Carciphona

Vol. 4: [ Pages 21-22 ]

Sun, May 19 April 2013 21:16:00 EST

Pages 21-22 are up! I changed Hiera's name to Hiraeth because I randomly found that name written down in the middle of my script's planning block, and apparently I COMPLETELY forgot that I had planned that to be her name for like 15 pages Q___Q Hiraeth is a word in welsh with a special meaning that suits her better haha! SORRY FOR THE CONFUSION '''orz

I'll be at Anime North in Toronto this up coming weekend! I will be selling volumes of Carciphona and lots of prints, including 4 brand new ones that have not been posted yet :D If you're going you can find me at the Comic Market in the convention center near the dealer's room exit:

Voting bonus: vocruen wip!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 19-20 ]

Sun, May 12 April 2013 21:13:00 EST

Pages 19-20 are up!

Voting is still on to get to #10 and unlock double updates next month! It looks unlikely that we'll make it this month though ): I appreciate all your support nonetheless!

Voting bonus: vocruen wip!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 17-18 ]

Sun, May 5 April 2013 23:24:00 EST

Pages 17-18 are up!

I was going to try doing another double update month this month but like I said, I ran out of pages to post and this month is going to be busy :c but instead of just doing these whenever I feel like, wouldn't it be nice if you could make it happen, and make it happen every month if you want?

That's right, simply >vote for Carciphona every day on TWC, and as long as Carciphona remains one of the top 10 comics for 10 days of the month or more, the next month will be a double update month! It's not hard to do since voting only takes 1 click, but it is not easy to achieve either because I don't have nearly as many readers as most highly ranked comics up there. However, as shown before in November when you guys brought me up to #7 for a little while, it is completely doable and the ranking brought in many new readers for CP, which was great!

Of course putting the entire pressure of getting extra updates on you guys wouldn't be nice, and I need to get rid of page buildups from time to time regardless, so I will still throw in double update months whenever possible, even if CP never gets back to top 10 again. So don't worry! This is just an opportunity for you to make it happen more often for your enjoyment :D

Voting bonus: Vocruen wip!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 15-16 ]

Sun, 28 April 2013 21:35:00 EST

Pages 15-16 are up! And double update month is over ;-; hope you enjoyed the head start into book 4 :D

Voting bonus: Another illust I'm trying to finish! Vocruen next if I have time hopefully ;;

Vol. 4: [ Pages 13-14 ]

Thur, 25 April 2013 21:27:00 EST

Pages 13-14 are up! Rae is not missing this minor character showdown.

It looks like I won't be able to have another double update month next month ): I spent most of the month on contract pieces and illustrations in preparation for Anime North, I don't even have next week's pages ready yet haha! No worry though, those pages will be done (:

Voting bonus: Another illust I'm trying to finish! Vocruen next if I have time hopefully ;;

Vol. 4: [ Pages 11-12 ]

Sun, 21 April 2013 20:54:00 EST

Pages 11-12 are up!

I've also posted a brand new illustration in the goodies page! (next to all the thumbnails of unreleased pieces haha ;-; A high resolution version is available on my DA page right here

Voting bonus: Another illust I'm trying to finish! Vocruen next if I have time hopefully ;;

Vol. 4: [ Pages 9-10 ]

Fri, 19 April 2013 12:26:00 EST

Pages 9-10 are up! sorry forgot to post yesterday ): I should look into some post queue system ugh

Voting bonus: I've wanted to draw Vocruen like this for a while but I never liked the things I came up with. I kind of like this one though!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 7-8 ]

Sun, 14 April 2013 21:34:00 EST

Pages 7-8 are up! end of colour pages ;-; I think I will go back to tweaking some of those coloured pages later, I did them without much preparation or warmups and I was really confused between styles from the previous few contract pieces I did, so they look kinda rigid and not very nice ):

Hope you're enjoying the double updates! I might try for double updates next month as well; actiony stuff is terribad at snail speed haha!

Voting bonus: I've wanted to draw Vocruen like this for a while but I never liked the things I came up with. I kind of like this one though!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 5-6 ]

Thur, 11 April 2013 13:25:00 EST

Pages 5-6 are up :D meet Meron's childhood idol

Voting bonus: random scrap!

Vol. 4: [ Pages 3-4 ]

Sun, 7 April 2013 23:19:00 EST

Pages 3-4 are up :D I debated whether or not to colour these pages because it's not like the pages feature colours of prominent characters anyway (lol young meron who has already been on the cover in colour), but in the end it was easier and more effective (maybe) to colour Hiera rather than tone her c:

Voting bonus: Something new I'm working on (:

Vol. 4: [ Pages 1-2 ]

Thur, 4 April 2013 19:32:00 EST

Book 4 is starting as promised with pages 1-2!

And as mentioned on Sunday (and obvious from a update on a Thursday) April will be double update month! Pages will be posted on Sundays and Thursday so don't forget to check back :D Please vote for Carciphona on TopWebComics if you want to help the comic grow, and tell your friends about us if you liked the comic c:

Voting bonus: Something new I'm working on (:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 159 ]

Sun, 31 March 2013 23:36:00 EST

Pages 159 is up! BOOK 3 IS OVER :D

Volume 4 will be starting right away with a DOUBLE UPDATE MONTH! (don't worry this is not an april fools joke) Come back Thursday for the first pages of Volume 4 in full colour!

Voting bonus: Something new I'm working on (:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 157 - 158 ]

Sun, 24 March 2013 22:37:00 EST

Pages 157-158 are up! This is not the book you're looking for :1.

Tapastic is going to WonderCon at Anaheim California this weekend, and they'll be carrying some of my prints on my behalf! If you're around the area and you're going, be sure to check their booth out there :D Sorry I rarely ever go to west coast cons cus of the distance ;-;

Volume 3 will be ending next weekend, adn volume 4 will be starting right away in April with a DOUBLE UPDATE MONTH because You've waited long enough! I wouldn't have allowed this painful drag to happen if I actually had more pages to post ): but now that I actually have pages IT'S PARTY TIME YEAHHHHH

Voting bonus: preview of a page from book 4! book 3 is ending soon, and book 4 is going to start with 8 whole colour pages :D

Vol. 3: [ Pages 155 - 156 ]

Sun, 17 March 2013 22:23:00 EST

Pages 155-156 are up! Keri is on reckless useless heroic main character mode.

Voting bonus: preview of a page from book 4! book 3 is ending soon, and book 4 is going to start with 8 whole colour pages :D

Vol. 3: [ Pages 153 - 154 ]

Sun, 10 March 2013 22:00:00 EST

Pages 153-154 are up!

I've also updated the goodies page with a bunch of new fanarts, and some amazing cosplays!! Go and take a look :D

Voting bonus: preview of a page from book 4! book 3 is ending soon, and book 4 is going to start with 8 whole colour pages :D

Vol. 3: [ Pages 151 - 152 ]

Sun, 3 March 2013 22:58:00 EST

Pages 151-152 are up! Iriel presents the voice of reason.

Voting bonus: A fairy!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 149 - 150 ]

Sun, 24 February 2013 23:07:00 EST

Pages 149-150 are up! Iriel knows his treasure list well c:

I've been doing some rough designs for book 4 characters and things, here are some tentative sketches!

Voting bonus: Another character from book 4! She's pretty much finalized though :D

Vol. 3: [ Pages 147 - 148 ]

Sun, 17 February 2013 20:04:00 EST

Pages 147-148 are up! Game over soon?

In other news, I've been submitting Carciphona to 2 sites which pay their authors for bringing in traffic to their site, Tapastic and Mangamagazine. My ultimate goal is always to get readers to read my story on my own website of course, but I would like to see if branching out a little can pay off in a way that helps me focus on moving the story forward by paying me on a regular basis. If you want to support CP without having to spend any money on me, that is now possible by clicking the balloons below and visiting these sites! The more views my manga receives, the more I will be paid proportionately (: And of course as always, please share my story with your friends if you enjoyed it ^^

Mangamagazine: http://www.mangamagazine.net/manga-and-comics/Carciphona/detail-page/477?lang=en
Tapastic! http://tapastic.com/series/260

Carciphona.com is still the most up to date site for Carciphona with multiple languages, preloading functions, background information, illustration, fanart, and anything else that I've ever made for Carciphona though! As well, I've finished thumbnailing all 150 pages of volume 4 and I will be starting to work on pages soon!! hopefully March or April will be another double update month c:

Voting bonus: wanted to draw something stylized c:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 145 - 146 ]

Sun, 10 February 2013 18:51:00 EST

Weirin gets her prioties together!

Voting bonus: RANDOM VELOCE ATTACK

Vol. 3: [ Pages 143 - 144 ]

Sun, 3 February 2013 20:20:00 EST

Pages 143-144 up!

Voting bonus: RANDOM VELOCE ATTACK

Vol. 3: [ Pages 141 - 142 ]

Sun, 27 January 2013 21:04:00 EST

That would've been a nice troll to have 1 panel of blackbird in the entire book haha~

I've been editing the script and thumbnailing volume 4 for the past while, and thumbnails are atrocious to look at despite it being a tremendous amount of work, so I have nothing to show ): Drafting mode also disables me from sketching anything worth showing because there is too much movement in the imagery in my mind, so hopefully when I'm done with thumbnails, I'll draw some scraps or paintings again for show! currently about 100 pages done out of around 150 pages :D

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 139 - 140 ]

Sun, 20 January 2013 23:18:00 EST

Hi Blackbird haha jk byeeeee

I've been editing the script and thumbnailing volume 4 for the past while, and thumbnails are atrocious to look at despite it being a tremendous amount of work, so I have nothing to show ): Drafting mode also disables me from sketching anything worth showing because there is too much movement in the imagery in my mind, so hopefully when I'm done with thumbnails, I'll draw some scraps or paintings again for show! currently about 100 pages done out of around 150 pages :D

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 137 - 138 ]

Sun, 13 January 2013 21:29:00 EST

Page 137-138 up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 135 - 136 ]

Sun, 6 January 2013 22:39:00 EST

Page 135-136 up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 134 ]

Tues, 1 January 2013 20:54:00 EST

Page 134 up XD extra page to tide you guys til sunday (:

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 133 ]

Mon, 31 December 2012 23:17:00 EST

Page 133 is up! Happy new year :D this officially ends daily update month! Hope you guys enjoyed it and thank you so much for reading Carciphona ;-; I hate to go back to regular updates now because it's a 4-fold drop LOL. I would keep updating this often if I could, but sorry ;-; Thank you for continuing to vote, please keep checking back to vote/support the story!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 132 ]

Mon, 31 December 2012 22:22:00 EST

Page 132 is up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 131 ]

Sat, 29 December 2012 22:22:00 EST

Page 131 is up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 130 ]

Fri, 28 December 2012 21:17:00 EST

Page 130 is up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 129 ]

Thu, 27 December 2012 21:44:00 EST

Page 129 is up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 128 ]

Wed, 26 December 2012 20:01:00 EST

Page 128 is up!

Voting bonus: a coloured wip!

Vol. 3: [ Page 127 ]

Tue, 25 December 2012 20:19:00 EST

Page 127 is up! See, I'm not THAT mean... :D ... Merry Christmas everyone!

Voting bonus: Sketch I did while I was in NYC (:

Vol. 3: [ Page 126 ]

Mon, 24 December 2012 19:47:00 EST

Page 126 is up! In other non plot related news, I'm incredibly sick ): Guess I'm taking an extra long vacation this year!

Voting bonus: Sketch I did while I was in NYC (:

Vol. 3: [ Page 125 ]

Sun, 23 December 2012 23:50:00 EST

Page 125 is up!

Voting bonus: Sketch I did while I was in NYC (:

Vol. 3: [ Page 124 ]

Sun, 23 December 2012 00:41:00 EST

Page 124 is up!

Voting bonus: Sketch I did while I was in NYC (:

Vol. 3: [ Page 123 ]

Fri, 21 December 2012 23:46:00 EST

Page 123 is up!

Voting bonus: Sketch I did while I was in NYC (:

Vol. 3: [ Page 122 ]

Fri, 21 December 2012 00:46:00 EST

Page 122 is up! Sorry for the lateness, I was stuck in the airport for 4 hours with a delayed flight ):

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 120-121 ]

Tues, 18 December 2012 21:26:00 EST

Page 120 and 121 are up! Tomorrow's page is up today because I won't have access to a computer tomorrow.

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 119 ]

Tues, 18 December 2012 00:10:00 EST

Page 119 is up!

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 118 ]

Mon, 17 December 2012 00:35:00 EST

Page 118 is up!

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 117 ]

Sat, 15 December 2012 21:42:00 EST

Page 117 is up!

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 116 ]

Fri, 14 December 2012 13:48:00 EST

Page 116 is up! Early update today because I'm leaving in a few hours to go to NYC (: Don't wory though! I will still be updating daily like nothing happened, barring any technological failures.

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 115 ]

Thu, 13 December 2012 23:42:00 EST

Page 115 is up!

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 114 ]

Wed, 12 December 2012 20:51:00 EST

Page 114 is up!

