Miller Redraw As A Treat To Myself

thank you everyone for posting your beautiful arts. tumblr has become not only the source of beautiful mgs fanart but also one of the reasons i practiced drawing more or less consistently. my skill improved (now i can draw without eraser and even can do faces sometimes, kinda) but also it unironically raised my quality of life in general. i hope you're spending holidays the way you like and hope to see more from you all in the future.

there's even more

these are so cool

i’ve been making metal gear reaction images for my personal use

MGS3 arguably has the most relevant symbols of what I call the MGS Cycle (MGS1, MGS2, and MGS3... and MGS5. Though MGS5 is more like a supplement and less a cyclic element. )--

--The reason MGS4 doesn't count, is because it breaks the narrative cycle, by convoluting its characters, turning the symbols meaningless, and well, ending the story without use of the cycle motifs--

MGS3 is a kind of map legend to the MGS Cycle motif. It breaks down the basic archetypes into their most obvious selves. EVA represents the Love Interest, Ocelot still dominates his archetype as the double-triple-crosser, the Sniper character in the End, the Ninja in the Fear, the in-over-his-head science-tech type found in Sokalov...

Ecctra, ecctra.

But the one prominent one that's important, that MGS3 puts in your face Look-Here Blazing-Signs because it is that important... and that's who the Boss stands for.

The Boss appears out of the fog of her first introduction, like a legend out of the fogs of myth. She is constantly praised as not just a Legend, but The Legend, the Mother of Legends even. She is the mentor, to where even Big Boss is but a student.

( Character analysis? She is also a broken women that has had literally everything robbed from her, including cognition, but still marches forward regardless. She is the embodiment of the saying that one can control nothing in life but their attitude. Quite frankly, I got real sick of hearing people praise her and questioned how come nobody is trying to actually Help her. She says things that come out of left field and don't make a whole lot of contextual sense, like she's not always present, and that's saying something given that we're in Metal Gear. The only time she ever seems to truly focus and is present is when she's on mission--Yes she was a legend, we know, but fuck, she needed Help, not Praise. What the hell is wrong with the MGS3 Cast. )

The Boss is represented by a snake, yes, given she leads the Cobra Unit and she is arguably where Naked Snake himself gets all his icons (which he will later drop as Big Boss), but she is also represented by the Horse.

And not just any Horse either... though we do see her literal horse, which is why this narrative symbolism is even being considered.

And Remember that MGS3 is when we get introduced to Chinese elements through Eva, just as Ocelot introduced / introduces Wild West elements.

One of the more important Chinese Horse symbols, is the Idea Horse or the Horse of Will. It is the embodiment of the indomitable human body and spirit, and often paired up with the Monkey of Mind, or the embodiment of the unfettered human mind.

There was a famous Chinese story that ran with these exact motifs--and that's Journey to the West.

Only instead of Sun Wukong (Who is arguably the more fitting of an setting filled with Hollywood Action Films that MGS likes to mimic), MGS embodies and centers around one of the other disciples--Bai Long Ma, the White Horse Dragon, and representative of the Horse of Will.

( And that's not getting into how horses and snakes are often combined mythologically anyway )

Through both narrative motifs, ancient literary symbols (The Horse), and of course, MGS cycle archetypes (The Snake), the Boss represents the indomitable human will.

There is, in fact, no opponent in the MGS Cycle that we face, that represents that archetype, though it is the most important archetype of all MGS.

Because we've faced them as an opponent before, but we have played them as a player character.

And that's Solid Snake.

ADDENDUM: THE REASON MGS IS (MEANT TO BE) A CYCLE

The reason I call it the MGS Cycle, is because it is a repetitious story, inspite of background elements.

The Indomitable Will (Solid Snake) is at the end of his trials of Self, and takes his last trial of self--Facing the Building Blocks of Life and History experienced (MGS1 whose key word is Gene, the literal building blocks of Life and all villians in MGS1 will claim that the steps experienced in their history has made them who they are), and facing down his worse self, his shadow, (Liquid Snake).

A new trialer begins their trials of self (Raiden), which starts facing what makes up their mind (MGS2 keyword is Meme--is your mind real, or is it merely made up of what you're informed is real), where the rookie asks himself what is real, what to believe, what led him to this point, and facing himself lest he fall into delusion.

