#digital art makes me feel dumb but i'm trying to get better

[vesubia-jugorum]

I really like how horrible Cersei is, here's how I imagined her.

[carbo-ships]

Okay I'm sorry to bug you but I'm so stupid. How are you guys making the yumeship things? Like the background and stuff is there a program y'all are using to get it? I've been trying on my phone and I don't know how y'all get them so perfect looking 😭 please explain it like I'm 5. If that's too much work, feel free to ignore this/delete this no hard feelings I'm just incredibly dumb 🥲😅

No worries at all!

I do it on my computer in my drawing software. If you don't have one, you can probably achieve just about everything that needs doing using this free software:

I'll break it down step by step how I made mine below the cut. there are lots of pictues. i hope this makes sense. we'll be recreating my Aether/Ardis one for this tutorial.

here is what we are going to do today

So step 1 is to download the template

I like using the transparent version because I find it easiest to edit for my purposes, but feel free to use the other ones as well if there's one you prefer. you'll just skip the first couple steps of this tutorial. Open it up in your software. I'm using Paint Tool SAI. It should look like this.

First, I'll drag in the background that I want and put it on a layer underneath the template. It will look something like this (you can also use a flat color, whatever you want)

Now I want to fill in the big boxes so that I can actually read the text, so I'll go back to the template layer and magic wand select the main bit of empty space (blue shows what's selected),

then invert it (there is probably a button for this on your software)

now I'll make another layer under the template and bucket fill what i want to be white

you can color in extra things you want to change the color of on this layer too, or just leave it as-is. I'm going to spruce it up a bit, though.

ok great. now i'm going to change the grey text boxes to be white because the light grey clashes with my pastels. this may not be necessary for yours. you can bucket fill those too on the main template, but I'm going to use what's called a clipping layer on SAI, which basically means that it's a layer that only draws on top of things that already exist in the layer under it (this may or may not exist in the software you're using, but do whatever works for you). so i'm going to make a new clipping layer over the template and color white over all the grey parts.

much better. it's time to cut out where we want our pictures to go. I find it easiest to work when I treat all the boxes like picture frames, kinda like how the ones in the bottom right are. there are other ways to do this, but this is my prefered method. so we're going to go to our template layer and magic wand select everywhere we want a picture to go (once again now highlighted in blue)

and delete those from both our template layer and our white layer. it should look like this now

so now all you do is drag in your pictures so that they're underneath your template, erasing any parts that stick out

and then you just add text and little rectangles and whatnot! (I added mine in a different program because my art software doesn't have a text feature)

I made a couple other adjustments to mine (black circle around the one photo, getting rid of the line at the bottom of the aesthetic trio) by just editing the template layer.

and that's it! all done! does that make sense? i hope that makes sense. if i skipped over anything vital or if that makes no sense, let me know.

[lizardsarecute]

Ok, so since you answered a related Ask to my previous question, I have another one: for aspiring digital artist who don't have THAT much in the way of traditional art class experience, how much would you reccomend they go back to using pencil and paper before doing digital art? That is to say: how much does it benefit you to be able to sketch something out on a physical sketchpad, vs just drawing software? Are there any specific drawing principles you think would be better to learn the traditional way, or is ok to mainly practice on the computer?

I'm asking because I fear I may have gotten too used to relying on the advantages of a digital medium (such as having layers, perfect erasing, and an undo button), but I don't know if it's truly stunting my growth at all, because I don't think I have enough experience to be able to tell if that's something that can happen.

Heya. Drawing/learning principles transcend medium imo. I might be dumb but I haven't really noticed any real difference doing art studies on digital vs traditional medium. Just different approaches and different levels of comfort and convenience.

For digital:

Drawing over a reference on low opacity is nice

Not to mention the volume of references you can save and make a library of to come back to later

my digital setup is in one place, it helps me get into focus mode quickly

Pencil/paper:

want a break because eyes are straining from a digital screen

want to hear the sound of a scritchy scratchy pencil

like seeing the book get filled up over time

able to draw anywhere in the apartment with it. Though I have a tablet that I draw in occasionally, the digital pen for it is ass. I only use that tablet when we're watching something in a dimly lit room and need a bit of brightness.

If you fear that drawing digitally is holding you back, then feel free to try out a sketchbook or two. If you don't have access to one, you can try limit your digital toolkit to reflect a more traditional medium. Draw on one layer, don't undo, make a palette of colors and only use those.

I believe any amount of drawing you do is experience gained, regardless of where you work on.

hope that helps a bit

[loupy-mongoose]

Are you by any chance willing to offer your thoughts or suggestions towards someone else looking to start a Mew/Mewtwo-focused blog? I keep second-guessing my idea a lot, and I worry it might get viewed as too much, I guess... and your concept just seems so fun and unique that it makes me still want to try, but I don't quite know where or how to start.

I'll try my best! (This ended up being quite the read, hoo boy...)

I'll start by saying that I got remarkably lucky. I don't know why people took a notice in my blog, and the last thing I want is to get a big head over it and become some out of reach hot-shot on a pedestal. I aim to treat others with respect, and hopefully earn respect back. (And if I ever fall short of that, I'm sorry!)

