Decided to make a new journal entry to get that other one off my page. Many thanks to all those who helped me out, especially *Kaitokalvi, who offered up a ton of new words and very much earned that subbie. ^^ For an example of one of the words I used for this project, see the end of my journal.

In other news, school is winding down--one more week before exams, and then blessed summer freedom and--hopefully--a lot of time to draw. Which is great because I have kiribans I really need to be doing. XD Ack, I'm sorry guys. Or girls, since you're both girls.



We had assessments for my art class yesterday. Highly unprofessional class. XD But I was able to use some DA-related work for part of my final project: A series of comic storyboards for Rise. Now, as you might imagine, at my university this sort of thing is sort of looked down upon--After all, leaving a display of soy sauce packets in the middle of a room is much more artistic and shows a lot more thought! </sarcasm> No seriously, that was part of one of the final projects one of our grad students did.



Nevertheless, while absolutely nobody jumped at it with the FIERY PASSION of the OCT crowd (Did I mention I love you? XD) I did get some highly amusing comments on it, namely on the character of



Art Teacher: He kind of reminds me of, I don't know, that guy, from Sailor Moon.
Me: ......o.o'' What, Tuxedo Mask? *shocked her art teacher even knows this character*
Art Teacher: Yeah, that's the one.
Fellow Student: Oh, so, like, he comes to her? Aww, that's so Peter Pan!....And he's got a top hat and a cane? That's so Willy Wonka!

CONGRATULATIONS, MR. TEA. Mr. Inverted is Tuxedo Mask, Peter Pan, and Willy Wonka, all rolled into one. NO WONDER EVERYONE LOVES HIM. XD

I pretty much loled over that for the rest of the night.

Also, if you're wanting to join an OCT, GO JOIN RISE, PPL. WITH ALIENS.



In other news, I've developed a pocky addiction in recent weeks fed by my local grocery shop, although I hope to get out of it soon as it's rather expensive. Thank goodness I'll be moving back to Virginia soon where these items are not available to me. To further cement this new image of myself as otaku I have been seriously considering going to Otakon this year. Unfortunately that can't happen unless I find a roommate. So if any of you know anyone, preferably girls but I'm getting less picky as time goes on, who's going to Otakon and maybe has a spot available, let me know, please! Reservations need to be made way in advance for this kind of thing.

And finally as a reminder...



ONE WEEK LEFT FOR EFN, PEOPLE! I'm expecting good things.


~C.T.

P.S. (Oh my Gooooood, Law of Talos. Tell us the winner already. I'm actually kind of irked that people were out for blood wanting to know who was in EfN after just one week, yet seem fine with the fact that judging a single match takes this long. )

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That Homework Example I Was Going to Show You

O•C•T — n. 1. An original character tournament held on DeviantArt. OCTs are long artistic endeavors, mainly for comic artists, in which a person creates an original character ("OC"), a reference sheet and an audition comic, and is judged by a small group assembled for the purpose of judging. From the auditions, usually comics created according to a preordained storyline, a number of contestants, usually 32 or 64, are selected based on artistic and literary merit and are pitted against one another tournament-style, producing a comic in which their character defeats their opponent’s in a preordained setting, for every round, until one person is declared the winner.

The word belongs primarily to a very exclusive artistic community on DeviantArt, but this group is quite passionate about their work.

This word is an acronym, always spoken as an initialism, never as, i.e., “oct” as in octagon. As one might guess from the definition, it is created from the first three letters of Original Character Tournament.

OCTs existed as early as 2006, when they were undertaken primarily on forums such as [link] In 2007, OCTs moved to DeviantArt, where the community provided a good setting in which to display the results of rounds to the public and to a much larger audience than is found on the forums. They were still referred to as “Original Character Tournaments” or “OC tournaments” until 2008, however. With the rise of the Winter Brawl and Endzone, both hosted in late 2007 ([link] and [link]), the term “original character tournament” had become popular enough on DeviantArt to merit the initialism OCT—"OC" already having been known and widely acknowledged. People would have known what an OC tournament was—it would have been transparent—but for a long time before Endzone had established the OCT the actual term OCT would have been opaque.

Unfortunately, I can’t find a precise date for the first instance of the use of OCT—with so much to sift through, though, that’s hardly surprising. Google hits seem to show a sharp rise in May 2008 (when searching “OCT” “original character tournament” “May 2008;” however, and unfortunately, “OCT” is often misrepresented as “Oct” for “October” by Google). However, I was definitely not aware of the term, and was still using “OC tournament” or “OC tourney,” as of March 1, 2008.

Examples: "People who try to compete in two OCTs at the same time are just insane."