#i don’t feel like digitizing this even though the sketch is super messy

[stormvanari]

Although she carries an electrifying passion for ancient times, it isn't the same for mundane museum heists. Having enough, Shirley taught herself to snipe intruders while keeping it a secret among her visitors and colleagues. But when the intelligent exterior is off, the archaeologist is an overthinking mess who despises her own reflection, and a secret attention seeker whose passion is deprived back in her childhood home.

Until new discoveries are made, Shirley takes on airplane sightseeing, engrossing in mystery tales, romanticizing sunsets, trespassing ghost towns, and bolting to the cinema as the first in line to see the next horror film.

[beardedhandstoadshark]

Hey, I was wondering if you had any tips for getting neater/smoother line art? It's the biggest thing I don't like about my attempts to do digital art.

Tbh I‘m probably the last person to be asked this, and these are all just semi-educated guesses with no guarantee given, but

generally it seems to help when you try to make big, sweeping lines by moving your entire elbow our even shoulder, instead of only doing wrist motions, because that‘s less range and also leads to making a bunch of small overlapping lines that tend to loot a bit messy (chicken scratching). Though it does take a while to get used to/changing the habit.

Warming up a bit might also help in getting better lines, like just making bunch of big strokes for a while? Maybe even as practice?

If you’re normally using the dip pen brush (or a similar one), you could try switching it out for one that stays consistent in shape? As much as I love how dynamic it can be, the shape does not lend itself very well to neatness, so perhaps this could help? (And then if you wanna add line weight go back in manually)

Also colour your sketch in a light color before setting it’s opacity down and drawing over it on a new layer, the contrast helps distinguish the sketch lines from the lineart ones so your brain can’t mush them together and it looks less off when taking the sketch away (<- that’s also why sketches sometimes seem "better“ than lineart, because with the messiness your brain can just round all the different lines into something that seems logical, while with lineart you’re fixed on one way)

Maybe also multiple sketches perhaps, that become clearer with each step? Like, first sketch is SUPER messy, then you put one on top of it that’s still loose but already a bit lineart-y, kinda going step-by-step, cleaning/focusing those lines with each one. That way the jump from sketch to lineart isn’t that jarring either, which fits with the color sketch thing above.

And perhaps play around with the smooth-line-aid feature (I‘m using ibisPaint and toggled it all the way up to 10, but other programs might be less subtle in the changes. Or maybe try turning it off to see if that feels more natural!)

Or you could go a completely different route! Sketchbook is for free and seems to emulate the feel of drawing traditionally pretty close, or at least way better than most programs (except maybe procreate but don’t have it so can’t judge) so that might be nice instead to work closer to how you’re using to!

But again I have. No idea if these tips are actually any good or even counter-productive, so you might wanna just look at works for you (or ask someone whose art you like and normally has very clean lines, if their box is open. Maybe they’ll wanna help! :D)

[shirecorn]

how about 17 and 24? what inspires you and how do you deal with art block?

Long post warning.

Art block...

I don't actually get art block, which is probably a combination of neurodivergence and drawing every day for the last 3 years

I wrote an entire tutorial about how to do that, but didn't feel like illustrating it. Would people want to read it even without visuals?

Maybe... I'll just start rambling.

There's a couple different types of art block, and it's really just a philosophy puzzle to get past them. I'm going to assume that the things I think of slow days, or art mud, is a milder form of art block and work through that.

Art block is a symptom, not a disease. You probably have something deep inside that you don't want to face, or don't know how. Sometimes you need to discover the cause, sometimes just power through.

Method 1: Rest

Let yourself just Exist. The act of consuming art is part of the process. Watching shows and playing games, taking a break and going gardening or focus on school. This is what you need for burnout-induced art block.

Method 2: Action

I always choose action, sometimes it means a tiny 2 min sketch per day. Ugly or super simplified. As long as I don't stop moving.

Toss everything. Start every piece thinking you will throw it away.

The act of drawing moves you forward; pinning it to the fridge does not. Don't work things until they are perfect. Work them until they are there.

Art block causes and solutions:

- No Inspiration

Not sure what to draw, nothing seems appealing. Art won't come out like it used to.

Do studies from life or photos. Sketch, paint, digital, traditional, doesn't matter. Rocks, fruit, figure drawing, landscapes, buildings, anything.

Study and copy professional's work. Old masters are best, like rubens, michalangelo (only his men tho) etc because they will teach you anatomy while you work. If you copy someone with a lot of flaws, you will repeat those flaws.

Trace to learn, not to earn. Trace photography and art from anyone you want. Don't post it unless you have the artist's permission or they are dead, whichever comes first. This is strictly work for yourself, on yourself. It's not about the finished drawing.

Find an artist with a fun style and try converting stuff into their style. Don't make that your new style though and especially don't start selling it. Your style is a chimera of everyone you love, not a clone of one person.

Take blurry photos. You don't need a fancy camera or good skills or beautiful subjects. Doing studies from your own photos can spark life into your workflow.

Make challenges for yourself. Randomly generate things to combine. Try fusing characters! Don't try to make it look good, just be fun.

Doodle patterns, swirls, lines, random stuff. Try looking up art warmups and doing some of those.

- Everything Sucks

You finally see how bad you are. Or somehow you got worse. Every piece is a fight and you spend hours trying to get something right only for it to be stiff and disgusting and STILL wrong.

Why are you trying to draw good? It's enough just to draw.

Accept that your art is bad. Every artist can see flaws in their work. Your problem is that those flaws outweigh anything remotely worthwhile and hurt to look at.

So what? You're in a period of growth, not a period of production. Keep that wonky second eye. Let them have hot dog fingers.

Show everyone! Show no one! No piece of art can ever be a reflection of the artist. Not their worth, not their skill. The only thing your art says about you is "Held and moved a pen for a bit."

Make bad art. It's ok. Most of the time, the pressure to perform and get things Right is what made them wrong in the first place. Relax.

- No Motivation

The #1 killer of artists everywhere. On some level you think you should draw, on every other level you think you should stay in bed.

You are not lazy. You wouldn't have read this far in a post about art block if you were lazy. You wouldn't CALL it art block if you were lazy. Laziness is wishing you didn't have to do anything. A block is wishing you were doing something. If you think you can namecall Yourself into productivity again, you're wrong and You need to unionize so that you don't treat You like that anymore.

Consider Mental Illness. Losing interest in something that brought you joy can be a symptom of depression. I know it seems obvious, but if you're waiting for a sign that it's "bad enough," it's bad enough. Seek care if you have the means. Forgive yourself if you already know this.

Selfcare. Examine yourself for neglect. Nutrition, exercise, enrichment, social need, and sleep are all part of the art process. Eat three meals and sleep 8 hours. That's your gaymer fuel. You deserve it, I promise. Depriving yourself of your needs will make your blocks worse, not kick you into making them better.

Identify potholes. Sketchbook falling apart? Tablet cord frayed? Half your pencils missing? Chair uncomfortable? Desk hard to reach? There's a lot of things that you tell yourself to work around and get over. Just because you CAN workaround something, doesn't mean you SHOULD. A difficult work environment can cause secret dread deep inside that you don't recognize and just think you're lazy. What you think of as "no motivation" might actually be "I don't want to deal with my tablet disconnecting every time I move it wrong and I have to wiggle it for a few seconds to make it work again." These little things are like potholes in the road. Sure you CAN still drive through them, but eventually you're going to look up and realize you haven't voluntarily left the house in weeks.

Repair potholes and roadblocks. You might feel bad about buying a new pencil, headphones, tablet, car, etc because technically the old one works if you hustle. But if you're running into so many potholes you've ground to a halt, it doesn't Actually work anymore, does it? Invest, save up, request, and require working equipment and suitable conditions. This stuff isn't just cushy privilege, it's an investment in yourself and your art. You are worth the effort it takes to clear the way. If you can't afford reliable (reliable! not perfect or luxurious) equipment, then say it. If cardboard is all you can afford, draw on cardboard. But know that you deserve canvas, and one day you might be able to make the jump. Acknowledge that sometimes, if you don't have it in you to smear burned twigs on wet cardboard, the problem isn't motivation, but opportunity.

- Haven't Drawn in So Long

A unique type of art block that self perpetuates. The thought of starting again is so stressful you can't do it. Or maybe you'll do it tomorrow. Yeah. Tomorrow for sure.

Face your fears. Are you ashamed of your lack of drawing? Are you anthropomorphizing your paper and thinking it's going to judge you, like "oh NOW you come back >:/" I internalize voices I hear and project them onto other people, concepts, locations, and inanimate objects. Your paper, computer, WIPs folder.... none of that is judging you.

Reframe your WIPs. Do you feel shame when you see "unfinished" projects? Why? Who says you MUST bring everything you start to Finish? You don't have to. A sketch is a finished art piece; it's called a sketch! If a sketch is a fully realized creation, pages that are half colored, 75% lined, or partially rendered are all fully realized creations too. Unless paid otherwise, art is done when you're done working on it.

Lower the stakes. Draw a chibi or grab some crayons. Get messy and slowly ease yourself back into the flow over the course of a couple days. It's fine.

Get a buddy! Find an art meme, do an art trade, get a study subject, or just wing it. Drawing art alongside someone can help you get past that block.

Pretend you never stopped. Don't think about the gap, how long it's been, or rustiness. As far as anyone knows, you drew the mona lisa yesterday and didn't break a sweat. Today, you drew a starfish on your hand with a gel pen. Keep up that streak, good job!

Just keep drawing. Make a goal to do one sucky drawing per day on the back of a napkin. Don't make up for missed days, just pretend they didn't happen. Who's going to judge you? The calendar? That's pieces of paper; it doesn't have an opinion. Draw a cat on it. Done. Keeping up the momentum is a great way to prevent art blocks in the future.

TLDR: Draw imperfectly and toss it. Selfcare is king. Draw often and don't judge yourself.

Art is a process, not a product.

[rhyva]

hi! so i was wondering about how you drew side profiles actually like any tips, guidelines things like that! idk (im fine at them but only like 2/10 times and its frustrating)

coz i try to see as many artists views and idk little quirks when drawing it. and try to incorporate that into my budding style lol. most of the times other artists version of a side profile in their style doesnt fit for me because its either too non-realistic or too realistic (im picky af) but your style appeals to me so much and like i love your art and thank u for blessing me

(and also like any tips about anatomy and the works if u have any ill appreciate like any and all help. im desperate)

(also yes im the anon from before)

Hello again love !!! Yes definitely, I can give some tips,, ok so this might be kinda long cuz I’m gonna help u as much as I can (reminder that eveehone does things differently and at their own pace!!! Art is art for a reason, everything you make is amazing and I’m still learning myself :)) this is just how I currently do things )

For side profiles, I have two ways which I do them because they are still quite tricky. The first method I don’t use as much anymore but it helped SO much. I recommend at least sitting though some YouTube classes about the planes of the head or studying some skulls before trying this once, but once you have basic knowledge of the head it’s so fun to just practice them for hours and see how many different features you can come up with.

It’s literally just getting a blob of colour, and carving away at it with an eraser till it kinda looks like a face. When you do this, you don’t focus on details and it’s a super quick way to practice digitally. (Sorry it only lets me add one video ugh)

My second way 👏🏻 THICK PENS/ BRUSHES 👏🏻 i found it’s all about ignoring the details when I’m doing my thumbnails or first sketches. Don’t get too caught up on an idea or trying to nitpick something that is supposed to be messy!!

For this I just use a really thick brush to do basic guidelines. I will literally swear by Asaro head until the grave for where to place ur guidelines, it helped me sooo much.

This is really messy because I did it quickly but you see the point. You draw atop of the painted mess to focus on details (I use this now)- if your traditional you can use the flat side of a B pencil very lightly and it’ll work- I hope this helped at least a little Im not very good at sticking to certain methods, I’ve just smushed different ones together over the years 😫

Oh, and anatomy!!! I did a quick sheet for you, I hope u can read my handwriting oh lord. A massive tip is, even if the reference doesn’t, I always exaggerate the way the body is tilting. I will lasso the torso after and move it backwards, and it just makes it a little more dynamic. The second way I said for profiles it’s literally what I use for bodies too, and then define. :)))

Studying stuff sucks in art but it helps so, so much. I hope this helped at least someone a tiny bit 🙏🙏 feel free to dm me if I misinterpreted you or something or you have any more questions :))

[meruz]

Aforementioned long ask post please excuse me while i try to figure out tumblr's new text editor. I’ll get into the art meme questions first and then the rest at the end.

Ok first of all thank you all for sending in questions! Giving me an excuse to talk hehe. I’ll address these in number order. Here’s a link to the ask meme for reference but also I’ll restate the question for ease of reading.

1. When did you get into art?

Super cliche answer but I don’t remember a time where I WASN’T the weird art kid! I started keeping a dedicated sketchbook when I was about 12? But here’s a page from my kindergarten journal about what I want to be when I grow up.

2. What art-related sites have you ever signed up for? 

LOL this is a weird question. Not sure why so many people want to know. Anyways I definitely had a dA. more than one dA account. I used to browse oekakis when I was a kid but I think I was only signed up to some small ones that internet friends owned. What else...? Mangabullet,Tegakie, Paintberri, iscribble back when that was a thing, instagram if that COUNTs, I used to post art on livejournal and dreamwidth too. Patreon, I guess. Gumroad, inprnt, bigcartel, storenvy all for selling stuff.

In terms of resources.. I have a schoolism account that I’m sharing with friends. Used to take classes on coursera for free. I signed up to textures.com for work recently haha. I can’t remember if I ever had an account on posemaniacs. Did they have accounts...? I definitely used to visit all the time.

