#I actually drew this first and when I struggled with the posing I did the full body sketch that I posted forever ago

[llitchilitchi]

the priest-emperor and his champion

[boxbug]

A Canary’s Final Flight

My piece for @trafficzine 4th edition! Get it for free here! 200 pages of excellent art and fics, incredible work from all participants and from the mods especially!! huge shoutout to the mods for real

Process notes under the cut! (I struggled a lot so it's a bit of a novel)

So the entire process was a Ride. I knew when I picked this prompt that I was going to have a hard time, because Jimmy’s final death had been illustrated a billion times over by extremely talented artists. But I had a Vision of the snapshot of the second before the impact, when everything is still but you know what’s about happen. It was very much inspired by the clip of Fog by Jabberwocky, bu the thing is, they have the advantage of all the build up of the fall, and that’s when the trouble started.

This was my first version, and obviously it wasn't working. And I was trying so hard, with so many iterations! Small wings, big wings, no wings, different poses, less backgrounds elements. I'd done compositions were everything seemed peaceful but something is Wrong, but it wasn't working this time.

So instead I focused on what rendering I'd like to do - I tried a painterly approach, for that visceral feeling, but it wasn't working either (but hey, I did keep the red sky, so, progress)

At this point I'd been doing back and forths for weeks and I was just as lost as at the start. Now that's my tip for people who make art of any kind, in situations like that, stop thinking about how you can make the best piece possible, and think about you can have fun with it (because when you aren't it's visible). And for that was, 1 - going back to using ink and pen nibs and doing way too detailed inking, and 2- looking at Dave McKean's covers for Sandman (which, funnily enough, was also a reference for my previous trafficzine piece)

And from there I was actually going somewhere! Between the jagged rocks, the red sky, and the increased verticality with the borders, I had hit the vibes I wanted.

I did some experimentation with the border, and even though I really liked the bad boys I drew they were taking too much away from the lonely desolation, so I actually used Red (Unecessary Redstone)'s idea of all of Jimmy's worldy's possessions scattered on the ground post impact, with the idea to make it looks like the central image is his grave being dug.

(and yes for a short amount of time the were supposed to be clock markings on the sun, but there was already enough going with the wings so I scrapped that) (also fun fact the reason why the wings aren't fully material but more ghostly is because my toddler cousin was watching me draw the very first draft and asked why he didn't just use his wings and i went :( so the wings are a metaphor now)

So from there I found a bunch of picture and took some myself, cut and assembled everything together, added shadows in all the appropriate places, and repainted some elements so that everything would look better intergrated (some of the wheats are basically 100% handpainted, the cardboard as well). This took a suprisingly long amount of time, but I was done!

Well I wasn't expecting to have that much to say, but I hope if you're still reading, it was at least interesting!

[raindrvq]

Psst. The Outsiders doodle ideas:

Ponyboy reading a book (could be used to practice posing, expressions, background, foreground, etc). Or its homework and he cannot figure it out for the life of him

Johnny and Ponyboy getting milkshakes

Johnny. Just.. him

If you want to on with color: blond Johnny and black (or is it just a dark brown????) haired Ponyboy

Ofc don’t feel forced! And if you want to swap and characters then go for it, just used those two since you said they’re the only ones with set designs so far

TYYYYY 🙏🔥💯‼️ love all the amazing ideas i did a few bc it is a teeny bit late rn (3 am)

first we got Pony reading Lord of the Flies in honor of my lotf hyperfixatation sophomore year 🫡🫡🫡 why is he upside down? bc why not 🤷‍♂️ i feel like Pony would be the type of person to get wayyyyy too invested in like, all the books he has to read in English class (projecting), I mean dude literally read Great Expectations n was like 'damn this guy just like me fr'. anyways Ponyboy lotf fan is real to ME

and then this is Pony STRUGGLING w his math homework bc i drew this while putting off my own math hw <3 I think that Pony would be pretty good at math bc obviously he's a smart guy but yknow he's more English smart than math smart so I feel like he breezed thru math when he was younger n then he started getting into more advanced classes n realized math is actually pretty difficult n he does NOT wanna be putting all that work into it but he's pushing thru it 🫡 trying so hard to be math smart its ok Pony embrace the English nerd in u

and finally Johnny drawing that im ngl im not liking but idk why.... it is 3 in the morning so ill probs wake up n realize a million things that r wrong it but for now its good enough to post 🙏 i do like the hair tho it looks nice

[mellohd]

Postal Model

hi sorry ive been neglecting my tumblr because im working on a stupid postal 2 dude model(so sorry if ive been late to replying to stuff and posting art :3), heres some screenshots(the textures are temporary i literally just drew the alien right on I SWEAR ITS TEMPORARY)

More information on the model below + some extra earlier screenshots at the end

this model is more advanced than daniels's(my first model) because it:

has a face instead of a 2d texture with a semi functioning mouth(working on the mouth and eyes cuz its new to me and idk what the hell im doing)

better anatomy(though the choice for a simpler look was for aesthetic reasons for daniels model)

Ears!(except my first models hair would have hidden the ears so take that as you will)

actual clothes apposed to just being melded on to his body(except for the pants cause i didn't care for adding physics to the pants) So the trenchcoat and shirt are seperate piecies, yay!

Heres whats coming next:

Im hoping to add actual eyeballs that will hopefully work, which will be hard because i have never modeled and rigged eyes before(or really rigged anything w/o mixamo)

posable eyebrows

physics on the clothes

uv unwrap (shudders cause i have no idea how the actual fuck to do that without the blender automatic unwrap)

trying out shaders cause that looks fun(hoping for some bright cell shaded cartoonish look)

then rigging and posing everything

Let it be known that this is only my second actual model and like day 2 of progress so if it looks ass IM TRYING MY BEST i know i cant do something super realistic yet, and truthfully i dont WANT to, so im trying to go for a more cute look.

Heres some extra screenshots I have from earlier in his development:

These are his og refs, I knew from the beginning i wasn't gonna really follow the head design because i wanted to have a similar look to my first model, but i added the head like that anyways just so i could experimen with it(which i did and i didn't like it)

this was when i was really struggling with the hair so i had to make another ref

for the eyes im hoping for it to look similar to Daniels, but yk 3D

[exocynraku]

would you mind sharing how you go about drawing the anatomy (body/legs/tail in relation to head) of a cat? its like the main thing i struggle with that i cant seem to find all too many tutorials for. apologies if youve answered something similar you just draw really good cat bodies & poses

i have NO idea how to put my thought process into words but i do have this image which has helped me very much (its a pic of a cat i saw here on tumblr that i just drew lines over) and also one simple rule that ive been trying to follow lately: the cats head (w/o ears) should be able to fit into the cats chest area and if it does not your head is too big

heres an example i drew quickly !! i also want to say that this is if you want your cats to be relatively anatomically correct (or at least how my brain says it should be) if your style says otherwise that is OK!!!!!!!!!!! do whatever you want idc . i also do break this rule and make heads too big occasionally (usually on kits cuz its funny looking) head size compared to tail doesnt really matter (to me) tails are very silly fun to draw and i like to have fun with it and leg size i usually base off of whether or not i think this cat would be able to stand up (ex: i wouldnt give a cat like the one at the bottom on the pic above skinny thin tall legs their legs would be chubbier and thicker) i also often draw necks too thin because well thats just how i draw them which doesnt matter too much the only rule with that i put in place for myself is the body has to be at least a LITTLE thicker than the neck er i dont think i have anything else to say the only other thing i think i could give you is breaking down the different body parts (like i did on the first image) for some of my designs which could maybe help ? if you want that then just send an ask! actually with that breaking down different body parts if you want to learn good anatomy id reccomened just finding images of cats online (preferably ones with different body types & simple poses) and then segmenting off their body parts like i did in the first pic it helped me alot when i used to reference images (now most of my poses just come from my head) because then i had a structure to draw off of (think of how some people draw human bodies with boxes and circles and triangles) ok im done for realsies now sorry i couldnt helpp too much im bad at explaining my though processes lawl

