#I really wanna get back into drawing and learning and improving

[milchreste]

[pinkpigtailsprincess]

𝜗𝜚 ݁ ˖ Summer Glow up: creating new habits 🎀⭐️ *࿐ ࿔*:･ﾟ!

Hi Dolls!! Welcome Back 2 Dollies 2 Months of Summer Glow Up !! 🎀⭐️ Today im gonna talk all about implementing brand new habits in my life !!

> Hobbies !! 🎀

> Academics !! 📒

> Beauty Care !! 🧖‍♀️

> Scheduling !! ☀️

> Taking Baby Steps !! 🛼

❤︎ ໋𓈒 Hobbies!! 🎀

…: This Summer I Plan on Taking up Some brand New Hobbies to keep my self busy and learn about brand new things bc everyday is useful!! and so i can use my time more wisely some hobbies i have in mind are…

- Yoga

- Painting

- Creative Writing

- Learning Japanese + Spanish

- Reading

- Puzzles!

- Blogging

- Learning To Code

- Doll Collecting

- Book Collecting

- Sewing + Crocheting

- Digital Art

- Piano

and obvii im already a blogger but i still added it anyways i will watching videos on how to get into these hobbies and videos on learning Spanish and more Japanese, also fun fact i’ve actually been studying Japanese sine 2021 but i stopped bc it got to hard but im starting back up!! anyways, after i watch the videos im gonna set up a financial list bc i have the fund all of these but its okay bc i can easily get money!! 🎀

❤︎ ໋𓈒 Academics !! 🎀

More Goals of mine are to raise my grades in an academic space bc i do have decent grades but i wanna aim higher and have PERFECT Grades so in turn that means i must study more and have more discipline and not so irresponsible with my time!! and i also wanna study subjects outside of school bc its always good to learn something new!! now for learning tips so far i have..

- Flash Cards

- Practice Methods

- Teaching Someone Else

- Trying to explain it to a 5 yr old

- Study a Week Before

- watch ted talks on topics

- SLEEP

- write out notes

Now i Also Have a list of subjects i want to learn about!!

- drawing facial expressions + bodies

- Sewing Stiches + How to Hem and Crochet

- How 2 Draw Bodies + Poses

- Full Anatomy 4 Both Genders

- Japanese + Spanish + French + ASL

- Color Theory

- Learning Cursive + Improving Handwriting

- Expanding Vocabulary

- Religious Cults

- Case and Law

- Poison and Toxicology

- Astronomy

- Medical Surgical Instruments

- Matriarchal Societies

- Socialism Societies

Now i definitely won’t be able to do all of this all at once bc it would definitely we too stressful so im gonna choose as least 2-3 to start with and study them and just learn! 🎀🧁

❤︎ ໋𓈒 Beauty Care !! 🐬

📧: Now I already have my regular beauty care regime skin,hair,eyebrows,eyelashes etc. but im also more focused on getting weekly treatments & weekly beauty care habits like…

- Nails

- Hair

- Eyelashes

- Face Mask

- Hand + Foot Mask

And i wanna try and find people in my city that can do this especially for nails bc i would go to the nail salon but i feel like they won’t be able to do it exactly how i want it to be !!!

❤︎ ໋𓈒 Scheduling !! ⭐️

Now That im gonna be so busy i need to make sure i also stay organized with my time so it doesn’t lead to stress so ill have my regular school classes on my regular schedule then making dedicated hours to studying Things i wanna learn about + Language Learning!

My Workouts are always early morning before school in the evening hours before i got to bed so i won’t have to worry about that affecting my academics. With my Hobbies i feel like only some of them really need scheduling so ill also make time dedicated to those as well !!!!

Beauty Maintenance will probably always be on weekends for the stuff that weekly/bi weekly like face masks,manipedis,hair etc!!

and last but definitely not least!!

❤︎ ໋𓈒 Taking Baby Steps !! ⭐️

This whole process is still all new too me so i’ll definitely only be doing a little at a time and working my way up and i get more familiar with the change in my daily life and i won’t pressure my self to complete everything extremely quickly and just take my time with everything! bye bye dolls tysm 4 keeping up with me while doing this kisses 4 all of u!!! 🎀⭐️

[azyimnothere]

HELLO HELLO HELLO💕💕💕

Well as you might've presumed, I'm back, and I'm back with a banger! Just like these two:

If y'all get my drill :D

They are officially the most fabulous villains I've seen in a while! Love them both equally, they're so well written and special 💕

But they somehow still ended up as my second favorite, you wanna know who's my favorite? You really wanna know?

THE FREAKING INTERVIEWER, THIS 'I WEAR A RIDICULOUS HAT AND HAD ONLY 4 MINUTES OF SCREEN TIME' SON OF A B*TCH. I DON'T UNDERSTAND, I JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND, HE MAKES ME SO UNREASONABLY HAPPY AND HE SAID ONLY A FEW COMPLETE SENTENCES IN TOTAL. BUT HE JUST GETS ME, I KNOW IF I SAT HIM DOWN AND GAVE HIM A COLA HE WOULD RESOLVE ALL MY EMOTIONAL TURMOIL.

(I drew him so zesty for no reason, also the hat had to go I'm so sorry) (I'm not)

Anyway, here are some sketches 💕

I didn't have time for more I'm sorry 💕💕💕💕

Andddddddddddd here's for y'all who want to see the drawing more clearly

I have to admit I improved after the break, I guess all the techniques I learned marinated enough to become a fine meal✨

Love you lovelies!!! 💕💕💕💕💕

[tthesongofachilless]

F1 DRIVERS AS TEACHERS

Max Verstappen - Geography Teacher

— Randomly quizzes students about which country is in which continent

— However he can take jokes

— Randomly trauma dumps (one student even asked him if they should call Logan)

Sergio Perez - Spanish Teacher #1

— " You used Google translate for that... tsk tsk.. "

— Oral assessments every friday no questions asked

— He and Fernando talk in Spanish in the teachers lounge to avoid eavesdroppers

Charles Leclerc - Music Teacher

— Has a pictures of his dog as his pfp on Google

— Forces everyone to listen to his newest piece before class ends

— Rumoured to have kissed Max outside of school (he denies it)

Carlos Sainz - Spanish teacher #2

— Seen teasing Lando during lunch and blushing

— Hates basically every student who refuses to learn any Spanish

— His favourites tease him about Lando in Spanish and he curses at them to stop

Lewis Hamilton - Art Teacher

— Really passionate about his job

— " Did you hear about Logan and Oscar? " " WHAT?.. oh... what..? I can't discuss this with my students. "

— He actually gives you tips on how to improve your work and doesn't mess up your work by drawing over it!

