All the Right Notes: Occult Academy

...or, an alternative title: How bad pacing can ruin a story.

When crafting a story in any medium, there are many aspects that must be addressed in order for that story to be successful.  Plot, characters, dialogue, and depending on the medium, animation, design, music score, etc.  There are plenty of good stories that satisfy--at least to a basic degree--most of these requirements.  Coming up a bit short on a few of them doesn't always ruin a story.  A good story can still have problems.

There are instances, however, when one aspect of a story can be so poorly done that it can change the image of the entire tale and completely ruin it.

A recent anime I checked out, Occult Academy, is the victim of such folly.

On the surface, I thought I would enjoy Occult Academy.  The art style is clean and detailed; it is well-animated, has a pleasant enough score, and its characters are initially compelling and enjoyable.

Halfway through the episodes, however, my opinion had completely changed, and I believe I can chalk it up to one sole reason (a reason you may have gathered from the fancy alternative title to this review).

Check out the rest of the review after the break!

Stop being so gorgeous, Occult Academy, you haven't earned the right!

All the Right Notes: Chihayafuru

When I was about halfway through Chihayafuru, I knew it would be the perfect show to illustrate what, I think, is a very important question for me: Why do I love anime?

Obviously, I don't want anyone to think that I uncritiquely watch and enjoy every single anime ever made.  This is far from the truth.  The word "anime" is basically a catch-all for all Japanese animation, a good portion of which I do not think is worth my while.  (I recently attempted to watch Chobits and was personally put off by it, for example.  Panty and Stocking, despite its popularity, is the same.  Not really my taste.)  However, I still confidently say that I do love the medium of anime.

Generally, Americans have a very strict view of animation.  Outside of America, however--notably in Japanese animation, of course--animation as a medium does not have the stigma and expectations Americans tend to give it.

So what does this all have to do with Chihayafuru?  Read on to find out!

This isn't your typical children's card game...

Check out the review after the break!

The spoken word?: The English Language

As new generations are raised on the Internet, the claim that English is steadily becoming a ruined language has become a popular one.  The idea of the English language dying in the face of colloquialisms and moronic speech is not new, however.  Authors such as C.S. Lewis and Mark Twain were also concerned about the status and quality f the English language as a whole.  As quality and scholarship falls, vocabulary is stifled and limited.  Sentences are poorly structured, arguments merely a tangle of unrelated words that say a lot and yet nothing at all.

"It would be very difficult to find a really clever 'situation' in Cooper's books, and still more difficult to find one of any kind which has failed to render absurd by his handling of it."

- Mark Twain, "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" (1895)

One of my favorite essays; it is uproariously funny and beautifully written.

Check out the rest of the article after the break!

Behind-the-scenes on "the western woods"

Another speedpaint!  This was my last one before the week from hell known as "finals."  Unfortunately, I'm still not completely done--I'm taking a required science course over two weeks at my college to get it out of the way.  Yeah, it's not gonna be fun, but at least then I'll be done with it!  (Darn you liberal arts educationnn!)

My latest paint was referenced from RiNymph-Stock on deviantART.  She has a lot of lovely stock photos, so if you need references or ideas, be sure to check out her wonderful gallery!  (The photo I used can be found here.)

So let's get on to the step-by-step!  :)  Check it out after the break!

Behind-the-scenes on "all this and heaven too"

So in the wake of the disappointment of last environment speedpaint, I was far from finished with environment speedpaints.  If anything, I was more fueled and excited than ever to give it another go and improve my digital speedpainting.  And my latest speedpaint, "all this and heaven too," definitely shows a lot of encouraging improvement!  (The title comes from a song of the same name by Florence + the Machine.  <3)

This is going to be a short step-by-step process blog of "all this and heaven too."  I saved a few files along the way, so you can see a bit of how the final came to be.  (Next time, I'll save more pics along the way.  ^_~)  I also used this opportunity to become more comfortable with some of the brushes I have saved onto my computer, which was a lot of fun!

Before I begin, I'd like to state that I did use a reference for this picture.  I believe I got the reference from a friend's Facebook photo album I was flipping through.  Unfortunately, I was really stupid and forgot to write down whose album it was (it wasn't an artist friend; just a random friend).  If I ever figure out whose picture it was, I will, of course, credit them.

Check it out after the break!  :)