It may be worth noting that I've been drawing since I could hold a pencil (/crayon/marker, whatever came first), which has led to me getting T O N S of practice, both traditional and digital. And I do recommend practice, if you want art to be a part of your blog. Study references, draw what you like, draw dumb stuff, have fun! And don't be afraid to let the way you draw things change, because that definitely happened to me!

I realized recently that having this blog has mitigated a bad habit of mine, and that's the habit of endlessly tinkering with my ideas. I can hold back on sharing my ideas when I feel like they need to be "ironed out" or "made better". And yeah, some ideas, especially if they're brand new or just came to you, they need to be refined.

But sometimes it's possible to just put the raw or underdeveloped idea out there and expand on it later.

I know it can be very scary to put ideas out there and "set them in stone". There may come a day I re-visit an idea and think "I don't want this to be like this anymore". I don't know what I'll do if that happens--Will I keep it, or retcon it, or meet somewhere in the middle? I don't know, but the fear of being in that position will keep me from posting anything at all!

I also recommend giving your characters history. A life behind them that led to who they are today. When I started my blog, I had a very vague idea of a history, but enough to give me a sense of who they are as people. It's another example of raw ideas being expanded on, because a LOT of my characters' history has been made up since I started this blog.

I know this is getting a bit long now, but there's one more silly little thing that came to mind that's purely an assumption on my end. As a fellow second-guesser, I tend to feel the need to apologize a lot. Try to resist doing so; think about if you truly feel sorry about it, or if you just want to appease whoever you're apologizing to. Ultimately what you do with your art and blog is up to you, so a lot of the things you may want to apologize for really don't deserve an apology.

[thegreatfrogdungeons]

Regional, mascot?

I forgot to post yesterday I was working on schoolwork and chaining in doodle world sowwy ;w;

I also slept for most of the day school killed me today so I'm only posting one line. However, it's a long one, so buckle up

The format of these older images is awful but to be honest I would still do it like this in the present day: it's the most information in one place as possible and is convenient when just generally sharing information. But when I'm TRYING TO DO A COOL THING AND GIVE THE MASCOT THEIR SPOTLIGHT- hhhhhh regardless, this is Sqishgo and Lorimato! Sqishgo is not based on any one particular species in particular, while Lorimato is based off of the Loricatosaur! (if only because it made the name work better lol).

Lorimato is pretty obviously based on the classic tomato pincushion, with the idea being that its pins get pushed further into its body and pop out of the other side as full spikes! It's honestly one of my favorite designs for how simple but effective it is.

Sqishgo, meanwhile, is based on both stressballs and literal marketable plushies. They are stupid and dumb and me and my friend that I do this with love them. Sqishgo has undergone literally ZERO design changes, not even in name: their very first sketch was made in five minutes and my friend called it absolutely perfect. The only thing you could get Sqishgo on changing around is it's evolutions, which is a doozy of a story.

Ok so to start, Sqishgo and Loricato originates from when me and my paleo-friend who i do this with were JUST starting to be friends and JUST started drawing digitally, let alone drawing fakemon, so communication and understanding of each other was shaky.

also i found a unique glimring while writing this and passively chaining for unique fluffi I hate it here

Ok, anywho, Sqishgo was original supposed to evolve from a normal type stegosaur into a large and armored grass/steel type stegosaur, to which my friend sent this concept that they had made and had been sitting in their gallery for years prior:

I know that I shouldn't be putting down people who are trying their best at making art, but I have known them for a few years now and I have been the only one drawing for their region idea, a lot of the time TO THIS DAY they don't have anything more to a concept other than "base creature" + "typing" + "name" and the actual design is all on me. With that said, I feel justified to say that there's a reason I keep saying "paleo-friend I do this with" instead of "paleo-friend I work with".

Even disregarding the very amateur art and acknowledging that I can have a bias to my own designs, I do not like this design concept: stegosaur with leaf plates works perfectly fine, plays off of their biology even, but there is SO LITTLE to this design that it's just infuriatingly boring to me, and my friend wanted it as-is with as little changes as possible. It's not anything more complicated than "just a normal stegosaur with leaf plates in armor", and its not stupidly simple enough to be endearingly hilarious, like flamigo or dudunsparce.

So as I was designing Sqishgo, I mentioned playing further off of the stressball idea and making it in a pincushion, and since I had expressed disapproval for the above design and my friend didn't put up much of a fight against the idea, I went with it and completed Lorimato's design as a replacement to the "armored stegosaur" evolution

As it turns out, my friend thought that Lorimato WAS Sqishgo, and was VERY against Lorimato replacing the armored stego. This resulted in a large argument that, to be honest hasn't fully resolved itself when talking about designing the fakemon for this region.

I didn't want a big fight and I still wanted to be friends with them, so

I did both

This is Ramparmatus, which takes the steel typing from Lorimato and gives it grass as well. Playing off of this type-borrowing, it's evolutionary method is just a more complicated method of evolving Lorimato. Don't worry, if this ever becomes an actual game we'll put in an npc who will gives hints as to how to evolve Sqishgo.

My thoughts about thisssssss are the same as the original concept image. The beetlejuice-scary-face head is doing a LOT of footwork keeping this from being my least favorite design in the dex by a mile (instead it's just my least favorite design by a couple hundred yards). Hopefully, this caters to an audience who jut wants a big cool-looking tank, god knows I'm not in it.

