#but also if anyone wants a more in depth tutorial

[ofmdee]

just thought i'd share:

awhile back someone asked how i make my sims gifs, so i made a little tutorial right here

it would also work for regular gifs, if u skip to the 'gif making' section

the tutorial pics are nsfw tho, lmfao, so 🔞

[kotori-mochi]

Can't afford art school?

After seeing post like this 👇

And this gem 👇

As well as countless of others from the AI generator community. Just talking about how "inaccessible art" is, I decided why not show how wrong these guys are while also helping anyone who actually wants to learn.

Here is the first one ART TEACHERS! There are plenty online and in places like youtube.

📺Here is my list:

Proko (Free, mostly teaches anatomy and how to draw people. But does have art talks and teaches the basics.)

Marc Brunet (Free but he does have other classes for a cheap price. Use to work for Blizzard and teaches you everything)

Aaron Rutten (free, tips about art, talks about art programs and the best products for digital art)

BoroCG (free, teaches a verity of art mediums from 3D modeling to digital painting. As well as some tips that can be used across styles)

Jesse J. Jones (free, talks about animating)

Jesus Conde (free, teaches digital painting and has classes in Spanish)

Mohammed Agbadi (free, he gives some advice in some videos and talks about art)

Ross Draws (free, he does have other classes for a good price. Mostly teaching character designs and simple backgrounds.)

SamDoesArts (free, gives good advice and critiques)

Drawfee Show (free, they do give some good advice and great inspiration)

The Art of Aaron Blaise ( useful tips for digital art and animation. Was an animator for Disney. Mostly nature art)

Bobby Chiu ( useful tips and interviews with artist who are in the industry or making a living as artist)

Sinix Design (has some tips on drawing people)

Winged canvas (art school for free on a verity of mediums)

Bob Ross (just a good time, learn how to paint, as well as how too relax when doing art. "there are no mistakes only happy accidents", this channel also provides tips from another artist)

Scott Christian Sava (Inspiration and provides tips and advice)

Pikat (art advice and critiques)

Drawbox (a suggested cheap online art school, made of a community of artist)

Skillshare (A cheap learning site that has art classes ranging from traditional to digital. As well as Animation and tutorials on art programs. All under one price, in the USA it's around $34 a month)

Human anatomy for artist (not a video or teacher but the site is full of awesome refs to practice and get better at anatomy)

Second part BOOKS, I have collected some books that have helped me and might help others.

📚Here is my list:

The "how to draw manga" series produced by Graphic-sha. These are for manga artist but they give great advice and information.

"Creating characters with personality" by Tom Bancroft. A great book that can help not just people who draw cartoons but also realistic ones. As it helps you with facial ques and how to make a character interesting.

"Albinus on anatomy" by Robert Beverly Hale and Terence Coyle. Great book to help someone learn basic anatomy.

"Artistic Anatomy" by Dr. Paul Richer and Robert Beverly Hale. A good book if you want to go further in-depth with anatomy.

"Directing the story" by Francis Glebas. A good book if you want to Story board or make comics.

"Animal Anatomy for Artists" by Eliot Goldfinger. A good book for if you want to draw animals or creatures.

"Constructive Anatomy: with almost 500 illustrations" by George B. Bridgman. A great book to help you block out shadows in your figures and see them in a more 3 diamantine way.

"Dynamic Anatomy: Revised and expand" by Burne Hogarth. A book that shows how to block out shapes and easily understand what you are looking out. When it comes to human subjects.

"An Atlas of animal anatomy for artist" by W. Ellenberger and H. Dittrich and H. Baum. This is another good one for people who want to draw animals or creatures.

Etherington Brothers, they make books and have a free blog with art tips.

📝As for Supplies, I recommend starting out cheap, buying Pencils and art paper at dollar tree or 5 below. If you want to go fancy Michaels is always a good place for traditional supplies. They also get in some good sales and discounts. For digital art, I recommend not starting with a screen art drawing tablet as they are usually more expensive.

For the Best art Tablet I recommend either Xp-pen, Bamboo or Huion. Some can range from about 40$ to the thousands.

💻As for art programs here is a list of Free to pay.

Clip Studio paint ( you can choose to pay once or sub and get updates. Galaxy, Windows, macOS, iPad, iPhone, Android, or Chromebook device. )

Procreate ( pay once for $9.99 usd, IPAD & IPHONE ONLY)

Blender (for 3D modules/sculpting, animation and more. Free)

PaintTool SAI (pay but has a 31 day free trail)

Krita (Free)

mypaint (free)

FireAlpaca (free)

Aseprite ($19.99 usd but has a free trail, for pixel art Windows & macOS)

Drawpile (free and for if you want to draw with others)

IbisPaint (free, phone app ONLY)

Medibang (free, IPAD, Android and PC)

NOTE: Some of these can work on almost any computer like Clip and Sai but others will require a bit stronger computer like Blender. Please check their sites for if your computer is compatible.

So do with this information as you will but as you can tell there are ways to learn how to become an artist, without breaking the bank. The only thing that might be stopping YOU from using any of these things, is YOU.

I have made time to learn to draw and many artist have too. Either in-between working two jobs or taking care of your family and a job or regular school and chores. YOU just have to take the time or use some time management, it really doesn't take long to practice for like an hour or less. YOU also don't have to do it every day, just once or three times a week is fine.

Hope this was helpful and have a great day.

"also apologies for any spelling or grammar errors, I have Dyslexia and it makes my brain go XP when it comes to speech or writing"

[topbottomswitchblade]

Intro To Knifeplay

I'd been wanting to make a tutorial and then @hollyhocks-hoping asked if I had any tips for getting into knifeplay so that finally motivated me enough. Gonna try to make this seem like a really know what I'm talking about and not get anyone killed.

