#Actually using this to test draw something I'm going to apply on a commission

[screwpinecaprice]

Ew they're flirting again.

[generichoneydew]

I know that you have a lot of requests now but if you want can you draw an Eastern Male Blue Bird in your style:3 It could have a background like the sky or the Appalachian mountains it's all up to you. Also you can add other animals or elements as it is your artwork. You should try and experiment with as many subjects as possible as like landscape and animals, but don't burn yourself out on anything especially since this is just an art suggestion not a commission. Plus don't listen to those weirdos that tell you otherwise and just ignore them. Anyways sorry for the long message and good luck if you're going to take this piece on. (P.S if you want I could pay you as well especially if you're going to be ambitious and spend a lot of time on this silly lil bird as well I got a spare $15 lying around lol)

Oh man. Thank you for your patience, I'm so sorry for making you wait 3 months for me to respond to this ^^". I mulled over what to do for this request for a long time, but for the LIFE of me I couldn't come up with something. I had so many thumbnails for a big drawing, but for some reason I just wasn't happy with any of them. About a month ago my wrist started acting up like crazy (I've been dealing with some TFCC tears for just over a year now) and while in my wheel throwing workshop I learned centering clay hurt like hell! So as to not to waste my time I decided to try hand building for the first time in like... god, not since I was in elementary school for sure. Anyways, I was thinking about what to make when I remembered, huh, bird guy told me to experiment. I will make a little bird!! And it will be lovely and splendid!! And I will have FUN!!!!! EVEN IF IT'S NOT PARTICULARLY WHAT YOU WHERE ASKING FOR!!!!!

By no means perfect, and I would have defiantly done it differently if I where to remake the little guy again, but I had a ton of fun testing this out! Hand building didn't bother my wrist at all, so I will probably stick to that when I go to my clay class until my wrist heals up :). Thank you for the kind words as well ∑ ദ്ദി(°∀°  ) 

72/104

(more yapping and pictures under cut)

Here some work in progress pictures!

I had a really hard time deciding what glaze (paint, essentially) to use since my studio had JUST replaced and swapped out a lot of the glazes and hadn't put them on the reference wall yet. I eventually settled on Watt's white for the base, LS purple for the eyes and beak, red art shino on the chest, and then Cobalt Blue for the top! That ones actually the pink glaze you see in the last image above. If you aren't familiar with clay, for the kind of glaze I like to use you have to put the pieces in a big oven to dry them out so they're ready to be glazed, then after they have the glaze on them you have to put them in the really hot oven again to make the glaze into glass. A lot of the time the heat changes the color of the glaze drastically, which is why I was really bummed when the glaze I would normally use for the really bright orange color wasn't available anymore. So I had to take a gamble with the red art shino. I think the colors turned out accurately enough, but I think I would apply the glaze differently if I where to do it again.

Also! a week after I built the bird, I made a shark! Modeled off of Blahaj because of course it was.

I took what I learned with the bird and applied it to this guy, and I think he turned out a lot better because of it. I'm not too happy with how the glaze turned out, though that was partially my fault with how I went about applying it. I think he's cute either way :).

Here's the two together! my cobalt blue babies,,,

The bowl in the background of the first image is actually another one I glazed along side these guys that I made before my wrist started acting up. I think the original ball of clay I used to make it was like... 4-5 pounds? I've been doing wheel throwing for about 3 years now, so I'm still very inexperienced, but I was very proud of myself for being able to wrangle a hunk of clay that size. Unfortunately the bottom totally cracked in the kiln so I can't use it for food or liquids, but still very pretty for holding misc things!

I don't typically share my ceramic hauls on here since... I don't think you people would be very interested in a bunch of bowls and stuff LMAO. However, the funniest possible thing in my 3 years of throwing just happened to me.

Completely normal bowl I threw, only about 2 and a half to 3 pounds. It had a bit of a wobble, so I couldn't really do anything super special with it without risking it completely failing on me. So I wasn't incredibly attached with the final product, but I still liked it enough to trim and glaze it and stuff. Glaze itself turned out lovely though, I wasn't expecting this combination to turn out so pretty on red clay. But over all though, It wasn't my favorite thing ever. I go to pick it up off the shelf to take it home, but I notice someone else's piece (round donut looking thing) fell onto it. No biggie, I'll just lift it off and move it so I can take my bowl and nothing ends up falling.

Expect, when I go to gently lay it away from my bowl, it doesn't move. I push harder, The Whole Freaking Bowl Moves With It.

