#i had a lot of fun trying different color and shading stuff

[alphazed]

it felt like they deserved a good hug

[meelusinee]

NOW SHE HAS ME UNDER HER SKIRT | M.R x READER

word count \ 3.7k | fluff & stuff | slash / mattheo riddle x reader

in which mattheo is absolutely in love with you before you two even talk for the first time (part one to lovesick!mattheo) author's note at the end!

part one | part two | part three | part four

NOW SHE HAS ME UNDER HER SKIRT | M.R x READER

Mattheo didn’t know much about love. 

Between being raised by a dictator and his craziest follower, he already didn’t have a very good start. Especially whenever he would get in trouble, the Cruciatus Curse was definitely no joke. Not to mention everyone pestering him about the legacy he led. News flash to the Gryffindors who would try to pick on him, he found it quite obvious that he was Voldemort’s son.

Suffice to say that he didn’t know much about love. He never had a true showcase of it, never had an example of it to compare to anything. The closest he ever had being another stunted teenager by the name of Theodore that considered him his brother, but even then there was still distance.

That was until he met you.

You, the most beautiful person he had ever met in his entire existence on this Earth. Anything he  lol looked at on you he would find absolutely perfect, from the color of your eyes to the way your hair bounced in the sunlight.

That alone made it hard to approach you. Your nice demeanor seemed to make it even harder.

So, he settled with admiring from afar. Mattheo knew your schedule, the classes that you would take and every time that it varied. He would subtly watch you in classes, hang around the same areas you did during your break periods, or even where you went for fun. And, to the best of his ability, he tried to avoid things that looked bad. No more fights or cursing, not unless he was truly provoked.

His mind also got its grubby hands on the idea of a journal. A place he could write about you freely, one he charmed so only he could read it. Entries, song ideas, anything he could think of. You made him an artist, you as his perfect muse.

And it all got even better when you two finally met.

You had just walked down to the courtyard, Mary Janes clacking along the rocks as you made your way over to a small pillar.

Recently, you noticed someone sitting by the pillars a lot more than usual. He was tall, his face usually covered by his brown curls as he wrote inna small journal he always carried with him. Said tall man with a face covered by his brown curls was your current potions partner, you had both been assigned to create a Liquid Luck potion.

“Hello?” you called out gently. face tilted down just a bit as you looked down at him. His eyes locked with yours when he looked up, the most beautiful shade of molten honey you had ever seen meeting your eyes. “Hi there, stranger.”

“Hello?” he whispered back at you, eyebrows furrowed as he spoke. His face looked rather cute when it was all scrunched up like that, a light blush covering his cheeks.

“I’m your Potions partner.” you said with a smile, flattening your skirt before moving to sit down next to him. “For the Liquid Luck project.”

“Oh,” he whispered, nodding as he closed his journal. It had a rather pretty leather cover, the pages aged and covered in ink from what you could tell. “Yeah, I remember. Y/N, right?”

“Yeah,” you smiled, nodding. “And you’re Mattheo.”

“Yes I am.” he said, a soft smile coming on his face as he heard that. He looked at you with something special in his eyes, eyes that carved themselves deep into your soul with the most intricate patterns you could think of.

The trance both of you seemed to be stuck in was broken when he cleared his throat, fingers tapping on his journal. “Did you have any ideas for the project?”

“Oh,” you whispered, nodding. “Yes, yes I do. I was thinking that we head to the library and research different potion methods and whatnot. Based on Slughorn’s instructions, I’m assuming that the instructions in the books won’t help much.”

“You’re a genius.” he whispered, barely loud enough for you to hear.

“What was that?” you asked him, eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“Nothing,” he said, clearing his throat as he began to sit up. “Do you want to go now?”

Mattheo thought that he was dreaming, if he was being honest.

The girl of his dreams, the girl that he had wrote almost obsessively day and night about for almost six years, that same girl was currently sitting across from him. Laughing.

“You’re ridiculous,” she smiled at his joke, her voice sweet like a piece of cotton candy melting on your tongue. He didn’t even remember what he had joked about at this point, his mind turning to mush the moment he heard that sound pass your lips.

Those lips that haunted his dreams every single night, the image of them so plush and pure he wanted to worship them like one would a holy angel. They looked absolutely perfect.

“Thank you,” he whispered, smiling softly as he rested his chin on his hand. He probably looked like a lovesick puppy, but he didn’t mind. 