[voiceofthebroken]

impulsively made designs for the voices! they're kind of more like concepts so they're likely to change if I get better ideas for them. I didn't want to make them too complex and give them pinterest outfits lol (I might do that another time though). notes for each voice under the cut!

Hero: I was kind of inspired when a friend said they'd picture that Hero would have similar armor to Artorias from Dark Souls, partially the reason I started drawing the voices

Contrarian: the first thought was to make him a jester, but I thought that's what people would usually imagine him as. so I gave him something more modern to stand apart from the rest of the voices where they're all medieval-ish. also the only voice with a completely round head and the only one without a lower eyelid. he looks silly too so bonus points for that. Contrarian can open his other eye, the diamond on his face is like a tattoo of sorts lol. The X on his chest is a reference to the Razor when he skewers himself (or ourself but same difference)

Stubborn: the first one I actually tried to design. I had the idea of giving a sharper, more prominent chin to the voices who seem more likely to resort to violence. the only idea I had for him was his arms so I had to google and this is the best I could come up with

Hunted: my first roadblock. I was clueless and even considered leaving him as just the base form, but a friend suggested giving him a bandana on his neck, so I did that. a little later I decided to make him fluffy instead of giving him clothes and it took a bit to figure out how to do that

Cold: I found an outfit while I was looking for ideas for Stubborn and I thought it was perfect for Cold. my original idea was just a scarf, but I really liked what I found. don't mind the bad posing by the way lmao, I had an idea for a separate art piece but executed that very poorly so now it's part of the design drawings

Smitten: I got some inspiration from Reverse 1999 for this one actually, but the idea was a little too similar to Hero so I mixed that in with something a bard might wear and gave him a funny feathery hat

Paranoid: I drew him before this post and nothing changed from there. the eye on his hood is one sided and there's nothing else underneath. I don't know how to fit all the details in a pose that would make sense so I'll make another post later lol

Broken: in the Tower route pledging yourself kind of was like becoming a priest for her or something so I gave him the first thing I saw on pinterest when I was looking for priest like clothes. there's a shard of glass connecting the cloak together. he also has stab wounds on his torso from the Tower route

Skeptic: so the last three I struggled to think of designs for so much. he has a scar on his neck from just before the Drowned Grey route where giving him the knife would get him to slit the player's throat. the outfit was inspired by something I found on pinterest and thought the chain going across could somewhat be like the chain going around the player's neck

Cheated: this took the longest to figure out and I gave up on thinking of something. I just gave him whatever outfit I could find on pinterest I thought that would fit him lmao. the only thing I managed to think of was putting bandages around his wrist. he has a scar under the bandages from the Razor

Opportunist: I don't know what I was thinking when I designed him or his clothes. I think he just kind of gave me merchant vibes so I tried going for that and gave him a silly hat. he's definitely not hiding a blade behind his back. the coin was just an extra thing I thought of adding. I ran out of paper space on the page and didn't want to put Opportunist on a different page all by himself so he's the only one without a full body drawing, but it wouldn't make much of a difference if it was a full body

[genericpuff]

This isn't meant to be a hateful ask, but you should probably stop saying you've 'fixed' Rachel's art whenever you redraw comic frames. At first, I could see why your posts were titled that, considering they were just edits made onto a frame, trying to keep in mind the style of the comic alongside it (and let me say, you absolutely nail colors when it comes to your gLOw series, I use your notes for my own art all the time). But it seems like for your more recent posts, you're redrawing panels in your own style and saying that you've 'fixed' the frames. I'm not saying that you can't do that, redraws are a core part of the LO community. But it feels as if you're putting Rachel's art style down in favor of your own. For example, your recent post. Smaller necks and 'googly eyes' (big eyes with small pupils) are usually apart of LOs more cartooney style, they aren't something as bad as LOs men's shoulder to head width, or awkward hand and feet positions, etc. The point I'm trying to make is that you should probably start titling frames you redraw in your own style as that, a redraw, not 'fixing' someone else's art style

EDIT: oh god I totally went off with this, BIG apologies for the essay dump in response to a very simple ask, it's just a topic I'm very passionate about and am willing to talk about at really extreme lengths. I appreciate your takes on this even if I do disagree with them, I just don't make shit easy and I apologize for that 😖 😂

Oookay, so I'm gonna try and answer this as best I can, with as little curtness as possible, because I know you're asking it genuinely, but please understand that this is a topic that comes up a LOT in artist/LO spaces and I'm sorta exhausted with having to talk about it. Often times because it's approaching the argument with a very misconstrued idea of what 'style' is.

Ironically enough, before I get into this, I actually do have a post queued up for tomorrow already that's called a 'redraw' because unlike the panels I'm assuming you're calling out, I actually painted the upcoming ones for tomorrow entirely from scratch. I'm still trying to replicate the LO style, of course, but it's not trying to remain quite as faithful as my edits tend to be because it's meant to be a redraw in the true sense of the word like you're referencing. My edits are often just a normal layer on top of the original that I paint over, which is what the last few posts have been. My redraws are drawn from the ground up, backgrounds, faces, poses, etc. often times with the goal of re-compositing the scene entirely. The ones from the last couple days were not drawn from the ground up, simply altered over the originals - but the unfortunate reality is that some of them simply can't be accurately edited entirely due to the original composition being such a visual mess. That includes this one which was a struggle to edit faithfully without my own anatomical stylizations bleeding into it due to how janky the original was (IMO). Like, the original panel didn't even "look like LO", it's godawful, and it's a stretch to say I'm dissing Rachel's "style" when I'm fairly certain Rachel didn't even draw any part of that original panel, it's INCREDIBLY obvious two different people from her team drew it and there's no way of knowing whether or not Rachel was one of them. I did not touch Hades because he's not the problem with the panel. Hades as you see him in that panel is exactly how he was in the original, I merely tried my best to edit Persephone to look more consistent with Hades and less creepy.

Disclaimers over, let's get on with this.

So here's the thing - if it were a simple matter of "style", I'd agree wholeheartedly with you. I'm not about pitting artists against one another, we're all different people with different takes and inspirations making our own thing.

However, there's a difference between style and execution.