First things first: Knifeplay is risky. It can cause actual harm. But like, so can driving a car, so we mitigate the danger with things like seat belts and drivers ed. This is drivers ed. (driver's ed? drivers' ed? hm.)

There's different ways to do knifeplay that can make it more safe or more risky, depending on what you want out of the experience and are comfortable with.

On the safest end, you can use alternatives to real/sharp knives. I'm going to give some examples but to be clear I am not vouching for any specific products because I have not used them because I skipped the safety level and went for blood. But that's just me.

Acrylic/resin knives (example 1, example 2, example 3,)

Training knives (example 1, example 2)

This is a knife you can order dull, which is kinda the same as a training knife, but I'm making a separate point to say: I have seen some people give advice on ways to dull a blade so you can use it for knifeplay and um. Don't Do That. First of all, very tedious. Second and more importantly, it's unlikely you'll get it to a safe level of dull and could end up hurting your partner/yourself worse if you get careless thinking it's low risk. And if you get cut, it won't be a clean cut. Also the one I linked it sold out sorry. But this one is a dulled bowie knife intended to be used as a paddle?

Putting a butter knife in the freezer so you get the chill of a cold blade without it being sharp. Pair it with leather gloves so the dom's hands don't get cold.

Of course, there's still risk associated with a dull or non-metal blade. If you're like "let's do a scene where I stab you to death, and baby, I'm going for an Oscar," you can still, like, stab your partner. It just won't do as much damage as a real knife would. Like, getting shot with a paintball vs a bullet. Still hurts, but it won't kill you. Don't jam it in their eyes or whatever.

Next up on the danger level: Using real knives without intending to cut your partner.

Use the spine instead of the blade.

Here's is a v simple diagram for our purposes

This comes with some risk (especially with a clip point) as the point is still sharp

But if you want to flash a real knife and hold it to their throat and whatnot, you can press the spine to their skin instead of the blade. Note: even I, as a pretty experienced knifeplayer, do not hold the blade's edge to my partner's throat. If I want to do that, I still use the spine.

You can also use the flat of the blade, which I'm going to say is a touch more risky because edge will be against their skin. Your sub will have to be good and keep still.

Next level: Making shallow cuts with the tip

What I usually do with my partner is use the back side of the knife (spine towards their skin) and make scratches and shallow cuts with the point of the blade. Keeping the blade edge turned away and only using the point gives me more control of the depth. I don't have to worry so much about actually slicing deep, but it's still sharp enough to draw a bit of blood.

Like so

It gets results like this

Pro tip: Open up shallow cuts wider (but not deeper) by paddling them afterwards 👍

I gave an example of clip and drop point above because they're the most common for folding knives, and also are featuring in my parts diagram, but for this practice I also use a karambit which looks like this

Obviously in this case I would not be facing the blade away to use the tip

Spice it up: Put the blade in your sub's mouth. But watch out!

Questionable method: Light stabbing

So. You can push the point in a bit before it breaks skin (unless it's a really sharp blade). I started incorporating this, but then one time I did break skin and it started For Real Bleeding. I staunched it with a tissue for a minute and it stopped and you couldn't even see the puncture, but uh. Probably won't do that again. Do with that what you will. Don't kill anyone; I don't want my blog to appear in court.

I don't think I should really suggest anything more extreme than that in good conscience. I'm sure there are people out there who go harder, but you'll have to find those people and ask them. Ultimately if you practice it safely and feel confident enough to experiment that is a call for you and your partner when you feel ready, just be smart about it and be prepared for do first aid in case of accidents.

Suggestions for blades:

Knives come in a wide range of types and prices, but you can find pretty good ones for like $20-30. Even name brands like Smith & Wesson can be anywhere between $15 and $160. Or if you want a really fancy one like a Benchmade they can run up to the multiple hundreds. But you don't need that.

I've gotten a few of my knives from megaknife.com

Outdoors/sporting goods stores (Cabela's, Tractor Supply Co, Dicks, etc)

Website for a specific brand (Smith & Wesson, Buck, Gerber, etc)

Exacto knives (craft or office supply stores) or scalpels if you want to do some carving. I have used an exacto knife but I prefer regular folding knives. I have not used a scalpel so proceed with caution.

Be aware of the knife laws where you live! This is more for if you're going to be carrying the knife, but still. Usually blades over 3" fall under concealed carry laws.

Safety tip: Aim for meaty parts. Avoid veins and arteries.

Sanitation:

Use alcohol wipes on the blade and skin beforehand. Wash your hands or wear gloves. Clean the cuts afterwards using a gentle soap and warm water. Do not use alcohol on the cuts afterwards. I mean, unless that's part of your pain play but I don't know if that would even be fun lol. You can use neosporin, bactine spray, etc as well.

In general, use good BDSM practices. Talk it through beforehand to establish what you and your partner are comfortable with. Use safewords, give aftercare with the first aid. Don't hesitate to check in throughout. Take it slow when you start out. Don't feel like you have to go hard and draw blood the first time you try it.

[gia-d]

Do you have any recommendations on how to learn bookbinding? It looks super cool, but I don't know where to start.

It depends on the type of bookbinding you want to get into, my focus is primarily on hardcover case bound books, so if that is what you are keen on, here are some resources that I found incredibly useful while learning:

YouTube

DAS bookbinding has a whole bunch of really detailed, professional tutorials that are incredibly useful. He covers multiple types of binds and techniques and they are all very easy to follow. (I always laugh when I watch his videos tho because he’s Aussie like me and he has the EXACT same shitty tiles in his workroom that I have in my house.)