“I found something really interesting in this book  by the way,” you said, Mattheo’s eyes instantly darting to where your hands were resting on the page. “It says in the recipe that we need to juice a squill bulb, which most people just cut it for. But this recipe here notes that squeezing ingredients over a funnel gets more juice out.”

“That’s really interesting.” he whispered, his gaze looking at your face as you spoke. 

“Isn’t it?” you asked with a smile. “And here it says that adding the entire Murtlap makes the potion last longer, rather than just growth.”

“That’s also really interesting.” he whispered again, gaze still stuck on your face. You looked so pretty whenever you were concentrating on things, the way your eyebrows furrowed making him think of a million different songs and rhythms. 

“Is it?” you asked with a chuckle.

“Well,” he muttered, looking at you with a small smile on his face. “I always found Potions an interesting topic.”

“Always is not a word. It’s more of a concept.” you said, humming as you continued reading the pages. Mattheo chuckled softly, looking at you like a lovesick puppy.

“You’re lovely,” he whispered. 

Theo was sitting in his bed reading a book, his curtains almost completely closed as he flipped between page to page. At least, he pretended to.

Recently, he had noticed Mattheo’s obsessive journaling habits. How his hands would be covered in ink by the time he was finished, or how he’d write until his new candle burnt out. Sometimes Mattheo would write even when the candle burnt out, instead opting for yet another one.

It was rather concerning to Theo, to say the least. Out of all of the things Mattheo could do, he was changing who he was. Self-improvement was one thing, but it seemed like he changed an obsession from fighting to writing.

“I can feel you staring at me.” Mattheo mumbled, looking back over at where Theo was sitting.

“I’m surprised you can,” Theo said under his breath, closing his book and standing up. “With how much you’ve been writing, I’d assume you get sucked in by a black hole sometime soon.”

“Oh hush,” he whispered, looking up from the journal. His hands were stained black and red with quill ink, the candle beside him still burning brightly. “Why do you keep staring at me? You’ve been doing it all week.”

“Your journal.” Theo smirked, walking behind Mattheo and placing his hands on his Mattheo’s shoulder. “What’s inside?”

“Why would I tell you?” Mattheo grumbled, continuing to write in the journal. Theo’s eyes squinted as they tried to read whatever was on the page, but the words were too jumbled to make any sense to him. No doubt a charm.

“You charmed the journal?” Theo asked curiously, looking down at Mattheo.

“Like you care.” he whispered under his breath, the quill scratching loudly against the paper. The room was quiet other than that, nothing but the quill scratching and the candle crackling.

“I do.” Theo said, his voice a bit more stern. He pulled up a chair next to Mattheo, resting his elbow on the table. “Mattheo, you’re pushing everyone away. Even me, and it’s not healthy. All you do is write in this journal, it’s kind of worrying.”

“I just like writing,” Mattheo whispered, moving his legs to rest his knees near his chest.

“About what?” Theo asked, his voice more soft than teasing.

“You’ll judge.” Mattheo whispered again, flicking the quill back and forth as his eyes glanced over at Theo. “Why do you want to know?”

“Because you’re my best friend.” Theo whispered. “I promise I won’t judge.”

Mattheo sighed before turning to the journal, pressing his wand against it as the words came into view more clearly. His handwriting was a lot more cursive than Theo first remembered, no doubt changing the more he wrote. 

“It’s a journal about her,” Mattheo whispered, flipping through some of the pages. “Love letters, poems, songs and stuff.”

“Her?” Theo asked curiously. “Who’s her?”

“Her,” Mattheo muttered to Theo, picking at his fingernails as he spoke. He looked like a blushing schoolboy who found his first love, it was rather cute to watch. “It’s, like, she’s a girl I just really like. I think about her a lot, you know? And I’m just trying to improve myself for her.”

“What’s her name?” Theo asked, resting his head against his hand as he crossed his legs.

“Y/N.” Mattheo sighed, like the word itself was a part of some holy prophecy. “She’s so beautiful, you know? Like something from heaven, just beautiful. And I just can’t get her out of my head.”

“Have you ever tried talking to her?” Theo asked, a small smile on his face.

“We have this project together right now.” he said, chuckling softly as he spoke. He was so down bad. “She took me to the library to research more about potions. Merlin, she’s so smart Theo. She figured the reason why nobody could make the potion was because the instructions were wrong.”

