Rise From the Grave

So... yeah... over six months without an update.

As you can see things for this blog haven't exactly gone as planned. Just when I was starting to think that maybe I could keep up a bi-weekly schedule I completely fell off the horse. Since I'm hoping to be posting some stuff in the near future (more on that in a bit) I thought it would be a good time to talk a bit about I've been doing during this absence.

Now the initial reason content for this blog stopped was that I was taking a painting class during the winter. This was the first time I had ever taken a painting class and I was eager to do well. What things ended up coming down to was deciding if I was going to spend my spare time working on art for this blog or focus on the work I was paying someone to get graded on. Unfortunately for anyone reading this was a pretty easy decision. I did take photos of the stuff I did in that class so I'll share my favorite of the bunch.

In addition to that I've since decided that I'm going to try and shoot for a computer science major so trying to do well in the prerequisites for that program has taking a lot of my time. 

Lastly, and possibly most relevant to this blog, I was able to get an old tablet I had lying around working so I've been trying to move away from Adobe Illustrator (where I produced everything you've seen up until this point) and into Photoshop. While Illustrator was nice in that allowed me to work with just a mouse the results were rather simple. While that's not necessarily a bad thing I'd like to be able to more than that. So once again I find myself in the dilemma of making content or practicing. 

1st attempt painting from a reference in Photoshop.

With that out of the way it's time to focus on some new stuff. PAX Prime is just a two days away and I'm very excited to be attending for my 8th year. One of my goals each year is to try and get more involved, this also happens to be the first year I'll be attending since owning a camera. Given that I thought it might be fun to try and do a write up of my experiences at the event. I know I'll be attending both the Magic party and the world building panel so stay tuned if you're inter either of those. If everything goes according to plan I'll start uploading that next week. This will also be my second year doing Buttoneering so if you happen to run into me feel free to ask for either of these two buttons that I'll be giving away.

Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker

So for the second update we have Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker. Anyone who's played with me before might recognize I'm starting this blog out with the generals I personally play. I think the best part about having a Shirei deck is it allows you to get excited over the cards nobody would normally care about, such as Fume Spitter, Liliana's Shade, Skirsdag High Preist, or Blood Artist (although people eventually caught on to this one).

Here's the printable PDF in case you want to print this one out.

Little agonies pave the way to greater power.

Sharuum the Hegemon

So here's the first of what will, hopefully be many of these Commander "card backs" I plan on uploading. I figure the best place to start will be with my first and favorite general, Sharuum the Hegemon. A bit of a background, I started playing during the first Mirrodin block, quit right before Champions of Kamigawa when my friends at the time lost interest, and started back up again right before Worldwake. Since Zendikar block was right in-between Shards of Alara and Scars of Mirrodin I naturally accumulated a lot of artifact cards. So when it came time to choose a commander the decision wasn't very difficult. Although Sharuum gets a bad rep for all the combos she can generate I still believe she's more than capable of being both fair and fun.

As for these card backs, I mentioned my idea was that they would be something you could print out and put behind your commander in a clear sleeve. Like so,

To that end, here's a printable PDF if you want to print one out look classy in your own commander games. Until next time.

"Soon I will sleep, eyes closing to a world tarnished with flesh, and then wake to a polished vision." 

-Sharuum

Introduction

Hello Internet, welcome to my art blog! I'm very much an amature at this sort of thing so my aim is that this blog will be a source of motivation and an opportunity to practice. I plan to focus mostly on the game Magic: The Gathering and furthermore, the EDH/Commander format as its my favorite way to play the game. Those of you in the Magic community likely have no idea who I am (which is understandable) although if you do, it would be as Ian who made the CommanderCast logo that was featured in the 2012 Gifts Given Charity.

I should have some content up within the week so, until then!