Update: The Gallery

I don't know if I posted this but the lunchroom smells like Jenny Craig stir fry and my brain - it's the fuzzy. In any case, the gallery is well on it's way to being fully updated. I've re-uploaded everything but the icons and the resources - lets be honest, those are going to be a lengthy process so please be as patient as possible...not that I really care if you're impatient because nothing in my daily plan is going to change :P

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah.

I know i should have fixed the gallery by now, and those of you clicking through to look at my icons are probably sick of getting a big fat nothing but that's not the point. The point is that I don't have time. Hopefully that will change soon (like maybe tonight) but, if not, you can at least count on the fact that sometime Saturday morning I will find the time. (Yes, I like italics today. My entire day has been about numbers and it's fun to use the letter buttons sometimes :P)

Crisis

Well, today I got the itch to update my g2 install and, as it seems to go this way everytime, i wasn't entirely surprised when I started getting error messages and nick informed me that I needed to delete and go for a fresh install.

Ladies and gents, that's what i'm doing.

All 1400 icons, all of the sets, the tutorials, the...everything...it all has to be re-uploaded, re-cagatorized and re...everything.

Fortunately, I'm working 9 and a half hour days...oh, wait, no - that's an unfortunately. Anyway, i'll get everything back up as quickly as I can. Tutorials first, then the small galleries, like vectors, etc...

Hold On To Your Chucks, Girls.

For those of you that can't take a bit of well directed sarcasm, a heavy dose of irony and a good solid whomping of reality, you're probably going to want to skip this because this - well, it's gonna be one of those "mean" posts that makes people feel "misunderstood." (Incidently, in my experience, when someone misunderstands something, even when it's you, the problem is that they understand you too well - perhaps better than you yourself do - and that is offensive to anyone.)

Do you remember My Little Pony, ladies? I remember My Little Pony. She was great. A peppy little message, a happy hair do, maybe a rhinestone or two and, way better than those stupid Breyer horses - My Little Pony actually stood up when you set her on a surface. Plus she came with those great plastic brushes that had little patterns on the back and a handle so tiny that only a child could properly manipulate it....

Well, it's all over folks. Check this out.

If the image didn't tip you already, this is going to be another one of those rants. I want you to notice a few things about this. First, i'd like you to note the time put forth on this project. I looked at this and the first thing I thought - well, after I finished swearing - was "Woah, when did they start selling MLP's with rocker hair?" That is, until I noticed this in her description of the item. "...rerooted hair..." Not being a toy-remanufacturing conneseuir myself, I can't really say that i'm certain I know what she meant by re-rooted but I'm assuming that she either ripped out all of MLP's old hair and dyed it, then stuck it back into her head or that she ripped out all of MLP's old hair, bought some new hair in her chosen color (or beheaded a Barbie Doll and terrorized her long blonde locks) and stuck it back into the horses head. Either way, this begs the question - doesn't she know emo went blonde? Red is out ladies and gents - the savior of the broken and the beaten and the fallen and the crying and the dying and the bastards said so. And you have to trust a man who wears Hot Topic.

Then, when I was done thinking that, I was drawn past the bejeweled sparkely skull and the poorly painted fishnet to something else about this image. As you'll notice, she's kindly signed it, so that no one try to steal the fruits of her labors and claim them as their own - wise move. The reason there are so many emo kids out there is that they lack the follow through to actually kill themselves. I suspect that branches over into their art as well. Maria Maya Haley - yes, Maria Maya Haley - wants you to know that she, in fact, made this piece. Couple of things here - first of all, are those circular letters filled with cutout stars? Is emo even allowed to have cutout stars? She is so dedicated to the emo/punk movement that she still hasn't changed her screenname from mayanbutterfly.

Now here's the thing. I don't know Maya. I don't hate Maya. I'm not even sure Maya annoys me. I glanced at Maya's gallery. I saw a lot of things - but I didn't glimpse any razor blades or cornstarch blood, and I commend her for that. Hell, maybe she made this pony for someone else and maybe she rolled her eyes the whole time she did it. Maybe she was going for something a little more Angelina Jolie in Hackers than she was something more everything-on-mtv-right-now. Hell, you have to either respect fear or pity someone who is willing to spend the time it must take to re-stuff a MLP head of hair.