“So you both started researching?” Theo asked.

“She researched, yeah,” Mattheo said, before chuckling again. His hand moved to scratch the back of his neck nervously. “I kind of just sat watching her the entire time.” 

“Mattheo,” Theo chuckled softly, shaking his head. 

“You said you wouldn’t judge!” Mattheo protested.

“I’m not judging.” Theo chuckled, looking down at the journal. “I’m just confused on how you think you’ll get your girl if you can’t even talk to her. Journaling can only go so far.”

“I know,” Mattheo whispered, looking down at his journal again. “But it still helps.”

Theo nodded, looking down at the journal again. “What are you writing about right now?”

“Uh,” he muttered, looking at the pages. “It’s a song. She said something at the library that made me think of a song, I haven’t been able to get it out of my head.”  

“What’s it sound like.” Theo asked, leaning back in his seat.

“Uhm,” he whispered, picking at his nails again as he pushed the journal towards Theo. He hummed softly as he picked it up, eyes squinting as he tried to read his handwriting.

Darling, just calm with your voice

Let your heart sing, how I always enjoy 

When you say “always” is not a word

You think love is a bit absurd.

“That’s really nice,” Theo said, looking up at Mattheo with a small smirk. “This is a lot better than I thought it’d be, to be honest.”

“What did you think I was writing about?” Mattheo asked confusedly.

“Dark magic or something.” Theo chuckled softly, shaking his head. “Like you were possessed by a ghost to figure out how to resurrect themselves.”

Mattheo chuckled at that, taking his journal back. “I think you’ll find someone like this, you know. It makes life really nice.”

“Being in love?” Theo asked, an eyebrow raised.

“Yeah,” Mattheo whispered. “In love.”

“Well, there’s always an opportunity for that. And when it happens, it’ll happen.” Theo said, patting his pockets and pulling out a box of cigarettes. “But until then, there’s cigarettes.”

“You know the way to my heart, don’t you?” Mattheo snickered at that, using the lit candle to light his own cigarette.

It had been a couple of weeks since you and Mattheo had started working on your project. You had figured out how to maximize the efficiency of your potion brewing, including changing methods of brewing and preparing ingredients. After about three different trials, you had finally found the perfect way to brew the potion. 

“That’s perfect.” Mattheo smiled softly at you, chuckling softly as he scratched the back of his neck. In all honesty, it looked like a regular potion to him. “I think that’s perfect, right?”

“That is perfect.” you said, giggling softly as his reaction You found it rather cute, if you were being honest. He seemed rather nervous around you. “Thank you for doing all of this with me, the potion work and all. Most people would probably just leave it to me, you know?”

“Why would they leave?” Mattheo asked, eyebrows furrowing.

You shrugged, looking down at the potion still set in the cauldron as you spoke. “I don’t really know. I guess people consider me weird or something like that. Someone said that I was whimsical once, I don’t think it was a nice way though.”

“That’s absolutely ridiculous.” Mattheo spat. He couldn’t understand the logic of that. In his eyes, you were absolutely perfect. He would give anything in the world to hang out with you more often than he got too, and people gave that up for free? The thought was absolutely ridiculous.

You chuckled quietly at that, smiling softly. “Yeah?”

“Definitely. I mean,” he paused, looking up at you like that was the most absurd thing in the entire world. He had a small flush on his face, no doubt questioning what he was going to say. “I mean, you’re such a nice person. And I think that hanging around you is comforting.”

“And I think that you’re rather sweet.” you chuckled, looking at him with a soft smile.

“I’m being serious!” Mattheo said, looking you in the eyes. You hadn’t heard him talk this much in the entire time that you had been working with him, and you especially didn’t expect it to be him defending you. “You’re just, like, you. Which is really sweet, you know? I really like you and your whimsy, or whatever they try to call you.”

You giggled again, smiling softly at him as you scooted a bit closer. “You’re rather nice yourself, if I do say so myself.”

“Thank you.” he whispered, his voice raising a pitch as he looked at the potion. “Do we need to test this?”

“I think so.” she nodded. “Do you want to do it?”

Mattheo looked at the potion, a small frown coming on her face. If anything went wrong with the podcast, he wouldn’t want you to be hurt by it. Which led to him nodding, the best option for him obviously being him taking the potion himself. 

