My name is Tanner Staheli, I am a 25-year-old certified 'artist' type creature from Utah, USA, with a small attention span and a FAT imagination. My love for drawing concepts and illustrations began with me finding ways to pass the time during high school classes, this went on long enough for me to realize my true potential in creating art and fictional settings using numerous inspirations that surrounded me at the time. I have recently graduated from Utah Valley University with a degree in Illustration.
I grew up surrounded by a very ambitious and loving family of 2 sisters, 1 brother, and my mom and dad; who both have supported me since the beginning, and I would not have even come to close to completing this universe if it weren't for them. I also have a pet ball python named Oliver :)
I also love video games, movies, etc that feature out-of-this-world settings, mainly because of how much they inspire me to work on art. My favorite games are Sekiro; Shadows Die Twice, League of Legends (FORMER), Hollow Knight, Minecraft, and Terraria. My taste in movies consist of Rango, Django, Yojimbo, Pulp Fiction, Kung Fu Panda 2, Seven Samurai, and Into the Spider verse.
Being a concept artist, I love to create things from imagination, and what's better than using that passion to create my own world around it all? The earliest creations of Immortalize has to be imagining Haruma in summer 2016, An edgy, dark clothed, hooded character with shadow powers and badass gauntlets that uses an ammunition system to power them up. From then on I've realized how much fun it is to create characters, and now I am here. I may not be the best writer but building Kudao is one of the main things that drive motivation for me :)
Q&A:
Q: Are you a weeb?:
A: no
Q: Are you sure?
A: Ok I'm a big fan of Jojo, Samurai Champloo, and Cowboy Bebop but that's it lol. (As of now)
Q: What do you plan to do with your universe?
A:
Gaslighting people into thinking it's real
Q: What are some fun trivia facts about your world?
A:
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Meiling and Anhai were Christmas gifts to my little brother and sister, whom I also based off of.
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My knowledge of Asian history and culture evolved a long with the creation of this project
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For example a lot of older drawings have people wearing kimonos the wrong way.
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There may be a lot of translation errors or just straight up gibberish in the calligraphy parts of older or even newer art pieces. I'm trying.
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I created everything in this project myself, however, they are some exceptions. For example, The Seigun Samurai used to be called the Shinimasu Samurai until it was criticized by Redditor /u/confanity for its lack of effort in Japanese translation. Another Redditor; /u/VACN suggested the much better name; Seidogunjin, or Seigun for short, literally meaning "precise soldiers" or "soldiers of precision"
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Lao is short for Láobùkěpò (牢不可破) which means unbreakable in Chinese
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Fubai (腐败) means 'corruption' in Chinese.
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Mazoku once ate 12 orphans because he thought it was funny
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The Seigun’s final battle is based on the real-life Battle of Shiroyama.
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Kasamatsu was named after my sister’s friend, I overheard it and thought it sounded cool.
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I spent a few months writing the history of Tekkan, referencing actual Japanese history to stay true to the narrative, then I realized I literally just made Star Wars, but a lot blander. So I had to make a ton of changes that shifted it more to the Sengoku-Edo era than sci-fi.
Q: What are your strengths?
A: I am VERY perfectionist, I work hard day and night on my projects and I redo my work even with the slightest mistakes, I care about my pieces as if they're my children lol. I can also work very long hours because art is one of the most enjoyable passions I've pursued, As long as my fingers don't get sore and my patience keeps in place.
Q: What are your weaknesses?
A: None, I am perfect.
And If I did I would not tell you.
Q: Do you have any advice?
A: I know this sounds really cheesy, but it's true; Never give up. Almost everyone I talk to about drawing I always hear the words "Man I wish I was good at art, haha, but I suck" The truth is the only thing that's preventing them from becoming artists is those very words. No one "magically" becomes good artists all of a sudden, there's no genetics involved or anything, you just have to practice, every day. It gets better, but you really have to do it, every day. It takes a while but in the end, it will all be worth it, that's what it takes to be a good artist, or good at most professions really. Just like the famous stereotypical quote: "The expert in anything was once a beginner"
Also some other legit advice (Probably legit, I never really took lessons to get where I am, it's just what I did, but if your an actual art pro and disagree with this I'm sorry). But I used to copy from other artists to get better (no tracing tho), sorry it doesn't sound good but hear me out. I did it for learning purposes and NOT for copying purposes. I would learn the very basics before-hand, find a really cool picture I liked, and I would try really hard to draw it. And when I did it, it educated me on how the pros do it which drastically improved me. It's more of a study if anything, don't submit the drawing your own work. Unless of course, you admit you referenced it from said picture or did it in a different medium. I hope that makes sense.
That's all folks! Feel free to check out my other social media platforms!
Artstation
Artstation Website
Instagram