Voting bonus: a sketch I drew in 2010 that I kind of feel like finishing now :D

Vol. 3: [ Page 113 ]

Tue, 11 December 2012 21:29:00 EST

Page 113 is up!

Voting bonus: a wip from a while ago!

Vol. 3: [ Page 112 ]

Mon, 10 December 2012 20:49:00 EST

Page 112 is up!

And CP is back on top 10, amazing! Thanks for all the votes and please keep voting ;w;

Voting bonus: a wip from a while ago!

Vol. 3: [ Page 111 ]

Sun, 9 December 2012 20:54:00 EST

Page 111 is up!

Voting bonus: a wip from a while ago!

Vol. 3: [ Page 110 ]

Sat, 8 December 2012 21:19:00 EST

Page 110 is up!

Voting bonus: a wip from a while ago!

Vol. 3: [ Page 109 ]

Fri, 7 December 2012 22:56:00 EST

Page 109 is up! I have finished shipping most international/Canadian orders and awaiting my friend to finish up US orders, so I suppose I will go actually DRAW SOMETHING to use as vote incentive haha Q__Q Thank you everyone for continuing to vote despite the image not having changed for weeks! Please keep voting for CP daily, it is of great help to me and it is something that only you guys can do!

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Page 108 ]

Thu, 6 December 2012 21:21:00 EST

Page 108 is up!

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Page 107 ]

Wed, 5 December 2012 20:43:00 EST

Page 107 is up! where did she even come from? NOBODY KNOWS...

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 105 - 106 ]

Tue, 4 December 2012 22:13:00 EST

Yesterday and today's pages are up! Sorry I missed yesterday's update ): I was moving today and I had to pack up a lot earlier than I anticipated, and it was after I took down my computer that I remembered I didn't upload a page yet q_q this is when I wish I had some sort of autoupdate queue thing HAHA...

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Page 104 ]

Sun, 2 December 2012 23:21:00 EST

Page 104 is up! IT'S STILL SUNDAY WHERE I'M AT

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Daily update December! Vol. 3: [ Pages 103 ]

Sat, 1 December 2012 18:02:00 EST

Rae done goofed?

You guys really floored me by beating the voting challenge without a sweat, so here is daily update for December as promised! Come back tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and the day after until the end of the month for a new page everyday :D Thanks so, so much for your support, and please continue voting for Carciphona so that it can gain more exposure and attract new readers! A lot more readers have been leaving comments lately and it's so fun to read them and talk to all of you :D

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 101 - 102 ]

Thu, 29 November 2012 21:25:00 EST

Kasga shows how fire magic is DONE.

This week is the last week to preorder volume 3 and all other goodies at preorder price! All preorders will be shipped starting next week, and regular orders after that will be shipped at the regular schedule of every Thursday. Click here to visit my shop ^^ shilin.storenvy.com

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 99 - 100 ]

Sun, 25 November 2012 22:03:00 EST

This page was all kind of hilarious to draw. I'M SORRY DES......

This week is the last week to preorder volume 3 and all other goodies at preorder price! All preorders will be shipped starting next week, and regular orders after that will be shipped at the regular schedule of every Thursday. Click here to visit my shop ^^ shilin.storenvy.com

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 97 - 98 ]

Thu, 22 November 2012 22:35:00 EST

Oh look the cell bars are made of clay.

Carciphona is officially above #10 for the past few days! That means I will post one page everyday for all of December!! I better start working on volume 4 because we'll jump into it a lot earlier than I had anticipated :D But congrats everyone! I didn't think you could do it but you all proved me wrong ;-; Please keep on voting to keep CP up there on the ranks so more readers can find us. A second of your day in a combined effort makes a huge difference in helping CP grow ^^

Voting bonus: More commission wip~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 95 - 96 ]

Sun, 18 November 2012 21:35:00 EST

Des's show is over.

Carciphona is now at #12!! Thanks everyone for your voting, I am pretty shocked that we're actually that close to #10! Also thanks for your support of volume 3's preorder event! It's amazing that I could continue to offer printed versions of Carciphona, even after riding out the initial launch surge. Thank you for your continued support to make this story possible ;-; and I can only hope that the rest of the story will be just as good for you. There are two weeks left for the preorder event, where you can purchase volumes of Carciphona at 30% off, as well as other great deals! Click here to visit my shop ^^

Voting bonus: Commission wip (:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 93 - 94 ]

Thu, 15 November 2012 20:56:00 EST

Des didn't really pass his how-to-be-a-villain class.

Voting bonus: Commission wip (:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 91 - 92 ]

Sun, 11 November 2012 20:56:00 EST

Hey Rae, we're home~

CP is now #14 on TopWebComics!! And in case you missed it, there was another update on Thursday since it is double update month, and there will be another 2 pages up on Thursday :D

Carciphona is also a premium comic on MangaMagazine.net now! By checking my page and the rest of their site out (which is home to lots of awesome webcomics), you can help me earn a share of their monthly sponsorhip pool of $20,000 for premium authors ^^ There are lots of way to financially support my manga, and this is one such way where you do not need to pay anything while giving my work the support it needs to continue.

Voting bonus: really rough update of an ollllddd drawing that I'm going to work on next!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 89 - 90 ]

Thu, 8 November 2012 20:25:00 EST

Have another update for double update month :D More pages on Monday!

CP is now #16 on TopWebComics! I am honestly quite surprised that we even got this far (not to denounce the effort of everyone who is voting, purely because the sheer amount of votes it takes to get up that high) and I am really, really grateful of everyone's votes. I would post more vote incentives to reward your efforts but I don't have much I can share at the moment ): CP did get an increase number of visitors from TWC, so your efforts are already paying off, thank you!

Carciphona is also a premium comic on MangaMagazine.net now! By checking my page and the rest of their site out (which is home to lots of awesome webcomics), you can help me earn a share of their monthly sponsorhip pool of $20,000 for premium authors ^^ There are lots of way to financially support my manga, and this is one such way where you do not need to pay anything while giving my work the support it needs to continue.

Voting bonus: really rough update of an ollllddd drawing that I'm going to work on next!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 87 - 88 ] + [ Volume 3 preorder! ]

Sun, 4 November 2012 20:07:00 EST

Even though no child ever remembers these things their parents say to them, the parents say them anyway.

Carciphona vol. 3 is available for preorder from

November 1 - November 31

at S H I L I N . S T O R E N V Y . C O M !

- - - - -

Veloce, Weirin, and Keritzel thought the city of Arenscura would be a temporary refuge, only to find the city tangled in its own troubles. Meron's allegiance is questioned when she consorts with the criminal Enfelid tribe warring against Arenscura. Amidst the conflict, they discover the true depth of the crisis before them: knots, bonds, and grudges rooted deeply in time.

Features:

160 pages of story (Chapters 7-9, ahead of online posting schedule)
10 pages of exclusive background story!
personally signed by me

All manga books are 30% off during preorder month! Just use the coupon code: CP3SPECIAL on checkout :D

- - - - -

Holiday Sale of November!

2 new items are also released for preorder in November:

Holiday card with handwritten custom message
Necklace based on Veloce's necklace design!

Bundles are available at up to $25 off regular price! Greeting card will have limited stock after preorder is over, and will be gone forever 2 weeks before Christmas.

- - - - -

BONUS: Carciphona reader challenge

If you are a reader for Carciphona, I have a challenge for you!
I participate in online voting sites such as TopWebComics, albeit not very actively. My comic ranks around 50-70 on the site which does not help bring in new readers very much.

My challenge for you is to help vote for me to bring Carciphona higher in the charts to unlock more pages for posting! You can vote once everyday through the vote link at Carciphona.com. The rewards?

If Carciphona ranks #30 or less, December will be another double update month!
If carciphona ranks #10 or less, I will post ONE PAGE EVERY SINGLE DAY for ALL OF DECEMBER.

Sounds like a good reward for helping Carciphona grow? I hope so! :D No purchase required, just spread the word and help Carciphona reach more people who might enjoy it (: Thanks so much for your continued support, I hope you will all continue to enjoy the story!

Voting bonus: Cleaned version of one of the scraps I posted c:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 85 - 86 ]

Sun, 27 October 2012 21:08:00 EST

Meron: "OBJECTION!!" Mom: "overruled"

Just a reminder that Carciphona volume 3 will be available for preorder this weekend on Sunday, November 4, at 8PM EST! It is also the weekend of the end of daylight saving time and all of us get the extra hour we're owed since spring (: If in doubt, just check the count down!

For celebration, I will also be doing DOUBLE UPDATE MONTH AGAIN for all of November!! But this is not the sweetest part of the year end events. Check back next week to see what I have to offer (:

Voting bonus: some more progress on the same painting I'm spending forever on!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 83 - 84 ]

Sun, 21 October 2012 21:08:00 EST

Meron tried so hard and got so far, but in the end it didn't matter la la la~ ): thanks mommy, thanks.

In more positive news, Carciphona volume 3 will be available for preorder on Sunday, November 4, at 8PM EST!

The count down on the front page should clear any timezone confusion (and it looks kinda cool :D MY FRONT PAGE IS A TICKING TIMEBOMB.) Like previous preorder events, there will be discount promotions and options to bundle books together to save on shipping. There will also be some special merchandise for this occasion, one you have already seen and one you haven't, as well as a challenge from me to you with great rewards! (: Check back on the day of release to find out what it is ;D

Voting bonus: They're my mental comfort and anti drug ;-;

Vol. 3: [ Pages 81 - 82 ]

Sun, 14 October 2012 22:20:00 EST

Veloce carebear mode!

I'm drawing lots of random pictures since I finished my book last week haha, taking a break before committing myself to working again ;; WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME I POSTED A DRAWING HERE LOL THIS IS A MIRACLE.

I've also finished upgrading the rest of the site to the light silver colour scheme, so no more strangeness with the dichotomy of layouts hahaha! The chatbox is also upgraded to disqus now since the old one expired and costs money. It's more spacious and easier to keep track of conversations with though I wish I could make the font smaller ;-; but either way, feel free to jump in and chat with everyone else there!

Voting bonus: WIP c: And I'm totally indulging myself by finishing meaningless time consuming pictures AND IT FEELS SO GOOD

Vol. 3: [ Pages 79 - 80 ]

Sun, 7 October 2012 20:35:00 EST

Rae wishes to end the 7 years of filler episodes in this show

Book 3 is done for good on my end! It is in the process of being printed as I work out everything for preorders to open some time next month (: Seeing how there are 160 pages in this volume, you guys are most likely going to be in for more update treats, or you'll have a ton of pages waiting for you in the printed copy should you decide to order :D In the mean time I will take a break and actually DRAW THINGS I WANT AGAIN... oops that will have to wait as I finish these 3-4 other illustrations I'm obligated to draw for other people, accumulated over the course of the past few months. huahuahuaha

Voting bonus: I did waste no time and jumped right into at least drawing a few scraps again. Here's one of them.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 77 - 78 ]

Sun, 30 September 2012 22:45:00 EST

I guess the biggest plot twist I can give to the story right now, ruining the plot in the process, is to reveal that the chief is mute. If only CP is a derpy comic instead of a super serious one!

Voting bonus: Potential volume 3 cover candidate? Not sure if I'll go with this one or the one from before ):

Vol. 3: [ Pages 75 - 76 ]

Thu, 27 September 2012 22:30:00 EST

My favourite scene in this book! leading up to probably the best part of this book, which is sad coming from me since I'm working on the last 50 pages and not happy with it ;-;

Last bonus update of the month! I hope you guys enjoyed the month, and thank you very much for discussing the pages as I updated! I love reading these discussions XD

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 73 - 74 ]

Sun, 23 September 2012 23:00:00 EST

Meron's mom tries to pull a Bumi with that "good things come to those who wait" thing.

We're entering our last week of double updates ): One last bonus update coming up on Friday!

Part of double update month (:

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 71 - 72 ]

Thu, 20 September 2012 22:15:00 EST

Welcome to 70 pages ago, Meron!

In other news, I'VE FINISHED INKING ALL 170 PAGES OF VOLUME 3! hopefully I can tone all of them within next week, proofread, then toss it over to the printers to have the proof copy printed while I paint the cover in the process. Christmas release is looking more and more likely! Though I have a TON of work after the books are printed because I have some sweet surprises for this Christmas to go with the release of volume 3 (: (barring mayan prophecies coming true and the world ends a few days before my readers can get the books)

Part of double update month!

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 69 - 70 ]

Sun, 16 September 2012 20:55:00 EST

Oh look a dramatic cliff standoff in CP, what is this a cowboy story or something?

So far you have noticed that all Beast-Humans have horns on their foreheads in addition to other features reflective of their beast forms. In the story's earliest conception, these horns were purely arbitrary and had no significance whatsoever, but thank goodness I've waited so long to get going with the story because I have made them a vital part of Beast-Humans since then (: The horns are reflective of their spiritual power--though whether or not they can make good use of that power is a whole different story. Chief Kasga has multiple spikes branching from his forehead, while most others have one ordinary spike. Contact with the horns also allow enemies to disrupt mental stability of the Beast-Human, especially in amateurs. It's a move frowned upon by Beast-Humans (and most Beast-Humans have learned to spiritually prevent this from happening) but that's what Des did on this page to interrupt Iriel's transformation which takes Iriel concentration to pull off.