“I’ll bottle it for you.” you said, grabbing the small ladle and pouring it inside the potion vial. “Here, one vial of Liquid Luck for you.”

Mattheo smiled softly as he took a sniff of it. “Is it meant to smell like something?”

“No, just air. I mean, clean air. Not like toxic air or anything.” you said, before ending your small speel. “It doesn’t smell like anything.”

Mattheo nodded again, taking a swig of it before coughing. “That’s definitely hot.”

“It did just come off the cauldron.” you chuckled, fingers fidgeting slightly. “Do you feel lucky?”

Mattheo looked up at you with a look you could only describe as a lovesick puppy, a small flush covering his face as he admired you. You could only assume the amount of thoughts running through his mind were plenty, some very hard to sort through. 

“Yeah,” he whispered, blinking slowly as he looked at you. “Very lucky.”

You chuckled softly at that, your face flushing as you watched his eyes lock onto your lips. “Do I have something on my lips or something?”

“No,” he whispered softly, his Adam’s Apple bobbing as he spoke. “No, I just,”

“Something on my teeth?” you asked, shining your teeth to him.

“I want to kiss you.” he whispered. 

Your mouth closed again as you heard that, eyes locking onto his after he spoke. That didn’t last long though, as his eyes focused back on your lips again. “You what?”

“I want to kiss you.” he said a bit more clearly, his voice hoarse as he spoke. “I mean, I don’t want to pressure you. But I really want to kiss you.”

“You can kiss me.” you whispered softly to him, scooting a bit closer to him in return. 

Mattheo blinked for a couple of seconds, the shock of your answer plastered on his face. It filled you with a small sense of confidence, the blush on his face fueling your own. “I can?”

“You can.” you smiled.

Mattheo smiled brightly at that, the burn of it brighter than the sun sucking his lips in like a blackhole would. His lips immediately met yours, burning like fireworks against his skin. It was absolute bliss to him, burning through his skin and turning him into nothing but lovesick ash.

“Your lips are absolutely perfect, my love.” he whispered, his eyes boring into yours with a gaze full of adoration. “So perfect.”

“Was your luck to try and kiss me, Riddle?” you chuckled softly at him. 

“This is the luckiest moment of my life.” he whispered. 

“Theo!” Mattheo spat out, opening the dorm room door as he stormed in. His palms looked sweaty, and his face was absolutely covered in a bright blush. 

“Mattheo.” Theo said his name back, closing his book as he looked at where Mattheo had stormed in. He looked absolutely wrecked, almost drenched in sweat. “You look like you just got your ass kicked on the Quidditch field.”

“I just,” he whispered, walking closer to Theo as he paced around the room. “I just kissed her.”

“Y/N?” Theo asked, a small smile crossing her face. “You kissed her?”

“It was so perfect.” he whispered, laying down on Theo’s bed. “Like, it was like her lips had a magnetic pull on me. I couldn’t stop for the next hour. A whole hour!”

“That’s wild, mate.” he chuckled softly, patting Mattheo on the head.

“It was just perfect,” he whispered under his breath, sighing softly. “Like, I don’t know how else to describe it. Maybe like looking at a supernova for the first time.”

“You are down bad, Mattheo.” he chuckled softly at that, continuing to pat his friend on the head.

“And then we, after that right?” he said, the smile on his face only growing larger. “We snuck off to this broom closet. You know the ones. And we did, we had,” he paused, sighing in frustration as his words jumbled in his head. “You know?”

“I know.” Theo chuckled.

“I have a song idea again.” Mattheo said, sitting up again as he rushed to the journal he kept so dearly to his heart. “I will be dead to the world for the next few hours.”

“You want me to go tell Y/N that, lover boy?” Theo smirked.

“She can come in whenever.” Mattheo said, dipping his quill in black ink. “I already gave her our dormitory password.”

“You what?”

“I have a present for you.” Mattheo whispered under his breath, a small smile on his face as he walked towards you.

It was the 6 month anniversary of one of the happiest relationships you had ever been in. There was communication and there was love. Small dates near the Black Lake at midnight, with breakfast you stole from the Great Hall earlier. Times where he’d take you into town and let you dress up however you wanted, all on the cards he stole from Malfoy. Or small get-togethers like this, hangouts at the top of the Astronomy Tower. 