Also I recognize I gave its horizontally swinging tail a vertical axehead these are old and I haven't updated them I'm sorry be nice to meeeeeeeee

Luckily, this doesn't have to end on a sour note

This is Barribarbs! A grass/poison kentrosaurus, it's the hardest one to get out of any of Sqishgo's evolutions, and as such borrows the grass type from Ramparmatus. This guy was originally supposed to be one of Sqishgo's 2 evolutions with Ramparmatus before the miscommunication occurred and Lorimato got added on. They are also more loyal to their marketable plushie origins: they're based on images of long abandoned plushies becoming overrun and interwoven with plant-life, most notably the infamous "Murby".

The general concept for this design is a kentrosaur with an evergrowing, spiky bramble tail that it wraps around its body to become a living bramble patch, and I frankly love this guy so much for it. The pokedex entry is also one of my personal favorites, just for the implication that every shiny Barribarbs is a serial murderer who will kill again.

While I don't like Ramparmatus, I don't think that after all of this I would get rid of it: it represents my friend, who despite me bitching and moaning about them in this project, I only dislike in this project. They are still my friend outside of it, and I love them all the same in that regard.

Also because Ramparmatus is so self-indulgent of a design for my friend I get to make my own self-indulgent designs which you all will see later >:3

Sorry for the venting and long post lol. Also I'm going to start tagging these posts with "gändvita region" now so I can more easily organize yippie :3

[baladric]

4, 10, 14!! heehee!

ouuuu thank you!!!!

4. How many different styles/medium (e.g., digital art, traditional art, comics, sculpture, paper craft, etc.) did you try this year?

on the diversity of media front, i feel like i stagnated a little! i used to have a lot more breadth, but this year like 98% of my work was done with procreate, and the other 2% were very occasional pencil/pen doodles that i then spruced up in procreate ahaha!! but honestly i'm not too arsed about this, like the sheer volume of art i made this year is so much higher than usual, entirely bc messing around w procreate and the specific hyperfixations i've had this year really inspired me to keep throwing myself at drawings again and again until i got it right—which has translated into a lot of skill growth, which i honestly could not be happier about!!!!!

10. What inspired/motivated you this year?

content-wise, the goblin emperor was my main artistic motivator (specifically my own goddamn au s;alkdfjaow;if), but i'm also really learning how to create my own original works as expressions of various emotional experiences i'm shufflin my way through lately.

also (and i've said this already recently but it bears saying again) literally i looked at @littleowlbub 's concept art for their new comic, prism, and i fell deeply and madly in love with how they draw hands—they're like... so expressive and lovely, but what really sets them apart for me is this sense that there's joy in the simple act of drawing them. their hands are, for me, the visual equivalent of taking that first full breath of fresh air at the start of a hike in the blue ridge mountains ;lakjdfaef like, god, i look at a few of the drawings of spectrum specifically and just feel love and peace in my own existence as a tactile being, idk!!!! this is all a lot of weight to put on the way someone draws hands, but it's WHERE I'M AT and honestly it has really inspired me to find my own ways of creating that feeling with the hands i draw, and i have a long road ahead still but the results are so visible to me, and i'm so so excited about that progress!!!

14. What's one pairing/character/subject/body part/object you want to explore next year?

pairing(s): hrmm honestly i've been eyeballing my internal visualization of evemer and kadou from @ariaste 's A Taste Of Iron and Gold, like i am itchin to draw them a whole whole bunch

characters: it's become a pathological need to figure out how to simplify eddie entertainment munson's dumb face down to a few brush strokes, like i've done so much noodling to try to figure out what it is exactly that makes his face his face—is it the full lips? the angle of his eyes? the sparse eyebrows? the laugh lines? nose, the particular contours of his 3/4 profile?? who the fuck knows!!! but i will figure it out or i will die trying!!!!!!!!

subject: really digging my vent pieces so i fully intend to keep honing that style and the sort of. idk creative muscles that go into funneling big emotions into little eyestrain-y guys

body part: see my tender screeching about hands above. also really working on understanding legs. why are they like that. whose idea was that.

object: man i need to draw more objects. engineered shapes in general suck SO BAD. i wanna get better at musical instruments especially, but one of my broadest goals is to get better at dramatic lighting (light is a huge part of my creative world, which is really apparent in my writing and poetry, but much less so in my art bc i Don't Know How To Do It Yet), and i'm annoyingly aware that the best way to work at that is to, in fact, do a lot of still lives, and probably like. paint more. pls pls, 2023 me, let yourself fuck up with gouache. you love gouache. it's so good for light.

artist wrapped ask meme!

[whatyourusherthinks]

AFRAID Review

Well I hate that title. It's a horror movie about AI, what's wrong with it? I dunno Buggnutz, it just rubs me the wrong way. Maybe because of the way the pun is formatted. Looks dumb. Otherwise, I only got the trailer once, and my opinions was, "It's a horror movie Blumhouse is making a movie about the dangers of AI... Huh." Trailer looked alright. I like that the director is also the writer. I heard it was stupid from my coworkers and the reviews were bad, but this wouldn't time I've disagreed with both of those group of people about Blumhouse specifically in the past, so maybe this movie will be another Imaginary. I'm not exactly optimistic, but it could be something.

What's The Movie About?

A family gets chosen to host an AI called AIA (No way. Yep. Look at the poster.) and it slowly forces it's way into every aspect of their lives. But is it for the better? (No way. Yep. As in you are correct to say it isn't.)

