#shading things digitally without a tablet is HELL

[sketchfanda]

Chestnut Stud Across the Multiverse: Double Z Opportunity

“How in the hell did I let 18 talk me into this kind of stuff….” Krillin half asked and said to himself as he mulled over his thoughts in regards to his current situation. Trying to look anywhere but right what was in front of him at the moment as he walked a seemingly plain, random office corridor. Now why you might ask was he in such a mood and what was he trying not stare at exactly you might ask? Well to answer the latter question, he was trying not to stare at the swaying backside of the woman guiding and leading him around here, a hot, sexy mature piece of ass known as Tina Lynx. The furry babe clad in a simple casual sweater,miniskirt, sneakers and shades and carrying a tablet in hand as a sort of digital clipboard and walking with a distinct sway and shady to her thick, plump and curvy form. Her thighs rubbing together, hips striding as her ass bounced and clapped, hinting she had a thing on beneath that saucy skirt of hers. Krillin of course doing any and everything he could to be polite, a blush in his face as he rubbed the back of his head nervously, the stubble of his spiky hair felt on his palm as his usually smooth dome head was in its unshaven  period. The former question and the cause if his nervousness as well as why he was following this lynx babe? Well that answer came soon enough the shades wearing babe shit a glance at him over her shoulder, a friendly smile on her pretty face.

“Hey don’t worry about it so much handsome, feel free to look, I don’t mind. Sure who hasn’t seen what I’ve got without clothes on,right?” Tina playfully quipped, a soft giggle from her muzzle at seeing Krillin flinch and blush as if he were a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Deciding to take her advice as it occurred to him that some of the pictures snd posters on display in this corridor snd throughout the office building it occupied were, shall we say, of a very adult nature. Tina’s tone friendly and playful all at once as she continued leading the off duty cop and former monk to where ever she was leading him to.  “And don’t worry too much about it, from what your wife told us over the phone and in your e-mail application, you’re gonna be a natural. But it’s perfectly reasonable to be a bit nervous for your first time doing anything related to porn..” Reassuring him as she reminded him exactly why he was feeling the way he was. Ah yes indeed that’s right, he was at the office of Double Z studios,  a pornographic movie company and he was here for his tryout to star as a performer. 18 by chance had come across a want ad in the paper, looking up the details in their website to find out that they were looking for human males and similar non anthro males to audition for the first time. To which his hot cyborg bombshell of a wife wasted no time in filling out an application on his behalf and arranged this appointment for him, such a lovely wife he had, he thought to himself sarcastically. He knew why she’d done it of course for more than one reason. He had plenty of spare time when he wasn’t on duty protecting snd serving the public and there wasn’t any of the odd, usual galactic threats to existence happening. Not to mention it paid quite handsomely and best of all,in her mind, she’d get to watch her man doing porn!! God the sex they had just from how turned on she was at the ides of her husband going at it with drop dead gorgeous furry babes, it’d been as wild as their first time together snd their honeymoon night. Hell even the very union that had conceived Maron and it wasn’t like the thought of doing this line of work wasn’t a a turn-on. Hell Oolong and Roshi would cry tears of blood if they knew, wk during why him and not them.

“Yeah I know, pretty sure that’s going to be a regular on the job kind of thing huh?” Krillin quipped as he out on a brave front, still blushing but a half hearted smile on his face as Tina gave a soft, friendly giggle to that remark. The mature feline hottie soon stopping as they came to an office door, displaying the name Zig Zag on its glass and shutter frame. Signifying they’d arrived at the domain of the boss lady herself as Krillin steadied his nerves. This was it, no turning back now as Tina knocked on the door, the pair awaiting a response as Krillin had an idle glance at his surroundings. Posters framed and hung in the wall alongside pictures of employees/performers of the month or week, proudly displaying the body of work Double Z studios had put out. Including some of their recent non anthro male stars who had also applied for the position he was trying out for. Among them being some guy they called Red Riot and some small little Red Devil looking guy with horns and a tail. The fact said posters boldly displayed their female stars naked as the day they were born made th compact fighter blush, reminding him how 18 he’d made him watch some Double Z movies for “research” as she had called it. Particularly of the founder and owner of this very studio herself. An exotic woman and Jack of many trades when it came to porn. Writer, director, producer and of course star, the one and only Zig Zag herself, whose voice called from inside for them to enter as Tina opened the door, leading the auditioning shirt king in. Showtime, he thought to himself as he followed, the door shutting behind them.

The Office itself seemed like well any old office and there Krillin saw set nicely snug in a corner was the notorious,infamous casting couch. While sitting across nice and comfy from it in simple but stylish corporate casual wear was the one and only Zig Zag herself. Ms.Double Z who was every bit as exotic as she looked, after all how many women like her in this world were full on tiger-skunk hybrids? Her sleek,toned and curvy bombshell body rocking a big fluffy tail with snow white fur decorated with black stripes, her eyes a rich sparkling crystal blue as she wore a sensual smile on her luscious face’s muzzle. Which from the shortstack lawman’s perspective could come across as rather predatory as those azure eyes were no doubt mentally undressing him as she locked her gaze on him. “Well now,your wife sent me a picture or two but seeing you in person, you look even better than I imagined..” the TigerSkunk hottie quipped and teased playfully. Krillin blushing as he rubbed the back of his neck out of nervous reflex, taking a seat as she gestured for him to do so. Between her and Tina,who stood between the desk and the chair like some casual neutral observing 3rd party, it was tough time trying to decide who’d be the least likely to get him all riled up with arousal by staring at either one of them. As aforementioned, 18 had him conduct “homework” by watching a few double Z movies for “research purposes”. These two had featured quite extensively among the vast ocean of clips, highlight reels and then some available on just the streaming platform alone. To say nothing of the dvd and bluray digital libary, as ZigZag caught his attention by getting up from seat to move around in front of her desktop and park her glorious miniskirt clad rear on the edge. Her fluffy tail idly wagging and waving sensually as she began to speak.

“Now handsome...mind if I call you that?” Krillin blushed but shrugged,hinting he was fine with it either which way as she nodded from his confirmation and resumed her train of thought. “As you’ll have gather, you’re not just any guy trying out for work here at my little playground here,no sir. This tryout goes well you’ll be among my small growing little cast I’ve been rounding up and assembling. Not my first human but definitely first among many,or the last should this work out for you. All depends how much you pass my personal standards...” she spoke,as she gestured to Tina, who nodded and tapped away at the screen on her tablet,showing a sort of checklist to the shortstack dude. This included details such as length, girth, build, stamina, staying power to name a few. He could see she wasn’t kidding about standards. Very high ones at that from the looks of it as she moved from sitting idly on her desktop to pacing about, hips swaying and her tail wafting in the air with a rather perfume like scent. It was rather intoxicating and pheromonal in its nature and quality, made sense given how charistmatic and stunning she was. As she spoke of what she aimed for when it came to selecting her stars and especially how to apply it to the likes of him. In their hiring experience so far, size defnitely counted but only especially and particularly if you knew how to use it. As well as how long you could last and go for and no damn pretentious egos!! Small mumbling rants about horses, bulls and the like, noticing a brief shudder of...passion shared between her and Tina when he heard them refer to something or someone like scalies, or whoever this Moxxie or Eijiro guys were. Before the Siberian TigerSkunk sexbomb looked at him coyly and playfully as she gestured for him to stand up, which he did, not wanting to disoblige her.

“First thing’s first, let’s see who and what we got to work with here. Be a sweetheart and strip down to your skivvies, won’t you?” She sensually quipped, his eyes bugging a bit as he bit back any remark or retort, blushing as he began to do just that. Tina and ZigZag gluing their gaze as they purred,certainly liking what they were seeing. At 5′1′‘, he certainly wasn’t going to turn heads at an airport but he wasn’t some stubby barrel or stringbean twig boy, no sir. From the neck down, Krillin was a physical Adonis or Atlas, his body a work of muscular art crafted,sculpted and honed by years to decades of combat training in the martial arts. Arms and legs like compact tree trunks, broad shoulders and pectorals with a perfect sixpack of abs. His boxers snug and tight but keeping him modest as he blushed and sat back on the couch, watching as Zigzag strode over and began to touch and caress him. Making him shudder,his muscles twitching as her busy hands massaged his physique, definitely liking what she. Oh yes,she quite liked it a lot as she teased hovering glances and touches to the crotch of his boxers, her tail waving like a snake slithering gracefully along the ground. “Mmm I like what I’m seeing, oh yeah you’re passing a few check arms so far handsome…“the hybrid hottie purred as she pried herself off from him to stand back and admire him like some prime work of art. Sitting back atop her desk, making the vertically challenged fighter blush as her skirt lifted enough to expose she was commando under it.

Tina of course reminded him of her presence in the office as she cleared her throat politely, making him jump a bit in his seat. “Alright boss should I call her in? I’d say we’re ready to start the tryout….” She enquired as her hybrid boss nodded in affirmative, Tina fished out her cellphone as she tapped away,typing and sending a text to god only knows who. Looking at the lynx hottie with a hint of puzzlement and confusion which she noticed as she eased it. “We’re just gonna have one of our stars com in here and perform with you like doing a scene from one of our projects. Naturally it’s not enough to have the looks but also the skills. So ofmcourse we will be recording this..,”she explained as she gestured to a nearby digits, video camera in a tripod which was connected to a laptop on ZigZag’s desk. It made Krillin wonder how he’d missed sight of thst when he got in here, gulping nervously as his face blushed. That’s right,he reminds himself internally, he was auditioning for work at a porn studio which meant having to be work in front of cameras and filming crew…having sex!! That somehow made him scared and aroused all at once, scaroused! Or even scared and horny, scorny!? Was that even a word? Point being he was already feeling exposed in front of the two furry hot piece of ass and they were going to watch and film him doing it with another woman. He hadn’t felt scaroused and scorny since that whole fiasco at Videl’s bachelorette party. Let’s just say things got lewd and wild when 18 and some of the ladies got drunk, Especially the guest of honour herself. His thoughts brought back to the present as a new fsce made their presence known as they barged into the office without knocking and slammed it shut behind them.

