#really wanted to focus more on the drawing and rendering of the figure rather than include clutter of objects though it does feel a bit bar

[azolitmin]

[anonymooose]

==== Spoilers for Delicious in Dungeon/Dungeon Meshi! ====

Ok, so, I randomly saw a post by @corvidonia about Falin!Hypnos.

So, I thought to myself, y'know I just started watching too and this seems like a fun mini-project so I started it. Then I subsequently got way too into it and accidently made a whole rendered scene and au concept... welp! It's here now!

For this little crossover Au whatever you wanna call it I did this main drawing but also came up with a bit of background stuff.

In this Meg would be a tall-man paladin in a sort of Chilchuck situation where she's mostly here because it's her job (and bonus, Dusa's here) and she'd be a paladin. Paladin might be an odd choice (?) but I felt it made sense due to her dedication and none of the other martial classes really stuck out to me like paladin.

Zagreus would be the party's Laios of sorts and a fighter tall-man, I imagine that the reason why they went through all the trouble for Hypnos is 50% Zagreus being friends with him and 49% Than not wanting his brother dead and 1% pity. I don't know if there would still be the culinary focus in this Au, probably not, so maybe instead it'd be more about just general monster knowledge. Like Zag and the gang filling out the codex?

Dusa would be a Half-foot, probably the farthest from their Dungeon Meshi inspo character, Senshi, only really sharing the fact that they came into the party late. I imagine that she's kind of in an "I'm the only monster around that has any sentience or emotion??" type situation though I don't really have a worked out reason why. She's also friends with Meg prior to joining and comes because of her.

I translated Thanatos and Hypnos' godhood into having a particular magical ability as elves, so they're elf twins. Than being a sorcerer rouge mostly for the vibes but also because sorcerer powers are innate to their being. Instead of a wand/staff I think he'd just use his scythe as a casting focus. I figure he'd be sort of like a mix of Chilchuck and Marcille, not bound to the party by a job but still kind of obligated to help Hypnos since they're family and all. I don't think he'd be thrilled about having to risk his life to save Hypnos from another screw up though, but he would and I do think he'd be relieved to have him back after the ordeal. (does Falin ever actually 100% come back? I've only watched the anime so idk actually, I like to think Hypnos would here though because I like my happy endings)

Hypnos is obviously the sort of Falin stand-in, but in a very different way I think. I do think he'd be a sort of magic prodigy like Falin but in more of an intuitive way compared to Than/Marcille's book smarts. I definitely think that the connection to the strange would remain but instead of ghosts it'd be personified dreams in the form of something like the Oneiroi. In this Au the starting incident with the monster would be the same but it'd probably be some sort of big bird/sheep to explain the bird/sheep design I went with for the Chimera design and it'd be Than in place of Laios. I also think that he'd be a cleric type situation like Falin sort of is, I like to think he'd excel at healing magic. I do kind of like the idea of Hypnos not being really encouraged to partake in adventuring due to his lack of physical ability but he'd go against that to spend time with Than and try to look out for him. As for Chimeros (As I've been calling it) I think it'd be accompanied by fog from Lethe rather than the harpies in the original and it'd have a similarly blank personality like Faligon (which'd be especially off-putting from him). Added angst potential, I figure his powerset would be very different from Faligon's and revolve around putting everyone to sleep (go figure) and memory erasure, so maybe the main party wouldn't even remember their first encounter with them?

I do actually have ideas for the remaining party, I'll keep it to one bullet though. I think Achille's would be a paladin/fighter or something like that and would be similar to Namari as a weapons expert, probably leaving for a different reason though maybe to join Pat's party? I don't have a particular idea for Shuro's stand-in, maybe switch the Shuro Falin romance thing to Charon Hypnos brotherhood thing and it could work? Idk though.

I did also make a full design for Hypnos as an elf/not Chimeros and here that is. The staff is inspired by actual myth where Hypnos sometimes has a wand dipped in Lethe to induce sleep.

Ramble over!! Congrats if you were able to push through my incessant yapping to actually get here. First Tumblr post btw, who would've thunk it'd be for this. If anyone is interested in using these designs or ideas for art/writing feel free, I'm probably not going to do anything else with this idea but if you want to I'd be very interested in seeing/hearing it! Also, really sorry if this isn't properly spoilered?? I'm not exactly sure what the proper spoiler etiquette is so I tried.

[inspiteofganon]

@bloobluebloo replied to your post “does anyone else play "does the artist think...”:

I play a broader game of "does the artist actually appreciate the character" because, as you mention, there are traits an artist might give him that may seem undesirable to me but are desirable to the artist in question. There are certain kinks and tropes that some people really like (for example, those people that really are into draw very large very well defined muscles which admittedly, not my thing) and a lot of those people also really like Ganondorf. Anyways the only time I really see Ganondorf draw in an "ugly" way imo is if the purpose of his portrayal is to show him being a threat or menace because ugly = evil. I find this is reflected in the way many people's initial reaction to wanting or desiring a Ganondorf with more character development was "you just want that because you think he's hot"

​That's the idea! And that's why trying to sus out context is such a big part of it when getting more specific than that (the game is rendered mostly over if the artist comes out and says their opinion on his looks, or does something obvious like selfship with him). Usually I don't have enough of a sample size-- especially for artworks where not a lot is happening-- to determine a more certain "hot or not?" It's easier to determine if the artist may struggle with him, or find him uncool, what features they try and bring out or minimize when depicting him... Ganondorf has such a distinct look about him that he varies a lot when people draw him because it's honestly kind of hard to capture, which is part of the fun of the game.

Plenty of times one isn't actively trying to make Ganondorf ugly-- he is a fit and well-dressed fellow with a cool visage-- but even if all the "handsome" ingredients are there... it just won't combine into the right vibe. Heck, even if a work is pornographic and Ganondorf is a key figure, the piece can still radiate major "doesn't really find him attractive" vibes! (this usually being result of him either just being there as a vehicle for an act rather than a facet of the big picture to be oogled, or looking so off-model he basically becomes an OC) "Finding Ganondorf hot" is a wide spectrum, so in playing this game I gotta be mindful that yes indeed... the artist might simply be into things I'm not.

A lot of people seem to just be trying to make him recognizable at all. Like "OK, here's Ganondorf", and they succeed well enough. It's a harder game outside of art that's longform sequential or shippy. He's not a common focus with depth, sadly.

I hesitate to give any contemporary examples of Ganondorfs I could clock as "artist probably thinks he's on the ugly side" in public since I don't wanna make any online artists who're up and around offended (though it's not a game I play to be mean), so I'll pull a few vintage 'Dorfs from History of Hyrule's library to give everyone a brief session of the game. This one's easy.

At a glance of these three... which artist probably found Ganondorf the most appealing?

[catprinx]

I know art is all about practice and trying out new things and not being afraid of using references, but do you have any advice for newer artists about areas to focus time on? Especially for learning digital art/colouring? I've always loved your art style so any advice you have would be valuable.

hi anon!!! Thank you for the kind words :)

There's no one good answer to this because art is about a lot of things. So rather than give you clear-cut actionable items to do, like a checklist, I'll just write down my own philosophies about art exploration. I've also been thinking a lot about this in terms of my own improvement.

(Also for everyone reading this I am by NO MEANS a teacher so take everything I say with a grain of salt. I'm simply someone that just enjoys thinking about art)

I think art is a lot about the combination of technical skill + visual language + concept.

Practicing technical skill, as you said, involves using reference and doing studies. I think an important thing to remember is you need to know what you're trying to learn. Here's a good example the former is a traditional still life of grapes, the artist probably intended to make a piece with a good composition and an impressive rendering technique. While the latter is definitely more of a value/color study. I'm certain this artist could have gone into detail rendering those grapes but being realistic isn't their intention/style. So when you're doing your studies I think simply asking "what do I want to work on?/what am I trying to communicate" can be helpful.