3. Show us your oldest piece of art you have on hand.

Alright here’s me actually logging into my old deviantart account. These are from September 2008 So I was 13 years old. I don’t have a deviantart account from before then because 13 was the required age for having an account and I didn’t want to lie about my age because I wanted people to be impressed by how young yet clearly incredible at art I was LOL.

4. What defines your artistic style?

You guys are probably more equipped to answer this than me but uh... I wanna say... Focus on colors. And... a slightly heavy hand? Like confident... not always well-considered mark making HAH...

Also I think I have a pretty healthy mix of american comics/manga influences. I feel like people who are into american comics always think my art is too manga and people who are into anime/manga always think my art is too american. And I’m taking that as a good sign.

5. Do you practice other styles/have you tried other styles in the past?

I like to think I switch it up a bunch! I mean, these are pretty different, right?

I think I’ve mentioned this before but one thing I really took away from art school is that, for an illustrator at least, art style shouldn’t be consistent. Your greatest weapon is changing the aspects of your style based on the task, the emotions and message you want to illustrate etc. So depending on the project I’m working on, the fandom I’m drawing for, whether I want something to be funny or serious or dramatic, I’ll change things about my style all the time.

One thing I don’t rly post on here is really tight polished work and that’s because I do that for my day job haha. If you’re not paying me... I’m probably not gonna color in the lines.

6. What levels of artistic education have you had?

I have a whole ass diploma LOL. Bachelor of Fine Arts in Illustration. from the Rhode Island School of Design. And I had a great college experience tbh. Besides the student loans. If any of you guys are thinking about art school feel free to e-mail or message me questions or concerns, I’ll be happy to help. Be as honest as I can be.

7. Show us at least one picture you drew or sketched recently that you did not put on a public site.

heres the wandavision kids. Uhh what else do I have...I feel like I’m rummaging for loose change here...

assorted valentines prep doodles

8. What is your favourite piece that you have done?

Well, obviously this is gonna change all the time and generally it’s gonna be my most recent piece LOL. So yeah, why the hell not. I’ll say it’s this one. I have a pretty short memory which I count as a blessing for an artist. I don’t dwell that long on older work and it keeps me moving forward.

10. What do you like most about your art?

I like that it’s something that only I would make! I had this thought fairly recently and I wrote it down in my sketchbook, it’s pretty cheesy and rambling but it felt revolutionary at the time:

So yeah. I like my art best when it’s the most me and for me. And I like it least when it feels like I’m just making something for social media or for other people’s expectations or whatever.

14. What do you like drawing the most?

Kids in baggy clothing are like my go-to LOL idk if that’s obvious. but also I like being challenged so lately I’ve really loved drawing multi-character compositions, environments, weird angles, etc.

oh i LOVE drawing the underside of shoes lol. And bandages. People that are kinda beat up.. I think it comes from getting a bunch of cuts all the time. I’m always patching myself up and I want to patch characters up too.

15. What do you like drawing the least?

mmm I try to find something to like in every drawing but lets see... I don’t like doing commissions of people’s dogs. Just because it’s normally like... a family friend and my mom volunteered me without my consent and I don’t even really know what they’re expecting me to draw and I don’t even get to meet the dog. Also I’m not that great at dog anatomy. Trying to learn though.

18. What is your purpose for drawing?

This could have a million answers! Uhhh to GIT GOOD??? But also to express myself... and also to make money... I mean it depends on what the drawing IS. I draw fanart mostly to connect to people in the fandom so if you ever see me drawing fanart please take it as like an open invitation to talk to me about the character haha. 

20. How would you rank your art? (poor, mediocre, good, etc.)

Good!!! I have a lot of self-confidence primarily born out of ignorance and a short attention span. If I don’t think too hard about how many other artists are mindblowingly unfathombly good... its easy to think I’m good too! LOL

In all seriousness though, I think the opinion a person has of their art is like a crazy balancing act, right? Like you have to think you suck enough to want to get better but also you have to think you’re good enough to not want to give up. I think we’re all walking that line, I know I am! But also I’m a glass half-full type of person so. Most of the time I feel good about it.

22. List at least one of your “artspirations.”

This is a good question because I’ve been trying and failing to put together one of those “influence map” memes for like a full month now. What’s giving me a hard time is I feel like none of these are actually really obvious “““influences”““ in my art? Like it’s hard to see a lot of them in the work I make...? But idk maybe you guys’ll see what I can’t.

And these are just a couple! God there’s so many more. I could talk about other artists for ages, from all different genres of art. Daumier, Rockwell like every illustrator out there, Dana Gibson, Alex Toth, Hiroshi Yoshida, a lot of the Brandywine School. Lots of current working artists too, Karl Kerschl, frikkin Masashi Kishimoto lol, Jake Wyatt, Richie Pope, Edouard Caplain, Matt Cook, Sachin Teng, - lots of big internet artists, Sophie Li, Freddy Carrasco, Milliofish, Angela Sung... like all my friends from art school too. I could just keep going but I’ll stop for now lol.

24. Do you have a shameful art past? (recolour sprite comics, tracing art, etc.)

I mean if that’s how we’re defining shameful?? sure LOL. It’s not sprite comics but I used to do pokemon sprite recolors all the time. And I used to trace manga panels and color them... Granted this was all when I was like under 12 yrs old so it’s not even embarrassing. Can you really call it shameful when a 7 year old wets the bed or whatever? Not really. In fact some of these are cool as fuck. Look

25. Draw a picture!

Man I’m so tired now but here.

I used to get a lot of compliments for drawing people smiling lol but I don’t think I’ve drawn a lot of smiling lately.. here’s proof I’ve still got it.

OK MEME DONE. onto the rest.

I read this ask first thing when i opened my computer in the morning and it made me really emotional.. I’m so glad my sketches could help you!!

I think a lot of artists on social media talk about the struggle of making art but imo not enough people talk about the joy! Like I know it’s corny but. I really meant what I said at the beginning of that sketchbook about re-contextualizing art around process and progress > product and perfection. I think its super important..! The strength of messy, unfinished, and energetic art! For the feeling of it, for the love it!

That's crazy!!! I hope you like 'em. The whole line of x-books is really good rn imo.

Hi! I totally have the answer for digital stuff on my faq lol. But in terms of drawing on paper.. it varies! I tend to use sketchbooking and any on-paper doodling I do as a way to loosen up/warm-up or experiment. But right now my go-to aresenal is:

from top > bottom

- kuretake no.55 doublesided brush pen

- tombow fudenosuke

- muji 0.38 ballpoint

- medium size poscas

- grey tombow double brush pens

- good ol bic mechanical pencil

not EXACTly sure which inking you referring to from my sketchbook but if I had to take a guess it'd probably be the kuretake no55. That's been my main inker, lately. Great for sketching with the thin end too.

You can print out and eat my art if you like. Just please don't mass produce or re-sell. <3

Thanks! I've come to accept that my art is always gonna be sort of gestural and painty naturally. It's getting it to tighten up enough to be legible that's hard lol...

uh yeah lol I agree actually. I think yolei is great.

I assume these asks are related? LOL

1) Yeah totally true. I love David.

2) I don’t take requests, sorry! But if you want to commission me to draw Legion i would be MORE than happy to. Just e-mail me at isellhotdogs@gmail.com.

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[avengerscompound]

Catch and Release - 5

Catch and Release: A Captain America Fanfic

Masterlist PREVIOUS //

Buy me a ☕ Character Pairing:  Bucky Barnes x Steve Rogers x F!Reader

Word Count:  3289

Rating:  E

Square filled: @star-spangled-bingo​ - Steve's Apartment

Warnings:  Smut (MMF, oral and vaginal sex, overstimulation)

Synopsis: When you overexert yourself on a mission with Steve and Bucky, the boys admit to having fantasies that involve you.  Fantasies that you share.  But with one Super Soldier needs intimacy and the other is still dealing with being touch starved, exploring those desires without anyone catching feelings is a little tricky.

Chapter 5: Lying in Wait

You knocked on the door to the apartment that Steve and Bucky shared.  They'd asked you around for dinner, which meant dinner and experimenting with their sexuality, and you were more than a little excited.  The dice game had gone over really well and for a couple of days after they would each come and tell you about what parts they liked the most.  You knew that they’d want to take it further and try more things.  Especially given Steve hadn’t technically gone ‘all the way’ with you.

You were very excited too.  This whole thing had not at all been what you’d expected.  The whole idea of a down and dirty three-way that was all about sex and just getting that release at the hands of the two super soldiers was definitely one that you’d visited alone a lot of times.  Somehow this was even better.  Steve and Bucky were such good friends, and this arrangement you’d come to was both exciting and safe all at once.  They might be finding out more about themselves, but this was your opportunity to find out more about yourself too.

Steve answered and greeted you with a kiss on the cheek.  It was funny really, you’d seen him on and off all day, but that was Cap.  Steve was a whole different person in a lot of ways and so even though you’d only seen him half an hour ago, this was the first time you were seeing him all day.  “Come in,” he said as he held the door open for you.

“I bought wine.”  You said holding up the bottle of merlot you’d ‘stolen’ from Tony’s cellar. 

“Trying to get us drunk are you?”  He asked taking it from you.

You chuckled and followed through the apartment to the table.  Their place was a weird mix of old and new.  There was a blue velvet wingback couch sitting next to a black leather recliner that had speakers in the headrest.  An old cabinet style record player sat next to a large flat-screen TV and had a PS4 sitting on top of it.  A set of nesting tables sat in front of the couch and each one was littered with art supplies and Steve’s shield was propped up against the couch.

The walls were decorated with artwork of vintage motorcycles and photos of family and friends.  One entire wall was boxed shelving, and each shell was full of books and vinyls.  There was no clear theme to any of it.  A boxed set of Harry Potter novels sat next to books on military tactics.  The Wizard of Oz series was there in its entirety but each volume was sitting on a different shelf.  The Wizard of Oz was next to a book on guided meditation.  Ozma of Oz was beside some vintage Captain America comic books.

Bucky was in the kitchen cooking.  He had his hair pulled back and a floral apron on.  The kitchen itself was quite modern and clean compared to the living room.  The benchtops were black granite and the fittings were all brushed chrome.  Bucky smiled when he saw you and came over and kissed your cheek.  “Everything is nearly ready.”  He said.

“It smells so good,” you said.  “And you look amazing.”

He pinched your hip and went back to his cooking.  “Steve, did you put your shit away?”

“Yes,” Steve lied, going straight to the coffee tables and bundling up the art supplies.

“That means your shield too,” Bucky said.

“It’s away,” Steve said.  He shoved the drawings and pencils into one of the gaps on the bookshelf before grabbing his shield and shoving it into the hall cupboard.

You chuckled and took down some wine glasses.  “It doesn’t matter how much time has passed, I will never get over the fact that he’s the messy one.”

“He’s always been the messy one,” Bucky said.  “Drives me crazy.”

“Can I help at all?”  You asked as you poured out three glasses.

“There’s a salad in the fridge.  You think you can take it out to the table?”

The table was already partially set.  The plates and silverware were out, as was a loaf of crusty bread.  You took the salad out and by the time you were sitting with Steve and taking your first sip from your wine glass Bucky was bringing out a serving platter piled high with risotto.

“So,” you said, as you all started filling your plates.  “What shall we do tonight?”

“Oh, uh…”  Steve said, almost dropping his fork.  “We thought dinner and if you wanted we could watch a movie…”

“Really?  That’s what you want to do?”  You teased.

“He’s being polite because he doesn’t want you to feel pressured to do anything,” Bucky said.

“Oh, I know.”  You said playfully, putting your hand on Steve’s.

“I just want to make sure you know that your friendship is important to me too,” Steve said, giving your hand a squeeze.  “I don’t want to put the sex above that.”

Bucky smiled and leaned over the table and kissed him.  Not that you could blame him.  You could practically feel your heart swell up.  When Bucky sat back in his chair, Steve looked a little love-struck himself.

“Then we should hang out as friends sometime,” you said as everyone started eating.  “Like we used to.  But I am wearing really expensive lingerie and I’d really like to show you it.”

“And I would definitely like to see it,” Bucky said.

“We were talking about just…”  Steve stopped mid-sentence and froze like he had forgotten the word he was looking for.  “You know… normal.”

You and Bucky looked at each other and bit back laughter.  “Ah yes, normal threesome style, Stevie.  Just the way everyone who has threesomes does it.”

Steve looked at Bucky deadpan.  “You know what I mean.”

“Well, yeah.  I do ‘cause we talked about it before.”  Bucky teased.  “What he means is because part of this is him getting to do some things he hasn’t done before, we’d like to focus on you and it just be…”

“... vanilla guy on girl sex.”  You finished.

“That’s the one,” Bucky said tapping his forehead.

“Gonna run the train,” you said and took a sip of your wine.  “Nice.”

“Is that okay?”  Steve asked.

“More than.”  You said.  “Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Of course, anything,” Steve answered.

“And just to be clear here, I’m talking to Cap.  Not Steve.”  You added.

“Oh,” Steve said, his posture stiffening.  “What is it?” 

“No,” Bucky groaned.  “Don’t invoke the Captain in here.”

“Just for a second.  I promise.”  You said.  “What happens if the others find out about what we’re doing?”

Steve’s jaw tensed and twitched at the corners as he thought.  “I don’t think we should go around bragging about it,” he said.  “But this is our personal business  We aren’t breaking any rules.  If the find out, they find out.”

“Besides, if Tasha doesn’t already suspect, then I don’t think that’s Natasha and we better find out where the real Natasha is,” Bucky added.