What I Like.

I dig the premise, actually. To risk a spoiler, the story heads in a very Mommie Dearest direction with AIA's motivation and how she manipulates the family. I think it's a whole lot more realistic than the "Robot decides humans a weak/detrimental to their development/the real problem for the earth and so they will kill all humans" angle, anyway. I also like how AIA manipulates the kids, it was incredibly creepy and would absolutely work. They don't, like, try to stab their parents or anything so it's not ridiculous, AIA just bribes them and gaslights them into putting themselves in danger. The ending is pretty damn dark and I was there for it. There's actually a pretty interesting mystery about what AIA is specifically and I kinda dug where it ended up, it seemed like a pretty cool bit of satire. Speaking of which, the way that AIA takes over the main characters' lives was just the extreme of what AI is doing now, which was incredibly smart. I felt like the writer was doing the classic dystopian focus-on-one-aspect-of-society-and-make-it-absurd this which was pretty cool and scary. There were some pretty tense moments over all, especially when AIA is able to convince the younger kids into basically walking into danger. All the acting was good too (except the younger kids, which I will not hold against them or the movie), as well as the cinematography. Nothing too crazy cool, but there's some fun focus shots and I liked the actors who played the parents.

What I Don't Like.

The characters are kinda dumb. Almost all of them seem to flip flop on a dime on whether or not AIA is cool or totally evil, and none of them give a second thought to the AI taking over their phones until like, the end of the movie. The younger kid was fine, but the two other kids' plotlines my eyes were glazing over during. The older daughter's would have been fine as it's own separate movie, because it is weirdly horny! It's not just the teen's plotline, there's a couple other moments that I felt had out of place sex jokes. Prude. I mean, I guess, but the jokes weren't particularly gross or anything. They just felt out of place when the main plot is this very sterile, tech-corporate futurist atheistic. Also, while I liked the ending, it does feel like it jumped the shark a little bit. There's like five twists back to back and while none of them are particularly outlandish, it did make some parts of the climax seem absurd until I thought about it a little bit. And as tense as some scenes where, there was an equal amount that were trying to be scary and were either bland or silly.

My final point is that I can't figure out of this movie uses AI art or not. It seems like they do, but it's purposefully bad and uncanny because it's supposed to part of the message of the movie. They credit a company for the digital images, and when I looked it up all the articles where about how the story of the movie talks about the dangers of AI images. (Which, I don't need to say this, but the images aren't strictly speaking the problem. Most sensible people can tell they are fake. The problem is that people will use an AI generated images instead of hiring an artist, thus giving money to a big tech company than a flesh and blood human being.) But isn't it on theme to use AI art in this movie? It's all about how dangerous AI is. Read my aside closer. Can you guess what I'm about say? *Sigh* To pay an artist to fak- PAY AN ARTIST TO FAKE IT, YES. Give no quarter everyone. Read my Late Night With Devil review or listen to the Video Brews podcast about the Borderlands to see what I mean about this. Man you've really sold out Roan. I'M SELF PROMOTING. Also I don't get paid for any of this shit.

Final Summation.

This movie's aight. It's biggest failing is that it tried to bridge the gap between a sterile horror sci-fi dystopia, and a some-what grimy slasher modern 'splotation movie that creates tonal dissonance. I'm annoyed it's not better to be perfectly frank. The movie is a great idea, but tries to spread itself too thin. Still, worth a watch. But not worth a "How I'd Fix It'? Nah. I'd have to rewrite the whole movie, not just a few parts. And if I'm gonna do that I need to get a writer's credit, got it?

[onlychorus]

I wanted to take another moment to reflect on my art and the future.. So AI is in full swing and seemingly at its current peak in the realm of digital art creation. A lot of online artists and industry artists have been deathly afraid of AI art replacing them and taking job opportunities. While others have been massively ignoring it, having neutral and unapproving stances. I do have a dissenting stance on it of course, as an artist. It sucks to see people flock to cheap AI creations and steal from actual artists. Even worse, AI creators have the audacity to make patreons, subscriptions and even sell their content. And they actually get buyers. So that really fucking sucks.

Now with me... If I have to be honest, I can credit a lot of my improvement with my own art to those...AI creations. I was able to improve my compositions and anatomy and colors using those images as guides. I mean I'm just trying to use it as could be intended, a tool, a guide, an advantage. I wouldn't ever give any money to it because there's so much of it for free online.

Of course, I do not want to rely on it entirely. I need to be inspired and guided by true illustration. I worry of how others would react if I told them I've improved my work by following AI examples... Is it the same as supported the industry that is replacing artists like me? I just want to improve as fast as I can...

If I had to be completely honest, I was getting no where a few years ago. Now, I have decent levels of technical skill to create better content. As long as I stay consistent of course. And it feels like my platforms have a chance of good growth.

I do feel shame, some embarrassment , and guilt but.... At the end of it, other people are doing it, I don't have as much time to invest, and ....idk I just want to get better. I don't support it, but it would be dumb to not use it to my advantage while its here. I don't know what the future would be like. All I know is that i have to work hard and smart now.

[kate-komics]

Okay, so I LOVE your comics SO MUCH!!!! So much so, that I wanna make a comic of my own too. I also use Procreate for a lot of art stuff, but are there any tips on comic layout and shadowing, lighting and drawing peopl? I'm having the most trouble with how the hair should look and lighting in the face.