If your goal is working on color specifically I think it would be important to practice values, hues, and temperature control. Those things are the basis of color and after that you can play with more stylistic color. In the end my advice is to do a lot of studies, and look at a lot of art! Doing these studies digitally is just a matter or practicing and familiarizing yourself with the art programs (it takes time). If you have an artist you like you can probably look at their work and breakdown what you like about it. For example the narumitsu art I was working on here is kind of a study of @/rei_17's art (from twitter). I love her use of non-local colors and colors that are very close in value but the depth comes from the hue/temperature shifts in color. It's so masterful to me!!! So, now that I know what I'm looking at it becomes easier to break down and put it into practice for my own art.

Visual language usually refers to "style". To me, it can mean a lot of different things but for the sake of this long ass text post let's say it's just about "art style". My tip is to...copy! Copy what you like and figure out what it is you like about it. I feel like your hand will guide you towards your own art style in the end. I don't view myself as someone with a particularly interesting or unique art style but I can breakdown my influences a little. I'm someone who grew up with anime/shoujo influence but also copied a lot of popular tumblr styles back in the day lmao. I want my anatomy to "feel" correct even though it's rarely realistic and I don't really exaggerate form too much because I don't have a preference for it. I'm someone who values drawing speed and clarity of form over details. And all those things added up are the reasons I draw like I do. You can totally make a style by more intentionally riffing off others, and you can also develop a style just by doing your own thing. Your art will always have an identity of its own even if you don't know it at the time!!!

Concept is just your idea/intentions/narrative etc. I really think concept can be anything you want. Some people can go really in-depth with their concept with studying and research and etc, and other people can make something visually interesting simply by going "I want to draw a cute girl". Everyone is different! I wouldn't take concept advice from me personally because I don't make original illustrations. Fanart is easier to work with because usually you're interpreting someone's existing narrative and you can churn out something cool from that. Maybe my advice is draw more fanart???

[crispycreambacon]

I thought I'd share the sketch of this poster/book cover as well as my initial concepts! You can click the "Read More" button for more in-depth explanations on my design process.

Thhis is all for my latest fanfiction, Snip Snip, so if you'd like to check that out, then...

Now let's crack in!

For the release of "Snip Snip", I actually had several different directions in mind! One was a comic of one of the scenes from the fanfic—specifically the one where the Professor breaks down in front of Kate and Joyce with the line "I don't like being a woman"—and the other was a series of doodles showing the Professor's transition. Unfortunately, both directions met dead ends as I couldn't find the motivation to do either. The most progress I made were these sketches.

If you're wondering, "The first one looks familiar..." that's because I reused that pose for my first promo art! It was too good of a pose. I couldn't waste it :P

But anyways, after a period of getting extremely frustrated over the lack of progress, I realized my main problem: I was biting off more than I could chew. I didn't know this at the time, but I was dealing with burnout from school assignments that made drawing more ambitious ideas like the ones I had very difficult. Hence, I had to scale it down. It made me think, "Why not do something like a movie poster or a book cover?"

That's how the sketches at the top of the post came to be! I consulted a friend of mine over which pose to choose, and he picked the third one which I understand why so. The obscuring of the Professor's face not only made it cool, but it adds symbolism in how we don't really see his true identity—the real him—until his transition. Here's the first sketch!

As you can see, the title is on the top left corner! However, I moved it to the bottom for two reasons

It's advice I learnt while looking up how to make movie posters since moving the title to the bottom tends to bring more focus to the illustration above.

I couldn't find a font that fits! And the idea of doing typography again (especially after the Keep Yourself Safe poster...) was really not what I signed up for.

But then it left the problem of the top corner looking empty. It was too distracting! So what did I fill it in with? The subtitle: This is their story. The composition is now more balanced, and also the subtitle tickles me.

As I said before, I looked up movie posters for this! Special thanks to the Nashville Film Institute and Muse by Clio for their articles that guided me during this poster making process. I will say though I got really sidetracked watching Filmmaker IQ's The History of the Hollywood Movie Poster 😭 It's really interesting, I'd recommend watching it!

One thing I learnt is that movie posters limit their colour palettes. Of course, this is good advice for art in general, but movie posters emphasize on its colour usage to attract the audience with their simple yet bold schemes. It is a piece of advertisement after all! Following their footsteps, I limited my colours to the primary colours (red, yellow, blue) and purple to make the scissors pop and allude to the nonbinary flag colour scheme.

And from there, it was just a matter of experimenting with rendering! I wanted a mix of pop art and storybook illustrations, so I mixed lineart with lineless, and I wanted to retain the energy of the sketch while still polishing it, so I cleaned the sketch, merged it with the colours, and painted on top of it rather than make a separate lineart layer.

Overall, I'm extremly proud of the end result! The struggle of figuring out the promo art for this fic has been tormenting me since the beginning of the year, so I'm glad to bring it to an end. Thank you for reading my ramblings! I hope you learnt something or at least had fun? Either way, have a good day!!

[yuribait]

claire from the start of the year vs end btw. :)

i think ive improved a lot but on small things... i think im better at drawing bodies + have a better understanding of where things go when i draw a person(/whatever)... i think the way i draw faces is better but i really need to improve on how to draw mouths + different expressions its something i dont have a good understanding on. i dont think ive improved much with colours which is another weak point of mine that i struggle with a lot. i think my lines look more confident and purposeful and i think im better at at least trying to draw things im not confident in rather than avoiding it or drawing around it as a copout. umm what else... i feel like ive gotten better at drawing hair. realising i much more enjoy making it look more realistic + that i enjoy my art looking more realistic (comparatively) in general so i want to work on that but also work on exaggerating shapes and poses and lines etc. etc.

some things i want to try and focus on next year... that stuff i already mentioned ofcourse but also really need to buckle down and focus on learning to use colour better. i want to figure out a colouring style i enjoy more as well bc i dont really enjoy the way i do it Or how it looks rn. i also want to try drawing different perspectives and more interesting looking + dynamic poses and art pieces in general. id also like to start focusing on drawing things that arent just characters as i would enjoy being able to do things like backgrounds props scenes etc. sometimes. i also really need to figure out how to draw multiple characters interacting + touching etc. and how to make it look natural/good bc it always looks stiff and awkward

i would also love to try drawing with different styles and methods (ie painting/rendering things sometimes stuff like that) bc the times i do try out different styles i enjoy it :) i need to do style studies. i also need to look at some tutorials or whatever for different digital art methods like painting which i dont really enjoy bc i can never seem to find any that i like

and i need to remember to have fun with it... i always end up trying to draw so people will think its good rather than because im enjoying it and i really need to focus on that again. and i want to draw More which i say all the time but i really do as ive said i dont draw much more than gets posted but even if i do sketches or practice more often would mean a lot to me. i really have in the last little while been much more motivated to actually start creating some of my stories that i have and while i think im still a long way away from being in a position where i would feel confident starting i want to start doing things that are pushing me in the right direction and alot of this here is doing that (along with practice writing and stuff but thats a big different thing). well i dont know what else to say. goodbye

[animation-practice-aru]

WEEKS FOUR, FIVE AND SIX

CREATING THE NOVEL

I started off my novel by sketching, I always found it easier to figure out my ideas traditionally rather than digitally. I figured out my panels pretty quickly. I had done a 20 page long comic for my final major project in foundation year so I already had some experience in making graphic novels and similar. I also read a lot of manga. One element I incorporated into most panels was the characters or objects breaking out of the panels, especially when the characters were in motion, such as running, as I felt it made them stand out more. I was initially concerned that the character jumped out of the panels too often and that it would be overwhelming for the viewer so one of the pages didn't have this. Though this disrupted the flow I had established with the characters jumping out of frame on every page but one. Because of this I decided to keep my characters out of frame for every page.