“I swear to God, this had better be a good reason for calling me here thst doesn’t involve cleaning another mess you made. I already been busy enough just mopping and sweeping up the sets from Red Riot and that damn Imp’s scenes earlier today!!” The new arrival snarked hardly as Krillin took in her appearance. Of course at this point why wouldn’t or shouldn’t he be surprised she was another hottie, it seemed like one of those absolute rules here at Double Z. Only the most bodacious tits,the bubbliest and juiciest asses and succulent curves and tones need apply and this babe was no exception to that. A heavily dark blue to navy feline who would no doubt seem pitch black in the sort of lighting and shading. A toned curvy figure and frame with her silky fur on display thanks to her denim dungarees,a wheeled bucket with the attached mop in hand signifying she was likely a custodian or janitor if her remarks were anything to go by, a feather earring dangling as her h pretty face displayed a natural neutral. Albeit offset by the aether intense, fierce expression she wore in her face which made it clear she was plenty annoyed and pissed off. Her golden feline eyes turning their glaring gaze on him as she noticed his presence, her expression deepening. “Oooh you saucy bitch, a casting couch routine? You got God knows how many horny bitches a available and you want  me to try get this runt off? Tch,fine whatever if I’m gonna be cleaning this mess, no harm in me being the one to make it…” with that said,she nudged her miko and bucket aside into an idle corner as Tina went to go prep the camera, Zigzag’s smile growing to a mix of amusement and arousal at the pending display she was about to witness. Her tail swaying as it’s pheromones scent flowed.

“Knew I could count on you to step up babycakes. Krillin honey,this is Darke Katt, part time starlet and custodian, don’t let the attitude out you off,she’s a sweetheart when you really get to know her.” The tigerskunk porno entrepreneur quipped playfully,shooting him a wink and a while. Katt of course responded by shooting her a dirty look over her shoulder as she razzed her and flipped her the bird. Before turning her focus back to Krillin with a deadpan look, the sort of which said ‘‘Better make this worth my while or I’ll fuck you uo in the all ways that make you useless to a woman!!” It was certainly scarousing, As the shadowy feline made him big his eyes out and drop his jaw as she undid he buttons of her dungarees, letting the to fall as she began to peel off and remove it, leaving herself naked as the day she was born. Her tits perky and firm, just right enough for a man’s hands to enjoy and play with,her swaying tail connected to a glorious bubble butt just crying to be played like a bongo drum, her slit glistening with small signs of arousal as he himself felt that familiarmrush of blood. The kind that went from his brains to his loins as the feisty feline leaned close to him, draping her arms around his shoulders as he pulled his face close towards her own. Suddenly pressing her lips to his, the fur of her muzzle silky and soft as he suddenly found her tongue invading his mouth. Overwhelming his brain with a surge of pleasure as her claws scraped along the skin of his back. Making him flinch as she hinted those babies were razor sharp snd ready to cut him up if he so much as got any funny ideas or really pissed her off. Much as she seemed to hate being the one to handle the two at hand, she seemed to be getting quite into it as her fingertips and palms caressed his muscles hinting she was maybe enjoying this. This caused him to gain some confidence as he returned the passion of her kiss, their tongues dancing as his hands touched and began to massage her back. Which got a deepthroated our coaxed out of her hinting she was coming to like this, as she broke theirs liplock for some air, eyes still deadpan but sort of softening. As her hands were soon caressing his thighs and hips before making their way to cup and grope his crotch. Blinking in puzzlement and confusion as those silk boxer spatz displayed a bulging swell which she kept rubbing, tilting her head as if wondering, was she really feeling what she thought she was? She grabbed the waistband and tugged his boxers down, making him gasp as she pulled them right off, she had to see it, she had to!!

See it she most certainly did, her golden eyes widening like saucer plates, jaw dropping as did ZigZag and Tina’s own. The latter’s shades tilting askew and crooked as right then and there before her eyes, there was his cock out there in the open. Standing stiff snd proud,more erect than a flag pole and looking hard enough to smash a boulder into rubble and dust or hammer nails into solid steel. Their pussies responding to their brains going into bitch in heat mode as they felt their nectar flow and run down along their thighs as Katt shook her head and found her voice. “Fucking hell is that a dick or a weapon of mass destruction?!!” Katt remarked with a tone of shock and awe, her feline eyes locked on that length and girth that seemed just ideal to be considered a pussy pleasing piece of heaven. Kneeling on the floor as she grabbed his cock in a firm grasp, stroking it as she leaned in close to breathe in his scent. Shuddering as that musk flooded her senses. Making her brain awaken those deep, dormant primal instincts which called to her,told her this compact Adonis before was an alpha male that would take her to great heights of pleasure. Smaller but louder voices crying, begging, pleading to have him mate and breed with her as she licked the lips of her muzzle and gave his cock head a kiss and a wet flick of her tongue. Followed by another and another as she went from tip to base and vice versa, showering his shaft with lust and affection, not even leaning his smooth but heavy balls untouched. The feline hottie sucking blowing away as if she weee enjoying s delicious meal.

“My oh my handsome,your lady sent me some dick pics but seeing it in the full flesh this up close and personal is something else….a literal and figurative money maker” ZigZag quipped with playful awe, biting her lip sensually as she sneaked a hand under her skirt. Poking and prodding her her slit as she and Tina watched Katt outright facefucking herself as she attempted to deepthroat Krillin’s cock. The little man shuddering as her tongue and mouth bathed his length in the wrongness and warmth of her saliva. Tina sensually panting as she kept the camera on them, rubbing her thighs together as her own pussy lips gushed as bad as Katt’s own was. Dribbling and raining down in the office floor as she and her boss slash bestie watched the short king do more tha okay in proving his credentials for this line of work. More so when he pried Kat off of his cock,pulling her up to sit in his lap and straddle him, pressing his lips to hers as they kissed and made out, the compact love machine giving into his primal arousal and just go with the flow of the feline babe’s sensual passion. Feeling her purr into their session of heavy petting as she humped ad ground her bubble nut and her slit against his drool soaked cock. Adding a nice heavy shower of her pussy juices as their hands massaged and caressed each other’s backs, her claws teasing along his skin as his grabbed and squeezed her asscheeks. Before the shadowy stray found her body acting on the erotic momentum as she raised her crotch and plunged down in his cock. Bottoming out balls deep instantly as she threw her head back to howl with orgasmic ecstasy as the penetration of such length and girth was so intense.

Not that it stopped her from continuing on,as she began to pump and move her hips, bucking and riding that dick like she were taming a wild rodeo bull or horse. Deepthroated moans and gasps escaping her muzzle s she cupped his fsce with her hands, eyes locked with his as she found him returning her lust and desire by pistoning away into that warm,hot womb. “Fucker…you big dicked…ass clapping little..runt…how dare you be so fucking good…making me feel so…fucking hate you…so much..you’re gonna feel every bit of hate…hate,hate…drain You dry ‘til this falls off…” on and in Katt went,proclaiming all her hate towards the shortstack stud. The tiger skunk babe grinning as such words in contrast to katt’s actions were proof Krillin was passing his tryout with flying colours. It was the shadowy sex kitten’s way of showing love and affection, Something she and many who were sexually experienced with Darke Katt had dealt with before as she her lynx companion continued to look on with shameless growing arousal. Watching as the momentum of passion developing between the hairless ape of a stud and the feisty tsundere of a sex kitten shifted and transition into positions which deepened the intensity of Krillin’s penetration. The navy/onyx furred babe moaning her head off as orgasms hit her so fast and hard that there was no way for her to keep count.

From a mating press, where her legs were,pushed and bent back so far her ankles laid in either side of her head, to head singing her wild mane of hair as as she was in her hands and knees on the couch as he fucked her doggy or rather kitty style in this case. His big balls smacking her clit as her juices splashed on the lush valure seating, his length and girth making her stomach bulge as his hands squeezed and massaged her ass. Before giving her a shocking delight as he hoisted her up into the air, standing on the couch as he fucked here in a full nelson position. Her arms and legs in his grasp as he pumped and hammered his shaft, Tina making sure the camera was locked on the display of their loins connected together in their lewd,intimate embrace. ZigZag of course had gotten so horny to the point she was now stripping herself naked, licking her lips with lust as as she watched Katt’s face wear an expression that screamed her brain was flooding with raw, mind numbing pleasure. Her pussy squirting as she yowled with ecstasy. Erupting like  a geyser as she felt the short king finally blow his load. Shots of hot white cream  shooting into her womb’s warm embrace as she felt her body become limp as a ragdoll. Pouting cutely as Krillin pried her off of his juice soaked cock and gently laid on the couch, just in time as her tigerskunk boss now entered into the fray. Purring with sensual delight as she began to kiss and lick on his cock and balls, loving the taste of his jizz and katt’s pussy nectar, hands caressing his torso as she kissed up along it to start her own make out with him, stunning and surprising him as she broke their liplock, her blue eyes twinkling with mischief. “Now now handsome…let’s see how your stamina and staying power really step up. Especially with more than one partner….” She playfully treated, kissing him again as Krillin shrugged his shoulders and just decided to roll with it. Making the hybrid hottie moan as she felt him begin to grope and stroke her furry bombshell frame all over.

Tina adjusted her shades, blushing with a sensual smile as she kept the camera rolling. Biting her lip as she watched ZigZag have her own turn with their potential new hire. ZigZag was no stranger to handling big cocks but there was no doubt this short king was ina whole league all his own,as she rode him cowgirl style, massaging his abs as her booty bounced and jiggled with every impact of their loins smacking together. Passionate moans escaping her muzzle as his hands grabbed and squeezed her tits, the hybrid bombshell getting first hand experience with some of his slight skills in the art of tantric love making. Feeling him not simply fuck her body but even assault her mind,heart and soul with sensual passion. Proving there was more to him than just his godly set of loins and thst his muscles weren’t for show as he now stood on his own two feet on the ground, hoisting snd holding her up in the air as he p,anted his hands on her ass. Squeezing that juicy striped furry booty as she draped her arms and legs around his compact Herculean body,tots rubbing against his firm pecs as their tongues mashed and danced together in a sloppy game of tonsil hockey. The Lynx cutie feeling her slit gush there was no doubt she was pretty much a bitch in heat as she was soon stripping off her own clothes. Now naked as she played with herself with little to no sense of shame or inhibition as she saw her boss now getting fucked in a piledriver position. Her back and legs at 90 degree angles as her head and shoulders laid on the floor, while Krillin pumped his cock like he was working a pornographic butter churn. Zigzag loving every second of it of course but especially when the luscious moment he finally let loose and came inside of of her arrived, cumming together with him as some of his excess spunk sprayed and flowed out. Tina licking her lips as she watched the off duty cop pull his shaft out, now slicker and wetter with a mix of jizz and the pussy juices of two absolute hot pieces of ass.