With full disclosure, I do not accept the argument that because LO has a more "cartoony style", then it's "fine" for it to very blatantly lower its quality in technical execution or turn into a cheap copy of what it once was. LO was never 'cartoony', it was more akin to storybook art, like something you'd find in old Disney concept art pieces or in children's illustration books. 'Cartoony' as in 'not realistic', sure, but definitely not cartoony in the way most people envision it or market it (like what you'd see in legitimate cartoon shows). The use of color was vibrant and had thought put into it, compositions were dynamic, lineart was only used where needed to create depth, and overall, there was a vibe to it that many of you can still recognize, it's what a lot of my blog talks about.

When I do these panel "fixes", my goal isn't to go "hey, my style is superior to Rachel's! Fuck Rachel!" Far from it. My goal is to analyze what made the original LO art so special and unique, and help preserve those elements in newer panels through key elements such as color choice, glow layers, composition, texturing, etc. many of which are elements that are outright missing from S2 of LO onwards.

Because, full bluntness, LO has zero effort being put into it anymore.

LO never had perfect anatomy and it's always struggled with creating a cohesive visual narrative, but it hid its issues well with a good balance of color choice, mood/tone, and lineart-less rendering. It wasn't meant to be some hyper-realistic comic, what set it apart were the colorful panels and vignettes and use of 'cutout' style backgrounds and foreground elements.

Stuff like this:

I have spent literally hours dissecting LO's art style, researching and hunting down its brushes, crawling the best and most recognizable color palettes, drawing and redrawing old panels in attempts to replicate Rachel's style and techniques as best I can. I'm not doing all that just to try and be like "I can do it better", more so to preserve what once was and could have been. Because I genuinely miss how old LO looked and so do many others. It's my own way of participating in a fandom that's being torn apart each week by the new episodes that only seem to further degrade the comic's original presentation and why people liked it.

Trust me, if I wanted to just draw LO in 'my style' as some sort of self-gratifying flex (because everyone in the art world nowadays thinks the only point in creating art is to have a "style" that they can pit against other "styles" as if styles are collectables like fucking Pokemon lmao), you wouldn't even recognize it.

THIS is my "style", y'all. The only elements that I've purely taken from LO is the background and how I did the lighting effects along the side but everything else is my standard 'style' when I draw anything that's NOT LO, especially with my own comics and my day job.

"Style" is not a tangible thing, at least not in the way people nowadays tend to define it. Style is an accumulation of everything that's influenced an artist over years of practice, learning, refinement, and mastery. It is not something any one person can 'own' nor is it something that can or should be 'fixed' in and of itself. Just like how Rachel has adopted elements of her style from inspirations such as Glen Keane and Mary Blair, I've gotten my stylistic inspirations from anime, manga, video games, and other webcomics. Our styles and why we create art and who we create art for are completely different.

I have zero issue with Rachel's 'style'. At its core it's actually freaking gorgeous, when she puts in the effort. Not even just LO, take a look at her even OLDER art that's still available to sift through on her DA:

The issues I'm bringing up have to do with the execution of said style, how it's blatantly obvious Rachel doesn't put any effort into the art anymore and often has her assistants picking up the slack in a very disorganized manner that leads to disjointed, bland, weird ass art that often can't even maintain consistency between SINGLE PANELS, like this:

The magic is gone. These are not reflections of Rachel's capabilities in the slightest. She is far capable of so much more, this is beyond being a 'stylistic choice' and falls more under the implication of laziness or lack of care.

What's wild is that she's outright stated that she's "streamlined" the LO creation process to make it easier for new assistants to acclimate - which would be fine, if it weren't for the fact that 'streamlining' shouldn't mean 'downgrade'. There are plenty of ways to streamline the LO art style that can still retain the original charm of LO that drew people to it in the first place without cheapening it. It's not like LO is the only webtoon under strict deadlines, Rachel has more assistants than most working for WT and yet everyone else on the platform seems to only improve in their comic's production workflow and its presentation whereas LO has only declined.

(The Kiss Bet, 2019-Present)

(Tower of God, 2014-Present)

Not every comic needs to make improvements this drastically, and technically LO didn't even have to make improvements in its original execution - but it's so far gone in the other direction that it begs the question, "Why do other creators and comics with less prestige and as many or less assistants compared to LO seem to make such bigger strides in the technical execution of their work?" Regardless of whether the style is erring more towards anime or cartoon or realism, 'style' doesn't make up for poor technical execution and lack of consistency. That's the same energy we get all the time from newcomers to the craft who reject any form of criticism towards their technique and understanding of the fundamentals with "THAT'S JUST MY STYYYYLE". Even many animators who predominantly work on cartoon productions still understand their fundamentals and utilize them in the creation of stylized pieces of work. This isn't even me questioning how much of the fundamentals Rachel knows because, again, she clearly has understanding of it in her older work, she just seems to have stopped caring or isn't doing a proper job directing her team.

I criticize the stick necks and googly eyes the same way I do the inconsistent body types, refrigerator shoulders and same-face syndrome because they're all things that are detracting from and lowering the quality of LO's art as a whole. They didn't always shade whites in the old episodes of LO, but they did often tint them to make them less jarring against the more vibrant colors. They didn't always color in the irises back in 2018/2019, but at least when they were just solid black pupils, they were actually drawn EQUALLY, vs. the solid pupils nowadays which feel like they're each on their own schedule and are never the same size or facing the same direction. They didn't always draw perfect necks and faces, but nowadays it feels like the heads are being stuck on sticks and attached to separate bodies that aren't even consistent with the characters' body types. All of these things are issues, there's no 'hierarchy' of problems, they're each a part of a much bigger lackluster whole.

When it comes to my own panel fixes/redraws/whatever you wanna call them, if they don't look enough like Rachel's 'style', that's either because we're failing to recognize what makes Rachel's art unique due to it being so watered down over the years, or because I'm just not doing a good enough job replicating it. Undoubtedly a little bit of both. I'm still 'adjusting' to a workflow that accommodates the LO style and how it looks. It's not exactly easy to just jump from one style (my style) to another without my own usual biases bleeding in (trust me, I'm not happy that there are people who know my usual art style who can still 'see' it in my LO art, because that completely defeats the purpose of what I'm trying to do lmao)

All that aside, we can't pretend that S1 LO's signature style is still being executed to its fullest potential in S3.

If I can be really brash here, there are WAY more egregious panel 'editors' out there who straight up are drawing stuff legitimately just in their own style. And they're still all great in their own right and get to the point of what they're trying to say even if they don't fit what you would define as a "fix". Don't bug me about mine.

Rachel's style in and of itself is gorgeous and unique. It's the lack of effort in the execution as time goes on that is the topic here. I can never hope to fully achieve that 'vibe' that so many people miss about 'old' LO because that was all Rachel and I can never fully capture the spirit of her work because it's hers, it's the accumulation of everything that's inspired and influenced her in her artistic journey.

What I can do is point out and design alternatives to the many errors, inconsistencies, and technical issues that tries to get it closer to that original look and feel of S1 LO that better reflected Rachel's original efforts. It's what it could potentially look like if modern LO art wasn't so disjointed among its scattered assistants and rushed with as little visible effort possible. It's what could have been if it didn't feel like Rachel has essentially given up.

Does it really matter how I specifically word my posts between 'edit' and 'redraw' in this context when both things are attempting to accomplish the same goal?