Part of double update month (:

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3. Up to pages 159!!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 67 - 68 ]

Thu, 13 September 2012 21:56:00 EST

Earthbender!Meron go!

Part of double update month (:

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3. Up to pages 138 now!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 65 - 66 ]

Sun, 9 September 2012 21:00:00 EST

Go Meron! Redeem your image, I bestow upon you this showdown :D. If you missed it, there was also an update on Friday as part of double update month (:

I've added some little fancy page flipping animation on hover to show that you can click on the actual pages to browse back and forth! Of course you can also use the left and right arrow on your keyboard as shortcuts if you're lazy like me c:. I've also added the Bookmark buttons. These do not save bookmarks on your browsers, as that would clutter up your bookmarks really fast. These save your current page as a "cookie" in your browser, allowing you to tell your browser to remember your progress in the story, or to save a favourite scene to jump to. Click the "save bookmark" button to save, and "load bookmark" to go back to the page you were on :D However, if you flush your cookies out too frequently, it will most likely flush out this cookie as well and lose your place, so it's best for saving your place for the next day if you're rereading the series and it's getting late (:

Part of double update month!

Voting bonus: More progress on volume 3. Up to pages 138 now!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 63 - 64 ]

Fri, 7 September 2012 16:59:00 EST

So far Rae's been pretty irresponsible in terms of actually doing ANYTHING in response to everything that has happened. He let troubles rampant and let culprits roam free, and normally I would've asked myself, how the hell would such a character keep a city in peace for a few decades' time? Arenscura should've been a rat's hole by now. What Rae has is just charm and amazing luck, almost the destiny kind. I based this part of him on my mom: she believes in giving people chances, forgiveness, and standing up when wronged, even in situations where it'd be dangerous and stupid to. She is so pure because she's done them in the past with success, always. Whether it be an unreasonable boss, an unsalvageable delinquent, somehow her faith never slap her back in the face. I never believed her to be completely right still because I think she is just fortunate, for example had she been an ugly male, she would not have gotten away with anything; but also she has a certain charm and intelligence about her that make people decide to be nice to her, even if they go ahead and screw everyone else over anyway. That charm is largely what allowed Rae to keep everything under control without actually doing much.

Part of double update month!

Voting bonus: A future panel I did over the weekend that I converted into some comic about CP chars watching hockey c:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 61 - 62 ]

Mon, 2 September 2012 22:13:00 EST

Rae finally explains a little background. This is one of the few instances where what I believe gets translated into the story haha!

And double update month returns! For the whole month of September, Carciphona will be updated twice a week on Mondays and Fridays! I have an excess of buffer at the moment, and I figured everything in this arc is finally coming together, and could use a little speeding up in pace (:

Pages take a long time to make, and because I update two pages at a time only once a week and rarely ever miss an update, the amount of work I put into this series may not be apparant. But if you enjoy these double updates and want to show a little appreciation, just remember to check back, comment (I love seeing what people have to say about the story or or characters!) and share the series with your friends who may also like these sorts of manga/comics! if more frequent updates helps Carciphona grow, then you can bet there will be more of these down the road :D

Voting bonus: A future panel I did over the weekend that I converted into some comic about CP chars watching hockey c:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 59 - 60 ]

Sun, 26 August 2012 21:10:00 EST

Be careful Veloce, your candid insults don't work on everyone, especially Rae since he's immune to pretty much everything.

Back from FanExpo! Thanks everyone who came by to say hi, whether by accident or not, and hi to any new readers here (: I find fanexpo a little strange because most people go there thinking artist alley is the same as dealers, and I had a number of people talk about Carciphona in front of my face like any other franchise believing that I was just another businessman LOL. At the same time it was kinda cool to hear people talk like that. lets me dream HAHA.

Voting bonus: A future panel I did over the weekend that I converted into some comic about CP chars watching hockey c:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 57 - 58 ]

Sun, 19 August 2012 20:40:00 EST

The children rates their VIP visit to the zoo.

I have up to page 110 of volume 3 complete now and I am working towards the last 56 pages. If I can get all of them done by October, I maybe able to release the book in time for Christmas! I would like to aim for Christmas release every year, that's the reason for the huge rush this year really. But the rush had been beneficial because the concentrated workflow was really good as practice, learning, as well as speed, and I am actually optimistic of being able finish this enormous series before age prevents me to do so LOL.

The good news for all this rushing is, I will most likely be able to put forth a lot of double update (or more) specials for the remainder of the year, because by the time I'm done, I will be like 100 pages ahead (1 whole year of 2 page per week updates!!) and I don't need that LMAO. I would consider releasing printed books a chapter or so ahead of the web schedule, but I think that might just stop people from reading it on the web altogether and stifle the however small community I have already. So for now, faster updates that may improve your experience and flow of the story! The first double update month will be next month, September :D So be sure to check back often for the bonus pages! Secondly I'll be at FanEXPO this coming weekend in Toronto! I'll be at the artist alley, selling the usual books, prints, and maybe as well as the necklace I mentioned for Otakon, hopefluly see you there if you're attending :D!

Voting bonus: WIP of the possible cover for book 3. I might try to change his pose to be a little more dynamic though

Vol. 3: [ Pages 55 - 56 ]

Sun, 12 August 2012 22:10:00 EST

Chief Kasga vs Rae, master of negotiation, who will prevail?

Voting bonus: I've been working on the next 50--YES 50--pages of CP and they should be done this week! Some of these will go towards double update month in September :D

Vol. 3: [ Pages 53 - 54 ]

Sun, 5 August 2012 20:11:00 EST

MORE INCOMPETENT HENCHMEN!! You know you're incompetent when you get bested by Iriel. God forbid you get bested by Keri! But don't worry I'm not ruthless enough to let that happen yet......... It's rather sad that this discussion came up in the comments section after the story was settled in stone, because I just look to the future of the story and realize there is actually not a single instance where these henchmen could redeem themselves ): better luck next time lemmings!

Voting bonus: a random sketch of Blackbird's face as a break. I felt extremely guilty doing this as always because it's totally meaningless but WHATEVER I NEED TO FIGHT THAT GUILT

Vol. 3: [ Pages 51 - 52 ]

Mon, 30 July 2012 17:11:00 EST

I'm back from Otakon! Hello new readers and old :D Here's your delayed update since I spent most of yesterday night clearing up my backlog of e-mails and messages. There were some problems but I've had an otherwise fun, fulfilling and smooth weekend! I didn't starve this year, my trips were safe and smooth, and I got to really meet and talk to a lot of people. Thanks everyone who showed up to chat and to get stuff too! I'm really happy about the con despite all the set backs and worries before my leave.

I also got these adorable veloces from Anna and Zetallis ;-; AND THEY'RE THE ORIGINAL im so happy ahhhh

Voting bonus: a little sketch I did during the con when I didn't feel like inking pages! It's some sort of design for a deity spirit in Maelstrom. Her name is Kiriumfonstis, but she's is more commonly known by another title that you will find out/figure out soon enough in the story. There are a bunch of lesser deities like this one that I would like to have developed for the world below the ranks of the Demon Lords, but since my world is so poorly defined right now, I can't really make them just yet until I setup everything else more ):

Vol. 3: [ Pages 49 - 50 ]

Mon, 23 July 2012 13:47:00 EST

Rae is good at showing up at the right time to take all the credit.

Sorry for the delayed update again! I got some kind of bug and had another fever yesterday, during which I did absolutely nothing. The fever is gone now and I feel much better, but my nose is still runny and I have no idea why. Let's just hope it behaves itself when Otakon comes ):

Speaking of Otakon, it is happening this weekend, July 27-29 In Baltimore. I will be there at the Artist alley at tables D10/D11 with the glorious bara-chan!! If you're going, please pay us a visit ;-; I will be selling the usual prints and books, which there would be many new additions since last year, as well as a special necklace design based on Veloce's pendant!

I won't sell it online for a while due to shipping constraints, but I will be selling a few of these at Otakon if you're interested :D Voting bonus: a sketch I've done a long time ago that I just might use as the cover of volume 3!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 47 - 48 ]

Sun, 15 July 2012 21:25:00 EST

Veloce vs the 3 stooges, the situation seems to be.

Voting bonus: a close up shot of page 36! I've been doing my best to increase the use of line strokes and hatching to replace the use of tones for values and texture.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 45 - 46 ]

Mon, 9 July 2012 19:25:00 EST

New chapter! Sorry for the delayed update; I had some wisdom tooth extraction mishap yesterday and am pretty much too traumatized to do anything now ): so no new vote incentive either, but I still appreciate any votes I get!

Voting bonus: a random original I did for the sake of drawing something simple.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 43 - 44 ]

Sun, 1 July 2012 20:35:00 EST

Scream for help and run in a zigzag pattern to--oh wait there aren't any guns in maelstrom... only pesky magicians that cheat through life |:

Carciphona is also translated into Russian by the Riverdance Crew!! It is now under the language drop down :D Up to volume 2 is translated ^^ Other than that, I still have not drawn anything except pages this week (up to page 76 done though!! expect a double update month soon!) ): It's also pretty hard to show any previews and WIPs of future pages because they pretty much spoil everything I have going, even if it is already obvious Q__Q So have a tiny panel of Des on page 7x!

It had just hit me though that I could post close ups of PREVIOUS pages... the web version of this manga is pretty small and looks like crap compared to the printed version, so I could potentially use that to show the true quality of the printed book. Maybe I'll start doing that next week!

Voting bonus: a random original I did for the sake of drawing something simple.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 41 - 42 ]

Sun, 24 June 2012 20:35:00 EST

Weirin's secret adventures continues!

Sorry I don't have anything new today ): spent most of this week drawing nothing but new pages! /sociopathic behaviour

Voting bonus: Some random beast human chieftain type stuff!/

Vol. 3: [ Pages 39 - 40 ]

Mon, 18 June 2012 01:03:00 EST

Well Weirin, you should've checked the weather before you ran out there in the first place.

I forgot if I mentioned here, but I am having a print sale for a month at my shop! All my convention prints are at $10 for 2 more weeks for online orders, for everyone who wanted these prints but can't attend the cons I go to (:

Click here to visit the shop!

Voting bonus: Some random beast human chieftain type stuff!/

Vol. 3: [ Pages 37 - 38 ]

Sun, 10 June 2012 23:07:00 EST

Keri is such a big troll bait, even serious people troll him.

And Carciphona got 1k likes on facebook this week! Thanks so much for the support :D Here's a simple celebratory chibi there because I'm sure you'd agree the time would be better spent on cranking out more pages XD

Voting bonus: A sketch of veloce's mommy Auresque! Arbyvee requested her in the vote incentive request thread in the forums, and I felt like using her to try out sketching without lines again (: It's a pretty weird method of drawing but it could be nice if I get used to it! And she's topless because she's a boss yaaaaaa \o/

Vol. 3: [ Pages 35 - 36 ]

Sun, 03 June 2012 23:00:00 EST

Really Rae, does that mean you'll actually do something like a responsible king!?

The website now has a new layout drawing to replace the anniversary picture! It's back to the usual grey and gloom :D I got rid of a lot of useless text and links as well as papery texture so everything is a lot cleaner! The content pages are not done but I will do those later when I have time. I hope you all like the new layout :D

Voting bonus: a drawing inspired by overwhelming amount of happiness after listening to this waltz from rachmaninoff suite for 2 pianos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1FUokpBQog

Vol. 3: [ Pages 33 - 34 ]

Mon, 28 May 2012 21:10:00 EST

Iriel and magic, the star crossed lovers (: ...

I'm back from Anime North! Thanks for everyone who came to see me, it was a wonderful convention ;; The turn out was amazing and I was really happy to have had a lot of interest in my books there from new readers. Sorry about the late update; I'm exhausted and I had just returned from a full day of family errands as well right after, so I will just leave you with the pages here and write about the con in detail in a few days ^^

Voting bonus: Another colour test page~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 31 - 32 ]

Sun, 20 May 2012 21:40:00 EST

Meron and Iriel exchange a bit of their stories before they ran away.

I will be at Anime North this upcoming weekend! It's a convention in Toronto, though if you haven't heard of it, this will most likely be irrelevant to you :D;; but if you're going, be sure to drop by! I will be selling all my books as well as many pieces of my art as prints. I will also bring THIS

That's right, the original pages for Carciphona! The binder is pretty damn heavy so I will only be bringing pages from the Arenscura arc as photographed above. Up to pages 50 (or more if I finish more this week) are in there with crappy handwriting text, so you can spoil yourself and read on if you like (: If you're interested in seeing them, come and ask and I'll show you! I won't display it publicly because I'm worried someone will run off with it LOL.