Why did this end up on my graphics journal? Because as I was browsing her gallery for hope that this might not be a sign of chronic psychosis, I found this.

Beware the filter.

Bewaaarre the filter.

icons100 Update

I posted batch three tonight. God am i starting to loathe this project.

Guess What I'm Posting For.

Yes, that's right, more updates.

Cheeky Resources Image Gallery: I'm not sure how this happened but, somehow I managed to have this great big image gallery and no Matt Damon??!?!?! I don't know how it happened and I think I probably personally owe the list an appology for ignoring one of it's decade long residents. So, with that, there's now a Matt Damon Gallery with 17 pages of yummyness (and a few faggy turtleneck pictures). And, yes, Matt Damon can pop collar. I don't personally know anyone who can pop collar and not look like a moron, so I'm proud of him and personally impressed. That and, last night I also updated the Justin Timberlake gallery because I had high hopes that whatever Black Snake Moan - no matter how fucked up a movie it turned out to be - might produce some good production stills with fatigues followed by me dying. They didn't, but I did find some other high-res shots so there you have it.

Icons 100 Challenge: I posted batch two of my icons100 challenge with 10 new Guys and Dolls Icons. As usual, I'm not particularly impressed but there you have it.

Delayed Update: So there have been a lot of male additions to the gallery and, in the spirit of fairness, and the fact that she's pretty, Olivia Wilde (The O.C. and, now, The Black Donnelly's) had been added and has her very own home in Cheeky Graphics. [NOTE: if you're reading this immediately after it's latest timestamp, the gallery is probably empty. I still need to make the upload.]

Updates!`

I've been lazing a bit on the update announcments over the past few days so I have a rather lot to make

Cheeky Images: Two new additions to the image gallery over the last few days - those Boston Boys have been killing me all over my TV so I went on a binge. Jonathan Tucker (Stateside and The Black Donnellys) and Bryan Greenberg (One Tree Hill and the soon-to-be October Road)

Cheeky Resources: Gilmore Girls bases are up to date for 7.15 - I Am A Kayak, Hear Me Roar! but I still haven't finished (or started, for that matter, 7.16 - Will You Be My Lorelai Gilmore?)

Cheeky Tutorials: I added this earlier this week because someone who shall remain nameless mentioned that they weren't clear on how to get that icy blue color just right so I thought I would write up a quick method tutorial. I don't know if it's the exact icy blue they were talking about but it is icy blue :)

Cheeky Graphics: I took on an icons100 challenge for Guys & Dolls (the movie) and I'm into my first batch - 10 Guys & Dolls Icons. Well, frankly, they suck, but that's kind of OK with me :) I have to admit though, I'm totally phoning in the stupid themes thing. "I uh, sure that could be about love...yeah...I meant it all along *shifty eyes*"

Project Update: In addition to continued work on The Light, my pursuit of learning G-Mesh in Illustrator, my icons100 challenge, updating my portfolio as I create portfolio worthy work, my off interest in re-skinning the site, i've been playing with hand sketching and manga in illustrator. So, ya know, just to keep you posted ;) Maybe i'll have to reopen the hentai project.

Updates

Some updates to Cheeky Resources Image Gallery - I ran across an OK gallery today and added a new album in the Males --> Celebrities section for Alex Pettyfer.

Also, did you know I had comment moderation turned on? Cuz I didn't...but apparently I did have comment moderation turned on and now all of your happy comments have been moderated :)

Bases/Cuts: I am finally caught up on my GG bases/cuts. This week I uploaded 7.11 - Santa's Secret Stuff, 7.12 - To Whom It May Concern and 7.13 - I'd Rather Be In Philadelphia. I also have the caps from 7.14 - Farewell, My Pet and I'm already weeding through them to pull out the ones i'd like to use.