“Round 3 handsome….” The lynx porno veteran quipped with sensual playfulness as she got his attention, seeing her now enter the fray in all her thicc,plump and curvy glory. Kissing him with a thirsty passion as their hands caressed and massaged each other’s bodies as she nudged him to lay back on the floor. Purring and grinning as she straddled his head, sitting on his face as she gave him a encouraging squeeze of her thick thighs. “Drink up there handsome,you must be parched….” The moment she said thst, she felt him lick and lap away at her slit, making her pussy juices pour into his mouth as he quenched his thirst while Tina rode the momentum of orgasmic ecstasy rocking her body. Falling foreard to grasp and stroke his lubed up cock as she practically made out with it. Deepthroating with abandon as she sucked and blew on thst shaft, her shades askew to expose the glowing pink hearts in her pupils which were also visible in those of zigzag and Katt as they recovered and watched Tina get her own turn becoming sexually acquainted with Krillin and his raw stud potential. Looking on as their arousal skyrocketed once more, kneeling on the floor as Katt probed her slit as zigzag made out with her, their tongues enacting a lesbian kiss as she squeezed and massaged the black cat’s furry titties as Tina rode Krillin in reverse cowgirl. The camera seeing the curvy lynx hottie’s tits bounce as Krillin couldn’t help himself from slapping thst ass like the erotic bongo drums just calling for him to play with them. It was pretty clear from just Katt alone that he’d passed his audition with flying colours butt they were just too horny to care as they last their passions drive them higher and higher into a primal dance of a passionate mating frenzy.

The red recording light on the video camera blinked away as it confused to capture the display of animalistic virility occurring in and around the casting couch tween the vertically challenged but supremely well endowed dude and the 3 furry porn stars. Tina pressing her furry tits against his shoulders as she caressed him from behind, making out with him while he fucked Zagzag doggystyle as the hybrid honey ate Katt out. The shadow furred hottie moaning as he held that mane of Snow White hair close, feeling thst sex goddess tongue lap up her nectar snd the excess flow of a Krillin’s jizz. To him fucking Tina on her hands and knees as he fingered Katt and Zigzag, 3 fingers knuckle deep into those sloppy snatches as his thumb rubbed their clits as he bucked and thrust into the lynx’s warm oven. Before he made Zigzag sit atop h his shoulders as he made out with her slit, her hands caressing his scalp as Tina and Katt made out together while they tagteamed his cock with a double blowjob. Each and any every instance he’d blow his load and was still hard, they change up positions and combinations, three or two on one or often having himself some one on one time with one of the, as the other two had some hot lesbian action together. The figurative and literal climax achieved as they knelt before him as he sat on the couch, stroking his cock and groaning as he shot them with a final shower of his seed raining on their faces and tits and into their mouths. The compact stud panting as he finally felt his bidy gave out, welcoming the rest as the trio of furry babes joined him on the couch, Tina and zigzag sandwiching him on either side as Katt laid atop his front, sleep taking them as they recovered and basked in the afterglow.

It wasn’t long after this quite enthusiastic audition that 18 would find an email in her inbox, the cyborg deadly beauty grinning sensually at seeing the subject title. ““He’s Hired!!” The blonde knew her man would succeed in his tryout and the only thing that would be as delicious as seeing him do porn with all kinds of sexy pretty hotties wss no doubt how many of them would welcome getting knocked up by her sex god of a husband. Oh yes,wild chestnut oats woild sown one way or another and the future would see a glorious army of krillin’s babies. She’d see to that and the fsct she’d get a bit of the royalties was just the delightful bonus,grinning as she forewarde the email to Bulma, Chichi, 21 and a few other lady friends and acquaintances knowing Krillin’s video of his audition was attached with it. Said video would be uploaded to Double Z’s studio streaming site of course, announcing their new hire and highlighting his prowess and skill as it made record numbers of views on day one. With many female subscribers commenting they were alresdy anticipating his feature adult film debut. 

[rawrtriesagain]

Heya, same anon who asked you for art advice! First, I wanted to thank you for answer my questions and listing all that wonderful advice! I just have some followups. It’s really okay to just draw without even knowing how to put down a line? Won’t that just lead to bad habits or not learning the right techniques? And you mentioned learning how to draw the human body, will the sites you listed help, or are there other resources I should look up (like maybe on Pinterest?). Again, thanks!

Combining your asks into one. Thank you for the kind words! I'll be happy to continue helping where I can :)

So in terms of bad habits and practices, this is where my advice will fall flat haha because I myself don't know what's a good practice actually - I just do what I want to do even if its the worst way to do something anyone's ever seen! For example, my way of doing 'lineart' (just cleaning up my sketches) is to draw big fat lines and then slowly carve it with an eraser into a line I deem good enough. Someone who could grab a pen and draw a perfect line on the fly would probably be like wtf watching me meticulously erase my one fat line lol

But!

If you really don't know how to put down a line at all yet, your best bet really is to just start. There's not really a trick or technique too it, its just practice. I think unless you were trying to go into art school or something and needed to work on a portfolio (btw again I am not the person to ask for that), there's not really a 'bad habit,' its just as long as you're having fun. In my earlier example about my 'lineart' I pretty much know I'm doing it in such a dumb way, but I actually find it really fun to carve away my line with an eraser haha. Yea I could put in the effort to actually learn how to do things properly, but I like wasting hours just nitpicking on this little thing just because its fun to me. (I do the same thing for coloring also. I'll scribble my entire screen and then use an eraser to start carving things out lmao)

Of course while you're drawing and you're doing something that makes you think "hey this actually sucks actually-" that's when you take the opportunity to grow and learn something new that you didn't know before. This is a digital art thing: but for the longest time I literally didn't know anything about layers and my thoughts were just "man there's got to be a better way to do this" which throws me into a rabbit hole of searching "how do I do This Thing"

If you're really into learning art techniques though it might be good to slowly go over all of the 'art fundamentals' especially when it comes to like shading and perspective. I looked at this blog post and it looks like it would help start you out with some links to other resources: link then of course you can look up the corresponding Youtube videos to see someone actually do the fundamental for real. I'd also honestly recommend like a beginners artist course in person if that's something affordable and accessible to you. It's been one of my dreams to go to like random art classes for fun haha but alas life happens so its just me and my tablet until I'm rich as hell I guess. I've never taken a digital course either, but if that's one of the ways you're able to learn that's great too and I'd recommend it!

Next on human body:

Sorry I should have talked about them more in depth at the time, but yes they will help but only if you're determined to use them correctly! So the sites I listed basically show a pose for 30 seconds, and the idea is you're supposed to just try to take in the shape/form of the pose and draw it without nitpicking over minor details. You can also set the timer higher if you need (I used to set it to at least 60 seconds just because I was just a slow ass artist). But basically it should help you break down the human body into simple shapes and lines.

Now what I mean by using the sites correctly: So there's two ways to approach drawing from references:

1. "eye tracing" which is where your eyes are kind of just following the outline of whatever you're drawing but you're not really processing what exactly you're doing to help you later down the line. I have a bad habit of doing this and I tend to struggle later again for the same pose.

2. Breaking down the reference into small chunks and shapes, and then morphing those shapes into your piece. And later down the line you should start to be able to think of things like "oh the Circle piece of the body normally goes Here!"

Here's a random google image I found to help illustrate what I'm kind of talking about:

So eye tracing would kind of be like a less refined version of #3. Just a blobby but like you can somewhat tell what it is and that's cool I guess, but its not very helpful for when you want to try drawing a variant of the pose above. Breaking down the reference is like steps #1 and #2, simple shapes and blocks that help guide and outline the final shape you want. #1 in particular is very easy to change around should you want to.

So while you're on the sites I linked, you should try to break down each pose into its shape instead of drawing exactly what you see. You should also keep in mind the 'line of action' while doing so:

It's definitely a lot to take in all at once, so I'd honestly recommend just loading up the site and doing your best to replicate the pose, 'eye tracing' or not. Once you get more used to the routine and flow, then try to branch into learning more appropriate techniques. I've seen around that some people also recommend removing the time limit on the poses, as some people learn better by taking their time on one thing and breaking things down even further from there, but that's definitely up to you. You could also go out and try drawing random people if that helps and if you're bold!

My experience with Pinterest has mostly been for inspiration or cool things I've never thought of before, though I'm sure others are able to use it better than I can haha. I'm sure there are step by step guides to help you out around there!

I think resources to learn how to draw better really do come down to what kind of learner you are in the first place. Lots of people learn really well from Youtube tutorials for example, or maybe reading and following along with a book about anatomy would work for you too. I have like the most god awful attention span ever, so what works for me is just raw trial and error and hoping for the best. tbh idk how I even got this far haha but i am happy that I've progressed at all

Let me know if you have more questions and I'll definitely do my best to answer them! If you're looking for more advice regarding traditional art learning fundamentals, I'm sure there are many other artists that would be happy to answer your questions as well!

Best of luck! :)

[dat-town]

7 ways to fall in love | ten

~ casually, over texts

You and Ten had mutual friends, so you had heard a lot about him even before meeting him. You were sure you had briefly met at gatherings but with so many people around, you didn't really have the chance to get to know each other. However, when you were thinking about getting a tattoo, one of your best friends directed you to him for advice.

"Maybe he can even draw you a design. He made his own ones," Xuanyi hummed, mindlessly scrolling through her Instagram feed while you were deeply invested in looking up the best tattoo artists in your area. You glanced up from your laptop screen though when you heard your flatmate’s claim.

"Really?" you raised a brow, curious and impressed, you had always appreciated artists a lot.

You had never seen his tattoos though, so Xuanyi quickly looked him up on social media and searched for a pic to show you. Looking at the details of the figure on his lean arm, you were pretty much convinced that it would be a good idea to at least talk to him. You were still a bit worried about getting your skin inked no matter how long time dream of yours it was, so getting an honest opinion from someone who had first-hand experience would have helped your case.

You: hey. not sure you know me, i'm xuanyi's flatmate. she told me to talk to you if i have questions regarding tattoos.

Ten: heya! sure, i remember you. 

Ten: oh~ you want to get a tattoo? cool!

You: yeah, i know what kind i would like to, just not sure where it would be the best and how big, things like that.

It all started like this and before you knew it, you started texting through the night, Ten answering all your worrisome questions about how painful the procedure was, how much it took for the tattoo to heal and not leave a red mark on your skin. He also really liked the idea of your dream tattoo: the traditional Chinese character for strength and the Gladiolus flower representing fighters. You had been through some bad shit in life and this would have been your way of reminding yourself that you had gotten over it, that you had that strength in you, the soul of a fighter, you just needed to believe in that.

