angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)
Magician Waits

Magician Waits - Tarot Apocalyptica - 11-2016
This one is very similar to the portrait, but has a completely different feeling for me. Also, apparently my idea to avoid water at all costs for the Waste? Yeah, that went out the window...

I have only done the usual color correcting on this one.
That's it.

That's the shot.

It wants to be a book cover so badly.

Also, at this point, I had ditched the fucking flash. It was just pissing me off so much because I was having to make do with the on-camera pop up flash, and that fucker always blows out way too fucking hot.

Did I mention that my external flash unit failed before we started shooting? Yes. The fucker failed.

So, this is me remembering all of my long gun training and getting super steady with my breath and using my knee under my elbow as a tripod. Like you do.

I fucking love it.
* * *
Yes, there's actually more...

I had a whole new batch spawn sub thoughts about how I just don’t bounce back from things anymore. The body is just so slow to recover.
I fucking hated it. I continue to hate it, but I am coming to some kind of detente with reality. We'll see how it goes.

Then there's today. Anger is still right there under the surface. I’m having more stairway conversations.

Today, I’m going to try and draw an angel. I’m going to draw it on the tablet and see how it goes.
Spent the morning daydreaming/troubleshooting the High Priestess. Thinking about how to make the dress for Cristi without it being perfect on a dress form and that’s all fucking right. I just have to get it constructed. Dress form could be months from now if ever. It’s all good.

Though, I gotta get me the Brother sooner than later though. Being able to do embroidered keyholes for the Imperator??? EEEEEEEE. But whatever. We’ll make due.

Because I hate putting in buttonholes. They are the worst.
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)
Alternate Magician
Alternate Magician Card - 11-2016

NB: main website is down for inexplicable reasons, so this gets to come live on LJ first.


This was actually the version of the Magician I was going to go with at first, but as I was fiddling with my camera, the Mouse had relaxed and...THAT (which I haven't posted yet) was the shot. Which I took, and this was no longer the Magician. 

Considering how I threw every obstacle I could think of in my own path to sabotage this shoot and this process, (no, really, I fucking was and it was fucking stupid, but somethimes you have to be stupid) it was a miracle that I got THIS shot, never mind the one that followed.

Saturday's shoot was the perfect example of what happens when I finally get the fuck out of the way of the work and just do the fucking work.Hopefully this time it'll stick. Cause it's not the first fucking time I've had this damn revelation.

But more on the shoot later...

* * *

And I begin  to catch you up...

I had a relapse. That's why I had not been blogging or talking as much and pretty much reduced to retweeting memes. Crushing depression, I had gotten to that stage of work with the Sutro Bath shoot where I just wanted to quit, because I hated everything. Ditto for the Apocalyptica and I'd only gotten one card in the bag. What the hell. Talk about resistance.  (I will be finishing up Sutro now, but it's on the back burner.)

So I put my head down and I kept swinging and I kept working,  but it felt like I am and was going so so so slow. Slow is better than not at all. It’s better than a lot of people ever manage. So why couldn't I just chill and do the work?

Because I was depressed and felt like shit and that was the hardest thing to do right then.

And really, if it wasn’t hard, everyone would do it.

So I just sat with how I felt. It is and was okay to feel like shit. Nowhere does it say that I have to feel great all the time and nowhere does it say that I have to perform happiness or wellness for anyone.

So it really fucking sucked to go through, but the jewel I found in the dark was worth it. I did say that this Apocalyptica was a journey of recovery. I just wish I knew a little more ahead of time when I'm fortelling, know what I'm sayin'?

Bloody hell.

angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)
The whole series...



If you click on any of the images, it will take you to SmugMug where prints are available. Whee! Enjoy!

Cloud Dress

Apr. 4th, 2015 12:25 pm
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)


More of the simple composite work. It needs some fussy detail work done on it still, but I'm still figuring out how this works.
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)


This was the one where I ran out of ideas for titles, so started stealing song lyrics... and it worked. Thank you, Coldplay!

The Mad Model's comment on first seeing this one was, "That's just dirty." Which made me laugh and laugh and laugh.

Yes. Yes, it is. In the best way.
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)


I really love how this turned out.
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)
Uncrowned Unbowed

It's the shadows of the spikes on her face that does it for me.

* * *

It's Tuesday, yeah? Tuesday.

I'm not all here.

Happy St. Patrick's Day. I have a corned beef to thaw and cook today. Looking forward to that.