Voting bonus: One of the earlier pages in volume 3, in colour. I did this very quickly to see if I could get the general feel I would like without going through too much hassle, and as of now the page feels unremarkable compared to the regular black/white toning, because I am considering the possibility of doing Carciphona in colour. In all honestly I can't make it too remarkable because it would take too long, and it would actually look worse, so I will have to keep experimenting to see if I could get some sort of improvement.

Vol. 3: [ Pages 29 - 30 ]

Mon, 14 May 2012 00:30:00 EST

Iriel gets an amazing 1-page training montage!!

Also in case you have not noticed already, I have resurrected the forums! It's still very new so there's not much going on, but you can help make it lively by joining or starting the discussion about plot, characters, or even non manga-related stuff (:

Voting bonus: My RO high priest character! I wish I wasn't so self conscious about drawing characters without background; I felt bad cus she was sitting on nothing and now she's an an aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean Q_Q

Vol. 3: [ Pages 27 - 28 ]

Sun, 6 May 2012 22:40:00 EST

Weirin should have waited and saved this for a better occasion for maximum effect, but teenagers are impatient and she doesn't have much interest in scheming and things like that.

If you also follow me on other sites, you may have already seen the big anniversary illustration I cooked up!

Blackbird/Carciphona is 7 years old! It didn't feel that long because the first few years were spent multitasking life, but who would've thought I would be able to do this full time without having to bask in poverty? It has also been one year since the printing of volume 1, and I am very grateful that I could continue the publishing of this project and it had not ended in failure. I'm not big on celebration myself because my logic is always, why waste time on celebratory nonsense when I could use that time to produce more story and content? I'm sure the readers would rather see those. But I've convinced myself to make an exception this time because I also realized I am just no fun most of the time LOL. I hope you guys will enjoy the pleasant scene and the very rare occasion that is a group shot!! The website will also retain this layout for the month of May, after which I will try my best to update the rest of the webpages as well to match this layout, and have a new regular layout image ready (: e-toast, and here's to another great year! I just can't wait to unveil more of the story :D

In other news, Carciphona is also now a featured manga on mangamagazine.net! Thanks so much to the team at mm.net for choosing to feature my manga and help promote it. If you don't use the site, be sure to go and look through some of the comics there, you may find many more webcomics you will enjoy :D

Voting bonus: A sketch that I did a while ago that I still do not have the time to do anything about!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 25 - 26 ]

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 23:40:00 EST

Veloce is kinda like my dad, just a lot more serious and a lot less troll! Living with a veloce is hard ):

Incidentally this is one of those obvious scenes where I actually write my experience into the story. I get asked all the time by people whether or not they should pursuit art or music or anything that they love but may not be viable. The general message that supportive individuals like to get across is for people to really find what they love, keep at it, and not put so much emphasis on success or measure themselves with others. But a lot of time people become so fixated on overcoming this mental obstacle whenever they feel unworthy or stuck, just because giving up or trying something else is always associated negatively with defeat. Not a lot of them realize this may sometimes also mean inflexibility on their part and a lack of the ability to adapt, as well as a lack of willingness to really look far and wide for something that truly fits them.

Voting bonus: I think the final version of veloce's next outfit in the story :D she'll get it in like 6 chapters lolol

Vol. 3: [ Pages 23 - 24 ]

Sun, 22 Apr 2012 23:00:00 EST

As awesome as Weirin and Keri's friendship is, they are still very different people with very different standards.

Not much to say again! Trying to catch up with some work as well as page progress, so nothing I can show ):

Voting bonus: a 2-hour sketch/fanart of the rogue/silver moon from dungeon fighter online~

Vol. 3: [ Pages 21 - 22 ]

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 22:50:00 EST

And the next morning, weirin and co discuss their #firstworldproblems.

In other news, CP is now on MangaMagazine.net! Please check it out if you use the site :D

I've finished 3 illustrations this week--granted they were all half complete in one way or another before this week, still it was kind of surprising. In all honestly I wanted to keep going with drawing illustrations, becasue if anything I could print some of them as prints for this year's conventions. But if I don't try to catch up with some pages any time soon, I won't ever catch up with my year-end goal for volume 3 ): BUT. If I keep going with illustrations, I might be able to make another artbook or something by the end of the year... THE DILEMMA.

Voting bonus: One of the pictures I finished! I'm keeping the others secret to the best of my ability for the next art book haha T__T

Vol. 3: [ Pages 19 - 20 ]

Sun, 8 Apr 2012 21:15:00 EST

And the cat is out of the bag...

I am going to tone one or two pages on livestream right now over at http://livestream.com/shilin, in order to record my toning process for a possible video. Come watch if you're interested!

Voting bonus: unrelated sketch of my weapon master from the game dungeon fighter (:

Vol. 3: [ Pages 17 - 18 ]

Mon, 2 Apr 2012 18:52:00 EST

Ok this time for real :D the pages has been updated with ~~boring~~ proper dialogues.

Volume 2 preorder event has ended! Thanks sooo much to everyone who preordered ;; I will be shipping out the books this week, most likely completing before the week is over. The books should arrive within the month at the latest for North American orders, and hopefully not too long for international orders! To all those who preordered, I will keep you updated via e-mail when everything has been shipped out, so you know when to expect them ^^

The preorder raffle drawing was also done today! There were 305 separate orders, so with the first 50 bonus entries added (and the spreadsheet starting at row 4), I've generated 6 winners using row numbers. Click here to see the image form of the results for legitimacy and for fun :D (and one of the winners entered their e-mail address wrong lol~) but tl;dr, the winners are:

Kira D.
Doriane P.
Amelie C.
Kelly M.
Melody W.
Yuen Ling T.

Congratulations, and thanks to everyone who participated! You have already been contacted if you are one of the winners.

The first 2 volumes are back at normal prices! I had made sure to mail extra copies to my friend in the US and I will continue to offer discount shipping for US orders until he no longer has any more books left.

Voting bonus: more progress on the picture

Vol. 3: [ Pages 17 - 18 ]

Sun, 1 Apr 2012 01:10:00 EST

I really think Meron's popularity would crush the others if this was actually her character, and as my friend states she looks the part too... but nopes jokes on you Meron you're stuck uke tsundere kawaii desu forever

In all seriousness the dialog will be updated to the real one tomorrow ^^ I'm too squeamish of a person to make a character like this

Voting bonus: more progress on the picture

Vol. 3: [ Pages 15 - 16 ]

Thurs, 29 Mar 2012 20:37:00 EST

Everybody is rather worried about the fate of a country that is placed in the hands of such a ruler as Rae.

And preorder for volume 2 ends on Satuday, just as a reminder ^^

This will also be the last update of the double update month! I hope you guys enjoyed it, and while I'd love to continue doing this (it seems to have helped make the comment section more active too, which I thoroughly enjoyed!) I just can't keep up XD I will save it for special occasions in the future! and seeing how I create pages a lot faster now, I hope to make this a regular treat (: The next update will be as usual on Sunday. Thanks for your votes, comments, chats and readership for the month!

Voting bonus: I was going to work on a happy commission for a friend, but this came out of my hands instead. Brilliant isn't it!?

Vol. 3: [ Pages 13 - 14 ]

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 21:05:00 EST

I feel pretty bad for des sometimes, he's just not having a good day and his boss is not helping him any.

We're at the last week of preorders for volume 2! I will send out the books to my friend in the USA this week, and all preorders will be shipped out starting next monday. Order before this Friday to get the books for the discounted price of $12, and be entered into the preorder raffle for a chance to have your books free :D Visit my shop to get your copy today. If you have already preordered, you will receive an e-mail within the first week of April to confirm that your book has been shipped!

Voting bonus: I was going to work on a happy commission for a friend, but this came out of my hands instead. Brilliant isn't it!?

Vol. 3: [ Pages 11 - 12 ]

Thur, 22 Mar 2012 22:30:00 EST

It's finally happened. Carciphona can end in peace now that the deserving has finally received their spanking.

Voting bonus: I was going to work on a happy commission for a friend, but this came out of my hands instead. Brilliant isn't it!?

Vol. 3: [ Pages 9 - 10 ]

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 19:56:00 EST

Meron is not alone! A very strong ally shows himself. Very... strong.........

Voting bonus: Something I doodled a few months ago going for a generic drawing, I can't remember if I posted this or not but I probably did ): It was supposed to be for Vday but obviously this did not make the date!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 7 - 8 ]

Thurs, 15 Mar 2012 21:55:00 EST

Fail action scene number x?!

Also for those who have not noticed, volume 2 cover art is up in both the goodies page and in the actual manga viewer :D! There are also one or two other illustrations posted too in the goodies page but one of them is just a thumbnail XD Voting bonus: Something I doodled a few months ago going for a generic drawing, I can't remember if I posted this or not but I probably did ): It was supposed to be for Vday but obviously this did not make the date!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 5 - 6 ]

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 21:55:00 EST

Sorry for the late update ): My internet died on Saturday morning and I didn't get it back until a few hours ago, so I couldn't do anything. But here are the new pages and the update on Thursday will still be on schedule!

I also want to thank everyone who has preordered the book so far ;; I'm very grateful for your support. Preorder will run until the end of the month at my storenvy shop here for all those interested! I will also be posting a bunch of new illustrations and videos like I usually do when I release a book in the next weeks, you can find those in my blog, DA, tumblr, or just the gallery section of this website :D

Voting bonus: snipplet A painting from like October or something that I finished this week that I will post later!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 3 - 4 ]

Thurs, 8 Mar 2012 21:30:00 EST

A lot of people saw this page coming! Please welcome Mrs. she-won't-ever-have-a-name ^^

Come back on Sunday for the next update :)

Voting bonus: snipplet A painting from like October or something that I finished this week that I will post later!

Vol. 3: [ Pages 1 - 2 ]

Mon, 5 Mar 2012 00:20:00 EST

Volume 3 starts as promised! I'm not actually as sadistic to you guys as I claim to be lol... although it would have been a pretty good effect if I actually left Mr. popular dead.

And the surprise I promised you guys is for the whole month of march, I will be updating twice a week as a way of saying thank you to your continued support! Every Sunday and Thursday night I will posted another 2 pages, making 4 pages every week (: I was thinking of posting one page every couple of days to make my feat sound more impressive, but decided posting half empty pages on double spreads would just be silly and make it look like a glaring marketting ploy LOL. So see you guys on Thursday for another update! :D

Voting bonus: I feel guilty almost 100% of the time when I keep drawing the same kind of stuff over and over again, but it seems to be all I want to do lately ):

Volume 2 release!

Sun, March 4 2012 20:00:00 EST

There will be an update in a few hours tonight, but first, release news!

"Veloce has finally left her home behind her, but the forces of the King and Blackbird are not her only concerns. A mysterious illness threatens to take her down before she can leave Kronzel."

Carciphona Volume 2 is now available for preorder at my shop at http://shilin.storenvy.com! :D And as usual, I am hosting a (almost) month-long preorder event from Sunday, March 4 to Saturday, March 31 to promote my newest book! Order the book during this period to be eligible for:

A discount!
Much cheaper shipping to the USA ($5 per maximum of 2 books rather than $8 each)
A place in the preorder raffle

- - - - -

[ Preorder raffle ]

All preorders are entered into a raffle for a chance to win your order for free! (ie. refunded) The number of winners depends on the amount of preorders: for every 50 preorders, there will be one more winner chosen. The first 50 preorders will receive a bonus entry (for a total of 2) into the raffle! A reply will be sent to the first 50 shortly after they have filled to let them know of their bonus entry, and I will scratch off this bonus once it has been reached.

Winners will be announced and contacted on April 2 (just so you guys don't think I'm trolling)

- - - - -

[ Shipping ]

All preorders will be shipped during the first week of April, right after preorders end. With the release of volume 2, I am offering combined shipping for those interested in purchasing both books to save shipping costs for you. If you would like to switch out one book for another (eg. 2 copies of volume 2 instead of 1+2), please clearly indicate in your order note or e-mail me to confirm ahead of time. Shipping prices are as follows:

Canada: up to 2 books per shipment: $5
USA: up to 2 books per shipment: $5
International: 1 book: $11, 2 books: $14

- - - - -

[ Cash order ]

If you would like to preorder, but do not have the means to pay for it online (ie. cannot use paypal or credit cards), you can choose to mail your payment to me. However I will not be responsible for any lost payment (though it has never happened in the past ~30 cash orders I have received). Please write me an e-mail at shilin@ashen-ray.com indicating your interest and I will send you everything you'll need to know! Unfortunately cash orders will not be entered into the raffle ):

Carciphona Volume 2

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 00:05:00 EST

Carciphona book 2 is almost here! It will be available for preorder starting Sunday, March 4 at 8pm EST at my shop, http://shilin.storenvy.com/, running until March 31. Manga updates will also resume on that day along with a surprise for you so remember to check back on this site for it ^^

The preorder event this time will be a raffle. Every preorder placed has a chance to win your order for free! (ie. your payment refunded) One more winner will be chosen for every 50 preorders placed, and the first 50 preorders will receive a bonus entry into the draw :D

More pictures of the book and full details will be posted on the day of the release.

