#i wanted to try out some new drawing and coloring techniques ^^

[alizalayne]

the doll collector

[sanzaibian]

Congrats on 1,000! I was hoping you could give me a haircut! I always wondered what if look like with a pompadour or soemthing like that

“Welcome to the normal barbershop ! Thank you for choosing our service !” You are welcomed as soon as you set foot inside the building. “You will be accompanied by Rilaj Mam, an associate of Dr. Davod, who is known for having studied all sorts of arts of the hair. - Please call me Rilaj, using mam makes me feel old !” A voice is being heard from further inside the shop. - Sorry, but it’s in your namecard !”

As those two bicker, you approach the place where this mysterious man is, and find a quite small man, dark-skinned, folded eyes, and silky black hair arranged in a man bun – although the rest of the head is flawlessly shaved down to the skin. He wears colorful clothes, including a big bandana, and presumably the large hat and the pair of sunglasses that have been put down on the counter, all hiding what your trained eyes recognize as a ripped body.

But when you come just a little but closer, that short guy, presumably Rilajn suddenly turns to you – almost looking up to you – and smiles, full of kindness, though there is a tinge of malice behind his pitch black eyes.

“No matter ! I now have work to attend to !” He finishes the bickering, before addressing you. “I was waiting for you ! Please take place on this seat !”

You oblige, finding the seat to be extremely comfortable, much more than most barbershops you’ve ever been to. Almost too comfortable, considering this shop is temporary, after all… However, you’re here to relax and change hairstyles. Your hair has grown quite a lot since last time, and it’s about time you arrange it up. And trying a new style is just the cherry on top.

“So…” Rilaj, the barber, starts, coming with a bottle full of a weird black substance. “I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that… your hair is way too short to make a good enough pompadour. You should have come in like… two months or three to have enough length to do what you wanted.”

You look at him disappointed. As if to prove it, he takes a strand of hair from the very front of your mop and drops it down your face, only reaching the base of your nose. And this shop is going to be closed by the time you grow enough hair, so although you can always come to another later, shelling out money for what is simply a bit of a silly tryout feels pointless.

“However, the good news is that I have a way to make a great pompadour thanks to my very special technique. So… are you interested ?” The barber offers with a malicious voice.

Still taken by your disappointment, you don’t think much and, foolishly, you agree immediately. You see his smile grow, as you are regretting having agreed so quickly while not considering what this technique is.

“Great ! Well, we shall start with a bit of trimming, no ? ‘Cause your hair might not be long enough, but it still needs shaping for this new cut !”

He draws out clippers and installs on it quite a big guard. Then, he turns it on, and starts mowing at your hair, tufts of it dropping from the sides of your head. His cutting style is quite peculiar, though, using the clippers only bit by bit, tuft by tuft, as if he was cutting with scissors. However, when he has finished one side of your head, continuing by working on the back, letting yet more strands of hair fall, you notice that the result is very regular, with each hair the exact same short size.

Somehow, that unorthodox technique works, and you are left with a great and very soft carpet of hair – which you were able to feel once he put down the clippers. Then, he draws out some scissors, of which one side is shaped in a sort of comb-like structure. He explains to you how it will make your hair less dense, which will make it easier to style, and better able to receive the special technique.

As he chops down some hairs on top, making the remainder of the mop lighter, you notice how silent he is throughout the whole ordeal. Although he seems like quite a jovial guy, even quite chatty at times, he doesn’t seem to be like other barbers, pulling you into discussions about what you did recently, or other mundanities. But looking at his pitch black eyes, matching his pitch black hair, you feel a weird sense of… tiredness ? coming from him. You can’t quite describe it, but as is always said : the eyes are the door to the soul. And behind the eyes you feel a truly ancient soul.

“That’s about it ! Now we’re coming to the good stuff !” Rilaj suddenly pulls you out of your thoughts. “Let me just show you…”

He takes the bottle of black stuff in his hands, and presents it to you through the mirror, before uncapping it.

“This is what I call nuuch’ay ! Don’t try searching it, you won’t see anything about it on the web. It’s an old tradition from my people, forgotten today, but that is very potent.”

He starts dropping it on your hair. It has a very slimy texture, and drops slowly. Looking at its pitch black but slightly shiny form, it almost looks like rubber… Once the bottle is fully emptied out, he puts it away on the counter. You look at it and notice a label, on which there is something written. You can’t understand it, the letters spell words you haven’t seen anywhere, but you do note that the handwriting is very neat and elaborate. It’s the kind of style that would belong in a historical document.

“Now, let me just rub it all in, and then I’ll be able to… pull your hair out of your head, let’s put it like that.”

You are quite disturbed by this. As he is spreading the black goo, you’re wondering about what kinds of irreversible damage it would make to your hair… if it’s pulling out your hair, won’t it damage the follicles ? Destroy your hair, and making go bald when the hair inevitably drop ? But as you’re considering whether to flee as a matter of precaution, you find that you’re actually unable to move. You look at his eyes… still a deep, deep black hole…

You are now trapped.

Concentrated, Rilaj starts, as promised, pulling on your hair. He does it first in the front, and just as he starts pulling, you feel weird… as if he is pulling on other parts of your body. You look at yourself, and aren’t really able to notice anything that has change… but as he suddenly pulls a second time, you feel a bit weird in your belly.

He pulls once again. You feel… tighter, as if the flab that you had been accumulating over the years was being… pulled back. Another pull. This time, you feel weird in your jaw, a weird sense of tingling all over your face… and on point, you notice that, as he pulls another time, there is no more facial hair. If you could draw your hand to your face, you’re sure you would feel it to be all smooth.

He continues pulling, the pain and the tightness being felt on all parts of your body. You look up at your hair, and notice black strands, reaching far higher than they ever have… and they are stood perfectly. It’s a feeling that you’ve never had, and as he pulls yet another time, tightening your body yet again, you feel kind of… hot ? Like, you’re wearing a haircut quite elaborate, your face is devoid of beard… you feel beautiful, and, dare you think, cute !

He continues pulling out your hair, continuing to tighten everything in your body, as he starts combing your new longer hair. The comb goes higher, and higher, your body feels tighter and tighter, until he goes back to the rest of the hair, revealing a big, tall, but not obnoxious pompadour.

The definition of beauty and hotness.

And as he finishes combing the rest, the barber looks at you, smiling from a well done job, just like you are from a wonderful haircut. You are enamored by the pomp, so much that you fail to realize how big your clothes now are on you. You want to feel it, you want to touch it… but before you can make your hand reach, not even registering how you’re suddenly able to move, Rilaj blocks your arm.

“No, you can’t touch it just yet. It needs to dry up a little bit more before you can, else you will mess everything up.”

Dry ? You do as said, but that use of words does throw you for a loop. And your barber notice, since he then adds a few precisions.

“See, the nuuch’ay is derived from rubber, and we need to let it dry a bit before it can keep its shape. I have variants that dry a lot faster, but for hair, only this one gives out good results.”

Of course ! It’s rubber ! You knew it ! Especially now that you look again at your pitch black and slightly shiny pompadour, the same color as the short guy’s man bun. He goes to fiddle with his tools, putting away the comb, scissors and clippers, and drawing out another bottle full of that black thing… “nootcheye”, was it ? Whatever, that rubber thing he put on your head.

Feeling he was finishing up, you feel like it’s appropriate for you to stand back up… but just when you are in a vertical position, you feel something dropping. You look below, your pants and your underwear are on the ground, your shirt being the only thing still hanging on, although it is by now only hovering around your body.

You cry in shock, drawing the attention of the barber, who smiles, almost mocking you – though you don’t feel anything truly mean about it.

“Oops ! I guess I didn’t consider that law from that one smart French guy – what was his name… Lavoisier ? yeah, Lavoisier’s law of conservation of matter.” He half-mocks, sticking out his tongue.

You glare at him, growing angry.

