AND CRIMINAL MEANS.
But at least the movie theaters and such finally opened back up, and it finally became the norm again for movies to actually be released, and not delayed. Barring Omicron becoming another world-halting pandemic of its own, it seems that, with the release of Spider-Man: No Way Home, movie theaters are back to normal, with the film making $121.8M on its opening day in the US (a figure that, due to the year’s worth of progress streaming made while theaters were paused, I didn’t think would happen again for an opening weekend, let alone a single day), and $516.4M domestically total as of me typing these words. Oh, and it also became the first film of the 2020s to cross the billion-dollar mark worldwide. Things are looking up for movie theaters, and even if my opinion on them has soured, I will admit I enjoyed the experiences of watching Mortal Kombat and Ghostbusters: Afterlife on the big screen. The latter in a Dolby theater!
2021 was also the year I finished college. I am awaiting my degree, Bachelors of Applied Science majoring in Digital Media, to come in the mail, and have started my search for employment immediately. Where this degree will take me, I don’t know. But at least I have a leg up among other applicants. And over the past year, I’ve refined my skill further, with attempts to draw sunlight, taking note of details as small as reflections of characters taking a photo, getting the hang of a tool introduced to ASP just in the past year, experimenting with a lineless art style, drawing backgrounds that pull off a convincing illusion of depth measured in miles, toying with different kinds of lighting to enhance the mood of a scene, and of course let’s not forget the wonders that stock images worked throughout the year, either making up the entire scene, getting traced over, manipulated for a texture, or used as a prop to make a scene less empty. The latter three are present in both of the pieces I released three different versions of.
Another trend in my artwork that took off this year was pixelating my own pre-made artwork, and presenting it as photos and posters hung on a wall. Which I feel I’ve earned at this point, considering the quantity of art I’ve made over the years. Besides, it’s not like that’s all I ever do for wall decoration. I’ve also done fully-detailed portraits of the elder generations of the Ketcham family and a minimalistic poster of Rita Hayworth because ha ha ha it’s funny because it’s a shared-name joke regarding Gilda. And let’s also not forget all the fanart. Animal Crossing, Amphibia, The Three Stooges, King of the Hill, The Ghost and Molly McGee, even an old PSA from my early childhood I rediscovered as an adult. All represented this year in my art. I also enjoyed making retro-style pin-up art of some of my characters. And I’m sure a lot of you guys did too; the Dolly one has racked up over two thousand views thus far.
Overall, 2021 has proved to be an immensely productive year in art for me, both in quantity, quality, and… development of quality. As I enter the next year, I look forward to seeing where my bachelor’s degree will lead me to, and how much my work, both professional and hobbyist, will develop.
And that’s all for this piece, and 2021 as a whole. To close out, here are the artworks featured in this edition of the year-in-review. Until next time, take care, and see you in 2022.
FEATURED ARTWORKS
January: tappitytappitytappitytappity
February: This Shouldn’t Still Be a Rivalry
March: Lowry Twins’ Birthday Party in Glorious Tri-Square!
April: A Single Piece
May: You May Now Kiss Any Hope For The Wedding Goodbye
June: A Bundle of Sticks
July: Lop the Jedi Bunny
August: Their Name is Auggie Lowry
September: Ballando la Tarantella nel Campo delle rose
October: Trick or Treatin’ Tetrad
November: Sisterly Bonding II
December: Beginning and Ending Like the Year Does
DON’T FORGET TO FOLLOW ME ON OTHER PLATFORMS:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/StormyAdlerPoG
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/phoenix_of_grunvale/
DeviantArt: https://www.deviantart.com/phoenixofgrunvale
YouTube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCEtCO…
Discord: Contact me by my tag (Stormy Adler, P.o.G.#1752) for an invite to my server.
Grunvale/OTOG is owned by me. You’re free to draw fanart of it, as long as you link me to it.
Star Wars is owned by Disney through Lucasfilm.
Charlotte Walker is owned by AnimationFan15.
This artwork was made at a resolution of 5076×2160 (aspect ratio 2.35:1).
The Gallery of Stormy Adler 