This is fucking bonkers.

I did it.

In my last journal, I was writing about how nervous I was to graduate from college.

But on December 18th I walked down that aisle and did it. After so many years of attending school, it's suddenly stopped. I still have to finish my driving education and get a job, but I feel extremely accomplished.

My last semester of school felt so unreal, and I improved so much since I started at the university. Even though I'm going to get better, I'm very happy with where I am now.
I'm not going to grad. school. All of the art professors I've ever had always gave a talk at some point of the semester; they always entail that one should never ever go to art school or to graduate school. Lots of money goes into the equivalent of what you can work on by yourself.

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As for fandom stuff, I'm still into Battle Royale, but I'm also falling more and more in love with Hiroshi Takahashi's CROWS.
It's a huge delinquent manga with tons of lovable characters, great fights and the unexpected nostalgia one gets for a high school experience that you never had. I definitely recommend the three movies and all manga tie-ins. It's truly a wonderful media that needs to be experience. Honestly, I'm surprised that the audience is small in the US, and that only the first two tankobon have been translated and released here (and from what I understand, that was a while ago).
Surprisingly, the only anime that exists is a two episode OVA that covers the beginning three volumes. It's a really good adaptation, though. Hella-good voice acting, the animation (for the time) is excellent, and it has songs by The Street Beats.
Hell yes, hell yes.
I need to draw more of these dorks. I have a few Ebizuka Trio-related pieces on the way, and I'm easing in to drawing Harumichi by sketching some chibis.

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Speaking of Crows, I'm going to work on a tumblr roleplay-related manga. It's Serita (Tamao Serizawa/Setsuko Narita), and it's gonna be a long haul to get it done. I still need to do more concept sketches and the actual dialogue and writing need completion. But it'll be worth it. Even though this is one of the strangest pairings that I've ever encountered, they work so well and I love them so much. Even though they're hella gross dorks.
I was given some good online tutorials to make things more structured, so hopefully that will smooth things along.

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In the meantime, while I'm job hunting, I'm also going to try and set up an Etsy shop. You lot will probably hear alot about it as I make progress with it. Mainly, I want to sell alot of my old schoolwork, which I know I can make money from. I see many people who have simpler art styles than me, and they seem to have a lucrative operation right there. Hopefully it will be the same for me. I'm also interested in obtaining a merchant's license and selling my work at anime conventions. I'm going to need to practice my speed if I want to get at-convention commissions done, but it looks like I'll have to suspend that aspect for now.

<3 <3 <3
That's all for now. Hopefully I'll be posting more frequently as I get things done, rather than having sporadic activity.
-E