You laughed and nodded.  “True.  You know if Tony finds out he’s going to give you hell for it.”

“What’s new?”  Steve said with a small shrug.  “Besides, like he can talk.”

“Also valid.”  You said.  “Alright.  I just wanted to make sure.  I agree.  I don’t want to go telling … well anyone, but like Bucky said, Nat figures this shit out, and I don’t want to be lying to our friends.”

Steve reached over and rubbed your arm.  “I would never ask you to do that.  You aren’t our dirty little secret.  You’re our friend.” 

“God, Steve.  Saying all the right things tonight.  I’m gonna fuck your brains out.”  You said.

“And I’ve got second,” Bucky added, reaching over and taking Steve’s hand.

The three of you finished up dinner and cleaned up together.  Steve had been right.  The three of you needed to nurture the friendship too.  This was how this started after all.

When the kitchen was practically sparkling Steve came up behind Bucky and wrapped his arms around his waist and kissed his neck.  Bucky closed his eyes and hummed softly.  He held out his hand to you and you took it and let him pull you into his arms.

His eyes opened and he blinked slowly, as he gazed down at you.  “Ready, darlin’?”

You smiled up at him as Steve’s arm snaked around you and he pressed his large hand to the middle of your back.  “As I’ll ever be.”

Bucky leaned in and ghosted his lips over yours.  You reached up and tangled your hands in his hair and pulled him into a hungry kiss.  Steve kissed and nipped at Bucky’s throat as the two of you kissed and pulled you a little tighter against Bucky.  You could feel Bucky start to harden against you and you pulled back with a quiet gasp.

“Bedroom?”  He asked.

“Bedroom.”  You agreed and Bucky put an arm around each of you and the three of you made your way down to the bedroom.

The room was painted sage, with gray trim.  The floor to ceiling windows on the far side looked out over the East River and beyond that, Brooklyn.  There were more shelves against one wall, though they mostly held little knick-knacks.  Things like a signed baseball, a Build-a-Bear dressed as Captain America, and model spaceships - the kind you built yourself.  Next to it was an antique drafting table with more art supplies and sketches littering it.  There were framed prints on the one bare wall above the bed, each one held different black and white photographs of the New York skyline over the years.

The bed was a king and had been made.  A crocheted quilt in dark red and white lay folded in half at the foot over the gunmetal quilt.  The bedside table on the left was clean and neat with a digital alarm clock, a dock for a Stark phone a worn copy of Dune.  There was also a basket with condoms and lube, the same as you had set up when they’d come to your place.  You wondered if he’d decided to steal the idea from you.  You couldn’t imagine that they were still using protection like that with each other.  The bedside table on the right was a mess of water bottles, notebooks, dog eared novels, colognes, and random scraps of paper.

You looked around as you unzipped your dress.  Bucky and Steve began to undress too.  “I’ve never seen your room before.”

“So many firsts tonight,” Bucky said playfully.

“Your bed is big enough to fit us three and Thor too.” You said dropping your dress and revealing the black lace push up bra and thong you were wearing.

The two men looked you over like hungry wolves.  “Two super soldiers not enough for you,” Bucky teased, stalking over to you and hooking his arm around your waist.  “You gotta include a god too?”

“Hey, I’ve been single for ages.  Let me have my fantasies.”  You joked, as he pulled you to him and lifted you, carrying you to the bed and dropping you on the mattress.

You lay back and arched your back as both Steve and Bucky crawled up with you.  Both had taken their shirts and shoes off, but while Steve was down to his boxers, Bucky was still in his jeans.  “You’re giving us ours, if you want to share yours with us, we’ll see what we can do.”  Steve rumbled as he kissed your neck and collarbone.  His hand ran down between your breasts and over your stomach, making your skin break out in goosebumps.

Bucky kissed the other side of your neck and tangled his hand in your hair.  “Threesomes are the most common fantasy you know?”  You half moaned.  “And they’re more common to have the older you get.”

“How do you know this stuff?”  Steve asked as he moved his hand to your cunt and he slowly began to palm it.

You moaned pushing up against his hand.  “It was in a documentary.  You guys are over a hundred.  So bringing Thor in would be good for you.”

Steve snorted while Bucky broke down laughing.  “We’ll keep that in mind, dork.”  Bucky teased and kissed you.

As you kissed, Steve kissed lower.  He paused at your breasts and sucked and bit at your nipples through your bra.  You reached behind you and unhooked it Steve slid it down and pulled your nipple into his mouth.  Bucky joined him at your other breast and they both sucked and bit your breasts as Steve’s hand slipped into your panties and he started to finger your clit.  You moaned and squeezed your legs around his hand as you writhed under them.

Steve moved down lower, pushing your legs apart and pulling your panties down.  He nuzzled at your cunt and flattened his tongue running it up your folds.  You put your feet on his shoulders and pushed your hips up into his mouth.  Bucky’s hand caressed your throat as he continued to suck and bite at your beasts.

The sounds you made got louder and louder as Steve became more and more focused.  You could tell he hadn’t done this before, but the way he moved was almost like watching him in the field.  He’d stop and cock his head to the side while his tongue flicked over your clit or his fingers moved inside of you, when you moaned just the way he wanted, he’d focus on what he’d just done.

As they brought your apart with just their hands and mouths, they kept touching each other too.  Stroking each other’s backs or legs.  While you moaned and bucked, your orgasm right there on the brink, they held hands.

Steve corkscrewed his wrist and sucked hard on your clit and you came, arching hard up off the mattress and crying out.  “Fuck, yes!”

Steve sat up, a proud little smile on his glistening lips.  Bucky got up on his knees and kissed him hungrily.  You wrapped your legs around Steve and began to grind against his erection as you unfastened Bucky’s jeans.  Bucky pushed Steve’s boxers down and began to stroke his cock and Steve groaned into Bucky’s lips, his cock jumping in Bucky’s hand and leaking precum onto your pussy as you rubbed against him.

Bucky broke the kiss and began to nuzzle at Steve’s neck.  “You gonna fuck her, Stevie?” He whispered.

Steve groaned and grabbed your thighs.  “Yeah, Buck.  I want to.”

“She’s so wet and warm, Steve,” Bucky whispered as he grabbed a condom.  “You’re gonna really like it.”

Steve closed his eyes and caressed his fingers over your stomach and cunt.  You reached up and cradled his jaw as Bucky rolled the condom down over his shaft.  Steve looked down at you, his blue eyes blown out with lust.  With a snap of his hips, he sunk deep into you.

You both gasped and you arched back as he lifted your hips up to him.  Bucky kissed Steve again before leaning down and sucking on your breasts against.  His metal fingers went to your clit and rubbed it as Steve started to slowly rut his hips against you, each thrust accompanied by a roll, so it felt like he was touching every part of you.

You felt like a live wire.  All your nerves were raw and stimulated as they made you the center of attention.  Steve fucked you slow and deep, filling you completely.  You gripped his wrists and rolled your hips with him.  Pleasure swirled through, starting in your breasts and cunt and meeting in your core.  It pressed down on you and radiated out until it was all you knew and all you wanted to know.  Your core clenched and you came hard, bucking up under them.

Steve was far from close though.  He picked up his pace, fucking you harder and a little more erratically.  Bucky began to massage the base of his cock and balls while his thumb rubbed your clit.  He switched from one breast to the next, keeping you right on the edge as Steve fucked you.

Steve’s eyes stayed locked with yours and his jaw tensed.  You jerked up suddenly as another orgasm tore through you, and with a hard snap of his hips, he came.

Bucky sat back as you relaxed down panting and Steve slipped from within you.  “How’re you doing there, darlin’?”  He asked as he ran his hands up Steve’s chest.

Steve kissed Bucky’s neck and got up, removing his condom and tossing it out.  “Really good, Buck,” you hummed.  “You gonna fuck me?”

“It would be my pleasure,” Bucky replied, grabbing one of the condoms and sheathing himself.  You sat up and stretched a little and Bucky sat opposite you.  You climbed into his lap and lowered yourself down onto his cock.   As you began to bounce on his cock Steve moved up behind you and sat with his legs on either side of you and Bucky.  He kissed your neck and ran his hands over the two of you.  Caressing skin.  Pinching nipples.  He rubbed your clit and massaged Bucky’s base.

You and Bucky kissed as you moved as one.  Your lips moved from lips to neck and back again and the sounds of your moans combined with each other’s and filled the room.

Sweat began to bead your skin as heat flowed through your veins, burning you up from the inside out.  Steve hardened against your back as you moved.  You began to feel fuzzy and high.  Steve’s fingers worked your clit as you bounced faster and faster.  It wasn’t long before you came again, and Bucky broke the kiss with a strained groan, gritting his teeth as he tried not to be dragged along with you.  It was no use though, his hips jerked and he came just after you.

You stayed joined, slowly rolling your hips as his cock emptied.  Steve ghosted his lips up the side of your neck and nipped at your earlobe.  “You up for more?”  He said in a soft growl.

“Mmm… I could go again.”  You hummed.

Three and a half hours the three of you spent switching from one to the other, the only break you got was to rehydrate.  By the time you called defeat you wondered if you were ever going to learn your lesson about trying to keep up with the two super soldiers.

You lay panting on the mattress as Bucky and Steve both lay back, the sweat running down their chests in rivulets.  You cunt ached and your legs felt weak. You had a vague feeling like you should get up and pee.  Get dressed.  Go home.  You didn’t think you’d even be able to get up.  You could barely even think straight.  It was all soft-focused.

You struggled up too sitting and blinked around the room.

“What are you doing, sweetheart?”  Steve asked, putting his hand on your hip.

“Gotta go home,” you mumbled.

“You’re exhausted.  Just stay.”  Steve reassured you.

“Yeah, darlin’, you liked cuddling with us when we were camping,” Bucky added.

“If I sleepover, then they’ll know.”  You tried to reason.

Steve sat up and kissed your shoulder, wrapping his arms around your waist.  “So they know.  We’re adults, we can do what we want.  Now lie down, you’re exhausted.”

You let yourself collapse back down, unable to think of one possible argument.  They both wrapped you in their arms and you were asleep before the blanket was even pulled over you.

// NEXT

[rainbowbrash]

@advtime-theories tagged me in the love yourself challenge a few days ago so i’m gonna go ahead and do it. because i don’t write or do edits often enough to where i have favorites this post is just gonna show my fave drawings of the year. all except the last one of these are ripped from instagram art account which is where i post most of my OC/character design/personal art :^}

1. the first piece i wanna draw attention to is this little birthday cake guy.

i personally really liked doing this one because i went all-out on the lineart. also i’m really intrigued by the concept of characters wearing cakes and elaborate messy foods as hats and this drawing was basically where that niche started for me :^] also i had fun designing this guy’s outfit pattern.

2. the second one is this older one that’s from summer (i think? it’s been a while)...

i really liked this one also because of the line art but also because i had so much fun doing the hair. the problem with drawing in this particular art style for me is that it creates an unpleasant stress on my hand and it loses some of the sensory appeal that usually motivates me to draw. because i did this one so quickly i was able to really get into it without any of that and i really like the finished product

3. the third one is my side of a collab piece i did with a friend of mine of super pochaco and super sonico :^>

this was the first drawing i really started drawing cheek and elbow swirlies in so i more or less view it as a kind of mini-evolution for me. this was also about when i started making trippy colorful backgrounds and adding edited textures/accessories/etc. in which has become a really big staple for me in my digital art now.

4. fourth one isn’t necessarily a finished piece, just nice lines that kinda got me back into the swing of art in the past week or so.

there’s a wish-washy plan to finish this in motion but at the same time i’m just grateful that able to scrape together motivation enough to get past the sketch layer. it’s nothing special, just another gross looking guy with sameface syndrome but i’m happy with it :^]

5. the final one is literally the one i just posted, i.e. the only one drawn using my more messy, scratchy style and the only blog-related art on this list.

i think developing this side art style was a good thing for me. even though i didn’t churn out as much fixation content as i would’ve liked to, being able to take a break from the more thick and tedious lines of my usual art was nice. and as sloppy as it can look sometimes, i really do enjoy the distinctive spottiness of the paint bucket tool and the jagged scribbles of line. the reason i only have one of my lemongrab related arts on here is because to me they all kind of blend together. they basically represent one thing- drawing for pure sensory pleasure. every moment of making this kind of stuff, from the sketch layer to the final product is based purely in me doing what feels good rather than what looks good. and cmon. look at lsp’s little face <:^9

i’m not terribly savvy with any mutuals or friends on here so i don’t really have anybody to tag, but i did enjoy doing this challenge and reflecting a little bit. here’s to yet another year of drawing fucked up goofy looking slobbering sharp-toothed humanoid creatures :^D

[m-ziliak]

Do you have certain materials you prefer? Like a certain type of paper, pens, etc.?