Sketching the initial pages has been my favourite part of the process, it made me debate doing my entire novel traditionally. I stick pretty heavily to digital art, its the medium I've used predominately for upwards of 5 years and so I'm really comfortable with it. Had this project been longer, I likely would have done it traditionally however for the time we had I decided digital was the most time effective method as I could edit my pieces easier. If I messed up traditionally I likely wouldn't have the time to re-do it. I did do my medium tests on paper though. I tried coloured pencil, chalk pastels and gouache. I made the backgrounds dark, even still it felt like my characters clashed with the background.

During a lecture, it was pointed out how sometimes the background is painted while the characters are done in simple block colours. I wanted to do that, I had the backgrounds be fully rendered in detail whereas the characters were in flat colours with little shading.

I drew directly over my sketches to create the line art. I made the line art red and slightly opaque to make the characters seem softer. This gave the effect of my characters being big blocks of solid colour helping them stand out.

In the end i opted for no dialogue. One, because the other character isn't human and therefore couldn't respond and two because of my time period. In my time period, stone age, humans didn't communicate with words and a spoken language didn't seem to fit at all.

I was really happy with how the initial sketches came out and I liked the way my digital renditions developed them. I wasn’t really good at backgrounds, so it was a challenge to have fully rendered backgrounds when I wasn’t used to drawing them. However I’m actually pretty proud of how the backgrounds came out. I based the cat on my own, I had a lot of references I could use for the cat because of this. I incorporated my cat also because in the beginning, I really struggled to come up with a story. I was advised to focus on something happening in my real life to draw (pun intended) inspiration from. At that time, I missed my cat a lot. This is what gave me the idea to focus on a cat in my novel. I based the cats behaviours on my own cats behaviour. I think drawing with her in mind put more love into my novel.

[trothplighted]

I’m actually willing to believe this if only because it explains and answers why there’s a “thunderbird” in the film, and why that “thunderbird” has… basically none of the iconography or powers of an actual thunderbird. Rowling isn’t above appropriating from other cultures and misrepresenting them, but she usually draws on things that are to some degree correct or accurate before flattening them into caricatures or shallow renderings. The kirin/qilin in FB3 is a really good example of this - it’s a real mythological creature whose function in stories is similar to this “choose the leader” purpose it serves here (anyone who’s read or watched The Twelve Kingdoms can speak to this) but it’s rendered in a very basic way with none of the richness or significance that comes with an authentic representation. But that “thunderbird”…

(now I want to make it clear that I’d still be mad if it were accurate. that’s a real religious figure from an active but oppressed spiritual practice observed by people who have seen enough shit and don’t need more of it. it’s not my own god nor in my people’s traditional beliefs but it’s in my extended cultural family’s beliefs and I’d like her to cut that shit out. its inaccuracies actually make me more tolerant of its presence here, because I can pretend real hard that it’s some kind of magical animal that settlers THINK is a thunderbird.)

This is also an excellent explanation for why the story is about the hunt for the “thunderbird” at all, rather than being about the things Joanne would presumably be more interested in given her focus in the broader Wizarding World stories - Muggle extremism leading to increased prejudice against wizards and political strife on both sides, a protagonist having to find and save the kind of morally grey magical child figure she became intrigued by in the last two books (there’s a lot of Merope and Ariana and Helena Ravenclaw in Credence, which she of course builds on by making him Aberforth’s secret I Can’t Believe It’s Not Incest baby later on), etc. I’ve felt for years that the Beast in the Fantastic Beasts films barely mattered outside movie 1, and now I think I have an answer as to why.

I've seen a theory floating around that the Fantastic Beasts film was repurposed from a scrapped Doctor Who movie script and I was curious for your take.

In the early 2010s, there were plans for a Doctor Who film to expand the franchise, offering a fresh entry point new fans with focuse on courting an American audience. David Yates was in talks to direct or produce, and the Eleventh Doctor’s planned encounter with the Master was saved for the movie. However, the project fell apart due to Matt Smith’s early departure, Steven Moffat’s workload (Doctor Who, Sherlock, & Tintin), and declining interest from the BBC. Instead, Doctor Who marked its 50th anniversary with a feature-length special.

Enter Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Despite being credited as the sole writer, J.K. Rowling had no screenwriting experience. At the time, she was focused on her detective novels, while Yates played a major role in Fantastic Beasts’ unusually fast development. The film’s protagonist—a quirky, pacifist British traveler with a bigger-on-the-inside case, a love for strange creatures, and two companions—closely resembles Doctor Who. The villain even has a transformed face.

It seems likely that Yates repurposed the abandoned Doctor Who script, handing it to Rowling to rework as a Harry Potter spinoff. While the first Fantastic Beasts had some structure, the sequels—written solely by Rowling—were poorly received, probably due to her lack of screenwriting experience.

Obviously there is no way to know for sure, but this theory honestly holds up for me. The dates line up. The studio politics line up. David Yates is there both times. According to Karen Gillian, Johnny Depp was attached to the Doctor Who movie - and if he *stayed* attached as it was retooled into Fantastic Beasts, that would help explain what is easily the most baffling casting decision in the whole franchise. Even people who liked Fantastic Beasts thought Johnny Depp was a bizarre Grindelwald. It is so obviously a role that wants a Colin Farrell or a Mads Mikkelsen.

Jacob is also SUCH a Doctor Who companion - normal guy, dead end job, swept away into magical adventures. He's really not a very JKR-ish character because... well... she doesn't write sympathetic muggles. Her muggle characters are villains, ridiculous (or both.) Or else exist totally off-page. Her most sympathetic muggle character is probably Frank Bryce - who is bad tempered, crotchety, and not very interesting. This is honestly kind of a structural problem: if your villain's main point is "wizards are better than muggles," I think you'd want to prove him wrong by writing muggle characters who don't suck.

But Doctor Who loves a normie protagonist who teaches the Doctor an important lesson about community, or responsibility, or love. That is 100% Jacob. There are also elements of Fantastic Beasts 1 that feel... pretty tonally off for a Harry Potter movie? I'm thinking specifically of the Death Cell execution room. That whole scene - the way it's designed and shot - it's all extremely horror movie. That's fine for Doctor Who, which has always had horror DNA. But Harry Potter doesn't. It also doesn't really make sense as a sanctioned government execution room, it makes sense as the sort of creepy, uncanny trap the Master would put the Doctor in. If Universal developed cool/expensive assets for Doctor Who, I think it's totally possible that they would be motivated to recycle them into Fantastic Beasts.

It also explains why Fantastic Beasts 2 (which would have been JKR's original work) immediately un-does a lot of the plot elements from Fantastic Beasts 1. The bittersweet moment of Jacob losing the memories of his adventure, but keeping his unlocked creativity and hope, that's such a Doctor Who ending. So is that moral-quandary moment of 'is there a way to stop this monster, who is both an danger to others and an innocent, without destroying it.' But in Fantastic Beasts 2, within the first ten minutes Jacob has his memory back and we hear that Credence is fine. Also... Jacob gets a wand in Fantastic Beasts 3. And it's not a "real wand" or whatever... but like, if the series continued, it was going to do something. (Because JKR doesn't like writing muggle protagonists.)

I will also say that in Fantastic Beasts 1 - information is delivered visually, film language is better understood, it has a good sense of its own scope. It's a filmmaker's movie, while Fantastic Beasts 2 is a writer's movie. It's got a million characters, tons of scenes of characters in a room or hallway just *talking* to each other (which is less interesting to watch than it is to read.) Important plot beats are delivered through monologs or extended flashback sequences. The pacing is much, much worse. The action sequences are much more confusing.

