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Apologies if you've been asked this before, but when creating period-accurate characters and costumes, how do you go about researching? I'm currently working on some historical fiction projects, and am overwhelmed! Do you have any places you frequently go for references, sources, etc? (Again, apologies if this has been asked)

Good news, I have a massive Google Doc for exactly that! 😄

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nearly oc-tober time again - time for some prompts for 2024

F.A.Q

do i have to draw? not at all! you are free to participate with any medium that suits you... writing, artwork, free bases and templates, simple text posts, in-character-as-your-oc roleplay, whatever! (just no stealing or AI)

do i have to make new content? nope! re-uploading old stuff that fits the prompts is allowed (and encouraged) ... old art that didn't get the appreciation it needed always deserves a chance to be shared again, it's a fun throwback!

do i have to post every day? nope! only 10 days are mandatory (the ones in red with a star symbol) and everything else (yellow) is 100% optional! if you're busy or tired, please skip as many as you want

can i start early? you can prep your posts in advance if you need to ... but please wait until the right day in october to share them!

can i re-upload your prompt list to another site? i would prefer if you dont - i have accounts on most sites, so just reblog/retweet/share from me!

event tag? #bweirdOCtober

have fun!

image desc/text version ↓under the cut↓ or on bweird.art/october

prompts:

WEEK 1: OC INTRODUCTIONS

⭐ 1: FAV OC what makes them your fav? 2: NEW OC how recently did you make them? 3: OLD OC how long ago did you make them? ⭐ 4: UNDER-APPRECIATED OC an oc you feel like you don't talk about enough, or you haven't fleshed out as much as you would like 5: RE-DESIGNED OC an oc who has changed a lot (what changed about them?) or, if you haven't redesigned an oc: is there anything you might want to change about an existing oc?

WEEK 2: BUILDING BACKSTORY

⭐ 6: PAST where is your oc from? what did they look like as a child? 7: LIKES what do they like (and why?) 8: DISLIKES what don't they like (and why?) ⭐ 9: RELATIONSHIPS doesn't have to be romantic! can any kind of relationship (frienship, family, rivalry etc) 10: PERSONALITY what are your oc's main personality traits 11: SYMBOLISM/THEMES what represents your oc? is there a specific colour you associate them with, or a specific animal? 12: FUTURE what will your oc look like in the future? do they have any plans or goals?

WEEK 3: FUN + GAMES

⭐13: MEMES do any memes remind you of your oc? are there memes your oc would find funny? maybe you want to redraw your oc as one? 14: WHO/WHAT INSPIRED YOUR OC are there existing characters that your oc looks like? was your oc based on yourself? is your oc originally from a specific fandom? 15: MUSIC share a character playlist, write a songfic, post lyrics that remind you of them, etc ⭐16: EYES CLOSED or NON DOMINANT HAND draw a picture of your oc with your eyes closed or with your non domminant hand, write or type a paragraph about them without your eyes closed, etc ... have fun, and don't worry about it looking "bad" -it's meant to!! 17: DnD ALIGNMENT CHART put all your ocs into a DnD alignment chart, or any other similar chart if you prefer i've compiled a few templates on my site, but you can find more easily if you google "oc alignment chart" ⭐18: SWAP swap something between your ocs - their role in the story, hairstyles, personalities, fashion taste, species ... whatever you want! how would this difference change them? 19: PALETTE CHALLENGES draw your ocs with as many of these colour palettes as you want (or just skip if you don't draw/don't like doing these!)

hex codes for the colours: palette 1 - #3C1E81 #6D1EA2 #B059E8 #FE0876 #FE5284 #FE7C96 #E0CFE3 #FFD5C3 palette 2 - #352823 #673F28 #AB541C #BA8233 #897128 #A68B2F #F7BF6A #DAC3A4 palette 3 - #A42E25 #D7412B #E47C29 #F7A233 #FCC02D #FCE4A6 #486548 #FEFDE8 palette 4 - #2F4769 #39597E #53779C #94D1E7 #AADDE7 #D48DB7 #D498B5 #D2BABA

WEEK 4: COMMUNITY

20-26: A WHOLE WEEK OF SOCIAL STUFF if you don't have the time/energy to do every day this week, ⭐ day 23 is the only one marked as mandatory! you can skip the rest!

some ideas for what you could do: talk about a friend's oc you like, make gift art/writing of them, collabs, trades, reblog/appreciate ocs in the event tag, make interactions between your ocs and other people's

WEEK 5: HALLOWEEN

⭐27: FEARS is your oc scared of anything? do they have any phobias? are they startled easily? would any of your ocs try to scare ppl on purpose? 28: MONSTER what would your oc be if they were a monster (eg: werewolf, vampire, eldritch beast.. whatever) or, do you have an oc who is already a monster? 29: PUMPKIN CARVING your ocs carving pumpkins, a drawing of a pumpkin carved to look like your oc ... or even carve it in real life! 30: GHOST this can be literally a ghost, or a concept that haunts your oc! up to you! ⭐ 31: COSTUMES what are your ocs wearing for halloween?

