Yevla's Creative Resolutions for 2011
I'm gaining a little bit of momentum in my writing and art, in the sense that I'm actually completing around 1/3rd of the goals I set out for myself each year, instead of the 0% success rate I'd racked up for most of my 20's. I'm getting more prolific, little by little. I figure I might actually be decently productive if I survive into my 40s.
Here's a list of creative projects I want to finish or accomplish in 2011;
Prose Fiction
Despite my constant disregard for spelling and grammatical structure, I've been told I've got a great sense of pacing and am capable of cranking out entertaining tales that can capture peoples attention. I think prose is my second greatest area of strength creatively, behind role-playing games. For 2011, I want to finish a couple of old NaNoWriMo novels and write at least two fan fiction stories.
SuicideGirl stories (design, begin, and finish)- This is my newest project, and the one that I'm most nervous about trying to pull off, for reasons I'm about to explain. I'm a member of the site suicidegirls.com, because I love alt art chicks and nerd culture. I started a thread in their forums recently, wondering if any of the SGs had received any fanfic written about them, and how did they feel about it? I'd seen plenty of examples of fan art, and naively thought it would be in the same vein. After a few negative replies (some of the models had been creeped out by fanfic sent to them, or about them), a few others responded positively, and even thought the idea was flattering. I messaged two of my favorite models on the site and asked them personally if I could create a story staring them, and both responded that they'd be delighted, with one restriction each. Porphyria has had bad experiences in the past with people not noting that their stories were fiction, so I promised to include a note that said 'This is not based on a true story'. LilithVain's request was 'don't make me take it up the bum'. She has a gorgeous bum, but I will grant her request and press on.
The Jewels of Shakalar (finish)- This is the first of two unfinished NaNoWriMo novels that I haven't finished and were getting a lot of attention before I bowed out of the contest. I wrote this around the same time I began getting paranoid about putting up my work on facebook. I'm going to follow the lead of my friend John Powers, who felt strongly about one of his unfinished NaNoWriMo novels and went back to complete it to get a sense of closure. I don't intend to publish this novel through professional means, but will edit it to the best of my own ability and put it up on the web for people to read and get a sense of my early writing abilities.
Shadows of the Moon (finish)- This was my unfinished NaNoWriMo novel from 2009, and I also feel that it was a good story that deserves completion. This story was known as my 'nymphomaniac werewolf story', a description that drew a lot of early interest. Like Jewels of Shakalar, I intend to edit it to the best of my ability after completion and publish it on the web for people to view.
Comic Art
I think art is my weakest area of strength, creatively, and I still don't feel comfortable starting another long term webcomic or trying to put together graphic experiments. I'm going to take it easy on the art this year and try to accomplish two things.
Mystara Drawings (sporadically throughout the year)- I don't own Mystara, it's a property of Dungeons and Dragons, so I don't feel paranoid about putting up Mystara-related gaming art in my facebook profile and saying 'hey, this is some of the stuff running around in my current Pathfinder games'. I think it's good practice for me, and something I won't get too anal about, so I'm going to continue to put up a picture here and there in my facebook photos.
Beckys Tree (start, finish)- Becky brought me art supplies while I was in the hospital, and informed me that I had drunkenly promised to draw her a tree some time ago. So I will draw her a magnificent tree, and then she is free to do with that drawing whatever she pleases.
RPG Games
I consider rpg games my greatest area of strength, creatively. I've been running tabletop games since the age of thirteen; they give me immediate feedback, a framing device to motivate me to do stories around (another reason I'm excited about the suicide girl stories), and they are one of the only ways most of my friends can get me to ease up and collaborate on something. I think I started too many campaigns and gaming ideas in 2010, and may scale it back a bit so I can work on some other things. I'm still running other games than the ones listed below, but these are the ones that interest me the most in a creative sense.
Pathfinder: Four Corners (continue throughout the year)- This campaign has a pretty healthy group, and now that I've convinced Thom and the others that I'll actually run it for a while, they've gotten extremely enthusiastic. It has two major villains in Randal Skelos and the Elemental Prophets, its got an interesting western-airship setting for me to play with, and this Sunday will be featuring an exciting guest appearance by Tom 'Azmo Danakar' King...a man whose dedication to gaming makes me look like I can't tell a a d4 from a caltrop. This campaign is shaping up to be a good solid base for me to test out a lot of new ideas and GM'ing methods. I intend to continue running this game like clockwork for the remainder of the year.