When you briefly told Ten about this, he didn't push you to tell more about your past, rather said how cool it was to have such a meaningful tattoo and he recommended a tattoo artist who would do a good job on that in his opinion.  He also sent you lots of reference pictures and photos of different styles of tattoos, so you would know your options and somewhere between all the tattoo talk, you started talking about everything else too.

You told him about university classes that stressed you out and your part-time job that you liked but dreamed of something else. He encouraged you to go for your dreams even if they seemed unreachable and for one, he didn't talk bullshit, being an artist himself, he really needed to put himself out there to make enough money without having side-jobs. When you asked, he even sent you some of his illustrations and photos, and you had to admit that he really had an eye for art.

What's more, he himself was art because oh boy, he was such a sight to behold. His series of selfies started out with playful mirror selfies or just snaps of his cats with him in the background. But probably because you weren't protesting about receiving those, he got more daring, sending you one almost on a daily basis and even though some of those were the literal definition of borderline rude and flirty, you didn't stop him. Why would you have, when deep inside, you enjoyed your conversation so much that you were anticipating his texts almost all the time? Even Xuanyi called you out for texting with Ten 24/7 but still not getting that tattoo. But you were getting there!

You didn't even have to ask, Ten offered to draw you a design and you trusted him enough to let him send that to the tattoo artist with whom you had made an appointment even before you would have seen it. Not to mention, he even willingly volunteered to accompany you to be your emotional support and when you were just getting ready to go, you weren't sure whether you were more nervous because of getting a tattoo or finally meeting him in person. But the moment he stepped into the café where you had agreed to meet, you knew you had nothing to be afraid of. He was still the same casual, funny and supportive guy you had gotten to know over texts in the last few weeks.

"Hey! Are you ready?" he walked up to you with a wide smile on his lips and his blonde locks looked even better on him in real life than on the pictures.

"As ready as I can be," you chuckled, sipping on your sweet treat that you needed in order to work up your courage before letting any needle close to your skin.

"Good because I have something for you," he said, fishing his drawing tablet out of his bag and under the sleeve of his shirt, you could catch a glimpse of his tattoo, too. It looked really nice against his somewhat toned skin.

Originally you just wanted a black and whitel line art kind of tattoo but the digital drawing in front of you took your breath away. The Chinese character had the perfect calligraphic strokes and the Gladiolus flower's pink petals that bloomed around it looked watercolor-like. It was beautiful and elegant, yet the meaning was still deeply engraved into every firm stroke of it.

"It's... gorgeous," you breathed when you looked up, finding Ten's coffee brown eyes on you and he seemed visibly relieved hearing your opinion. “Thank you so much.”

"I'm glad you like it. Now let's get it onto you," he winked at you playfully and you involuntarily let out a chuckle.

You talked all the way up to the tattoo parlor and Ten was really good in taking your mind off worrying. Even when you laid on your front, in a strapless bra, getting inked over your bladebone while holding his hand (no, you did not think it over when you asked him to be there with you). But him murmuring soothing words, telling you stories and caressing your palm gently helped you get over even the most painful shading part and it was one hell of a beginning to your story.

7 ways to fall in love masterlist

[sye216-fr]

GOD i want to open an ART SHOP and take commissions to make more FR money and also trade art for accents and shit but i HAVE NO TABLET!!! GODDAMNIT!!!

[hunterartist711]

Darkness 2 For Mac

Gameplay Sound Graphics Value

Genre: ActionMin OS X: 10.6

‎Second issue in an four issue series! Each 24 page comic is published in print and digital at the same time! Don't miss the next chapter in this exclusive comics prequel to next summer's blockbuster STAR TREK movie! New characters and new conflicts threaten Captain Kirk and the crew of the Enterpris.

The Darkness 2 game playable on macOS and Windows is published by 2K games has a Very Positive rating on Steam (out of 4106 user reviews). The Darkness 2 is a supernatural first-person shooter developed by developed by Digital Extremes( developers of co-op shooter Warframe) is based on a comic book series by Top Cow Productions.

I just got the Darkness II, and my wife wants to play it also. I didn't think it would be enjoyable for her to play over my save, I thought it would be better if she started off from the beginning.

360 controller works but, not in darkness II So i'm using big picture mode with my controller just fine but, i play darkness 2 the 360 controller doesn't work. The options menu shows support for it, it works great in other games but, i get nothing in darkness 2.

Buy The Darkness II as a Steam Key. It’s been two years since Jackie Estacado, now Don of the Franchetti crime family, used The Darkness to kill the men responsible for his girlfriend’s murder. He’s been unable to shake the memory of Jenny’s death since bottling up his supernatural power and now The Darkness.

The Darkness II April 26, 2012 | Jon Carr

Pages:123Gallery

Click to enlargeGuns Blazing

Mac OS X: 10.6.8 / 10.7.2 | CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo | RAM: 2 GB | HD Space: 11 GB | Graphics: AMD HD2600 / Nvidia 9600GT with at least 256 MB VRAM or higher

Reviewer's Rig:

27' iMac, Core i5 Quad 2.8Ghz, 8GB RAM, ATI Radeon HD5750 1GB

What is perhaps most interesting about The Darkness, is that it started as comic book back in 1996 (It's actually quite good, and anyone further interested in the story and Jackie should check them out. But be warned, they are even more explicit and gruesome than the game). The comics got a makeover in 2002, and still remain successful. In 2007 Starbreeze Studios (of Chronicles of Riddick fame) developed a game based on the comic books, also named The Darkness. Sadly, this game was console exclusive and never made its way to PC or Mac. The first game's story is briefly covered in an opening flashback and should be paid attention to as it highly relates to what is going on in the second game.

Yes, The Darkness 2 is now out on Mac as of a few days ago thanks to the efforts of Transgaming and published again by 2K (And is of course available at GameTreeMac, as well as Steamplay). However, Digital Extremes developed the 2nd game, not Starbreeze Studios. How the two compare Mac gamers will never know, but you can know that The Darkness 2 is very good. Why? Read on!

As a quick overview The Darkness is an evil, sentient being, one of the two primal forces in the game's universe (his opposite being The Angelus, who is female and Light) Both forces inhabit male and female hosts respectively, granting them amazing powers, but also causing them to fight for their individuality and control, as both forces contend not only with each other, but to take over their host completely so it does their bidding.

In the first game, The Darkness awakens in Jackie Estacado on his 21st birthday. As a hit man for the Franchetti crime family this turns out to be particularly useful since The Darkness enjoys and is fueled by killing. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when the mob kills Jackie's girlfriend Jenny right in front of him while The Darkness forces him to watch. In turn Jackie goes on a murderous rampage and wipes out the whole mob. But by doing so he is completely consumed by The Darkness.

After the events of the first Darkness game, Jackie is now head of the Franchetti crime family and has been suppressing The Darkness for years. However, a spectacular ambush during an evening at a restaurant forces Jackie to awaken The Darkness once more, unleashing its awesome powers and imbuing our protagonist with scary Darkness arms and a predilection for shooting out lights.

As you can imagine The Darkness doesn't do well in the light. Anytime Jackie stands in, or is blasted with, light he is partially blinded and loses Darkness powers and abilities. So, it is in your best interest to shoot any and all lights, in addition to focusing on the light carrying foes you encounter later in the game. It's not quite Splinter Cell levels of lightbulb assassination, but it is part of things.

Perhaps the most interesting and compelling aspects of The Darkness 2 are the story and characters. Essentially, you are playing a criminal and a murderer. However, Jackie is extremely likable and easy to care for, especially when you see how tortured he is about Jenny's death. You have a number of flashbacks and possible hallucinations of Jenny throughout the game and these are surprisingly sweet and tender moments in contrast to all the brutal violence on display. Even without playing the first game it's easy to connect with Jackie and Jenny and care about both of them because it's so easy to see how much they loved each other, and how much Jackie still loves her. Not many games believably pull off romantic relationships, but The Darkness 2 is certainly one of them. You also get to interact with the men under you in your mansion between action missions and various other interesting characters who are all impressively voiced and animated.

Pages:123Gallery

Platform: Steam

In stock

Feb 6, 2012

Categories: Action, Most Popular, Most Viewed, New and Trending, Popular Games, Recently Updated, Top Selling, What's Popular

Darkness 2 For Mac Os

$29.99

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The Darkness II steam key free

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About The Darkness II free steam key

Inspired by the popular comic book series produced by Top Cow Productions, Inc., The Darkness II is an intense first person shooter that delivers a twisted and gripping narrative of tragedy, modern crime drama, and supernatural horror. Players will be taken down the brutal and personal path of Jackie Estacado, head of a New York crime family and wielder of an ancient and ruthless force of chaos and destruction known as The Darkness. Its been two years since Jackie Estacado used The Darkness to kill the men responsible for his girlfriends murder. Hes been unable to shake the memory of Jennys death since bottling up his supernatural power and now The Darkness wants out. A sudden, unprovoked attack by a mysterious organization known as the Brotherhood heralds the start of a full-scale war and opens the door for The Darkness to reemerge, setting Jackie on a journey to hell and worse.

4-Player Co-op Campaign - Play as one of four unique characters each capable of wielding weapons infused with Darkness powers.

Quad-Wielding Chaos - Slash, grab, and throw objects and enemies with the Demon Arms while simultaneously firing two weapons, adding a new dimension to the FPS category.

Harness an Unstoppable Power - Master the Demon Arms and summon the powers of The Darkness for even more explosive gameplay.

Kill the Lights - The vicious powers of The Darkness manifest only in the shadows so use the environment to your advantage and watch out for enemies who will use light as a weapon.

Intense and Personal Journey - Experience a dark, twisted and gripping story written exclusively for the game by acclaimed comic book author Paul Jenkins whose credits also include The Incredible Hulk, Wolverine, and the original The Darkness game.

Distinctive Graphic-Noir Style - Graphic novel shading and color combined with the dramatic lighting of film noir pays tribute to the source material and brings the pages of the comic series to life. Inspired by the popular comic book series created by Top Cow.

Limited Edition Content

If you pre-purchased The Darkness II you are exclusively entitled to the Limited Edition, which includes free digital editions of The Darkness: Origins Volumes 1 and 2, collecting the origin of Jackie Estacado and the Darkness by Garth Ennis and Marc Silvestri! Please visit http://comics.comixology.com/redeem and enter your code. You must login to your comiXology account, or create one, in order to redeem. Once redeemed, you can download your comics on your smartphone or tablet device, as well as read on the web!