If you’re practicing, use the cheap crap! Use printer paper and ballpoint pens and RoseArt and Reeves! Always practice with the cheap stuff and save the good quality materials for when you know what you’re doing. For stuff I prefer for myself now... Paper. When working in sketchbooks I really like Canson Mix Media. It has some tooth to it and I really like that. I also work a lot with markers and it holds up to them really well. I have Strathmore Mixed Media books, too, but they’re really smooth and I’m not very fond of that. Seems like it would be better for blending, but I always feel like the pencil or ink is going to smear or feather. For comic book paper I really like Canson as well. Doesn’t bleed, doesn’t feather, I just wish it had some more layout markers. (Though I can just do that with a ruler.) Pencils! Been using Prismacolor Col-Erase for a long while now, usually in Light Blue and Carmine Red. Please note that Carmine Red doesn’t erase well and is kinda a pain in the butt. I used to draw in Non-Photo Blue, but it was too light when I was inking and I’d have a hard time seeing my sketch and scanners would still pick it up. If I’m doing warm-ups, thumbnails, or just sketches I’ll use anything. Normal pencils, ball-point pens. Anything. Pens. For inking I usually go for Sakura Micron. Comes in a bunch of sizes and I go through them like candy. They can handle a decent amount of work, have pretty durable nibs as long as you’re not stabbing the paper. I also like their brush pens for filling in. I used to use Copics as well for inking, but they were too expensive to upkeep and I  didn’t really like how they felt. (I had the metal ones that you could refill. Heavy pens.) I also used to use Stabilo and I kinda hated them. Did my first comic with them and it looks like shit. Feels like holding a pencil, though. I might try them again now that I know how to use pens better, but for now I’ll stick with Sakura. Oh! I also use Sakura Gelly Roll for white ink, but I’m not super fond of it. I just need it for fixing mistakes. I’ll look for a better white ink pen later. Markers! If you wanna get into markers, use Ohuhu. They’re cheap, they dry out in a year, and they come in a ton of colors. Good to practice with. Right now I use Copic Sketch and I like them a lot. I have some that have dried out too soon, so I might try to revive them again, but overall I like them. They blend nicely, they don’t usually feather or bleed too bad, they come in a verity of colors. I like them. I’ve also used Faber-Castell, they’re okay. I’m not really fond of them. They never seem to dry out which is nice. Don’t blend very well, but that may just be me. Sharpie I hate. Never got the hang of them. Hate the smell, hate the colors, I don’t like Sharpie. I know other people that can make them work, though, so that’s definitely me. Other art stuff! I use Mod Podge to glue things, usually paper to whatever I messed up on so I can re-draw it. Bad idea. don’t use Mod Podge to glue things. Coloring over it will also make it look weird. Get a quark-back metal ruler. Keeps the ruler from slipping around. I have a cheap glove-thing I got for free when I bought a tablet to cover my hand and keep me from smearing stuff. I used to have a SmudgeGuard brand one, but the elastic gave out on it and for some reason the woman who ran the store didn’t believe I had small hands so she sent me the wrong size with a letter that an adult can’t have hands that size. I may try to sew my own one day. But it does keep the pencil and whatnot from getting messy.  Computer stuff?? For taking photos and posting them to Insta, I use SnapSeed for fixing contrast and white-balance issues and LINE Camera for editing out stuff like eraser dust or little things like that. For digital art I use Photoshop CS6 and a really out-of-date version of GIMP. Like, so old. Super old. I don’t actually have a scanner and haven’t for a long time now, so I can’t really do any digital art. I’d like to get back into it, but I’m also VERY rusty. I never draw digitally and I should really try to get better at that. I want to try out Clip Studio Paint, but that’s a bit expensive for something I don’t know if I’ll like so maybe I’ll use their free trial. Drawing tablets I’ve used have been a Wacom Graphire3. From 2004. It was a good little tablet until it died. I have a little Wacom Intuos. It has a giant scratch on the surface, but it works fine. If I do any digital art, I usually do it with that. I also have a Huion Kamvas GT156HD. I hate it. It worked properly once and never again. The wires are a pain in the ass, setting it up is even MORE of a pain in the ass. It’s constantly running in the background for no reason, the pens can’t hold a charge, and it freaks out if you have drivers for other tablets installed. No matter how many times I uninstall and reinstall drivers it never works right. It’s a pain to change pen settings, I just hate it. Haven’t used it for two years or so, it was a huge waste of money.

[mysticsparklewings]

I will be with You

When you go, just know that I will remember you If living was the hardest part, we'll then one day be together And in the end we'll fall apart, just as the leaves change in color And then I will be with you, I will be there one last time now --My Chemical Romance, "It's Not a Fashion Statement, it's a Deathwish" ____ It's rare that I'm this proud of an artwork I've created. ^_^ Usually, there's some glaring issue or just an assortment of small things I'd still change if I had the patience and/or artistic ability to do it. Or even just some things that I feel like could've been done better, even if I know it did the best I could. This time? No. Not right now, shortly after it's been completed, anyway. I'm sure years down the line from now I'll look back and feel at least slightly different. But as it stands now, while I'm sure it has its faults, I am truly happy and truly proud of what I've created here and whatever faults are there aren't bothering me at all. So what then is this, exactly? This my dear Sparklers is a visual love letter to the band I discovered just a little too late but was still there for me when no one else was all the same. Earlier this month, I uploaded a different piece of art to celebrate the announcement of My Chemical Romance's Return, but even when I uploaded that one I was already thinking of doing another one, this time something that was more obviously fan art. But not just fan art as I've done for them in the past (Exhibit A, Exhibit B, and Exhibit C), but something extra-special and fun. I really did go into creating this wanting it to be as I described it above; a visual love letter to this band that I love so much and could not be happier that they're back. As such, I've squeezed in as many references as I could: 1. The female figure is molded after Helena from the album Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge 2. The male/skeleton figure is supposed to be Pepe (that's what Google said his name was, anyway), the icon and seemingly marching band conductor from The Black Parade album 3. On Pepe's hat, I replaced the usual symbol with the Candle symbol that's been featured in the band's Return artwork 4. They fade into leaves based on the line from It's Not a Fashion Statement, It's a Deathwish (a song from Three Cheers) that I quoted at the top of the description 5. behind them is Party Poison's mask, as featured in the Danger Days music videos 6. on the mask, I replaced one of the black triangle shapes with the hanging man silhouette from I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love 7. The rest of the background is inspired by the covers for the Conventional Weapons releases (which in my mind I count as essentially an unofficial fifth album) (Debatable) 8. Their touching hands could be an indirect reference to the line "And as we're touching hands, and as we're falling down" from Demolition Lovers, a song from Bullets. That's at least one reference each (Three Cheers technically got two) for each of the main releases, plus one directly related to this new era we don't know much about yet. It's not an exhaustive "spot the reference" game, but I'm glad I was able to incorporate as many as I did. Now that I've explained them, maybe I can talk about my process without having to stop to re-explain each reference as they come up.   After some brainstorming, I got this image in my head of Helena and Pepe in this pose (inspired at least partially by this pre-existing fanart I've seen many times before) , which to me is a "renaissance dancing" pose but I'm sure there's some other better way to describe it I haven't thought of. I tried for a very long time to find a reference image of this exact pose to help me get the proportions and general anatomy right within my own stylization, but for the life of me, I couldn't find anything close enough to suit me and I really didn't want to have to settle for something else. As such, I'm sure the proportions and anatomy are off, but even so, I think I did pretty good considering. The main issues I ran into during sketching were mainly balancing the energy between the two characters--which I do think I managed in the end--Helena's skirt, as she's supposed to be holding onto it with that hand you can't see, and Pepe's torso. Originally, I was planning on doing this piece traditionally, but once the sketch was finished it almost immediately clicked into place that I'd be better served to do it digitally, considering what I wanted to do with the mask in the background already, as well as the leaf-fade. (The Conventional Weapons reference hadn't been planned yet, and it was technically only made possible later on by this piece being digital.) Luckily, doing things digitally meant that Pepe's torso was fixed pretty easily. It was too thin in the sketch, but all I had to do was select the right lines and move them out a bit in Photoshop. He's still a bit thin and not super buff, but personally I'm letting that go because...I mean, he's at least part if not all skeleton. If anyone's going to be too thin, wouldn't it make sense that it's him? Helena's skirt I did end up happy within the sketch but...we'll come back to the skirt in a moment. Pepe's...face? looked a bit odd in the sketch, but other than that, once I was happy with that foundation, I scanned it in and got to work on digitizing everything. I went over my lines for Helena and Pepe the way I normally would for something like this if a little intentionally messy instead of trying to get them super clean--as I thought that might be appropriate here--and then I paused with them to work on the mask behind them. The mask admittedly came out very poorly in the sketch, just because I bothered to look up no references for it whatsoever once I decided I was going to make this digital and I knew I could just draw half of it and flip it over. And I'm glad I didn't start trying to follow my sketch lines for it at all because looking up actual references showed me that would've been way off. While I had my reference up, I ended up going in and basically full-coloring and detailing the mask right then. That's the beauty of digital work; a lot of steps can be done basically out of order from how you'd have to do them traditionally and it doesn't matter because you can just move layers around and adjust effects later. I went with this pseudo-soft shading based on the colors and shadows I was seeing in my references, even though I wasn't sure yet exactly how I was going to shade Helena and Pepe. I figured that even if I used a different method for them that I could either go back and adjust the mask as necessary or that it wouldn't matter since the mask was part of the background anyway. Once that was done, I went back to ponder my two figures and the leaf effect that I wanted to do with them. And again, I went a little out of order here, as I ended up filling in the silhouette of Helena and Pepe with a blanket layer of gray so I could see how them blocking the mask was going to look (and I figured based on past experiences I might need the blanket layer in white later). From there, I went into working on the fading-to-leaves effect. My logic was that I'd need mostly the silhouettes of the leaves and then I'd get what I wanted after playing with layer effects or something. This assumption ended up being correct, but we're not there yet. As I worked, I kept looking at my "finished" messy lines. Something just didn't feel right. Honestly, I couldn't tell you where the idea to do this lineless look came from, but it got in my head as I was working and I kept looking at the lines I had and not being happy to just color those in as I normally would, shade it, and call it a day. I tried. I tried really hard to ignore the urge to at least try it and carry on as I was. I'd already come this far, and I'd be done so much faster if I stuck to the plan...But!! Clearly I lost that argument with myself. You know what though? I'm glad I did! I don't think I've ever done lineless art like this before, not counting my watercolor work where that's just part of the process to me. But digital? Certainly not. Human figures? Also no. I've come close in the sense that I've shaded my art before, turned off the line layers before, and thought, "oh hey that almost works without the lines because of the shading,"  but not much farther than that. Naturally, I wasn't even sure how or where to begin, so I went with what came naturally to me. I started by just filling in the lines as I normally would have, and then I went back layer by layer and went back and forth between having the line layer (with the opacity brought down somewhat already so I could sort of see what I was doing) on and off to try and balance the shapes between what they looked like with and without the lines. It's weird because if you ever try this, it's a little like having to figure out a bunch of individual silhouettes that make one whole one, except you need them to be a little more defined if you want them to make visual sense. That step and the next one, the shading, are tied in my mind for which one took me the longest. For the shading, I really just went in blind, using hard-edge cell shading, though originally I planning to come back with some soft shading in certain areas later. The soft shading ended up not happening partly because I liked it much better than I thought I would without it, and I thought the hard-edge shading made the figures pop a little more compared to the background. The thing about this was the same issue I run into with my lines nowadays; to get smooth shapes I spend a while going back and forth between putting color down and erasing it, and sometimes undoing and redoing the same line a dozen times to get it right in one stroke. But that's really my own fault for being stubborn and trying to work solely within Photoshop and not use other programs, as I know good and well I'd have less of that issue if I'd hop into Paint Tool Sai and use the linework layers in there. What can I say? I live up to my Capricorn sign by being as stubborn as a goat. Anyway. The biggest challenge to figure out the shading for was Helena's skirt. I think I would've still had issues with that though even if I colored and shaded my normal way, with the lines and everything. It's just the position it's in that complicates things. I actually did a good amount of shading in reverse here, where I'd make the base layer the shadow color and then the layer on top would be the regular color, as in some cases it just seemed easier to do that than the other way around. The part of Helena's dress around the top, for example. Or Pepe's pants (what little you can see of them). Additionally, I ended up leaving the feather attached to Pepe's hat alone and not really smoothing it out, as I thought the roughness and inconsistencies worked really well to make it seem more feathery. With enough patience and persistence and much back and forth among the various layers, I made it through all of that. I was a little concerned at first about some of my color choices and if the shading was too harsh in some places or not, but I mellowed out as I worked and ended up not making make adjustments after the fact. For instance, originally I thought I'd go back and make Pepe's...skin? closer to a true white and this fleshy off-white color was more of a placeholder, but the longer I worked with it, the more I didn't want to change it. It actually makes sense, given that his hands are normal (as they are presented in official artwork and other fan art not made by me) and that bones usually are naturally more of an off-white color. And I also think it just looks really good next to Helena's pale skin. The hands were a special challenge in regards to both shading and coloring, as hands like to be the more complicated part of a drawing more often than not, but even that I managed to get through with a lot more ease than I would've bet on. The other thing about that is that I was surprised once I got through the steps at how much better Pepe's face looked in comparison to the rest of the drawing. As I mentioned before, it looked odd in the sketch. But one I had most of the colors for him and Helena filled in digitally, the contrast or something just made it look infinitely better. (Combined with a hefty dose of earlier back-and-forth making adjustments to his jawbone area.) Originally, I thought I might use the same cell shading for Helena's eyeshadow. However, while I was still thinking of adding some selective soft shading, I added it using one of the brushes I'd used on the mask earlier. It looked so good to me that even after I tried added the soft shading with it like I planned and decided I didn't want/need it anywhere else, I kept it. And for the record, Helena's hair is kind of the wrong texture (it's officially more straight than this) and she's missing this little netted veil thing she's supposed to have, but I had a very specific vision in mind, so those were the two creative liberties I took with her design. I say it's fair game since I took a liberty with Pepe's hat to get the Return reference in. And besides, those two details being off doesn't make her totally unrecognizable if you know who Helena is in the first place. Once they were done, I spent longer than I bothered to document playing with the leaf layer I'd made earlier to try and figure out how to get the effect I wanted. Sparing you the boring details of my trial error, as I'm sure this description will be long enough without them, I eventually determined the best thing to do was to have one layer of the leaves on top set as an "overlay" layer, and another behind/beneath Helena and Pepe. Then I went back and extended my color and shading layers to extend down over the leaves, and I arranged and clipped the layers accordingly. Technically, the overlay layer wasn't necessary, but it added a little extra dimension that I really liked. By that point, it was my second day of working digitally and getting late, but I had to do one more thing before I could go to bed with my mind at ease that night. With Helena and Pepe done, I turned the mask back on (I'd turned it off so I could focus on them without it distracting me or otherwise getting in the way) and I felt like they weren't standing out enough against it. The bright yellow color was competing too much for my eyes' attention. So, after trying the "stroke" blending option in white and that looking God-awful, I added a new layer between them and the mask and manually gave them a white outline. It wasn't a perfect solution, and I knew that even then, but it was enough that I could sleep soundly knowing how far I'd gotten with the artwork. The next day I had to take a break from working on this to bust out a painting for the challenge I decided to take on this month, but I went back to this as soon as I could after that was taken care of. When I came back to it, I acknowledged that I technically could've left it as it was and call it finished. But I still didn't like how obnoxious the mask seemed for a background piece and it felt...I don't know. Almost hollow, in a way. It was a cool graphic, sure, but I wanting something more than that. Again, I'll spare you most of the nitty-gritty details. But long story short, I played around with layer effects and filters for a while until I had blurred the mask out just enough that it wasn't so obnoxious but also so looking at it directly didn't make me nauseous, and the edges were softened so it felt more like a true background piece and not just an accessory that had been plastered carelessly back there. It was only after I started saving off versions with different backgrounds--one with no background, one with white, one with black--that I realized I was missing a golden (semi pun intended) opportunity to incorporate a Conventional Weapons reference/allusion. Which was exciting because I'd previously been disappointed that I couldn't think of a good way to do that. I went back and forth on layer styles and adding texture with brushes and things for a while on that too, but you can see what I ultimately settled on. It's not a 1:1 to the CW covers, but I'm really pleased with it anyway. I did end up adding a bit more to the white outline in a few places and adding a drop shadow to Helena and Pepe so they'd pop a bit more (it almost makes them look like paper cutouts to me!), but really the only other thing I had to do after that was add my watermark. It took roughly 3 days of work from start to finish, but I was honestly surprised by how fairly smooth the process went. Especially considering the new things I'd tried along the way. I can only assume it's because of just how much my heart was really into making this piece. As I said before, I am truly proud of how this piece turned out. I love it. I love it, and I love the band that inspired its creation. Even the title says a lot here, I think. I picked this line that's repeated at the end of It's Not a Fashion Statement, It's a Deathwish, as it was a leading inspiration with the leaves and everything, and after looking at the lyrics I realized how fitting that line is for this. I discovered My Chemical Romance two years too late, two years after they broke up in 2013, but I've stuck by them ever since, and I will continue to do so, with whatever the unwritten future holds. They've changed, as anyone would over the course of six years, but they came back anyway. Even if it's just for a few shows and they're gone again. Or if it's going to be so much more than that. They. Came. Back. And that's not an easy thing to do a lot of the time. And so, I show my solidarity. I will be with you, MCR, no matter what comes next. You were there for me, and now it's my turn to be there for you, even if it as just another fan among the crowd. And that's really all I have to say on the matter. ____ Artwork © me, MysticSparkleWings ____ Where to find me & my artwork: My Website | Commission Info + Prices | Ko-Fi | dA Print Shop | RedBubble |   Twitter | Tumblr | Instagram

