#pulling up with another redraw from 2023

[disorganizedguts]

winter

[dark-overlord-of-rainbows]

Drawn Apr 30 2023 I reused a bunch of my old character designs and some adopt I and my friend had never used to throw in this universe so I was redrawing some characters I haven't touched in so, so long... Not all of them, also idk why some are cut off like that? this is an old edit If you've attacked me on artfight before there's a chance you've seen a couple of these before I remember some of the ways I was trying to vary their looks but man so many of them have soft faces and big round ears.. I guess I still default to that but I've been trying to work on it a bit more since... still not perfect but y'know To be fairer to myself from back then though, this might've been my first time trying to vary the shape of the ears of a bunch of characters that weren't splatoon characters (Splatoon was actually indirectly the reason for me starting? More specifically: Because I was drawing splatoon characters during artfight, I noticed how differently people were doing their ears, and so I practiced varying my own characters ears with my cephalopods first based on the different styles I saw) and this is also missing quite a few of the other characters that I had done here, some of whom I did branch out a little more. And to be clear! I think there is some stuff I did well and can pull from again, I'm just not as proud as I once was. Anyway I'll talk about the parts I do remember since I was playing with style here

The one at the with the grey/purple eyes at the top, I don't think I had ever really used a palette like that. Sometimes I want to give a character eyes that - depending on the lighting - looks different colours (some people have this irl, people with eyes that are ambiguously gray/blue/green for example), so I was kinda wondering if making it like a gradient (that'd change which colour is more dominant) would work as one way of representing that? with another character (different universe) I've also tried making the eye one colour and putting the shine of the eye as a different colour instead of the white that everyone else got (it was also done a little different) With the character here just an ambiguous, in-between grey/purple would work (although if I'd done that I'd totally have forgotten my intention with them because I was so bad at writing this crap down.) but the other one I mentioned it wouldn't work because it was supposed to go between blue and red, and if I just did an inbetween colour... well, that's just purple. I didn't want it to be purple. ever. Liam up there (second from top, brown hair) is drawn with my right (non-dominant) hand (Sorry yes I'm one of those left-handed weirdos...) I wanted this cast to be a little more whimsical~ As an aside it is always very funny seeing people talk about challenges drawing with the non-dominant hand and refer to it as a "left hand drawing challenge". Lefties winning The blond with the hazel eyes, well, I kinda just realized I've never given any characters hazel eyes (amber as well). I was trying something else with the eyes there since they're the only one with that.... it kinda looks like a chip out of the iris? it's not the shine but it looks like how some artists do the shine out of the eye. not sure They were also an adopt I never used. The lower orange haired one's the only one without the outer outline for the eyes as well... With Ciara (lower right, red hair) and Aaron (her brother, not pictured) I'm not sure if I was specifically going for sectoral heterochromia with them? I've drawn Eliza before with yellow, albeit human not cat-like eyes before, but this is technically a return to form for her I can't remember what I was thinking with anyone else. did not realize I'd be mostly talking about eyes here either Liam, Ciara, Aaron, & the orange-haired girl at the bottom are co-owned by a friend

[kingdomkeykitsune]

KHOC WEEK 2023 DAY 4: ALTERNATE UNIVERSE

Alright, so, Day 4 of @khoc-week ! Old af art, I didn't have time to redraw it, but the outfit designs hold up!

I had a plethora of choices for AUs with Kimbri, I've come up with a fair few over the years, but I decided to pull out an old favorite, my untitled Modern Fantasy Slice of Life AU! You might remember this setting from... I think it was Year 3? I posted a drabble about Vanitas vs The Gremlin at Exhaustion Departure, the coffee shop. Well Kimbri just so happens to work at Merlin's Books right next door in this AU! It's a magical place that holds WAY more books than it should be able to, while also playing host to it's own resident magical creatures, in this case mostly colorful pixies who live in birdhouses around the store! They're definitely a bit better off in this regard than their neighbors, lol. Other members of the staff include Merlin himself, Ienzo, another OC of mine, Lena, handyman Cid, who also owns his own garage down the street, and part-timers Pence and Olette.

Below the cut find a drabble I wrote set in this AU. Enjoy some warm, fuzzy goodness in:

Sweater Weather

Ienzo frowned as another strong gust of wind rattled the windows of the overstocked book store, causing the resident pixies to scatter back to their little houses. Judging by the drafts it caused, it was high time Merlin got the windows resealed, though he remembered thinking something similar around this time last year. Sighing, he tried to return his attention to the inventory sheets in front of him, trying not to shiver as a draft blew down his neck.

A few moments later the bell over the door rang, signaling someone's arrival, but he paid it no mind, knowing that if whoever it was needed help they'd come to the counter to get him. A moment later he regretted his decision not to look up when the only warning he got before his vision was completely eclipsed by something fuzzy and purple was the smell of salted caramel and espresso, the hallmarks of Kimbri's favorite drink from Exhaustion Departure. As he sputtered, startled, and fought his way out of his warm, lavender and vanilla scented prison he could hear his coworker and foster sibling giggling mischievously. Eventually he managed to pull the soft turtleneck over his head and turned to glare at the girl next to him in irritated confusion.

"Kimbri, what on earth possessed you to do that?"

"You looked cold." She shrugged with a grin. "Besides, I bought that for you, you always forget to bring a sweater when it first starts getting actually cold. I saw that the last time I went to the thrift store and it was just your size. Don't worry, I washed it twice before I brought it to you." 

Ienzo looked down at the purple sweater with an almost perplexed expression before finally pulling it the rest of the way on.

"Thank you Kimbri, I really appreciate it." He said once it was properly adjusted.

"No problem, what's family for?" Kimbri smiled again and took a sip of her drink. "Now let's have a look at these inventory sheets..."