How to get The Darkness II key free

1 - First step is to register as the member 2 - Choose an offer available and make sure you choose the one that's giving you lots of coins 3 - Complete the offer you have chosen, you must use real information to complete an offer / survey 4 - Get coins instantly to your account

Darkness 2 For Mac Iso

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Darkness 2 For Mac Download

Source: Source

OS: Windows XP/Vista/7

Processor: Intel Core 2 @ 2GHz / AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+

Memory: 1.5GB RAM

Hard Disk Space: 10GB

Video Card: 256MB NVIDIA GeForce 8600 / ATI Radeon HD 2600

Sound: DirectX Compatible

Additional: Requires installation of Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable, DirectX and nVidia PhysX version 9.11.1107 (included with download)

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[kitsoa]

Lyric Comic Q&A

So it turns out when you work on a project for half a year, you get a lot of Thoughts and want to express them whether people are actually curious or not. Without further ado, your un-requested Birdmen Lyric Comic Q&A

(Warning: I’m long winded)

*Why a Lyric Comic?

Dude, lyric comics are cool. I’ve always been fascinated by the beautiful, multifaceted artistic experience they provide, because of my love for music and art. Furthermore, I am often plagued by cinematic trapped in my head, spurred by the movement and lyrics of my favorite songs. Since I have no means or experience in the animation category (which would free these phantoms from my head) the lyric comic was a godsend of a medium for this inspired idea of mine. Kiki-kit of the Gravity Falls fandom and Tides-miraculous’ lyric comic in the Miraculous Ladybug are my main inspirations, I’ve adored their sense of motion and emotional savviness. It’s quite the powerful medium.

It’s also a good medium for me personally. I am a ‘looper’ with my music, allowing me to listen to something over and over without tiring. This is useful in the drafting stages! I loved the challenge (though I definitely didn’t anticipate it’d take this long).

*Why this song?

“Out of Mind” was one of those songs that spoke to me, in an overly cathartic, heart-yearning-- almost funnily sardonic ways. Birdmen being on the brain, I started to easily see how much the singers voice reflected that bombastic frustration our Eishi is so known for. The Pre-Chorus “Are you kidding me?” speaks to me the most, reminding me of his cry of frustration during his first blackout, screaming against his fate as he fell from the sky (this exact image did not make the final cut in the end, but I certainly vied for it until other themes overtook it-- let’s face it, there are many screaming Eishi’s to choose from).

This period of time between Takayama’s disappearance and the inevitable reunion is super intriguing to me. Eishi’s in the role of the heartbroken singer, hopelessly betrayed and unable to get over the good thing they had.

*Breakdown the story:

The progression goes like this:

Eishi’s loneliness consumes the first verse, Takayama’s empty seat, Eishi standing alone… all the while peppered with Takayama’s broken promise, which culminates with Eishi’s defiant Death Tweet. The Refrain then serves as these hallmark moments that define them. This is what they had. Every rescue, every proclamation or venomous defying of fate-- it’s what made them. And you’d have to be out of your mind to think that these moments could be forgotten.

Verse 2 is all about that shift in Eishi to follow him. Wistful memories drive Eishi as he chooses to leave and depart from everything he knows, just to get him back. Meanwhile, that opinion of Takayama is still weighed down by that grating irritation (like hell he’s in touch reality, how could he do this?) culminating to his call for him in the Himalayas. The Refrain fires again with the same point as the last but this time I tried to go for a more fervent angle, some of the scenes actually focus on Takayama’s feelings for Eishi and ultimately the pull they have towards each other.

The Bridge is where things get desperate. The moments in the manga where Eishi is in physical pain because of the Whiteout shake me so much. It reminds me of a straight up panic attack. I let this crescendo with the music, making the black void swallow the chaos in a quick snap. Building to the final chorus.

The whiteout is special because Eishi both yearns after this figment emotionally (his friendship with Takayama) and intellectually (what the hell is it and what does it mean?). It represents his unique position in the realm of the story being able to see it, but it ultimately captures the almost divine force behind the relationship of Eishi and Takayama. The outro then brings us back to Eishi failed call at the Himalaya’s, the whiteout ripping him up and forcing Takayama to save him. All the while calling back to that first interaction between them. A mysterious moment that obviously held more weight than any world shaking rescue. And I cap it off with a warmer depiction of their reunion.

*Are you shipping in this comic?

Despite the romantic song, my affections for the pairing, and any other subtext I’ve provided, I went in with the project with a platonic angle. Like I’m not lying. I’m on the ace spectrum or whatever so I kind of interpret every strong bond in the same realm. So that means, if you think it’s a romantic interpretation-- then you’re right. If you think it’s not, you’re also right. Love comes in many forms. Have fun kids.

*What was your process?

Storyboarding

Listen over and over and figure out where to phrase the panels. I then divided the lyrics up accordingly in a draft and reviewed the pacing over and over again. Does it flow? How many words would comfortably fit with each panel?

Determined the thematic arc. At this point I already had a few anchoring moments so I wrote a description of the panel in the draft. I went with the formula of Verses= move the ideas, Refrain= emotional accents, and the Bridge is like… the climax with an epilogue of an outro. This was tricky step. I debated a lot of ideas and some lyrics didn’t feel like a good fit until I really sat on it for a while.

Fill in the draft. This is where I sketch the general shape of panels. This is also where I look at the gestalt of the thing and make sure the composition is easy on the eyes. I tried to make it dynamic and zig-zaggy so as not to be boring. This is the step where one gets really excited about the project. Cause it’s no longer trapped in your head.

Sketching

Gathered references. Surfed the web, made some myself.

Made time to sketch, I did a lot of them at my summer job, made sure to draw about 2 or 3 a day. I had the time then because it was before I took on my day job. I was very surprised to find that I rarely went back to edit a picture or dispose of a draft. I went through with the mantra that I was going to finish the picture no matter what.

Stayed disciplined with said time. I would not let myself take a break from drawing because half the success came from the fact that I was on a roll.

When I finished them I then went through the process of scanning them (my scanner broke between the first 20 panels so RIP)

Coloring Stage

...Good lord. This is where I probably went the most wrong. Make sure you have a good process in place before starting out this stage.  I was not one to digital art much as of late so my familiarity with my program was lackluster (and it also is literally the worst program  in the world), and my laptop couldn’t handle more than 10 panels. So hurray for a very desperate fix. I did everything from my brothers computer, in his room. Sometimes at terrible hours because that's the only time I’m home.

Color planning. I rushed this process but I pulled up the textures and color pallets and reference images from internet searches and stock piled them. While planning I approximated the overall ‘tone’ of each pane; (is it a dark shade, a light shade, blue, or red in hue…) and then I adjusted that so the colors didn’t repeat or blend unless the panels where connected in the same scene. There was a lot of problem solving in the actual coloring so some of this was not as smooth and I paid for it later.

Sketch Editing. I was able to go back in, move around things and edit certain aspects of the sketch without compromising the entire work. This was a life saver.

Actually coloring. Because I color sketches it’s actually a painstaking process where I can’t use a wand or a fill. I’m not familiar with certain masking and coloring methods that would have sped the process up and I wanted to be consistent. This would take 3 to 5 hours a panel which I would do in small bursts.

Type-setting

Deciding font. I was hunting around for a good font for ages until I just decided… to use my own handwriting. This meant that I had to makes sure my tablet pressure specs were up to date and I had to practice my style. It’s not perfect but its cool.

Apply font to panel. There were moments when I literally said ‘screw it’ and left my handwriting a little more sloppy than standard.

Consultation. I worked with my graphic designer friend on improving the placement of text and the color choices. This was an interesting step she is a saint.

Finalize

Every single panel is extremely large. I had to resize each one. Before this I had many tests in the drafts to see how certain sizes would load or format.

*Will you make another?

Probably. Like, there is nothing more satisfying than getting something stuck in your head out of it. I have a lot of tunes I am fond of but barely any qualify for lyric comics (need to have a good pace, easy to latch on musical phrases, thematic content that works etc.) The fandom is important too. Now that I think about it I have storyboards for an old DCMK ‘lyric comic’ idea to Imogen Heap’s “A-ha” (it was like some hidden dark side!au shit I still come back to it). I can’t let my interest wan or it straight up dies. Birdmen is a really unique series for me because its held on for a remarkable amount of time and strongly at that.

Fun Facts:

I colored a total 77 panels, 11 of which were scraped versions of the core 66 because perfectionist tendencies.

It took me 3 months to sketch all the panels out, sometimes drawing 3 a day. I would often cradle my sleeping kitten while I drew.

Panel 54-- the final chorus, whiteout splash page-- took three days to draw. At first it was two pages taped together, then it was three. I had my friend mend the images together into a massive pic for me to color, then break it apart for blog distribution. The full version is used in her video edit of the lyric comic.

I didn’t use pressure sensitivity on my tablet until I got to the last chunk. RIP

It usually took me over a day to do one picture.

I do not have a computer in my room that utilizes the art program I need. I literally did every panel after #10 in my brothers room. Sometimes hella late at night too. Props to my generous brother, he tells me he likes the company.

I took a few notable breaks. All of Inktober was used on the art challenge. The weeks leading up to Birdmen Week. And at least half of the Christmas season was spent on coloring hiatus.

I like adding a ring around the pupils of the seraph eyes. This is not canon, but an error that I really liked. You can see it as a sort of glow.

I am having my friend edit the panels into a video for your convenience. I have no idea how long it will take but I’m tired.

[notorious-prince]

==> Wake up

You wake up with a noticeable pain to your head. Where are you? Why is everything so blue?

What the hell is this cool dude doing here? What the hell are these stupidly awesone glasses doing on the floor? (author opinion, quite frankly they are awfull, how the hell can he wear that?) Okay, point aside, you ask yourself how you ended up here? why is there a spaceship crashed in that building over there?

You don’t remember anything but you intend on discovering very soon.

==> Stand up dude!

You stand up and slid your rad glasses on your face. 

You look around and figures the only logical thing you could possibly do at this very momment is to look for a place where you can find answers so you grab the book laying there on the floor next to your feet and start walking toward no particular destination. 

You walk for maybe 30 fucking long minutes before you start seeing a black building. The reason why you head over there is because there is light seeping through the green tinted windows.

—————————

Hi, it’s the author here, now please be indulgent i have no form of any device on which i can actually make a decent digital drawing so i had to make do, it already took me fucjking one hour to make this shitty version of the character alone, without shading, which is shitty again. anyway, got no moneys to actually pay for a tablet and i dont even know if im gonna be any good at it. OMG, am i ever gonna shut up. Anyway. Byes guys, Love ya’lls!!!!!

Hey, it's the author again, i have edited the photo a bit, isn't better that way?