Voting bonus: still trying to get back into drawing random illustrations ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 153 - 154 ]

Sun, 19 Feb 2012 23:05:00 EST

If you thought I was mean for last week's update, THINK AGAIN.

And volume 2 concludes! I looked forward to finally getting away from the starting point of the story and really move on from just the main character being repeatedly attacked by the same person, though I am anxious about how the progression of the story will be received from now on. The central story is actually far from beginning, but there's no rollercoaster ride without climbing up to the top first!

These updates just flew by for me, I really felt the buffer I had built up would've lasted longer (of course, I calculated and knew it would run out this week long ago lol ): ) Volume 3's planning took a while, also a lot of family stuff, other work, andagamebutwewonttalkaboutthat and the printing of volume 2 took away work time so I'm not as ahead as I'd like to be with pages. I will be taking a two week break before starting Volume 3, so check back then :D

Lastly, the good news is, volume 2 will be released for preorder in 2 weeks! I'm really grateful for everyone who has asked in the past little while, it makes me happy that some people were looking forward to it, and a bit guilty that I couldn't bring it out sooner XD The tentative date is set on Sunday, March 4, at 8pm EST. Confirmed info and teaser pictures will be posted sometime next week, before preorders happen, so keep an eye on my sites or pages :D I will also have a surprise/gift for you the day updates resumes, so whether or not you are interested in a copy, come back on that day to find out what it is (:

Voting bonus: still trying to get back into drawing random illustrations ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 151 - 152 ]

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 01:30:00 EST

Yes let's bring ALL our guests to the scene of the crime!

Voting bonus: a crack chibi drawing I don't know what I was thinking lolol

Vol. 2: [ Pages 149 - 150 ]

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 02:30:00 EST

GUUUU is tongue for "yes there is a problem".

The books are here and they are safe! They've been in cold weather for ages so I'm letting them air out a bit and get warmer naturally LOL... they were just like bricks of ice. I will still be waiting for about a month before launching preorders, so I can cut about half the price off US shipping (hopefully) for you guys in the future.

To kind of make up for the lack of any art at all in the recent past due to my time constraints, here is a WIP for a commission I was working on! oh fabric my love

Voting bonus: I drew this like, RIGHT NOW, just to break the terrible vote incentive streak I've been having. Seems when I try to force out illustrations I just end up slashing them some more q_q

Vol. 2: [ Pages 147 - 148 ]

Sun, 30 Jan 2012 21:30:00 EST

Weirin's had enough of the passive aggression, apparently.

Voting bonus: I'm working on some CD covers so I haven't drawn anything again. Instead I put together this stupid collage of panels from the manga. I noticed these from proofreading volume 2 over and over again LOL...

Vol. 2: [ Pages 145 - 146 ]

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 21:45:00 EST

Rae forgot whose side he's on lalala~

Trying really hard to get back into drawing stuff now that the thumbnails are done, man it's hard to change pace ):

Voting bonus: A little more progress on the sleeping picture!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 143 - 144 ]

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 21:30:00 EST

Meron sets a good example for all the children present.

I finally finished thumbnailing all of volume 3! It's not as fun to draw out the entire story this way because by the time I finished the thumbnails (which is now) I would've known the story so well and can't tell if it's even interesting anymore ): each page would probably also be less creative LOL... I would have to fancy them up as I go along. It does help me be consistent with the pace, pages and story though... the dilemma

Voting bonus: trying to make a new site layout ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 141 - 142 ]

Sun, 08 Jan 2012 23:50:00 EST

ONCE AGAIN, WE FEAST. My friend used to make fun of me drawing lots of scenes where my charas are eating but you can't blame me right, eating is great.

I've been busy the whole week with my family, and I'm still hacking away at the next volume which is taking the entirety of my mind so once again, I don't have much to say and I don't have a new voting incentive ): I'll try to draw something for next week! (although I've said that to myself every time sunday came about for the past month HAHA) I did, however, upload 5 more fanart/gifts I got from last month onto the goodies page ~~to distract you from my lack of work to present~~, so go take a look!

Voting bonus: same wip from last week!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 139 - 140 ]

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 00:50:00 EST

Veloce's amazing disguise is not amazing enough to fool uncle Rae ):

I hope everyone had a happy new year!! I haven't slept too well because of new things going on in the house and I'm actually really sleepy right now LOL... BUT YEAH I HOPE YOURS STARTED OFF OK!! Here is a little something I drew for the new years just because I never draw festive drawings ): tiny Meron failing at skating yaaa

Voting bonus: I've been having trouble making voting images lately because I've been geared to storyboard and write. The sudden jump in my manga progress rate brought storywriting back to the front of my to do list because I will have to actually get off my lazy ass and finalize a lot of things far far down the line just so I can finish the next part of the story. So I slapped on some colours to an old sketch! I want to finish this anyway but I just don't have any ideas for the surroundings ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 137 - 138 ]

Sun, 25 Dec 2011 21:10:00 EST

Today's name is brought to you by my waifu fina/sepia ^_^

Merry Christmas everyone! Enjoy your breaks if you have one, and if you don't, well, may the spirit of the holiday be with you anyway! I didn't have much time to whip up a new incentive this week so it's still the old one ): But votes are still appreciated as always! Voting bonus: Lots of des's on the front page of the site this week...!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 135 - 136 ]

Sun, 18 Dec 2011 19:10:00 EST

The lord of the house is here to show Des how to properly welcome guests!

Extra character information for the next part of the story! For those of you who have not read the walls of text in my world setting page, there is a specific group of human civilization called the Northerners. They have a history that I won't cover for a while, but I'd just like to mention that they are named in Chinese, then translated into English in a strange phonetic way. Their first and lastname generally work together as a phrase to describe a natural phenomenon and they are specifically named that way. There is no set pattern and therefore no way to tell which parts of these characters' names are their firstnames and which is their last aside from judging by how they are addressed by others. For example, Sangyun Rae's lastname is Sangyun and most of his subjects address him as Lord Sangyun, while his friends, like Weirin and Keri, call him Lord Rae or sometimes just Rae. Rosien Keur's first name is Rosien, and that's what Rae calls her.

I don't like writing those as addendums because I feel like everything pertinent to the story/world should be naturally explained in the story itself. Things will be clarified eventually but because the story updates so slowly, I thought leaving people to get confused over a minor detail like WHAT'S THIS CHARACTER'S NAME for the upcoming months/years is not quite the way to go :D;;

Voting bonus: Lots of des's on the front page of the site this week...!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 133 - 134 ]

Sun, 11 Dec 2011 19:10:00 EST

Maybe this is cue for Des to fire his subordinates and hire more competent ones.

In other news, I am now selling 11x17 inch prints! (ledger size, ie. 2 sheets of regular printer paper big!) I've been selling these for ages at conventions I attend, but because of ridiculous shipping involved, I've only sold then online once before and have let DeviantART handle it thereafter. My friend is helping me ship them now so the shipping is actually not double-digits. My art is rather elaborate so they look great on a big size ^^ You can Check them out here, and for the next few weeks or months, all posters are buy 2 get 1 free (:

I've also made large posters available on my DeviantART print shop (16x24 inch up to 24x36 inch). I took them off for a while because I wanted to try to get them made on my own, but that was even harder than getting these 11x17" posters shipped. So after some requests over the past half a year, I've put them back up.

Voting bonus: The first spontaneous drawing in a while... I don't know which version I like better haha

Vol. 2: [ Pages 131 - 132 ]

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 21:00:00 EST

Iriel gets his free roller coaster ride :D

After many suggestions, I've finally took some time between waiting for the volume 2 proof and replaced the text boxes for page navigation with some drop down menus. So now there is no way you can get an error with improper inputs (unless you change the url directly to some incorrect value, in which case I can't help you there, you deserve that error page). The drop down should automatically select the page you're on right now, and reload the correct page/chapter lists when you change the volume value. Hopefully this is more convenient for everyone (: Please let me know if there are any problems with the menu.

I used to talk about the drawing process of each page on updates, but since I finished these ages ago, I stopped doing that because I would have forgotten what I wanted to say about the page ): But I remember this set of pages. Every action scene I come across is like an opportunity to redeem myself in executing them well after MONTHS of talking pages. But once again I ended with some mediocrity because, well, what do I expect from not practicing :D;; better luck next book!

Voting bonus: A bunch of Merons I drew for my Spanish translator Celes as a gift! she requested Meron or vel/des x meron so I did that HAHA

Vol. 2: [ Pages 129 - 130 ]

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 02:10:00 EST

Oops I forgot today (or yesterday) was Sunday.........

I bought a Cintiq so here's a random headshot of Des as a guinea pig! I'll probably change his eye colours but I hadn't settled on them at the time of drawing this.

Voting bonus: No new incentive this week ): WIP for said cover image!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 127 - 128 ]

Sun, 20 Nov 2011 20:45:00 EST

Good bye Iriel, again, love from your creator.

I livestream from time to time but I only post announcements on twitter, DA and sometimes Tumblr, so some of you might not know that I do. But I will be livestreaming in about 10-20 minutes (it is now 8:45PM EST, GMT-5) and I will be colouring the cover for volume 2, so if you're interested, feel free to drop by! http://livestream.com/shilin

Preorders for my art book will run on until tonight :D

Voting bonus: WIP so far for said cover image!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 125 - 126 ]

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 21:00:00 EST

But veloce, how will I run the story on for 4 chapters if you leave? Silly woman trying to escape my series, my minion Keri will never let you succeed.

Got nothing much to say, time to run back to toning billions of pages :D ONLY 4 AWAY FROM COMPLETION! - - -

Preorders for my art book will run on until November 20 :D

Voting bonus: my archeological dig for scraps to post continues... not sure if I had already posted this or not

Vol. 2: [ Pages 123 - 124 ]

Sun, 05 Nov 2011 21:00:00 EST

But veloce, how will I run the story on for 4 chapters if we do that?

And although I don't think this site is a big source of the art book support since its content is not exclusive to Carciphona (I could be wrong), Thank you everyone who preordered a copy! I'm very grateful and I will show my thanks in the form of pushing forward with work. As long as I can maintain the present level of support I receive, I can rely on publishing my work and count on it to return me enough income to continue this career full time. I will continue to save up pages but once I reach 1 or 2 chapters of buffer (LOL THAT'S A LOT BUT DON'T WORRY I GOT THIS) I will start updating twice a week (: or once every other day with just one page since apparently that kind of psychology works better for some readers for continuity. I couldn't have promised this without your help so I'm indebted to all of you to be able to say this ;;

In less serious news, I keep forgetting but my spanish translator Celes drew me this hysterial hypothesis of Des and Meron when she mentioned that Meron look uncomfortable seeing Des and omg... I'm just going to let the picture speak for itself

- - -

Preorders for my art book will run on until November 20 :D

Voting bonus: So I felt bad and looked through my old sketchbook for any sketches that I have not posted yet AND I DIDNT FIND ANYTHING. So here is a headshot from a year or so ago that I'm fond of despite being utterly generic and incomplete. He existed before Des and I had a lot of trouble differenciating them because they are so damn similar, so in the end I resorted to leaving this guy's design problems for later. HE IS SOMEBODY'S PARENT. CAN YOU GUESS WHO? you will not find out the answer for many many years though :'D

Vol. 2: [ Pages 121 - 122 ]

Sun, 30 Oct 2011 23:30:00 EST

Mystery of the cat people continues!

My art book is now available for preorder at my shop! The preorder event will run from today until November 20. It is a collection of the best of my art, and since I focus on Carciphona a lot, the majority of the book is actually Carciphona art XD The book will ship in time for the holidays, so if you or a friend like it, this might make a good gift ^^ See the poster below for some relatively flattering pictures of the book and details about what's in the book, or go to the shop and preorder a copy :D Thanks so much again for your patience and interest!

Voting bonus: more bonus sketches @u@;;;;.............

Vol. 2: [ Pages 119 - 120 ]

Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:20:00 EST

DES YOU'RE A RETARD. luckily Veloce isn't the type to burst into uncontrollable laughter in this kind of situation and bust her own ass.

I'm back from NYAF! I had a great time there both at the convention and in New York City. Thanks for coming by if you did! I really appreciate your support there and your help to make the con awesome ;; If you're interested, I've written a longwinded derp post about the trip on my blog here: http://blog.ashen-ray.com/2011/10/20/new-york/

And oh my god it's finally happening, my art book Toccata will be released on this upcoming Sunday, October 30, at 8 PM EST!! Why the specific date and time you ask? WELL, just like volume 1 preorders, I will be doing a preorder event with discounted prices and bonus goods for those who purchase in advance! I will be giving out free lettersize prints this time while these prints last to those who preorder. The first 50 will get to pick which prints they want as well :D Some of you may have already seen/bought the book at NYAF and have posted nice comments testifying for quality and value, which I am very grateful for!

So please check back at my storenvy shop, HTTP://SHILIN.STORENVY.COM next Sunday if you're interested :D I will also be updating as usual on schedule around that time.