George Russell - English teacher #1

— " Girls can we please put the eyelash curler away. And the makeup brush... and the hairbrush, gosh how do you fit this all into your pockets!? "

— Deffo dating Alex but doesn't admit to it

— Homework every single week, will report to your parents if not handed in

Lando Norris - PE teacher

— He doesn't know himself how he got the job

— Basically lets the students play dodgeball all year

— Giggles and kicks his feet whenever Carlos pops by to say hi

Oscar Piastri - English teacher #2

— Has been seen napping in the teachers lounge multiple times, Logan sometimes acts as his pillow

— " Guys can we not.. Nando is going to kill me if he finds out I'm giving out sweets. "

— Voted most gay teacher by the students

Fernando Alonso - Head of Year

— Brings the teachers snacks to their lessons

— " What the skibidi .. " " Mr. Alonso never say that again. "

— He deffo doesn't have favourite teachers (wink wink)

Lance Stroll - Woodwork teacher

— Definitely not suited for his job

— Just eats his lunch in the middle of lessons because he doesn't wanna be with the other teachers (Estaban isn't there)

— Watches on as students try and hammer in screws and does nothing about it

Daniel Ricciardo - Science Teacher

— He only applied because he wants to do cool experiments

— " Follow the instructions. " " Sir these are in french.. " " uhmm.. does anyone wanna watch the martian? "

— Everyone loves him

Yuki Tsunoda - Food Tech

— " That looks like if Mr. Norris tried cooking. "

— Randomly gives out snacks while he's doing instructions

— Disses the other teachers but when someone mentions Pierre he gets all excited asking how his lessons are going

Kevin Magnussen - History/Religion Teacher

— He just wants to go home after the first hour everyday

— He has shelves dedicated to historical Lego builds

— Has no favourites (" You always let Fred go early. " " Fred is doing the work. ")

Nico Hulkenberg - Cover Teacher

— Laughs at dad jokes that weren't even funny

— Probably wants to apply for a different job but can't

— Dressed up as the hulk for Halloween

Valtteri Bottas - Maths Teacher

— " Guys.. I know you miss Kimi but I'm basically him but, more ass, you know? "

— Bff's with Lewis and Zhou

— Let's the class play blooket every Friday instead of work

Zhou Guanyu - Textiles Teacher

— Voted most fashionable teacher of the year

— Randomly gives out sweets to his favourite students

— Actually puts work into grading

Alex Albon - Science Teacher

— " Sir, are you dating Mr. Russell? " " I have a girlfriend. " " Show her then!! " " No. "

— Never gives back tests

— Gossips with George and Lando in the hallways

Logan Sargeant - Guidance Counselor/Cover Teacher

— He needs therapy himself instead of giving students it

— Follows Oscar around like a lost puppy, it's rumoured he's absolutely whipped for Oscar but is too shy to do anything about it

— His favourites edit him and Oscar to 'Lacy' and he can't hear the song anymore without crying

Pierre Gasly - French Teacher #1

— Him and Estaban have BEEF

— stares into your soul when you awnser a question

— " But the other class didn't have to do this! " " That's because Mr. Ocon doesn't want his students to learn proper french. "

Estaban Ocon - French Teacher #2

— " I don't understand what I did to Mr. Gasly. " " You snitched on him giving out sweets, sir. " " I don't see the issue. "

— Only talks in french in the lessons

— He himself gives out sweets and such

[moonstruckme]

On Thin Ice

part 1 | part 2 | part 3

When your usual figure skating partner Regulus is injured, you're forced to prepare the most romantic routine you've ever done with Sirius Black. You've known Sirius since you were little and have always found him irritating, but as you spend more and more time together, your feelings towards him start to change

cw: injury (no details)

Figure Skater!Sirius Black x fem!reader ♡ 1.7k words

You can finally feel the music again.

Your legs push at the ice in tandem with Sirius’, taking his hand before drifting away from him again to the melody of the strings. That lightness is back, the intuitive rhythm you’d had with the routine before Regulus’ injury threw you off-balance. Every sweep of your foot underneath you, every stretch of your arms and back feels right in a way you thought you’d lost during the last two practices. Maybe more right than it ever has. 

You return Sirius’ smile as you finish, hands linked with your arms extended between you, and Coach practically whoops from the edge of the rink. 

“That’s what I like to see,” he declares. “We’ve got some stuff to clean up—you came out of that last spin too fast, Y/N, and Sirius, I wanna see you let her get lower on the death spiral—but that was great, great progress. If we keep at it, I think we’ll be ready for comp.” 

You can’t stop smiling, giddy at the prospect of getting to perform such an impressive routine when, just yesterday, you thought you might never be ready. Sirius sets a hand on your shoulder, squeezing excitedly, and you don’t shake him off like you usually might. Whatever his flaws, something had changed last night between you and Sirius. You wouldn’t call it friendship just yet, but there’s a sort of camaraderie now, an understanding of your mutual investment in this partnership, this routine. You have to work together, and it may as well not be an entirely unpleasant experience for the both of you. Plus, it means you get to enjoy moments like this. You place your hand atop his, squeezing back.

“Ready to go again?” Coach says. “Let’s take it from the spiral sequence.” 

☆ ☆ ☆

Over the few practices, you and Sirius become more and more in tune with each other, until you suspect no one would guess you haven’t been partners all along. You’re beginning to forget that too. The feeling of his hands on you has become a familiar pressure, you’ve learned to anticipate each other’s tiny movements in a split second, and you’ve grown fond of Sirius’ grander style of skating, enjoying the flow of mirroring his maneuvers. You’ve begun mirroring his expressions, too, returning his smiles automatically and engaging with the playful looks he sends you when one of you wobbles or misses a step. 