[titleleaf]

@rocket-eighty-eight mentioned you on a post “The real saw trap is reading an incredibly wrong...”:

@titleleaf WHERE did you see this red dragon take?!?!!

​Why, here on Tumblr Dot Com, of course! I thought I had it screencapped but I managed to restrain myself from engaging with the original post -- the OP was all of 20 and God knows I made absolutely boneheaded Tumblr posts when I was 20, I make some pretty stupid ones now. Regardless, it had pretty hardcore "hasn't actually read Red Dragon" energy. As you might also expect it was a post gassing up the NBC Hannibal s3 finale, framing Will's participation in the killing of Dolarhyde as him embracing queerness and aligning himself with his true love, Hannibal, rather than his fake comphet love, Molly.

Paraphrased, their interpretation was: "the end of Red Dragon, the book, has Will triumphing over Dolarhyde and successfully saving his wife and child, reaffirming the integrity of heterosexual marriage and exorcising the queer threat that Lecter poses to Will's identity of himself as straight, while the show's s3 finale has the better and more affirming depiction: Will leaving behind his wife and child and going to be with Hannibal and embrace his nature as a killer, showing that he's accepted his true self and what he holds in common with Lecter." Which... all of that aside, that's not remotely what happens in the book Red Dragon!

The ending of the novel is so notoriously downbeat and ambivalent that I have read multiple pieces of academic writing commenting on it, and it's something both film adaptations have felt the need to change. It's a fucking downer. You can't even feel good about Molly killing Dolarhyde because you've seen enough of Dolarhyde as a sympathetic wounded beast to wish that outcome, however inevitable genre conventions make it, could be different. Will's relationship to his stepson is already fatally wounded before Dolarhyde shows up, and Will's marriage is fucking toast -- even as Will's lying in his hospital bed he knows this, that Molly will leave him because of what's happened, and by the time SOTL takes place it certainly seems to have come true. Will's physical and mental well-being have been burned through, and by the next time we hear about him he's a deeply traumatized alcoholic whose face looks like damn Picasso drew it, and, we can assume, very single. Heterosexual love is not enough in this book to save anybody! Not Dolarhyde and Reba, not Will and Molly, not the Leedses, not the Jacobis, not Dolarhyde's mother and her new husband, not even Freddy Lounds and Wendy. Will comes to a fuller understanding of the "vicious urges" within him that humanity more broadly struggles with, not just outliers like Dolarhyde and Lecter, but it's not a comfortable exorcism of the destabilizing threat of violence, the emotional tone remains uneasy and weird. It's a bummer. Nobody is living happily ever after and it's Lecter who gets the last word. (And he's such a bitch about it, too, I'm obsessed.)

My own feelings on how the show does the RD plotline with Dolarhyde in s3 aside (short version: badly) I think people have a tendency to back-project the show's framing of Will and Hannibal's relationship onto the first novel when it doesn't apply. Their relationship in the book is interesting and imo very fun but it's very different because the rest of the canon from which the show will draw to pad it out just does not exist yet -- the show sort of Frankensteins together parts of Clarice's plotlines to make up the difference and while I enjoy the results in isolation Will and Hannibal's relationship dynamic in the show isn't remotely a straightforward translation from book to screen or some kind of more correct, uncensored version of what the book was too timid to show. (Clarice's whole perverse union with Lecter in Hannibal the book follows its own different trajectory, and I can see how people read it as liberating and/or affirming, but uhhhh I'll get back to them on that later.) I don't think the show does the fusion of those two relationships particularly elegantly (or the distribution of other aspects of the Hannibal-Clarice relationship onto other characters' relationships to Hannibal, though it did bring me one of my favorite parts of s3 with Bedelia) but I think it's really muddied people's ability to talk about the actual books (and films) on the merits of what they actually contain versus what they assume they must contain or would like them to contain. It's a hot mess express.

[teememdee]

2023 ART SUMMARY!!!

2023 was uhhhhhhh a year! And I made art! And I’m going to talk for a long time about everything I did month by month! Yippee!!!

original individual posts can be found in my #tanner art tag!

JANUARY

Started off the year with my favorite skrunklies sleepy and snuggling. Then sleeping together while holding one another is so incredibly important to me, they’re so cute and I needed to draw it. Struggled with Kai’Sa’s face but I particularly like the drapery of the pillow behind them.

FEBRUARY

First off, just a simple Kai’Sa piece for the Vibes(TM) and background practice. I was also fairly miserable and when I get miserable I draw Kai’Sa being miserable as well. I love my favorite character of all time <3

Then a quick Valentine’s Day piece, soft gradient map stuff. Love my skrunklies, hopefully this year I can make something for the day that isn’t rushed

MARCH

In March I FINALLY finished my Star Guardian Kahri fic, be the light to carry me, and drew Kiko and Ina being adorable together to go along with it. They’re SO cute and people LOVE that fic. Chapter 3 ended up being a whole 20k words and every time I re-read I’m amazed that I wrote it.

A kiss for Kai’Sa’s birthday! This was actually two sketches mashed together because I had a good Kai’Sa and a good Ahri on separate attempts. Love Kai’Sa’s smile on this one.

NOW. Strong contender for my favorite piece of the year. Captioned “please don’t lose yourself,” my K/DA-verse Kassadin’s very dead wife’s ghost weighs on him, begging him to not get lost in his grief and lose sight of their daughter. Kassadin feels lost and broken without her. I love the emotions in this one, and I think the idea comes across even without knowledge of my headcanons. Love it so much.

APRIL

Full-body piece that took me all month. I just love this one so much. It’s just pure Kahri, pure love, pure joy. Pose inspired by Blake Belladonna from RWBY’s leg pop during the long-awaited Bumblby kiss. This piece just makes me so happy.

MAY

Oops! No art! Was too busy being on a (student) film set every weekend as well as dealing with classes and multiple other stressors. I did START a piece though, but wouldn’t finish it until the middle of June.

JUNE

I actually did the first sketch of the Evelynn piece in February, but I decided to revamp it in May, and then when school finally set me free I finished it, and it turned out exactly how I wanted it to. Her hair was a labor to render but I'm so so pleased with how it looks, as well as the blood. The first time I've finished a fully rendered Evelynn piece!

Naafiri is so fucking cool. Upon her reveal, I was seeing so much incredible fanart and I just needed to get in on it. The shapes and points are just so good. I used to draw dogs all the time as a kid, and my younger self would absolutely flip out at seeing this. I did this piece in one day, and I have no idea how I pulled that background off but hopefully I can do it again some day lol

JULY

Two drastically different vibes here. Realized it had been forever since I had drawn Kahri so I just wanted to make a cute summertime piece. Their hands should be bigger and it bugs me but this is still really cute, I missed my girls dearly.

And then my very very sad man Kassadin being very very sad about his very very dead wife. This is what I call his phase 2 design, when he's at the peak of his grief (spiraling, as emphasized by the background) and feels just so sad and alone. In my head this and the March piece are part of a series that I hope to continue.