Okay. Fantastic Beats 1 could have been made out of assets originally developed for Doctor Who, and by some of the same creative team. Yeah. I see it.

[mi5018tomberry]

Photography 1

Here are the notes I took during the Photography lecture. In the past I've never been able to warm up to photography as a hobby so I've not learnt about the technical terms which I've used during Arnold rendering in Maya projects. I made sure to take notes about anything I needed to memorise and it was interesting to finally learn what all these terms meant and how they impacted your photography. It's important for me to study this because of the influence this knowledge has on capturing the right aesthetic for your animation as the mimicry of real photography results in more compelling animation.

This is the PRO photography setting my phone has which we used to learnt the impact these settings have in practise rather than just in note form.

I paired up with Harvie for my photography and these were some of the earlier photos we took. Adjusting the WB (White Balance) gave the effect of changing the images temperature so that's why some of the images above are blueish. Harvie managed to mess around with the focus on my face and blur the background which I need to figure out because blurring is as crucial as composition when it comes to draw focus to a certain part of the photo.

We messed around with the panorama effect on our phones to get some stupid photos and making a lot of mistakes along the way.

It was fun playing around with perspectives mainly because of the stupid results we got but I've always been drawn to images which incorporate foreshortening. It exaggerates the depth of an image and thus emphasises a sense of motion and intrigue within the photo like the image from Magnum force above. Forced perspective mixed with a dynamic pose helps push the leading lines in the image which elevates the image bringing it to life.

I decided to mess around with the shutter speed of the camera to try and create a motion echo of a speeding figure like the flash. I noticed that when increasing the shutter duration, it took in more light and thus the first two images in the studio room we used for the other photos were fully blown out. When attempting the long exposure images, the EV (Exposure Value) skyrocketed and went into the red on my phone so I realised that for this sort of photography you need to be able to control the lighting so we went to the Dragonframe room to try it out in a darker room. In all of the images of the Dragonframe room Harvie was walking across the room towards the camera but wasn't being picked up at all. We tried again with Harvie standing still for the full duration just to see if it would pick him up in this lighting and it worked.

We kept messing around with the phone torch to create these echoes images light a dementor or a ghost. Eventually we figured out that Harvie needed to stand still for a couple of seconds throughout the 30 second duration to properly pick up his face instead of the previous blurry mess. Finally just by changing the direction of the lighting of Harvie's phone torch we got the last image which, whilst its a mess, it looks really visually interesting.

For this module I need to keep experimenting with these settings to better come to grips with their impact on an image and how these settings can be manipulated for better results. I need to start thinking of how I want my camera footage to play its part in my final compositing project. I already know about shot composition and framing and creating leading lines within an image from storyboarding and drawing in general but figuring out the impact of these photography settings will hopefully end in a better final shot.

[alt-bluesman]

Animal Crossing memories, part 1

New Horizons was my first Animal Crossing game. I recently picked it back up after about 3 years of barely touching my Switch and got into it again. The floodgates of memories and nostalgia opened far and wide. Just like in 2020, the game came at the right moment for me (and many others), but for different reasons this time!

... then my enjoyment was abruptly cut short by the Joy-Con drift, lmao. I used the console for less than 700 hours in total (so not even a full month), diligently keeping it clean and shielding from any damage. All in vain! My left analog stick started showing signs of the dreaded drifting within half a year of first use and soon after it got so bad that it rendered any game pretty much unplayable.

So I did the thing. I sent my Joy-Cons all the way to Czechia for free repair (there is no official Nintendo distributor/representative in Poland). I'm glad this is still an option because it is honestly the only right thing to do after the whole Joy-Con blunder. I hope they don't replace the hardware with the same trash parts they used the first time!

While I'm waiting for the controllers to come back, I may as well go on a little trip down the memory lane, just for the heck of it. I went through my gallery and found out I have almost 300 screenshots, holy smokes. I'm usually not this eager to save screenshots or clips, but I'm so glad I did it! Now let's jump right into it and pay a short visit to the island of Pan!

I went into the game knowing almost nothing about it. But everybody was talkin' about it, playin' it & lovin' it, so I wanted in! The first moments were enchanting, I was completely unfamiliar with the rules and mechanics, so having to figure it all out on my own was very exciting. That's how I like to approach my games - the less I know, the better. It's funny to look back at all the newbie mistakes you made. Huh? Well then... it's certainly funny to me!

(I used to think that writing board posts affected the game and your villagers could somehow understand what you wrote!)

Katt & Mac were my starters. Not the worst, definitely not the best. Then all the bird villagers began moving in and I was fuming. With few exceptions (and penguins! I love penguins), I find AC birds to be rather boring and unappealing in appearance. And Pan was full of them. Pompom the duck promptly became the main recipient of my rage. Now cue the examples:

She really didn't have it easy on Pan, haha. Looking back on it though, it was all part of the fun! Some of my my most memorable moments were born this way! Made the game sorta challenging too because I wanted to move her out so bad. I also had no regards for island theme or aesthetics at that time, meaning when there was a bird house, there was fire, trash and barbed wire. And poop.

Later I bought a bunch of fakemiibos and kicked Pompom out with Rowan. I remember being frustrated out of my mind at all the birds, but then moving out villagers with cards became way too easy. I still regret buying so many of them, I think I will attempt to sell them except the absolute favourites. Focus on villager hunting as it makes them a lot more precious!

Oh I'm sure you won't, you poor thing. You know what's crazy? I don't hate Pompom at all anymore, I kinda developed some fondness for her after all the absolute mayhem I put her through. I wouldn't mind her coming back to my island. May we meet again in the future, Pompom... you moron!!

I have almost no recollection of visiting Harv's Photopia, but apparently I did that a lot! Least favourite villagers versus villagers I liked. And Katt that fell somewhere in the middle. She got stuck with cleaning after us, but at least didn't have to put up with ominous death threats while wearing dumb clothes.

Visiting and inviting friends was so much fun. Touring their islands, seeing their progress, drawing on boards, exchanging items or DIY recipes and sending letters are some of the best memories I have! The loading screens were abysmal & the lack of mini-games was rather disappointing, but I still got a lot of enjoyment out of the multiplayer despite its limits.

One of my favourite things to do is arranging the villagers' yards based on their style, personality and hobbies. Those are old and outdated examples, though my decorating skills are still very modest compared to all the pro players - it's absolutely amazing what some people can pull off in this game. But even then, it's another fun thing to do. What else do ya need!

(Getting that first lily of the valley was a big moment for me, came unexpectedly & took ages)

Kangaroos are my most beloved species in AC. Sylvia was my fave for a long time, but I believe that spot belongs to Kitt now! I got Kitt from another player and based on what they told me, she was well loved on their island. All the gifted clothes she came with are so darn cute - especially the red bow she likes to parade in. I know she's just a fictional animal, but man, I just love my Kitt. I wish other kangaroos such as Marcy, Koharu and Valise were still in the game.

(Naturally, nothing could have stopped me from ruining Kitt. Nintendo has since censored "feck" and it's no longer allowed. FECK)

"Fatass" didn't get that kind of treatment yet! It raised to the rank of the most popular catchphrase on Pan. Along with, regretfully, "ketchup".

(It's a moment of triumph whenever my deranged ideas get sprinkled on whatever they say & the results turn out like this)

I love New Horizons to bits, but I have to agree with one of the main criticisms it received - the dialogue is overly polite and repetitive, therefore it feels rather lackluster. I didn't get to experience rude remarks nor Mr. Resetti's angry outbursts from the previous games. I feel like I'm missin' out! I wouldn't necessarily want to be constantly berated by fictional animals, but I wish this game made me experience a wider range of emotions. So sometimes I build those awful Snowboys just to get a small taste of what true AC veterans still fondly remember.