Though you’ve always had fun with Regulus, he’s all business on the ice. Sirius rarely stops joking around, seeming to find everything amusing even though you know skating really is important to him. He’s at the rink early every day and on the days when he doesn’t walk you home, stays late to correct whatever mistakes he made during practice. It’s rare for your coach to give him a direction during one session that he hasn’t implemented seamlessly by the next. 

Another difference: whereas Regulus has raw talent, Sirius works hard for it. 

Drive isn’t something you honestly would’ve associated with him before, but you suppose that’s because he never draws attention to it. He’ll give up his practice to help you fine-tune a difficult turn in an instant and he’s more given to speculating about what your costumes will look like than discussing his efforts to improve his form, but left to his own devices, Sirius will drill and drill a move until not even your coach can find flaw in it. 

Still, you would never guess that he’s even trying to concentrate as he winks at you, the both of you coming out of a synchronized turn and going into arabesque. Your fingertips brush for the barest of seconds, and you can’t say whether it’s the wink or that which takes your mind off your skates as you launch into one of your solo jumps, but your thoughts are spinning nearly as quickly as your vision as you twist through the air. 

You feel the slip, the slight shift of your back foot to where it shouldn’t be, while you’re still airborne, but there’s no time to correct it before you’re hitting the ground, skate catching oddly on the ice. Your leg twists under you, and you throw yourself to the side before you can land on the blade. You feel something pop before your shoulder hits the wall that borders the rink with a dull thud. 

Naturally, you’ve managed to turn a small error into a spectacle of injury. Your pride hurts worse than anything, but your knee is fighting hard for second place. Already the initial sharp pain has given way to a manageable throbbing, but it feels stiff, locked in place. There’s a swish of blades, and then Sirius is beside you, eyes darting over you with something close to panic. 

“Are you okay?” His hands ghost over your shoulder, your face. “What hurts?”

You push yourself up with your hands, trying to straighten your leg before hissing in pain. 

“Don’t.” Sirius sets a hand just above your knee as if to stop you from repeating the motion. “Don’t move. Is it your ankle?”

You swallow, feeling like you could burst into tears. If you have to sit out this season, after all your hard work, you’re going to be so disappointed in yourself. “My knee. I don’t think it’s bad,” you say, knowing that’s probably wishful thinking. 

“Hopefully not,” he agrees, and your coach finally makes it to you, crouching by your leg. 

“Does anything feel broken?” he asks, prodding at your shin. “Dislocated?”

“I, um,” you hesitate to admit to anything too drastic, as if that’ll change the actual severity of whatever’s wrong with you, “I felt something pop, but it doesn’t feel dislocated. And it doesn’t look like it, right?”

“Right.” Coach pokes at your knee, and you flinch a little, gasping. “I don’t love that, though.”

“You hit the wall with your shoulder too, didn’t you?” Sirius’ expression is as severe as you’ve ever seen it, and you find yourself shrinking under all the attention.

“Yeah, but that’s fine,” you reply hastily. “It’ll probably just bruise.” 

Coach eyes you, a preparatory disappointment in his gaze that worsens your own apprehension. “Can you put weight on it?”

You hesitate, and Sirius steps in before you can answer. “Let’s not chance it, yeah?”

Coach nods. “Okay, yeah, let’s end practice for today. Go get it checked out and text me what you find out, alright?”

You nod, and neither he nor Sirius seem angry with you, but that does nothing to stop the acute upset that’s forming in your chest. “Okay.” 

Sirius eases an arm carefully under your knees, slipping the other behind your back. He’s slow as he brings you to his chest, watching your face. “Does that hurt?”

You shake your head, and he stands with you in his arms, making his way to the exit. 

“I’m really sorry,” you whisper, hiding your face in his shoulder as tears arrive unbidden, distorting your vision. “I don’t want to mess this up.” 

“Hey.” Sirius’ breath is warm on your forehead as he speaks softly, head bent over yours. “Don’t be sorry. You aren’t messing anything up, it was an easy mistake.” He steps off the ice, setting you down on the bleachers and ducking his head until you’re looking at him. “It might still be nothing, yeah? Maybe you just tweaked something. So don’t cry just yet, shortcake, alright?”

You nod, wiping embarrassedly under your eyes. Sirius sits on the bench below you, unlacing your skates before you can even think to reach for them. “And even if you were out for the rest of the season,” he says lightly, “you’d just be coordinating your break with Regulus, and then the two of you could perform together next season.” He slips your first skate off, starting on the second. “Just like you wanted, yeah?”

You look at him, pieces of hair that have escaped the knot in the back of his head falling in his face as his fingers move deftly over your laces. You do want to skate with Regulus again, but you’re not so ready to forgo this season as you might’ve been when he was first taken out of the running. You like having Sirius as a partner. You enjoy practicing with him, talking with him, just being around him. And if this is your only season to do that, you’re not ready to give it up quite yet. 

“Yeah,” you say weakly, and something indecipherable flickers across Sirius’ face before he pulls your other foot free of your skate. “Thanks.” 

“Anytime, sunshine.” He grins at you, whatever you might’ve seen skillfully hidden away. “I’m known for being great at pep talks, you know.” 

You do your best to match his playful tone. “I believe it.” 

“Alright.” He pats your good knee, standing. “Do you think you could get a ride home? I’d carry you the whole way if I could, but I’m not sure you’d thank me for it if I messed up our throws tomorrow.” 

You laugh. “Yeah, I’m sure I can get a ride. Thanks, though.” 

You expect Sirius to leave, but he sits with you until your ride arrives, insisting on helping you to the car when you won’t let him carry you. After a long and somewhat teary phone call with Regulus that night, you make an appointment with a doctor for the next morning, where they tell you have something called a meniscus tear. You leave with a compression bandage around your knee and instructions to rest over the next couple of days. Coach echoes your relief over the phone, saying he’ll train with just Sirius until you can come back to practice and making you swear to do nothing but rest your knee until then. 

You almost call Sirius, too, but eventually settle for telling Regulus, sure that he’ll convey the message. You’ve never been happier to have to sit around, especially since it means you’ll still be able to compete this year. 

And you never thought you’d be this enthusiastic to finish out the season with Sirius Black, but you can’t wait until your next practice.