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I am Clay or Fowl, and this is my art blog

i draw furries and stuff, posting here when i feel like it or remember to

i am an adult, so sometimes I post/reblog adult things

i like/follow from @foggypirates

my other links:

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i appreciate how upset this fish looks so i drew fanart

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valentines day reblog :3

Lumos <3s you!

1/3 silly lil color experiments

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「 commission 」 illustration for zyhgar 📚💫

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it's worth it!

quick warmup doodle

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Good news, fellow artists! Nightshade has finally been released by the UChicago team! If you aren't aware of what Nightshade is, it's a tool that helps poison AI datasets so that the model "sees" something different from what an image actually depicts. It's the same team that released Glaze, which helps protect art against style mimicry (aka those finetuned models that try to rip off a specific artist). As they show in their paper, even a hundred poisoned concepts make a huge difference.

(Reminder that glazing your art is more important than nighshading it, as they mention in their tweets above, so when you're uploading your art, try to glaze it at the very least.)

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my 2023 summary of art!

Template:here

still not consistently posting anywhere, but I like doing these. they're fun there's a lot of things i would've liked to include but had to exclude, due to not being shareable on this account. maybe i'll have more stuff next year!

this is long, so details under the cut

JANUARY silly lizard oc i generally dont do much single line hatching, so it was nice to fiddle with it this time

FEBRUARY the wittle scrunkly lizard last time i drew this one, they were an lps shitpost, so its nice to like draw them normally lol

MARCH herman is running out of time glasses axolotl but make him neon idk

APRIL fancy calico i honestly dont know whats up with the clothes, i just kinda drew whatever tbh

MAY yippie!! toontown oc! was playing ttcc w/shard and co, this is the character i ended up making i also got covid around april-march iirc so i was feeling horrid for a while (and the remaining symptoms didnt clear up till like june)

JUNE an oc i got years ago but didnt have the confidence to draw for a while lmao anyways i like her colors and shape, she's fun

JULY mandatory artfight posting this was one of the last ones i did! ocs belong to pookapooka and they were so fun to paint

idk if ill be doing artfight again tbh. ive been doing it consistently since sun vs moon but its honestly felt less fun ever since the tiktok invasion`and how ppls behavior has changed, and especially since the whole ownership thing that happened mid fight this year. (not interested in any of the alternatives ive seen either bc they have the same issues, notably worse issues, or are not furry friendly) but tbh that might just be me being disenchanted with online art spaces due to the intensifying shittification of basically everything, fucking rip

AUGUST ring but hes going to jail (again but for real this time) the staxie monthly prompt was barbie mugshots but i . . . i did this with ring and lumos and promptly forgor to do this with cakes and ale like i was planning to lmfao im actually gonna watch the barbie movie tonight, renting it so i can watch it on the big tv (didnt watch in theaters bc expensive (movie tickets are generally 15-25 bucks in my area (compared to the 5-10 in my aunt's area (renting is cheaper per person)), and they changed the chairs to these weird uncomfy pleather recliners that make my skin crawl to "justify the price raise" + i hate sitting for more than an hour i need water, bathroom, stretch, and snack breaks))

SEPTEMBER ganache went over the hedge was very busy w/projects so i did little casual art this was inspired by me comparing the over the hedge version of supermarket by ben folds (upbeat & high energy) vs the one by the clash (melancholy + commercial-induced agony) ever since then i cant stop thinking abt how much the lemon demon guy's voice sounds like the fucking clash guy sdjkhfkjsd also over the hedge was one of my favorite movies as a kid and i watched it at least 10 times before we had to return the dvd to netflix. i also regularly played the flash games on the site until i forgot about it after finding out about miniclip + notdoppler from other kids and decided to use those for flash games instead bc more options lol

OCTOBER dta img for a new oc i got, funny long neck budgie thingy busy w/projects again so little casual art had to use old mini tablet bc previous tablet was completely unusable fucking rip

NOVEMBER ganache + cactus pony, they want to know if you have any bubblegum. do you? busy w/projects again so little casual art doodle i made in heavypaint (one of the old layerless versions, i bought a lisence for it a while ago.) i got a new tablet on black friday since the mini tablet was horrible + my broken tablet was making me work very slow

DECEMBER ring in the void (this is lore accurate) or as nic put it, "fucked up twilight sparkle" lol busy w/projects + gifts so little casual art i actually sketched this w/the mini tablet, but didnt finish it up till getting the new tablet

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for reading this far, you get to see amogus.

i would've put amogus whisper on the chart but decided against it since im not done with that one yet lmao

[fowl-leaf]

Something I try to keep in mind when making art that looks vintage is keeping a limited color pallette. Digital art gives you a very wide, Crisp scope of colors, whereas traditional art-- especially older traditional art-- had a very limited and sometimes dulled use of color.

