astrodrawsturtles

[astrodrawsturtles]

Doodles and warm ups from the starts of 2024!

[astrodrawsturtles]

Some more portfolio stuff : )

[astrodrawsturtles]

As part of my portfolio, I did a copy cat piece in the style of The Glass Scientists. I love this comic so much, if you like gay mad scientists check it out!

[astrodrawsturtles]

Discovered the 'Be More Chill' musical tonight and I had to make a quick mini comic from it

[astrodrawsturtles]

Sins of Immortals OC warm up sketches art dump #3, the final one for now : )

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Sins of Immortals OC warm up sketches art dump #2!

[astrodrawsturtles]

Sins of Immortals OC warm up sketches art dump #1 :)

[astrodrawsturtles]

A concept page for my comic, Sins of Immortals! Really proud of this one

[astrodrawsturtles]

Some art posting tips for the artists migrating over here, as a Certified Tumblr Artist Veteran™️ who's never stopped posting here in a decade:

1. Don't add links under all of your posts

It means they won't show up in search results or tags, it's better to have the one pinned post with links at the top of your blog or links in your description. Alternatively like I do, you can keep links out of posts when you're just posting your art on its own, then only add them to posts that are specifically calling to visit another site (e.g. you're promoting a Kickstarter)

2. You don't need to use really specific tags like on Instagram, and the first 20 ones you use are the ones that count

I remember a few years back it was passed around that the key to getting attention on Instagram was using alternating niche tags, but now some artists just do it everywhere when it won't really do you any favours here.

The first 20 tags you use are the ones that appear in search results, the best general tags to use are #art and #artists on tumblr then after that use ones more specific to you such as say, #illustration or #digital art (also notice these have spaces between the words as tags mostly do on this website)

3. Keep your posts pretty and clean looking

A lot of users can be particular about what they have on their blog because they're trying to keep it clean and aesthetic looking, if your posts are overall pleasing to the eye including the description I've found people are more likely to reblog your posts. That means avoiding massive paragraphs with needless hashtags in the description, and uploading high-quality photosets of your work that shows off the pretty details of your artworks!

As a general rule if you have a bunch of sketches or similar images they'll do much better as a photo set than posting them all individually, unlike on other social media posts do better with quality over quantity, and your post won't "expire" after like 24 hours - people will keep reblogging a post for years here especially artworks.

4. Submit to blogs

One downside for a new artist posting here is there's no algorithm to show you to random strangers to get a momentum going, and it can be hard starting off from nothing because of this. However, if you search around you'll find that there are quite a few art curation blogs here who will be happy to either reblog your art or take submissions and post your art on your behalf with links back to your blog. Just be sure it's a blog that's actively looking for artists and not a random user that you're pestering to promote your work, they usually indicate in their description that they're accepting submissions.

Some examples: @artistalley @sosuperawesome @littlealienproducts @art @supersonicart

You may even find yourself drawing the attention of the Tumblr staff who run multiple art promotion blogs and often feature artists on the Tumblr Radar (it's a little spotlight section visible both on mobile and desktop that features your post to the whole userbase, and it's very exciting getting an email that you've been selected! :D)

5. Read the tags under your posts

Due to an old habit that the website collectively held onto from the days where replies hadn't been added to posts yet, a lot of people use the tags to basically ramble their thoughts under a post they're reblogging.

What does this have to do with artists? Well a lot of people will think out loud in the tags about your art and you can read them all under your post, I find it really supportive and endearing and it's one of my favourite things about posting here!

6. Customise your blog on desktop

Something that new users who only use Tumblr on mobile might not notice is that your blog actually has its own webpage on desktop outside of the app with the URL "yourusernamehere(dot)tumblr(dot)com"

You can actually customise this page in HTML and there's a lot of premade layouts called "themes" either available for free or buyable in marketplaces - this can be a pretty accessible and cheap alternative to a custom portfolio website if you don't have one!

I hope some of this is useful, good luck with getting your art in front of new eyes! 💫

[astrodrawsturtles]

I'm very much still learning how to color dark skin, but here's my girl APRIL!

[astrodrawsturtles]

A concept page for the TMNT New World Mutants comic

May or may not come back to this project ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[astrodrawsturtles]

Hello tumbr you seemed to like my iteration of the turtles . here are some sketches bc i havent fully figured out how i want to draw them yet 🥸

[astrodrawsturtles]

ASL Alphabet

For @eternalglitch

I learning sigh languages from class. Well, I’m hard of hearing and muted.

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I have no idea about “M” and “W”. It’s hard to think. @tmnt

[astrodrawsturtles]

Little half assed ref sheet for my version of the Ninja turts 🤓

[astrodrawsturtles]

Hello! I saw your art in this tiktok and thought you’d like to know about it. Hope you’re having a good day!

Holy shit what?? ? ? ? Thank you for telling me and to the person who did that???? ExCUSE???????

[astrodrawsturtles]

Cleaned up an inktober sketch from last year, will eventually make a figure out of this one too!

[astrodrawsturtles]

The reference drawing for my first full body Invader Zim figure!