Credit where credit is due: I thoroughly enjoy the dialogue between villagers. It can be interesting, funny, witty and spicy, sometimes a bit mean too! I live for that stuff & always bolt towards them whenever I see them talking - it's one of the very best highlights of New Horizons for me that often appears to be overlooked by many other players.

_______________

End of part 1! I will share my final thoughts, favourite screenshots and future plans in another post because I reached the image limit in this one, lmao. See you soon!

[sabertoothwalrus]

eep sorry if youve been asked this, but when u go abt drawing bgs for ur comics, do u look up references or use imagination, and how do u practice drawing bgs for storyboards rather than illustrations? im rlly not sure where to start, and i feel like a lot of advice focuses on rendering bgs rather than it feeling ~lived in~ or actively being used or augh not sure how to say!!

hhhh ok this is something I am also still in the process of trying to figure out, and I am not a professional storyboard artist so I will attempt to answer to the best of my ability.

when it comes to storyboards, the amount of detail bgs will have during the boards phase will depend largely on both the studio AND the specific production. some 3D shows will have a render of a commonly used room the board artists can angle around for their shots. Adventure Time boards tended to be pretty loose, while the Owl House boards are EXCEPTIONALLY clean. DTVA seems to have bgs created in a several step process, and I'm not exactly sure of the timeline, but I know they have vis dev artists that do more illustrative, conceptual drawings to get the vibe, then the board artists draw out what general angles will actually be used, then layout artists/bg designers who actually go in and DRAW those bgs and add in all the little details, and THEN the colorist comes in and...colors it. I don't think every studio distributes the work in this same way. Not every studio is going to want board artists to draw clean backgrounds, but MOST will get pissed if you refuse to draw them at all djfhgdjf

If you want some tips about adding small details, this has some really useful advice.

I don't add lighting or grayscale values to my comics unless it's important to the tone/clarity, and I think that's generally the case with boards too (at least for TV, I don't know as much about boarding for feature). Here's some advice about adding lighting.

^ here's a bg I put a little more effort into than usual. I referenced some images of thrift shops I pulled up on duck duck go, some of my own memories of thrift shops I've been to, and even went on the shiftythrifting tumblr. This was just a silly comic I knew I'd be posting on tumblr rather than a serious board, so it didn't matter to me if it was perfectly clean or not. some of the shapes are... vague. and loose. but who cares sdjhfjd I think (?) it conveys the concept that this is a thrift shop.

^ for THIS comic I wanted imply hunter crowded them in the bathroom to "talk in private" which felt like a very 16 year old thing to do + there were already some nifty references of the Noceda's bathroom. and listen I know it's not perfect. I didn't draw ANY perspective guides, did more trial and error than I probably needed to, the cabinet is WAY too high. (even in the original, why is this bathroom so spacious???? why is the toilet so far from the wall where the toilet paper is???) but even with all the mistakes, it doesn't matter! no one probably noticed while watching. you see it so briefly, and your attention is still focused on the characters.

I'd say the main thing when drawing bgs for storyboarding & comics is to focus on Perspective and Composition above all else. It's ok to be loose, but make sure you still have Clarity. Be mindful of proportion ("how big is this character in comparison to the objects around them?") and angles ("if this is a low angle, shouldn't I be seeing the ceiling/sky?") etc etc because even if you know you won't be drawing it perfectly, it helps to still have it in mind.

[worldofavania]

Drawn: 2021

Analysis: Unlike Issue 6's cover, where I ended up completely scrapping the original ideas I had for it, my initial concept for this cover seemed like it would work, but it took a number of revisions to adequately hit the mark ( @alfafilly helped me with some feedback during this process too)! After a few iterations and various bits of tweaking, I arrived at this cover. I wanted to show main focuses of both this issue's chapters, but since they are two rather different scenes it made combining them into one composition a bit challenging. In the end I had to drop one element from the original concept, that being Rick popping a wheelie on his motorcycle, as it just ended up being too distracting at first, and then there not being room for it anyway in this later design. 

As for how the final product looks, I am pretty satisfied with it. The composition has a focus now despite depicting two separate scenes, and there is a nice sense of depth with the exaggerated perspective. As for the art itself, year after year of drawing has given me plenty of practice and I think the line art is very nice, but more so the render quality has really improved with some fancier shading and light effects (which you'll also see in the greyscale interior art)... Man do those muscles look nice!

If I drew it again:  After all the time put into figuring out how best to show this concept, I think I got it pretty well down. However, the perspective does make Role and Charlotte's arms closest to the camera look a bit too big, and while that isn't really a problem for Role, since she's supposed to be conspicuously larger than the others, it does seem a little weird to me when I look at Charlotte.

Favorite Part: The nice shading, especially the muscle detail. Really happy with the combination of hard and soft shadows turned out. Also Una loving the heck out of her greasy breakfast lol.

Avania No.7 Front Cover

[luveline]

you know, I'm coming right back [Fred Weasley x Reader]

summary: you're a lonely artist and Fred is your adoring model

word count: 2.4k

tags: reader insert, lonely reader, artist reader, seventh year, kids in love, first kiss, getting together, pining, fluff, friends-to-lovers

It was easy for you, usually, to act fine. To feel fine. Any loneliness that clouded your life was pushed firmly into the depths of your thoughts. You tried to focus on the things that mattered, essays and charms and your art.

You loved to draw. You had sketchbooks filled to the brim with sketches, some half finished, others coloured and lined. You drew everything, though you struggled to bring anything from your memory. Everything you drew had to be done right there, right then, with unsuspecting models. You sketched students eating their dinner, scribbled side profiles when you managed a spare minute in class. But you're most impressive artwork was done in the library, where nothing moved. Everyone was silent. You had pages and pages of bored, tired looking students. When exams approached, you hurriedly copied down the expressions of people on the edge of depression and panic.

You had friends, ish. You knew people. You'd had intense friendships that somehow always ended in awkward drifting aparts. Well, you thought. There must be something wrong with me. They liked me before they didn't, so the fault must've been mine.

You huffed out a sigh, pressing your face deep into the textured page of your sketch book, breathing in the smell of charcoal. You were sketching the illusive Fred Weasley, who you'd never truly drawn before. Maybe you had scraps from your second or third year when you'd still attempted to draw moving objects before getting comfortable and accepting that still life was your forte.

He was maddeningly good lucking when his eyebrows puckered in concentration. He seemed to actually be studying for once, sat at a table with his brother, George, and housemates Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet.

You were sat by yourself, and couldn't help listening to his lilting voice as he bantered with his friends. They were talking about Umbridge (the current victim of the Hogwarts' student body hate train), and quidditch, and their recent ban from quidditch. You'd never played.

"Watch out, dolly fell asleep," said one of the girls.

You bit your lip. You'd been nicknamed dolly by the girls in your dorm because of your porcelain doll you'd had since childhood. Even though this year was your last, you still hadn't felt the need to hide her away. She made you feel much less anxious and alone.

The whole school knew, naturally.

"Don't get any funny ideas," said Angelina,  to the twins.

"Come on Angie, you think so little of us?" said George.

"Yesterday I watched you trick a group of forth years into taking puking pastilles." Angelina said.

"It was hardly a trick. We told them they were multi-faceted," said George.

You could hear your heartbeat if you focused. It was in your ears. It bump, bump, bumped.

Bump bump. You flinched, a hand settled on your shoulder quickly moved.

"Wake up, dolly. Library's closing."

You squinted up into Fred's face, head halo'd by candlelight. Lifting your head from the wooden table, you stretched your neck to the left. It clicked.

