BlackBackStudio

BlizzCon Tickets On Sale Tonight!

2010-06-02T17:13:00.000-07:00

Queue up your browsers and prepare for the e-line! BlizzCon tickets go on sale tonight at 7pm Pacific. Click here to head over to the official ticket sales page! And good luck!

Oh ya, guess what? Announcement: Nuku and I are officially planning to attend!!! *squee* That is if I can grab some tickets!! Hope I can score tickets tonight!

Eyes

2009-12-04T13:50:00.000-08:00

I really like the way these eyes turned out. I used Prismacolor markers + Sharpies on the buckram (stiff white, semi-see-through fabric) for the iris and pupil color. (I'm very proud of my freehand circles, shine, and shading!) The paper "eyelid" is still just the template (to be made of black, leather-textured vinyl, and the plastic "white" isn't glued down yet. The whites will be glued on after I fur the entire head. I used a Clorox Wipes container for the plastic. ^_^

And I received the plastic wolf nose from Van Dyke's Taxidermy today. It's quite hard, so I'm in the process of spraying it with black Plasti-Dip (rubber texture). It's actually time for another coat! BBL.

2009-11-12T20:47:00.001-08:00

Working on a new head. This is another personal project for me. I'm finally getting around to making a second version of my fursona and mascot of our website, Ember, the black-backed jackal.
WIP photo:

2009-10-05T11:13:00.000-07:00

Hey folks, just giving a small update to let you know we haven't completely disappeared. Since Black Back Studio is more of a hobby than a business for my husband and I, we've put it on the back-burner for a time while we get some things straightened up here at home. We've lived here for about 2 and a half years and it was only recently that we've really started to "move in" so to speak.

We live in a 2 bedroom, 1 bath, upstairs apartment and the Master bedroom became a garage of sorts; uninhabitable, the room where we store crap and just chuck things into before we have company over. Well, this last week, we finally converted the master bedroom into the bedroom and our guest room is now the office/den.

I don't really have a designated work area for fursuit building at the moment, but that may be remedied before the end of this year since the "office area" is no longer in the dining/kitchen area. We still have more organizing and simply getting rid of old clutter to do in the other rooms, but our space is really starting to become "home".

I'll be sure to post any new noteworthy developments as they come. Thanks!

We're still here!

2009-06-16T08:53:00.000-07:00

Just working on art commissions, trades and gifts currently. We'll have a few photos of Krystal's partial costume outing at FanimeCon 2009 up in the gallery soon!

Tail Waggin'

2009-05-18T15:15:00.000-07:00

Finished up Krystal's tail and took some video footage so I can actually see how it moves and looks while wearing it.

Krystal Update

2009-04-09T23:20:00.000-07:00

The fabric for the body suit just came in and drafting the pattern is in process. I still haven't finished furring her head because I'm having second thoughts about the shade of blue I used. This light blue fur is so soft, but people are already getting on my nerves about it not being the right blue. It's been really hard to find her true blue because its either too light, too royal, or too green/teal.

It will probably push back my finish date by a LOT, but I'm considering ordering the "too royal" blue since the darker blue would shout, "Krystal!" a lot more than the baby blue is. *sigh* In the end if it looks more like Krystal I'm happy with it.

Blogger

2009-03-21T18:53:00.001-07:00

I've finally gotten around to making blogger appear "seamless" in my index page. I feel like I've not only accomplished my goal, but it is exactly the way I wanted it in the first place. And to think that I almost settled for using iframes... wow. This calls for celebration!

LiveJournal

2009-03-21T03:36:00.000-07:00

The blackbackstudio livejournal has been converted to a community to make posting to it easier for me. Now I don't have to juggle two accounts on LiveJournal (personal: emberisolte & business: blackbackstudio).

Updates to livejournal will most likely be a copies of posts in this blog. The main reason I have this blogger account is because of how pretty it looks with the website and how much more user friendly it is for me to update the homepage without editing the html.

Small Krystal Update

2009-03-19T19:20:00.001-07:00

I redid her teeth yet again. But for the final time since I am quite pleased with the way they are now! I'll post comparison pictures once I upload them.