Pathfinder: Rise of the Wraithlords (continue until bowing out to Jeff Gaithers campaign)- My friend and artist I admire greatly, Jeff Gaither, helped me get this campaign together to run as a placeholder until he gets his own world and campaign set up for play. It's another great atmosphere, and I'm meeting members of Louisvilles rpg network that I had never come across before. It's starting to shape up to be a good campaign full of weird islands and pirate invasions, but I'll run a few story arcs and gladly wrap it up when Jeff wants to take the GM throne later this year. I'm giddy to see what he comes up with.
GURPS: Dames and Demons (continue through the year)- This is a new solo campaign Brian and I developed, and we're both starting to get a lot more excited about it than Mystara solo I had designed earlier; him because Brian goes fucknuts for anything pulp, me so I can run something besides 'dee n dee', and play with supernatural antagonists. We're putting our friendship and culture knowledge skills to work on this one, and I think I could spin a couple of related fanfics or drawings out of it somewhere down the line. I'm going to jump back into it sometime next week, and continue to run it throughout the year.
GURPS: Ogans Heroes (pick up again when my two star players can be organized, finish off another couple of story arcs, then put to rest)- Much like my NaNoWriMo novels, it remains unfinished, and also like the novels, I still believe the story was strong and deserves to be told. Most of my normal players didn't display any interest in a Mage game, but pickles and Danny Kincaide loved it, and still ask about if from time to time. The last game ended on a bittersweet note, but I want to go back and run through a really important arc that has a major plot point for my whole rpg multiverse....a plot point that is probably only important to three people on earth, maybe two, because I think Danny just loves his character. I want to run it for a while later in 2011 when I can get us three together and end it on a much better note. I will wait until later years when I've found a better group for the concept to try running Mage again.
I'm gaining a little bit of momentum in my writing and art, in the sense that I'm actually completing around 1/3rd of the goals I set out for myself each year, instead of the 0% success rate I'd racked up for most of my 20's. I'm getting more prolific, little by little. I figure I might actually be decently productive if I survive into my 40s.
Here's a list of creative projects I want to finish or accomplish in 2011;
Prose Fiction
Despite my constant disregard for spelling and grammatical structure, I've been told I've got a great sense of pacing and am capable of cranking out entertaining tales that can capture peoples attention. I think prose is my second greatest area of strength creatively, behind role-playing games. For 2011, I want to finish a couple of old NaNoWriMo novels and write at least two fan fiction stories.
SuicideGirl stories (design, begin, and finish)- This is my newest project, and the one that I'm most nervous about trying to pull off, for reasons I'm about to explain. I'm a member of the site suicidegirls.com, because I love alt art chicks and nerd culture. I started a thread in their forums recently, wondering if any of the SGs had received any fanfic written about them, and how did they feel about it? I'd seen plenty of examples of fan art, and naively thought it would be in the same vein. After a few negative replies (some of the models had been creeped out by fanfic sent to them, or about them), a few others responded positively, and even thought the idea was flattering. I messaged two of my favorite models on the site and asked them personally if I could create a story staring them, and both responded that they'd be delighted, with one restriction each. Porphyria has had bad experiences in the past with people not noting that their stories were fiction, so I promised to include a note that said 'This is not based on a true story'. LilithVain's request was 'don't make me take it up the bum'. She has a gorgeous bum, but I will grant her request and press on.
The Jewels of Shakalar (finish)- This is the first of two unfinished NaNoWriMo novels that I haven't finished and were getting a lot of attention before I bowed out of the contest. I wrote this around the same time I began getting paranoid about putting up my work on facebook. I'm going to follow the lead of my friend John Powers, who felt strongly about one of his unfinished NaNoWriMo novels and went back to complete it to get a sense of closure. I don't intend to publish this novel through professional means, but will edit it to the best of my own ability and put it up on the web for people to read and get a sense of my early writing abilities.
Shadows of the Moon (finish)- This was my unfinished NaNoWriMo novel from 2009, and I also feel that it was a good story that deserves completion. This story was known as my 'nymphomaniac werewolf story', a description that drew a lot of early interest. Like Jewels of Shakalar, I intend to edit it to the best of my ability after completion and publish it on the web for people to view.