Voting bonus: it makes me sad that I still have to use these bonus sketches as incentives LOL where did all my drawingn time go...

Vol. 2: [ Pages 117 - 118 ]

Sun, 9 Oct 2011 8:00:00 EST

A new character! This hasn't happened since the first introduction of Iriel in 2006 or something, unless you count all of Keri's random servants and Iriel's redesign LOL ): Also bringing the current main circle of characters to 4 girls vs 2.5 boys :'D

Next week I'll be in New York city for a week so I won't be updating. Please check back on the 23rd or something for the next update! I will also most likely have a set release date for my artbook by that time as well LOL FINALLY HOLY CRAP

Also I keep forgetting but I've made a Facebook page for Carciphona! It has nothing on it right now because I really just made it so that no one can take that username, but I xpost short update notices there, and will post any future important notices, art, books etc there as well. You can show your support by liking the page :D

Since all I've been drawing is pages and pages of serious business and drama, I hope it is excusable that I draw some random booty as a break

Voting bonus: Some more bonus sketches for volume 1's preorders! I consider this Keri to be the best sketch of the pile except for MAYBE the veloce with a cat, maybe

Vol. 2: [ Pages 115 - 116 ]

Wed, 5 Oct 2011 11:30:00 EST

I'm sorry veloce you're the main character and you won't be gone anytime soon...

Enjoy the 2 extra pages as promised (: and as a reminder I will be going to New York Anime Festival artist alley on the weekend of the 14th! It's on the 4th floor of the convention center. I will be selling my prints, manga and my ARTBOOK that has not been released anywhere else and won't be for another few weeks!! So please come find me and other awesome artists if you're going :D

I have nothing else for show today and I shall plunge right back to work yayyyyyyyyyyyy

Voting bonus: Volume 2 cover draft! LE EXCITE. As much as I love Blackbird eating ramen it is unfortunately not an acceptable cover

Vol. 2: [ Pages 113 - 114 ]

Sun, 2 Oct 2011 21:00:00 EST

Chapter 6 starts! I suck at chapter titles so I might change it later ): An extra update will be posted on Thursday to make up for the lack of anything happening on these pages LOL :D;

Up to page 126 is done now, but in exchange I have nothing to post again so here are another two bonus sketches I did for the release of volume 1 :)

Voting bonus: Volume 2 cover draft! LE EXCITE. As much as I love Blackbird eating ramen it is unfortunately not an acceptable cover

Vol. 2: [ Pages 111 - 112 ]

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 21:00:00 EST

End of the chapter yay! We can finally move on after 2 months of drama :D the chapter ended exactly like volume 1 but I can't say I have enough fucks left to give to improve it... Q__Q

I've finished the WIP I posted as incentive last week, and I plastered it on the main page as the new banner. I'm so happy I don't have to look at the cover image anymore lol I'm not particularly fond of it ): This one only has Veloce on it, but at least it gets the story's genres across and looks... a little more exciting? Hope you like!

Voting bonus: a sketch that I've been working on in small increments. It's still not done but I don't know what to do with it and I don't think I'll get much progress on it any time soon.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 109 - 110 ]

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 22:00:00 EST

Veloce gives some reason for jumping into the sea over a little accessory.

I don't have much to say except that I've been super busy, I don't have much to show either, so I'll just leave you guys to read the wall of text veloce is saying instead!

Voting bonus: I've been really busy so I don't have any good vote incentives ): here's a little progress I've made on a recent illustration.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 107 - 108 ]

Sun, 11 Sep 2011 21:30:00 EST

More stories because this is a story yay!

Author confession: I have a lot of beef with the following couple of pages until the conclusion of this chapter ): I changed this part of the chapter sequence completely at least 5 times over many years, especially this year, and made countless countless changes to it, because the original had soooo much information crammed in in a narrative way it was terrible (much worse than now). In the end I just couldn't figure out a way to fix this story telling hell I made for myself years ago because no amount of surface fixing can fix problems at the root, so I just sucked it up and just aimed to finish it, get over it and move on. So if the next few pages look like I've given up on them, I did HAHAHA

And the good news is, I finished the chapter! I am planning to finish this book sooner for convenience reasons, so I've been drawing a lot more pages than usual. Up to page 112 is done :D and I am taking a break to sort out the material of the next arc before starting it. If all works well, I should have a lot of buffer pages at the end of this and be able to either post bonus updates for whatever reason, or increase update frequency if I can keep this up for a while haha.

And I have nothing new to post so here is a pair of bonus sketches I did for volume 1 book release :D I put the pile of sketches I did in a basket and just took quick photos under my lamp LOLOL. The recipients are separate but the drawings are themed together! I wanted to finish the theme with other characters but I kind of forgot about it after 30 more blackbird/veloce requests ):

Voting bonus: A random scenario page that is actually close to the current story! I did this as a break from drawing pages but this is itself a page, and it took a lot longer than my normal pages lol /failbreak

Vol. 2: [ Pages 105 - 106 ]

Sun, 04 Sep 2011 21:30:00 EST

ANTITHEFT SYSTEM ACTIVATE.

More pages as promised to make up for my random hiatus! And I almost forgot to process new fanart I've gotten in the past while LOL BUT I REMEMBERED LAST MINUTE. You can see them in the goodies section, outlined in red! Two of them were GIVEN to me at a convention oh my god I was sooo happy ;; thanks so much again for drawing these, whether they're intended for me or you just wanted to draw the characters!

And when I was taking a break I was thinking about updating some site background/banner drawings, then I realized the number of character drawings where they actually WEAR NORMAL CLOTHES is next to 0, so having no pictures I could use, I decided to make a new one lmao. WIP below!

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 103 - 104 ]

Wed, 31 Aug 2011 1:00:00 EST

Iriel makes an astonishing revelation.

I'm back from all the conventions of August! (but August is over) My only convention left this year is New York Anime Festival in October, so I'll have some time to breathe in September. Thanks to everyone who came by, left a message or bought something! This is the most conventions I've ever been to in one go because I'm not really a convention person BUT I'LL DO ANYTHING TO PROMOTE CARCIPHONA YEAHHHH!

Then afterwards I was so caught up in finishing my artbook--I had no idea how ill-prepared I was for it--that I had to skip a few weeks of updates, and that's right after boasting about my punctuality ): I will make up for it by updating again this weekend. Said artbook will be released in the upcoming weeks also :D I AM SO EXCITED.

I also got a lot of fanart in the past while that I've been neglecting to put up; I think I'll get to that this weekend!

I'm saving a lot of art to post for my artbook release and I haven't been drawing much so here's a sketch I did at a convention. These are all Carciphona characters that you won't see until you're 50 so feel free to take wild guesses of who the heck they are! My scanner conveniently broke when I scanned this so the left half is cut off lmao ):

AND LASTLY, the vote incentive is the finished version of the illustration I've posted so many wips of. I haven't posted this in its completion anywhere else and I've forked out my life over it (even though it doesn't look it) so I hope it makes up for my uncalled for hiatus.

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 101 - 102 ]

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 02:45:00 EST

Grandma Meron, the children think your bed time story sucks.

There won't be an update next week because I will be at Otakuthon! I was going to do the pages beforehand so I wouldn't have to skip updates, but I have too much other stuff to do ): So please come back in 2 weeks for the next update! But if you're going to Otakuthon at the Palais de Congres Montreal next weekend, please come by and say hi! I will be at the Artisan's space (a row sandwiched between the Artist Alley and the Dealers XD) table 312, facing the Artist Alley, with my usual print collection and volume 1 for sale :D

Another exciting piece of news is, I am finalizing work on my upcoming artbook slated to release in September! This will be my first art book ever so even though I won't be able to get too many new pieces in (too busy ): ), I'm still really excited about finally having something like this available (: I originally was going to release a Carciphona-only book but I decided variety is good. It would only be an issue of words anyway because more than half the book is Carciphona art LOL.

And lastly here's another random non plot related piece of these two. I use them too freely as elements of expression I'm sorry if it confuses anybody lmao

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 99 - 100 ]

Mon, 01 Aug 2011 02:45:00 EST

Vocruen's totally not keeping Meron in the dark, he just conveniently forgot something important for a couple of years.

I am back from Otakon :D Thanks so much to everyone who came by and mentioned carciphona to me and/or bought stuff, along with the fun times I had with my friends plus oogling at idols whom I've met for the first time, I had an amazing weekend! To those of you who are new, I hope you will enjoy the manga (: I will do my best to bring you volume 2 early next year.

I didn't draw anything new in the past weeks because I barely had time, so here is another old work as eyecandy:

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 97 - 98 ]

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 04:00:00 EST

Meron achievement unlocked: generic unexplained magical arts mastery of some sort :D

I will be attending Otakon this upcoming weekend. I will be selling some prints and books at the Artist alley, tables Y03/Y04 (next to the bathrooms LOL. There's a huge sign on the wall for the bathrooms in the alley so you can't miss it HAHAHA) If you've wanted a book but didn't want to pay for shipping and you'll be there, this is your chance to do so! I won't be able to bring too many so please come early if you want to make sure you get one (:

I forgot to mention a few weeks ago, I've finished Blackbird's character profile image! You can see her along with her profile (and everyone else's) here. When I started working on these profile images it was about 3 or 4 years ago... The way I draw/colour has changed a lot over the years so it was kind of painful trying to preserve my old colouring style on this image in order to maintain some consistency. Because of this I don't want to draw Iriel a profile anymore LOL... I decided to toss him in the non-mains group, since a lot of those characters play crucial roles in the story anyway he's fine in the party. I've also drawn her outfit from volume 2 instead of 1 because I like it better, even though she won't wear this again in the future XD

And here is a random bonus sketch of music, jets, and blackbird/veloce!

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 95 - 96 ]

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 02:00:00 EST

I drew these pages last week I don't even remember what they were about LOL. Also I'm back from Ai-kon! But my flight missed a cart of luggage and mine was in it so I don't have any sketches to show. But I will tomorrow when my stuff will (hopefully) arrive :D

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 93 - 94 ]

Sun, 10 Jul 2011 11:00:00 EST

MERON WHAT ARE YOU SO SCARED ABOUT SHE'S 8 YEARS OLD.

More random pics of non mains LOL. I'm drawing like an entire year worth of non main characters in two days... HAVE A VOCRUEN.

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 91 - 92 ]

Sun, 03 Jul 2011 9:00:00 EST

If I were Meron I don't think I would've taken that last panel seriously lol.

I think I draw nothing except for veloce and blackbird SO HERE IS A PICTURE OF VELOCE'S MOM. Sometime in ancient history she used to be such an angelic, ethereal being but look what happened

Also here is a drawing video of my future artbook cover! The voting image is a screenshot of the piece as well :D http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31ZrYs7q_Os

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 89 - 90 ]

Sun, 26 Jun 2011 10:30:00 EST

And of course, the conversation quickly goes nowhere.

I've been doing thumbnails and character design for the next part of the story. Here is the Minister of Arenscura! Followed by some crappy thumbnails of the next chapter. If you can figure out wtf is going on well, you just got a preview of what happens next :D

Click below to vote for us and see bonus art stuffs!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 87 - 88 ]

Mon, 20 Jun 2011 01:30:00 EST

Veloce likes to keep people on their toes.

I have been working on thumbnails for the next part of the story in attempt to keep track of pagecount, then I realized I have quite a bit of character design that I haven't done yet :D so the vote incentive is one of them! I was going to swap the bonus illustration here with the vote incentive but I didn't want to give the impression that I keep drawing smutty crap just to get people to vote lol.

The bonus pic is an edit I did of last week's art book cover draft. I just felt like adding another person and turning it into a dance and this happened :D

Vol. 2: [ Pages 85 - 86 ]

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 09:30:00 EST

Weirin is good at not running beneath large falling objects!

Lots of updates today: first of all, the Spanish version of chapter 3 and 4 are up, with chapter 5 coming soon I think :D Thanks so so soooo much to D-Artemisatto for the translation. You can read it here. I believe a French, German and Russian version are also being worked on right now (Part of chapter 4 in French is already uploaded), and as always, the Chinese version is up to date with current updates. Although saying that here is probably not very useful HAHA.

I also forgot to mention for a month but there are 8 new fanarts up in the goodies section LOL. New pieces will now be emphasized in a red frame so you can find them easily. Go look at them!

And lastly, I am planning to create an art book in the near future of most of my presentable art so far (and some new unreleased pieces) So to give myself some sort of incentive to work towards it, I decided to draft up a cover that I can look forward to painting. If I don't change my mind, this will be the cover and title of the book :D I will try to get this done before the winter months because shipping in snow/slush is balls.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 83 - 84 ]

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 04:00:00 EST

Oh ok I guess Vocruen isn't that bad of a prophet after all.

and here is a picture of the piles of books that I've spent all week packing. All orders are packed and I expect to ship every order out by Tuesday. Some of you who live in Canada may receive your book this week at the earliest!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 81 - 82 ]

Mon, 30 May 2011 16:30:00 EST

Hello, Vocruen the Terrible Prophet.