Sea Lemon does bookbinding amongst other crafts, and while her videos are shorter and less in depth, they are very friendly for beginners and offer alternatives if you don’t have all the tools/equipment at home

Omgreylo is great for if you are doing fanbinding, she also has videos on typesetting, which is something you’ll want to learn too if you are planning on fanbinding. Her videos are also very chill and sometimes I’ll just watch them to relax because I’m a nerd.

Ingenious Designs has some really good videos on some more advanced skills like edge gilding and working with leather bound books. He’s also really charismatic so his videos are fun and informative.

I’m probably forgetting a few, but those channels have all been super useful. The other thing that I do and highly recommend is just browsing the bookbinding and fanbinding tags on tumblr, reddit and instagram to see what other people are doing. A lot of people (including myself when I finally remember to actually take pictures and record the process) will post progress photos alongside the finished project and will talk about the process. Most people are quite happy to answer any questions you might have about their projects too so don’t be afraid to ask.

Also the most important piece of advice I can give, if you are serious about bookbinding, GET YOURSELF SOME SHORT-GRAIN PAPER. It makes all the difference in terms of quality, ease of use, and durability.

Anyways if anyone else has any other resources or tips they think are useful, please feel free to add!

[spacecolonie]

i adore your paintings so muchhh would you happen to have any other tips or tutorials for your process? anything from thumbnailing all the way to final render

Thank you 😭♥ I appreciate that a lot!! To start with I've got my advice tag (both new and veeery old stuff lol), & my youtube has a couple of speedpaints on it, one with commentary including process, brushes etc

In terms of general stuff about how I approach painting, I tend to tailor the method to the desired outcome. I talk about it more in depth on this post here, I also link to some references & tutorials that I really enjoy/recommend!

Besides that though, I guess I can do a little walkthrough of the Whisper & Tangle painting I uploaded a few months ago, since I tried something new with it that I pseudo integrated into my workflow & could be fun to talk about? 🤔

SO yes, I do always thumbnail when I'm doing a bigger painting, and they're definitely not pretty LOL. I usually use the colour fill lasso just to block in basic shapes and values with a gradient map slapped on the top -- I ended up swapping the values around in the end because it let me use the fireflies as the sole light source, making it more character focused! Then it's the usual process of resketching it all & flatting in the base colours (I also added Whisper's wisps hehe), then adding shading:

This is how I usually approach it, w/ all the shading layers clipped to the original flats to preserve editing. Multiply, screen & overlay are the most common layer modes I use while doing this, and if I'm ever struggling I'll sometimes add a gradient map too in order to unify awkward colours etc. The new thing I tried for this painting was doing what's often nicknamed as a 'clown pass' -- which is using hard edged shapes to create an easily-accessible selection mask for each part:

It looks Super funny but I actually found it very helpful, and I ended up using it to select & cut out all of their body parts onto seperate layers, which were then alpha locked. It meant I could go ham w/ large or textured brushes, smudges etc without worrying about losing those edges, or accidentally over-rendering and screwing up the anatomy in the process!!

I've kept doing something similar since, though it's a bit more dialed back; mainly using the lasso select to chop it up directly and preserve specific/necessary edges, grouping up similar body parts on a single layer etc.

After doing all that, I sat down and started rendering. The background was all blocked in & detailed with a hard round brush and these amazing brushes from Devin Elle Kurtz. There isn't anything super insightful that I think I could type on how I render, but I do have that speedpaint I mentioned earlier that'll probably shed more light. It's just a lot of eyedropping & painting, rinse and repeat

When rendering is done I usually add a concoction of adjustment layers, as well as an overlay w/ a noise texture on it. I also sharpen it all after doing so! These are the ones that I ended up adding for this painting:

The dupe & blur is a fun thing that doesn't always work, but it looks super neat when the painting itself calls for it, especially when paired w/ that noise texture. It can make stuff look like an old/low quality photograph or recording -- here's another example w/ a shadow and amy doodle I posted a few months ago:

That's about it for this painting, the majority of the time spent on it was honestly me rendering those damn leaves 🥲 Very tedious but worth it & it was a really good learning experience. I'm not sure if any of this will prove useful but thank you so much for sending in the ask, & if you (or anyone else reading this) wants a similar breakdown for a different painting of mine, please do let me know and I'll try my best to do one!! 🥺💞

[kaphzzz]

Do you use photoshop to edit your pictures? Their so crisp and clean and I just got 4k res on my pc.

If so, can you maaayyybbee give us a brief tutorial on how you enhance these for previews for tumblr. Because they always come out so clean even in the preview images.

hiii!!! omg sorry almost didnt see this! congrats on getting 4K!!! it's truly life changing *tears up*. and thanks for such a high compliment 🥹🥹🥹

i do edit my photos yes, but i don't do it in photoshop, but rather in mobile apps so i can just do it during time i cant do other stuff like on the subway so, yes, i can give a tutorial, but it's going to be general steps and guidelines :) sorry i can't give anything like photoshop specific! and i know you're only asking for editing advice but i'll go over the whole process for anyone else who wants to read this as well, so please bear with me. (and please don't take my advice too seriously, i'm only an amateur hobbyist too)

1. The base photo

So firstly, I think it's important that the base picture itself looks good when you capture it in game. With a good photo straight out of the game you can avoid a lot of further editing down the line.