AUGUST

Just one piece that took me all month because I was quite busy in August, and Runeterra Kahri pieces take forever, but as I always say, it's always worth it. This pose comes from mellon_soup on instagram, who makes a lot of really great pose references for artists to use, highly recommend checking them out. This piece is just so soft to me. Captioned "'you're beautiful, you know that?'" they're saying it to each other, two people that struggle with their self image finding love and confidence in the other. Also I'm so very happy with the background. I love these two so so so so much, they're my world.

SEPTEMBER

One of my goals for this year was to branch out in the fanart I made. Baldur's Gate 3 came along and I love watching my best friend play it, we love Shadowheart and I just wanted to draw her. This came after a lot of sketches of both her and our favorite Tav that ended up changing how I draw eyes. The rendering of her face here is also something I'm proud of, her nose looks great. And again, the background! This piece didn't get a lot of attention at all but that's okay, I made it for me and I'm very happy with it.

OCTOBER

STAR WARS TOXIC YURI WENT CRAZY THIS YEAR!!! Wolfwren (Sabine Wren x Shin Hati, from the Ahsoka TV series) had me by the THROAT for a solid two months or so, I haven't been that feral and deranged over a ship in a hot minute. They had me frothing at the mouth every episode even though I did not like the show overall. Anyways. First piece is a redraw of the part in episode 4 where they just have the most charged eye contact of all time, and I decided to take that in stride with inspiration from Horimiya, a favorite anime of mine, during particularly emotionally charged moments, the background changes and there's a particular color silhouette behind them. It really fits that moment of the show and I am SO proud of these faces, especially Sabine's. Drawing from a real human face reference was kinda new to me but it's taught me a lot. The file size also ended up enormous somehow idk lol

Then, my most popular piece of the year, on both tumblr and twitter. I LOVE hand imagery, I love subtle hand touches, I churned this out in I think exactly one day, it's so soft it's so cute and I totally understand the overwhelming positivity it received.

NOVEMBER

I was not doing well at this time in the year. The state of the world just had me in a horrible mental state, I wasn't taking care of myself well at all, I couldn't get myself to make art, especially something happy or cute, it just felt wrong. But then sometimes you feel something so strong and specific there's no other way to process it than to make art. To make a long story short, earlier in the year I thought a girl liked me, I liked her back, but it turned out she did indeed have a boyfriend the whole time. We didn't see or talk to each other for a few months but in November we (and the bf, lol) met up again. When she saw me at the door she smiled at me so sweetly and it was just the worst feeling ever and I just had to hide it behind a smile and a wave. Oversharing aside, this is a style I'd wanted to execute for a while and I'm really pleased with how it turned out, would love to make more like this.

DECEMBER

All of this was done / finished in the first two weeks of the month because then I got sick + was visiting family + jet lag took me out. Kinda sad I didn't get something done for Ahri's birthday or a traditional Kahri Winter piece but that's what January is for. Anyway.

Sometimes you just want to draw girls kissing and sometimes you wanna make it a little suggestive. Not much to say. Proud of the drapery on Kai'Sa's sleeve and you can always tell I love drawing hands.

Now it's time for classwork. Here I just have two pages but I've posted the whole comic on its own, this was for my "Art and Text" class, I have it printed in a booklet and my classmates + friends have responded to it so sweetly I'm really proud, I really really want to make more comics. This project was a culmination of so many inspirations from other artists and I'm really happy with the execution even if it was really rough for me to manage my time well for that class.

Then for my "Fiction and Allegory" class, two of my friends and I made a storyboard film (which I don't want to share publicly, but if I know you you can ask for a link) and during the all-nighter two of us pulled to get it done on time, I decided one scene needed music instead of diegetic sound, so I churned this out on garageband in about an hour. Would definitely love to try my hand at making more music in the future. Wish my classmates / teacher liked / understood the film more but oh well. I learned a lot and for the thousandth time, I'm proud of what I did.

IN CONCLUSION:

I ended up with less full pieces than 2022 but what I did create in 2023 are big, detailed, emotional pieces, and I'm more than satisfied. I think my skills in rendering, backgrounds, and colors really improved and I'm looking forward to how I continue to improve in 2024. This upcoming year has a lot of scary stuff ahead (namely graduating college) but I will come out the other side regardless, hopefully with just as much art I'm proud of.

If you read all of this, thank you!! If you've liked, shared, or commented on any of my art, thank you!!!!!! It means the world, always.

[lyr-caelum]

Hello Lyr!!! (Can I call you that? Is that what people call you? Do you like that??)

I adore your art.

And I love how you kind of take us on your art journey and show us the process sometimes! I’m obsessed with watching speed runs of how artists create their beautiful art! (It’s inspiring and makes me feel like I could actually get there too haha, makes it graspable?)

Anyway, my question to you is, do you have any tips on how to do anatomy? I’m struggling hahah

I watched a few youtube videos but I quickly get overwhelmed, they always expect you to just know so much, y’know? It’s always like “and this is how you draw a leg, and here the calf does this curve in this position and here look I drew it in another position” and I’m just like “but how am I supposed to know! How am I supposed to know that a leg looks that way!!!” (My apologies, this is a mess, my words have failed me today hahah)

And even if you don’t have any concrete advice I’d still be interested in your art journey! How did you learn? :D

HI!

Yes ofc u can call me Lyr, yes people call me that online and yes I do like it, (it's like the celestial version of my real name)

I'm so glad u enjoy it when I share my process... My sketches are very messy and sometimes I'm like... no one it's going to understand this but oh well.. it is what it is....

About your question, yes! I do have a lot of anatomy tips, and like you I saw every video, I did life studies, I drew scultures... I did everything my teachers and all the youtube videos tell u to do... but at first it didn't work, and I get that is frustating.... sometimes I'm also like... wait... how do knees work? And it's normal.. the more common things, the things u see every day are the hardest to draw, cause u can spot that something is off even when u don't know what it is... and that can be very anoying...

I believe I have a long way to go when it comes to drawing, and that is what I like about it, that everything is improvement and there is no finish line, you will only get better and better.

With time I think every artist comes with their own methods of anatomy solving, for me is understanding volume more than shape, cause every body is diferent and if I understand the mass instead of the shape of an arm for example, I can draw every arm, right?

Also I draw in front of a mirror, I have a mirror placed on the wall behind my tablet, so everytime I don't know an expresion or how something looks like, I just pose and I use myself as a reference (I prefer this than going endleslly though pinterest looking for a reference picture) I sometimes also take pictures of myself (this is embarrassing tbh)

I am also a big fan of art books, specially from artist that I like, more than anatomic ones, but I can recomend you "secret charracter drawing" and "point charracter drawing" by Tako. It's great if you are starting and it might help!

I know this migh sound unhelpfull but I learned how to draw... drawing and looking, looking a lot, I love looking at people, their body language, how peoples personalitys or feelings get mirrored on their bodys... (for this I recomend dark sunglasses, don't be creepy and if you stare to hard, don't get caught) FOR ACADEMIC REASONS ONLY!

I usually have on my phone a note pad where I write things that I saw and I would like to use as inspo, or as a reference. I'll never take a pic of somebody in a creepy way, I rather type down what I'am understanding and then try to draw that feeling.

Sorry for the long reply, I love talking about this stuff!

Thank you so much for your ask and for liking my art <3

[aromanticannibal]

amateur art advice from an amateur artist.

disclaimer. this isn't for people who want to make art their jobs (some of the advice may be useful to you, but some will very much not be). keep that in mind.