Comic Art
I think art is my weakest area of strength, creatively, and I still don't feel comfortable starting another long term webcomic or trying to put together graphic experiments. I'm going to take it easy on the art this year and try to accomplish two things.
Mystara Drawings (sporadically throughout the year)- I don't own Mystara, it's a property of Dungeons and Dragons, so I don't feel paranoid about putting up Mystara-related gaming art in my facebook profile and saying 'hey, this is some of the stuff running around in my current Pathfinder games'. I think it's good practice for me, and something I won't get too anal about, so I'm going to continue to put up a picture here and there in my facebook photos.
Beckys Tree (start, finish)- Becky brought me art supplies while I was in the hospital, and informed me that I had drunkenly promised to draw her a tree some time ago. So I will draw her a magnificent tree, and then she is free to do with that drawing whatever she pleases.
RPG Games
I consider rpg games my greatest area of strength, creatively. I've been running tabletop games since the age of thirteen; they give me immediate feedback, a framing device to motivate me to do stories around (another reason I'm excited about the suicide girl stories), and they are one of the only ways most of my friends can get me to ease up and collaborate on something. I think I started too many campaigns and gaming ideas in 2010, and may scale it back a bit so I can work on some other things. I'm still running other games than the ones listed below, but these are the ones that interest me the most in a creative sense.
Pathfinder: Four Corners (continue throughout the year)- This campaign has a pretty healthy group, and now that I've convinced Thom and the others that I'll actually run it for a while, they've gotten extremely enthusiastic. It has two major villains in Randal Skelos and the Elemental Prophets, its got an interesting western-airship setting for me to play with, and this Sunday will be featuring an exciting guest appearance by Tom 'Azmo Danakar' King...a man whose dedication to gaming makes me look like I can't tell a a d4 from a caltrop. This campaign is shaping up to be a good solid base for me to test out a lot of new ideas and GM'ing methods. I intend to continue running this game like clockwork for the remainder of the year.
Pathfinder: Rise of the Wraithlords (continue until bowing out to Jeff Gaithers campaign)- My friend and artist I admire greatly, Jeff Gaither, helped me get this campaign together to run as a placeholder until he gets his own world and campaign set up for play. It's another great atmosphere, and I'm meeting members of Louisvilles rpg network that I had never come across before. It's starting to shape up to be a good campaign full of weird islands and pirate invasions, but I'll run a few story arcs and gladly wrap it up when Jeff wants to take the GM throne later this year. I'm giddy to see what he comes up with.
GURPS: Dames and Demons (continue through the year)- This is a new solo campaign Brian and I developed, and we're both starting to get a lot more excited about it than Mystara solo I had designed earlier; him because Brian goes fucknuts for anything pulp, me so I can run something besides 'dee n dee', and play with supernatural antagonists. We're putting our friendship and culture knowledge skills to work on this one, and I think I could spin a couple of related fanfics or drawings out of it somewhere down the line. I'm going to jump back into it sometime next week, and continue to run it throughout the year.
GURPS: Ogans Heroes (pick up again when my two star players can be organized, finish off another couple of story arcs, then put to rest)- Much like my NaNoWriMo novels, it remains unfinished, and also like the novels, I still believe the story was strong and deserves to be told. Most of my normal players didn't display any interest in a Mage game, but pickles and Danny Kincaide loved it, and still ask about if from time to time. The last game ended on a bittersweet note, but I want to go back and run through a really important arc that has a major plot point for my whole rpg multiverse....a plot point that is probably only important to three people on earth, maybe two, because I think Danny just loves his character. I want to run it for a while later in 2011 when I can get us three together and end it on a much better note. I will wait until later years when I've found a better group for the concept to try running Mage again.
VIEW 4 of 4 COMMENTS
Just gotta treat art like a 9-5 job and be a strict boss with yourself. Although that's certainly easier said than done.
Kevin was in charge of organizing/promoting everything for the X-Sanguin party and he asked me if I would be in the poster, introduced me to Jeff, coordinated everything so the posters could be printed and given away for free at SDCC. Kevin's really the guy who made it all happen. And, in addition to organizing everything beforehand, he was at the booth every day helping us and really making our days so much fun. He worked SO hard.