"Uh..."

"Hmm?" You prompted him, smoothing your hair behind your ears.

"You have - dirt. On your face. Here-" He said, reaching forward. You closed your eyes as he gently wiped the skin above your eyebrow.

"It's charcoal."

"What?"

"It's not dirt," you said, peaking at him through your eyelashes. "It's charcoal."

He looked mildly surprised. You shifted, hoping to cover your sketch before he caught sight of it.

It didn't matter.

"It's me. My gorgeous dolly, you've created quite the masterpiece right there, haven't you? I look vexingly handsome, of course. Thought if that's a consequence of your skill or my handsomeness is anyones guess."

You were lost for words. "Uh, quite."

"Yes, yes, quite. Say, could I keep it?"

"... You want the drawing?"

"I'd love it, if that's okay."

"I," you quickly dug your thumbnail into the paper, tearing carefully at the centre. The paper came away a little ragged and smudged. "Of course. It's yours."

He handled it with care.

The librarian jingled her little bell again.

"Thank you. So, see you?"

"Yep," you agreed.

He nodded his head and bowed out with his friends. You tried not to feel paranoid at their laughter.

-

You were curled up in a hidden alcove, though it was hardly hidden. Most students knew where to seek privacy in the castle. You just so happened to get there first that evening.

You were trying to sketch Fred again. It felt weird to be missing a page from your book, and weirder still that you couldn't remember his face when he wasn't right in front of you. You tried, but it kept going wrong.

When you finally managed one you liked well enough, you had accidentally ruined it with a heavy hand and the wrong shade of brown.

He looked much too brunette.

You carefully rolled your coloured pencils back up, securing the leather ties tightly so as to keep every pencil confined.

Sighing morosely, you flipped to a new page. Things got so complicated sometimes, it made you agitated. You doodled a little sad face in the corner of your page. When the one thing that you enjoyed in life started to go wrong, it set off your whole mood.

Your birthday was coming up. It had been on your mind a lot lately. You'd spend it alone. That's what you figured. Nobody would know it was your birthday, or if they did, you weren't friends now, so...

You began with an arching circle, bisecting the lines appropriately. Feeling out the familiar lines of your own face came easy, the slight upper tilt of your brows, your hair and your pursed mouth. You always looked sad in the mirror, and it showed, dotted here and there when the only thing to draw was your own face.

The rudimentary outline of a birthday cake took form. The candles were unlit.

In a fit of unhappiness, you scratched out your mouth. It was never smiling.

"What did that piece of paper ever do to you?" said a voice.

You jumped. Fred was peering down at you curiously, wringing his hands. You put your pencil between the soft cover and smashed it flat, closed.

"Hi, dolly."

"Weasley."

"Oh, not even a first name?"

"You neglected mine first," you reasoned, rolling the words. He smiled at your joking tone.

"How rude of me. Hi, Y/N," he corrected himself.

"Hi, Weasley."

He smirked.

"Anymore of me in that blessed vessel?"

"Nah. You never stand still."

"If I pose for it?" He asked. You patted the ground in front of you.

He was a lovely model. He stayed infinitely still, more still than you imagined possible for him. He sat at a 3/4ths angle, chin up but not too far, mouth tilted and eyes open.

His eyes were the one thing he couldn't keep still. You tried not to flame in the cheeks everything you'd catch his gaze on you.

You sketched fast, choosing to hatch rather than render, big swooping lines to give the illusion of a depth that wasn't really there. You would've loved to do a full render, maybe even a colour portrait, but he was beginning to look a little antsy.

You set the book on the floor to face him and pushed it into his eyesight softlt. He turned. He looked nice like that, face bent, hair falling into his eyes.

After a moment, he began scrounging through his robe pockets. He set down a box, a lighter, a pair of gloves.

Finally, he set a galleon onto the floor close to your crossed legs.

"For you," he said, smiling at your inquisitive look. "For the drawing."

"Oh, I can't accept that. And I'd like to keep this one, if it's alright."

Fred thought for a moment. "Alright, you keep it. And the galleon, too, for the one you gave me the other day."

You bit back a smile. "I can't take your money, Fred."

"I can't keep having you draw me for free. It's as valuable a service as anything else. Plus, I'm not sure if you know, but I run a lucrative business these days."

You picked up the coin, rubbing your thumb against the engravings thoughtfully. "It's hardly a service."

"A talent, then. A skill. You're very good."

You're neck almost snapped as you looked into his face, wanting to assess his expression for genuineness. He looked earnest, and kind. You blinked away the gathering heat behind your eyes.

"Thank you."

He waved a hand at you. "Think nothing of it."

"Really-" you cleared your throat, "-you're doing me a favour. I'm not good at drawing things that move."

"I'm sure you're better than you think," he said.

You shook your head, smiling smiling smiling.

"What's in the box?"

"Oh, this old thing?" Fred weighed the box in his hands. It was soft at the corners, like a simple jewelry box that you had in your trunk. He offered it to you. You opened it carefully, the lid sliding free with a shhhhh sound. Inside was an evil looking fruit pastille, a match stick and a dried up flower petal.

It felt like a very private thing to see, suddenly. Such an eclectic collection of items couldn't be random.

"The first puking pastille George and I made. Or rather, the second - the first was forcibly fed to Lee Jordan in our third year. The match stick is from my Uncle's matchbox. I never met him. And the flower was from Ginny, when she was 9." He sounded nervous.

"It's a memory box."

"I- yes. It is. Things are sometimes so miserable now, with Umbridge and you-know-who. Scary, even. I look at them when I feel like it won't ever end."

You took them in for a little while longer and then placed the lid onto the box with nimble fingers. You scratched the lid with a fingernail.

"It's nice. You're right. Things are so awful right now, it's good to have reminders of why we keep going."

"Exaclty. Dolly, can I interest you in a fruit pastille?"

"Not on your life."

"They're perfectly edible!"

"Sure, Fred."

-

The honest conversation you'd shared with Fred was a catalyst between you. He often came to find you, each time whining and nagging you to just sit in the library like most people do.

"What, so your housemates can throw paper balls at me?"

"They thought you were sleeping!"

A likely story, you thought. He sometimes asked you to draw him, posing with the elegance of a natural born model. It was great for you personally, you felt that you were really getting a feel for his face. Eventually, you were able to draw his face from memory, the details of his nose coming to your fingers as easily as a first year spell.

It became about capturing emotion. You could capture his likeness now without a second thought, but his emotions were much more complicated. How would you show his veiled frustration the day Umbridge kicked him off the quidditch team? Through the clenching of his jaw? The shy veins in his forehead? How did you showcase the fear when he'd come back to Hogwarts after Christmas break, through his eyes, downturned and squinting just a little?

Today, it was poorly hidden elation. "How come you're so happy?" You asked, pencil between your teeth. He grinned. You measured his face with your thumb in the air, forming an L.

"Is it a prank?"

"You're thinking too small."

"A new product?"

"Still need to go bigger!"

"Hmmm," you hummed. Measure twice, cut once. Or in your case, sketch once.

"George and I, we're gonna open a shop."

"A section at Zonko's isn't enough for you?" You asked, casually, though you were very very happy for him.

"It's going to be amazing. We're going to run it, just the two of us, and you won't catch me in these scrappy long sleeves anymore. The next time you see me, I'll be in a full suit and tie."

"The next time? Is that not tomorrow?"

Fred closed his mouth, realising his mistake. He had revealed something he hadn't intended to. "We're leaving," he confessed. "We were going to wait for our NEWTs but... Well, we won't need them. This is going to work."

"So. You're leaving today?" You asked, crestfallen.

"Hey," Fred said, rubbing a placating hand over the curve of your shoulder. "Tomorrow. During the DADA OWL. We have a plan."