“Okay, okay, don’t need to be this upset ! I was going to explain how the nuuch’ay works before you left anyway !” He throws his hands up in surrender. “Basically, it’s just stretching your body so that the hair is higher, so it had to take mass from somewhere else – that somewhere being your fat, mostly. « The nuuch’ay is currently keeping your body stretched, meaning that you will stay like that for quite a while. However, once it completely dries up, it will crack and then your body will go back to normal, whence why I couldn’t use the instantly drying up nuuch’ay.”

He starts helping you out of your shirt, revealing a lithe body, one that you hadn’t seen since early puberty. Although you can see muscles, they lack any definition, and are only revealed by the low amount of body fat you now have. By all definitions, you can now call yourself a definite twink. No matter how much of one you already were, by now there is no mistake, with how hairless and skinny you are.

“It should last about a month or two, I didn’t check when I made this bottle, but if you want to end it early, you have to warm your hair up with, for example, a perming machine.” He continues to explain, as he starts uncapping his other bottle of ‘nootcheye’. “But until then, your hair will stay exactly like this, no matter how much you squeeze it, wash it, or mess it up !”

As if to prove his point, he squeezes down your pompadour, and as he removes his hand it bounces back into place, as if nothing had happened. Bewildered, you let your hand reach your hair, messing it up in more and more extreme ways, but like rubber, it always gets back to its place. It just feels… surreal.

“By the way, we don’t have any spare clothes for you – all the spare are made for bigger people – so I will use this bottle to create clothes. Don’t worry, I have great taste.”

He pours the bottle of nuuch’ay he had in his hands, and it spreads over all your body, from your neck down to your feet, creating a big, black, shiny jumpsuit. But as it settles, red accents and multiple crevasses appear, until it has formed into a kind of black leathery tunic, one that you would more readily see in fetish publications than in the street.

But you love it.

And under the smile of Rilaj Mam who artfully wanders out of the field of view, you take a photo to commemorate that new hairstyle, that new shiny black pompadour.

But before you go out of the barbershop, after having collected your bag and your unfortunately big clothes, Rilaj stops you.

“Sorry to bother you, but could you grant me a favor ?” He draws out a short red cigarette. “I found that thing when I went to Tokyo a few weeks ago, and I think your uncle might be interested in it.”

You look at him shocked when he suddenly mentions your uncle – especially knowing the unfortunate fate he suffered.

“Now, don’t make this face. I knew who you were ever since I saw your name booking this haircut, that’s the reason I chose to cut your hair. That guy at the welcome desk can attest that I’m very selective with my clients.” You hear a frustrated ‘yes’ from far away. “But if you have any questions, ask them to him, I won’t say anything he doesn’t want me to. After all, he is the only one who has the right to answer them...”

Hearing his tone, it feels as if he wanted you to ask questions to your uncle… Does he feel smart for trying to so blatantly manipulate you ? Or does he realize that you can’t ask questions to your uncle and expect a coherent answer anymore ?

“And, seriously, don’t use that cigarette. You saw how potent the nuuch’ay is, and this is more insidious. On that, send my regards to your uncle. Xtiqaatz’at chik na qii’.”

Without waiting for you to react, he leaves out the door, leaving more questions than answers.

[ms-demeanor]

hi! i am not sure if you will have good advice for this but your photography guide made me think about this issue. i grew up quite poor (school supplies were a struggle every september) and now as an adult i am not as financially stable as id like. this has made me very scared to use any art supplies because im always thinking that im wasting them on not good enough projects or not good enough skills or similar thinking. however that leads to me having supplies bc of gifts and whatnot (ie watercolor paper) but not using it out of anxiety. do you have any advice? thanks!

There are two ways that I go about getting over this kind of issue:

Get out the supplies right now and start making any marks. Cut a piece of watercolor paper in half. Draw a line down the center of a page in grease pencil. Do anything to just start using it to get over the "can't open it, must save for special occasions/projects" mindset. Once you've broken the seal on a first use, it's a lot easier to use tools or notebooks or paints a second time.

Plan projects for yourself like they're assignments. Give yourself a deadline and materials list, write it up like a school assignment sheet, and then do the assignment.

And, if it helps to think of it this way: you're likely hesitant to use your materials because you don't want them "going to waste," but at the moment they are being wasted because they aren't being used.

It is solidly my opinion that art supplies used for art are never wasted; not all "art" is meant to be kept and a part of the process of creating art is practice, which should lead to massive piles of clumsily made, "bad" art that you wouldn't want to hang up on the wall but is nonetheless a part of the process of making art that you'd want to hang on the wall.

You may be looking at the watercolor paper and thinking "I shouldn't break into this because each piece of this paper needs to be something special to show that I value this gift" but you don't get better at painting with watercolors if you use them on printer paper. You need to use the paper (and the paints, and your brushes) to maintain and improve your fluency with the medium.

Many people are hesitant to "waste" sketchbooks or good paper or canvas or expensive paint because they think they are throwing away the good things they *could* make if only the had the perfect plan and create the perfect piece of art with each page and each new tube.

But these things are consumables. Your sketchbook is not a guitar, and it is not a finished song, it is a set of strings. The lovely watercolor paper is a gift for you to make art with, but it is also a gift for you to *practice* making art with and the practice is just as much a part of the gift as a finished artwork would be.

So you're not wasting it if you just get out your paper and start painting with no plan, or if you "mess up" a piece, or if you just use the paper for practice.

So, if you're trying to get yourself to use watercolor paper specifically, I have an assignment for you:

Watercolor Thumbnails Assignment

Materials: Watercolor paper, 2 colors of paint (your choice), Hard pencil Tools: Ruler, Small and medium brushes, Palette

Instructions:

Using your pencil and your ruler, divide the page into 10 equal rectangles.

Visit this website and click the "surprise me" button. Select 10 artworks to create monochrome thumbnails of. (you can click as many times as you need to, but the goal here is to do thumbnails of art that you aren't familiar with rather than seeking out art that you know well for this assignment)

Reproduce each of the images as a monochrome thumbnail in the ten rectangles you've marked on your paper. You don't have to mix a unique color for each rectangle, but you should mix a few different colors and use only one for each rectangle. For instance, if you are using green and yellow paint, some images should be yellow, some should be green, some should be green-yellow, some should be yellow-green.

Purpose:

To use your materials

Work on achieving different values with single colors by layering or diluting your paint.

Composition study

Time Limits:

Once you have collected your ten images and have your station set up, you should take no more than one hour to complete your thumbnails.

Due Date: July 20th 2024

___________________

If you are not familiar with watercolor, here's a good video on some of the basic techniques for painting with watercolor:

And this is a good example of a monochrome painting done in watercolor; if you want, you can watch the video and use it as a tutorial to practice getting a feel for monochrome painting.

Use this assignment to practice! Make use of the gift that you were given by familiarizing yourself with the medium and thinking about art and working in color.

I'm going to play along too and will reblog this post with my thumbnails on July 20th - anyone who wants to join in is welcome to do so as well.

And everyone please remember: time and materials spent doing something you love or practicing a skill you enjoy are never wasted. Even if you don't end up with a "good" finished product, you have learned something and that, in itself, is valuable.