And the presents were always lovely. Small poems that he wrote for you, or love letters that he hand wrapped himself. A small blush or dress you had been eyeing for more than two seconds, or room decor that went with your forever indecisive aesthetics. 

“You do?” you giggled softly, gasping softly as he pulled out a small guitar. “A song?”

“I’ve written a couple for you,” he whispered. “And I wanted to sing them to you. For our anniversary.”

“I love you.” you giggled, smiling as he sat down.

He cleared his throat as he made sure the guitar was in tune, strumming a few chords before eventually developing a melody. It seemed almost hypnotic the way his hands moved, his voice humming along as he figured out the rhythm.

“Yesterday, I was a word. Left with no voice to speak it,” he hummed softly, his voice and the guitar both vibrating through the walls. You smiled brightly as you heard his voice, not realizing how pretty his voice actually sounded.

“Now I am a happy song, placed on the lips of a woman.” he sang, winking at you. He continued for a few lines, a small smirk growing on his lips as he got to the instrumental part.

“What are you going to sing next?” you asked, watching him giggle softly. “Seriously!”

“Patience,” he whispered, chuckling as he strung the melody again, his eyes darting down at the guitar. “Now she has me, under her skirt,”

“Mattheo!” you flushed, slapping his arm and breaking the rhythm of his song. “My skirt?”

The both of you burst out into a laugh at that, the sound breaking through the cold night air that breezed through the alcove you sat in. Or maybe you just felt warm in his presence, a constant feeling of love rushing through your body.

“Can I finish my song now?” he smirked.

“I suppose you could.” you whispered, resting your head on his shoulder as he continued to sing.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

my second post oh my GOD this one took a hot minute to get through. beta-reading and proof reading is definitely not my jam, and there's definitely things that i missed in this. but i hope it still works out well, especially the whole lovesick angle i was going for. if you guys haven't already, please please please go check out tamino's music. it is actually so. good. if you listen to hozier or adrianne lenker, i think you'd really like his songs (my favorites are the first disciple and habibi)

if you would like to read the second part, click here!

as always, please like, comment, and reblog! it really helps out, and i really appreciate everyone who does! if you guys have any requests or something you can request in the ask box!

[pleucas]

i got a few asks about my process :0 so yea i took some screenshots mid-process of my recent cliff-skk thing just for that

m gonna preface everything by saying that i did have a ref for the environment!! i avoid color dropping from the image and tracing cuz i do want to hone some digital skills. also saying i'm doing an "environment study" when i'm really just drawing skk makes me feel better abt myself

when i don't have a reference, i tend to do some thumbnail sketches in my sketchbook. here's some random stuff of past work, where i rawdogged everything:

but whatever, back to the cliff-skk. i'll also post a timelapse of it for easy ref, but detailed stuff is under the cut :)

first i did some rough sketches on an orangeish background (underpainting etiquette, i find it helps things feel brighter and keep a stable tone when choosing colors to lay on top), and I quickly lined skk :)

then I laid down some flats for the background, again really eyeballing the reference for hues. afterwards i thought it was a bit bright, and i wanted a more sepia/nostalgia feel to it, so i hue adjusted everything to something more uniform

then i lay down flats for skk + the ocean, which i both had to color adjust a lot (you might see that in the timelapse), and then i jump straight into rendering the background. when i render, i always prefer to do it over something lineless, so i turn the sketch layer off. i rarely do lineart for backgrounds.

i also used to render the characters first, but i've found that it's just not a great approach—especially for art where characters and background are interacting, knowing the hues and shades of the environment is crucial to effective rendering on the character that doesn't make them look out of place.

when i'm rendering, i really try to keep in mind tenants of contrast, perspective, form, and light/shadow. ex, stuff "closer" to us has more detail; the hill in the back is minimalist (in comparison); the shadows lean cool-green while the light leans gray-yellow. rake brushes really carried me here idk... my fav brushstyle forever

eventually i reach a point where i'm satisfied (or bored) with the background. for the last stages i usually have the subjects hidden so i can really perfect the details—but then for super duper final details, like the little leaf specks and grass strands, i unhid skk so the poppy details could work around skk. then i get to rendering the characters :)

i forgot to take ss of all the stages when i rendered skk, but here's something from... about the middle of the process? i tend to render characters with the lineart hidden as well, sometimes bringing it back just to clarify things, but ultimately i prefer to define things by form than by line. that's just me tho idk, idt it makes or breaks anything, just a preference