[hitodama89]

I’m feeling really anxious because Communicating With People TM is hard, so I want to get my mind out of it by rambling about something random I’ve been reminiscing lately: huge art realizations. Like those heureka-moments when you learn something that becomes really vital for you as soon as you hear about it! Maybe it’s just because I tend to be oblivious even to some very simple things, but I’ve had quite a bunch of these moments throughout the years.

These are going to be in order from oldest to newest.

First things first. I was still a little kid, way before I was old enough to go to school, when I saw a pretty picture of a mermaid sitting on a stone in some magazine. I wanted to try drawing the same thing myself and started, as a child’s logic suggested, by drawing the ocean. The rock was already fairly difficult to draw when the whole paper was colored blue, and the mermaid on top of the rock was just a colorful mess. I was pretty upset and didn’t understand what went wrong until either my mother or grandmother explained that I should’ve drawn everything in reverse order: the mermaid first, then the rock, then the ocean. That really blew my mind. =‘D

Sketching is magic. When this one happened I was already in school, maybe in 3rd grade or so. I had a friend who confessed me that she had spied how the best artist of our class drew. (She was really good and always placed first in every art competition of the school.) My friend told me about this weird technique she had seen her use: she drew the lines hairy instead of smooth! We, too, tried that out and Io and behold: we had learned how to sketch.

Inked line art makes everything look professional. I was still in elementary school, but in a different one with different people than previously. Once again in my class was an amazing artist who I admired a lot and tbh who I tried to mimic a bit. For a long while I had no idea what exactly she did to make her comic art look like it was printed and perfect (to my eyes at least) and I went through a lot of trial and error when I finally decided it was because of how the line art looked like. I tried pressing hard with normal pencil, tried to use black crayon and finally even tried this horribly thick and messy marker that bled through everything and smudged like there was no tomorrow. The last one, no matter how inconvenient, produced a look that was already somewhat close, so I continued to try out different markers until I finally got my hands on an actual piece of gold: a thin writing marker with permanent ink. I felt enlightened once again! Here’s a piece from the time when I was still testing all sort of markers: https://imgur.com/b4Bxv10

Circles really are useful. Pretty soon after that, maybe a year or two, I just suddenly one day decided that I want to start drawing cartoon dogs - and that I indeed did for darn many years afterwards. But at the beginning I didn’t really know how to draw dogs, and because I wasn’t nearly good enough artist yet that I would’ve understood anything by studying live models, I used another technique I had heard of instead: the famous circles. One circle for head, one for chest and one for butt. It’s actually pretty cute how clearly you can still see the circles in the first finished canines & circles art piece: https://imgur.com/kDtIO7h 

If digital art is hell, drawing tablet is your Jesus. At some point I started occasionally using computer in art making, and that process in itself was full of amusing mistakes and huge discoveries. I’m not telling detailed stories of them all just because I think most people go through the same things: omg layers, wow brushes, wtf layer masks and so on. But the thing that changed things a lot for me was, of course, drawing tablet. At first I was even somewhat hesitant of using it as I had actually became pretty okay at coloring stuff with mouse and didn’t feel like starting the learning process all over again, but for a reason or another I didn’t completely give up on it. First I used it just for coloring, then occasionally even in making line art on a hand-drawn sketch. Finally, when I was feeling exceptionally lazy and had a big art meme waiting to be drawn, I said fuck it and just jumped to the deep end of the pool by making everything from start to finish with the tablet. I don’t think I’ve had to sketch anything separately ever since.

The first thing I colored digitally: https://imgur.com/2OFi75s

The first thing I drew with tablet: https://imgur.com/H6TinbC

The meme drawn from scratch with tablet: https://imgur.com/uFVG0on

The magic involving quality pens and white color. Even though after that I’ve drawn the vast majority of my art with computer simply because it’s so easily accessible, I hadn’t abandoned traditional art completely. What had always bothered me though was how it was darn impossible to scan a work colored with pens in a way that the scan would show all of the light shades of the actual work. That’s why I became interested in making my color pencil pieces to have as smooth, vibrant surface as possible; if the paper was full of color, even my shitty scanner couldn’t miss it. Eventually I learned two things, one of them being that the quality of your pens matters a lot in this one. You just can’t squeeze pigment out of pens that don’t have any! But the more interesting one was that you can smoothen the surface and blend the colors by coloring over everything with either white or transparent pen. (Or oil - a technique I haven’t yet explored much.) The difference the white layer makes can be seen pretty clearly in these two aceos from the same era:

Without the white pen: https://imgur.com/xh3c2In

With the white pen: https://imgur.com/KypkUqT

And, for now, that’s pretty much it! Ahh, my nerves have indeed calmed down a lot, so I guess this pondering was worth writing.

[luffie]

What do you need to start doing digital art? 

The ultimate comprehensive guide for the absolute beginners. 

Now, you’ve probably decided to venture into digital art, or digital painting to be more precise but you are a little unsure what you need to get a good start without making too many mistakes. 

I am a digital artist myself, so this guide will be very practical and based on my experience and also many other artists, not just some guide you find on a tech blog. And also, this guides assumes that you want to be serious in digital art, not some casual hobby.

Now without further ado, let’s dive in to the important parts shall we? 

EQUIPMENT

1. A laptop 

When looking for one do take note that it should have 

About 8gb ram or more 

Minimum of 1gb dedicated ram on graphics card, preferably 2gb.

Screen size about 14-15 inch is good.

You might be thinking why not a tablet? Most tablets do not have the computing power to handle large files, which you will do, when doing nice digital illustrations. The screens are too small, forcing you to zoom in and out often, disrupting workflow. And keyboard shortcuts saves a lot of time. 

Of course if you don’t mind, a desktop or workstation with large monitors of even Cintiq (tablet monitor) will be the best ideal solution. But that will add up to quite a lot of budget. And a desktop is not portable. Laptop nowadays have enough power to do some heavy digital art. The ram are what is important to work with digital art in a reliable speed, if you get anything less than that, then you might encounter some major annoyances in speed when your file size starts to get big. Besides, those specs are readily available and will last you for quite some time without needing to upgrade. 

2. A graphics tablet 

There’s not much brand available in the market of tablets, the most popular on is of course Wacom. But there is also various chinese/taiwan brand available in the market. 

My recommendation is: Wacom Intuos 

Preferably A4 size. Unsurprisingly, wacom is also the most expensive brand there is. If budget is a little tight, you can get wacom bamboo that is cheaper, with less sensitivity pressure, but you probably won’t notice it anyway. If you get smaller than A4, your wrist might get sore/tired easily after prolong hours of painting. 

The other brand are actually really usable too, but they require batteries on their pen, and I hate having to forget replacing them and having them dying on crucial moments. Of course, they are much cheaper than wacom, so there’s that. 

In my experience, a wacom intuos is very durable, and will last you a very long time. I am using an old version that is wacom intuos 3 A4 size. It has dropped on the side before, thereby having a crack, but the tablet is still functioning fine, and I haven’t replaced a nib for ever. So I think in the long run, it is a very good investment. Get a good tablet, and if you take care of it, it will probably last you many many years. 

SOFTWARE 

Now there are several popular brands in the market, and from time to time, I always found people asking which software they should use and buy. While different software cater to different needs, not all software are made equal. 

The software that you often hear are probably: 

Photoshop (PS)

Sai 

Clip Studio Paint (CSP)

Corel Painter 

Procreate and Medibang etc 

You can read my detailed review of PS and Painter here. 

But let me throw a short gist here: You want to get serious and go far in digital painting, so you want a software that is robust, reliable and provide powerful tools for professional work. 

In the end, only 3 remain: CSP , PS, and Painter. 

I won’t delve in to the rest, but simply, they don’t have enough professional features to carry you far. 

Now don’t get me wrong, anyone can create great art with whatever tools, hell some can even paint with MS Paint and Mouse. But the appropriate and powerful tool can carry your skills far than MS Paint and mouse will ever do. 

This is not a debate about good art, it’s a guide on the most useful tool for the job. So let’s move on, and I’ll give you a brief description on what each software does. 

Corel Painter: 

If you want to emulate traditional media look and artistic brushes, Painter is easily the king. Here is what painter can do (all my art): 

That oil painting look can be achieved in Painter easily, and it has much more tools like Palette Knife, Watercolors and Pen etc. 

Plus Painter can also create some very sleek line work like this: 

Painter has a “paint on a path” feature, that allows any kind of brush to produce very sleek line work. 

So, line art and Traditional look: Use Painter

Though I have to warn you, the brush control panel is extremely robust and can seem quite daunting at first. And Painter has many annoying quirks and glitches that can be annoying, which you can find out in detail in my review. 

Photoshop 

In summary Photoshop is king, you can read a detailed review here. 

If you are looking to create art like this: 

Or this (and also top banner art): 

Then PS is the answer. It has all the tools you need to do from A to Z. 

Concept art, speed painting, character design: use PS

If you want to do line art though, PS is quite bad at line stabilization, it will look like this at best: 

As you can see it’s not bad, but it can’t produce that sleek and cleanliness that Painter can. While Painter can do it in one stroke, PS needs to do it with multiple stroke and eraser. So if the lines are only used for sketching like me, then PS is fine, otherwise it’s not. 

Clip Studio Paint 

I haven’t dabbled very long in CSP to produce a complete art with it. But CSP is very geared towards those who wanted to create manga in it’s purest form. 

It has multiple options to create Manga panels, it also have plenty of options for those half-tone shadings. The brushes provided within are also catered to making manga. While CSP can also be used to make paintings, it doesn’t have features as robust as Painter or PS. CSP also has good line stabilization. There’s one thing it stands out though. CSP is cheap. So in summary: 

If you want to make comic/manga: Use Clip Studio Paint. 

CONCLUSION

“In summary, get a decent laptop, an A4 intuos tablet, and Photoshop to get started. If budget is an issue, save on software first. PS uses subscription for $20 a month, CSP standard version is only $50 (cheap!).” 

Now that you have everything ready, let’s get started on learning how to create digital art..... on another tutorial! If you found this helpful, please reblog, thanks!

[worldbuildguild]

heya! so i dunno if other people have this problem but: im trying to draw more digitally, but i find myself extremely unmotivated to do so. i can draw on paper just fine and without any sort of internal struggle, but drawing on my computer throws my brain for a loop. somehow everything seems harder and it gets really overwhelming. if any of you know how to combat this id really appreciate it, thank you!!!!

I believe I may have already written about this before, but I feel it doesn’t hurt to restate it again!

