#this post is so ugly but its ok

[humans-are-tasty]

[verflares]

(pre-calam) filling the compendium :-)

+ closeup and the aftermath

[mediapen]

BITE THE HAND, PART ONE.

↳ CS55 ++ 'how to be a dog' by andrew kane ++ [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x] // [x]

[lupins-hehim-pussy]

[ ID in ALT ]

what's wrong with him (based on That Scene in the hit wriolette fanfic Love Will Find A Way, So Will Naked Mole Rats by noxetic)

[thereallycoolmonsterithoughtup]

my comic i made

[stitchwraith-stingers]

orchid the rain/hive hybird! local painter (mostly does portraits and realism, but perfers to do abstract) she is a very stressed and spunky teen, only the dark red stripes can change color

2024 vs 2022 ish

[dreadnotau]

Happy three years everybody! As always, there’s a lot to say on the occasion, so pop in at the end of the post for the tl;dr if you don’t have time for my detailed diatribes, haha

Boy, time flies, huh? Feels like the second anniversary was just yesterday, but maybe that’s just the several long hiatuses getting to me. I’ve been scarce on uploading anything anywhere for a while now, even though I promised I’d actually pick up the slack this time around. What gives? Well…

For one, college hell, and for two, a lot of unfounded anxiety about putting my art out there. Allow me some theatrics for a moment and I’ll actually get back to the comic at hand… I’ve never had an exceptionally supportive environment for making art. It wasn’t suppressive, not in the slightest, but it also wasn’t… encouraging. It was always treated as a hobby or a distraction rather than something I was allowed to be fully proud of, especially because a lot of my art focused on more cartoon-y and fantasy ideas, rather than still life studies and painting (which people generally outside of the art sphere tend to value more, arbitrarily). Couple that with a childhood full of being bullied over minute shit you hadn’t even considered could be an issue before, and you get a teenager hellbent on never sharing his interests or ideas with anyone, mostly due to the fear of rejection.

I’ve grown, thankfully, but that paranoia and fear doesn’t go away overnight. As I’m sure you all know, Meowchela was the one who originally encouraged me to post this comic, and the only reason she succeeded was because she was the first person in a long time who listened and engaged with my interests and my art in a meaningful way. It’s kind of obvious her friendship had a profound impact on me, and I’d cite her as one of the reasons I was even hopeful enough to apply to an art college in the first place! This comic, and that bond with another person, proved that maybe these things I’m so passionate about weren’t duds, and weren’t something I had to keep to myself.

So, fast forward a few years. About three years, in fact.

During one of my classes, right before this hellish two weeks of exams started, one of the class assistants talked me into showing my comic pages to one of my professors. He’s generally a pretty open guy when it comes to new mediums, but I’m always… apprehensive about showing my less “traditional art”-y things to professors, but, he ended up being genuinely proud of it. Specifically, I showed him pages 85-87 (because they’re my favourites) and, he didn’t read the text, just the visuals were enough for him to say “good job, keep it up” (which is HIGH praise from that guy). When I mentioned I’ve been meaning to simplify the visuals because I didn’t have time to work on the comic very often because of college and classes, he dismissed it on principle. I was honestly caught off guard. Heavily paraphrasing, he suggested that worsening the visuals for an arbitrary deadline was counterproductive to making something that’s Good™.

That’s kinda stuck with me. For a good few years now I was more focused on optimisation rather than visual improvement for the comic, and though it HAS contributed to better visuals in some ways (cutting corners sometimes makes for a less pointy and jagged end result), it’s kind of weird I’m treating an art project that way, isn’t it? I set a lot of… arbitrary deadlines and standards for myself, in the form of expectations and what I “should” or “shouldn’t” be doing at certain stages in my life. I’ve thought of Dread Not as a passion project second and a stepping stone first, if I’m being honest. As if it was too… fandom-y and derivative to be treated with more gravity than that, like it’s an immature project because I was still a child when I came up with it. As if it was something I’m making to Build Up to Something Else, something Bigger and Cooler and More Important, and… the more I think about the future of Dread Not, and even my future career options, the more I realised that’s, ironically, a really immature way to think about it.

If there’s one thing going to this art college has taught me, is that there’s no “right” way to make art, and there’s no “right” way to success as an artist. There’s no clear-cut paths, just more commonly treaded roads, but even those are heavily overgrown. Why should I try to box myself into thinking I have to make things from complete scratch to be taken seriously? What’s so bad about Dread Not as a story and as a comic that’s caused me to vaguely keep it under wraps when conversing with people in my day-to-day life? Why wouldn’t I put all these skills I’ve acquired to improve and expand this project that’s Right There, WAITING for me to finally get off my ass and get pages out there again?