again rlly just thinking about cool/warm, reflective tones (the greenish shadow on chuuya's left inner leg, sky-gray blue on dazai's vest), really just slotting the subject into the environment. after i finish rendering the characters, i usually return to the background and add some stuff—in this one i defined the waves a bit and put some grass around skk

and yeah then we're done idk LOL. sometimes i run the file through camera raw (photoshop) to do some color adjustments—i find that my iPad displays colors super differently, usually making things a lot lighter than they are (u can see how dark the timelapse is...), so i find myself lightening my work a lot. i also sharpen and add noise as needed :)

i think my process has changed a lotttt even in this past year. it's kinda crazy!! it's always fun to do these and just reflect a bit on how i work. mostly just mindless insanity until it kinda works.

thanks for sending in an ask. and if u read all that, thanks to u too lolol

[verrixstudios]

What has been your favourite art piece you have drawn? And your favourite character u have drawn?

AUGH I LOVE THESE QUESTIONS BUT IM SO INDECISIVE SO IM GONNA SHOW SOME OF MY FAVORITE WORKS ACROSS DIFFERENT MEDIA

This was my first creature art for the roblox game i’m helping on called Legends of Pandora, and it taught me a LOT about how to translate colors into my style

This was my first ever painting commission, and was the first time i’ve ever used gold foil and textures for paintings. Unfortunately I kinda got scammed with it, but the experience was still pretty awesome. I think the final products still looks pretty great in their room too!

This is one of a whole group of sculptures I made for my senior show for highschool! I graduated last summer, and wanted to try something new so I decided to go all out. I did sculpts, felting, and some wire art, but this cheetah is by far my favorite.

THIS WAS MY FAVORITE ART TRADE IVE DONE SO FAR!! I pushed myself a LOT with this one, I made a rendered piece with a dynamic pose, I actually tried a background for once, I tried drawing water for once, I used layer modes like multiply and lighten and stuff, and I even used a noise screen for it! This was a fun challenge

These were from a batch of my first time using Ink and paintbrushes andAHHH I honestly loved it. If i had the money for my own supplies, I’d absolutely use this again!!

THIS WAS MY FIRST 3D ENVIRONMENT!! I MADE THIS TWO WEEKS AGO AND I AM VERY PROUD!! I modeled EVERYTHING! Except the water but I taught myself how to set up the nodes for it!

AAANNNDDD my favorite character will always be Piper or Bentley, who belong in the same universe but aren’t directly connected (Piper knows Bentleys brother instead) She’s a goofball and I adore her, and all of the characters I made around her, Bentley and Maddox. Here’s some art I found on my phone.

The last one is terrible quality but i have no clue how to find the magma page i drew it on so oops. If you click on it it helps!

Also also if you meant character as preexisting character from some sort of media haha oops, i ran out of image space. I don’t often draw characters, but it’s probably art of Hancock from Fallout, who I used to teach myself new shading methods. Can you tell I try a lot of weird/random things and end up getting happy with how they turn out?

[confused-cakepop]

OK so in art we had to do a watercolor drawing of a single thing really zoomed in and I picked my converse cause I thought they looked cool. But mine are red and I didn't want to use one color for the whole picture so I wanted to find a way to make it colorful.

I asked a couple people and they gave me the idea to just do a bunch of different angles of converse with each one being a different color.

So I got the idea to make it ninjago themed!

Update: GUYYYSSS I GOT A 100% ON THIS ASSIGNMENT. NINJAGO W!!!

Zoom ins, details, explanations for design choices and more under the cut! @coconut-ice-cream-137 and @rusted-fairy-wings really helped me brainstorm ideas for these so that you to them for all the help!!

Kai's shoe

-OK to be honest his was the most basic but the one I drew first and possibly the one that inspired the ninjago theme in the first place.

-so the flames are an obvious tie to his element and sorta self explanatory

-I was stuck on ideas though and it randomly struck me to make his scar included into his shoe as well and make it look ripped open!

-I chose the yellow laces cause he has a lot of yellow/gold accents on his gis and I thought it would fit better!

-I would definitely try to make his more interesting if I wasn't on a time crunch and got to think it out more

-thank you to rusty for hearing out my ideas for his!

Nya's shoe

-OK I think this one is really cute!

-I have the all star converse and since she has an ocean theme I decided to make it a star fish instead.