Icons: A few really bad Gilmore Girls icons were added today. I also added a bunch of quote icons. I think those are probably the only that i'll be doing for a while (i.e., making quote icons) because I'm really having no luck with the regular icons once i've done the bases. Maybe when

the season is over i'll do a Season in Review series. :)

Lots of Updates

There are a lot of updates today. Obviously, it you're reading this, you probably scrolled down and noticed that I blogged about the obsessive amounts of light textures being used but, if you didn't, here is a link.

UFG: I added a new up for grabs banner today. It features Hilary Burton and Dan Radcliffe (one of the new shots from the naked play everyone is in such an uproar about :P) and, for now at elast, it's called due.
Cheeky Resources: Then, in addition to the other days additon of Hilary Burton, Bethany Joy Galeotti and some major updates to the Kristen Storms gallery, I've also made a huge update of all high-res photos to Isla Fisher's folder.

Cheeky Designs: There's also a major gift for you Godfather fans out there that I have stuck in the gallery. Namely tons of icons from The Godfather. More to come from the first film and, maybe, if i still like you, more to come from II and III as well :)

Light Textures: The Take Over

For those of you that don't yet know what a light texture is, it can be a few things. The ones i'm speaking of particularly today are called "dotty light textures." Here's an example.

See how there are spots, and how they look all...spotty. Well, set that to "lighten" or "screen" and all of the black will disappear - the color, however, will stay resolutely present and what you get is a great way to cover almost anything up. Lighten is a great function and Light textures are fun. I use them a lot - particularly in icons. Hell, this one is exploding with them. Course, it's of a 12 year old girl in a pink sweater, so, ya know, she's pretty sparkely in and of herself. For the most part, however, I prefer a different variety of light texture - subtle. Take this desktop as an example - there is a light texture that I made applied to that - it's dark red and barely visible. It's an accent, not the focus.

Why did I choose two different kinds of light texture for two different kinds of graphics? Well, I did it because they had a different feel. In the icon, I was working with a young female who had a great big smile and a generally bubbly disposition. In the desktop, I was working with an adult male pulling a total James Bond with the jacket and the pinstripes and the fedora and it was like the 1940's on a canvas - using sparkles would have been a smidge inappropriate, not to mention cluttered.

So what am I saying - when you use something, consider your audience, consider your subject and consider your desired effect.

Why am I saying this? Well, because today, ladies and gents, I saw this. Now, to spare this person any embarassment, i'm certainly not going to pick out names, but - oh man - did i laugh....then blog.
Okay, first - these are men. Men don't like dots unless they're kissing girls. At least the dots aren't pink, though. Second, I don't know if you know what show these men are on or from whence this image came but it's from a show called Prison Break (FOX) and they play ex-cons breaking out of prison. The show is about stress, death, guns and beer. Things explode all of the time. It's a show on FOX. Third, these are their wanted posters. What about any of that says sparkles to you?

Normally, a single graphic wouldn't make me gripe like that. Sometimes people do crazy things but, of late, light textures have taken over the world at The Dark Arts and it seems to have started at Pandora's Closet and I must put a stop to it! I must! I must!

Or, at least I have to go on record begging for the cessation of hostilities toward my brain.

Launching The Portfolio

For those of you that check my gallery for updates, you probably haven't seen a lot of late and there is a key reason for that - I haven't been making any.

It occured to me, when I started trying to decide what I would show off to potential clients, that I absolutely do not want them looking at my actual gallery for all of the crap that would innundate them. I did, however, come up with a solution.

http://www.portfolio.bitterepiphany.com/

There really isn't a lot of new stuff there but there are a lot of things most of you haven't had the opportunity to see.

I've also been making a lot of uploads at deviantART.

Updates To Cheeky Resources

A lot of you probably noticed that the Resoruce Image Gallery lost all of its Harry Potter images this past week. The zips are available for download for a limited time - if you need to know where, leave a comment and I will get you URL's. More importantly, however, there have been major upgrades to the Cheeky Resources Image Gallery where OC's are concerned. Significant uploads of high-res photos have been made to

Chad Michael Murray
David Anders
Johnny Depp
Justin Timberlake
Matt Czuchry
Michael Vartan
Orlando Bloom

There are more updates - namely for, ya know, females, but I had some dog washing duties to handle today ;)

New Pieces

I have a new desktop out - Adam Brody, of all things.

it comes in all four sizes.