1. it's okay if you're not good. seriously. what matters is that you're creating and having fun (and if you're not having fun, perhaps there's something wrong).

good is subjective. when I was 13 and I drew big pretty anime eyes for the first time, I was super happy! and for me, it looked good. and it still looks good for someone out there, just like how people tell you how good your art looks when you think it's mediocre. it's not. your art is good, because you made it. Its true quality does not matter until you need it to for work. You're still learning, be good to yourself.

2. you've heard the PRACTICE advice from everyone ever, so I'll go with something different : try new stuff.

for all the summer holidays of 2021, I didnt draw at all, only doodled silly cats because yknow. mental illness. when I drew again, I tried drawing a full body pose, which I never succeeded in doing before. and I did it! obviously it wasn't perfect, but it was the best ive ever done. and now im pretty okay with drawing poses!

so try new stuff. try to draw busts from another angle, try to draw profiles. draw noses, draw combat poses, draw folds and old people and fat people and black people because i know most of the starting artists start with one type of character and stick to it (for me, it was front facing busts of skinny white girls with straight hair and no nose).

this also counts for objects, and animals, try to draw them (and try to draw people if you've only ever drawn animals or objects)

and again, it does not matter if it doesn't look good at first. don't get discouraged. your favorite artists have something they struggle with, the most famous and respected artists have struggled with some things and probably still disliked some parts of their work at their peak.

3. look at people. try to draw who you see. if you don't get out much or are scared to draw people when they're with you, then draw from photographs you have, or references (im begging new artists to look at references of actual human people. I'm on my knees. references are important, study what you see).

study your own face! when you take selfies or when you put on makeup or even just when you see your reflection - if you can, look at your face, the shape of your eyes, your nose, your lips, your face. I rediscovered this year that I actually have freckles and realized I have more of them on one side than the other. I realized my face is actually pretty androgynous and I have a soft square jaw. look at people. look at yourself, look at everything around you.

4. learn and try the tips other artists give you. once someone said that to draw both eyes the same way, you had to draw them at the same time, step by step, instead of doing one then the other. and it works! for me at least. don't be afraid to try stuff. you don't even have to keep doing it if you don't like how it looks or doesn't fit with your style, that's fine! just try to do things for a while, and if in the end it doesn't work out, you at least know this is a thing that exists and you know it doesn't work for you. knowledge is useful.

5. STOP. BEING. SO. HARD. ON. YOURSELF.

no one cares there's 10 years old kids who can draw better than you. no one cares you're starting at 30 years old, or 40, 50, any age that isn't teenagehood. and if there's people who care, they should not. you should draw because you want to. if drawing isn't making you happy, then stop, or try something else. if you are able, take art classes! do whatever makes you happy and stop thinking what you're doing is cringe, or bad, or ugly. it does not matter. what matters is if you're having fun or not. how "cringe" or "basic" it is does not matter.

I hope you keep loving art and I hope you keep doing art because there are people who want to see it. even if you think it's mediocre, even if it really is, even if you're a beginner. I hope you never stop doing art because you think it's never going to amount to anything.

good luck doing art, and have fun!

[ruth-the-artblog]

Hey @ari-shipping-stuff i thought i would answer everything in a seperate post so i can compile things easier fkjdkdidhdidjd

1- Yeah the saturation is edited :> I was going for a sunset vibe. Which is Extra Eerie in school because we always go before sunset. The original is regular window light + shadows. I'll put the og one at the readmore at the bottom. Also tbh i been using mostly pens for drawing to prevent me from constantly fixing mistakes in comics. Kkdhdkdjkdjdkjd

Oml those fucking windows. I hated them so much. As a public school student, they were in all my schools.

These, but much less clean (im talking CAKED in dust) and half the windows were broken/the glass panel is half hanging out of the frame. It was such a hazard to clean tbh because it was so easy to push out a loose panel. AND WE SAT NEXT TO THOSE BITCHES 🤡🤡🤡🤡

2- Thanks :> i also liked how it turned out with the blue pen and orange lights. I think the reason my drawings are rly expressive is because i like to draw those the most kdhdkdhdkd

3- kdhddkdjdkdjdjdkdjd with how much eyes it has, you def could hit one of them square in the eye

4- It's a karaoke room im leaving a photo under the readmore for reference. I kinda just based it off how i remembered it. Now that i think about it im not sure if there was a disco ball, but in my heart there sure is. The things on the table are microphones, but no one is singing right now. The song playing is "Eyes Without a Face" by Billy Idol, the one i linked in the post.

5- Nah i didn't use the knife, quite the opposite actually. I didn't like how one of the draings turned out, so i ripped the bottom half of the paper and drew at the bottom. Then i used my phone editor to blur the two pages together.

What ending scenes dym btw?

This place was inspired by the song "I Know The End" by Pheobe Bridgers. The place is sunset with thousands of billboards. Eyeballs and Lee sit on the titular billboard from the song as they chat.

When did Lee meet Wingtips or Eyeballs?

For Wingtips, its the usual one. Wingtips is a manifestation of Lee's imagination as a coping mechanism. Vae also act as a therapist and later a parental figure to Lee until the end.

For Eyeballs, after Lee dies, Eyeballs poses as Wingtips to torment him in Hell for eternity. However, something happens and leaves Eyeballs just as trapped in the dream-hellscape as Lee is. They kinda struggle to understand each other, as they are the only real people in the dream-hellscape

First comic

^ i think i sent the full vid in the discord before. Lmk if you want me to find it for you

Right that's it. Thanks for reading everything.

[canyouhearthelight]

The Miys, Ch. 209

Thank you everyone who is still here after the last chapter... Your patience with the world’s weirdest plot point is appreciated. Also, everyone who came for the story and has stayed for the doodles.

Also appreciated: @baelpenrose for beta work on this chapter, as always.

Happy Halloween, Samhain, and Day of the Dead (I don’t know the correct salutation to that lost one, so apologies and let me know if you know what it should be) to everyone who celebrates them, since the next chapter won’t come until afterwards.

The first thing I thought as I walked into my office was Why does it smell like jalapeno and cinnamon?

That particular train of thinking ended as abruptly as my stride when I noticed the walls.  Immediate impressions were simply “orange”, and only slightly improved when I realized why - everywhere I looked, my office, my sacred working space, was covered floor-to-ceiling in pumpkins.

“Floor.” I blurted out in emphasis. “Why floor?”

Hannah just waved the question away. “Why not floor? Why not ceiling? Why not both?”

With no small degree of dawning horror, I slowly rolled my eyes upward at the ceiling.  “Puh,” I squeaked as I took in the sight of my ceiling coated in a thick layer of moving yellow fuzz, only scant patches of orange showing through. The bags in my hands hit the floor with a dull thud, and all I could do was gape.

Something warm was pressed into my hand as I tried to comprehend what I was looking at. I started piecing together that the pumpkin art was being removed by Else, who seemed to be enjoying their treat with singular abandon. “Parvati?” I asked.