Y'know, I'd write something pithy, but my brain just got up and left, muttering something about lack of coffee.

Untitled

Mar. 5th, 2015 09:28 am
angela_n_hunt: (Me 2014)
Untitled

aka I couldn't think of a title for this one, other than OMGYUMMY, which doesn't really work. This is currently one of my favorites. It reminds me of something Tim Bradstreet would draw.

Fucking love it.

This is the Galadriel that Frodo is warned of by the Lady: "In the place of a Dark Lord you would have a Queen! Not dark but beautiful and terrible as the dawn! Treacherous as the seas! Stronger than the foundations of the Earth! All shall love me and despair!"

Hmm. That might be it's title. Love and Despair. Hmm. What do you think?
angela_n_hunt: (blue eyes)

Deer Shaman

Well, NSFW if you’re a prude. There, I said it. But since I’ve gotten in trouble before for pix no worse than this, I have to slap the NSFW on it.

Frikken’ silly, if you ask me.

But whatever.

Ta da! Naked goddess with deer horns! I promised and here I deliver and can I just say again and for the record that the Amazing A is amazing and so good for a game of larks and not even blinking twice about the crazy ass things I ask her? I freaking love her. And the rest of these are so wonderful I can hardly choose. Really.

More and more, I love this shoot to death. Can’t wait to do the next one with the Mad Model.

Originally published at ANGELA N. HUNT. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

aka Anji’s Guide to Surviving Artistic Failure

Memories of Wonderland

Well, the campaign didn’t make it.

*looks over the poor thing and pats it*

Happens. Not all art connects. Or is at the right place at the right time. I’m not sure why the show failed to fund, but my suspicion is that galleries have little appeal for folks today, in a world of short attention spans and iPads. Which is really too bad. Gallery and museum spaces fulfill an incredible spot in human culture. But like libraries, well, they’re not very shiny, now are they? They require you to slow down and stand in front of a piece of art and take it in.

That changes you. *she says, thinking of standing in front of the David in Florence, Italy*

But what this failure in particular means is that I will not be doing any more gallery shows for the foreseeable future, self-funded or otherwise. I’ll be focusing on my commercial photography. I don’t know how I’ll be releasing my fine art photography yet, but I’ll burn that bridge when I get there. What I do know now with certainty is that galleries are now a complete dead end for fine art photographers.

In the meantime, I have been getting a lot of notes of condolence and they are wonderful, but they seem to be coming from a place of, “Oh, you must be devastated!”

Except I am not.

I realized that I am clearly reacting to this all in a way that is passing strange to some of you. So I figured I would share why I’m not curled up in a ball under my desk, sobbing hysterically and eating chocolate and a gallon of Hagen-Daaz in reaction to the campaign not making it.

This isn’t my first time to the rodeo. I’ve failed plenty of times in the past. As a result, I now have a four-step process for dealing with artistic failure/loss. And I realized, DUDE. I should actually not keep it to myself. So here it is:

First: allow yourself to grieve. Yes, that means if you feel like crying a little in the bathroom because it didn’t work out, *that is fucking fine.* Then go wash your face and breathe. Because it doesn’t matter and it’s not the end of the world. Really.

Second: red wine and strawberries, aka do something nice for yourself. In my case, doing something nice last night meant eating strawberries in heavy cream and drinking a glass and a half of red wine.

Third: go to your happy place. In my case, this meant cuing up Jill Scott’s Golden on the iPod this morning, followed by multiple George Michael dance songs. Because music is the fastest way to change my mood on earth and it reminds me that life is beautiful, even in the face of disappointment.

Fourth: move on to the next thing.

THIS STEP IS CRITICAL.

In my experience, dwelling on what didn’t happen, on if onlys, is the quickest way to block the fuck up.

DO NOT DO IT.

If you are at all committed to the life of creating something, you already have another project (if not twenty *looks mildly guilty*). If a project doesn’t work out, it means that something better is waiting out there for you.

Could I be full of shit? Could your mileage vary? Fuck yeah. But my experience has always been that failure is merely a project overreaching or being wrong for that moment in time. It always leads to more: more knowledge, more experience, more strength.

Besides. At the end of the day, I made the art for my own delight. And Alice and her friends did that and more.

Look at that.

Success.

Originally published at ANGELA N. HUNT. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Because tomorrow, it will be. The Amazing A dropped off the first of the Vaudeville props last night and it is *awesome*.