[ohno-the-sun]

Oh uh forgot to ask in the previous ask (the one with the digital piece of candy and scurrying and stuff)

How do you draw art so good

Like

Is there a method you use or is that just the style you've gotten over time?

you've activated my trap card

I'm just gonna preface that this tutorial is from someone who was not professionally trained and didn't have a lot of free time for art, so a lot of the tips I have is short cuts I use to get the best results quickly

If you genuinely want to get better at art then please look at references and practice that is always the best

However if you are like me and only really do art for fun but want to go faster then these are for you pfppt

Overall I'd say my style is influenced by speedpaints I would watch when I was younger, I like analyzing how people do things and what makes something look "good" to me

I always recommend watching them because they will often have techniques you've never seen before or do things a certain way that you can try out yourself

I consume good art, it feeds me

but seriously it can be super helpful when developing your own methodology, or just generally trying something new

Usually it starts with me pulling some references from artists I really admire and sort of sketching out how they do the things I like

For example 8um8le has like super good anatomy and poses so I focused on trying to replicate how they do that

venemous-qwille is super good at color and pulling focus so that's what I focused on in my study of them

In general I'd say my process is sketch -> silhouette -> color -> shading -> render

I really don't like doing lineart lol

I'd say for the sketch the most important part is using references and just kind of fudging it until it looks correct anatomically/physically

General rule of thumb is spend time on areas of interest, and keep non important areas light (like the stitching on his pants)

I don't do lineart because I think its unnecessary for most paintings I do

I naturally tend to put more time and focus on areas of interest (like hands and feet) and if you use a brush with opacity for the sketch, those areas are naturally going to be darker in the final sketch

Of course this is gonna be different for everyone but it's what works for me

Sometimes I do a really really sketchy layer underneath my sketch/lineart, just so I know where everything is going

Use thumbnails! They are great to help figure out the general layout of things and what pose I wanna do

Next is what I call the "silhouette" layer

This is super important for me cause it helps me refine the figure and make sure the pose/anatomy looks correct, also depending on what color I choose for the silhouette helps guide what colors I'm going to use on top

This piece is a good example of how it works. The silhouette shows me how the figure interacts with the background, how the pose looks and if its any good

The silhouette layer doesn't have to be super clean, as long as it follows the sketch decently well and shows where the figure is then its fine

I also sometimes make the silhouette layer multiple colors to help guide shading and vibe

Next is the coloring layer. I usually make this a clipping layer on top of the silhouette layer, or I change the silhouette layer to alpha lock, either way it saves me time on coloring everything in

Sometimes I am super rough with the coloring too, using like an airbrush or my fav watercolor brush just to generically block in color where I want it

Works out cause most objects have like a bounce light to them from surrounding objects, so this is sort of a cheat I use to get that effect without all the work lol

Also don't be afraid to have the lower silhouette layer shining through, having multiple colors sort of subtly shining through the piece helps lots

Next is the shading layer, this is usually another clipping layer, usually set to "multiply"

The colors I pick here is usually within this range, any color works, just depends on the piece and vibes.

Since this piece is set in a sunset forest I choose a more desaturated orange for the shading layer

I know there's a whole thing about multiply layer being a crutch (and it kind of it) but it is a useful tool when you just want some darker values across the piece but don't want to go through the process of color picking every single darker shade

Also in my opinion it looks better than picking a darker color and setting it to a lower opacity, idk I just think the color has more "depth"

Next is the hardest to explain, sort of the vibes layer

Usually its just a layer of more concentrated color on top of the normal color and I fudge with the settings and values until I get a result I like

Next is the longest step, is the "extra" or the render stage.

Usually I add a background before this step so that if I need to merge the figure better with the background I can

If I render with a white background but he's supposed to be in a dark forest, its going to mess with the lighting severely

Also this is when I add more "vibe" layers on top to get the figure to match the background better

Backgrounds in general I recommend checking out @/derekdomnicdsouza on instagram he's got lots of great tutorials for breaking down backgrounds simply

I'd say general rule for the rendering layer is to focus on the areas of interest and spend less time on areas you don't care about

I even blur stuff out on the edges I don't want people to see, partially to save time on fixing mistakes in areas I dont care about (oop), but mainly to help draw the eye to the areas I do want people to focus on

Theoretically parts of the background should like mesh with the characters, parrallel lines are a no no unless they are directing a viewer to look somewhere, things that are perpendicular help bring things together

tbh I'm still not the best at layout and probably need more practice, but overall this is what I like doing

Overall this is what my layer set up ends up being

Sort of a sandwich with the lineart/sketch as the "meat" lol

Color and basic shading below the sketch, clean-up and rendering on top

I like this method cause it's super flexible if I ever want to try something different or try to replicate someone's style

I can make each step less or more messy depending on the end result and can add a lineart layer if need be. Also if there's a part that is straight up not working or needs to be removed its super easy to do cause I can just paint over it on the "extras" layer, color picking from the surrounding area to get the same vibe

Generally rule of thumb for my style is: get the initial layout of colors, form and shading to look good, then the rendering should be smooth sailing

Really the best advice I can give to get better at art is to enjoy what you're doing and become very very obsessed with drawing a silly little guy

You'll eventually get very good at drawing them pfptpf

[tyrantisterror]

I decided to spruce up the Thorn and the Spectre today - one of the problems when you have a big art project that keeps growing despite your attempts to end it because you're having too much fun with it is that your skills grow with it, and eventually you look back on the first parts of it and being like, "Uh, yeah, I think we can do better than we did." This is why Tyrantis's soft sculpture model has two whole remodelings.

The Spectre's touch-ups were somewhat minor. I added more transparent material to the interior of her skirt so she feels a bit more substantial, and then, uh... cut off her face for the second time and gave her a third and final one. This time I used the technique I first tried with the Beast of layering the foam rubber on her head so she has naturally sunken eye sockets and cheeks, then covered it in a thin layer of fabric so the seams aren't as noticeable. It worked, I think she looks much closer to the cute ghost she is in the game! Also now she has her old face as a fun accessory.

With the Thorn, I decided to do something I had initially intended to do, but decided against because it seemed to have a bad ratio of "insane amount of fiddly intricate detail work" to "things people will actually notice and give a shit about. Namely, cutting out a bunch of tiny little thorns to put on her vines and gluing them all on individually. Even now I can feel Dennis Nedry waving his hat around and saying, "See? Nobody cares!" about all the effort I put into this, but dammit, this is the Thorn! My favorite princess! She should have her namesake! I also made some extra vines to put in her hair to make her more canon-compliant, which of course meant I had to make even more tiny little fucking thorns no one will notice.

It's ok, she's worth it. She's worth it.

Oh, and I beefed up her legs a bit with some more fabric. Her original legs were too twiggy and it was really noticeable whenever I stood her next to the other princesses, so now she's got stronger gams.

...and since I had the hot glue gun anyway, I decided to make one last new princess. As a treat! The Princess and the Dragon is one of my favorite routes of the game, and it can result in one version of the princess who's, like, color inverted - where the other princesses look like cross-hatched pencil drawings, this one looks like a cross-hatched chalk drawing, and it's just a really cool effect that I wanted to try and figure out how to do. I... I'm kind of ok with the result? I like the felt I got for the hair, it's dark gray with streaks of white and really feels as close to the chalk drawing looks as I can probably get with that material. Unfortunately, the white-ink pen I got to try and do detailing on her face did not show up as well as its black-ink siblings have - you can kinda sorta see the lines I drew on for her lower lip and eyebrows if you squint, but yeah, bit of a disappointing result, especially since I was hoping to be able to use it to give her skin some of those faint chalk cross-hatching lines that make her look so cool. Still, she looks nice next to her fellow princesses!

I imagine if I was good with paint there'd probably be some sort of fabric paint that would work, but I can never use the stuff without it globbing everywhere.

The funny thing is, while I think she's one of the most visually striking princess designs, the ending that gets you the photo-negative Princess isn't my favorite for The Princess and the Dragon route. My favorite is the one where you and her get out of the basement and just lay on the grass together. Sure, her design isn't as striking in that one - she's almost identical to how she appears in the beginning of the game, just missing a hand and bearing an x-shaped scar on her heart - but it's such a sweet, tender little moment, and I savor those in the game. Definitely the least interesting P&D take on the princess to make a doll of, but perhaps the one that's more dear to my heart.

...

but I did say this would be my last one, so...

[miss0atae]

Random Thoughts about Gelboys EP1 : The excitement of teen love, nail art and queer identity.