For some reason my updates always manage to match my work load perfectly; whenever I have no time over the weekend, the page is always really simple to draw (I plan a few pages ahead of time so the cause and effect is not the other way around LOL). I was at Anime North this weekend! I wasted a lot of money buying artbooks as usual and then played some RO while a friend had a sleepover here, so I didn't really start on the update until last night :D;

Preorders ends tomorrow! The books are supposed to arrive today but they haven't yet. I will most certainly spam about it when it happens (or spam the company about it tomorrow if it doesn't get here today), and everyone who have paid before they arrive should expect to have their books shipped out sometime this week ^^. I will be taking down the preorder page tomorrow, and replace it with a real shop this week or next. There won't be any new items aside from the book, regularly priced at $15. But I intend to try build up my catalogue over time!

and here's something I scribbled up. I wasn't happy with the other roughs I made for this scene so I tried again! and I'm not happy with this one either... LOL but here it is anyways!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 79 - 80 ]

Mon, 23 May 2011 02:30:00 EST

I think we have a winner in this troll fight!

I've been working on the 100 free sketches for preorders, and while I wanted to post a lot of them I don't think it's nice to people who are getting them. I might post them way later on though!

Preorders ends sometime around next update! After preorder period ends, the price of the book will be upped to $15, so if you want a copy, get one here before it's too late :D

Vol. 2: [ Pages 77 - 78 ]

Mon, 16 May 2011 01:00:00 EST

Meron's threat worked! Or did it...?

I've also updated the home page and manga viewer page of the website to be more newbie friendly, with first/last page links and (hopefully) better organized discussion blocks! Sadly it doesn't work on my ipad's safari for some reason and I can't fix it. But if you see anything wrong with it on your browser, please e-mail me or leave a comment to let me know!

We're half way through the preorder promotion, and about 450 copies (half my stock!) have already been reserved/paid for. Thank you guys so much I love you all ;w; The least I could do is to keep up with bonus drawings but shit hit the fan and I couldn't do anything for 2 days LOL;;;; So I only have a non-Blackbird CG as vote incentive, because I'm more of an illustrator than a manga artist (I think) :D It's the first stage design of a new character of mine for another story I'm developing ^^

Vol. 2: [ Pages 75 - 76 ]

Mon, 09 May 2011 17:00:00 EST

Blackbird finds herself aboard a ship full of rude people.

Thank you guys so much for already making my first publication sale a success in its first week! (at least in my opinion LOL) I consider myself incredibly lucky to be able to continue doing something I'm passionate about with your support. It doesn't matter that I work more hours a day than a steady 9-5 job, I will try my best to really plan out my working schedule for the rest of the year, and hopefully be able to work it out so I can bring you more updates a week.

But because of the preorder stuff plus a commission I had to work on, I didn't have any time to draw anything this week to post here ): All I got is a sketch that you can see by voting (or subscribing to my blog art blog etc)

Also, tons of questions were answered on Veloce's Formspring! I will not be answering any more questions, but I will leave the page up for a week or so for anyone who has time to kill and would like to know more about this stone wall (:

Carciphona Volume 1 now on sale!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 73 - 74 ]

Sorry Veloce you're going to die because Meron cannot afford to ruin her eyelashes. And sudden family outing missions = ninja schedule setback of 2 days... POSTING THIS AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT BEFORE DAWN HITS

Also, Volume 1 will debut in book form tonight at http://carciphona.com/shop.php :D

Mini Game

I forgot to mention this because of all the big announcements yesterday.

I've made a mini game after The Meek! I've made a Formspring account for Veloce. For the next few weeks, you can feel free to ask her any question! They will all be answered unless she doesn't know how to answer them (like questions about me, for example), it completely spoils the story, or if it's inappropriate.

Have fun!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 71 - 72 ]

Veloce remains highly motivated towards her goal.

Today I also bring you some big news! First of all:

Blackbird is finally available in print!

No fancy publisher, just self publishing, but I promise you I put in a lot of blood sweat and tears (ok maybe not blood) to make sure these books look as professional as they can, and cost as little as they can. This will also be the first printed work I've done, and next week is also the 6th(I think ? LOL I'M LOSING COUNT) anniversary of Blackbird. To celebrate both of these occasions, from May 1 (next sunday) until May 31, I will be holding a 1-month-long preorder promotion! The book will be available at a great discount accompanied by free sketches, and a very limited edition, cute little charm will also be available for sale! Check back on this page: http://carciphona.com/shop.php on May 1 at 20:00 EST for all this awesomeness :D

Which brings me to the second point, as you may have noticed from the promotion sign above. I am renaming "Blackbird" to "Carciphona". Blackbird has been an established title of this series, and I did make sure there is nothing else in the manga world out there with the same name. But sometime between when I started the series and now, a very well-known Japanese manga of the same title was published and licensed here in North America by Viz. A lot of people think this is not a big deal, but I don't know where I'll go with this series; maybe it will go nowhere and remain small, maybe it will luck out and become successful, but wherever it ends up, I wouldn't want risk getting sued and then to look back and think to myself, "damn I should've changed the name when I could". There is no better time than now when I am releasing the first book, so I'm changing it now. As for the meaning of the new title, you will get a glimpse of it in the refined dialog of the first book, and at the end of the current chapter!

And I'd like to thank you guys again for reading (: Whether you're new to this work or been through its entire growth, I am really happy that you've decided to stick around and I hope you'll continue to enjoy it!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 69 - 70 ]

Today's late page has been brought to you by the word no!

These pages were hell to draw, I hope one day I can be good enough to not have to feel so challenged like a noob and take forever on a single manga page lol ): Also I keep drawing smaller and smaller, and my web display size can no longer do my pages justice... I would change to a 1 page layout but I personally really feel disconnection between the pages with 1-page viewers lol. At least now I really look forward to printing volume 2 because it will look awesomesauce compared to the shitty web version HAHA.

And I finished that illustration that I've been showing countless WIPs of! Here it is but you can always find it along with the rest of my illustrations on the goodies page.

ok time to go do everything else that I need to do that is also late because of this stupid update lol ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 67 - 68 ]

Being predictable is Blackbird's hobby. Someone on livestream last week basically drew out page 67 lmao

In other awesome news, I received the proof copy of the volume 1 last week! I took some pictures and posted them on my blog. Click on the image below to go read more about it and see the photos!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 65 - 66 ]

Meron reveals herself as stalker #2!

Some people have asked me about Meron's colours over time so I drew this little chibi of her to do that XD

Vol. 2: [ Pages 63 - 64 ]

Keri falls victim to trolling.

There is another new awesome fanart of keri in the goodies page this week :D

I've made 2 drawing videos of a painting process. If you're interested in seeing how my drawing process looks like at the speed of light, you can view them here: http://youtube.com/shilinTV

Vol. 2: [ Pages 61 - 62 ]

Rescue success!

There is also a new awesome fanart of veloce in the goodies page :D go look at it!

and bad scrap is bad BUT IT'S SOMETHING I GUESS... I'll finish these when I have time ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 59 - 60 ]

Rescue arrives!

This week's pages pissed me off so much I don't know why, I redrew every panel 2 or 3 times, and the cardstock is just battered with pencil tracks it's unacceptable. I really should've restarted it somewhere down the line, maybe it would've turned out better BUT IT'S TOO LATE NOW.

and here's a glittery panel of glitter from the exclusive 10-page story that will be included in the printed version of volume 1

Vol. 2: [ Pages 57 - 58 ]

Why did I make such a strong chara but make her lose fights all the time SIGHHHHH

Once upon a time I did weekly vote incentives on TWC, but I got rid of the voting feature for some reason I can no longer recall. Now that I draw more frequently, it's time for it to return! I'll try to keep posting extra sketches here and if I draw more than one sketch that week, you can see it by voting! All sketches are usually posted on my tumblr/personal blog already though, if keeping up with blogs is more your style.

And here's something stupid I did to slap on my manga viewer as the you've-reached-the-end page

Vol. 2: [ Pages 55 - 56 ]

In a fantasy world, crates are meant to explode into pieces. Or give you coins and other random loot...

Next week's update might be missed to work on the final few pages of volume 1's extra story. I'll try not to though!

And while I was a vegetable from the hospital, I have restored the goodies section that I have destroyed since my layout revamp. That means old fanarts and illustrations are back up for your viewing pleasure! yes I LOVE to do useless website stuff like these HEHEHEHEH

And a simplistic (or not...) scrap

Vol. 2: [ Pages 53 - 54 ]

Karma hits veloce for bullying Meron.

I do a lot of story related (or not) sketches but I usually only post 1 here every week. You can see the rest on my art blog that might as well be a Blackbird blog (lol blackblirdblogblah?)

weirin's bff lord sangyun rae of arenscura

Vol. 2: [ Pages 51 - 52 ]

Regularly scheduled plot interruption go!

I livestreamed the toning of page 52 yesterday. You can find the video on my livestream library at http://shilin.livestream.com. It's 3.5 hours long and there is no speed playing feature that I know of so it may be annoying to watch lol.

And I also whipped up a scrap for the song I wrote this week. The song is now finished and can be downloaded here.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 49 - 50 ]

Veloce's ragefit continues!

I've been wasting a lot of time playing with Reason after Chris helped me find it again, and I just played with instruments and effects on little songs I had written ages ago. If you were around many, many, many years ago you probably remember that I once had this hideous midi up on my manga site that I called Veloce's theme song. Over the weekend I ~~photoshopped~~ REASON'ed the shit out of it (at the cost of late update lmfao)

In any case you can click here to dl and listen to what I have so far (: it loops seamlessly so it lacks a proper beginning and ending.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 47 - 48 ] & [ Toning: Pages 129 - 136 ]

Meron tries to get a civil discussion going.

Pages 129-136 are also toned! ALL UNTONED PAGES ARE FINALLY FINISHED I AM SO VERY INCREDIBLY RELIEVED ^__^ Next is fixing the bleeds of the first 30 pages but I found out the place I want to print through only requires 1/8 inch bleeds, so my situation may not be as dire as I had anticipated! I also need to make sure there's no engrish in the first book before I print it (which I'm sure there's a fucking ton right now... especially the beginning lol), so if you have time, please check whatever amount of pages you feel like for anything that is utterly out of this world and needs to be fixed, and send me an email at shilin@ashen-ray.com. THANK YOU SO MUCH! It's almost ready for printing :D :D :D

Lastly I've also worked on Weirin's profile picture 2 weeks ago, and is now up on her profile! I realized not many people even know the existence of these character profiles so I thought I would mention them LOL. As useless as these character profiles are, I do enjoy making them.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 45 - 46 ] & [ Toning: Pages 125 - 128 ]

Veloce seems to enjoy breaking things Keri owns. Pages 125-128 are also toned! only 8 pages left omg fml

I was so scared to draw the zoomlines on page 45 with a pencil, because I was scared I'd make a mistake and ruin the page LOL. (bruised pages are a bitch to fix even if I'm only using a pencil) I used so much lead but in the end I blacked out most of the bottom part on Photoshop because I went overboard with the gradient of zoomlines. My poor hardwork wasted ):

And here's a rough painting I did on livestream last week. Hopefully I'll finish it for vday or something so it would look like I drew it for the occasion lolol

Vol. 2: [ Pages 43 - 44 ] & [ Toning: Pages 123 - 124 ]

The presence of an unwelcomed guest is evident. Pages 123-124 are toned too (:

Hope you had a great Christmas and New Year! And birthday if applicable. Seriously I know too many people who are born around this time, ESPECIALLY ON CHRISTMAS DAY WHAT IS THIS LOL. And here's a group pic in a totally different setting and completely out of character :D You can find a wall of text about this alternate universe on my blog.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 41 - 42 ] & [ Toning: Pages 119 - 121 ]

Post-Christmas mystery murder with detective Keri and his sidekick. Also 119-122 are toned! Only 14 more pages OMFG I'm going insane from these old pages. I'm also changed the earlier chapter titles to shin angyo onshi style titles because it saves me a lot of braincells creating relevant titles ):

I don't have any fancy gifts aside from the little sketch I posted a few weeks back. The best I can do is not miss this update so I started it early because I'll be gone for the next few days :D...... It's 4am now but THAT'S OK because I spent 4 hours watching march of the penguins twice today lmfao. I HOPE YOU ALL HAD A GREAT XMAS and continue to enjoy the remainder of your holidays.

And here is a little Keri because I've been neglecting him

Vol. 2: [ Pages 39 - 40 ]

Iriel gets updated by Weirin on their situation. No extras today ):

Vol. 2: [ Pages 37 - 38 ]

MANNERS, VELOCE HAS NONE. although we've established that a long time ago...

I've added DISQUS to the manga viewer; you can find it by scrolling down each page. You can now leave comments on each page and replies will be much easier to track! I don't know if I want to keep it yet so I haven't gotten rid of the Chatbox, which is nice for all around general messages and it's so much fun making it slide.