[alllgator-blood]

Have you ever wanted to draw something but you fought due to your skill level at the time you decide not to do it

OH ABSOLUTELY, I personally feel like the key to art improvement is trying new things and experimenting often. But the thing about trying new things is that they're typically out of your comfort zone, and often times you're left struggling because you've never had to move your hand in the configuration needed to depict the thing you want? So often times it feels easier to just not do that thing, but you might not improve if you give up when you fight against your own skill level.

I'm wrapping up on a comic and I almost gave up on it because for some reason, I decided "these two should be hunting while this conversation takes place" and I struggled on and off for two days because of my dedication to get this comic out. The payoff to them hunting doesn't even happen til the second page so I really didn't need to do this. I actually have experience with archery but for some reason, I just COULD NOT figure out where to put shamura's arms to make them hold that damn bow.....UNFINISHED COMIC PANELS INCOMING:

Is it perfect? HELL no I think it looks pretty awkward cause I've only been drawing these characters for a few weeks so I'm still getting used to them, and that in combination with drawing them doing action poses after years of drawing slice of life comics is..............not ideal. I'm more used to drawing furries hitting a bong on a garbage covered couch. But that's the thing! I wanna do more fanart for this Violent Video Game, so I need to learn how to draw people holding weapons. If I give up, like half my fanart ideas will never come to fruition, so I think making flawed art is better than making no art at all.

If you're struggling with your art, just absolutely barrel through whatever it is you're struggling with and come back another time in the future to revisit it. Attempt to draw you're struggling with (even if it's like the shittiest worst sketch ever, god knows I have tons of those), save it somewhere, and when you want to give that idea another go, compare the new art to what you did last time. Honestly I wish I tried and failed more than I didn't try at all, I'd have more to show for myself if I took my own advice.

[kinglets]

my art then vs now

I can't believe it's already 10 years since I started learning art because I was motivated by soriku. The left picture is from June 2014, and the one on the right I scribbled just last night. Seeing the difference is pretty wild because when I first started I never thought it could change so much.

I can't forget how hard it was at first, because nothing turned out the way I wanted it to and I gave my files some incredibly deprecating names. I was really kind of flying blind without any technique because I never had formal lessons lmao. I'm incredibly thankful to my friend Kett, who encouraged me a lot in my early years, otherwise I don't know if I could have stuck with it.

It's interesting to look through my art tag and see it stretch so far back. It took about 2 years of practice before I started to see noticeable improvement, and another year before it looked good enough that people wanted to reblog it. Whenever I got into new fandoms from time to time-- getting to see new styles and paying attention to what I liked about each-- also helped me improve some too. That being said, I think I could also have done more to study from real life or guides properly. Setting time aside to draw is tough because I was usually a full-time student or working a full-time job. When my time is limited, I just want to skip to drawing the things that give me serotonin, y'know?

This art journey changed my life for the better because it gave me the ability to contribute to what I love. I went from being a lurker to a participant and got to bond with other soriku fans, some of which who became very dear friends to me.

If you ever want to draw for your OTP but don't know how to, or feel embarrassed to, I wanna say just try it! It's a bit of a long term investment because the payoff might not come for years, but it's been rewarding for me and I only wish I started sooner.

[vasyandii]

how'd your art get to where it is now? as in, how did you learn? do you have any tips?

Howdy Anon! Thank you for the ask :) I've been drawing since I was 9-10, so I've learned a few things and done a few things! I'll try to condense it down as much as I can!

How I learned to draw (In no particular order)

1.) Speedpaints

I watched a lot of speed paints, a lot. Any style that I found appealing I would just watch for hours on end to see how those artists applied their techniques in practice. ((I also watched a lot of sketchbook tours and animation short films))

2.) Imitation

I would try my best to imitate the art styles I liked at the time, I wouldn't post the art, obviously but it was good practice that I sought out.

3.) Consistency

Drawing is one of the easiest things to get into, you can draw on any surface as long as your medium can leave marks, and if you mess up? You just throw away the paper and start again. I drew whenever I felt like it and it really helped :)

4.) Art Books/Tutorials

It ultimately depends on what style you wish to have, I usually strive between the line of Cartoon/semi-realism so I recommend Books like Morpho and Websites like Lineofaction.com :)

Art (Not really art) Tips!

1.) Supplies ≠ Skill

Understand that your art supplies/program does not equate to your abilities as an artist. You can spend a million dollars on the best supplies and equipment, but it won't be worth shit if you don't have the technical skills to use them. Upgrade gradually as you go.

2.) DON'T FORCE YOURSELF TO DRAW!!

A lot of artists struggle with Executive dysfunction and Art block. Just like exercise, your mind needs rest and recovery! If you don't let it, you'll further strain that muscle! Watch your favourite shows, eat good food (this also applies to foods that make you FEEL GOOD!)

3.) Don't complain

This is just a personal tip xD You don't draw because it's easy, you draw because it's hard. Don't complain about having Art Block.

I'm not saying you shouldn't ever be capable of having a creative block, I'm aware there's going to be periods of time where you can't seem to get your art right. But you shouldn't complain about your body signaling you to take a break or how your art "sucks".

Creating art to me is like a workout (for your brain and hands), so when I hear someone complaining about having Art block I hear the artist equivalent of "UGHHH I hate the gym, I wanna work out but I caaaan't I could neeever exercise."

4.) "Just Practice lol" is bullshit.

I hate this response, really. It's an "easy way out" half-assed answer that doesn't help artists that start out. While consistency is key, You can draw and "practice" your fundamentals as much as you want, but you wont improve as much as you would when you draw the things that YOU enjoy. Once you do that, the improvement comes naturally.

You like drawing faces? You start learning how to make your faces look better. You like drawing clothes? You leave to improve in drawing clothes. And so on.

You need to ACTIVELY SEEK it out yk

5.) Growth is never Exponential.

Never EVER be afraid that your art "doesn't look as good as it did" the last time you drew, you just got back from your break, ease into it! You need to roll with the punches, and try your best to fight back!

Hope this helps! I'm not sure how helpful this advice is, since I'm not a professional artist, but these are what work for me :D

[dice-wizard]

Hello everyone looking for a new fantasy tabletop game!

As it nears backer release, there's never been a better time to pre-order Exalted: Essence

Pre-ordering gets you access to the beta document and the early release backer pdf.

What's Exalted you ask?