One common mistake I see a lot is that the field of view will be left unadjusted to the default value, which is good for landscape shots, but for portraits it will have a wonky fisheye effect. For portraits you'd typically want to zoom in a lot so the character doesn't look super thin and distorted. In photo mode this is the "lens" option, I typically just zoom in to the max, and tweak what fits into the frame with the freecam. Here's a pic with good FOV for a zoomed in character shot vs. one with the default FOV (his whole face is skewed, as well as pupper):

Also, the in game environment is important for setting up a good shot. You'd typically want some kind of light vs. dark contrast to make your subject pop out, especially against any background. I like to use Rampage Trainer to tweak the in game time and weather and freeze them for better lighting and atmosphere, and sometimes spawn an extra light source but that's a rare case. For example, okay vs. not very okay lighting that's impossible to salvage even with editing:

I also like to blur the background and foreground in the game, with either the focus tab of photo mode or with depth of field reshade presets, because it's a big hassle to blur those during editing. It's quite subtle most of the time but really helps focus the shot on your character, especially if the background is so messy it can swallow your main subject (trees, I'm looking at you).

The photos in this section aren't edited; my point is that with good lighting, composition etc in game, your base vanilla photo can already look pretty good :D This is RDR2 after all.

2. Cropping

I typically crop my images at 3/4 or 2/3 ratio, depending on what looks better. But I think a general rule of thumb is that you want to crop your image so that the contents look balanced; I don't know how to explain this in concrete terms... Basically the same way centering your subject or cropping it by the rule of thirds serves to balance an image. All these pics are more or less 'balanced' in different ways, even though they're not straight smack centered. It's an eyeing process but I think with time it will be easier to tell how to balance your photo...

3. Editing

So! Editing!

Editing I think is just a lot of fine tuning based on what you have with the base image. Me personally, I used to do a lot of colour and lighting editing, but more recently since figuring out that you can just make your base image look good right out of the game, the editing has become a lot lighter. The game can definitely do the heavy lifting, but still editing is important.

I'll demonstrate with two images (hello my babygorls *kissy noises*):

So these two images obviously need some work. Firstly, I'll tweak the lighting, so that dark and light areas aren't too extreme, and also improve the definition/contrast, not too much, but just enough so that the subject is more defined. For Arthur's image the lighting is too murky so I used RGB curves to sort it out a bit.

Then I will colour grade it a little by tuning the warmth and the tone (not touching filters yet). For Charles, it's at night so I've made the tone a little colder for the blue, and for Arthur a little warmer, as well as some custom light patches just to make his face stand out a little more against the background. Some other mild adjustments.

Then if I think the background is still too attention stealing I'll blur it out a bit more. Again, I try to just blur it enough in game, since manually blurring is faulty and annoying.

Then if I think overall the lighting and colour is fine, I'll go through the filters the app offers to see if I can improve it a little more. Since I focus on portraits (pretty bois how could I not) and not do really cinematic/dramatic scenes I tend to stick to the more natural looking filters that just harmonise the colours a bit more.

And that's pretty much it for the editing.

On a side note, contrast is a good thing, but not limited to contrast in lighting, and not necessarily in lighting either. Contrast can be in the colour of your subject and in the back/foreground, or in the conplexity of your subject and blankness of everything else. I think for especially atmospheric photos you'd actually want less contrast for that softer feeling, and not like super hard silhouettes. So yeah, the editing process depends a lot on the image itself and what kind of emotion I want it to have.

4. Other miscellaneous things that help

Besides using mods to customise lighting and props and character pose etc. to your liking, reshade is definitely also a big help. It has a lot of presets that can help your photo to have better colours or add blur. I don't really have a recommended list since I don't remember how I set up my Reshade, but I think a lot of the most popular or built in ones work really well, just play with it and see what you like.

A mod I sometimes use for colour grading in game is the 'Seasons' mod. I don't like too much green so I often set the season to Autumn for that warmer tone to the grass and trees. The other seasons also have different colour tones so it's good for trying different tones! Without vs. with the mod set to Autumn (ignore the quality on those they are from ages ago):

5. Most importantly! Do what you think suits your visual preferences and taste!

So personally I think this is definitely the most important point! I think while you should look at others' work for inspiration and analyse what they're doing well, you should also definitely always prioritise your own preferences on what you like to see in your own pictures :D I think it's important to just do what you like in the moment instead of worrying about what's necessarily right or wrong, or looks good to others.

For example for me my style changed a lot over the past year and a half, and there was definitely a learning and realisation process along the way but I think my more recent preference isn't necessarily better and how I used to do things wasn't necessarily wrong either, it's just different taste.

Hope this was helpful!! :D

Please ask me if you've got any more questions or would like me to explain anything else <3

[minmocat]

How do you do papercraft?

most of my papercraft stuff on here is digital! (i posted a tutorial here, i'll also reblog it in a second)

for irl papercraft, it's a little trickier, but you can do it with relatively few materials - i usually just use an xacto knife (or any kind of precision blade), colored paper (you can repurpose old paper, buy it from craft stores, or pick up some construction paper from the school/home office section at the grocery store), some glue, and a thick piece of cardstock/cardboard.

irl papercraft is pretty simple, you just cut out the shapes you want using a precision knife and paste it in layers over a piece of paper thick enough to hold it. there's a lot of different techniques you can use to fold/shape paper, but it's always been a little too tricky for me.

also, if you try papercraft irl, i can't recommend enough picking up some foam adhesive dots! i got mine from Michael's

they're basically like 3d little stickers you can use to glue things together. it adds a lot more depth than just regular glue and really helps your papercraft pop.

if anyone has any tips or suggestions sound off in the replies 👍

[1am-yan]

Hii, dunno if you've been asked this before but how do you make the dolls? Like the Sydney one who was kneeling(?) on the book

Hi!! I haven't been asked that before actually!