I made the decision to watch this series because it was centered around the turmoil of teen romance with nail art as the basis for the story. If you ask me nowadays if I have any interest for nail art, I would answer with a firm “no”. I have no interest with nail art anymore, but there was a time when I was younger and it was really important to me. I had several nail polishes of so many different colors and I used to change them a lot. I tried to make few designs, but turns out it's far more complicated to draw on your own nails than it is on someone's else nails. I forgot how I liked it back then when I was a teen. This long introduction that has nothing to do with the series, is to show you that I believe the creator of this series made a conscious choice when he decided to put nail art as the basis for the story and that's what I want to talk about in this “random thoughts” about the first episode.

I will make a quick summary of first episode, but you have to know there isn't much happening. This is mostly an introduction of the series' “world” and characters. We get to meet Fou4Mod aka Sakolphat Phlaphithak, a teenager boy who, in the first minutes of the series, discovers that the person he thinks he is dating, is actually seeing someone else too and he ends up blocking them from all his social media and crying from the heartbreak. Then, you'll watch him being a normal teenager: being embarrassed by his mom(‘s old taste in music) as many teens are, going to school, taking the public transport, spending time with friends, being bored in class and socializing. The first day he takes the BTS, he meets Chian and he noticed him because he was wearing nail art. From this point, he became really interested in him and it steers him to try nail art too. Unfortunately, this attraction may cause him some pain too as Chian is described as a “player” by his own friend “Bua”, another character who is a “friend” of Chian and certainly the future “love rival” of Fou4Mod. There is also another important character Baabin Saebal, Fou4Mod's friend.

So as you can see, nail art has its importance in the series. There has always been a social relevance of nail art in our society from a very long time. Unfortunately, I'm not an expert in this, so take everything I say with a grain of salt as my passion from nail art died with me discovering I had allergy to most nail polishes and I stopped caring for this when I entered university. Despite this everyone can agree that nail art is a form of creative expression. It is a way of creating its own identity through fashion because nail art can be seen as just another accessory. The color choices, the length and the shape communicate something about what you like and who you are. It's an easy way to show your individuality, and even if you're not making them yourself, it also shows your taste in art and creativity as you still get to be the one who chooses the design. In the series, the characters' nail art is made with what seems to be gel nail polish technique (I don’t know yet if it’s going to be relevant).

Nail art can be an allegory of queer identity. The fact that you can use different colors and shape to suit your taste, can be seen as letting go of your past self; the one where you couldn't be who you wanted or you had to be the way your parents/caregivers choose for you to be. In choosing some specific design for your nails, you're creating your new self, something that could be more aligned with who you want to be. It's a form of protest too, where you can reject the gender norms. If nail art can be tied to the idea of “femininity” it doesn't mean that it's only meant for this “purpose” (I'm sorry I don't a better word here). In the story of Gelboys, Fou4Mod starts doing nail art because he has developed an instant crush on Chian who was wearing it. It's probably a way of feeling connected to him that steers Fou4Mod to do it. In a way, he is self-expressing by doing nail art that he wants to become closer to Chian. I wonder if in the upcoming episodes, the choice he is going to make in his nail art will be showing the turmoil of his love life. I also want to know if there is going to be a larger discussion of his queer identity. I'm not saying it has to be shown, but I admit I would really like to see it. I feel there is a common pattern with LoveSick 2024 where I felt like young queer love can be mixed with the identity development associated with the transitional stage that is adolescence. Here in Gelboys the identity development could be seen through nail art.

Anyway, I’m pleasantly surprised by this first episode. You can see how I liked the introduction of nail art as I believe it can be queer performativity.

[nocturnalfandomartist]

.⋆｡ﾟ Art vs Artist 2024! ⋆｡ﾟ☁︎｡⋆｡ ﾟ☾ ﾟ｡⋆

Click for better quality!

It's my first time doing art vs artist, but I thought it'd be a nice opportunity to see how it looks! My style has been so inconsistent this year (thanks multiple style crises), but I am proud of a few pieces. Mostly. I seem to use similar techniques and colors a lot, but I guess that's the point of an art style anyway. Everything up here is cropped a bit since I don't draw at a 1:1 ratio usually. If this is your first time seeing my work, I love The Legend of Zelda and Zelink!

Thanks for another fun year of art! ^^ Some stats below:

#1 | 1,943 notes | June 18, 2024

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༺ Top 10 posts by notes!

I remember drawing this on the announcement day, within a few hours! It's my first post to surpass 1k!

My second post to surpass 1k!

#2 | 1,197 notes | June 22, 2024

#3 | 694 notes | July 27, 2024

...trends work

i need to repost this with type instead of handwriting

#4 | 572 notes | August 3, 2024

I want to redraw this one, even if it's not very canon

#5 | 546 notes | July 28, 2024

#6 | 528 notes | August 5, 2024

I will continue to change how I draw her

#7 | 456 notes | Setember 19, 2024

I tried a slightly different look here, I think it's kinda cute!

A tie!

#8 | 456 notes | June 19, 2024

Two pieces are in this post! I love Classic Zelink, so I was trying to figure out how I wanted to draw them. :) I have a lot of drawings of them to come...

#9 | 355 notes | June 9, 2024

I've really been trying to figure out how I want to do backgrounds on my doodle pages. And how to draw TP Zelda properly. Still haven't figured either out, if you're wondering.

#10 | 353 notes | May 18, 2024

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So much from EoW... I jumped on that hype so fast, it's the Zelda game I've only ever dreamed about!! ♡ Still kind of surprised nothing from Linktober is up here, though, considering it was all the better stuff. ^^" There are a few pieces I never finished this year, also... maybe 2025 will be their year!

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Small announcement - I got a private commission I'm working on at the moment, but soon they will be entirely open again! I do character art and designs if you're interested! ^^

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

✦ Ko-Fi | ✧ Ao3 | ⟡ Bluesky

REBLOGGING IS ENCOURAGED, BUT DO NOT REPOST.

[thefaiao]

Hi, firstly I just wanted to say that I love your art, especially with the way you use dynamism and angles in character sketches. It's really beautiful and I always look forward to seeing more black and white pieces from you.

I just wanted to ask, as a beginner artist whose been drawing on and off from 2017 onwards and hasn't seen much improvement, are there any resources or books you would recommend for someone still trying to grasp form and shape? Especially in creating 3d forms with line? I'd love to be able to draw characters in a similar way that you do but my cubes and cones never seem to come out correctly and humanoid shapes are even tougher. Thanks again for sharing your art.

Hello! Thank you very much for the compliments. Up until somewhat recently the B&W pieces were my favorite things to draw, so I get you. I did fall in love with coloring eventually though.

Alright, there are lots of things that can be done. I have had some classical training, and done human figure studies live, but honestly not nearly as much as I probably should have. You definitely should still do figure study as much as possible, especially in person. I'm just prefacing to say it may not get you to draw the way I draw I suppose, as its only part of what I've done to improve my drawing ability.

There are a few good resources to start with, notably the Loomis method, which a lot of artists use as a base. That's how you should use it too, ideally. It's not about copying his work exactly, it's about understanding just how the human body is proportioned, and adapting it from there. It doesn't have to define your thinking, it's just a good guideline. It's possible to structure a body quite differently than Loomis (and there are many many books for that), but the truth, which is, the proportions of the human body, is still there in all mindsets. Once you understand that, you can understand the reason for each approach, and even forego them to express something more unique, abstract and visceral.

The biggest thing you should do though, is always be observing the world around you, both online and offline. Figure studies are nice but they remove one of the most important things, and that is context. I find that people who will use those large libraries from people who pose professionally with bows and swords and the like will often draw technically impressive images, but they still feel like a fake pose. It doesn't feel like the person is holding onto the weapon like their life depended on it, or like they have a relationship with the object, that they pose and move in a certain way that reflects their personality. Live study with strangers helps rectify this somewhat.