Exalted is an epic fantasy TTRPG where players play the titular Exalted - humans elevated to superhuman/demigod status - in a wild and unique setting that draws inspiration from the ancient world rather than medieval Europe. Creation (the setting) draws key inspirations from the entire world. If you're used to having to make yourself visible on your own in other fantasy, there's probably some representation in Exalted.

It has explicit queer and trans themes about finding your people, creating your own identity, and having the power to punch back at the people who hate you. This isn't incidental. The writing staff is queer as hell. You can hear me break this down more here.

Curious to learn all you can? Well you can get a detailed overview of the entire game on the podcast Systematic Understanding of Everything hosted by myself, @presidentofbirds and @phillycuriosity

If I'm used to D&D 5e why should I pick this up?

Well, I presume if you're reading this post you're already interested in trying something new, so:

The entire game in one book. Exalted: Essence is self contained, character types, equipment, enemies and all!

An exciting style of fantasy that's different than classic D&D but like, textually gay, and very easy to have scenes like ballroom fights, epic galas, and touching homoerotic healing scenes - no house rules required.

But also, tactical depth and combat you can really sink your teeth into if fighting monsters and villains is your bag.

An excuse to use all your d10s at once

Character building and advancement mechanics designed to be familiar to a 5e audience. Characters "level up" based on story beats, and have Advantages, which are functionally similar to class and race features.

A world welcoming to most heroic archetypes, so it's easy to convert your favorite OC.

Extremely kissable dragons, demons, gods, elementals, ghosts, faeries, and unnamed ancient horrors

I'm a fan of a previous edition, what's Essence got for me?

Design focused on alleviating some of the previous versions' missteps

Virtues are back, baby

2e fans will find it an improvement from second edition's mechanical strengths - it's pretty easy to convert all your favorite 2e Charms to XS.

Streamlined versions of familiar rules to make it painless to introduce new friends to the game we love.

The Cliff's notes on Ex3's new Exalt types.

Did I mention it's all of Exalted in one book?

How does it play?

d10 dice pool looking for 7,8,9 as successes. 10s count as two successes, which can lead to explosive, heroic outcomes

Combat system designed to keep all players engaged the entire time - even characters who aren't focused on fighting at all.

Combat also narrows the gap between experienced and new players and players who want to win at RPGs and players who just wanna vibe so GMs aren't tearing their hair out trying to balance encounters.

Social system designed to resolve in a single roll so you can be immersed in role play and not interrupt it with constant rolling - without sacrificing a variety of social approaches

"Ventures" system for characters working on long term projects from traveling across the world to crafting magical wonders to building communities without forcing this to be "downtime" activity

Characters have access to Charms - exception-based special powers that make them extremely good at whatever they focus on.

It's easily my favorite game (and the project I developed that I'm the proudest of), so I'm excited for everyone to try it out.

[ssalballoon]

i wanna get better at art but dont know how to start ^^' whats a good way to get into studying anatomy and improving as an artist? tysm 💗 love your art soso much

more art converts 😼 yay!!

i think these asks were sent by different people but they're pretty related + a lot of my advice is the same! so i'll answer these together under the cut (it's so long oh gosh)

ok first of all i'm very flattered that people are asking me for art advice but i'm really not the most equipped person to ask TTOTT I've never been deliberately studious with my art so I feel bad offering advice when I've mostly gotten by with just drawing fanart and ocs a lot... my rate of improvement has therefore been slow, but I've still had an enjoyable learning experience so perhaps from that angle my input may help! i'll mainly refer you to external resources that have helped me

For anatomy + drawing humans:

1) I know I'm not diligent enough to sit down and study muscles, so instead I make it more enjoyable by drawing my favorite characters in a pose that targets the muscles I want to practice! (i default to drawing ppl naked because of this lol) This isn't the most efficient, but it serves as good motivation to get practice in. (honestly a lot of my general art advice has the undercurrent of becoming so obsessed with characters to drive your motivation to draw even when artblocked/ struggling with doubts!)

2) I want to refer you to Sinix's Anatomy playlist! Although Sinix focuses more on digital painting, he gives simplified anatomy breakdowns that include how muscles change shape under different movements/poses, which is crucial for natural human posing. the static anatomy diagrams from Google don't really help for that

3) What's just as important as anatomy is gestures! (especially important if you're used to drawing non-human objects I think!) Making figures look like they have flow to them will sell the "naturalness"(?) to your anatomy. If you have in person life drawing sessions accessible near you I'd recommend trying those out, or if you prefer trying it digitally there's this website!

This helps you not only get a sense of human proportions, but also natural posing! I'd limit the time taken to draw the poses from like 10 seconds to 1 minute(?) for quick gestures, and maybe 1 minute to 5mins(for now!! typically they go much longer) to study human proportions. I'd say don't spend a lot of time on them, repetition is more important!

4) I've also picked up on useful anatomy tidbits from artists online! Looking at how practiced/ professional artists stylize a body helps me focus on what the essential details are to convey a particular form (looking up "human muscles" and being hit with anatomy diagrams full of all the smallest details can be overwhelming! what do you even focus on?! so these educated simplifications really help me) Like Emilio Dekure's work! Look how simplified these figures are, and yet contain all the essential information to convey the sense of accurate form (even though it's highly exaggerated!)

(shamefully admits I've never studied from actual anatomy books so I can't recommend anything in that sense TTOTT)

For general improvement:

1) I highly recommend Sinix's Design Theory playlist and Paintover Pals! (+ his channel in general) You don't have to put them immediately into practice, but I think these are good fundamental lessons to just listen to and have them in the back of your mind to revisit another day. Plus these videos are just fun and very approachable! Design theory fundamentals are essential to creating appeal and directing a viewer's attention, and critiquing others' work/ seeing his suggestions are a good way to practice noticing areas of improvement+ solutions yourself!

2) If you prefer a more formal teaching resource, the Drawabox YouTube course covers all the basic fundamentals of drawing in short lessons. But honestly if I were starting out, this would be a little intimidating for me (and even now it still is! I haven't done all of them) But even if you don't watch them, the titles should give you an idea of the basic concepts that are valuable to pick up. I think it would be nice to keep in mind and revisit once in a while as you learn!