Have you considered trying to do a drawing on paper first, then either by scanning or taking a photo of the traditional drawing, transfer it to your computer where you can then open it in your art program and proceed to lineart the sketch or just color it immediately?

When I was a child who managed to get their little paws on Photoshop, I lacked a tablet and would always doodle on paper, scan it in, and then do some filter work to make the lineart solid enough for me to paint bucket. The first few attempts weren’t... Great... I just shot the sharpness up to a point where the white space was white enough, but the lines were fried to high hell.

I would eventually go on to teach myself how to properly flatten my lineart so that it was solid black lines as opposed to... That...

However, I do not which program you use, nor if there is much in the way of adjustments that can be made to it with the more expensive programs such as Photoshop or Clip Studio. But I do feel that many programs still possess the same layer mode capabilities.

Here are some tutorials I was able to find for various art programs about how to take traditional drawings and color them digitally:

[For Sai] “How to digitally color traditional” Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 by mute-owl (DeviantArt)

[For Photoshop] “Tutorial: How to Turn Traditional Lineart into Digital” by neonbuttstache (YouTube)

[For Gimp] “Lineart in Gimp - Scan, Clean, Color 2017″ by GHOSTSTALKER (YouTube)

[For FireAlpaca] Using Extracting Lines by @everythingfirealpaca (Tumblr)

I do not know which program you have to work with specifically, as many will have their own little fixes for how to clean up the lineart. In general, the consensus for coloring in your lines is to: (1) scan/photo in your traditional drawing, (2) import it into your art program of choice, (3) adjust the brightness/contrast for drawings without a perfect white background, (4) set the traditional drawing’s layer mode from “Normal” to “Multiply”, and then (5) fill in colors in the layer beneath your drawing.

This was eventually the method I would come to learn when I drew traditionally and scanned it in to color digitally. And really, you will be learning a lot of techniques by just coloring your art work in the program as you may start to experiment more with other things like shading and then seeing what various tools can do what.

All that aside, and as another answer to your question on how to help minimize being overwhelmed by this new medium: take a day to just simply go through every tool, edit/adjustment, filter, layer mode, all of it and see what happens. The worst you’ll manage to do when doing this will be closing the program by some weird fashion, because if you close a window like your brushes or can’t find your list of layers, then it is just hidden and can be brought back out with the Window tab at the very top bar of your computer screen:

You need to familiarize yourself with this space, it is important that you experiment with it yourself, or go online and look up what it is you want to do or something like DeviantArt or YouTube where thousands upon thousands of resources are readily available, free of charge, for everyone to see and share.

It’s fine starting simple with a program unfamiliar to you, even when I moved from Photoshop to Clip Studio there was a lot of things I had to relearn or that felt strange to me. Hotkeys for example were a little confusing given I only ever worried about [B] for “Brushes” in Photoshop, but Clip Studio there is [B] and [P] for Brushes and Pens, and in Clip Studio, “Pens” are different from Photoshop’s version of the Pen Tool.

I had to wean myself off Photoshop by linearting in Clip and then bringing it back to Photoshop to color and shade for my personal comfort. But now, I’ve become pretty confident with Clip Studio and ultimately use it for everything and have dropped my subscription to Adobe.

The transition won’t come immediately, it took 3-4 years (condensed) for me to feel pretty proficient in Photoshop, and then beyond that I continued to learn a couple more things I didn’t know I could do in the program. And sometimes, you’re just going to never even see half the stuff your program provides. 

Which if you can learn to navigate to your essential tools and ignore the rest, that would help you immensely down the line.

I hope this advice was helpful!

-Mod Em

[jackieisonline]

[Drawing on Everything] Week One

~~Part 1: 10 Different Drawing Apps/Software~~

[Note: After I wrote about these I then got the instructions that we should research software, so I’m not sure that I should have picked ones that I already have used. Hopefully this list is still insightful though!]

My formative childhood years were defined by learning how to use the computer to draw, so picking 10 different drawing apps/software is a nostalgic exercise for me. This list will be vaguely chronological, starting from the first drawing software I’ve ever used, and the years that I’ve used them.

1.  MS Paint (2000ish-2007)

My first experience with drawing on the computer was MS Paint.

2.  Oekaki (2006-2008ish?)

Around age 10 I discovered that the internet was a thing that had communities, so I joined something called an “Oekaki board” - these were forum-like environments where you used an online drawing applet to post your art, and other users could comment and critique on your work. There were a lot of these different boards around - in particular I was really (cough, am still) obsessed with this one Nickelodeon show, “Avatar: The Last Airbender”, and spent the good amount of my pre-teenage years learning to draw by joining related boards and creating fan-art.

The actual drawing applets on these boards were varied - there was one called “Shipainter” which I liked to use, especially for its watercolor brush with a dynamic range of opacity. I think this program was conducive to developing a soft coloring/shading style, which is still part of my current style.

(2007) I also became really into Naruto fanart communities as well. 10+ years later I’ve started watching the series again, so life really starts to surprise you.

3.  Corel Painter (2007-2008ish?)

I think this came free with my Wacom tablet, so I played around with it a bit when I was 11ish - but I remember it confusing the hell out of me. I think it was the “oil-painting” effects that added some 3D texture to your drawing, that I just didn’t know how to wield at that age.

3.  Photoshop (2008-present)

I started to feel at the age 11 that drawing on the computer was really my passion, so I asked for Photoshop Elements for as a Christmas gift. I really got into Photoshop and started to do more elaborate digital painting. I also used it to go extremely overboard in any middle school projects that involved some type of graphic design or illustration work. Past me was really excessive, but I guess that took me to where I am today.

My first Photoshop Elements creation. I named it, “In Those Eyes”. Fitting.

4.  Drawing Games: Draw My Thing (2011ish?)

In high school I would go on this site called OmgPop and play this online, multiplayer Pictionary style game. Obviously I wasn’t trying to build my art portfolio through this game, but I think in a sense it’s a good test about how to sharpen your symbolic thinking and drawing skills in a timed setting. Whatever phenomena happens during this is really interesting  and probably relates to big ideas about human intelligence and communication - it’d be cool to do some further research on this.

6.  OneNote (2014-2016)

I had a windows laptop at the beginning of my undergrad that let you draw on the screen with a pressure-sensitive Pen. It was a Lenovo Yoga Thinkpad. I remember taking notes in OneNote for my classes but also using it to doodle.

I drew this in OneNote, before going to college. I just went to visit Japan in the summer so I referenced this from a magazine I got.

6.  Sketch (2016-present)

Sketch is a vector based software for doing things like UI design. Because I’ve kind of veered toward UX design as a career path lately, I’ve been using it a lot in the work that I do for internships but also to design personal projects, and sometimes create illustrations.

One of the first things I made while learning this software was a set of avatars for myself.

7.  Mischief (2017)

Mischief is this software I downloaded a free trial for. Apparently it’s raster based drawing software (like Photoshop), but allows you to infinitely zoom into your drawings without quality loss the way vector based software works. 

8.  Google Machine Learning Drawing Game (2017?)

This came out a bit ago - it’s like pictionary in that you have to draw an object and others guess, but in this case “others” is a machine learning model trained to recognize drawn objects. I have similar thoughts/questions to my Draw My Thing example.

9.  TV Paint (2017)

One year ago I took an animation class at Harvard. This is more like software dedicated for animation but has a pretty robust brush set and features, which is nice since you can just create the art directly in the program as you animate.

10.  Piskel (2018)

I used this tool when I was making animated sprites for a video game group project during my final semester at MIT. I later moved to Photoshop because it was getting difficult to manage files only using the website’s interface.

~~Part 2: Drawing in the Present~~~

That was a rather intimate history of my prolific but embarrassing pre-teen self. Let’s draw some stuff today, as a 22 year old grad student.

For each type of software, I’m giving myself 20 minutes to draw whatever my hands/mind gravitate to. Apparently today it’s colorful girls.

1. Photoshop

2. Sketch

3. Piskel

[beingmad2017-blog]

Evaluation: My 12 months With Microsoft Surface Pro

New Post has been published on https://beingmad.org/evaluation-my-12-months-with-microsoft-floor-pro/

Evaluation: My 12 months With Microsoft Surface Pro

Imperfect, Heavy, Light, Powerful, and High-quality.

Simply shy of one year ago, I transitioned from a Macbook Pro and iPad combination to a Microsoft Surface Pro 128GB. In Mild of this week’s announcement of Floor Seasoned three and my acquisition of a Surface Seasoned 2, I think it’s time to mirror on what that enjoy became like. Like maximum oldsters, I used to be a touch skeptical approximately the concept of mixing a PC and pill into a single unit. Would it be too heavy? Would the overall performance be too low? Would the battery life be awful? And what about the brand new Windows eight OS it truly is been the situation of so much teeth-gnashing? I will try to answer a lot of these questions and extra as succinctly as viable. Hit the star and let’s get into the question: what is it want to stay with Microsoft’s imaginative and prescient for computing within the destiny?

1. The Running System, starring Windows eight/8.1:

Home windows eight.1 Replace 1 had a good head start with Home windows 8, as I started the use of it in the course of the first publicly to be had betas about nine months earlier than release, twin booting on my Macbook Seasoned. That enjoy gave me masses of time to figure out how to navigate the OS properly before launch, so I didn’t have the battle that plenty of people did. Of direction, it likely facilitates that I Simply naturally enjoy exploring and coming across new matters. The early Home windows eight experience did have its struggles, though. I would end up conversant in the iPad and even to my Home windows Cellphone 7 tool, both of which had plenty of apps to be had in their shops. Home windows eight’s shop changed into notoriously barren through assessment, and that led to some early frustration whilst trying to use Floor Pro as only a tablet. Too many apps and functions had been lacking to make for a satisfying enjoy.

Although, the device’s ability to address legacy Windows desktop apps with aplomb stored me happy sufficient to continue, and the app saves catch 22 situations have become less essential by means of the day. If there are one component Home windows simply wishes to repair, though, is its way of offering the desktop. The computer continues to be wrapped in the trappings of an archaic System whose time has surpassed, and it is time for Microsoft to Replace it to a greater modern presentation that has fonts massive sufficient to examine on high DPI monitors and huge enough to function with a finger.

With eight.1 and the new eight.1 Spring Replace (truely? We couldn’t Just name it 8.2?), really all my lawsuits about Windows 8 evaporated. At the same time as a few dislike the new aesthetic, I’ve individually discovered myself loving the flat shades, active tiles and removal of extraneous outcomes. My honest hope is that as Windows evolves it gets even flatter and the metro aesthetic will become extra pervasive.