They're just made from felt + a tiny bit of embroidery... I made the pattern up as I went along (LOL) based on a single sketch (one I made for Kylar that I later copied & altered for Sydney)

The dolls have a pipe cleaner skeleton (thank you to my beloved (silly) Haunting for the idea) so they're posable :b

I can always do a more in-depth tutorial/try to reverse engineer a pattern if anyone wants, but those are the basics! I also measured them a crazy ton both to make sure the proportions (mostly) matched the sketches and to make sure the parts were even on both sides :>

Thanks for sending an ask abt them! I'm glad someone is curious hehe /gen

[lacebird]

Hi! Can I ask how you did the text in this post? It's beautiful! 64(.)media(.)tumblr(.)com/5e5d23e7809c6ee181ad52142050aa15/ac1a9f9dc72b17a7-9e/s540x810/262cc36a82324d0652af8e28f14e307cf465c756(.)gifv

ULTRAVIOLENCE GIF TUTORIAL

Here's a little tutorial on how I made the first gif in this set. It's pretty easy to make, but let me know if you need more help! Also apologies for the delay, i had computer issues!

Just a heads up before we start — the dimensions for this gif are 540x540px

FONT

There are two ways you can go about this:

Download the Ultraviolence font. After you've downloaded it, open it up in Photopea like you would with any file and it will show up in the list of fonts.

Use a pre-installed font in Photopea called Bebas Neue. This is the font I used when making this set. In order for it to resemble the original album font, though, I had to edit it.

The following is my process for making this gif using the second option. If you downloaded the Ultraviolence font, the steps below won't be necessary.

For the font you need to do some adjustments in the Character panel. Below is a screenshot of all the edits made to the text layer.

Essentially what you want to do is:

Set the font to bold. After you've selected Bebas Neue, do to the dropdown right next to it and select Bold.

Increase the tracking so that there is some space between the letters.

Make the text bolder by clicking on the first P at the bottom of the window (see screenshot). We've already selected the bold version of the font, but I personally want it even thicker, so I select this option.

Stretch out the text to make it taller. I set this to 200%

Stretch out the text to make it wider. I set this to 120%

I recommend putting the original album cover below the text layer so you can stretch the text as you go until it matches. The reason I'm not giving you exact numbers is that it will all depend on your text. Play around until you're happy!

BASE COLORING

I won't go too in depth here about how I color my gifs, but here is the gist of it:

Curves (auto, check the box that makes the scene brighter)

Gradient map (blend mode: saturation)

Gradient map (blend mode: soft light, lower opacity if too dark)

Selective color (adjust the whites, blacks and neutrals).

FINISHING TOUCHES

After you've done your base coloring, you can decide if you wanna add a color overlay to match it to the album cover. Make a new color overlay layer, type in #26252a in the popup window and then change the layer blend mode to screen.

Here's the difference between the two. In the original set I made, I didn't use a color overlay. Do whatever floats your speeder!

Lastly, you can't forget the explicit sticker! I like to use this one from Wikipedia

I hope this helps anyone out! Feel free to ask if anything is unclear <3 Sending lots of giffy love to you all!! 💜💜💜💜

[mabbbish]

Hello! I love your art sm and it’s so pretty! If you don’t mind me asking, how do you make draw your art-? Like what’s the process behind it?

(Sorry if this doesn’t make sense I’m bad at explaining stuff lol)

hi! i’m stoked anyone would want to know my process, no i don’t mind at all! tumblr deleted the draft i made where i went in depth about everything and i’m extremely mad about it, but hopefully this one sends.

i’m not sure if there was a specific drawing you were referring to, bc sometimes my process changed depending on how enthusiastic i’m feeling about the piece, but this is a general guide using the au as a reference :

1. sketch! i mostly just get down the main shapes.

2. finalise lineart!

3. Block colours! on the layer below lineart, use select tool within the lineart, alpha lock it, and add in block colours (this is where i experiment, you can see the remnants of lloyd’s other shirt colours near the collar before i decided i didn’t like them). i also put in loose details if i think i’m going to forget them before the render (eg i knew i wanted kais pants to be a gradient so i put it on the colour block layer so i could use the gradient later on in the render layer).

4. render! on the layer above colour, i put all my details. i use the lasso took a lot for shading and for hair (second image has a selection i used for kais roots. i select an area that i want to give depth w lasso tool, and airbrush either a shade lighter or darker than base).

5. shadows! set the layer above render to multiply and add in shadows to create more depth. i blend some of the shadows in, but mostly not bc i like the texture the harsh lines give (also the colours are gone so the shadows are more obvious for tutorials sake)

6. check values and colour lineart!

on a layer above everything, i fill with a completely desaturated shade (can be any) and set to saturation. this makes the image black and white, and i can go through and see if i need to change any colours or shading to make it more readable. i also alpha lock the lineart and add a warm red where ever i think blush would be on the face, or flesh is.

7. backgrounds if any then done! i also have a speedpaint of the nya and zane process to see it in action plus the order of layers

[esutonia]

Scars: what they look like on East Asian skin

I wanted to make a post about this because it's a detail that often comes up when drawing or describing characters. This is not a call-out, just a primer on how scars show up on East Asian skin. There are many tutorials on how to draw scars for dark skin, but not a lot regarding East Asian skin, possibly due to the assumption that it behaves like European skin.