Online you should also be following lots and lots of different artists! Don't limit yourself, pay attention to how they construct their drawings, how they go about things. It's important you follow a lot of people, see how they evolve. They are not only a point in time, they are also learning and evolving just like you. It's especially good if you can have artists friends to draw and share stuff with. I have a deep-seated belief that we draw art for others, to express ourselves to them, so they need to see it.

It may sound weird for me to say if you want to draw like me try to draw unlike me, but I'm just saying what I've done. I follow a lot of people and draw from a lot of places. Ultimately the main appeal of my forms is their dynamism and volume as you've said, but it's good to be versatile so you can always explore new avenues!

Now, you've done all these things, you are practicing them constantly. Now is the most important part. Keep drawing!!! Just keep drawing no matter what, no matter how bad you think it looks. You have to believe you have something to say, to express, no matter what. You say you haven't improved, but I don't believe you! Maybe you are faster, maybe your technique is better, maybe you have better habits, maybe you are a little more patient. There are a million ways to improve which don't even appear in the image. You have to keep drawing, NO MATTER WHAT!!! You have to believe you were born to do this and you will do it well, don't worry about what others think.

I can only draw such dynamic forms because I have kept drawing and masticating and elaborating this idea that is called my style. When you are drawing you are developing your own little language, and only when you are fluent you can start writing good books with it. Being fluent will take many years, you must accept that. If you take breaks, take breaks so you can keep drawing later. Take care of your health so you can keep drawing. You will only get to see your drawings become beautiful if you live long. To live a long and healthy life is to keep drawing.

That is my ultimate advice really, let that frustration build up, but keep drawing anyway. You will force yourself to find solutions to release that frustration as you do so, and improve. Maybe it's simple, but it's the only thing that is true no matter what. Don't worry about AI or whatever, none of that matters. Just keep drawing!

[aychama]

I'm sorry if this is too personal but did you had/have any art trauma caused by art teachers in school? And by trauma I mean some aversion to try learning one thing, because art teacher was just a dick. I have something like that with shading and it still holds after 6 years as a adult and I want to break it, but I cannot force myself to try it again and this holds my proggres as a ,,artist" and that's make me smad. I'm sorry once again if this is too personal or too hard to answer

Yup I did! Tho idk if I can call it "trauma" tbh

Oop I kinda went on a rant sorry lol

I studied ceramics in uni but I did have nude art classes and classes that required detailed art projects.

Although most of my uni time was wasted thanks to covid, I did get harrassed by a few of my classmates and my teacher in my last year.

My classmate had said that my art level wasnt good enough to be in this uni and my teacher yelled at me in the middle of class for like a week or two because I refused his ideas for my projects (he had given me the ok on the design before he changed his mind 180 and started pointing and laughing at me with my classmates while i worked on my ceramic project)

I eventually had to give up resisting because I wanted to pass the class and let him do whatever he wanted. (He legit just put clay on top of my design, smoothed it out and that was it in fact here is the design he gave me the ok to, the middle of my project and the way he stopped me)

After this I basicly didnt do anything more for his class, minimum effort. My days in Uni weren't all bad thank god but I was extremely unmotivated.

After I graduated, I didnt really draw or create much until my love for drawing rekindled with Cult of The Lamb! I love this game and Narilamb too much lmao-

But as for something similar to your experience I would say that I used to play the bass and electro guitar in highschool and we had to perform one day which I chickened out from that resulted in the music teacher getting angry at me. I dont play the guitar anymore :/ But my love for music hasnt died and I am using my love for art diffrently!

I would say that even if certain experiences deviates you from some topics, branches of art or people, dont let it kill your whimsy and ideas. You can always try out diffrent things to find something fun like diffrent styles of drawing, shading or no shading, diffrent mediums like digital or traditional, new or old techniques, weird colors or designs. You can always try out whats popular to see if you like it or not as well. You can also consume a lot of art media, educational or entertainment.

There is so many creative things you can try out, you dont have to be stuck on the past and that one shading idea your teacher tried to teach you ır tried to force onto you. I think you can go back to it after trying out many diffrent things to see if it was the technique or the teacher that ruined it for you.

If it was the technique, there are many MANY diffrent ones that you can enjoy!

If it was the teacher, Im not a therapist so idk what would be the right thing to say but healing takes time, sometimes the things people say never leaves you and sometimes you forget it 5 minutes later. You are a person with the ability to change, learn and grow. The only thing that is in your way is your 'will'. If you are willing to change, even if takes a long time, you will change! But if you dont want to, then no one can force you.

Healing and moving on is hard but not impossible. Dont let an asshole teacher get in the way of your growth ❤️

[ane-doodles]

Abut this 2024... Thanks to everyone

I wanted to sit down and write something for this end of the year full of surprises, please be patient with me because I am relying on a translator for this.

I recently decided to take a look at my blog posts this year, and boy have I seen some great things! Not only a significant improvement in my art, but seeing how I've dared to try new things and all the wonderful gifts I've received from all of you.

Starting with the fact that I probably wouldn't be here fulfilling my dreams and sharing my art if it weren't for all of you. Thanks to everyone who chipped in to help me with my PC, thanks to you I still have my job as a designer (hey surprise, I was the most active designer in the company this year :D), it has allowed me to do my research for my thesis, it has allowed me to dedicate myself to commissions as I have wanted for years and above all it has allowed me to share my art and improve significantly. Thank you.

I also want to thank everyone who wished me a happy birthday this year!! It was a bit of a complicated date at home and I spent weeks preparing my massive drawing attack (pt1 and pt2) … but I'm happy that everyone enjoyed it. Special thanks to the wonderful people who made me drawings QwQ, I promise to put them in my album one day. (There are a few more drawings missing from my pendrive, thanks to you too)

Special thanks also to everyone who attacked me during artfight!! I never expected so many people to shoot me with so much art, so many different styles that I really appreciate (my mom says she wants to frame some of them haha). I also got the chance to attack a lot of people with art, it was fun and I got to experiment a lot with coloring techniques and learned to draw faster. (Special mention to the last drawing which is a gif and should be appreciated properly, loviu <3)

Thanks also to all of you who have enjoyed my little comics. These have been pure experiment, trial and error… And seeing your comments has brought me a happiness that I can't describe (I want to talk about this later in another post, in the meantime let's continue with my cheesy stuff)

Special thanks to @/the-one-who-lambs (I'm embarrassed to tag >///<)who made me take up one of my old hobbies that I had abandoned years ago, now I have two giant bags of stuffing in my room for future use :3

Special mention to all of you who decided to commission me for art this year… You have been a special blessing in my home. Thanks to you and those who sometimes stop by my redbubble store I have been able to help out around the house and yesterday (after more than nine years) I was able to take my family out to eat and buy new clothes for the new year. Thank you.

And well, to finish I also want to thank all the friends, artists and in general everyone I have met during this year. In my life I never thought I would get to talk to someone behind the screen, much less with people I don't know in person or that I admire… It's still difficult for me but little by little I have been learning and I have gathered the courage for small conversations and interactions. I have received words of encouragement, questions, casual conversations, compliments and advice, and I can't think of anything that I value more than this, especially for someone who rarely leaves home but enjoys sharing their art with the world.

This year I have experienced so many new things that I can hardly imagine what surprises next year will bring. In the meantime I promise to put more effort into my art! try new things! try to interact more! (please be patient with me) and above all have fun with all of you.

Thank you all very much

[werewolfoffeverswamp]

tbh i dont know if i’ve ever made a single piece of art i actually like in an academic setting. they’re always haphazardly done last minute and the subject matter is always so. hm. it’s a little boring. the only times i think i’ve come close to making something i was proud of in school is when i was pushed to my mental breaking point and i just started fucking doing whatever i wanted. so today i’m rating them

in my sophomore year i was in sculpture class and had to make a smooth plaster sculpture. the amount of manual labor required to sand down a sculpture that had to be at least 3 feet in some direction is not something i wanted to deal with. as you can see my sculpture is not smooth. the design i was happy with— the sculpture itself i was not.

it was titled “Mistakes” or something along those lines. my classmates stood up for me in critique when my professor said it was lazy and unfinished. not one of my peers said a bad thing about it. we smashed the sculptures apart behind the building when critique was over. i still want to cry when i think about it, it was an extremely special experience for me.