I wish I could say I’ve used all this time away in a particularly clever way, but I really haven’t - at least, it feels like I haven’t. My art has undoubtedly improved over time (though admittedly the art for this post was Very rushed, fuckin exams), and while I’ve been working on projects in the background, chipping away at them in a VERY disorganised way, I haven’t been posting that progress anywhere, and I haven’t made any good progress on my biggest project, Dread Not, because of the other ones. And, honestly? Admitting that kinda stings. This comic means a lot to me, and I wish I actually gave it the time and attention it deserves instead of letting it sit out hiatus after hiatus because I keep failing at structuring my time.

So, my new plan is a little more abstract: find a way to work Dread Not into my school schedule, and slowly build a habit of working on it more often. No clue how long that’ll take, but I think it’ll be worth it to consider it as an option, and hopefully finally end these long, drawn out hiatuses with short bursts of uploads in-between. HOPEFULLY. Building habits was never my strong suit, so please bear with me while I figure this out in what will probably be the most hectic upload schedule in this comics history, which is: no schedule at all.

From now on (until the end of Act 1), I’ll upload pages when they’re ready, and depending on how the weeks go and how complex the page is, they could be weeks or days apart from one another. Hell, some might even take a month to finish if school stuff gets REALLY hectic (god knows Hellish Exam Week number 1 and number 2 won’t be giving me much time to work on the comic), but I’m determined to do this. I want to be able to put my all into this project again!!

(And hopefully finish Act 1 by the end of this semester…)

TL;DR: College is giving me life lessons I didn’t expect, and because of them I’ve decided to give myself a non-existent upload schedule for Dread Not: Pages will be posted when they’re ready, and the spacing between pages could wildly vary depending on circumstances and the actual complexity of the page itself.

As always, thank you for being here, thank you for reading, and thank you for being patient!

If all goes well, there will be new content very, very soon.

[ultrasopp]

Constantly fighting between trying to act So Normal and Casual about tog Oh yes ive heard of it haha yeah its okay VS i am thinking big thoughts about it all the time vibrating shaking foaming at the mouth bark bark bark rabies

Anyway the hill im dying on today is once again. Why is mr 1069 always depicted baby cheek smooth fresh shaved while crossing the ural mountains on foot in the year of our lord 1306. Not just him actually why are they all depicted as models. Make them uglier make them unconventional make them human

[neilphen]

this was enough to send me into cardiac arrest. goodbye 4ever </3

[tomb-mold]

i was never like 100% happy and confident with my face and body before, but i used to feel pretty ok about myself and not really think that much about how i looked..but i think being on the internet has legit given me new mental illnesses wrt body image LMAO

[zitrovee]

ONE OF THE LAST ONES I SWEAR. Woah im so happy i found these w good quality again. Bunch of sketches, old drawings too, some OC stuff, mostly silly self indulgent stuff

like look at this its so cool i miss trying out stuff even tho it doesnt resonates lots with me. it was my very first IT fanart that was like. actual fanart and not me doodling in my notebooks for myself. insane.

stuff from the book 2 swap au

cringe but free headcanon that simon used to change his hair for grace

oc stuff lastly

plus this i made when i found out simon’s VA also voices the wizard guy from cookie ruin

[milkbreadtoast]

ai is just so fucking bleak man it makes me want to end it all...

taking everything joyful about life... everything i ever wanted or loved or hoped for... and not just that, everything else too... no job is safe... the only way i can go on is to pretend it doesnt exist and just keep creating and trying as we always have done it haha but meanwhile it just keeps getting worse and im filled with sickening dread... the only hope I have is that people will continue to stick together and protect each other even as ai tries to destroy and take everything from us and our identity and our joy sorry to sound poetic and pretentious but i just need to get the vent out. its bleak man.

[t0asty1]

today feels like an excellent day to embarrass myself and make bad desicions that i will definitely regret, so i will text my crush that i haven’t talked to for months, and has also told me that he is not romantically interested in me, and tell him all the ways he is lovely and gorgeous

[thylacid]

this might be the worst warrior cats image ive ever seen in my life im so serious

[todayisafridaynight]

y3-y4 daigo is so goofy looking to me i love him immensely with his thwomp headass. his smile is more deceased than his Best Friend and his hair is not brushed and frayed at the bottom like an abused paint brush i simply think he deserves a spa day

[cliveguy]

honestly, you revealing redacted would make my month. Will set a calendar reminder in my brain for 9 months from now

Okay for fun i prommy i will do a big dramatic reveal and expose my ugly favourite character to the world. one day.