Okay I can finally answer this one! I had to gather my MATERIALS...

First off, thank you so much for reading my comics and I’m so happy you want to make one! So , let’s get into the process!

So, I write my own scripts and figure out what each page will have and what each panel will contain. The internet’s full of good comic script examples. Some good advice I’ve gotten for figuring out your panels is thinking of it ‘cinematically’, because what are comics besides still movies, really? So when I say cinematically I just mean stuff like close ups to show a lot of dramatic emotion, long shots to establish your environment, different angles for different emotions and so on. I highly recommend finding some crash course in filmmaking. I’m sure YouTube is full of them 😂

As for layouts I don’t have too much to say. Those are really up to the artist style. Like, I usually stick to grid-ish layouts and hardly ever do any diagonal or circular panels. It’s just what I like. Some artists have pages of only crazy dramatic panels with characters bursting out of them everywhere and a bunch of slanting borders of emphasis and over lapping images that look cool.

It. Is. Up. To. The. Artist.

I really really like the way Mike Mignola and Duncan Fegredo lay out the Hellboy comics. Their my main story telling inspiration and I look through their comics often for inspiration on layouts. I thing I often consult is this...

It’s a bunch of examples from Jack Kirby (the king of comics) and layouts he frequently used. It’s saved my ass SO many times. Just keep reading comics and you’ll get a feel for the kind of layouts you like 😘

In the same vain I also come up with 2 or 3 thumbnail ideas for a pages layout and try to figure out which one shows the story the clearest. It’s all about telling a story clearly in the end. Once I get that figured out my process looks something like this...

Tell a clear story. That’s all the goal is. Don’t worry about the quality of your art or your style. Just tell a good story 🥰

So, I can’t give you much advice on drawing people since that is a journey every artist has to endure and it’s different for everyone. Keep practicing and get out of your comfort zone with some crazy poses and props!

BUT... I can tell you some stuff about my shading method that I wish I knew when I started going digital.

First of all, I’d like to say there are...SO many coloring techniques for digital. This is just the way I do it and it works for me.

So, I do all my shading with the magic of the ‘Multiply Mode!’ If you don’t know the coloring modes it’s a very easy one second google. So when I’m shading I use more of an unsaturated color of the environment around them and that looks something like this...

God, I use pale purple for almost everything 😂 but what’s nice about using multiply is that you don’t have to guess at colors and figure out color theory and what not. Your shading with one color that helps unify the whole piece. And you can layer a bunch of multiply layers for deeper shadows or use darker versions of your color as well. And it’s easy to edit the saturation and tone so there’s that too, as a bonus.

And it also really helps set the tone of the environment too! Like if it’s cool or warm, dark or really bright. Here’s some better examples of that...

So yeah....multiply is magic and maybe learn a little bit about color theory to help you along 👍🏻

And finally... shading the face! I’ll be honest, I don’t think I do this that well but here we go anyway. So, the dumb thing about the face is it’s just a bunch of weird recognizable lumps that we have to make sense of and there’s so many lighting angles that cast so many weird shadows and while you’re drawing it you’ll be thinking the whole time “Is this right? This looks really weird.” Lighting a face is HARD, but if you just remember the important areas of it you can make out petty well.

Of course the shading changes with where the light source is coming from, but if you just remember how the ridges of the face slope you can figure out stuff like ‘Should the shadow go on top of or underneath the cheek? The light is really dramatic here so I should make the shadow by the eyes really dark. This character has a very smooth and round face so they don’t need much shading around their cheeks and chin.’ Slowly but surely it will come.

My final advice...

Please....please use references. If you don’t understand something then look it up or look at yourself. Pinterest is a PLETHORA of amazing artistic references, there’s free use 3D models, there’s a timer on your phone camera and there’s the world around you! Reference is so key when it comes to being an artist. Use the tools around you ❤️

And I think that’s all I got. I hope this helps! Thank you for coming to my TED talk. Good luck creating!

[yemilnisu]

The Moon and The Sun

Chapter 1: Good to know.

Synopsis: After finding out that your online friend has a crush on someone that he met online and has an idea who she is. You got curious and wanted to know more. Unfortunately, your online friend deactivated his twitter account and gaming account. Will the answer to your curiosity left unknown?

A/N: If you would like to be on the taglist, feel free to send me an ask or leave a comment! I hope you enjoy my first smau/written work! Also feel free to chat me, I would love to interact with everyone!😊

🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕

We were laughing about what the topic of our conversation was. About how we ended up in here instead of attending 7th period. We were seating down at the sand while the sunsets. He we’re holding my hand while telling sweet things to me. Then he stops and stares at my eyes.

 "Hello? Earth to Y/N? Are you having a stroke or something?" Hitoka said while waving her hand in front of my face.

 I pushed her hand away from my face. "Yeah I'm fine." I said with a bit of annoyance in my tone.

 "You were daydreaming weren't you?" She said while getting something from her bag.

 "I was at the middle of daydreaming but you suddenly interrupted my moment." I rolled my eyes at her. "Why did you interrupted my daydreaming huh?" I accused her like she just committed a crime.

 "Well while you were at the middle of your daydreaming half of our classmates is already eating their lunch." She pointed out. Now holding her wallet in her left hand.