[dotzines]

Artist spotlight: Lunarin-Arts!

✿ Commissions ✿ Instagram ✿ DeviantArt ✿ Twitter ✿ Tumblr

Header source: [X]  

Introduce yourself I am Lonneke! But online I prefer going by the name Rumii. I am currently 20 years old and I live in the Netherlands. In my spare time I like drawing (of course), Cosplaying and Gaming. I used to be really into anime, And I still have favourites like Kamisama hajimemashita, Black butler and hetalia. But right now I am more of an artist/ gamer. In which I play alot of Overwatch, which would be my main fandom. and Story rich games like NieR; Automata. I love meeting new people, and especially other artists. Even though I tend to be a bit shy at first //especially in large groups Nonetheless I hope we can get along!! And Im very excited to try out zines. as I have never done them before. When did you start drawing? Are you a digital or traditional artist? I started drawing in last grade of primary school, so around the age of 11/12. I primarily started out traditionally, but quickly picked up on digital art. Mainly using MS Paint when I just started out. Next thing I know I had a drawing tablet and extensively used Paint tool SAI. So I would say I am a digital artist. Though I do traditional as well, but I don't upload traditional art as much.  Do you use any traditional mediums? If so, which are your favorites? I have! for traditional work I just use whatever pencils I have around for sketching. Micron fineliners for Linearting. I don't color my works often, but have started getting some copic markers, pro markers and twin markers to try out. I like using the copic markers alot, they are very expensive.. but I can just feel how much better the quality is compared to my other markers.

image source: [X]   Why do you prefer traditional over digital? (or viceversa) I highly prefer digital, mainly because it's way more easy to manipulate your works, edit any smaller mistakes without having to draw them over again. and from lineart on, nothing you do is permanent. Plus I can use way more colors than I can on traditional mediums right now. What do you think is the most challenging part about being a traditional/digital artist? I think the biggest challenges for me were getting accustomed to my drawing tablet. I mean it really takes some time to get used to the pressure, and it really feels different than draiwng directly on paper. and after that getting familiar with the drawing programs. I just switched programs again and I am still figuring out all the tools. So even though I think digital mediums make things alot more easy, it takes a long time to get everything out of it. even years later you can discover a function you never knew of. which will elevate your art even more. What inspires your pieces? I take inspiration from various places, I like doing challenges, or just fanart. but also alot from music. it can get me into a certain mood or I can just see a piece that fits with the music. and then try sketching it out while listening to this song. I also like looking around for special things like 'mermay' for example. Look at the themes and just try to imagine what kind of piece I can do with that.

image source: [X]   Explain your "everyday" drawing process I kinda take I gotta explain how I get through an artwork? well, first of course I try to find my inspiration. Or I already have a vague idea of what I want to do. And I make a super super rough sketch. then I go over it and add slightly more details. My sketches are still usually very messy. but I love that when I lineart I can make everything pretty and detailed. and it looks better compared to the sketch. Which is obviously my next step. After that I lay down base coloring in seperate layers. Always starting with skincolor > Haircolor > eyes > bigger parts of clothes > smaller parts of clothes > details If I have background I try to go with the biggest parts like the sky or ground or whatever first. and move up from bigger to smaller things pretty much. I work very organized so I always have my layers in different maps. Usually one for each character, and for the entire BG. sometimes also different ones for different parts of the background. so it's easy to find back if I have to fix something in a certain part of my artwork. Besides this I also sometimes do more painted works, I have only done those in portraits so far. But in those I made the sketch > put colors below it > merge layers > start the shading part by part on top of it. usually working back to front on which colors overlap eachother Do you have an artist you admire (or more than one)?

I have a few people I know that inspire me, like Chance-To-Draw on DA ( https://www.deviantart.com/chance-to-draw ) And my best friend of mine who doesn't really upload her works anywhere anymore ;;-;; So I can only admire her through our discord server >< I also love Lord_Gris (https://www.instagram.com/lord_gris/) alot! And Rosuuri (https://www.instagram.com/rosuuriart/) ofc those are a few well-known artists. I follow alot more people with amazing art but gosh I can't possibly list all of them here >< I just like seeing a variety of different art styles and OC's Is there an artwork you are most proud of? Why? Right now I'd say this one; http://fav.me/dd4acw5 I just..love how the coloring turned out. this was a really hard painted piece to do aaa >< especially her hair. But Im just so happy with it! I really feel like I have been improving my coloring again lately and I can't get enough of it jgkdhf

Do you listen to music (or tv shows/films/anything else) when drawing? YEees, I listen to vocaloid covers alot, actually. also covers from other things. just..alot of covers. or original fanbase songs ahah A few examples here; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwMZhdyZHVI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNoy_b_JYU0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPMhkIiapIA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPw-0vctJJQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Tr014nQ4pk

image source: [X]   What makes art interesting for you? For me it started alot as a way to vent my emotions. It calms me down to draw when I am sad, angry or happy even. I love being able to look back and see the improvement. and know that in 2 years I will once again look back at the stuff I am currently very proud of. and know I can already do so much better than that! This is really what keeps it interesting to me, I think. What do you do when art block strikes? //Cry// Jk, To be honest. I either try to break through and search for any inspiration. Or I just call it a day and go game or listen to music. In the last 1.5/2 years I have had a massive art block. I was dissapointed in my own art. didn't know what to draw anymore. and didn't see the point of continuing. Just recently I found a new art program. which in this case helped me get out of this huge slump. and I'm ready to be a bit more active. and get into new projects and broaden my horizon's in general What’s the most valuable art advice you’ve ever received?

Well, I haven't asked for alot of advice before. but a while ago I sortof got the advice to use references more often. After which I feel alot less afraid to do so. and feel like my works are getting alot better. and I find it easier to start on things after searching for pose or background refs

[zitavoros]

digital drawing tutorial

I wanted to make a quick overview of how I make some of my artwork! With digital art, I work in Photoshop, so any reference to technical tools are through there. These steps obviously vary piece by piece, but with digital works the following is usually what I do to make a drawing complete. I drew up a quick doodle for this tutorial to replicate the process so I can show you all how a fast piece comes together! 

1. Sketch

Sketching is where all pieces usually start, unless you’re some magician and can just create art just by drawing out of nowhere (I’ve seen it happen). For this piece, I went on some figure drawing websites and just doodled some pretty girls until I filled the whole screen. I highly recommend this, it’s a lot of fun. 

Feel free to be messy, sketchy, and loose with these drawings. This is the part where it’s just a sketch- not a finished piece! Not all of my sketches look great, but some do! Digital work is a lot more lenient than traditional art as well, so don’t feel too stressed if sketching is difficult. 

2. Clean up line art

After sketching, regardless of whether or not I’m using the line art in the end, I straighten out my line art. In this piece I decided to keep using it, but in a lot of my other pieces I ditch it to give it a more flat, “cutesy” look with just blocked colours. For this step I like to use a colour that’s a shade darker than the background. 

3. Block in colours

This is where you just push in all the flat colours so that you have a rough idea of what the final piece will look like! This is also the step at which I would get rid of the line art by cleaning up the colours, if I chose to go that style. Working with line art is a lot easier though, since your colour edges don’t have to be perfect. I always go lighter/less saturated than I intend to, because colour correcting with adjustment layers is a lot easier with going darker (and looks better) than it is to look lighter (in my opinion). 

I do this with the lineart as well, changing the layer mode to not be a dark magenta (this one I swapped to Luminosity, so it reflected the skin tones a bit more). 

4. Add textures, patterns, and colour correct! 

Add some depth by using colour in cheeks, adding shadows, making the eyes darker! I also added patterns on some of the shirts- flat patterns, no need to get fancy unless you want to. For quick works, flat patterns work great! It makes it look like you’ve done a lot more work than you actually did. 

I also go in with a layer adjustment mask and amp up a little on saturation and contrast to make the subjects pop a little more. 

5. Add a simple background if you want, toss on your signature, and export! 

When I make artwork with complex backgrounds, I start with the background first. With simple drawings that are less drawing-intensive, a simple background with a pattern brush works just as well, or even just a rectangle! It gives a little more pizazz and depth without really taking away from the drawing. I preferred this drawing without a background, but experimenting is a huge part of the ride!

Finally, don’t forget to add your signature or artist mark. This is super important! Mine has changed a lot over the years, and I enjoy seeing how everything from my style to my sign improves over the years. 

Hope you all enjoyed this, or at least found it a little helpful! 