SOMEONE ELSE'S PIECE HAD FALLEN ONTO MINE IN THE KILN AND GOT ATTACHED. I started laughing my butt off, and I walk back into the studio to go put it down with the rest of my stuff so I could get working, and the instructor sees me with it and explains the situation:

Apparently some (her words) "ding dong adult" had placed this donut looking thing next to my piece A) without asking anyone, B) without scraping the glaze off the bottom (you have to do that so the piece doesn't stick to the cookie/kiln), and C) in a way that would OBVIOUSLY fall over if someone even sneezed on it wrong. Bless her heart, she offered to try and chip it off for me, but I told her no since it was so funny to me and I wasn't that committed to the piece anyways. When you think about it, its like a free handle!

Anyways, after discovering that absolute treat (and also getting to see a very cute whooper my instructor made), I decided to try my hand at making one of my favorite pokemon, kommo-o. He's just the main body so far, no scales or fluffy bits yet, but he's coming together!

Also! If/When I ever make another Pokemon discussion video, I added the bird and the shark to the background, so they may or may not be in there next time lol.

And that's about it for now! Again, so sorry on the wait for this post ^^;...

Oh, and totally off topic, but I have good news for the people who have been seeing me complaining about my wrist for the last year! I finally got a chance to go back to my doctor about it after it started acting up again in January. I got another physical therapy referral, a new wrist brace, and I'm going to take the summer off tennis and some other intensive activities, so hopefully all should be better soon! The kind of injury I have takes a long time of overuse to develop, and a long time of healing to fix. So, this is your yearly reminder to be better then me, and to always stretch before doing anything very intensive activity with your body!!! This INCLUDES handwriting, drawing, running, ANYTHING. Take frequent breaks, stay active and take care of yourself. You in your 30s-40s+ will thank you for the efforts are doing to stay happy and healthy now. Learn from me, I wish I could punch middle school me in the face because I am WAY too young to be having pain like this. Head my warning, and have a lovely day |˶˙ᵕ˙ )ﾉﾞ!!

[scasuallypursuits]

#12: Done with all commissions.

I'm finally done with all. I'll discuss the process during it (As far as I can remember at least) and what I'll be doing next this week.

Look I even made a small gif at the end. It looks incredibly cute and the commissioner loved it.

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The commission started after I made his santa gift. He asked if I was taking commission and I said yes, I was. It was my first time doing commission and, thank to gods, was so incredibly patient and understanding for me. Asking what kind of commissions I was most comfortable taking. Didn't even knew what kind of commission he wanted, he just wanted a one.

My commission process started with sending 4 simple thumbnails to the client with their idea and 50% of the agreed price for insurance. I suggested, "why not about them showing affection to each other in their own way."

Based on that description, I made these thumbnails.

The idea I had going to this was something quite casual. They both like each other but the other doesn't know it so I imagined that they like hanging out a lot, no matter the activities as long the other one one there. But no touching since they don't want the other person to think that they are annoying. A, C, D explores the idea of them just hanging out, just with A being more about showing them off to the viewer. I wanted a bit more variation so I made B where they are more comfortable in showing they're affections with each other.

The client loved them.

They like it so much that they decided to commission me for both A and D.

Which I eventually translated to sketch ,line and finally color.

Each step of the way I showed these stages for approval if the current design looks okay. At this point I ask for the remaining 50% percent before I start rendering. They paid I got to work to make these.

During the rendering phase, I experimented a bit.

Doing color streaks. I like it a lot as it gives a lot of color punch to the picture. I came to it thinking, as long you can tell what is the supposed color is, you can add random streaks of color as stylization. The colors used are other colors in the pic as well so that it can feel more "together". And in the end, it looks amazing.

Made a quick background so it isn't so boring. Look at the difference below on with and with BG here. And during this, also tested the workflow of just doing 2 layers of line and color only. It feels better and I think Imma experiment this more in the future.

I even made the short gif you see at the top as gratitude for being patient me. The whole commission took me like 2 months to complete. Mostly due to work taking most of my time but I was able to power through and it's over now so I can now actually focus more on art now.

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What's next?

Probably finish that zelink wip that I did. some stuff already. Even applying some stuff I experimented during the commission like drawing a sketch first, make new layer for all the color first then the clean lines in another laye. So mainly 3 layers during the work. It actually allows me to work faster and it matched my tempo.

Here ye wip of it. With this new technique, perhaps I could get this wip done next week. Or atleast this frame ready.