The Indomitable Will, seeking to break the cycle to allow the world to remain as it was, mentors the new trialer (often through grueling methods) as he takes on his new trials.

Now the mentoree (Jack / Naked Snake), strong through his teacher's teachings, after succeeding his Trial of Mind, he now must face his Trial of Reality (MGS3's keyword is Scene, the World is a stage, now that you know you are real, is the world you're in real?) as the warrior he was built to be. Unfortunately, this trial involves facing off against the Indomitable Will who has already taken all her trials (The Boss).

... and the Mentoree fails, because by defeating the Indomitable Will, he breaks his own will in the process and, wins the mission but fails the trial. He becomes an aspect of the trials for the next Indomitable Will to face down.

This is how the cycle, by its motifs, works. If MGS4 had followed the set narrative cycle, it would've resulted in Raiden killing Solid Snake, just as Naked Snake killed the Boss, and setting Raiden up to become the next "Big Boss" archetype.

... And then the cycle starts over.

MGS5 is an odd supplement, because its worth more if you place its story motifs between MGS2 and MGS3, rather following after MGS4. It details how the Indomitable Will, in spite of its rebellion against the cycle, would get re-entrenched into the cycle. The Boss, for all her will power, is, for some reason, insanely shackled by loyalty to something that she knows means her harm. MGS5 shows the metaphorical shackling--how do you shackle the Indomitable Will? By forcing it into a false form.

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morning line of action. focused on shadows today: looked at the whole photo and thoughts which parts are the darkest, the lightest, a bit dark etc, picked a part (all the darkest areas, for example), drew a light line to mark the edges of that area and filled it in with respective value. i should think of a better way that allows more than 3 values and smoother transitions between shadow and light, but for now i like how it came out compared to yesterday. focused on faces too; it only goes for longer sketches but i resisted the temptation to leave the face blank or draw a -_- like thingy; i disliked what i was seeing while drawing them but now i think it's not horrible. i should do faces practice later to improve.

noticed that for some reason it takes me longer to draw feminine looking models than masculine looking ones. 5 minutes was enough to draw and shade the curvy guy, draw his face in a simplified way and his genitals (something i do rarely), and for the next 5 minute sketch of a lady i didn't even get to her head before time ran out. 10 minute lady's boobies are unshaded bc i ran out of time too. i wonder why is that; the answer might be bc i get lots of pictures of that particular guy for some reason and mb i learnt to draw him faster, but who knows. i wanted to shade the orb on the 25 minute one, but ran out of time exactly as soon as i was finished with the man. look at that orb tho, guess who is failing hard at drawabox ellipse tasks lol

it's the second time i do line of action in the morning instead of evening and both times i am satisfied more than on average; mb will make it a part of my morning routine (which is currently washing face, brushing teeth, mb shower and breakfast lol)

seeing other people in tumblr do same exercises daily makes me want to practice every day too

You guys want to play a game? REBLOG and put in the tags why you follow this person

just to represent the opposite opinion i'll note that i enjoyed vr missions a lot and side missions (except "eliminate gajillion tank chopper units that are almost the same" in pw) are often more fun than main plot missions to me

homework done i should play metal gear. as a treat

few days ago tried to draw, let's say, "a man of japanese heritage" to get better at drawing miller. ended up white washing him beyond recognition, lmao. will probably try again later

I felt nostalgic and full of love for MGR community today, so... 2015-2023 MGR FAN ART BOOK This is a compilation of my artworks done over the years. Most of them appeared on my blog, but some haven't. This pdf contains 30 pages of art in chronological order: https://drive.google.com/file/d/13x7v1gGjAgE84C_ncDMyih1cS_IJAyla/view?usp=sharing Aside from a little retouching, I chose not to redraw older works and included them as is. This art book vividly illustrates how my themes and style have changed, so I feel almost disconnected from the starting pages.

Includes violence and Samdowner things, of course.

thought this exercise is just going to be atrocious but i kinda like the top one (10 minutes)

sometimes it do be like that (worse than before) but we keep going. i kinda disliked drawing that guy bc his photographer uses settings that distort proportions (like fisheye or the opposite) so his limbs look bizarrely huge and disproportionate. but today i enjoyed the cartoonish look.