 "Oh" I replied. I also reach for my wallet in my bag. "The teacher didn't give any homework right? She just said that there's going to be a new lesson tomorrow." I asked her just to be sure. I wasn't entirely zoning out of course. I care about my grades. That's the only thing I can try my best about something. Knowing I don't have talents, gifts or passion. I really admire people with talents and passions they do their best about something they truly want.

 "Let's go" We started walking out of our classroom and straight to the cafeteria. I just ordered a sandwich since I have a water bottle in my bag and I don't really like drinking soda and coffee. Yeah I guess I'm weird. I was looking for Hitoka and I can't see her anywhere. I waited for 5 more minutes for her but I still can’t see where she's at. So I went back to our classroom.

 "Where were you?" I asked after seeing her sitting at her desk already eating her lunch. I sat down at my desk which is beside hers.

 "Have you thought of a club to join yet?" She asked me before biting down at her sandwich. I removed the plastic that is covering my sandwich while I think about her question.

 "A club? No I haven't what about you?" I actually have two in mind but I'm not that good in neither one. It was either the Arts Club or Dance Club. I love designing especially painting and I also love to dance but again I'm not great at neither of them. I wasn't great at sports either but I do love playing badminton and volleyball. If you were to compare me to players, dancers or painters I'm nothing.

 "I wasn't really thinking of one yet until this beautiful and sexy girl came up to me asking if I want to be the manager of a volleyball team. I think she's a 3rd year." She explained. So that was why I couldn't find her anywhere earlier. A 3rd year were asking if she wants to be a manager of a volleyball club.

 "Woah a beautiful girl I want to be friends with her. Wait, manager of a volleyball team? What do they do? I didn't know volleyball teams have managers." I replied after I swallowed my sandwich.

 "Yeah neither did I." She said before taking a sip from her soda drink.

 "Are you thinking of trying it out?" I asked her. She could join the Arts Club too since she's great at drawings and digital arts.

 "I don't know since it's a boys’ volleyball team." She said.

 "Boys’ volleyball team? You're going to be a manager of a boys’ volleyball team?" I asked totally surprise that it was a boys’ volleyball team.

 "Yeah" She mumbled.

 "I'm not against it or anything I mean, that's your life you can do whatever you want with it but If you decided to accept being a manager of a boys’ volleyball club and they turned out to be jerks. I'm telling your mom and pulling you out of that club, I swear." I proclaimed, dead serious.

 "Woah chill." She laughed awkwardly. "I'm still thinking about it. Of course before I agree I'll check out the people in that club first." She added.

 "Okay good." I replied. After that the teacher entered the classroom and started discussing the lesson.

  ****

We're walking home from school when my phone buzzed.

"Is that the guy you met on a discord server?" Hitoka asked trying to look at my phone.

 "Yeah, why?" I answered. Putting my phone back in my pockets. I just suddenly got invited into a server and I accepted it, it’s not like I have something better to do. We played together for hours he was really fun to play with though he's a little quiet but when the game starts that’s when he starts shouting nonsense.

 After a couple of weeks playing with him. He asked if I have a twitter account. I gave it to him but of course it’s not my main. I think the account he gave me is also not his main maybe a dump account or something because I don't see any photos of him posted in that account. We’re both playing it safe.

 "Nothing. You don't really feel comfortable with having online friends." She replied. Eyes looking straight ahead.

 "Yeah that’s why I gave him my dump account. We both don't know the appearance of each other." She's right I don't like making friends online. I don't like the idea of being friends with someone I don't know. That someone might be a 40 years old dude trying to sell my organs at the black market we may never know.

 "That's good but you know each other's voices right?" She questioned, looking at me waiting for my response.

 "Of course, how else would we communicate while playing a game." I said avoiding her gaze. I can see from my peripheral vision that she's looking at me while raising her eyebrows. "I may or may not know that were both living in Japan."

 "Y/N!" She yelled while looking at me with disbelief. She now stopped walking and is waiting for my explanation.

 "What? He told me that he's living in Tokyo that was it!" I explained defending myself. I also stopped walking and looked at her.

 "You didn't tell him that you live in Miyagi?" She said interrogating me.

 "Duh, of course not! I changed the topic after that." I answered. "I'm not that dumb." I rolled my eyes and started walking again.

 "Good to know." Hitoka said in relief and catch up to my pace.

🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕

Fun Facts!

Y/N and Hitoka has been classmates since they were in middle school up until now.

Y/N’s mom and Hitoka’s mom were close friends.

Y/N’s mom trust and treats Hitoka as her own daughter and same with Hitoka’s mom with Y/N.

If one of them have trouble in understanding a subject the other one will help and teach the lesson.

Both of them are very protective of one another.

Sometimes they would have sleepovers with one of their house and they would just gossip, watch a movie or play video games.

🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕

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[ldoesanartthing]

Hiya! You're art is really good! I was wondering if you could show your drawing process? I'm trying to develop some tips and stuff, heh.. thank you!!! - ♡♡♡

Well for starters, thank you so much! I’m glad you enjoy my art! But I’m very sorry if this isn’t as in depth as one might hope, I’ve been in a bit of a rush this morning, so my apologies (also please forgive my uncropped screencaps)

To start off, I either sketch it out on paper and take a pic, or sketch in krita. I typically use krita for almost everything I draw digitally. To start, my default canvas size is around 3300 x 3000, and if I’m not feeling lazy, I fill the canvas a nice grey. I don’t know why, but it makes the drawings nicer.