“She found the paint pens, yes.” Hannah’s voice was suddenly deeper, far more droll, and severely British.  Her hands were also noticeably larger as she steered me to a chair to sit in front of her.  I only realized it was actually Alistair when he plunked a lid and a straw on my coffee. “I don’t trust you to drink freely in your current state.”

Definitely Alistair.

I took a couple of careful sips, focusing on the artificial alertness sizzling in my half-shocked brain. “Extra espresso?”

“And extra sugar, yes.”

“Thanks.” Gradually, I took everything in while slurping contentedly.  Pumpkins really were painted everywhere. It was like a fever dream, a sensation only enhanced as I watched Else trundle along the ceiling in blissful ignorance of gravity. “Did she have to do the ceiling and the floor?”

Hannah sighed and screwed her mouth to the side. “Just be glad she ran out of paint halfway through your desk.” When I started to snap my head around to look, she placed a hand over mine and squeezed gently. “Else already ate that, it’s clean.”

I slumped in slight relief. “Then it could have clearly been worse. Somehow.”

An ear-splitting shriek proved me horribly wrong. All eyes turned toward the door, and both Hannah and I were half-standing as it slid open to reveal a bouncing, squealing version of my sister that was clearly summoned from the depths of hell. “My office is covered in ghosts and skeletons!” she cried in delight as she bounded forward before stopping short. “Oh wow, that’s a lot of pumpkins….”

Parvati was one step behind her, wiggling a finger in her left ear to banish the inevitable ringing that would have resulted in such close proximity to a noise that penetrated bulkheads. Karma at its finest, in my judgment.

Half-glaring, I nodded. “Eyeah. Helluva scene to walk into half asleep, I’ll go ahead and tell you that. Also, why don’t I have skeletons and ghosts?”

“Why don’t I have pumpkins?” Tyche demanded.

Flicking her braid over one shoulder, Parvati drew herself into a confident pose. “Different colors evoke different emotions.  I made sure to use oranges in Sophia’s office because I know she struggles to wake up in the mornings, and it’s a bright and wakeful, but cheery, color.  It evokes energy! And the spicy scents of jalapeno and cinnamon are warming and comforting, reducing possible anxiety in the face of a full workday - “

Hannah interrupted. “She also ran out of white and gray.”

“Shut up, Hannah,” her counterpart hissed playfully. “I used whites and grays in Tyche’s office because the subtlety of the colors against the neutral bulkheads would be less distracting and also lend itself to the ethereal quality of the skeletons and ghosts….”

I rubbed my temples gently in mock frustration. “Promise me you didn’t do this anywhere else?”

She paused before venturing slowly, “I may have also painted Professor Farro’s office.”

“SO HELP ME CTHULU if you used red in his office…!” Alistair shouted, panicking.

Hannah started snorting, and Tyche pulled an about-face to hide her smile. To her credit, Parvati looked extremely confused. “I used blue? You know: trust, detachment? And a big dose of ‘chill the fuck out’ just in case?”

Alistair was still scowling until Hannah was able to get her laughter under control. “Also, you already ate all the red on your scones, Worthington. I promise, there wasn’t even enough to fake a mild sunburn, much less paint Arthur’s office with it.”

He reached a shaky hand for a chair to steady himself until he could sit in it. “The mental image of Farro steepling his fingers and staring over them like some creep from those anime he enjoys was simply too much. I daresay he would wear his glasses and leave his office door open, just for the occasion.”

I started to laugh, but then the exact image he was talking about popped in my head. With my third, fresh dawning horror of the day, I turned my head toward my assistant. “Please tell me neither of you possess a hair straightener?”

“I do not, but I can only speak for myself.”

As hilarious as the mental image of Arthur Farro dressing up as Gendo Ikari for Halloween was, I had serious doubts that everyone on the Ark would be well versed enough in late-Twentieth Century pop culture to know it was a costume.  I was entirely sure that not enough would know it was a joke to persuade anyone that Farro had not, in fact, gone full genocidal dictator overnight.

“Fuuuuuck fuckfuckfuckfuck,” I started chanting. Finishing off my coffee, I started giving out directions. “Parvati, do nothing. Seriously. Nothing else. Hannah, I need you to call Charly and let her know not to make any more red paint without authorization from myself or Xiomara.  Alistair, Tyche, I would tell you to hold down the fort, but it would be like telling you to breathe, so just do what you do, please.”

“Where are you going?” Tyche demanded as I bolted for the door.

“To warn Xiomara that it’s a joke!” I shouted over my shoulder. “Potatoes in bags on the floor, help yourselves, I’ll be baaaaack!”

The door closed behind me just as I heard a confused voice ask “Potatoes?”

I was panting when I reached Xio’s office and frantically started requesting entry. The door was only slightly cracked when I heard her snap “WHAT?”

“There was a prank!” I shouted as the door opened enough for me to enter. “I don’t think it was meant to be a prank, but there was a prank and Arthur got dragged into it, and I need to make sure you know that he isn’t actually a genocidal maniac hellbent on bringing a deceased love back from the dead at the cost of his own child and any others he can get his hands on.” I was gasping for air when I finished, and entirely unphased by Xiomara’s expression.

“Youuuuu need a med eval…” she responded, flicking open her datapad while keeping an eye on me.

Diving forward, I shook her wrist to dismiss the datapad. Three seconds later, I was staring up at her from the floor, shoulder aching and wrist sprained. Probably. “Well, I sure as fuck do now, Jesus Christ, Xio. Just let me explain before you put me in the hug jacket okay?”

“Fifteen seconds.”

Generous of her. “Parvati painted Arthur’s office for the holiday, only he’s going to think it was a prank if it looks anything like mine did. We both know he is going to go overboard in retaliation, because Arthur. My best guess is that he is going to paint his office red and dress up like Gendo Ikari, who you can look up in the database to understand why I came to warn you.”

“Three seconds left.” Impressed, she helped me up off the floor. “So, you are warning me because…?”

“Because we are trying to warn Charly not to make him any paint until we can explain it was well-intentioned, but just in case Hannah can’t reach her in time to head it off from that direction, you are going to get complaints.”

“From students?”

“From passersby. There isn’t a chance this side of death that he would go to those lengths and not let everyone walking past his office see what he’s done. You know how much pride he takes in a job well done.”

“And triple that in a well-executed prank,” she nodded. “I’m going to look up the name you gave me, and if you promise not to try to grab me again, I’ll let you keep the other wrist and skip the psych hold.”

Cradling my already throbbing arm, I nodded.  I was still pretty sure it was only sprained, but I couldn’t move it very well so concern was starting to set in alongside the pain.

Her nod told me she found the relevant images, but when her eyes widened I realized that she was reading the background profile. “No wonder you sounded like your grip on reality slipped…. And this was an actual entertainment that people watched?”

“Hey!” I objected. “It makes more sense when you are watching it.” Granted, not much, but at least some.  “You would be astonished the number of people who remember it fondly as their first exposure to the genre.”

She just shook her head. “You can keep your religious hallucination television, thank you…. The creator was having an active psychiatric episode while writing this!?”

“Allegedly.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me. You had Derek plant this, right?”

“Not even I could make up that show, four manga, and six films.”

“SIX?”

“What can I say? We didn’t like the ending. Or the other ending. Or the other other ending.”