VistaPrint Refund =)

2009-03-11T07:57:00.000-07:00

I called VistaPrint this morning about a refund and they credited me my order (less shipping, which was totally fine by me.) The lady said they would credit my account, but I was like, "Is it possible to just refund the money directly to the card I used because I'd like to close my VistaPrint account as well." Her reaction actually surprised me since it was a simple, "Oh, all right," and she didn't try to sell me on keeping the account. So, she immediately closed my account (only 1 minute or less on hold, I was impressed). I'm still a little paranoid about the "discount clubs" scamming I read about thanks to "hubbers" comments in my previous blog entry, so I'll be checking my bank statement closely for a few months.

Oh yeah, to clarify, when I said that the paper wasn't even white, I meant that the paper was just a very, very, very low quality white, so it actually looked like it had a yellow or stained tint to it. VistaPrint says they use 80lb stock for their business cards but I doubt it. I have swatches and samples of 80lb stock from Georgia Pacific and the crap that VistaPrint printed on barely even feels like 45lb stock... anyway. I'm glad I got my refund.

VistaPrint

2009-03-09T19:31:00.001-07:00

I had my custom designed business cards printed with VistaPrint.com. They arrived today... I am very dissatisfied. The design is cropped WAY off center by 2 whole millimeters. (And on a surface area of only 3 in. x 2 in. that makes a huge difference.) The paper isn't even white!! I couldn't believe it. And the "foil" accent isn't even finished the way they state and SHOW how it's done on their website.

So, VistaPrint is definitely on my X-list. Oh well, lesson learned. I'll be calling them tomorrow to see about their "Satisfaction Guarantee" and refund.

Jaw Test

2009-03-06T20:24:00.000-08:00

Nuku shot and put together a quick little video of me showing off the way Krystal's jaw moves to post up on youtube. The music is Krazoa Palace Base Theme from Starfox Adventures. You can find the mp3 and others from the Starfox games at http://krystalarchive.com.

Personal Cosplay Progress

2009-03-03T13:38:00.000-08:00

*Que music: Sexy Eyes by Dr. Hook*

Workin' on a personal suit..

2009-02-25T18:58:00.000-08:00

I'm not taking any fursuit commissions at the moment so I can spend some relaxing time working on my cosplay fursuit. Some people already know who she is, but for those that don't, she'll still be a secret. =p (Not a very well kept secret since this character is so popular, but, you'll find out eventually.) So far I love the way she's coming along

And that's all for this update.

2009-02-17T23:29:00.000-08:00

The Gallery was updated a few days ago, as well as a few other pages on the site.

The Gallery

2009-02-10T09:53:00.000-08:00

The gallery is empty. I decided to wipe it and install the latest version of Gallery2. I didn't have that much work up in the gallery to begin with, and this way, the Gallery2 files are all up to date and I start with a clean slate. I'll post when I have my previous work back up in the gallery when I upload them. For now, I need to take a break from the website. =)

It's up!

2009-02-10T02:39:00.000-08:00

I believe BlackBackStudio.com's remodel is complete enough to finally upload the index and re-announce it! There are some pages that I haven't completely migrated from the old to the new layout, but it will happen soon enough. So, I hope you like the new design of BlackBackStudio.com!

Twitter

2009-02-07T06:06:00.000-08:00

Yes, I too have I jumped up on the bandwagon and got myself a Twitter account. I wasn't planning on ever getting one because the whole "micro-blogging" thing didn't seem practical to me. But when I realized it would be cheaper than text messaging people, I was sold. =) I'll just have to get my family to twitter and I'll be set! XD

Follow Me: emberisolte

Shozu

2009-02-04T18:14:00.000-08:00

I do not like Shozu. Baleted.

Another Test

2009-02-04T01:40:00.001-08:00

Testing out Shozu on my iPhone.

Bandit

2009-02-04T01:30:00.001-08:00

My puppy dog.

Test Post

2009-02-03T21:47:00.000-08:00

I'm messing with the Blogger stylesheet and I just want to see how it affected the margin between posts. I needed another post to see the change! =p

Website Makeover

2009-02-03T01:21:00.000-08:00

The website makeover is going very well. I've got the design and layout mostly finalized on the index page and now I have to see how it will work with the rest of the site.

I should probably get to bed tonight though, since I just looked at the clock and it's 1:20am. =/ I hate stopping when I'm on a roll, but I guess it will give me a little break long enough to see anything weird that I may not have noticed tonight. I'll just have to dream about code so I can get right back into it tomorrow morning. =)