"This is goodbye?"

"No! No. Not if you don't want it to be. Actually, I've been meaning to ask you something, and maybe now isn't the best time, I had this whole letter planned and I didn't want to distract you from your exams and-"

"What do you want to ask me?"

Fred straightened. "I wanted to ask - will you go out with me? Not, you don't have to be my girlfriend if it's too soon, I'd love to take you for food someplace, I was going to ask you to Hogsmeade, but when the shop officially became ours, the plans changed so fast and I didn't know if you'd still want-" you cut off his rambling.

"I'll be your girlfriend," you said.

"You will?"

"Sure, if you'll be my boyfriend," you murmured.

Fred moved the arm that had been on your shoulder to the nape of your neck. "That's a dealbreaker," he said, leaning in.

He kissed you chastely on the lips first and then pulled back to look into your face. You chased him, a moment of bravery, and opened your mouth to taste him. He was sweet, like sugar. Your sketch pad crinkled beneath you both as he pressed forward. Your chests touched, heaving.

"You're not gonna be my boyfriend?" You asked against his mouth, breathing hard.

"I'm gonna be much more than that, dolly," he said heatedly.

Your mouth was tingling. "Kiss me again?"

You gasped at the force of him, laughing. He laughed too against your lips, and the sound tickled. He gave you a multitude of short and sweet kisses before pulling away again.

He wiped the wetness from your lip with his pinky finger. "Godric, you're cute. Look how flushed you are! You're insane."

Something churned in your stomach. The butterflies had acquired a trampoline. You felt happier than you had in a very long time. "You're not half-bad yourself, Weasley."

[kelmcdonald]

See You at VanCAF

This is copy pasted from my newletter. 

Hey all! My main thing is I'll be at VanCAF which is in Vancouver, British Columbia on May 20&21. They haven't posted con maps yet, so I don't know what my table number is. But I'll be there and it's free to get into. So stop by!

Like I said the big thing this month is going to VanCAF. The rest of the month is mostly keeping my nose to the grindstone. 

This month's full moon movie is The Wolfman again. This time the remake. While watching the original Wolf Man, myself and other folks in the discord talked about some of the stuff that was changed in the remake (stuff like the remake is twice as long.) So I figured doing a back to back would be kinda fun. So if you wanna join, we'll be watching it May 5th at 6pm PST. Join the discord if you want.

As always I'll be streaming art on Twitch. My schedule is currently the following:

Tuesday 8pm-10pm PST

Wednesday 8pm-10pm PST

Thursday 6pm-9pm PST (during the Iron Circus Geekshow)

I mentioned last month that I was redoing the live reading of Fame and Misfortune. My mic worked this time so I've saved it and posted it on my youtube. We go over through the whole story in about 30 mins. Then I answer some questions from fans.

I'll definitely doing something like this for The Better to Find You With. As I'll get to in the next section, I got a lot of stuff on my plate. It will probably be some time in the fall.

I spent a lot of April still playing catching up on things. I was really backed up on my work for Seven Seas. I think I got it handled now, but Blue Moon is still not done. I think that has to be my primary focus this month. I was hoping to get the current chapter of You are the Chosen One last month, but that didn't happen. It's penciled so for the next few Fridays I'll post the pencils of the rest of chapter.

By the time those go up, I'll hopefully be done with Blue Moon and can give You are the Chosen One more attention. I hate to do it, but I have to put something on hold. The City Between being free means it gets me more new readers/attention and You are the Chosen One takes longer. And after I write Blue Moon, I should probably make sure the next batch of You are the Chosen One script are ready for drawing. So here's my to do list/priority:

Write Blue Moon

Keep up with The City Between

Freelance thing that is NDA

Clean up Murky Water to make a book

Finish Chapter 3 of You are the Chosen One

Review next few chapters of You are the Chosen One

Anyway, that's quite a lot.  I barely had time to read or watch new stuff this month. So kinda a short list this month.

Darling by Olivia Stephens - Darling is a Western Horror about a black woman who's living as a werewolf to escape the racism of 1800s America. She meets a black man on the run and the two have an instant connection Olivia art is excellent and rendering makes every page look both beautiful and haunting. It's one of the best werewolf comics I've read. You should all go back it here.

Love is Hard for Otaku - This is one checked out because Mangasplaining did an episode on it. They had a kinda mixed opinion of it, but I was curious to look into it myself. It's about a gal who's a big nerd but is hiding it from her day job because her last boyfriend dumped her for being too nerdy. A nerdy guy friend proposes they date each other because since they are both nerds she won't have to worry about him dumping her for it. There is a manga and an anime. The manga is a little rough. The pacing seems to be kinda wonky. The anime does a better job landing the jokes, mostly because a lot of the jokes involved references to anime. So the joke works better when they can copy the scene from Evangelion shot for shot, rather than translation the animation into a comic. I don't 100% buy the characters as a couple so I'm on the fence about continuing to watch it. 

Nope - This was something that was on my I should get around to seeing this movie since it came out. It was streaming so I made a point to watch it. It's less than a year old so I won't go into details about the plot. But I really liked the point it makes about random chance and nature. I also really liked the relationship between the two main siblings. It was a good mix for conflict, frustration, and affection.

Anyway, thanks for sticking with me through the big workload that's going on. Please back my Patreon if you can. Every little bit helps!

[wiltkingart]

hi wilt, sorry if this is a weird ask, but do you have any advice on working faster? ive been drawing for a while, but i feel like even relatively simple things take me a long time to do well compared 2 other people. But whenever I try and force myself to work faster, i think my art suffers for it. I'm just drawing for myself rn, so there's no outside pressure or anything, im just unsure how to draw/paint faster without sacrificing the quality of what i'm working on.

i can speak from my personal experience, at the very least!

first off i want to preface that taking longer than other people to make art isnt a bad thing at all. some artists that i admire a lot have said that they take days or weeks or even months to make a single art piece. the fast paced pressure of being a modern ‘social media artist’ does us more harm than good, i think. and there’s really nothing wrong at all about taking your time, especially if you like your art better when you go at your own pace.

personally i have gotten significantly faster at art over the past 3 years, but that wasnt ever actually my intention. in fact my goal was just to simplify my sketches to make the whole process easier on my hand. but by simplifying my sketches, i ended up cutting back severely on the amount of time it would normally take to overwork and cleanup my sketches, as well as reducing the amount of time i needed to clean up my work while coloring. so it became a positive side effect of my original goal, rather than my main focus.

for example, this is what my sketches looked like in 2016

i would spend so much time and effort on them that i would often end up just using the sketch as lineart and coloring underneath.

lots of artists do this, and it isnt bad at all! but this was very stressful on my hand. i literally got tendonitis so bad i had to see a physical therapist and rethink my whole life, and i was hardly able to make actual paintings because it would take so long and the rendering/cleanup process was hell. in 2017 i tried to mitigate the problem by letting myself be messy in both the sketch + painting process. thus the start of the wiggly era.

but it wasnt enough. i still didnt like how much time i was spending on cleanup/rendering. so began my 2018 journey to simplify my sketches and i forced myself to do this by completely removing my ability to use pen pressure by using the binary tool. i also started laying down silhouettes first, which is something i still do to this day.

i’ll admit it was a rough period of time, but i kept at it! i liked how i had more freedom and maneuverability with the painting phase. and eventually i adapted to it and became more comfortable with it and my art started to look and feel decent again.

i became so comfortable with it that i decided it was time to set aside the binary tool and go back to my good old friend the marker tool, because i missed having the ability to make sketches that looked good on their own too. but by now i had the ability to quickly and effectively make sketches that held the bare minimum information i needed to work with.

and right now im really happy with my current art process. its super flexible and im satisfied with splitting up my time as 10% sketch 90% color/painting. plus my hand pain is at an all time minimum! so i guess what im trying to say with all this is that as long as you’re happy with your process and your art, it doesn’t matter how slow or fast you are. if you’re not happy with your process, then by all means try new things. but i dont think speed is in any way an indicator of skill.