New Project

So I said that, for the remainder of January and all of February, my goal was going to be to learn how to operate G-Mesh in Illustrator. Now, I come into it knowing the basic concept, so it's not really fair - but my goal was to learn to G-Mesh like this.

Obviously, i'm not there yet. After having tinkered with a few failed vectors - i'm going to go about it this way and I've started The Light.

Latest Project

Ranting Brought To You By Kay

OH MY GOD.

For as many sloppy sweatshirts and semi-generic character/text t-shirts as I am apt to wear on any given day, I have a style and it has nothing to do with any of that, so I have a few things to say about a few things but today I saw something absolutely horrific. Now, I don't intend for this to sound like technical critique on the graphic, but the obsession with fashion photography has gone way way way too far.

It's always been annoying to log on and see 88000423352 different models living in people's signatures for no reason other than that they thing they may have finally caught the most ridiculous pose/outfit and captured it in a signature. This, however - this is just going too far.

Now I Don't Mean To Be Mean, But...

I saw this today and literally almost choked on my own saliva.

What you're looking at is the result sheet from a tutorial posted on a website. This tutorial is designed to teach people how to 'shed pounds' using photoshop. Now, I haven't tried the tutorial but, looking at the result, the poster did a bang up job of it. What you're also looking at, however, is a Dove ad.

I don't know how many of you know this, but if you've accidently turned on the TV some time in the last six months, particularly during the day, you've probably seen a Campaign for Real Beauty ad from Dove. Their latest marketting gig has teamed up with Oprah, it seems, and is designed to use real people - not runway models - to market their product. Now, don't get me wrong, I've yet to see a housewive in her oatmeal stained bathrobe, but they have at least embraced the fat chick.

If you can't see the irony by now, i'll hit you over the head with it - they've taken someone who was embracing her outer fat chick on tv and in print and made her into a skinny chick, ya know, so she feels better about herself. They airbrushed an ad campaign based on not airbrushing.

Dove, I think you have more work to do.

Merry Christmas Accomplishments

Okay, so I made a blend...if I tell you it was my New Years Resolution to learn, would you believe me?

Update: Gilmore Girls

So i did something I never thought I would actually do - I managed to get the bases and icons, in their normal quality and quantity, out less than 24 hours after the episode released - meaning I have over a day until Grey's Anatomy comes out - and even longer until caps are available in good quality to tka e abreak from episode caps. And, hey, I went and took care of my rollerblading already today, so i'm on a roll. Now if i could just squeeze in some sleep between the laundry I have to do within the next three hours, i'd be set.

Yes, there's a party goin' on.

Anyway, bases and icons from 7.04 - S'Wonderful, S'Marvelous.

Soooo Many Updates

So it's been a while since I gave an update and lots of things have been done since then :)

A new sub-gallery was added to my avatars gallery that, at the moment, houses quite a few Grey's Anatomy Icons. The icons there are made from the Grey's bases I made and released yesterday. Which, did I mention, oodles of Grey's Anatomy Icon Bases. These are from episodes 3.01 - The Time Has Come Today and 3.02 - I Am A Tree. There are a ton and there are more to come as the episodes come out.

This is a pretty late announcement, but speaking of icons made from my bases (how many speaking of which's can I put in one post?), I finaly got around to taking my Gilmore Girls bases and creating the usual episodic icons from them. A link to the lot from episode 7.01 - The Long Morrow can be found here.

Lastly, in addition to all of that, I was bored and tinkering with a blend. (Of late, i've made it my mission to be able to make them - i've never been any good at blends in their true form. They seem pointless and we all know how well i deal with that.) Anyway, I decided to turn it into a desktop because - duh - that's what I do...plus, Logan is so dreamy :P In any case, the desktop can be accessed in four formats here.

Keep your eyes peeled for bases and icons from GG 7.02 - That's What You Get Folks, For Makin' Whoopie later on this week and, of course, Grey's Anatomy Bases and possibly icons after the episode airs.