The most common error that I see is drawing/describing scars lighter than the background skin tone. While it's true that this happens to European skin, Asian skin is more likely to darken compared to the background skin tone, even for pale individuals. This is why scars really stand out on characters' faces.

Kashiwagi is a good example. Notice that his scar is darker and raised compared to the rest of his face. This kind of darkening happens with acne, clean cuts, and superficial burns. Top surgery scars also tend to look like this.

Meanwhile, burn scars turn into a light brown or pink color. It depends on the depth and age of the injury, but burn scars also do not lighten--instead they become noticeably pinker than the surrounding skin. This is most obvious at the edges of the scar. Often they will have a pink border, with brown at the deepest points of the scar.

Asians are more likely to develop hypertrophic or keloid scars, which are large raised areas of scar tissue. These can be uniformly dark pink/brown (refer back to Kashiwagi) or light with a brown border, like this example. Note how the hyperpigmented border is wide and fades into the surrounding skin.

Here is another example of wider wound scars, this time with a sunken wound. There is still a dark border here. However, it is much sharper and tightly confined to the inside edges of the injury. Bullet wounds behave similarly.

In summary, scars on East Asian skin are dark and obvious and stay that way for a long time. When in doubt, draw scars darker then the background skin tone and consider referencing photos if you want a more detailed look. I hope this helps for anyone making RGG fanart or designing OCs!

[gesturesweirdly]

ur art style is so so so cool it feels like a scrapbook or an alex g song! What pens or textures do u use in ur art??

thank you so much! this is such a cool comparison i am giggling and kicking my feet.

I primarily use csp , but when I use procreate I usually just use the default hb pencil brush. anyways! Here’s links to csp assets

I love pencil brushes for lining. I typically use this one for lining but I also use this hb pencil one a lot too. I also color with them !

For coloring/rendering I tend to just use a default round brush with the opacity down but sometimes i use a more pixely one (here)

The texture I use is pretty much just a basic noise texture! You can get pretty much the same result in any drawing app w/ a filter but here is a link to the one I use and also a tutorial on how to use it !

I tend to mess around a lot with brushes but these r pretty much my main ones right now ! my biggest advice is to play around and use a lot of different things. Dattebayo .

I can also get more in depth with this if anyone wants more specification !

[millibee]

hey! i'm not usually one to write or anything so this will probably not come to fruition but i've spent the last few days coming up with a prequel to aa1 centring mia fey as she finds her feet establishing her own law firm and moving on from all the stuff with diego and dahlia and misty.

this also would hypothetically be a lanamia thing with lana as the main prosecutor! also phoenix is the designated weird girl and it would kinda show his transition from how he is in turnabout memories to how he is in aa1.

i've ironed out what some of the plot points and crime scenes would be (e.g one at a picnic in the park, one at a sports stadium, one in kurain village etc), with themes of family (as mia's parents left her and she left maya to be a lawyer in the big city) and a tension between her and lana as this is post sl-9 and lana is all cold and quiet and not like she used to be when they were students together (but would warm up to mia again as it goes on)

but yeah i'd love to put a few polls up here for you guys to help decide a few things i'm completely stumped about - and if anyone has any ideas or wants to contribute or anything feel free to put it in tags or send me an ask or anything and i'll try to reply if i still have the motivation to continue with this !! i'm very artsy but not really a storyteller so i feel out of my depth even putting this out there

also i know there have been plenty of similar fan cases too about mia but idk i fancied having a go myself

anyways here's the first question - since phoenix is gonna be assisting every other case would it be boring to have him also in the tutorial case? or would it make more logical sense as then mia can explain the gameplay mechanics to someone (although no one reading this will not already have played an ace attorney case) or would grossberg be a better fit just for case 1 like in turnabout memories? or maybe someone different like maya or mia could even go solo idk

[shuttershocky]

Hi shutters, got a couple questions for you,

how would one go about getting into dota after playing league? i'm liking dota's design more than league's but i don't really know where to start considering the stuff i've read, it seems a lot more, ambiguous on lanes, jungles and such.

also as a side note, do you have any games similar to armored core 6 to suggest? i've gotten a runaway focus on it and there's not much for me to do outside of mech dressup, i've sorta finished it all with 250 odd hours :/ not my brightest moment i will admit

If you don't have any friends that already play Dota 2, there's three ways to learn:

1) Watch the competitive scene - Dota's competitive scene is extremely old, with the original Dota having been a Warcraft 3 custom map that grew so popular it became its own thriving, grassroots competitive scene. After almost 20 years of being known as one of the hardest games to ever learn, tournament casters have become really fucking good at describing the game in simple language without sacrificing detail, and you can legitimately learn what different heroes do and what roles there are to play by watching the best in the world go head to head. Plus, many major Dota tournaments have extremely cool plugins on Twitch where you can mouse over any abilities, heroes, or items currently onscreen and you get a pop-up with their full details as if you're mousing over them in-game. Incredibly useful!

2) Trial by fire - Finish the tutorial and the few bot matches you're encouraged to do, and then jump right into real games. Mute anybody that flames you for being new and just figure shit out as you go along. That's what I (and plenty of other friends) did when I first started out in 2012. I've played a few sessions of the original Dota mod before then, but it was only when I got access to the Dota 2 beta that I really got into the game hardcore. Take note that while you can definitely learn the game by just playing around and having fun, getting good is another matter entirely. For example, I've got 11 years in this game, and I'm fucking garbage LMAO.

