Interview: Pelycosaur24

I'm taking a small break from my Riordan Retrospectives.  I've just gotten a major break with my writing career, and I need to focus on that for the moment.  However, I'm not going to leave you guys empty-handed.  I've got another interview today.  We've having a brief chat with Pelycosaur24 from DeviantArt.  She's made some really nice commissioned art for me, which I'll hopefully get to share with you guys soon.  So, without further ado, let's get started.

1) In your own words, tell us who you are

I am someone with a lot of different interests - which has led to four different university studies (I am currently working on my master’s thesis). My hobbies include experimental archaeology, archery, sword fighting and of course drawing.

2) I understand that you're from Austria. Can you tell the readers a bit about what life is like in Austria?

It is very different than life in America, I imagine, but I am very happy to live in Austria, what I love most about this country is the great balance between modern times and historical presence. Most cities have existed at least since the middle ages and there are a lot of old houses everywhere. But of course, we have a lot of nature too, mostly mountains and forests.

3) What got you into art?

I used to write short stories and wanted to get a better picture of my characters, so I started illustrating my stories

4) Is there any story behind your user name?

I just love mammal-like reptiles, but there is no particular story behind the name

5) What is a typical day like for you?

Since I joined the army 2 months ago, a typical day for me now begins at 6 am and consists mostly of marching and combat training.

6) What historical era is your favorite? Relatedly, what historical figure do you most admire?

That is a tough question, but I think I go with the roman republic. Corresponding with that one of the historical figures that fascinates me most is Tiberius Gracchus. The historical figure I most admire would probably be Archduke Charles, a 19th century Austrian military commander.

7) What is your favorite prehistoric creature and why?

My favorite Dinosaur has always been Iguanodon (also because I love the history of paleontology and the story of how Iguanodon was discovered), while my favorite prehistoric mammal is the cave bear (the most common prehistoric animal in Austria - 30.000 have been found in one cave near where I live).

8) Are there any works of fiction that you're a fan of?

I generally really love Pixar and DreamWorks movies (especially Kung Fu Panda), and I also really like the show Primeval.

9) Any advice for aspiring artists?

Just always keep practicing, and from time to time you can compare your drawings and reflect on your progress.

10) What are you working on at the moment?

I had a rather big drawing project where I drew lots of people from the Chalcolithic and now I am working on some backgrounds for them, and of course I have my Stone Age movie reviews that I write every other week.

11) What does the future hold for you?

Right now, I just want to get through basic training and finish my master’s thesis at the same time.  Then I will see what I do from there.

12) Any closing remarks, and where can the readers find you?

You can find my drawings at my DeviantArt page or on my Facebook page. I appreciate every like and favorite.  

Interview: LadyLoriel

Today we've got another interview from one of the artists I frequently commission things from. She's known as LadyLoriel over on Deviantart, but in real life her name is Sofie. She's an artist from Sweden, and without further ado let's get on to the interview.

1) In your own words, tell us who you are.

Well, my name is Sofie but I’m also known as LadyLoriel and some other names on the internet, though LadyLoriel is the main one. I’m mainly a hobby artist and writer who enjoy working with Fantasy themes a lot.

2) I understand that you are from Sweden, can you tell us a bit about what life is like in Sweden?

Well, I guess peaceful is the best word to use in my case. I live in the north of Sweden in the middle of a forest at the moment. So, as you can imagine I don’t exactly have to deal with loud neighbours or anything like that. Over all I’m not sure how to describe the life here as I never lived in a different country. But I can say that if you like snow and long dark winters, and not a lot of people around then North Sweden is a good place to be.

3) Is there any story behind your user name?

There isn’t much of a story behind the username LadyLoriel to be honest. Loriel was the name of a city in a Fantasy series written by Niklas Krog that I enjoyed a lot when I was younger. So, I started of using that as a name for a character I played when I tried Utopia for the first time about 11-12 years ago. And Lady later became added to it as it was a title I gained in Utopia. Since then it just got stuck with me.