10/10 i actually wish i still had it and i have been meaning to make a tiny version out of clay. such a special piece to me, very formative

this piece was made at the end of my college career when i first started testosterone. i wanted to make some sort of tribute to it for my final piece— i’m of an extremely divided mind when i think about it. there are parts that look clunky and not developed properly… thrown together, as i believe my professor Jason said. i am, however, happy with certain technical aspects of the piece! the formation and shading of the hand and the syringe is something i really like, and did a lot of layering to achieve. i used a paper cutout to make the repeated syringes on the bottom left, another new technique i tried and was happy with the results of.

the text WAS thrown on last minute in an effort to spice up the piece but it’s a reference to the song Crosseyed and Painless by Talking Heads. it’s a song i’ve always identified with in a gender way, with the first few lines being “Lost my shape, trying to act casual./Can’t stop, I might end up in the hospital.” i felt on the verge of collapse constantly in the early days of my transition. it was like i had lost my shape and was destined to end up hurt in some way. i wish the text was more well thought out, it could have been done in a more uniform way and i think it would have looked a little better.

the wasp head is also a reference to an old oc of mine, who was a man with a wasp head named Gene. i wish i would have used different colors, the black and yellow i used should have been warmer. mars black instead of ivory. whatever again it’s technical stuff.

6.5/10 i could technically go back and fix this one bc i still have it, but i have better things to do rn.

the hand dino came into the world in a fiery manner. for the final project we had to make a piece with the dimensions of minimum like 4ft by 4ft, and by this point i was burnt out and the most exhausted with art i’d ever been (besides maybe sophomore year ig 🤔) and i told my professor i couldn’t do a project that big. he made the mistake of telling me to do what i could manage, which ended up being a roughly 12in by 12in piece of oil painting paper.

in many ways i like the concept of this piece. the idea of it. it’s fun! it’s combining realistic elements with cartoonish ones in a way i enjoy.

however. looking back, i genuinely think it would have been a cooler concept on a bigger scale 😭 which is so frustrating.

7.5/10 i wish i’d had it in me to do it better.

and how could we forget dear body horror babe? made in my first semester of sophomore year and done with ink and charcoal and conte crayons, it was an assignment one of my more eccentric teachers wanted us to do where we randomly splattered ink on a paper using ink-covered coins and tried to come up with a drawing just from the happenstance of where the ink coins landed.

i chose a more abstract route and basically turned every ink splat into an eye and tried to come up with somewhat distorted body imagery to evenly fill all the space on the paper. you can find a lot of stuff going on in this piece.

11/10 but also not done at my lowest point, just during the steady decline.

ok can i be frank for a second. i fucking hate this piece. so what you’re seeing is an 8ft by 4ft thin block of particle board, carved by hand in low relief to ink and print on old bedsheets.

my professor for this relief class was strict about the theme of the class, which was political art. she insisted we make art relating to a political topic and our beliefs on it. and this isn’t to say political art is bad in any way, but it’s truly not something i want to FOCUS on creating necessarily. the fact that it was MANDATORY is the issue here. one of my classmates refused to make purposely political art and instead chose to make a beautiful piece of the sun and moon as lovers. i wish i had just done the same and refused to make strictly political art. if i’m honest i just wanted to make an epic wood carving scene of a dark and eerie night outside draculas castle. instead, as you can see, i chose (somewhat arbitrarily in an effort to make the project into something i could enjoy carving) environmentalism.

technically i don’t mind this piece. the composition is fine and the detail in some areas i’m very proud of. other areas not as much. my teacher also forced me to do what i think is over-carve some areas to fill the piece with texture. i do not like it and i wish i had kept some areas fully un-carved, even if it didnt print right. i don’t care.

also what’s worse about the whole experience of this piece is that it was part of an event called Blocktoberfest and my school partnered with a local state college to make and print these huge blocks on their campus. the reason this is bad is bc the state college students did whatever the hell they wanted for their designs and we saw some really cool subject matters, from aliens to occult symbolism. and their school’s art department had a couch in it and ours didn’t. :/

also blocktoberfest was an insane amount of physical work bc rolling those big ass rollers in ink and then a giant block and then ink and then the block and ink and block was a lot of effort. i was sore after it. and it lowkey felt like me and my classmates were doing all the work and like maybe 5 people from the other school were helping. whatever. whatever anyways

1/10 genuinely pisses me off to look at. wish i would have just done draculas castle

^i also think it’s worth mentioning about this professor: no one really liked her. she made it very clear that she thought there was a right and wrong way to create art. and she fully believed she was right about everything bc she was old and wise. and she was also gay so maybe she had some credit. but her art to me always felt a little uppity and she was also really rich. she let us visit her studio and we did our final critique there of a piece i made that i absolutely hated everything about. i dont even have a picture of it bc it pissed me off so bad. she also was lowkey racist towards a few of my classmates so i really don’t like her.

anyways that’s all the pieces i want to review currently. let me know what you guys think about em if you want. i hereby ask for you to critique my art.

the difference between making art for a deadline vs making art purely bc you enjoy the process and outcome is so crazy. it actually makes me sick with sadness. i don’t have the resources to create freely yet. anyways art under the constraint of academia is so frustrating for me specifically. like whatever. whatever

[pararecovery]

Tips for Coping with Paraphilic Disorders

I wrote this for anyone who needs help coping with sexual thoughts/feelings/urges that bring them distress or harm. If you don't know what paraphilias or paraphilic disorders are, you can learn about that on this other post!

I'm not a professional, just a person with who has a paraphilic disorder. I made this drawing from my own experiences and therapy. I hope it helps you even a tiny bit. 🫂

🧡 First off, I want to say that having a paraphilic disorder does NOT make you a bad person. Your thoughts and feelings =/= your actions! You cannot control that you get feelings, but you can control what you do about them. The fact that you're looking at this list means you're already making positive steps!

💙 Trying to stop yourself from thinking/feeling a certain way tends to make you think/feel it more. The best thing you can do for yourself when having distressing thoughts/feelings is to try to acknowledge that you're having them without any shame or judgement. I know that can be easier said than done. Practicing with nicer thoughts/feelings first can help!

🧡 Please talk to someone. It's so important to have someone who can listen to you without judgement and provide support. If you don't have anyone to talk to, my inbox is always open!

💙 When you're fantasizing in a way you don't want to, try changing just one thing about the fantasy. It's okay if it's only a small change, like changing the color of someone's hair. Just try to make steps towards creating a less distressing fantasy. It'll get easier over time to create more changes. Sometimes your fantasy will return to how it was originally and that's okay. Any effort you make is progress.

🧡Add a new ending to your fantasies. Add in an aftercare scene where it turns out everything was a consensual roleplay, or the characters turn out to have shapeshifting or healing powers, or a director yells "CUT!" to reveal that it was all actors doing a scene.

💙 An exercise I've done when distressed by a paraphilia is to imagine the object of my arousal as something I am protecting, instead. Imagine yourself defending them from harm and sending them away to a safer place.

🧡 If you're concerned about the kind of porn you're looking at, try to walk yourself back to porn that's more clearly fantasy or roleplay. For example, if you're reading stories about rape, try stories about CNC instead. Try animations instead of live action, or fiction/art instead of videos.

💙 Look into grounding techniques and intrusive thought management skills to see if any of them work for you. They can be incredibly helpful.

🧡 Self harm doesn't look like just one thing. It can go hand-and-hand with paraphilic disorder. Some examples could be masturbating to the point of hurting yourself, unsafe solo or partnered play, and looking at porn that emotionally harms you. Please look into safe alternatives to self harm and also learn about HARM MINIMIZATION!

