Alison Stump's Sketch Blog

Well we've hit midterms and the work has started snowballing. Which is ironic as the sun is shining the wind is warm and the last of the snow has begun to melt.
I want to go dance in the sun shine but I am stuck inside working.
I am getting ready for my schools merit scholarships where we compete for really nice packs of money based on the best artist in each major and department, or at least, the one judged best, there are always those that disagree with the results. I'm fairly confident that I will not win because there are some truly amazing comic artists participating this year but I will try my best and it will be a good experience.
To add to my merit scholarship show I have completed three new comics that I very much enjoy. There is Life, Touch, and Samurai no Musume which means Daughter of the Samurai. I've had a lot of fun with all of these projects. My favorite so far has been Samurai no Musume because I had to do research on ancient Japan and the traditions of the feudal era.

In this time period the women of Japan were often left to protect their lands while the men rode off to try and conquer other lands. Most women were accomplished warriors and fought with long spears with curved blades and short swords more like long daggers. The daggers were more often used in suicides which were the preference to being captured where it was expected that a woman would be raped and sold into slavery. Her suicide was the honorable thing to do. It was similar to the ritual suicide performed by males except that the blade went across the throat instead of the stomach.

I plan on updating my website soon with all of these new comics and also look forward to an entirely new layout for my website. Its a little darker but I think it works well.