4) What inspired you to be an artist?

I don’t know if there was ever a specific inspiration as much as it was just something I enjoyed at first. I didn’t start drawing until I was about 16-17 and I thought it was fun and sort of relaxing so I just kept doing it and along the way I got to know other artists who in turn inspired me to improve and try new things with art.

5) What works of fiction are you a fan of?

There are a lot, but the first thing that comes to mind is the Locke Lamora book series. I absolutely love those stories and eagerly await the 4^th book now. But besides that I do enjoy J.R.R Tolkin’s work, The Discworld series by Terry Pratchett, and similar Fantasy books.

6) What other interests or hobbies do you have?

Well, video games are one of the things that take my time. Especially when I get a sudden urge to play through old LucasArt or Sierra games, or reply Skyrim. I also do bake a lot (but might also come from that I studied to be a baker)

7) What's a typical day like for you?

It mostly consists of waiting to be called in for work (which can be a day, evening, or night shifts) and looking for a more stable job. And walking the dogs of course. When I have some time for it I do work on art (be it commissions or for myself. Depends on what kind of art day I have)

8) What advice do you have for aspiring artists?

Keep drawing what you like to draw, if someone gives you constructive critic or give you an advice do take it and learn from it. You might not have to follow it, but it can contain a point that helps you improve. And lastly… Don’t shy away from references, they are excellent to help you get a pose down or see how proportions and anatomy work. Learn from references and you will be able to learn to break things down and work without them in the future.

9) What are you working on at the moment?

Well commissions are my main priority at the moment. Got more at once than I thought I would, which surprised me. But other than that, I do have my own project that I work on, there are about 15 of them. I have finally started to write some properly and not just small scenes. I also sometimes draw some quick things for contests and groups on dA.

10) Do you have any plans for the future?

Well, getting a stable job first of all. But, when it comes to my art and writing, I do hope to one day be able to publish one of my stories, and maybe try to learn to draw comics (since it’s a thing I would like to do but have yet to learn).

11) Obviously, I've commissioned a lot of stuff from you, but before you go tell us where other people can commission you and find you?

Well easiest way to contact me would be to send me a note on ladyloriel.deviantart.com/
but you may also get a hold of me at toyhou.se/Ladyloriel
In the future I might also set up a specific email address for those who aren’t comfortable with using these sites, but as it is right now I don’t have one set up.
I also have a page on Facebook, that is rather new, where I can be reached. It’s simply called Art of LadyLoriel

Interview: Alan Garcia

I've decided that it's high time I started kicking this blog into gear and seriously committing to it. As the first step towards this I've decided to take inspiration from Matt Mitrovitch and Dave Rubin by interview several people whom I happen to admire greatly, or just anyone I think will be worth interviewing. To kick things off we're going to start with one of my favorite artists from DeviantArt, and one who's art has been featured here quite a few times: Alan Garcia aka Shinoharaa.

Also, side note, if you haven't seen The Rubin Report and all the amazing stuff Dave Rubin is doing then do yourself a favor and check it out. Anyway, let's all give a big Knowledge, Adventure and Wonder welcome to Alan Garcia.


Welcome to Knowledge, Adventure and Wonder. To start, tell us who Alan Garcia is, in your own words.

 Hello! My name is Alan Garcia, also known as Shinohara. I'm a 21 years old Brazilian artist (mostly digital) from Sao Paulo, and I work with anime webgames.  


A lot of what you do is vector work. For our readers who may not have heard of it, can you briefly describe what that is?

Vector artist is something like getting a low quality image and remaking it in a bigger resolution. I use my own style in a 8000x8000 resolution, using what I learned from another artists' styles, mainly from meshugene89 (meshugene89.deviantart.com/), that is my first inspiration.


Your user name is Shinoharaa. Is there any story behind that name?