[unproduciblesmackdown]

i've said how it's occurred to me that the idea of "don't compare other people's art to your own" (which you do most of the time anyways even tho you know the reasons you shouldn't) can apply also to like, comparing how people relate to their art and what they expect of it and want from it, vs what you do. and i also make that comparison anyhow even though there's no reason to, and so i'll see some convo on twitter or something & get all somewhat frustrated or riled up coz i'm like, that's not me. so anyhow

i talked too much about the sink and now i'm trying to remember what my thoughts were that i was meaning to put here. i guess i was thinking first that it was weird to see a conversation about people being able to make money off their art, which is like, it's great of course when people who want to do that, can. but it's strange i guess because for me i've never drawn with the idea that it was what i "wanted to do" as a sort of career thing. and to get the full picture, i never had or have had anything solid i felt i wanted to do as sort of a career. that's just not how it goes for me. but it's odd because i've been drawing for ages and i've gone to classes outside of school for a good while and i did some classes in college and stuff, but mostly got kind of re-into drawing a while ago and started drawing more just on my own, not for any classes or anything, and have largely been self-taught in that way. and i don't mind the busy-work aspect of it, or spending 8+ hours on something in one sitting, or any of that, so it would seem to make sense like, oh this is your passion and what you're good at and so this should be your job. but, well firstly i don't think that the world of what a person does to make money is inherently meant to be the same as whatever their passion is. but also i don't even consider drawing or art in itself to be a passion, maybe an interest, but not really. it's what i'm drawing, which is gay shit—if i don't have something i want to draw into existence, i don't draw the way you should to just practice or create or something. and i Get all that about myself, but i suppose when the subject of being an artist as your job comes up, i have to feel defensive even if nobody's talking to me

i mean, there are reasons i've never felt it was something i would or could get money out of. mainly it's that really, i don't make art unless it's to make exactly the picture i want to see, which as you might know tends to be very specific and personalized exactly to what i want to make. as though nobody else does, i know, but the thing is that if i'm not drawing exactly what i want, i'm not drawing at all. back before i realized this about myself, i'd once or twice told a friend i could draw something for them, and fully expected and intended to, but of course never did because i just couldn't make myself even start. i can't do the sitting there for ten hours without tiring of it or enjoying the busy work or monotony or anything like that. i can't even put a pencil to paper or get my brain to start planning it out. it's why i tell people who ask that i don't do requests or commissions, it's only once in the bluest moon that i manage to even do it for friends. i sort of half-assed a bday card once and then some of my family got the idea that i ought to draw cards for relatives or something, my grandma told like a small child that i'd draw something for her, i started to lose my temper about it really fast which was an especial effort in that scenario, as the fallout for standing up for yourself could be pretty severe. but it was just that, that i can't even force myself to do it more than a handful of times, and those few times are miserable.

so what i'm getting at is that i genuinely really can't draw hardly beyond my niche fanart for myself. the whole thing just shuts down really fast. and for whatever reason, i'm 0% a creative person when it comes to stuff like making up my own stories, i can't even do that if i try. so i can't really draw things other people ask me to, and i've never wanted to use my art to make my own x y or z. i didn't even hardly want to draw before i realized i could make gay fanart for my blog, and as you can tell my ambitions for my ability to draw have never changed.

i don't know, i've supposed i could do illustrative art, but when i imagine it i know i'm mostly thinking about it in terms of "what if i was asked to draw this thing that would seem already slightly interesting to draw" and of course that wouldn't always be the case. plus, i have no experience, and also i'm lousy with traditional media, and also digital media. i only give myself an office pen and a cheap barnes and noble sketchbook because thats all i need, and i don't have the talent to get the quality out of quality art supplies and stuff. like, sure, copics would be fun, but i'm crap at inking linework, so that's out. and bad at choosing colors. so nah. and anyhow i can't even think of any other "job" sort of application

another problem is the true horror of how i can't draw anything in like less than a couple of hours, and even my fancier drawings are fairly simple and still take me hours upon hours or multiple days or even weeks. and i'm really inconsistent with output, i have "bad" periods where i just can't even meet my own standards, and i can't even get anything out of a few hours of effort. plus, my drawing process is lousy and counterproductive. i get too caught up in details before i've done the simpler planning stuff. and my focus is terrible, too, and i have to sort of have a set "distraction" like music or a podcast or a show to at least hold my wandering attention sort of nearby. even being aware of this sort of stuff doesn't fix it; my head just isn't good for getting stuff done quickly. i'm sure i couldn't work fast enough for anyone on anything

plus, my sketching is lousy. i have to clean stuff up too much, in part because i just like details too much a lot of the time. but just moreso, some people's sketches look really good you know? it's not clean or fancy or whatever but you can just tell it has life and it holds their style, because they're good at their linework. it's hard to make good "messy" drawings and people that can are just really good in general. i'm not good enough to draw fast, and my slow drawings are ludicrously slow. r.i.p.

i'm just not that good, either. in addition to having no experience with most mediums or with doing "projects" or with doing anything job-related or part of a group work or anything useful to anyone or applicable at all, i know that in my sheer drawing ability, i could say i'm middling, or probably middling-bad. and within the stuff i do, i have a lot of weak points, elements i don't practice as much & can only say i'm barely adequate or still just bad at. i'm not about to be competitive about what i can provide. and i'm inconsistent as fuck still, its like i'm always changing my ideas about how i draw certain things, or going through those "bad" periods where i forget how to draw somehow. frustrating. and not useful for work

anyhow then i have to think about what the value of it is. because while i've never exactly had ambitions about my art or considered it any more important that the one purpose it has, which is to draw the content i myself want to see. but thats not useless or anything. it entertains me and gives me something i feel i can do, and then when i've made something, it fulfils that purpose in that i get to look at it and have it exist. and if i'm lucky, someone who happens to want to look at it too in the same way i do will get to find it. i like to know that i'm providing that too for a handful of people who happen to have that exact same rando niche taste as i do. and of course i really value anyone saying stuff they like about what i make. i do put a good amt of feeling or meaning into a decent number of things, and some feeling into basically everything, so in that way everything is important to me and its meaningful to get compliments about it or people saying they enjoy it or caught that feeling i'd put in or whatever. i don't need to feel that it's super impactful or lasting or significant. i mean, i don't even like to call my art "art," because it feels so disconnected to a lot of concepts tied to that concept.

it reminds me too that i've gotten a lot of value in my life from the less "ambitious" or life-changing work that other people have done. like, not that anything isn't life-changing, but not a huge project that's intending to be a masterpiece or super serious and deeply meaningful or all-encompassing or whatever. how much mileage i got out out of mh, a youtube video series made by college students who just felt like it and it wasn't anything formal and it wasn't anything not Internet Horror Genre but i looked forward to those videos every week, i liked to spend time analyzing them and making diagrams and trying to guess where things were going, i liked to talk and joke about it. the pals i made from other people who liked it were some of the first people to talk to me even nearly that much and were people i could talk to during really shitty times when i didn't feel like i had any support. mh gave me something to look forward to on a scale of not only day to day or week to week but also month to month to year to year. during some really shit years. i had fun and i had stuff to be happy about, and its still really important to me. and it was always just some amateur people's spare-time project where with $20 and a forest or abandoned building they made something for their youtube channel. not that i'm saying marble hornets isn't super high quality and recognized as such because it absolutely is. i'm just saying that on paper it doesn't exactly sound "lofty."

thats always the stuff thats been most important to me anyways, and sometimes i'll see people who make exactly the kind of projects as the things i've always been enjoying, and they'll talk about feeling like they're not complete without that "big" project that's really signicant or something and really meaningful to people. and i absolutely get that people's goals should be whatever they are and they can strive for whatever they want, but it tends to make me feel kinda bad. as if that stuff they're doing now, the family of stuff that's what has the most value for me, isn't the important or meaningful stuff or otherwise not good enough. i don't know. so i tend to be aware that i don't think stuff that looks fancy or polished or that has any form more permanent than a png file on one specific website is inherently without value. i don't mind if people only get a little enjoyment out of my stuff. it's not that life and death important to me either. like, i don't mind if i don't make anything that anyone remembers all their life; if it dies with me and gets totally buried just a little while later and largely nobody thinks about it ever again. it's just more of an in the moment thing, if someone gets a small moment of enjoyment and moves on, that's totally fine

and really the more behind the scenes mechanics that you need to make money off anything you do is another reason i don't see myself ever being any kind of artist as a job. i already said i really can't be competitive about it, i'm just not organized, i'm not willing to push about anything or advocate for myself or any of that stuff. maybe someone would read all this and say well it's just excuses and if they would just motivate themselves they could do all of it or something, and if you do think it's just my faults and shortcomings then? ok. i won't stop you from thinking that. whether that's true or not, what difference does it make to me or what i do or don't do.

and also i just think that stuff you do that doesn't make money or doesn't even have an apparent usefulness to anyone doesn't mean it doesn't have value or isn't a skill.

anyhow, that's some ways i think about drawing when i have to think of why i don't intend or believe myself capable of using my drawing to get that cash. it's not a blow to me on account of i'm not a person who had/has dreams/goals/ambitions etc. i just get defensive about everything b/c i'm too used to being attacked. it wasn't relevant to the stuff here but i did once have to try explaining why i, with literally like minimal photoshop experience and nothing else, couldn't reasonably apply to a graphic website design position for a decent-sized company with an intl customer base. couldn't get my mom to believe i couldn't argue to them that i could learn digital art and vector art and website design and coding and photoshop and other platforms all in the course of several weeks or even a month or two, if i tried hard enough. it just goes to show that for every topic, i have a ridiculous story about my parents for it.

anyways, that's why i don't strive at all for any career position related to art and yet why i feel i have to argue for why i don't. useless or unimportant stuff is alright too. whats it to the world if one person's passable drawing abilities don't reach the loftiest imaginable potential and rake in the dough for life? the answer is: nothing

[beedalee]

Bee’s Modest Art Arsenal

I made a comprehensive list of all the stuff I typically use to make art as of right now. It’s not meant to be an end-all-be-all for art supplies by any means, just... stuff I like! And it’s largely affordable whenever possible, yay!!! Some of my favorite art products I find completely on accident or in unlikely places so never be afraid to give it a shot if it calls to you! My list is under the cut, and ofc, all photos are not mine and used purely for educational purposes.

Paper & Sketchbooks

Printer paper (the cheapest kind anyway) is absolutely fine if it’s what’s accessible and convenient, especially if you’re just doing warmups and concepts! I like to keep paper and recycle it in some way too- and some printer/junkmail paper is REALLY nice!! Typically though I prefer bound sketchbooks to keep track of my growth better. I seek specific textures and weights that are better suited to more aggressive mediums, like watercolor and marker. Printer paper is flimsy and really only for dry media!

So for more experimental mixed medium drawing, like markers, paint, watercolor, heavy inks, scrap-booking and collage stuff, I own these:

Shown above are: Strathmore Mixed Media 400 series, Canson XL watercolor paper, Canson XL mixed media paper. Each pad was between 5-9 dollars depending on the size you want, and you can find these at many stores; Joann’s, Micheal’s, Walmart, Staples, etc.

As for sketchbooks- I don’t swear by a brand but here’s what I look for: I prefer wire bound or coptic binding, because both allow the book to lay flat (unlike classic “book” case binding) Also, texture is veeeery important to me! I like very smooth bright white paper that isn’t too thin for sketching and inking. It’s a small personal thing, but because I’m left handed, the more textured paper is the more I smudge it to hell and back. (;￣ー￣川

Pencils & Erasers

For general sketching, I prefer mechanical pencils (but I always keep some wooden pencils around too just in case I need something softer) I’ll use just about any brand or size lead, but my personal favorite is 0.5mm lead, and comfort grips are essential for your artist’s finger bump!!! The two pencils I use the most are a Bic Velocity and Pentel whose label has been smudged off... but again, ANY brand is seriously fine. Some people like standard .7 or even .9 could be good for you if you’re prone to breaking lead!

(Disclaimer: I have virtually no experience with those fancy different lead size HB wood pencils because it smudges so i don’t want it.... (ʘ‿ʘ);;; )

Red and blue sketching pencils are useful because when you scan it, you have the option of editing out JUST the blue or red channel in your art program, leaving only the refined sketch or inks. If you don’t have easy access to an art store that carries these kinds (or just love rainbows like me) use erasable colored pencils for more or less the same effect.

95% of the time, I don’t trust erasers on the tip of any pencil. Ever. My family has a bad habit of hoarding pencils for years or buying cheap ones with cute prints, so the erasers ALWAYS suck. Instead, I use an entirely separate selection of erasers. 

Shown above are Faber-Castell eraser 3pack, Prismacolor kneaded rubber, and Pentel’s hi-polymer eraser. They’re relatively easy to find, though Pentel’s may be the easiest in a pinch, and you get a bunch for a low price!  Those pointy pencil topper erasers work as well if you want something smaller tho!

Kneaded rubber is really useful if not making a eraser crumb mess is very important to you or your work, effective and very gentle. (and gross looking after a while... like a grey poo... but it’s fun to play with?) I always have a big fat eraser like these around for erasing large areas- I prefer them a LOT over pink erasers, which occasionally do the dreaded smudge or dry out. and then smudge. HHNGGH

Pictured above are Papermate TUFF STUFF eraser stick (and a refill), Pentel’s Clic Eraser, and Clic Eraser refills. The refills are almost always exactly next to the product itself.

So you have a big eraser! But for detail work and hard to reach spaces, that fat nub might make you want to pull your hair out as you accidentally erase the face you spent 15 minutes perfecting. These are probably one of my favorite tools, and I’ve used them since I was 14! Pentel’s eraser is great for moderate to fine detailing, and then I recently found Papermate’s at a Dick Blick. It may be the most elusive (I mean.. we have the internet now so...) but it’s INCREDIBLE for detail erasing. I’m super finicky about precision, so these are heavenly for me.

Pens & Markers

For inking and lining, I turn to these! They’re pretty accessible in many stores now-a-days (Sakura used to be so hard to find). Shown here are Sakura Micron Pigma 8 pack and Staedtler Pigment Liner 4pack. Staedler was my first baby-bee brand and the quality is still good, even if I prefer Sakura now because of the wide variety of nib sizes. You can also find Sakura in singles in art stores like DickBlick or Jerry’s Artarama probably! Liners are waterproof and archival, and take a lot of punishment under wet media or on top (though I’d always encourage letting it dry first.)

Shown above are Sakura Micron Gelly Roll Metallic and Classic White Gel Pens! Gel pens were a super cool fad back in the 2000s for me but now they actually serve a REALLY handy purpose. You could use them to highlight or detail just about anything, but I especially find the metalic and white gelpens very useful. The metals are great to add a bit of bling to a drawing, shine your rendered metal, or just add sparkles. ✧☆✧ (و｡･｀ω´･｡)و  The white is GREAT for tan, gray, or black paper- or to highlight areas in hair or eyes- AND to white out small oopsies without having to use actual white out. I highly recommend getting a 3 pack of these guys!