3.) Purge - Purge is an analytical caster in the Dota competitive scene, but he also has a Youtube channel dedicated to him just showcasing matches where he plays as different heroes. His incredibly monotonous voice and almost non-existent sense of humor are only matched by his ridiculous dedication to explaining each and every little detail in his games, and after a match he'll even do a post-game analysis about what he could have done better. He's become beloved in the community (even for those who don't watch the competitive scene) as every new player's first teacher, and if you're somehow also suffering from insomnia you can put on his humongous 9 hour patch notes analysis (he makes one whenever a new big patch drops) where his deep, emotionless, but calming voice is also guaranteed to knock you out and keep you sleeping. You ever want to learn the basics of a hero, just type his name and the hero name into Youtube and he'll almost assuredly have a video for you.

____

As for more games like Armored Core 6, I'm afraid there hasn't been too many mech games lately that feature anything even close to the level of customization and depth so I don't know any, but if anyone else wants to chime in with recommendations feel free.

[pinkacademic]

Studying for Fun

Ok, Girlies, Part of me was like “duh, Queenie, they know how to have fun;” but then I realise that what I actually needed to do was provide advice for structured fun- not to mention resources!!  So, those are my two points for today.

Part 1: Structure

You know what your actual timetable looks like, but here’s a sample one that I’ve made that might help you add structure to your day

Now here’s how to actually do that

List out every single thing you HAVE to do in a week- work, studying etc, but also tidying, cleaning, what day is laundry day.

Make up a grid like this, or do a list of times, however you’d prefer. Fill in all the immovable things- work*,lectures- and then fill the moveable things- study time, exercise, travel time to your lectures- around them.

if you work shifts, you may need to do this weekly 3. Be realistic. Are you actually going to wake up at 5:00? Girl, are you not going to socials on Wednesday nights? Are you not going to need a little bit more time in bed on a Thursday morning? You know what makes sense for you. But also, can you realistically get all the things you need to do done if you wake up at 10 and go to bed by 6?

I’m using silly examples, but I think you get the point that you need to make sure you are working healthily for your lifestyle.

Let me know if you want a more in-depth tutorial on this!

Another idea that can really help for structure and discipline is parallel play … that’s a phrase usually thrown about in child development, but whatever…

Parallel play or body doubling is essentially two or more people working on two separate tasks, but in the same space.

study with your friends

Set goals with your friends

Call them and exercise together

Accountability buddies are how you keep up structure.

Part Two: resources

These are some of my favourite places to learn things

(Yes, I do like history, how did you guess?)

*i don't use duolingo anymore bc of the whole ai, staff layoff thing... but I thought I ought include it...

Here's some others!!

Ok I'm DONE!!

[psychangels]

been thinking abt the different dynamics and general relationships between the gang. so here's those thoughts summarized, with my more in-depth ones under the cut

chai and peppermint they have a very fun dynamic, with their bickering and bantering. the evolution of their relationship is fascinating and sweet, and i will forever love how peppermint starts caring about chai fairly early on and lies horribly about it to his face because she doesn't want to admit to anyone—least of all herself—that she's getting attached

chai and macaron their dynamic is just nice and sweet. chai helps macaron grow more confident and tries to help him relax. macaron helps chai by rooting for him and complimenting him when others won't. it's also rlly cute how they're the only ones to refer to each other with nicknames/terms of endearment (mac and little guy respectively)

peppermint and macaron endlessly fascinating to me how they both love roxanne and what she built so much that, despite not meeting due to her keeping them at arms length, they're ultimately brought together

macaron and cnmn their dynamic is so fun! cnmn's bluntness contrasts well with macaron's cautious nature. love how macaron built cnmn because he didn't want to be alone...and was self-aware enough that he needed help to also make them a therapy bot

chai and cnmn such an interesting dynamic. the guy that supresses basically any and all negative feelings and hides his past and pains; the therapist robot that recognizes that, but is just tactful enough to not call him out on it...for the most part

cnmn and peppermint kind of a similar dynamic to cnmn and chai. she appreciates cnmn for his more analytical side than his goofiness

cnmn and korsica these two can be fun. korsica definitely appreciates how direct cnmn is. i think post-game, they probably bond a bit over how they both got pretty fucked up by kale physically.

chai and korsica their dynamic is just...truly fascinating to me. mostly bc of their parallels. i've made a post talking about that in the past, though, so i won't repeat myself. but i also really like their differences. the main one that i always think of is her drive to challenge herself and need to do more, which contrasts with his more lax nature

peppermint and korsica they're neat. they get along well because they're pretty similar. both assertive, tactical, and confident in their own skills; share a distaste for puns and a need to keep busy; total dorks. post-game i imagine they grow pretty close.

macaron and korsica these two have a lot of potential for a interesting dynamic. they both look up to and respect roxanne a lot, and knew that something was wrong with the company but did not act due to their own beliefs. her levelheadedness is a good counter for his anxiety.

chai and peppermint their relationship starts off the most strained out of all of them, with the exception of korsica for obvious reasons. something that i find interesting is how she starts to care about him fairly early on. despite being (understandably) mad at him for blowing her cover, she checks in on him and compliments him throughout the parry tutorial. later, when she shows up at macaron's lab, she runs in saying, "don't be dead!" and lies horribly about being worried about him when he asks.

the two of them both seek out loneliness and prefer to be on their own. but it's interesting how, despite being described as the "loner hacker girl," peppermint is actually far more inclined to seek help and companionship than chai. she clearly doesn't want to admit that, though, considering how, as i said earlier, she lies about being worried about him. she does sort of let it slip when she mentions how 808 provides companionship as well as being a spy drone, though

the two of them have a very fun dynamic. they bicker and banter. their interactions are often filled with a sort of confidence, if that makes sense. not really sure how to explain. all of the lines they say to each other when she gets called in are sort of assertive in some capacity; that same confidence. there's a growing trust there.