(One lesson I do encourage you to watch is the line control one! A confident continuous line conveys motion and flow much better compared to discontinuous frayed lines which I think is good to practice early by drawing from the wrist and shoulder)

3) As a universal piece of advice: Please please please use references! Use a reference for literally everything, observing is how we learn! You'll find that a lot of things you thought you knew what they looked like are inaccurate by memory alone. Also, trace! This is solely for your practice, tracing then freehanding has helped me grasp proportions when I was struggling! (of course don't post these online if you traced from art)

I've found that being able to compile references into easy to access boards has been very helpful in encouraging me to use references more. For PC, I think they use PureRef (free/pay what you want), and for iPad I use VizRef. VizRef is a one time purchase (which was definitely worth the $3.99 USD price imo)

4) On that note, try building up the habit to observe from media + real life and make purposeful comments about what you see! Like hey, when I bend my knee, the muscles/fat in my thighs and calves bulge outwards, I should draw that next time. Purposeful observation carries over to your overall visual library, and it's a little thing that adds up over time

5) For motivation, get into media you really enjoy, or make your own characters! The way I started art more seriously was by drawing fanart + OCs from anime that I liked ^^ For OCs it really encourages you to draw more because you're the primary creator of their art! Also you gotta see a lot of good art to make good art! Watching visually appealing media (like animation with appealing stylization/simplification) can passively help you learn just by observation.

ok wow I could go on but this is already a lot of information TTOTT my main aim for this reply is basically: don't let anything discourage you from learning to draw!! drawing is so fun and brings me a lot of joy ^^ practicing often will of course help you improve, and the way to incentivize that is by having fun with it! i hope this could help!💞

[herotome]

Devlog #126

Hi-ho, Wudge here.

Happy new year! And open disclosure, I uh... kinda worked through the holidays. And in fact, I... worked this past weekend...

My friend @crescencestudio informed me I also worked through the holidays last year... So uh, I think I owe myself a break.

ᵂʰᵉᵗʰᵉʳ ᵒʳ ⁿᵒᵗ ᴵ ᵃᶜᵗᵘᵃˡˡʸ ᵗᵃᵏᵉ ᵗʰᵃᵗ ᵇʳᵉᵃᵏ…

A-- Ahem.

On expressions - I'm reaching a point where I drew enough assets that I can mix and match! ... Mia doesn't have a single smile just yet.

I organized the PSD/.clip files for Mia and Warden a great deal too - much easier to find revelant layers now. Haven't finished importing/coding the expressions into the game yet - that'll be a whole song and dance for another day.

There's a few more small parts I wanna draw (namely irises to the side, and a 'talking' open mouth), and then she should be all set for her demo scene. Fingers crossed.

I'll either jump back to Warden next, or move onto Griffin.

I also drew.... three concepts for potential upcoming characters (and for 2 objects!). I don't wanna show them off since there's no guarantee that they'll be in the game/that this will be their final designs, but I can at least give a lil peek:

I had a nice time comparing these concepts to my concept art from 1-2 years ago! My line confidence seems to have improved :D

It's kinda weird since gesture and linework were always My Thing when I worked traditionally, but when I transitioned to digital art there was still a huge learning curve! I'm happy to have gotten better at it, but it took a surprising long while.

Writing-wise - I came up with what I think is a preeetty solid idea for showing off Mia's powers in-game! I have a rough draft/notes of the scene, it's not remotely near first draft completion, but I can at least show off this choice menu:

That's about it, I think...!

Sorry I've been slacking a bit on getting back with yall - I see yalls messages and they are delightful. I've been spending my spoons too recklessly - I'll really try to take a bit of time off to get myself back to normal. So uh, maybe no devlog next week - I'll try not to hold myself to it and just. try. not to work. lol.

Thank you for bearing with me!!!

Stay safe and keep warm,

Wudge.

[masquayla-the-splendid]

In an earlier post, I listed the evidence pointing towards the one and only metallic noodle clown as being some robot form of neurodivergent. I have since dubbed this as "bot-tism."

(The Sonic half of my brain argues an episode of Aosth touching upon this concept and calling it "mechanically challenged." Egh.)

Since we're taking April, I finally finished this sketch from a while ago.

I made a whole render of it for reference and everything, but I ended up drawing over the limbs and stuff anyway.

It is actually a redraw from 2020! Blech the messaging is so blatant.

As you can clearly see, this was drawn and posted when I killed the part that cringes.

I left the new and improved version textless and up for interpretation, but if you want my exact thought process, then see below the cut, because I don't wanna ruin the fun for anyone else.

The 2020 drawing was the first instance of me using Ennard's mask as a metaphor for "masking." Although not used directly in a ND sense, but for an internal struggle nonetheless.

Ennard’s desire to be human, and the ambiguity of how his mind even works is a perfect metaphor for a number of neuro types.

The former can be interpreted as many NDs struggle of being treated differently than NTs in a social setting. Like I said in the previous post, they only wear their mask when they know they're being perceived, and when he does finally get his skin suit, it only lasts for a week before it fails him. Burnout.

"But oh! Silly goose, why don't you just be yourself?" The neighbors reactions to the skin suit deteriorating. The entire point is that they need look/act "normal" to be treated like a human.

The latter can be interpreted to how many NDs have so many differing brain signals than a NTs, that they aren't even aware of.

To add on to the other post, Fnaf 6 seems to characterize Molten Freddy/Scrap Baby as if they were mindless entities that must be destroyed, hence "burn it" in the 2020 drawing. This bled into a whole different interp of Ennard as more animalistic than he really is. It wasn't widely used, but it was noticeable enough for 14-15 y/o me to draw about it. This to me is a lot like what I said prior about masking and looking "normal." This interp seems to paint him from an unknowing observers point of view. 'How dare you visually emote with your hands' or, 'how dare you get stressed out over the complexity of sound or light, weirdo.' You know. Which is probably my injustice sensitivity typing up paragraphs backing up a fictitious robot.

The latest version has his mask removed voluntarily, while covering his face his with his own hand. The mirrors are now silly mirrors, the floor is a spiral, and the reflections remain of himself, but also of his components, and another character of importance on the far left. (It's a bloodied Michael hand.)

He voluntarily unmasks, only to be surrounded by distorted reflections of himself. The Funtimes can represent the many oddities of his mind, and the aforementioned bloodied Michael hand can represent the damage that can be done to yourself or others if you dont take the accountability and measures to learn your own boundaries.