💙 If you're in any friend groups or communities that talk about paraphilias, please make sure that they're healthy for you and not encouraging you to harm yourself or others. Here's a tool for evaluating how toxic a group is. Here's also a guide on protecting yourself from online harassment.

🧡 I cannot stress enough how important it is to educate yourself on healthy boundaries & consent -- even if you think you already know everything! Here's a great guide to start with. Also, if you have any interest in having kinky sex, PLEASE read The New Topping Book or The New Bottoming Book by Dossie Easton & Janet Hardy. They are essential.

💙 Lastly, a few extra resources:

Suicide Hotlines & Crisis Helplines

Get Self Help - free self help resources

Therapy Worksheets - free self help worksheets

Online Communities for Survivors - support for SA survivors

Stop It Now UK / Stop It Now USA - preventing CSA

[24karatcherrygold]

Cherri’s here with a new and improved Lady Cynder design!

I wanted to see if I could get an idea for how Cynder would fight, or at least how she fights in Gold’s story. They recently watched Arcane and was fascinated by the rugged fighting style of Vi, so they implemented that into how they write Cynder.

Cynder’s physical form also gives her some extra accessories to use in a fight, like her tail and wings. That’s not even including her shadow-walking, wisp friends, and electrical shocks.

Gold asked me to try and draw an outline for how Cynder fights to use as a reference for their writing. I think it came out great, especially with my new coloring technique!

I think I might do more of these fighting style concepts for other Skylanders! What do you guys think?

This was a lot of fun! So I hope you all enjoy it!

With love

-Cherri

[tulikettuun]

An OC being the prince of Hyrule (don’t worry, there’s a princess too!) in an LoZ AU a friend and I have been working on. It’s been turning in my head like a rotisserie chicken for over a year now.

More explanation and close up pictures below the cut:

I said that if I could finish the Sheikah Tower I’d go ahead and post this. It’s technically still a WIP because there are parts that are very obviously not finished but I was using this to learn some new digital art techniques that I got a really good hang of and my main focus was always on the character and he’s been done for almost a year now, so I’m ready to call this good enough a move on. I couldn’t move on until the Sheikah tower was more than just a blue rectangle in the distance, though. 😂 I can let the foliage be low detail and sketchy, but that blue rectangle was really jarring so close to the character, which was meant to be the main focus but got lost in the background quite a bit. When I was planning this drawing I only had the character and had actually completely finished it before I even considered what I wanted the background to look like. As a result I drew both a bit independently and meshed them together and unfortunately it sort of shows. I do like parts of it tho. The character and the coloring process I used for him were the main things I was focused on in this, and as a learning exercise it turned out great! I still use a lot of what I learned from this today.

I spent an absolute TON of time on the clothes — partially because I was designing what his outfit would look like, and partially because I was learning how to paint on top of a rough sketch. All the shading, highlights, color gradients — all of it was painstakingly done like I was using a colored pencil on paper. I could have used digital art tricks, but I was trying to find a middle ground between digital art and the traditional art I’m more accustomed to.

One of my favorite details is the running horses along one side of the waist band. I used the early animation stills of the running horse as reference, so there are about 4-5 unique designs that repeat along the border.

I used “Creating a Champion” to get ideas for the design on the tunic.

Another random favorite detail is the added gusset on the inside upper part of the pants for reinforcement. Because I drew that detail in, I got to play a lot with how the lighting would look there and I like how that turned out (I also like the idea of reinforced crotches and thighs on pants — why do these not exist???)

As I was working on this tonight, I realized how much I really liked the shading and light bounce on the arm wraps — this one specifically. Past me was on some good ish when she did that. We’re gonna ignore the sword for now. I did put thought into the design, but I definitely also want to redesign it.

Face close ups because that’s another part I spent a ton of time on. This character has a super distinctive canon hair style that I always have to get creative to maintain the silhouette of whenever I put him in a fantasy setting. This is one of the only times I’ve been satisfied with the results — partially because I just kept his “duck butt” hair in the front (that’s the canon hair style) and partially because I felt like I really killed the braids. (He’s also got some freckles that I am contractually obligated to draw attention to at every opportunity.)

Finally we have some parts of the background I like. The left-hand side of it was always more complete than the right hand side. I could spend another 20 hours rendering those trees, but I just decided I had had enough for now. Maybe when I’m bored in the future I’ll dip back in and play. And ofc the Sheikah tower. I finished that tonight and wound up pretty proud of how it came out. Ofc I was aided by the fact that the tower is in the distance and dimmed by the lightning, so it didn’t have to be super detailed or accurate. But still. After looking at a blue rectangle for the past year, that tower looks pretty good completed.

More sketches of my OC as Prince of Hyrule!

Keep reading if you’d like a little explanation of the LoZ AU this comes from.

Usually when my friend and I start an AU, we leave everything how it is in the universe and just plop our characters in and make them the focus. Easy. But since the plot of LoZ is always so intrinsically tied to the hero, princess, Ganon, and other major characters with major roles, there’s not a lot of room to carve out a spot for our OCs. I suppose we could have done a slice of life type thing in the vein of “Rosencranz and Guildenstern Are Dead” but with such a large cast of characters already in the LoZverse and the fact that she and I have a pretty large cast of OCs, there wasn’t a lot of room for that. So, we did things a little backwards. Instead of just using the universe, we also hijacked the plot and the character roles and stuck our OCs in the already established roles. One of my OCs is princess Zelda, one of hers is Link and another of hers is Ganondorf. We decided to play in the BotW/TotK LoZverse, so we also replaced the former champions and future sages with our characters. When we got done, I had a leftover character that didn’t seem to really fit anywhere. I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of a prince of Hyrule — not to take the role from Zelda, but as an addition in the narrative. And we know of at least one prince in the canon. I decided to add the role of prince and stick my leftover OC there. It now means he’s the brother of his canon wife, but eh, they’re really cute as siblings.

I’ve got heaps of lore about what the addition of a prince does to the BotW/TotK narrative, but the only detail you need to understand this art is the fact that Cooper (OC I’ve drawn here and been yapping about) is very proficient with magic and his magic aligns with the elemental dragons Farosh, Dinraal, and Naydra. He can use Lightning, Fire, and water/ice magic in a few different ways. Here he’s just using lightning magic for a nice AoE type of attack in Farosh’s domain of Faron. Not sure what he’s attacking. Didn’t think that far ahead. 😂

I might yap more about this AU in the future. It’s one of several Zelda related things that are currently rotting my brain, so there’s plenty to yap about. 😅

[bigandsoft]

This is just a frustration vent related to my artwork and growth as an artist so don’t feel obligated to read unless you want to! Its not that interesting, I just had to throw the words out into the void somewhere to help my mental state

I feel like lately I’ve been really struggling to grow as an artist as well as my socials kind of stagnating. I know there’s no sure fire way to fix either of those issues (keep drawing and keep posting) but it’s definitely disheartening at times. I do draw for myself, like I definitely haven’t really drawn much that I didn’t actually want to draw, but I also know what (most) people like in this community so it’s very easy to play that up in my art.

Definitely just having a very bad case of “comparing yourself to others” situation right now. Not to out my wife or anything but they are WILDLY more popular than I am in terms of interactions such as likes/reblogs as well as followers. We both started our accounts at around the same time, and I am SO so happy of the growth they’ve had, I love to see the new stuff she’s creating as well as how many people enjoy it enough to throw a like or reblog at it. She has an amazing style that you can clock from a mile away, does wonderful work with colors and posing, and every time they experiment with new techniques it just always comes out looking so cool. I truly cannot praise their skill enough and getting to see their success and how much they enjoy what they create just makes me fall so much deeper in love with her ❤️

Looking at my accounts though, I’ve got maybe a third of the followers (less on sites like bsky and fur affinity) and struggle to get more than 20 notes on my own without a reblog from them or rarely, another more popular artist. I know that my style isn’t nearly as fleshed out as theirs and that I’m not as experimental (I’ve been working on that lately) but I’m really trying. And evidently I’m just not very good right now at handling the hard truth that I’m not as skilled as them and so many other artists I look up to. I can see how much I’ve improved in the past year and a half I’ve been doing this but I’m dipping hard back into the opinion that it’s not enough.