We have rope. With interesting knots!!!

I also sketched in two paintings yesterday, so I’m feeling more sane than I have in weeks. Working on paintings = instant sanity.

I get some photo editing in and I’ll be a whole new woman.

I have also got all the current perks worked out for the upcoming Alice Assassin campaign and I am pretty excited about it. Getting the show on the gallery walls will be made of total awesome, especially in conjunction with the book release. At this point, we’re 38 days out from launch of the campaign.

Knocked down the 18 miler on Sunday. Only one more this Sunday and then I begin the taper, the period of time where I allow my muscles to heal in prep for the marathon in (holy shit) 25 days.

And did I mention that the Bean is turning 3 this April?

Yeah.

First Quarter of 2012?

Burning it down.

Originally published at Angela N. Hunt. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Keep Her Out of Trouble

But it’s a little girl with a rock. How much luck do you think the White Rook is going to have here?

Yeah, me neither.

* * *

I have acquired an epic set of blisters on my right foot pinkie toe and may end up missing a run this week to give it time to heal a little more.

Yesterday’s fourteen-miler was an interesting one in that physically, I was pretty fine, barring the blisters. Yes, as I got to the last three miles, I was feeling *tired*. But that wasn’t what was eating me.

It was all the bullshit in my head.

It’s amazing the crap judgments we run on ourselves. Yesterday, it was all about how I wasn’t running fast enough, never mind the blisters, never mind that I ache like an old lady, it didn’t matter. Every time someone passed me, the Critic in the head would start up on how we should speed up, we were going too slow, yadda yadda yadda…

Except…

In comparison to what?

The part of me that knows better came back very quickly thankfully with, “According to whom?”

So here’s this last run’s lesson.

This isn’t a speed race. It’s an endurance race. The point is to *finish*. And this is true about so many damn things. Who the fuck cares if you get there first? Because I have news for you. Someone’s already been there first. ALWAYS. But not everyone finishes.

Slow doesn’t matter.

*DONE* matters.

And right now? As of yesterday, I ran more than half a marathon. The Critic can suck it.

Originally published at Angela N. Hunt. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Stay with Me

The husband loves this one for the Mouse’s expression. I do too. “Make the crazy lady stop squeezing me!”

Too perfect…

* * *

The end of the current novel is being a stone bitch. I know what happens. But unpacking it into actual action is killing me. I don’t know why. I am resorting to my usual trick of going to YouTube and watching fight scenes from my favorite movies for inspiration.

There are just not enough epic sword fight scenes in movies anymore…

Originally published at Angela N. Hunt. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Alice's Stone III

And we return you to your regular broadcast schedule…

Slowly digging through the photos. I meant to do more work last night, but my brain was so burnt after the few photos I got edited, I had to turn in. I ended up reading a book of Leonardo Da Vinci’s collected writings.

He didn’t think much of the willfully ignorant either…

* * *

Training is continuing to go well, which sustains me. So does writing. Husband is on the hustle. Still no word on other things.

We keep on keeping on.

Originally published at Angela N. Hunt. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Must get back to the metaphorical drawing board and get more photos processed.

Granted, once that’s done…

Yeah. Don’t know what I’m going to do. Well. Not true. I’ll post the prop list. There’s two shoots in the works: the Vaudeville concept art shoot and the Huntress shoot. If I have to, I can combine both shoots in to one epic day of shooting or a weekend of epic shooting, an endeavor that I have done before. It just takes meticulous logistics planning. And money. The last may be what keeps it from happening this year. Both shoots require costumes. Then there’s the photo shoot that the Mad Model would like to do that will be emotionally draining for us both, but will yield epic work.

*looks at year*

*looks at ideas*

Yeah, I may just put the camera in the closet this year, aside from playing with the macro lens filters I got for Yule.

Originally published at Angela N. Hunt. You can comment here or there.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

The Sky Warning II, originally uploaded by quennessa.


And a little moodier here.

Oh, I love how creepy it is.

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

Pinky's Ransom, originally uploaded by quennessa.


This one, like the White Rook considering the Girl Alice, the one that seems to be so filled with nostalgia, *this* one...

Oh, the story.

And the White Queen's disdain...

angela_n_hunt: (Default)

White Queen's Judgment, originally uploaded by quennessa.


Love the light and silhouette of this. It's ominous and just wonderful.

Oh yes.

Love this project so much.

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