#Also like don't obsess over finding “a style” it's more than okay to be inconsistent with the way you draw things

[excali8ur]

How did you get so good at drawing? And do you have any tips??? (Pls I'm a beginner help)

Honestly dude you never get good at art. It's sweet that people like my stuff but I still feel like most of it sucks and I think that's sort of an inherent part of drawing lmao. You've just gotta decide to keep doing it anyway because it matters to you

I do have a few tips for improving your technical drawing though:

Do figure sketching. If you can go to in-person life drawing classes that's great, and there'll usually be at least a few running if you live in a city/big town, but you can do it online too. Here are some websites I use: Line of Action / SketchDaily / Quick Poses. Try drawing with different lengths of time (so start with poses appearing for 30 seconds, then move up to 1 minute, then 2, then 5, then 10). Also don't feel too bad if the first few times you try it and the sketches don't turn out quite right or the proportions get messed up or you run out of time. It's part of the process & you'll improve the longer you keep at it. Just try to use longer & messier lines and don't focus on the details until you have basic shapes blocked out. (This is literally what I tell anyone who asks me for art advice because it's about the only drawing exercise I ever deliberately do lmao)

Draw real life subjects and not just from photos- it's more challenging but helps you develop your observation & sketching skills. This includes still life and landscapes/architecture as well as living things btw

Use references as much as you can. I suck at this but it'll genuinely make you improve faster if you do lmao. You can find loads of references on Google or DeviantArt but I also have some specific places I get them from: JookpubStock / Fat Photo Ref (requires registering but I can verify they're legit) / AdorkaStock / Teamwarchicken (actually my blog that I use for collecting images)

When you're learning to shade remember that you're shading a 3 dimensional object, and try to avoid just doing shading around the very edges of things. Same goes for highlights.

Try drawing in different styles and subjects you don't usually draw. If you can afford it try out different physical art materials too. It helps keep the art block at bay if nothing else lmao

Don't be a perfectionist. Learn to just say "good enough" and not obsess over mistakes. It's better to draw lots of slightly wonky things than one thing that you freaked out about getting perfect.

If anyone else has any other advice/resources then please add them! I do not know as much about art as people think I do hjfgjkhdf

[pixuou]

random 4am rant about the existential questions of posting sims stories on tumblr

now that i'm forced to stop with the storytelling posts for a minute, i thought i would share this thought that has been straining my brain for AGES: some time ago i read somewhere that the most common (and according to some, the most annoying) mistake writers make is being inconsistent with the use of past/present tense in their writing, and i'm going to take a wild guess and say this is probably even more of a thing for people who post their writing periodically - like us simblrs. and god damn it i only noticed this in my writing after a good while of having been posting my gameplay already, even though i knew about it before! and then once i realised i'd been doing it the whole time, i tried very hard to avoid it and stick to either past or present tense while writing about what my sims got up to, but failed over and over again. apparently some posts don't feel right in present tense, while other posts don't make sense in past tense. it also hugely depends on when i'm posting a certain bit of a story/gameplay - it's different to post screenshots fresh-out-of-the-game than to be a week behind and try to catch up on uploading and write about the events knowing fully well what happened in the game after. i am definitely more prone to do the latter, and so i've been thinking maybe i should try to stick to past tense. the funny thing is i barely notice when others make this "mistake", unless i'm binge reading a story of course. but normally my dashboard is full of gameplay stories mixed with each other and you simply just don't remember or care to start thinking about what tense that one blog usually posts their stories in and if they're consistent. i only get bothered by this when i catch myself writing like that. does anybody else obsess over this? or even care about it (either from a reader's or a writer's pov)? if you do happen to care about this or notice it in posts - which do you think suits sims stories on tumblr better? telling the story as if it happened in the past or is happening right now in the present? i guess it also depends on writing style and how far a player takes their stories from the literal things that happen in the game. omg now i could start philosophizing on this too - like is it okay if one day i post like i'm trying to write a novel, and the next day i don't have the energy and just go "stella earned a bronze gardening badge ! yay."? but i WON'T get deeper into this now i promise. if you have any opinions you'd like to share on this please do - i'm really curious! as for myself, i can't decide if i see myself more as an enthusiastic sims player sharing my game or as an enthusiastic but uncreative and lazy storyteller using the sims to have fun coming up with small bits of writing and dialogue when i feel like it. in fact even if you take away the posting and community aspect of it, i still feel this is a question in me that i can't answer - do i love the game for the game, or do i just use it as a platform that helps me bring out the creativity in me that i otherwise find overwhelming to do something about? what even is the game? ...but then i realise i really don't have to answer this. just do what makes you happy. i love playing and i love writing and maybe some of it is cringey, and maybe sometimes i don't have it in me to go all out with captions so i let the pictures speak more instead, and maybe i entertain myself the most of all with my posts, and maybe i mix past and present tense. but it makes me happy and that's all that matters.

...this started as a post about grammar