Also the irony that the horror clown character endures how a horror clown character would torment their victim.

The true message: Unmasking is a process.

[basiatlu]

@black-occamy here again 🖤

Oh, amazing Artist! Would you be so kind to share some tips for absolute crap beginners?

Love 😘

Helloooo~☆ I took a moment to type this out a little bit ago and to tweak and edit as I saw fit so ty for waiting.

Ok ok so here's Crap Tips for Crap Beginners:

Stop calling yourself "crap, bad, and trash" when first starting out. - You wanna improve and have the drive to make art and feel satisfied at the end of a drawing? Then give yourself the positive reinforcement that most pups need in learning a new skill and trick. Treats and good pets and "nice jobs!" The whole world will fight against you, they'll try to beat you down and tell you what you do and how you do it doesn't matter. You've got to tell them to stick that where the sun doesn't shine. Aggressively support yourself - fake it till you make it etc etc. Pretend everything you do is intentional until you see yourself making more intentional decisions with your artwork.

With the pep talk out of the way - Warming Up is so important. Just like athletes and dancers do beforehand, you need to stretch your hands and arms and shoulders. And then you need to have a healthy back posture if possible. Draw with your whole arm and not just your wrists and fingers. Aaaand then you need to get the squiggles out. By that I mean make marks on your medium/paper/tablet. Little hatch marks, boxes, circles, tornados, silly emoji faces! When learning to draw, there will be 100 bad drawings before you reach a single good one, is what my college professor would say. And damn was he good.

If you can't draw something well or easily then you need to draw it again and again and again.... and again. I was really struggling to draw hands and feet! So I took pictures of my own hands, of my friends' hands, saved pictures from online, etc and made studies of them. Just paid extremely close attention to what I was actually looking at (and not what I thought hands where supposed to appear as). I also studied medical anatomical diagrams on hands to learn the bones, muscles, and tendons in the hands! It's very important!!! Studying can be applied to anything: cars, plants, animals, braids, fabric textures....

You have to refresh your lessons - once you do a study it doesn't permanently install into your brain for you to copy/paste whenever you need it. You have to revisit and keep that muscle memory in your hands for when you go to draw. I fall out of practice ALL the time and need to dedicate time to relearn how to draw things. And this isn't because I'm failing or wasting away as an artist, it's just a simple fact that I lost a little bit of my artist muscle mass and need to work out those muscles again. See?

You don't need fancy tools to draw, but they do help. I always break it down to the simplest form of sticks and mud. You can draw with pencils, twigs, charcoal, paint, on paper, in the dirt, in the sand, on canvas, on your phone, on a tablet. On and on it goes. Have the tools you need so you don't hinder yourself but don't hold back because you need to 'wait for the latest and greatest tech.' Why wait? Brush packs will not instantly make you a better artist, my dude. Printer paper and a sharpened pencil will take you miles.

And that's honestly it! Generally all good tips to keep in mind for when you're first starting. Some of these I have to also remind myself. I get down on my abilities and need the reminders too. Getting down to the basics is really important. Stretch, practice, stay strong, and oh! Also take breaks. ✨️

[chronocrump]

Hello Chronocrump, I recently stumbled upon your art the other day, and I couldn't stop staring at your gallery.. It makes me realize there is so much thats lacking from my art that I really want to improve on. I felt desperate to contact you, but wasn't sure if it would be rude. I wanted to try to ask you, how do you approach drawing? Do you structure it first, or start with a gesture drawing? Focus on the form or perspective first? Etc My other question might seem strange, but I wanted to ask how do you hold your pencil? Ive learned that different pencil grips can drastically change the quality of someone's art. Thank you for your time. I'm sorry if my message is to long, or you don't want to respond back. I wanted to atleast try, but also let you know that your work has been very inspiring for me to keep trying.

I'm glad to answer your questions, it's seriously no problem. I wanna start by telling you how amazed I was when I checked your profile to see your work. I know you have a huge lack of confidence in it, but your art is genuinely beautiful, and frankly, looking at it, I found it hard to believe that you would be asking me for advice...from my perspective, you're way ahead of me. You're certainly better with color; you might notice I really only post sketches lol. I really don't want to dismiss or downplay your feelings about it, but I have to let you know how I felt looking at it. To me it seems like your brain is telling you your art isn't good enough when it very, very much is.

Anyway, enough gushing from me lol. On to your questions.

Usually when starting a drawing, I very loosely and lightly sketch the overall form of the pose I wanna do. Very rough basic shapes/forms to get everything in its right place before I start really drawing it with confident lines. Even then, all the lines are subject to change; nothing is sacred. To be honest tho, I usually mess up the proportions and have to fix them a bit lol. I try to sketch cleanly and concisely, meaning I try not to draw a lot of lines in a spot that could really be done with just one or two. I'm not super strict on that tho, at the end of the day while I try to draw efficiently, I also want to draw comfortably. So with something like a big circle for example, I'll draw that pretty sketchy. In terms of perspective, I'm trying to get better at it, but when considering how I want to use it in a drawing, it's part of the initial image or idea I have in my head, so I lay it out from the beginning. I do also draw structure lines on the face, just a simple cross to plan where the center of the face will be. Lately I've also tried taking more pictures of myself for pose reference and it works well.

Most of my practice comes from studying my favorite artists and trying to emulate the specific ways they structure their drawings. I should actually be doing dedicated practice sessions with that, but I digress. Recently I've been trying to practice from photos first thing in the morning, tho I'm finding it hard to commit to doing it daily. I just go on pinterest and find cool poses, then draw them, trying to get down the basic shapes and prominent features more than focusing on minute details. I've posted some of these practice sketches on here but there's a few more on my twitter if you wanna see what I'm talking about.

In terms of my pencil grip, I'm not sure...since I was little, I've always had an unusual grip. Looking it up, I guess it's like the "dynamic quadrupod" grip, but with my forefinger farther back. Really the most I try to do is draw less with my wrist and more with my forearm. Some say you should "draw from the shoulder", and that sounds right...I guess it's all about avoiding straining your wrist and getting carpal tunnel lol.