Yes, I draw for myself, and I have fun with what I’m drawing. 90% of the time I’m so happy with how my recent works have come out, and I’m like “Yea, this looks so good, surely other people will think so too!”

And then I get, maybe 10 notes. I already don’t have much of an ego but this really kills everything I have left.

This is not even mentioning the money part of things since I would love to be able to make some money on the side off of my artwork since it’s literally what my college degree is in !! I do have a stable job but it is absolutely a “barely scraping by” salary. I’m in my job for the stable hours, benefits, and people I interact with, not the pay. So being able to take on commissions and draw things for others that I also enjoy drawing? Sounds like an amazing gig to help bring in more money.

Can’t really do that unless people like my stuff! And I can’t explain how appreciative I am of everyone who has been along with me on this ride so far, I love every single one of you SO much and this is not me trying to be unappreciative towards my current followers. Purely this is just about the potential growth I could have, but am not getting.

Long story short, all of this is frustration with myself because nobody has done anything wrong. I don’t have an easily identifiable style, I don’t focus on drawing one gender over the other (I feel like this could really be hurting me since a lot of gay men don’t want to look at women art and vice versa), and I’m in a furry subcommunity that is growing, but is still niche to some degree.

To the 3 or 4 people who see this and the 1 or 2 out of that who read this - I see you, I love you, and I’ll be fine. I just wish things were easier.

[verdeltiathedead]

[ORIGINAL CHARACTER] LYNN MASTERPOST

Lynn was a band director at a high school of a variety of people. She died there protecting one of the students, and to her surprise, she woke back up as a robotic version of herself with new abilities. She plays the trumpet professionally, and often played in marching band.

MORE REFS, STORY AND LINKED POSTS UNDER THE CUT

["""Summary""" of backstory here] [Original post about her here](Warning for school fights/kinda bullying, death and shootings) [Scuffed height chart 1(Feat. Ephesite, Claire, Mal, Hammer, Sine] [Cleaner height chart here!!!!(Ft. Ephesite, Avarey, Cordel, Claire, Mal, Sine, Starshow)]

[Random post 1] [Doodles 1] [Doodles 2(Traditional)] [First ref update(Given longer hair)] [Reblog(Tags: "#if someone kissed her would noise come out of the trumpet tail")] [Reblog(Lynn being patted)] [First ref redraw(Ref 2)] [Random post 2(Girl who cares so much it makes her sick)] [Doodles 3(Feat. Claire)(Blood/Sketchy mechanical gore warning)] [Random post 3(Single doodle)] [Ref 2 edit] [Random post 4(Cropped doodle)] [Wrapped askgame drawing(Wonderland)] [Random post 5(Suit doodle)] [Random post 6(Whiteboard doodle)] [Random post 7(Suit ref wip)] [Doodles 4(Feat. Mal)] [Litter(Lynn Critter)] [Fanart by @/fishbone5] [Doodles 5(Warnings in post/Under readmore)] [Artpiece "Black Hole Sun"] [Doodles 6(Feat. Mal)] [Animation 1(Feat. Mal)] [Artpiece/Doodle "Feels Wrong"(Mechanical internals/mildly medical)] [Doodle thingie uhh] [Doodles 7(ft. Claire, Chastity)] [Doodles 8(Focus on Mal)] [Ref redraw(Ref 3)] [Doodles 9(ft. Chastity)] [

(All posts above in (somewhat)order of being posted)

(Btw you may see an oc named Chastity mentioned above, she is my friends oc and not my own.)

(Also warning for below for referenced forgetfulness/memory loss (though i will try to keep most points about that at the very bottom))

LYNN STACCATO

She/her, female

6 feet tall(182.88 cm)

Serious at times, often tired, sometimes anxious though it doesn't show often.

Usually struggles to express herself and often hides anything negative she feels. Will care about others and want to hear how they feel, though.

Earlier in life she was extremely uncomfortable with being touched, but after a while, she wasn't as uncomfortable(though still preferred not to be touched), and as she grew closer to her friends she started to want it just a little. Though even then, she wasn't really used to any kind of touch that wasn't a result of fighting and combat.

Somewhat okay at actual combat, not the best with technique, often uses weapons but doesn't always use them in their intended way, also tends to use anything she can get her hands on as a weapon.

Trumpet bell tail only sometimes appears. It can make noise when Lynn is surprised/only makes noise involuntarily.

Eyes change color depending on emotion or feeling.

(From left to right: [Being upset, discomfort, pain]: Sickly green irises akin to a storm with solid black pupils. || [Extreme rage, feeling hopeless]: No pupils, iris akin to a black hole. || [Irritated, annoyed, slightly angry]: Darker red/pink irises, with solar eclipse pupils with a slash through them. || [Neutral]: Orange-yellow irises with solar eclipse pupils || [Anxiety, fear, uneasiness]: Dark blue/purple like a night sky with solid white pupils. || [Happiness, embarrassment, flustered]: Sky blue with solid white pupils.)(Don't mind the old hair, btw! Eyes are still the same)

The colors of her eyes transition between each other like the sky changes, such as if her eyes go from neutral to happy or somewhere in-between, it'll be like a sunrise to daytime, or if she's in some pain, it'll be like a storm starting to form.

Her android body is able to "summon"/create weapons made of brass out of the air, and float them through the air.

Overwhelming emotions, overexertion, and serious bodily harm can cause Lynn to "pass out", or moreso completely shut down/restart for a short period of time.

Her favorite season is summer, and she prefers warm temperatures. She hates the cold.

She often sleeps with multiple layers of blankets, especially during colder seasons or weather.

Though, she often struggles with sleep, sometimes not sleeping at all on some nights. When she can't sleep, she tries to do something in the meantime, like practicing new songs or planning things out.

She isn't opposed to wearing dresses, but doesn't usually wear them.

She also prefers to cover as much of her skin as possible, and always wears gloves, usually because she tends to pick at her skin or at any scars she has(usually around her wrists and on her hands)

She doesn't know much about lgbt+ things and their terms(though is still supportive), but she's likely on the aro and/or ace spectrum, and prefers women more or entirely(though not all entirely interesting in dating at all, only has once with another girl and it wasn't for long due to how she wasn't very keen on touch at the time).

She likes caramel candy, watermelon, lemon(and generally sour flavors) and dark chocolates

She can handle spice, but it isn't her favorite thing.

She doesn't mind if you put pineapples or other types of fruit on pizza, but it's not one of her favorite. She'd prefer pepperoni and mushrooms.

She'd be the type to have the most neutral expression during an intense theme park ride and wouldn't scream. Internally, she'd freak out a little, though.

She has a slight fear of fire, often feeling rather uneasy thinking about it.

She brushes her hair often, but doesn't use an excessive amount of products for it(and probably uses even less considering her hair is no longer organic).

She can sometimes be a bit forgetful about her past, having forgotten some songs she used to play and some people she used to know, and doesn't remember anything about her parents besides how they didn't seem to care that much about her.

She can be very intense about the timing and rhythm of things, in and outside of music. She always tries to be on time for events, and do things in a certain rhythm, and if it doesn't go in an exact way she tends to feel rather uncomfortable about it, sometimes even worse if she was already not doing well.

And even when playing, she always tries to get perfect at anything she practices, doing things over and over and over until she can get it, and tends to get rather upset if she starts to struggle at certain things, especially things like rhythm and timing.

And more with music, she tends to count and tap her foot to herself if stressed in any way, trying to focus.