Idea: Use a Microsoft account, and use OneDrive! I can not stress these sufficient. In case you’re the use of Home windows eight–and on a Surface Seasoned, you’ll be–you shouldn’t create a local account. Doing so cuts you off from some of Home windows eight’s first-class functions. Amongst these is the ability to have almost your entire Computer configuration, proper all the way down to tile sizes, locations and apps established, sponsored up on your OneDrive account within the occasion you either need to restore your Laptop otherwise you sign into a different Windows 8.1 Laptop. satisfactory, even though, is that with OneDrive you get 7GB garage totally free, which, While no longer enough to the cowl, say, your music and snap shots collection, might be masses to make certain your essential documents are all effectively subsidized up inside moments of you making any exchange. It’s easy to learn how to keep in your OneDrive folder, and as soon as you’ve become conversant in having that safety net you will wonder the way you ever lived without it.

2. The Hardware: Build First-rate, Heft, and Capability.

Floor Seasoned Docking Station

I used to lug around a 2010 Macbook Seasoned thirteen.3″, which weighed four.5 pounds, and an iPad 1, which weighed 1.5 pounds for a complete of 6 kilos. So after I say that the 2.5 pound total of the Surface Pro and sort cover turned into a massive weight off my back, I am genuinely no longer kidding. The sacrifice was that I had a smaller screen, but the gain becomes miles more Powerful processor and a long way advanced display decision and pixel density. The Construct Nice is the first rate: there may be literally zero flex to this device, its magnesium shell is tough and robust enough to withstand likely greater abuse than you should sense comfortable making your Laptop undergo. As a pill, It’s half of a pound heavier than that unique iPad was, but as a laptop, it has a large gain over some thing Apple offers. but you possibly marvel what I use my Surface Seasoned for?

Workload

I have spent a maximum of the beyond 12 months as a movie school pupil at UCLA, this means that that quite a few my workload entails modifying and transcoding video, compositing after consequences compositions, transferring photos throughout special media and so forth. I take advantage of Adobe Top-quality for most of these responsibilities, and my Floor Pro has dealt with all of them with grace. I’ve had no issues modifying and rendering 1080p video in actual-time. And as you’d assume from a Windows device with a complete size USB port, working with external hard drives and optical drives is a breeze. Suffice to mention, I also do the basics including running in Microsoft Office, writing in Final Draft, checking e mail, surfing the internet, yadda yadda. Basic, I have had no court cases store one: early on, my first Surface Pro had a few severe troubles with the Marvell Avastar wifi chip and had to be exchanged, a hassle it’s no longer absolutely uncommon with this device. extra on that later.

Webcams

allow’s be sincere: the webcams in this device suck. They may be flat-out terrible, and there’s no getting around that reality. They are satisfactory for simple Skype video calls, however, this is pretty much it. If you really want to report video, use something else. whatever else.

Stylus

I regularly take notes in OneNote MX (it really is the metro model), specifically currently. Like most college students, I’ve tended during the last few years to type my notes, but current studies show that students who take notes through hand tend to do higher on assessments. nicely, I’m serious about evidence primarily based research, so I took this to coronary heart, but I am also lazy, because of this I don’t need to type things after I’ve written them down. Enter Surface Seasoned’s stylus and voila: I will hand write my notes and have them in a virtual layout all at the same time. Hell yes. I locate that the stylus, regardless of its reasonably-priced plastic sense, works well as a virtual inking device. some whinge about the shortage of a dock for the stylus, but in reality, I’ve no issues with that. I have been the use of it for 12 months and haven’t begun to lose the element.

Art Associated Work

Ultimate notice on usability: my fiancée, artist Kelley Frisby, got her Surface Pro on launch day exactly due to the included Wacom digitizer with 1,024 stages of stress sensitivity. From the outset, the utilization right here turned into contentious due to the fact Surface Pro shipped with out a pressure touchy driver that Photoshop could understand. But, as soon as that motive force materialized, she took to using the stylus all the time. And whilst we discovered approximately Manga Studio Seasoned from artist Jonathan Case’s internet site, things definitely went off the hook as she observed it to be some distance superior to photoshop for creating hand drawn illustrations. That she can have her Floor Pro on her lap with stress sensitivity Whilst she draws, and her keyboard reachable for the use of keyboard shortcuts is a massive benefit that different pills really don’t provide. Clearly, In case you’re an artist who attracts and paints digitally, Floor Seasoned is the tool for you. Nothing else combines such a lot of Hardware abilities and large software availability.

three. Battery lifestyles

Floor Seasoned Kickstand

This is the only extreme issue that has dogged the Surface Seasoned due to the fact that its authentic launch, notwithstanding the fact that it became in no way as awful as human beings claimed or the truth that Surface Pro 2 absolutely mitigated the problem (and by using all reviews, Floor Seasoned 3 does even better). Early claims had been that Surface Pro was given approximately 3.5 hours of battery life. And below sure instances, that’s proper: watching 1080p films with the brightness up Whilst downloading stuff inside the history will, like another device, consume battery lifestyles an awful lot greater than common usage will. however it really is handiest a part of the test, isn’t it? below normal usage, which I’ll define as the web, e-mail, and word processing, Surface Pro 1 gets five hours battery existence proper out of the container. With a few mild tweaks to the power profile, which I have specified in one in all our maximum famous posts, It is completely possible to get 6-7 hours of battery existence. My exceptional time turned into Simply over 8 hours general, but with a caveat: I used to be operating with the wifi became off, writing in a phrase, in a low Mild situation wherein I may want to effectively turn down the display screen brightness to minimum. The majority I recognize get in the variety of 5-6 hours.

Why I Switched

allow’s be as clean as possible right here: the Surface Seasoned isn’t a faultless tool, however then, nor is whatever else. My chief complaints are that the computing device in Home windows eight.X needs a present day UI revamp and that I desire the screen have been a touch bigger. I’m hoping to improve to a Surface Pro 3 sooner or later within the destiny for that very purpose, although my suspicion is that the artist network, including my own superb Kelley Frisby, will hesitate to improve as a result of the new device’s probably inferior N-Trig digitizer.

So that leaves the huge query: why did I switch? it really is a complex query. First, I was by no means sold on Mac OSX, but whilst Apple’s Bootcamp 5 Update removed my ability to install Home windows 8 as a twin-boot OS preference, claiming it wasn’t well suited with the laptop I might be using for 2.5 years (and at that, going for walks Windows 8 on for 9 months), the Final straw broke. This becomes the 0.33 time Apple’s created issues for my devices, following the iOS 5 Update that slowed my iPad to a crawl and the iOS 4 Replace that made my iPhone 3G all but unusable.

The prospect of having a pill and computer all in an unmarried tool turned into also very appealing to me. sure, there are compromises: It is a touch heavier than a tablet and a little smaller than an average computer, but the Common effect is the internet wonderful, and I am happy to mention that my 12 months with Surface Pro has me convinced: Microsoft’s vision of the world in which pills are Simply slender, Mild, contact-pleasant Computer’s is the proper one. That we now see even desktop all-in-ones turning into large tablets (significantly, have you visible the Dell Venue Pro 18″ tablets? Loopy!), and touch slowly however truely spreading even to budget level laptops, is a great signal the convergence Microsoft anticipated whilst it announced the original Surface Pro is actually going on.

problems I had & Answers Microsoft presented

Surface via Microsoft

I cited the problem my unique Surface Pro had with its wifi chip awhile in the past, however, there is greater to that story. In fact, Simply multiple weeks in the past my Floor Pro another time started out having problems with the wifi chip, and no Replace, driving force substitute, or even a Machine reset helped. Ultimately the device commenced blue screening again and again, so I took it in to peer what Microsoft ought to do for me. To my entire marvel, they exceeded me a cutting-edge Floor Seasoned 2 and even permit me to pay the distinction to improve it to the 256GB/8GB version, which I eagerly did. the new device is largely all of the exquisite stuff approximately Floor Seasoned 1, distilled into a purer shape. equal weight, size and shape, barely better display (though I really can’t tell the difference, for what It is really worth), and the type cowl 2 is an incredible little keyboard that does its activity with aplomb. I am very happy certainly, and more than satisfied I bought the extended assurance.

Value Proposition

I’ve seen a whole lot of folks argue that the Floor Pro collection is too luxurious, and I’m able to apprehend why. $999 before you even upload the keyboard looks as if a quite tough tablet to swallow, specifically for a pill while you stay in an international of $499 iPads and $199 Kindle Fires. however, I think It is worth remembering what you get while you buy into the Surface Pro Device:

1. You get an ultrabook that may run pretty much any legacy Windows app you may throw at it. It has Brilliant RAM alternatives (4-8GB) and garage options (sixty four-512GB), a full-sized USB port and each stressed and wireless external monitor support (the latter thru Miracast). In Apple land, this costs you $900 minimal.

2. You get a pill which could do anything an iPad or Android pill can do, plus extra, with the best disadvantage being sheer numbers of apps. Even that is converting as the Home windows save processes two hundred,000 and could quickly merge with the Windows Smartphone shop to boot. And as it’s Home windows, you furthermore may get the perk of person bills right out of the field. In Apple land, This is every other $four hundred+

three. A virtual drawing/inking answer. Whether you Just take notes otherwise you do fine Artwork, the Floor Pro has you blanketed. You don’t get this in Apple land at all. You rather purchase a USB pill that does not have a display screen for $one hundred+, or you buy a Cintiq to connect with your Macbook for $1,000.

Lengthy tale quick: at first glance, yes, it seems like Surface Pro/2 is steeply-priced, however, you get a first-rate quantity of Fee for your money.

Remaining Phrases

Would I suggest the Surface Seasoned or Pro 2? Sincerely, specially If you’re an artist or someone who is Just sick and tired of lugging round more than one gadgets. We live in a global where our computing Hardware isn’t Just Powerful, however, can do its job with noticeably little strength or heat. there’s Just no reason to hold devices on your bag further to the smartphone to your pocket. If I may want to have a wish granted, it would be for Microsoft to feature an extra USB three.zero port, thunderbolt, and circulate from an mSATA to a PCIe SSD. Mind you, it doesn’t precisely want those items, however, the Hardware nerd in me Could be simply glad to have them.

As for Floor Seasoned 3, nicely, I might love to check it, and greater importantly I would love to place it in the palms of our classically trained illustrator so she will put it thru its paces and render a verdict on its usefulness as an artist’s digital tablet, but to date haven’t had any luck getting time with the new device. but howdy, if Microsoft would really like to let us borrow one, we should probable Work some thing out!