Anyway, I'm flattered that you would ask me for advice. To be honest, it makes me feel like I should have more confidence in my own art. And you should too! I can say that, objectively, your art is very good. I hope my advice was actually helpful and not generic stuff you've heard before lol. Good luck in your art journey.

[lemonisntreal]

Do you have a Tone Deaf version of Clay Calloway?

(Perfectly fine if you don't. I was just curious, plus I love all your redesigns) 🦁🎸

SORRY THIS TOOK FUCKING FOREVER LMAO [been sitting in my inbox since FEBRUARY THIRTEENTH, HOLY SHIT :D]. YEAH, here he is :pppp a solid draft for you

Lowkey [highkey] gave up on the clothing wrinkles on the arms, but I still like how it turned out I think. I don't have much on him in terms of rewrite, but I do have some, so I'll dump it all here under the cut.

I swear I love asks, please feel free to say/ask whatever, I'm just horrible at answering in a reasonable time-frame because I always want to make it this beautiful masterpiece and end up turning all of them into full-on posts- or, at least I want to ~_~

Headcanonssss-

Ash gave him that button off her jacket [probably needs to be resized I'm realizing lol] [also I totally adopted this headcanon from someone elses post- might've been yours. Whoever came up with it I love it <3]

Born during the reformation that happened after the war- basically, nobody was really fighting anymore during this time, but some big people in power were still being stupid [aka: not letting their prisoners go]

So that would be somewhere around 1947? Which would put his age at 61 in my universe [which is in 2008- the times are pretty much random, nothing really lines up irl. Ignore how they use tech and other things that shouldn't have been invented yet lol]

He grew up when the Skunk Dolls were new and popular and stuff. And he loved them- so much that the band actually kinda inspired his music career

[Skunk Dolls also made loads of protest songs btw. War stuff]

Takes a ridiculous amount of care with his mane, and if he lets you touch it, that's a true sign of trust

So the Piglets always like to play with it, and Ash has given him braids a few times

He's had that scruffy red jacket since his early days

I should draw patches on it-

Ash probably'll give him a quill or two to put in it too with all the patches and repair stitches

He wears a lot of plaid, I just didn't wanna draw it <3

Rough and torn up clothes too

Everything he owns has some sort of smudge or tear in it from motorbiking and/or just being himself <3

His ears are pierced in almost every way imaginable, and when Ash found out, she went CRAZY

Cue her getting him to try on a bunch of stuff

He likes wrought iron jewelry and has never been a fan of anything with gemstones in it

Buster is terrified of him, but Clay is just kinda a blunt person and it doesn't mix well with Buster sometimes. They get along eventually tho. There was also some really bad timing with the circumstances of how they even met in the first place too lol-

Johnny is also. Super terrified.

Buster and him are like "Ahhh.... that guy scares the living daylights out of me." "Ohh, thank god it's not just me-"

He has a strange out-of-pocket interest in astrology.

And in herbology and plants in general, but he picked that up from Ruby. Astrology was all his, and it is the one thing he will "nerd out" over

Also the kind of guy to make fun of you for nerding out too

Making fun of people is his love language

So is giving people food

He's not great with his words and can find it hard to express love by just telling someone. Back to the bluntness thing, you can often find him accidentally offending someone and he doesn't even realize it

The troupe very quickly learned this and it's more of an endearing trait of his to them [and to most people who know him]

REALLY good cook. Fantastic, in fact. Probably one of the best chefs out of any of the characters.

Learned the hard way that enlisting Buster's help in the kitchen is a bad idea. Also Ash isn't great either, but he actually tries to teach her some of his recipes. And she's quickly improving

Buster was just being an idiot and forgot you shouldn't microwave tinfoil

Clay travels a lot, but spends most of his time in Calatonia [he technically still lives at his and Ruby's house, but he's super scared of accidentally closing himself off again, so he only visits to check up on the flowers and maintain the property pretty much]

He's like Ash's second [and very cool] dad. Which- also intimidates Buster quite a bit :D

I feel like their dynamic could be a sitcom. Clay is Ash's awesome dad and Buster is Ash's lame [endearing] and oddly unhinged and anxious dad who feels like he has to be as cool as Clay [and always fails heehee]

Clay is more entertained by Buster's ridiculous criminal record than horrified and I don't know if that's worrying or just a classic Calloway W

He's a very nonchalant person

Ruby's death is the only time I can really think he had a legitimate emotional break that wasn't just him being snappy [which is also pretty rare]

Clay's also like an uncle to the Piglets

He's kinda just taken up the role of "super awesome miscellaneous family member" for everyone at this point

He's back performing again after Sing 2- just not frequently or putting out any new songs [on his own at least- he might do a collaboration or two with Ash]

[annymation]

Following my ask about Star, what about Asha’s arc?

Sorry if I’m making you repeat yourself 😅

No problem! Focusing on them individually actually helps me a lot.

So, Asha in the beginning of the movie would want to improve her drawing skills, but she couldn’t really put into words why besides just “My mom inspired me” but by the middle of the story she has a realization that the reason she loves drawing so much is because she needs to try over and over again to get better, practicing every day, even when she makes a bad drawing she tries again, and it’s so satisfying when she manages to get it right.

Drawing in this case is a metaphor for life, that’s the life Asha wants, a life that she’s free to try over and over again and always get back up again when she fails, she doesn’t want a life where she can just make a wish and that wish will comes true with the snap of her fingers, she wants a life where she can achieve everything she want with her own hands.

So it’s like a journey of her learning that about herself, really it’s a journey of self discovery and also self improvement because she never stopped to think about herself and her own wants before.

A little detail I’m thinking on including is that at first Asha is terrible at drawing self portraits. They say you can only draw something well if you really understand that something, Asha has trouble understanding herself so in turn she can’t draw herself properly. But, after learning more about herself, by the end of the story she learns how to make a perfect self portrait, that may sound insignificant but it’s actually major for her defeating the villains, how?

Well, I was gonna leave to say it later buuuut… Aster will enchant her pencil and turn it into a magic pencil that can bring her drawings to life, I don’t wanna spoil much so let’s just say this magic pencil + her knowing how to perfectly draw herself are things that comes in handy during the final confrontation.

So yeah Asha goes from a quiet and shy girl to a confident and inspiring woman, but really that woman was already inside of her, she just needed learn how to show herself.