chai and macaron their relationship and dynamic is very nice. there isn't as much to say as the previous dynamic, but that's because they don't rlly have a whole lot of growth in terms of theirs. it stays basically the same the whole time. but that makes sense and works well, because macaron's growth is centered around him becoming more confident. which chai is great for, because he's probably the most confident member of the whole gang aside from peppermint and probably cnmn.

they're the only members of the gang to refer to each other with any sort of nicknames/terms of endearment (chai calls him mac; macaron calls him little guy), which is neat. also really cute.

also, to discuss the lines that they say when he's called in: they're actually fairly assertive and confident. they have no lines where they check-in on each other, but this time there are no exceptions. i honestly find this a little strange, i feel like out of all of them, macaron would want to check on chai the most.

peppermint and macaron something that i find so interesting about their relationship is how they both seemed to be very close to roxanne despite the ways she held them at arms length, yet they never met until recently-ish. it makes sense why. but it really does make me wonder if roxanne never even had pictures of her kids in her office or anything similar. i also find it fascinating how their love of roxanne, and what she built, is what eventually causes them to meet

we don't really get to see them interacting one-on-one much, but they seem to get along relatively well. they have a lot of similar interests and hobbies (stem stuff), which definitely helps with that. i can imagine them helping each other out with projects when one of them is struggling with a certain bit of code or figuring out a design or...other tech-y things

macaron and cnmn the bffs! i love them. it's really interesting to see sort of a reverse of peppermint and chai, who sought loneliness and preferred being on their own, with macaron, who was sort of forced in many ways to be on his own but chose to seek companionship by making cnmn. i also find it fascinating how he specifically chose to build them with the purpose of being a sort of therapist. it shows how self-aware he is. i also find it hilarious that he named him CRAP, most likely without meaning to

their dynamic is very fun! cnmn's bluntness has a nice contrast with macaron's more nervous nature. the way that macaron prefers peaceful options, whereas cnmn is totally down to fight, but simply can't due to macaron's preferences being reflected in their design. inaction vs action, but in a friendly and compassionate way

chai and cnmn such an interesting dynamic. the guy that supresses basically any and all negative feelings and hides his past and pains; the therapist robot that recognizes that, but is just tactful enough to not call him out on it...for the most part. i get the sense that chai is sort of wary of cnmn in some ways because of that. but he also respects them and enjoys their company. they have fun! they're both silly fellas! they enjoy puns!

i love how cnmn has his own sort of growth, and chai, while he doesn't fully know how to help them with it, does what he can: offer his support. it's very sweet. it's also interesting because it's the reverse of what you would expect. you'd think cnmn would be the one helping chai with his insecurities, but instead they're the one being offered comfort and support

cnmn and peppermint kind of a similar dynamic to cnmn and chai, but i don't think peppermint's really wary of cnmn. she enjoys his company more for his analytical side, rather than his goofy one. i think she appreciates his bluntness. she also appreciates that he knows when to and when to not share his thoughts and perceptions, for obvious reasons

i wish i had more to say about them, but similar to macaron and peppermint, we don't get to see the two of them interact one-on-one. and they don't have As much in common, aside from that cnmn knows how to hack. the two of them likely aren't particularly close, but that doesn't mean they don't care abt one another.

cnmn and korsica these two can be fun. korsica definitely appreciates how direct cnmn is. i think post-game, they probably bond a bit over how they both got pretty fucked up by kale physically. they would try to help her feel less self-conscious about her scars, and offer support on the whole in regards to some of her insecurities. in turn, she would teach them to fight and help them with their own insecurities in regards to how they feel like they don't do enough for the team

in terms of actual canon interactions, this is another one where we don't get to see very many, so i don't have much else to say. but i do think they'll become fairly close

chai and korsica these two are so interesting to me. they're the only ones with voice lines when she's called in where they ask one another if they're okay ("korsica, you got this?" "you alright, chai?"). she also actively compliments him, unlike the others ("good timing!" "very precise, chai!"). and, of course, she has her moment where she compliments him in the hideout after she joins the team. also special shoutout to him calling her "vandelay security's finest" (heard if you perform one of her jam combos)

their dynamic is just...truly fascinating to me. mostly because of their parallels. i've made a post talking abt that in the past, though, so i won't repeat myself. but i also really like their differences. the main one that i always think of is her drive to challenge herself and need to do more, which contrasts with his more lax nature

peppermint and korsica they're neat. they get along well because they're pretty similar. both assertive, tactical, and confident in their own skills; share a distaste for puns and a need to keep busy; total dorks. post-game i imagine they grow pretty close. peppermint helps korsica with her implants and things down in security; korsica helps peppermint with getting rid of some of kale's bullshittery that's still left

i'm viewing their dynamic here from a more platonic lens, but peppermint's crush is important to take into account. though i'm not sure how much it would really change up their dynamic, aside from peppermint's flustered-ness causing potential cute/silly moments

macaron and korsica these two have a lot of potential for an interesting dynamic. they both look up to and respect roxanne a lot, and knew that something was wrong with the company but did not act due to their own beliefs (macaron didn't want to fight; korsica pushed down her feelings because she had finally achieved her dream). they also both have arm implants, which i'm sure macaron helps her adjust to

her levelheadedness is a good counter for his anxiety. i imagine her presence, though perhaps intimidating at first, can actually be rather calming. especialy since she is known to offer reassurance to those that need it (her interactions with chai being the primary example). i see the two of them as pretty good friends