I like to start off with a basic idea of what posing I want, with a loose crosshair on the head to figure out where the character is looking, in this case, the weird floating thing we got here

Next, I start putting in shapes and finalizing our pose. most drawings of mine are built with shapes (usually most obvious with DKtDW Michael, he’s very rectangular.) For hands I use that pentagon shape, this helps me plug in the thumbs and fingers. Our character here is very slight, so i used sort of a tube, ect, ect,

next, I refine the crosshair. Most artists who use a crosshair only have a line for the bottom of the eyes, but I never got the hang of that one, so I have it for the top and bottom (also I gave her a tail. Because.) And then I place the face stuff on. Eyes I like to do “anime style” (sparkly, only the top and bottom lash line are lined, ect, ect,) unless it’s robots, and by exenstion animatronics. One thing I’ve learned is a good idea is if your character has pupils, sketch the iris first, then the pupils. This will work better for you and gives you a nice ratio of iris to pupil.

Next, plan the hairline. I usually have two hairlines I apply, rounded, and widow’s peak. This will help you plan the hair out easier, which is beneficial for short and long hair.

I’ve never known how to describe the way I draw hair, but generally, make it flowy if it’s long. Hair tends to be curlier with shorter hair, because it’s less weighed down, and please, practice different hair textures and styles, I may go into that more if anyone wants me to try to do a hair tutorial.

Next, move onto clothes, and refining other details. I like to make skirts flowy, flowy is fun, dynamic, and interesting, visually.

uhhh let’s refine that glowy thing, right? Let’s make it a crystal. Crystals are fun.

Next, let’s give her a background.I wanted to draw space, so we’re drawing space now. I gave her a planet.

Line the background! I use Basic_tip_default on weighted smoothing for almost all my lineart. Don’t be afraid to use the line and circle tools. They’re helpful, and denying yourself the tools that the program comes with is dumb, and limiting.

Rad, the lineart’s done on the background!

Next, let’s line the character. For hair lining, use gentle strokes, it creates a feathery and light feel

For lining around the eyes I turn off weighted smoothing, and feather ‘til it looks like eyelashes

lineart complete, nice

Next, let’s lay out some background colors. Try not to make them too overpowering compared to the character, or you’ll the character as the focal point. I’ve chosen my main galaxy colors, and my color for the planet. The balcony will be a sleek white. I’ve been taught not to use pure white or pure blacks and greys, but you do whatever makes you happy, don’t let anyone boss you around unless you’re paying them to teach you, or they’re paying you. I use pure black for lines, and pure white for eye shines, but it’s important that you work out what makes you happiest. Art isn’t about what’s the standard of the time, it’s about what makes you happy. If neon ponies is what makes your heart soar, then make all the neon ponies you could ever dream of, you beautiful soul.

Next, fill in the bg’s most prominent color with either the fill bucket or a large brush, this is my galaxy base.

I like to airbrush the other colors, but sometimes it’s too sharp, so let’s

b l u r i t o u t. I used the 99 x 99 radius to get it absolutely dreamy

star it up baby, bc you’re a star. my favorite brush for sparkles and stars is FX_splat_starfield, it’s lovely

next the planet, I airbrushed some darker and lighter teals for detail, as well as gave it a haze around the edge for because.

Then we’re all colored!

shade it up, babey. In this piece’s case, our light source is the planet, so we shade accordingly. the shades in the ref docker are my go-to’s. Good rule of thumb is the warmer the light, the warmer the shade, but my default is the purple-ish blue color, i set it to multiply and the opacity to 40%

Next I block in the character’s colors, I only do this if this is my first time drawing them, if not, i use the previous image or the character’s ref sheet

flats are done, and she looks spiffy, let’s shade her

cool

close up of the hair shading. i always take my lining brush, and make it thinner for hair shading, it looks fluffy, and nice. this is also the beginning of the eye shining process, for fancy eyes like hers, i take white and lower the opacity, that way no detail is lost, and it’s still nice and shiny, for plain eyes, i just up the saturation and lightness

next, over the lineart, put pure white like this, it make the eyes have lots of depth. and an option if you have a light source that’s a different color, a shine of that will really tie it together.

nice, she’s shaded and highlighting. but now we need some… glowies

much better. if your light is especially bright or your character is pale, some reflection goes a long way. i use the airbrush for glowy stuff and these reflections on matte surfaces

Now we shade in a way that effects bg and character, i call envo shade. I went ahead and took my airbrush set to erase where stuff glows, but now it looks too sharps, so…

We blur it up again. Perfect.

Never forget to sign and date your work. Dating is so you can look back and see how much you’ve improved, and signing is just good practice, but i won’t get into it. i tend to watermark my stuff after it being reposted so many times, but that’s something you can decide on. Again, please keep experimenting and trying different things to develop how you draw, and if you ever use these methods, feel free to send me the link so I can see ^^, have a lovely day, and if you need me to explain anything further, shoot me another ask.