Actually it should be Shinohara, but that was taken I create an account, so I put another 'A' hahahah. When I was a child, I need a nickname for my in-game character. For some magical reason I chose Shinohara and uses it until today. Currently, I only play with female characters with nickname Ayumi and Usuki, but between you and me, I think that wouldn’t be very much like an artist name for me.

What inspired you to be an artist?

My entire family is made of artists. My mother painted pictures, my brother drew on paper and my father worked with TV commercials. I remember watching my brother drawing Dragon Ball characters and I started too. But I was always bad at drawing something from my mind, so since I was a kid I put the original picture beside the paper and I copied onto the paper.

When I started play Naruto games, I was the one player who was boring with new ideas and layouts, but there were characters in the game that did not have good renders over the Internet, such as drunk Rock Lee, and then I learned in one day using the Paint Tool SAI and started making characters that had no pictures on the internet to use in the game.

With time I started to get better and people started asking me to do a specific character. With more and more requests, I began to see the future in the business and began to charge pretty cheap for the arts. When I received more than 20 requests and took months to finish all, I decided to raise the price, and fortunately the people have recognized my work enough to continue the requests.

I can say that I am very lucky to work on two things I like and still be able to connect both.

You're obviously a pretty big anime fan. Do you have any favorites?

ANGEL BEATS! Oh, sorry. Yeah, I love the animation and the music from Fairy Tail, the characters from Sword Art Online, the history from many. I really like Naruto, maybe because I know every name on the anime. It’s like how some people know the name of every Pokémon for me hahah, but I admit I never watched entire classic saga. I saw only until the fight between Lee and Gaara. Yeah, I never watched Orochimaru invasion, or the famous Naruto and Sasuke epic clash on the Valley of the End, but I watched Shippuuden since the very first episode, every week, including the infinite fillers

But definitely I have two favorite animes: Angel Beats and Steins;Gate. Angel Beats is really fun, beautiful, exciting, sad but perfect! Steins;Gate, with issues about time travel and John Titor, holy shit, my mind blows up!

What can you tell us about the Brazilian anime fandom?

Well, I can talk about the players from the games that I work. They like everything, but they are crazy about the famous ones like Sword Art Online, Shingeki no Kyojin, One Punch Man, Naruto, One Piece, Bleach. You know, the main ones. Hehe!

What's a typical day like for you?

Well, I wake up 8am, go to work and back home by almost 8pm. I have from 8pm until 2am to do what I can. Play. Draw. Parachute jump. Anything. When I have a really big commission list, I try to focus on it, but without inspiration is really boring and it never ends, so I play something (STAR WAAAAARS NOOWWW).

When I’m inspired, sometimes I start and finish on the same day. But sometimes, if it’s a hard one, I can take 1 or 2 weeks, and that kills me.

What's it like making one of your crossover commissions?

I love it. I love the challenge of drawing it, and when someone comments that both characters have something in common, like the seiyuu. Btw, right now I’m drawing 5 crossovers that I always want to do, just keep watching.

What are you working on at the moment?

I’m doing some characters that I always wanted to draw (secret), some Hot Spring ones (oh, I miss drawing those) and maybe some Disney ones (I love Disney hahah). Oh, and my brother told me to trying draw League of Legends Splash Arts in anime style. Well, we will see, hahah.

Any advice for aspiring artists?

DO IT! JUST DO IT! Don't let your dreams, be dreams! Yesterday, you said tomorrow, so JUST DO I---wait, that's not mine, LOL. Well, you draw bad? No problem. You need keep going, improve, learn. You just became better if you never stop! As the famous quote says, an artist never ends an art, it just abandons. Never is good enough, so you need to know when stop and start another, better than the first one. Try new styles, improve the same. Find your motivation!

Well it was really great having you over. Before you go, where can the readers find you if they want to commission you or drop a donation your way?

Thanks for inviting me! Just access my DeviantArt account Shinoharaa (shinoharaa.deviantart.com/) and keep watching my journal. I open the commissions for 1-2 weeks every time I finish the commission list