“im just unsure how to draw/paint faster without sacrificing the quality of what i'm working on.”

if you dont want to change the way your art looks then there’s no need to force the issue. but if you are still interested in trying to speed up your work, there will most definitely be a dip in quality for a while while you figure things out and learn new techniques, as i think ive shown with my journey. but that dip will be temporary.

as far as how to speed up your work, ive only shown my approach to it and there’s dozens of different ways to do it. some people force themselves to do 5 min / 1 min / 30 second figure studies. other people use multiply/overlay effects to speed up the coloring process. its a highly personal matter and i would recommend asking other artists or looking up tutorials! best of luck and i hope this helps in some small way.

[thevindicativevordan]

what would you say are the differences between Metropolis’ two major crime factions, the 100 and Intergang? How do they combat Superman?

There also was the Invisible Mafia which had some ideas about how crime in Metropolis operates that I really dug. Do have some ideas on how to differentiate between the three of them. I'd give them an overall "theme" that unites them as a group while also enabling them to pose a threat to Superman in large numbers.

Intergang - Technology

Their comic incarnations have never been more than minor flunkies at best, probably why they aren't treated as a bigger deal. Part of the reason why is Manheim has been the closest thing they have to a "face", yet he's a dull character for the most part, a low level stooge for Darkseid throughout most of his history. Might surprise you but unlike when they poached Maggie Sawyer, I had no strong feelings about the Gotham books poaching Intergang. Manheim's Satanic mafia gimmick from 52 works better with Batwoman anyway. Having said that, they have also returned to the Superman books along with Maggie, so what can be done with them to make them more intimidating opponents for Superman?

In order to elevate them I would kick Bruno Manheim and his followers out of Intergang, they can be a "Cult of Cain" that operate as Batwoman foes. In his place will be a new head of Intergang: Ultra-Humanite. Humanite has decided to attempt a "reinvention" of himself as leader of an interglobal crime syndicate, and he's the one who ousts Manheim from power. Most of the rank and file of Intergang accept Humanite's leadership because he's fine with returning Intergang's focus on making money rather than using it to indulge his terrifying religious beliefs like Manheim did. Humanite augments Intergang's arsenal with his own tech, turning them into a threat to Superman in large groups thanks to their mech suits, Humanite-enhanced alien weaponry, and cybernetic enhancements. Criminal activities revolve around usual offenses such as arms dealing, human trafficking, drugs, etc, but the arms come from Apokolips or Warworld, the drugs were grown in another solar system, the humans are sold to the Dominators, and so forth. Taking ordinary crimes and elevating them to a superhuman level is what Intergang specializes in.

Profit is the only thing they care about, greed is their defining trait. Even Superman is a way for them to make money, some of the "crimes" they commit are meant to draw him out so they can show the effectiveness of their weapons and armor. Humanite has the battles recorded and then uses them as marketing ads to sell the equipment used in fights to other countries on the pitch of "if this can pose a threat to Superman, imagine what it could do to your ordinary human rivals!", sometimes loaning men and arms to Prankster for the express purpose of Prankster using them in "real" supervillain fights.

The 100 - Magic

Reading the original background for these guys... it's fantastic?!? The heads of the 100 combined various scientific, arcane, and alchemical methods of life extension in order to render themselves immortal back during the time of the Inquisition. Sustaining their unnatural lifespans required them to cultivate despair in others, and they also figured out a way to posses bodies. They're basically feeding off of human suffering like vampires on blood. Background-wise you've got the perfect set-up for what they want beyond killing Superman, and why they'd want him gone.

Immediately I can see why they would want to fight Superman (and other heroes): he's ruining their food supplies by giving people hope! While they'd prefer to avoid a fight with him, his attempts to help people threaten their survival, so they have to make attempts on his life in order to keep their enslaved population subdued. They run Suicide Slum where they commit various criminal activities for the secret purpose of harvesting the emotional torment the population of the area endures to fuel the arcane rituals that extend their lives. While a worldwide threat, they've set up shop in Metropolis because the city is a potent magical conduit thanks to various occult activities that occurred in the past, such as the ritual that "killed" Silver Banshee's parents. True magical power rests with the 100 leaders, but their minions are able to access some of the magic the leaders wield in order to pose a threat to Superman in large enough numbers. Weapons enchanted to hurt Superman, spells to hide from his senses, potions to enhance their physical abilities, and poisons that can overcome even Clark's immune system.

Similarly to Intergang I think they need a "face" to act as their head, and I've got the absolutely perfect candidate: Khyber! Created during Busiek's run, Khyber was another immortal who achieved eternal life through alchemical means. Tying him and the 100 together makes sense, they both have similar backgrounds, and you could have Khyber be originally from what was once Al-Andalus. He was the mastermind who discovered and performed the ritual, along with 99 other chosen, that granted them all immortality. Originally conceived as an enlightened elite who would guide humanity into a better future, his comrades quickly became obsessed with sustaining their own lives and pursuing personal pleasure. Khyber left the group in disgust, deciding instead to create his Sect of Assassins. Now in the modern era he has reclaimed control over the 100 by assassinating most of the previous leadership and replacing them with men loyal to him.

The replacements inherited the immortality of the old, but because they weren't the original participants in the ritual, the old guard's souls must be joined to theirs in order to grant them the same immortality. Drawback is that there is a risk the old souls could seize control of the new bloods bodies, and only Khyber knows how to keep the old souls subdued. Such measures ensure that his directives will not be ignored with this new 100. While operations aimed at farming suffering from the unfortunates under their control in order to sustain their immortality continue, Khyber is combining the wealth and power of the 100 with the skills of his Assassins to pursue a new visionary plan for humanity.

The Invisible Mafia - Metahumans

Of the three groups the Invisible Mafia are the youngest and the smallest, but possess the muscle to punch above their weight. Born out of Superman's arrival to Metropolis making the old way of committing street crime borderline impossible, the Invisible Mafia prefers to not commit crimes that attract his notice at all. They like to recruit metahumans who can mask their activities from Superman, while still having a few metas who can pose a legit threat to Superman should they be forced into open conflict. Loved Bendis' conception of them as using seemingly harmless words to talk about their activities in a way that wouldn't be picked up by Superman's super-hearing, meeting in a sound-proof tanker for even more security.

Their penchent for secrecy also means they prefer to infiltrate Metropolis' institutions such as the mayor's office, the police and fire departments, the megacorps, and the news organizations such as the Daily Planet. Their agents operate as evil copycats to how Clark does, gathering information in their secret identities and passing it up the chain of command. Dug the hell out of Bendis making a criminal counterpart to Clark, and I'd like to see that become part of the Mafia's standard modus operandi.

I'd make Red Cloud aka Robinson Goode their new leader. After getting out of prison, Goode gets a new face and a new name in an attempt to restart her life. She's learned her lesson from trying to take on Superman and his Family by herself, and for now is seemingly content to go back to the old way of doing things, running the Mafia in a way that doesn't attract Superman's attention. Secretly she is still seething over Superman defeating her and Leone abandoning her. Rebuilding the Mafia is her current focus, but she also pursues two side goals. One is the aggressive recruitment of metas, either by finding or creating them, Cloud knows she needs to build up an army of metahumans before she can even think of challenging the Superfamily again. Second is tracking down where Leone went in the Multiverse. Ultimately she wants revenge on both, and isn't going to stop until she gets it one way or the other.