Commission info

[nebluus]

Hello I hope you are doing well! I was wondering what kind of college classes did you take for art? (I think you are going to college sorry if I got that wrong!!) I hope that doesn't sound dumb its just I been trying to figure out if I need to take fine art classes to get better at just drawing in general I guess? I really want to go further with digital art (I want to make a webcomic one day..) I'm just scared if I don't take one class I'll miss something Idk sorry for bothering you!! =)

(sorry this is late! hopefully it’s still relevant lmao)

h’okay, this is gonna be long probably, so the tl;dr of this is take drawing classes to get better at drawing; any fine art class you can take is gonna help you get better. 

i got a more detailed explanation under cut

first thing is if you’re interested in art, you gotta pick a college that offers degrees in art. If you’re curious to know exactly what school I go to, feel free to ask me privately for more info. this particular school offers a Bachelor’s Degree in Digital Arts and Design (DAD, lol) with two? two specializations that I know of, those being Production Animation and Graphic Design. (i am obviously under the animation specialization)

Now DAD (lol) majors all have to take their generals (science, math, history, writing, etc) and also fine arts classes (drawing 101, color theory, figure drawing, painting, etc). After that we all take classes labeled ARTD (art, digital), but the specialization you pick changes what classes you take. For example, as an animation major I needed to take motion graphics to graduate, which is an ARTD class, but I’m not required to take graphic effects to graduate, which is still an ARTD class. However both graphic design and animation majors need to take digital painting (ARTD) in order to graduate. it all just depends

so when you pick your school, make sure you look through the majors list and the classes list in order to see what it has to offer. when you apply and are accepted you’ll be assigned an advisor who can help you plan out your schedule so you can take the classes you need to graduate. if you’re not looking to go to school for art, but just want the art classes to improve anyway, don’t worry! you don’t even need an arts major to take arts classes! you also get to take electives, which are just classes you take for more substance for your major (i’m minoring in Fine Art with my electives) or just classes for funsies. If you’re say, a Computer Science major but you like drawing, just take a drawing class for one of your electives. 

(usually you get like 3 electives or something. ask your advisor) (do be wise about how you use them though and remember that most higher level art classes require prerequisite classes in order to attend) (it’s all very complicated so just make friends with your advisor; if you take anything away from this long-ass reply please make sure it’s that your advisor is there to help you please utilize them) (unless they’re shit) (then get a new advisor you’re allowed to do that)

at the end of the day, you gotta know what you’re after and research your options. my college is just a starting point for my education; i’m planning on applying for a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at SCAD later this fall, but maybe a high end art school isn’t for everyone. if you don’t think you wanna go to college after my long winded explanation, then maybe starting with online resources would be a better option. (I recommend the Storyteller’s Summit as a place to start if you’re interested in writing a comic or story of any kind)

and of course it’s not like you gotta wait till college to start learning digital art; i began digital painting when i was 12

anyway, hopefully this is a good explanation for how college courses work and gives you some insight to what you need to do to start your college education

[numinoceur]

So this will be a really dumb question but I just don't know. I'm almost 28 years old but I've always wanted to draw. I find myself wanting to do it more now than ever but I feel like I'm too late to try to draw my favorite things. And I'm not sure where to even start? I know a lot of artists are self-taught but I'm not sure where to even start if that makes sense? I'm sorry to put this in your ask box but I'm not sure what to do or where to go to learn how to. I'm sorry to bother you ; v ;

       Not a dumb question at all! Everyone needs some guidance right! I didn’t know what I was doing until I reached high school, but that was for learning traditional arts! Digital is a whole other story with me and many other artists like me, and we can get you in there too! It’s never to late to start drawing and painting the things you love! Art is a timeless and ageless hobby that can begin at any age at any time! It’s no bother at all! 

      You can honestly start by drawing the simplest of things beside you or just jump into characters and landscapes! If you can’t afford schooling ( like me because I can’t afford much of a further education than a highschool diploma ) there are resources online that can better send you in the right direction! Sometimes a simple “ how to draw so and so ” google search can go a long way! Youtube-ing paint tutorials and drawing tutorials is also great because many artists do take their viewers back to the beginning and teach the rules and tricks of the trade as you go! 

If you wanna learn how to draw people or faces, there are steps on measurements for the correct faces on the internet that can help, immerse yourself with various facial structures after you get the basics, reference peoples faces and even study your own! Many of times I’ve had to look at my own face to see just what kind of quirks my eyes make or how my nose crinkles! It’s all about observations of the eye of reality around you, but learning how to apply those observations on paper is the tough part!

If you wanna start drawing but want to have some sort of guidance there are plenty of free online classes and courses that people post to youtube now that can get you there! Trust me when I say I’ve gotten myself a seat into those classes so I can paint better with photoshop and such! 

You can start with fanart, original art, drawing even a cup beside you is a step that you’d be surprised helps! Everyone has to start from the bottom, but you have to keep going in order to reach the top that makes you happy! Trust when I say my journey has been so long and so hard, but I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for those random nights when I was 13 I’d google a simple how to draw to a flower, finding a teacher that can show me an even better way to do it, that I can just draw flowers on my own and not worry about it anymore!

There are many teachers around you, unfortunately, you have to take that step to find them as well! 

I DO HAVE SOME RECOMMENDATIONS FOR LEARNING!! Do their challenges one day! You only improve if you practice! 

Istebrak

paintable

Ahmed Aldoori

( Istebrak is my fav one tbh—she’s very kind and very patient with her community!    It’s a very comfortable place for all skill types! )