I also recommend ballpoint pens. Yes, those random ones all over your house, given out for free at banks or offices- any old ballpoint pen (that isn’t on the verge of dying.) The difference between sketching in pencil, inking art, and using pen is that ballpoint pen is all the permanence without the refinement of inking. I looove using ballpoint to sketch messy stuff, to mess up and start over. plus, it also comes in a billion colors, and you don’t feel bad writing with them normally or losing them when you travel. It isn’t waterproof so it will bleed if you put marker or watercolor on it, but... sometimes i do it anyway! 8) 

I currently use Spectrum Noir and Prismacolor Alcohol markers. SN are in packs of 6 for 14.99, but if you’re like me, a joann’s 50% off coupon can net these sets for 7.50 apiece. I got the prismacolor 12 pack for my birthday, and I like to collect a few certain colors on occasion, but the money saved on the SN makes that splurge possible. I think the quality is really great for the price, even if I am still pretty novice at marker coloring. I write a bit more about these here!

Digital Art Tools

10x6.25 in Monoprice Tablet (and some AAA batteries) (You can probably find bigger or more updated models for the same price by now, as well.)

Love this tablet! REALLY affordable (70-80) and such a trooper- I’ve battered this thing with water and heat and cold and it’s still as resilient as ever. I think I’ve changed the single AAA battery in my pen like... 3 times max in the 4-5 years I’ve owned it. I’ve disabled the “close window” hotkey (bc I’m LEFT HANDED AND HIT IT ALL THE TIME) but otherwise it’s a really great tablet, does exactly what it should. Works with windows 7 well, but I can’t give a review of it on any other OS.  More about it here.

I use Easy Paint Tool Sai and Photoshop 7 for text/editing (though I’d like to upgrade to CS2 in the future), but free/purchased art programs are vast and endless, so it’s really up to your personal taste... and this post is already long enough!

So, that’s about it for now! Those are all the essentials I like at the moment- everything else is experimental, which is always encouraged!!! Expand your horizons!! Have fun!! Go draw a thing!

[mimiriiu]

any tips for a person starting digital art and things?

Of course! I’m very honored that you asked!

First you’d need a drawing tablet, I recommend a wacom intuos (this is what i use, but there are many other drawing tablets out there. Wacom in general is a good company to buy from.)

As for drawing programs, at the moment I’m using Krita, but FireAlpaca is a good alternative. Photoshop you would have to pay for but I wouldn’t advise using it as a beginner, the program itself is pretty complex. Paint SAI is another alternative usually you’d have to pay for it, but it’s easiest to download a cracked version.

Be patient with what you draw, even professionals struggle.

Use references and get some advice from friends! AKA constructive criticism

Watch other artists draw; I believe they’re called speedpainting. They may be boring but if you see their process it may help you out in the long run. Analyzing your favorite artists work and trying to copy it is fine as well! You probably don’t want to post that though, but it is certainly good practice.

Be sure to not kill your back or shoulders, stretch every once in a while and take a break or you’ll end up feeling really old (if you aren’t already)

Don’t spend a lot of time on sketching! It’s perfectly okay if it’s super messy, you can always improvise with it later

There are many different types of art forms and media, don’t be afraid to try them all! 

Draw what you want, there’s no limit to your imagination

You probably won’t get a lot of recognition at first, but it’s just like making gifs! You get better as you keep creating new content. Someone out there is sure to enjoy your work. Don’t let it discourage you. 

If someone sends you hate mail I’ll attack them with the rage of a thousand angry swans

[blackthornass]

Do you have any art tips?

Uhhhhhh Funk im not The Greatest Artist ™ but I’ll try to bestow some Wisdom on you. Keep in mind Art is Subjective and I’m no expert and all that so take everything with a grain of salt but that being said I’ll try to give u Tips and Tricks

-listen so if you have a boring class at school just draw in it. School is great because you have 1. Access to paper at all times 2. Incredibly boring lectures. If you have a study hall that’s the Drawing JACKPOT. Basically what I’m saying is practice all the time when you have energy but like that’s such boring art advice. It’s important but “practice! uwu” is like what people with Natural Art Talent say when they didn’t have to figure everything out from the ground up so it’s kind of aggravating

-There’s gonna be people better than you. Chances are you have a friend who’s better than you because this is Tumblr we all draw. Try Not To Compare Yourself ™ which idk how to do but it’s bad don’t do it

-unless you find a terrible person with worse art than you in which case FUCK DUDE COMPARE YOURSELF TO THEM! THEYRE HORRIBLE AND THEY CANT DRAW FOR SHIT LOOK WHOS LAUGHING NOW!

-“work until your idols become your rivals” is absolute bullshit because your idols are working at it at the same time you are. You fool. You imbecile. I feel like this works better for writing when your idols can become irrelevant or straight up die between you being an aspiring author 8 year old and a tired 30 year old who just wrote The Great American Novel ™ or just kind of. Leave the fandom if you’re writing fanfic. Anyway

-ok that’s all the preachy shit, time for Real Art Advice ™. Keep in mind I do digital cartoony shit with Strong Lineart and cel shading for the most part and I pretty much only draw people so my knowledge is limited to that. if you wanna be a professional artist maybe do other things and Expand your Abilities ™

-Ok first off if you’re using Gimp or Photoshop please love yourself and download Firealpaca or illegally torrent Paint Tool Sai or something. I swear by Firealpaca it cured my depression but like. Photoshop is Trash for drawing. Get Firealpaca it has Line Correction ™

-Keep Line Correction ™ at like. A 5 when you’re sketching and at a 19 (the maximum) when you’re lining, coloring, shading, highlighting, doing literally anything that isn’t sketching

-Sketching digitally can be hard if you’re used to sketching on paper and I find it easier to do a sketch on paper, take a picture of it on my phone or scan it, and line/color it digitally. You do you and figure out what works best

-speaking of which I refused to use sketchbooks until I was Worthy ™ of not drawing on notebook paper and uhhhhhh that’s dumb just get a sketchbook they cost a little more than a notebook at Target it’s not super expensive. Although if you’re not financially in the position to buy a sketchbook anyway, just hoard notebooks from school that you didn’t use much. Bam, that’s your new sketchbook

-the Head Circle Cross Thing and the Spheres For Shoulder, Elbow, and Wrist Thing are good and important and will save you

-hands are hard so use references but bullshit your way through it. eventually they’ll look good (I haven’t gotten there yet)

-HAVE FUN WITH NOSES OH MY GOD. Noses are super fun and cool because there’s, like, infinite variety with them, they can be as long or short, thin or thick, rounded or pointy as you want, you can make them be, like, triangles or circles or more squareish or diamond-shaped, the base of the nose can be about as high or as low on the face as you want, you can make the nostrils prominent or not really there at all, they can add another Layer to a character’s design, oh my goodness noses are so fun. They’re like, severely underrated and oh my god I could gush about how fucking fun noses are

-same with facial expressions. Where you put the pupils and how big they are, how much of the eye is covered by eyelids, the way the eyebrows are, the mouth, tons of other shit. There’s loads of variety and so much you can do and honestly having fun with the facial expression is The Best Part. There’s tons of Face Art Chart Memes floating around, you know the ones, save it to your phone/computer and practice those on your own time it’s fun

-if you don’t know how to do something, avoiding it won’t help you. Just kind of draw around with it in your sketchbook or in a “I’m not posting this” file until you feel confident enough to do it in your Real Projects ™.

-Ok for lining did you know..… it isn’t illegal to erase parts of the lineart to clean it up.… just be careful and draw it back in to the best of your abilities if you erase too far and use a smaller eraser brush/lining brush for this… I know it’s tedious nobody likes lining it’s okay you can do this put on some good music

-use mcfucking references

-eyedrop character’s official colors but adjust said colors based on the color of your background to make them look less funky is my general rule for clothing, I usually pick the hair/skin by myself or from something I’ve already drawn though

-for flats, make sure your lineart is all closed off and there aren’t any “holes” cuz that’ll mess up your coloring

-so how I do flats is I use the magic wand tool to select whatever I want to color, expand selection 3 pixels (in firealpaca you can set it to do this automatically), pick the color I need, turn up the brush to as big as possible, and color it in. It saves the time you’d spend with cleaning up where the color gets outside the lines

-you can do the flats on one layer, but I personally like to do every Object on a different layer so when I do shading, I know what goes on top of what

-if a color is darker than the lineart it looks ugly so pick your line color with caution (or just use black! Unlike shading black lineart tends to go with pretty much everything)

-SHADE YOUR GODDAMN ART. Like, what makes people go “wow holy shit that’s good!” is the shading + highlights, don’t be lazy ya fuck.

-I’d take a break before shading to Refresh Your Eyes ™ but also I constantly forget this is a good idea

-don’t shade with black oh my god. Unless you’re doing Strong Punchy Dramatic Stuff or monochrome black and white stuff, don’t shade with black, and if you’re doing that it’ll probably be drawn into the lineart. Don’t shade with black please we can tell you’re doing it and it looks bad

-highlighting with white isn’t too bad though, especially with the eyes, but it might look too strong in some places

-As a general rule, shading is darker and more saturated, highlighting is lighter and less saturated. Whether it gets warmer or cooler depends a lot on what color or thing you’re shading or what you want the feel of the picture to be and I’m not 100% sure how to do it myself so uh. Trust your gut and change the color if it looks wrong I guess.

-where exactly the shadows or highlights fall depends on lots of things, just kind of. Look at how things work irl maybe? This is the kind of thing that you just have to practice, and it’ll look like shit until suddenly it doesn’t sorry I’m not sure what to say

-One Medium Sized White Dot on a layer above the lineart where the pupil borders the Iris (or the whites of the eyes if you’re like me and you make the pupil and Iris one thing) works for a glint in the eye that makes a person look less dead and more cute. How big you’re gonna make it depends on how adorable you want the person to be

-SMOOTH BORDERS FOR THE SHADING ARE REALLY IMPORTANT IF YOURE DOING CEL SHADING which is why firealpaca is my best friend thanks line smoothing. If you’re doing like. Soft shading or painterly shit or other kinds of shading it’s less Super Important but like. Still be sort of neat. Unless being really messy and sketchy is what you’re going for but even then you still need to be sort of careful

-for simple backgrounds, it’s like. Easy to make it interesting. Add polka dots to the background or a big old square or a gradient or a cloud filter or something the possibilities are endless. Another option is to straight up make it transparent and write a secret message in white on the side. But uhh never do a blank white background at the very least fill it with a solid color

-ok style is kind of hard because I never had to struggle to find my style? I just “drew in my handwriting” so to speak and then if along the way I realized something looked shitty I just changed how I drew it slightly? I guess a thing you could do if you’re in tune enough is look at the styles of things you do like and things you don’t and figure out why you do and don’t like it. “I like how *2010s cartoon* does Eyes!” great take that general concept. “I hate how this shitty yaoi has enormous hands!” great then don’t do that. It’s all Personal Preference my dude style is Your Own Thing

-notes aren’t everything but fuck do they feel nice. Self reblogs are fine but don’t overdo it, I’d say reblog it Twice to account for time zones and tag it as self reblog so as to not be a dick

This got long whoops. That’s all I can think of but I hope this helps it’s All I Know

[randomyetnot]

W.i.P.

                                             A  Work  in  Progress    

                                               By: Scribe’s Work                                                    May 23 2017

Art -  1. The  expression  or  application  of  human  creative  skill  and  imagination,  typically  in  a  visual  form  such  as  painting  or  sculpture,  producing  works  to  be  appreciated  primarily  for  their  beauty  or  emotional  power.

2. The  various  branches  of  creative  activity,  such  as  painting,  music,  literature,  and dance.

Art.  So  many  ways  to  interpret  it.  It  has  different  meanings  to  everyone,  or  no  meaning  at all.  But  it  usually  means  something  to  someone. Art,  one  word,  has  many  different  'meanings,'  depending  on  the  way  you  look  at  it.

Art  isn't  a  new  thing,  it's  a  VERY  old  practice.  Ranging  from  cave  walls  to  today's  modern  art  on  digital  surfaces.  It  can  be  found  on  cave  walls,  carved  into  stone,  painted  on  canvas,  sketched  on  paper,  or  ( more recently)  drawn  digitally.  And  this  is  only  meaning  in  the  'typical'  art  form  of  drawing/painting.  Music  is  quite  old  as  well. Art  might  not  seem  important;  but  it  is.  Art  served  as  a  method  of  story  telling  as  well  as  a  way  to  keep  record  of  things  before  written  language  was well  developed.  And  after  that,  it  served  as  a  medium  of  expression,  of  feeling,  or emotion,  a  message of the generation.  "Art  is  a  reflection  on  life.  Life  isn’t  something  we can  cut  and  fix.  It’s  always  in  a  state  of  flux." ~El Anatsui.  Art  reflects  the  generation  that  it  was  made  in.   

           Artists  have  been  many  different  sorts  of  people  through  the  ages.  Some  of  my  favorites  shall  be  listed  below,  along  with  the  name  of  a  piece  of  their  art.

Georgie O'Keefle  (Born November 15, 1887 – died March 6, 1986 age 98)  –  Blue and Green Music 1919 - 1921  Oil On  Canvas, Based  on  the  idea  that  music  could  be  translated  into  something  for  the  eyes. 

Leonardo da Vinci  (Born  April  15, 1452 – died May 2, 1519 age 67)  –  The Battle of Anghiari 1505,  also  known  as  "The Lost Leonardo"

Michelangelo  (Born  March 6, 1475  –  February 18, 1564 age 88)  –  Sistine Chapel  1508  -  1512,  Michelangelo  seriously  hated  doing  the  ceiling.

Vincent van Goph  (Born  March 30, 1953  –   July 29, 1890 age 37)  –  Wheatfield with Crows  1890,  one  of  his  last  paintings.

Damien Hirst  (Born June 7, 1965  –  still alive, age 52)  –  The Unbearable Lightness of Being 2003,  one  of  his  more  normal  pieces. 