She dismissed her datapad and stood, hands held up in a defensive posture. “Nope. Not doing it. You said ‘we’, which means you’re part of it. Thank you for the warning that Farro may go overboard, please leave my office.”

I turned toward the door, grumbling. “Geez, you didn’t even see how bad the ship wars for that one were…”

“OUT! NOW!”

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[sun-marie]

✨Self-rec tag game ✨

I was tagged by @glamfellens​ for this very cool reflection challenge! This is a super fun one, thank you for tagging me!

Rules: Share five of your own fanworks (fic, art, etc.). Then, tag five more people to share the things they’ve made.

1) Something you absolutely adore

Dimitri and Byleth is such a tender pair for me, and I'm a really big fan of the softness of this piece 🥺 Plus, since it's a redraw, I really enjoy it as a marker of my artistic improvement 💗

2) Something that was challenging to create

This one had a lot going on before I made the decision to render it in a lineless style. Posing four characters full bodies, having them interact with each other believably, creating appealing and in-character post-canon designs, having dynamic lighting... and then when I was almost done I had thought of "what if I tried that rendering thing I see other artists do" which added another solid two days to the time spent on this piece 😅 In my humble opinion, though, it was worth it, and I still consider this one of my most impressive pieces!

3) Something that makes you laugh/smile

I drew this little series off the heels of my New Year's resolution to "draw more silly", which I was struggling with bc the first one was def supposed to be a little goofier, but it actually came out looking very serene. And then one morning my dog jumped into my bed and woke me up by sitting on my face 😂 It reminded me a lot of Declan the Mabari and I wondered how Fenris would take to a dog sitting on him in the morning haha

4) Something that surprised you

I still look at this one some times and am just like,,,, bro how did I do that. I think it's like one of my Top 3 kisses I've drawn, and I'm still shocked at how good the colors came out (I've actually come to the realization with this that black hair is really fun to color in bright environments bc it's so reflective 👀)

5) Something you want other people to see

A pretty recent one, but one I'm really really proud of! The BG3 brainrot is real :')

I think I'll tag @thefife01, @hajima-7, @stereotypedebunker, @hanpaopaoo, and @iubworks! I'd love to see some of y'all's favorite works! No pressure though of course! (especially if you've already been tagged in this haha 😅)

[bokettochild]

🦊sorry for being annoying but can i ask an art related question.? in the drawing you posted yesterday i saw the sword in it and it looks so *cool*, may i ask how you draw them? i try to but they always look like a 3 year old did it for me. i also tend to have shaky hands so getting stuff super straight and perfect looking is really hard (i know ive already said it but sorry for getting whiny last night. im feeling a little bit better today, just tired.)

Of course!

So, I also kinda don't draw weapons very well, they're agonizing and I usually struggle a lot to get something I deem acceptable (hence why I basically just drew the hilt). For reference, since it's Legend's Tempered Sword, I looked up 'tempered sword a link to the past' on Google, as well as pulling up JoJo's design (on her masterlist it's under 'Swords' in the very top section of links). I used these as my primary references.

Now, unlike most sword designs, the ALTTP design has a curved guard on it, rather than something more traditional or the wings of the Master Sword. This makes drawing it harder because I'm used to blades being primarily angles and used that as my main cheat when drawing them in the past. With a curve though, I have to think harder about the angles.

I actually did some posing of myself to figure out how the sword would be held, and ran the scene in my head a bit to see how Legend would have been moving previously, which would have a big impact on the angle of his blade. I determined that I wanted it angled away from him and the viewer, and that gave me a place to start with the hilt. I initially drew a basic, symmetrical curve and then once I had a feel for width and stuff, I erased it and drew it again at a sort of an angle so that one side was facing more towards us than the other (sort of angled away from us and towards the right if you will).

Because the hilt is thicker than the blade of the sword, I extended the guard outwards from hilt by a bit, about a fingers-width (one of Legend's fingers in the picture, not mine) and then drew another arch parallel to the first one on the other side, also a bit out from the hilt.

I couldn't tell by looking at the reference art what the points of Legend's sword guard looked like, so I literally just made them end in points and left it there, taking into consideration of course that the sword is at an angle and thus one edge should look a bit longer than the other to give it dimension. I did the same thing for the far point of the guard as well, but made it small since it's slightly further away.

As for the blade itself, I drew two parallel lines and then made a middle-line between them, but kept it off center and more away from the viewer, so that the edge of the blade facing us looks bigger than the one facing away.

Finally, I just added the slight detailing that Jojo included in her design, while using my middle-line and edges for reference.

I'm no expert, but using this sort of technique (although usually without curves) is my go too when I do have to draw blades. And of course, adding a bit of shadow work to the blade always makes it more believable, especially if contrasted with some sort of gleam from a light source of some sort :)

Hope this helps!

[the-tzarina-alexandra-paracosm]

Some of my favourite art - a timeline

Part 14: 2024

The first half or so, at least

January. The fake album covers series. This is only a concept sketch but I really like how it looks even so, and I like the logo too.

February. This is actually a panel from my comics. This is one of the more detailed drawings in my black white and red rough sketch style. I like the pose, especially since it was so difficult for me to draw something like this in the past.

April. This is hands down my favourite panel from all the FIF comics I've done so far. The concept and the composition are very good.

May. Self portrait. Technically traced over a photo, but, as I've come to realise, even tracing in an aesthetically pleasing and artistic way is its own skill. (And the colouring and shading as well as the composition is done without tracing anyway). The first full colour picture of the year.

June. Quick sketch for my hacker story.

June. I like how I drew the babies here. Drawing the poses was a struggle, but I'm glad I didn't give up on it. I also liked drawing that transparent ball.

Early July. My first artfight this year (@ user is_noah). This is definitely the best drawing I've made this year, and the highest effort one. I spent about 3-4 full days drawing this, so a cumulative total of 20 hours or more. I like pretty much everything about this drawing, the shading, lighting, colour, mood, perspective, anatomy, poses, composition, clothing, character expressions etc etc. I feel like it looks just as I envisioned it in my mind if not better. And most importantly the emotion, the angst grief etc is there. What I struggled with the most was definitely the composition.

Late July. My second and last artfight this year, and a very high effort drawing for my friend @sea-angle. I like the lighting, colours and poses here. The composition was definitely the biggest struggle, but it was very much worth it. Although I spent a full week on this, I think the net time was about half of the other drawing.

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The way I would characterise this year so far is that I'm still in an experimental phase especially in terms of subject matter, and am constantly going out of my comfort zone. At the same time, this is the period of time in which my artstyle is the most "my own" it's ever been, and the skills I've acquired over the years stacked up, thus enabling me to draw things that would've been extremely challenging even just last year. And to be fair, they were very challenging this year too, but I was determined to see them through to the end. My biggest improvements have been in terms of anatomy (+ poses), lighting and especially composition, which I've also put a much higher level of intentionality in.

But all of this did not occur overnight. If this 15+ year retrospective showed me anything it's that even those years that I felt like I was stagnating or regressing in my art, were actually crucial steps in building skills that would define my art in the future. I am extremely grateful for the journey I've had so far. I hope that any artist who reads through this series feels encouraged, because every new drawing means progress, even when, or especially when we feel it the least