This is a modern riso ink swatch, but still you find a similar and limited selection of colors to mix with. (Mixing digitally as to emulate the layering of ink riso would be coloring on Multiply, and layering on top of eachother 👉)

If you find some old prints, take a closer look and see if you can tell what colors they used and which ones they layered... a lot of the time you'll find yellow as a base!

Misprints can really reveal what colors were used and where, I love misprints...

Something else I keep in the back of my mind is: how the human eye perceives color on paper vs. a screen. Ink and paint soaks into paper, it bleeds, stains, fades over time, smears, ect... the history of a piece can show in physical wear. What kind of history do you want to emulate? Misprinted? Stained? Kept as clean as possible, but unable to escape the bluing damages of the sun? It's one of my favorite things about making vintage art. Making it imperfect!

You can see the bleed, the wobble of the lines on the rug, the fading, the dirt... beautiful!!

Thinking in terms of traditional-method art while drawing digital can help open avenues to achieving that genuine, vintage look!

[fowl-leaf]

Surrealist Paintings by Rob Gonsalves

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Looking at your recent commissions, those backgrounds are soo pretty!! Do you have any tips for backgrounds? I always struggle with them :>

aAA many many thanks!!

backgrounds can absolutely be a struggle but they don't have to be! they just require a little more creative planning~!

whether it be a commission or a personal drawing, if I'm building an elaborate art piece i focus on establishing the background First.

the background is the stage for your character! planning the background first will make it easier to tailor the character's actions and how they interact with the environment around them.

planning the background first can be the difference between your character standing awkwardly front and center with the setting going on behind them, or actually participating in their environment.

if i'm super stumped for background ideas, i browse stock image sites to get inspiration. sometimes it helps to doodle on an image to generate some ideas - kinda like you're playing with JPEGs like dolls.

that said - while i'm pinpointing WHAT i want to draw, i keep the ideas loose. i don't want to focus on the itty-bitty details until i've got the overall aesthetic and layout in mind, as i might get inspired to add something in later!

THUMBNAILING

if you're planning a big piece it can be helpful to break it down into something bite-sized before you go all in and start lining or painting. these are "thumbnails" - fast little sketches that establish the scene in a way that doesn't consume a lot of time or effort. it's also great as a little perspective exercise as a treat.

here i decided i want to draw a character walking home in a back alley street. with these photo references in mind, i can plan a layout and how the character will act in the scene. is this a candid shot? are they posing cutely? are they looking down at us in a tense way? there are many ideas to be had!

after you've chosen the layout / vibe for your idea, you can scale up your thumbnail to your preferred canvas size and start fleshing out the details. be sure to keep referring to your reference images to get additional ideas, such as storefronts, items, props etc!

3D MODELS

If you're trying to create a unique environment that photo references simply cannot help you visualize, 3D models exist! This gives you that ability to rotate / scale things for better visualization. Clip Studio has a vast catalogue of 3D models to download For Free that you can fiddle around with. i know there are many 3D builder sites out there as well, though i've never made use of them so i'm afraid i cannot recommend any off the top of my head. hell, you can even use the Sims game to design a setting and go from there!

also if anyone is going to come into my house and say 3D models are cheating: they are not. using a 3D model to better grasp an angle or get a better idea for perspective is not cheating. using 3D models to help plan the environment in your art is not cheating. they are no different than brushes; these are tools made to HELP YOU. use them!

PERSPECTIVE

perspective and angles can make a HUGE difference in the art piece. there's nothing wrong with static long shots! if that's what you want to draw, do it!! there's no right and wrong here!

but if you're finding your work to be a little robotic and stiff, slap an angle in there. consider an overhead view. these same techniques are applied to photography and film! nothing wrong with wide shots, but every once in a while it can help to throw in a dutch angle.

if there is one note i'd like to leave off on, it's that your backgrounds do not have to be 100% accurate-to-life to be Good. unless realism is something you're really striving for in your style, don't feel compelled to nitpick every brick and leaf in your art. us artists can tend to over-prune our work until our art looks a little bare and soulless. flaws can give your work character, and that's often a lot more appealing than how accurate the scale ratio between background building A and building B are [again, unless you WANT to go for that realistic look then you can fuss over those details all you like].

i hope this helped a little! MY APOLOGIES FOR MAKING IT SO LONG AH

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Take a leap

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cat

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First of many batches of artfight posts!

Characters featured belong to Xenryft, ZipZap, and @nicthechameleon

This year I'm mostly doing traditional stuff instead since I wanna use dip pen more, and my new brush pen! (first one is digital lol)

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Some more pen doodles