Damien Hirst  is  the  best  one  to  end  the  list  with,  for  he  is  the  one  that  brings  us  up  to  modern  times  and  art.  Many  of  his  pieces  are  odd.  But,  most  modern  art  seems  to  take  this  in  some  stride.  Colors  and  blobs,  oddities  and  strangeness,  abstract.  Absract  Art  is  currently  the  most  'popular'  big  time  art.  Sometimes,  there  are  meanings,  sometimes  not.  It  is  sometimes  viewed  negatively  by  those  that  don't  understand  it,  I  myself  don't  get  half  of  the  modern  art,  but  it  does  still  carry  meaning  to  someone.  Art,  in  most  any  form,  is  still... art.

And  Speaking  of  art  and form,  there  are  many  different  sorts  of  art  forms.  Traditional -paper,  canvas,  sculptures  and  such-,  Digital -art  done  electronically-,  Sculpting -self  explanatory,  and  mixed-media ( a  mixing  of  multiple  other  art  forms ).  Now,  a  bit  on  each  sort  of  art  type.              Traditional,  the  older  art  form,  also  the  most  accepted.  Now-a-days,  the  term  'Traditional  art'  mostly  means  paper  and  pencil,  canvas  and  paint;  though,  sometimes  pottery  and  sculpting  are  considered  part  of  the  'Traditional'  art form.  Paper  and  pencil,  the  simplest  way  of  drawing/sketching.  

Many  a  person  doodles  in  a  notebook  with  their  #2  pencil.  Of  course,  the  more  into  drawing  in  the  traditional  fashion,  the  more  expensive  the  hobby  can  get.  With  the  huge  amount  of different  supplies.  Charcoal  sticks,  kneaded  erasers,  crayons,  markers,  and  the  many  brands  of  each  of  these  few examples.  Take  crayons  for  example,  a  shortened  list  of  crayon  brands:  Binney & Smith (Crayola),  E. Steiger & Co.,  Franklin Mfg Co.,  Eberhard Faber., Charles A. Bowley.,  Joseph Dixon Crucible Co.,  Prang Educational Company.,  B.B. Crayons...  That's  the  name  of  a  few.             And   that's  just  with  paper,  things  get  even  more  crazy  when  one  adds  in  the  canvas  and  painting  factors,  as  well  as  just  any  expense  of  art.  When  painting  is  the chosen  art  form  though,  the  expense  does rise  a bit.  But  by  gosh,  it's  a  medium  that  is  so  popular  and  good.             Of  course,  there  is  also  pottery  and  sculpting.  Which,  as  they  do  fit  in   the  'traditional'  category,  are  so  very  different  than  the  past  two.  It's  such  a  different  set  of  actions  that  are  involved.             And  finally,  mixed  media.  Mixed  Media  is  the  use  of  a  variety  of  media  in  a  work  of  art,  mixing  charcoal  sketching  with  watercolor  for  instance.  Or, using  both  paints  and  markers  on  the  same  piece.  Or  putting  a  3D  picture  with  a  statue.            There  of  course,  Digital  art  as  well.  Usually,  there  are  fewer  initial  supplies  that  are  needed  when  doing  digital  art.  But  getting  a  good  tablet/screen  to  do  said  art  on  is  often  expensive.  It  doesn't  have  some  of  the  same  issues  as  Traditional  art,  such  as  trying  to  get  a  glow  effect  or  trying  to  make  something  that  has  a  difficult  pattern,  digital  can  make  those  problems  mostly  go  away.  It  does  have  its  own  issues  though:  wearing  down  your  nib (the  tip  of  the  special  pen),  batteries,  working  with  layers,  and  picking  an  art  program. 

"A  picture  is  a  poem  without  words." ~ Horace

Of  course,  drawing  and  painting  aren't  the  only  form  of  art.  Writing  is  also  an  art form.  This  is  the  art  that  tests  your  vocabulary.  There  are  pros  and  cons  to  writing,  one  good  thing  is  that  it  requires  less  hand – eye – coordination.  Even  if  you  are  writing  something  on  paper,  it  just  takes  a tad  less  effort.  Of  course,  creative  writing  ( making  up  stories )  does  test  your  ability  to  "world  build"  and  have  character  development.            There  are  several  ways  to  categorize  a  story,  one  way  is  by length – is  it  short  or  longer -, how  many  there  books/stories  there  are  to  a  certain  idea – trilogies or  series  with  fewer/more  books –.  Short  stories  have  less  time  dedicated  to  them,  and  the  plot  has  to  move  along  faster,  often  a  bit more  romanticized ( deal  with  or  describe  in  an  idealized  or  unrealistic  fashion,  to  exaggerate )  than  most  books  of  a  larger  word  count.            Then  there's  poems,  also  known  to  tell  stories  or  just  describe  a  thing  or  emotion. Sufferer ~Scribe's Work Once  and  a  day a  time  has  passed thoughts  drift memories  shift I  was  holding  on I  was  holding  out Keeping  my  grip But  fingers  slip The  head  is  hurting Fog  invades  the  mind hands  tremble surroundings  crumble Eyes  untrusting Sights  dusting Pain  growing Soul  is  glowing Defeated  I  am  not With  no  worrying  thought Though  I  do  suffer I  remain.

  Some  are  really,  really  short  and  others  are  SUPER  long.  Older  poetry  often  held  true  to  certain  form  and  scheme,  but  modern  poetry,  more  or  less,  throws  that  out  the  window.

"Mary  had  a  little  lamb,  little  lamb,  little lamb~ Who's  fleece  was  white  as  snow~ And  everywhere  that  Mary  went,  she  threw  the  lamb out  the  window~!" ~Version of little lamb being chanted at work (5/10/17)

The  thing  of  sheep  can  cleanly  bring  us  up  to  the  next  topic  of  fabrics  and  dye.  Clothing  is  a  sort  of  art  too.  Older  style  clothes (particularly women's)  were  often  a  huge  amount  of  decorated,  or  at  least  pretty,  fabric.  The  fancier  the  skirt,  the  more  expensive  it  was.  There  are  some  that  would  have  embroidery  on  them  that  mimicked  the  patterns  of  stained  glass  windows  or  just  fantastically  complicated  patterns.

Of  course,  then  there  are  the  less  complicated  ways  of  making  art  on  fabric.  One  that  can  be  done  at  home! Tye Dye!  Dye  is  a  fun  and  messy  way  of  adding  color  to  clothing.

Speaking  of  fun,  have  you  ever  watched  an  animation?  Well,  animation  is  yet  another  sort  of  art.  And,  just  like  still  art,  there  are  many  different  forms  of  animation:  Traditional  ( example:  Disney's Fantasia ),  CGI  (example: Rise of the Guardians ),  Rotoscope animation (example:  The Lord of the Rings 1978 ),  Claymation (example:  Shaun the Sheep ),  Stop Motion animation (example:  Kubo and the Two Strings ),  Flash  Animation (example:  Wakfu ).  There  are  more  than  this,  but  many  of  them  are  different  sorts  of  similar  animations.  Now,  animation  combines  the  skill  of  drawing  and  story  telling  in  moving  form ( cause  comics  also  tell  a  story,  though,  they  do  not  move).  These  animated  videos  can  range  from  a  few  seconds  in length  to  several  hours,  but  even  getting  a  few  moments  of  animation  can take  days.  Most  shorter  videos  are  done  by  one  animator,  while  most  movie-length  animations  have  a  team  of  at  least  three.           There's  also  video-editing  I'm  going  to  put  under  the  term  animation.  Because,  they  are  animating  in  way,  just  onto  a  pre-existing  video.

And  the  concept  of  animated  movies  brings  me  to  voice  acting.  Voice  acting  is  the  art  of  conveying  the  emotion,  thoughts,  and  words  of  a  character  in  fiction.  Just  through  the  use  of  one's  voice,  of  course,  there  usually  is  an  animated  figure  that  will  later  be  adding  expression  and  movement  to  these  lines.  But,  sometimes,  there  isn't  and  it's  just  the  voice. 

            Which  brings  me  to  acting.  In  both  movies  and  plays.  The  art  of  acting.  Having  to  be  someone  you  are  not. In  movies,  there  is  the  ability  to  do  retakes,  but  the  stunts (when  done  with  practical  effects )  are  quite  impressive.  In  a  play,  there  is  only  the  one  chance  to  get  it  right,  so  there  is  a  bit  of  more  pressure,  but  also  there  usually  isn't  as  much  fame  and  social  pressure  to  being  a  play  actor  nowadays.

Going  off  the  idea  of  filming,  there  is  also  the  art  of  photography.  Still  pictures,  taken  with  a  camera.  It  can  range  from  a  scenery  shot  to  a  person  to  a  flower.  You  can  edit  it  or  leave  it  as  is.  There's  different  cameras  that  take  pictures  slightly  differently.  You  can  go old  school  and  find  yourself  some  film,  and  make  old  lookin' pcitures,  or  you   can  go  new  school  and  go  digital.  There  are  perks  and  downsides  to both  ways.  ( Photograph  taken  by  me,  of:  Butterfly -it’s in a case)

Dance  and  music  are  both  used  in  movies  and  plays,  but  deserve  a  small spot  of  their  own.  Music  is  art  for  the  ears.  Sounds  that  a  person  finds  enjoyable.  Whether  it  be  simple  music  and  tunes  or  complicated  like  that  of  Beethoven.  There  are  many  different  types  of  music,  from  pop,  country,  synth,  classic,  and  rock. 

            Dance  goes  with  music.  Moving  to  the beats  of  the  song.  Just  as  there  are  different  types  of  music,  there  are  different  types  of  dance,  usually  going  with  the  different  sorts  of  music.

One  of  the  last  things  I  want  to  talk  about  is  Fan-Creation.  Which  means  Fan  Art,  fan  fiction,  cosplay,  and  things  just  made  inspired  by  something  one  is  a  fan  of.  Now,  there  are  those  that  think  that  fan-creation  is  not  real  art,  and  that  "Real  Art"  has  to  be  one  hundred  percent  original.  But,  going  but  the  earlier  definition  of  art... "The  expression  or  application  of  human  creative  skill..."  it  does  not  mention  having  to  be  one  hundred  percent  your  own  idea.  There  are  a  few  that  still  don't  like  it,  and  they  are  allowed  to  not  like  it.  But  they  should   not  crush  the  artist  for  drawing  Fan Art  or  such  because  they  happen  to  think  that  "It's  not  art."               Moving  on.  Fan-Art,  as  in  drawings / paintings / sketches,  is  one  of  the  most  recognized  fan-creation  forms.  It  has  the  most  variation  of  all  the  fan-creation  forms,  due  to  the  many  different  forms  of  that  sort  of  art  there  are.  It  serves  as  a  way  to  show  you  like  a  thing.  It  makes  for  easier  practice,  because  the characters  already  have  a  set  design  so  you  don't  have  to  try  and  come  up  with  something.  It  makes  most  happy  to  show  how  much  they  love  a  thing  through  drawing  it.   ( Flowey  the  Flower  Signed – Scribe's Work.–, Undertale.  Game  by  Toby Fox )

Fan-Fiction  is  the  written  side  of  fan  creation.  It's  a  grand  part.  It  can  expand  off  of  the  original  concept  of  the  thing  it  is  based  on ( canon ), or  just  be  something  based  in  that  world  either  following  all  the  world's  rules  or  coming  up  with  its  own ( fanon).  Of  course,  both  can  take  time.  Writing  is  a long  process  sometimes.  But,  fan-fiction  does  provide  a  good  medium  in  which  to  develop  writing  skill.  The  world  building  is  already  done,  so  it's  easier  to  work  out  a  writing  style  and  figure  out  interesting  concepts  that  follow  certain  world  rules.  Excerpt  from  "My  Beginning"  a  Bionicle  Fan-fiction:   ---------------------  "You covard!" I raged, "come back and fight me!" The other one, the mind that had been in danger, the one that had been my reason for forcing myself into existence. He fainted. Not knowing what else to do, I picked him up and a quick glance at his mind told me where I needed to take him. I teleported to this place. This island called Destral. ---------------------

Cosplay  =  Costume  Play.  The  art  of  dressing  like  a  character  from  something  or  just  an  interesting  costume,  or  even a  character  that  one  made  up  to  go  with  something  ( often  called  oc's )  that  goes  with .  Whether  the  costume  is  overly  simple  ( example,  my  Vakama  cosplay ),  a  middle  ground  between  complicated and  simple  ( example,  Abi's  Ruby  cosplay or  Becca's  Photo  'Bomber' ),  or  super  complicated.  Usually,  no  matter  what  sort  of  cosplay  you  do,  you  have  to  have  at  least  a  little  bit  of  skill  in  costumes.  

There  are  probably  many  sorts  of  art  I  didn't  cover,  but  I  covered  as  many  as  I  could  think  of.  There  are  troubles  with  the  ones  listed,  either  being  a  problem  with  actual  art  process  ( broken  tools,  lack  of  skill,  missing  supplies )  or  with  other  issues  (the  put  down  of  the  artist,  hate,  lack  of  motivation ).  Recently,  there's  been  a  huge  strike  against  artists  on  the  interweb:  things  being  stolen,  false copyright  strikes,  huge  negative  feedback  because  of  hate,  and  many  things  similar.  Thankfully,  this  is  being  solved  by  both  the  artists  and  the  sites  that  the  art  is  posted  on.

Art,  has  meaning.  That  meaning  is  different  to  most  everyone,  but  the  meaning  is  there.  It  Defines  the  day  and  age  it  comes  from.  It  defines  the  artist.  It  often  defines  those  who  enjoy  it.