Lastly if you don't check the front page, which is now decorated with a little holiday card, here it is! I would love to draw something better but I have absolutely no time, and I'd probably work on pages instead if I actually do have time lol ): Thank you very much for reading!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 35 - 36 ]

And finally, the party gets back on track on what they were doing about 20 pages ago.

I was determined to do everything the best I can, so I buried myself in piles of reference and tried my best to learn more about tall ships/rigged ships/sail boats/whatever you call them! This ship ended up to be mostly based on a famous ship named "Sovereign of the Seas", you can google the name if you're interested to see the absolutely GORGEOUS original ship.

I hope there aren't any ship fanatics in the crowd to cringe at the horrendous mistakes I've made all over that ship. I know how that feels when I see art or comics where people play instruments all crooked and it is not nice at all ): needless to say I did not consider the consequences of having an entire scene take place on a ship and now I'm raging.

In continuation to last week's sketch, here's Veloce and Blackbird doing something other than standing around!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 33 - 34 ] & [ Toning: Pages 113 - 118 ]

Luckily for Iriel, bawwing is super effective on Keri!

I have decided to expand update notification options and use LJ as one of the means to do so. If LJ is more convenient for you, or you just don't like using RSS, you can feel free to friend my account at http://shilin.livejournal.com. Everything you see here on this RSS will be posted there as well from now on (that means including extra sketches and stuff!)

Anyway, I printed out the templates for this week too small, so I was trying to squish more stuff into the page to prevent them from looking empty when enlarged. The result? I SQUISHED TOO MUCH STUFF ONTO THE PAGES and now they look cramped. Fortunately it's just a bunch of kids detonating their plot devices so I might as well keep it short! Pages 113-118 are also toned.

And since I love to draw illustrations that look NOTHING like the actual manga, here is a sketch of Veloce and Blackbird with fancy clothes

Vol. 2: [ Pages 31 - 32 ]

Veloce tries to convince iriel to go away.

Busy weeks ): no bonus sketches! I'll try to cook up something for next week.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 29 - 30 ]

The best solution to a raging headache is of course, booze.

Nothing else to show today, tiresome week!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 27 - 28 ]

My thumb and lots of lead died during the creation of this page... I am alright with the effect but the whole thing ended up looking very confusing and messy haha, better luck next time to me

And a random gif I made about a week ago from an inside joke

Vol. 2: [ Pages 25 - 26 ] & [ Old Version Download ]

Iriel uses Mind Crush! It's super effective! Veloce receives Brain Damage.

so I broke my promise about last week, but here it is this week! The original version of Blackbird was drawn from 2005 to the end of 2006, during which 5 chapters were produced. At the end of chapter 5, I decided to restart because it's the cool thing to do I really disliked the old art, and most of chapter 1-3's art are very rough. After I took down the old version for good, I've been asked numerous times over the years to repost them; a lot of people even preferred the old version to the new one. So now that the current version has caught up to the old one in terms of plot (everything from now on will differ from what happens in the old version), I've posted a zip of all the pages of old Blackbird up. You can download it over at the bottom of the archive page.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 23 - 24 ]

Iriel does not give up. Iriel perseveres.

I will be putting up downloads of the old version of Blackbird next week since I've received a lot of requests for it over the years. I really hate looking at old art a lot so I took them off for a long time (I haven't looked at the files myself during all this time either because I just can't stand it LOL). Another reason I held off posting them up again was because so far, this version is pretty much the same as the last, so by reposting it I'm spoiling Blackbird for new readers. But next week's update will be the last update where the same thing happens in both the new and old version. Everything that happens from then on will be different from the old plot.

And here are two sketches of Blackbird since she hasn't shown up for ages XD

Vol. 2: [ Pages 21 - 22 ] & [ Toning: Pages 105 - 112 ]

Iriel's celebration quickly goes downhill...

I went all out and toned 8 pages for this week. only 24 to go ffffff ):

Once in a while someone would ask me how I create comic pages, or ask me to do a tutorial. So I made one out of this week's update. You can see it here! Hopefully this is somewhat helpful!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 19 - 20 ]

The little thief celebrates victory!

I will resume toning old pages soon ): hopefully! here's the finished version of the work in progress from last time.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 17 - 18 ]

Weirin refuses to accept defeat.

Sorry for the long wait! In between getting sick, other work, and playing RO, I've missed a few updates ): but here's something I'm working on!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 15 - 16 ] & [ Toning: Pages 103 - 104 ]

Nothing is sweeter than revenge and trash talk! Pages 103 and 104 are also toned.

The first chapter of Blackbird is also now available in Spanish thanks to Berenice! You can view the spanish version by going to the archive, or opening the viewer window, and check the spanish button when you search for a page.

And all I have today is a clothing design I can't use for at least like 7 more chapters lmao

Vol. 2: [ Pages 13 - 14 ] & [ Toning: Pages 99 - 102 ]

Keritzel's observational skills has leveled up!! or has it...

The sketch today is prompted by a song named "Haruame", or spring rain. go to http://blog.ashen-ray.com to listen to the song and read more about how this sketch came to be! Or just enjoy the piece as is here (:

Vol. 2: [ Pages 11 - 12 ]

Weirin grasps her golden opportunity to let off some steam.

I drew this at Otakon and rough coloured it when I got back. I was tired from Otakon and the doctors, so I treated myself to a lot of folds and a lot of red :D I really wanted to make this a book cover for something, but I don't have any books that needs such a cover LOL

And I drew sketched this really quickly during a livestream session for some other piece. It looks like crap but I'll share it anyways!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 9 - 10 ]

I printed out the wrong template for today's pages, so some panels and bubbles are on the verge of being cut off LOL.

I am also going to Otakon this weekend and will be in the artist alley with 4 other friends! Our tables are way off in a corner though, so consult the program or something if you can't find me (:

And here's a sketch:

Inspired by Dead Fantasy! This is a scene from the next part (not chapter) of the story.

Vol. 2: [ Pages 7 - 8 ] & [ Toning: Pages 97 - 98 ]

Veloce continues to disapprove of everything as expected. Pages 97-98 are also toned!

Vol. 2: [ Pages 5 - 6 ]

And I am back from Europe! It was a very long 2 weeks but Europe is a beautiful place (: If you're interested, you can see the pictures I took here: http://europe.ashen-ray.com.

I will try to be good with updates for the next few weeks, before I have to go to Otakon. However I do have a lot of work piled up (again) so I may or may not do so well in being punctual. The best way to keep up is still, naturally, by using this RSS feed!

Lastly, I usually post all WIPs, sketches and scraps on my blog and nowhere else. But from now on I'll post Blackbird-related scraps and stuff on this feed as well whenever there is an update, so that people who do not check my blog still get to see random Blackbird stuff. I will try to figure out how to incorporate relevant posts on my blog onto this site in the future when I have time.

Sketch of the week is this random haunted house looking group pic. It is taken from an actual scene in the story, minus the fact that they're supposed to be running through a forest, not some mansion ): I just didn't feel like drawing trees LOL.

Website: [ Character profiles ]

Character profiles are up! I am very good at derailing from my work sometimes, and this time waiting for a client's response led me to finishing this section. Now if I could finish those last 2 or 3 more portraits so that Weirin and Blackbird won't just be a giant sadface...

Vol. 2: [ Pages 3 - 4 ]

The protagonists' imminent crisis is beginning to sound more and more like an exciting vacation, and Veloce does not approve.

I will probably only be able to get a few more pages toned and *maybe* one more update in before Anime North. I will be going on a 3-week-ish hiatus as I will be traveling to Europe for 2 weeks after AN! We plan to travel light so even if I want to work on Blackbird during the trip, I can't because the binder and stuff would be too bulky to bring along. I'll use my free time there to get down some of the upcoming character/item design, but most importantly, try to absorb Europe the best I could. Hopefully I will learn lots while there and show it in my future work!

[ Toning: Pages 93 - 96 ]

Cathing up~

[ Toning: Pages 89 - 90 ]

More tones! The next page was conveniently toned at the original time of posting as well :D

[ Pages 1 - 2 ]

I am late but volume 2 is finally starting along with my most proud masterpiece of the year that is the cover of volume 2! (hahah ok no) From here on, (almost) everything will be new, and different from the previous volume 2 storyline as I removed an unnecessary section of the story. Blackbird is a very expansive story, and although it will take a long time, I am super excited that I can move on and slowly unravel the story!

Since this is the start of a new chapter, I'm pretty sure some parts of my site will either be out of date or generated broken links. I will look over stuff and get them fixed tomorrow.

[ Vol. 1 Cover ]

That's right. Volume 1 cover is here! And I will go scribble something stupid for the volume 2 cover placeholder for all of you to look at for another year or two :D It just so happens that it makes sense to me quality wise that I do the cover after I've finished each book, since I am 99% certain I'll want to redraw the cover by the time I complete a book.

And I lied about starting volume 2 this week ): I was pulling my hair out over the details of this image for some reason, even though it's not even anything spectacular. I've spent the better part of the week getting worked up over fussy details. I swear I resaved this file like at least 10 times after I finished it. Oh, and don't mind the glaring colours on the back cover. I was at a total lost of what to do on the back, and this is my 2-am solution after researching back-covers for the whole night. I may change it later because it is pretty ridiculous (not to mention the art recycling lol) but it will have to do for now!

[ Pages 159 ]

Last page posted. I can finally move on again! THIS IS A MIRACLE.

I have edited the past 10 pages of dialog slightly and I will change 1 or 2 things again in the next few days. This is the price I pay for not having a prepared script for volume 1. It is an improvement from havingn NO SCRIPT AT ALL for the old version, but I still need to work on that ): hopefully it won't happen for volume 2!

[ Pages 157 - 158 ] & [ Toning: Pages 83 - 88 ]

Veloce gives in and contemplates the irony of her own actions.

There is only one more page left before volume 1 concludes! I was going to delay posting until I finish the last page, but it's been 2 weeks since the last update, so I decided to post this up first. I will do my best and finish the last page quickly.

The new volume 2 will be different from the old volume 2. Two chapters dedicated to one event will be skipped, so chapter 4 will start with the events of the originally planned chapter 6. However, I will be doing a few test pages before I start illustration volume 2 pages. As some of you know, right now I fold a lettersize paper in half and draw one full page on each half. That's a really small working area. Although I feel like it's perfect for me because I am more accustomed to drawing small than drawing big, I would like to try out doing full-page pages and see if I can handle it. So expect a few pages of story that won't actually happen until very far down the road!

[ Pages 155 - 156 ] & [ Toning: Pages 81 - 82 ]

Weirin is annoyed and decides to ignore this whole nonsense.

Amazingly, this volume is only a few pages away from being finished. Unfortunately, there are still abount 50 pages to tone ):

[ Pages 153 - 154 ]

Though wounded, Veloce somehow manages to continue getting on people's nerves.

Some dialog on the last 2 pages are edited, since I am apparently horrible at this language thing. Also I've noticed my layout style varies too much ): I am not very satisfied with the last 10 pages or so as much as I am with today's update. Need more practice!

[ Pages 151 - 152 ]

With the tension gone, Veloce loses her grip. Have a good Valentine's and lunar new year!

[ Toning: Pages 77 - 80 ]

Some more pages are toned! As some of you may have noticed, some dialogues are changed while I tone the pages. Nothing major is changed, just small things that make the conversation flow better as well as provide some missing information. The first panel on page 80 is also changed because I realized I never really established what Keri's mansion looked like lmao.

This will probably be the last pages I tone before next week's update; I will be spending the remainder of the week working on a commission.

[ Pages 149 - 150 ] & [ Toning: Pages 75 - 76 ]

The battle comes to a close. Back to commissions and toning old pages!

[ Toning: Pages 73 - 74 ]

This cold is really getting in the way of my burst of motivation to work hard ):

[ Toning: Pages 71 - 72 ]

The first of the unfinished pages are toned! I managed to finish it pretty quick so hopefully this won't drag too long. While updatingi the pages, I also noticed that I pasted the unfinished pages 71-72 backwards ROFL. I must've confused a whole lot of people.

[ Pages 147 - 148 ]

Nimble elder faces the blade-grabbing young'un.

I will set it as my goal to tone 2 old pages everytime I post new pages as the volume is coming to a close soon. Hopefully it will make the polishing of the first volume a much quicker process and minimize stall time before continuing the story.

[ Pages 145 - 146 ]

Protagonist monologue continues til the end of time. Some story background information pages are also updated. Without images though they're pretty much huge walls of text for the hardcore bored.

[ Pages 143 - 144 ]

Veloce speaks her mind.

[ Pages 141 - 142 ] & [ New layout ]

Veloce finally faces the one she truly intend to deal with.

Also, a new layout is up! It is image-heavy but hopefully nice to look at. Please check it out and let me know of any layout placement errors that you come across! There are a lot of incomplete links that lead to nowhere, I will update those in the near future.

[pgs. 139-140]

The servants of Keritzel's mansion shows their concern for their masters' safety.

[pgs. 137-138]

Weirin points out something odd.

[pgs. 135-136]

Veloce proves that good manners doesn't bring you too far.

[pgs. 133-134]