After last week's marathon of color images for Sorcerer's Apprentice volume one, I had hoped to be able to catch up on Queen of Games. Of course, what I neglected to remember was that between all the coloring I was killing myself over, I had a stack of pages for chapter 3 that went unworked on, turning into another one of those twofer weeks where I had more pages to get done than normal. I had to take Monday off because I was totally exhausted. I was working until Sunday morning on the color images, and my medication was expired meaning I felt like a flopping carp in terms of energy levels. I still managed to get 4 pages up, which isn't bad considering that's more than the two weeks before it put together.

Because I took Monday off, everything has been pushed back at least a day and I'm still not done with this week's pages. So I have to spend most of tomorrow working on them. I think I'll need to put off Pokemon Rebel for a few weeks so I don't feel so overwhelmed, and so I can finally, peacefully, work on Queen of Games. I need to do the script for the next chapter, as well as finish the other rising stack of unfinished work that is the current chapter. The cosmic joke is normally I never get work done, right now I have work done, just not scanned and posted. I promise you, it really does exist. I nice big stack of pages depicting Neferi and her upcoming confrontation with Duke. And it actually has decent art, too.

I'm not too worried about falling behind though. I'm making big strides in chapter 3 of SA, and my goal is to finish Sorcerer's Apprentice volume 1 by April. I don't know if I can actually finish the whole book by that time, but that's the goal I set for myself. Once the book is done, I'll have a little time off to work on fun drawings again, as well as return to my "So you want to be a manga-ka" ebook. On one hand, I always overwhelm myself with lots of projects all going at the same time, and for weeks it feels like I get nothing done. On the other hand, if I were to do one project at a time and be totally dedicated to it, it would more than likely never get all done in a lifetime. Plus my system doesn't work that way. I have to jump around in my work or I get so bored it's pathetic.

I haven't much time to play anything recently as I've just spent the past few days elbow deep in watercolor paints, markers and pastels working on my book, but I did have an hour or so to play Final Fantasy IV.

First off, Kain sucks. I don't mean as a fighter. As a fighter he's pretty damn good. A real train engine with high HP and great attack. But as a character, he's kind of an ass. For the second time in the game, he's been 'controlled by Golbez' and has turned traitor. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice and I start to get pissed off with the game's writers. Now I'm just leveling up again on the Overworld and get some better items. I have next to no summons for Rydia except the default ones and have no idea how to force my enemies to drop more items. I think I might have to look that one up.

Another stupidly busy week fighting to get the chapter art done. Every so often I get the ambitious idea of one day doing a comic in color. This week has taught me a valuable experience. That unless I hire a colorist, to never, ever, do it. Color just always takes me forever. Markers take me way less time than doing things digitally, but it still is way longer than screentoning.

The other hangup was not having the right colored marker. Victoria and Allister's outfit use a fairly specific dark green and the one I had died one (prismacolor markers have lovely colors but dry out really, really fast) and naturally every store in my area was out of them. So on Wednesday I went and finally tracked down the marker, but when you finally get really started in the middle of the week, well, it slows you down a bit. Queen of Games has been not updating for this specific reason, all my creative and mental energy has been going into working on chapter art.

And I'm still not done!

I still have to color chapters 5 and 6, then scan the whole lot and put in the backgrounds. That means I'm going to have to work on Saturday. Not fun as that means Pokemon Rebel and Queen of Games will be in a death match over what will actually get my time on Sunday. And what about time off and rest? Rest is for the weak, from what it looks like.

The good news is next week goes back to normal pages. I do have to get 12 pages out of the way, which is a lot, but at least I'm getting back on track. If I get the book done as soon as possible, it means the sooner it goes to print and the sooner I'll have some time back to work on other art. That's just the way things go sometimes.

Oh Best Buy, why do you keep having stupidly good deals on PSP games? You are making it impossible to finish anything because just when I start making headway, another game goes on sale. Last week Final Fantasy IV The Complete Collection for PSP was on sale for 10 bucks, so I had to buy it.

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This has been a busy, busy week for me.

On Sunday I finally got a light table. Got it off of Craigslist for 35 bucks, and this thing is rapidly turning into my best friend. My editor has been asking for the cover so this thing came in just in the nick of time. I used to do covers by a Macguyver setup of a glass coffee table and a flashlight, but with my condition that was a no-go anymore.

In addition to the cover of the book, I've also been doing the chapter art. Color art always takes me way longer than black and white, even when it's not digital (then it takes me forever), so I've only got 3 images mostly done. I say mostly as opposed to entirely because the green marker that I use to color Allister and Victoria's magician outfit (as well as several of Victoria's outfits) died on me, and seemingly every store in a 3 mile radius is out of it. I'm hoping a store slightly further away has it in stock, otherwise I'll have to special order it, which naturally takes forever.

I'm not too discouraged though. However with the constant painting, drawing, inking and almost continuous marker high I've been on, I ran out of time to work on Queen of Games this week. The good news is I do have a good stack of pages for next week already half-done (geez, I've got a big pile of WIPs this week, I've got a pile of Sorcerer's Apprentice pages that need to be worked on as well...)

Oh, I've also located my doll repainting supplies so that means two things: one, I can finally finish the Bayonetta repaint I've had in the works for a while, and the other is that I can customize my My Little Pony figures. I'm going to make them show accurate by fixing their hair and painting on a second Cutie Mark. I'll also make a tutorial for all you Bronies who take issue with the figures Hasbro has produced. I don't know if I'll get to them this weekend, but I'm certainly going to try.

Also another chapter of Pokemon Rebel is going up as well. I know this for a fact because this next chapter is one I've wanted to get to for a while.