-I included her water form markings cause I think their really cool and they were fun to add!

-I think I did well with the colors and I like that I put 2 different shades of cyan instead of 1

-I really wouldn't change anything about this one and I think it's 1/2 solid ones I'm completely happy with :)

Cole's shoe

-So for him I did the bottom of my shoe cause I thought that the triangle diamond like markings could be colored to look like his lava markings he gets in his arms

-Originally that was all I was gonna do, but someone in class mentioned that it looked like a pineapple so I knew I had to switch it up lol.

-Since my shoe curved up at the top I decided to make it look like a volcano so it was more clear that the markings were supposed to look like lava since it was dripping into it.

-The bottom part was supposed to look like mountains but I forgot to outline it so it doesn't really look like it. (I'll definitely fix it when I get my paper back)

-This is the 2nd shoe that I think I'm completely happy with!

Zane's shoe

-This one gave me the most trouble to be honest

-I didn't have many ideas for what I could do with his outside of making the star into the snow flake symbol he has on his gi in the movie.

-While I was making it I decide to try and give elements that made it look like his og heart core in the show.

-I kinda wanted pixal to be included somehow and needed to make the shoe look more balanced so I added her markings on the side so that there was both parts of his heart on both parts of the shoe.

-The heel part was a last minute choice. I was trying to make it look like the gold head piece on all of the ninjas masks cause I thought it would look cool but the overall shape was a bit off.

-I think I should have left it there and made it just the solid gold piece but there was a square on the heel of my shoe that said the logo and stuff so I decided to include that and made it the birch forest that he unlocks his tree potential in.

-But idk it think it makes the shoe look all over the place

Jay's shoe

-So with his I ended up making the point of the shoe have lightning strikes on it

-I didn't know how to draw lightning or how I would go about outlining it so I left it where it was.

-I made the little metal pieces look like gears to reference his inventor past instead of just having regular ones.

-I added a quote on his that somehow got...smudged off? Huh I wonder why jay would smudge it off...

-The backround is also on Jay's shoe and his only. You could probably give that some sort of meaning but I was tired so i couldn't come up with a reason tbh

-Overall I wish I had done more with it like make the laces be in the shape of lightning or something but I was heavily focused on the refrence photo that I didn't think to do it since it was already too complicated in my eyes

Lloyd's shoe

-I made the star into the little design movie lloyd has on his gi cause i love him and thought it would be nice.

-And yellow laces!!

-Originally I was just gonna do some plant stuff with his (I didn't have any design ideas I just thought that the whole life = nature thing) but then I looked at my shoe for a second and I was like-

"Oh my shoe looks like the wing of a dragon!!"

-And I told some classmates that and they were so confused. And were just like "????" So I showed them a picture of my shoe that I drew on to show them my vision:

-They still didn't get it but I thought the idea was cool so I went with it anyway!

-The shoe anatomy is off but I really like the idea of it so it was fun to design which is good!

Garmadon/Wu's shoe

-So I knew that since there was a big chunk of space in the picture and I couldn't decided to either do garmadon (all the ninja +their enemy) or wu (all the ninja + their sensei aka the good side)

-I talked to coconut about it and they said that I could make one shoe that was Yin and yang with both of them!

-I thought that was really cool and wanted to do it but I realized that no matter what position I put the shoe in, it wouldn't fit that whole chunk of space. So I decided to make it a Frankenstein shoe!

-Wu and garmadon have their own shoe, but their's are stitched together, making both of their little star circles combine to make the yin and yang symbol!

-Underneath is both of their head pieces that I decided to make into an hour glass shape (representing their immortality but also the time twins situation)

-Then on the bottom part I made it wu's staff and a snake for garmadon with the white part having yellow and purple blend into eachother.

-I think this one is really nice.

Overall

I can see a lot of mistakes I made with this piece, rather that was design choices, line art mistakes or bad shoe anatomy there's definitely stuff I could fix if I ever decided to recreate this. But with this piece I realized something pretty important-

My art (and anything I do) doesn't have to be perfect for me to still feel proud of it. It doesn't have to be masterful or something that my teacher would show off to others to be happy about it. I think mine was pretty good for someone who's only done serious water color a handful of times and I took time and effort into this and tried my best and that's the best thing I could do. I'm happy with this!

[adobe-outdesign]

Been getting into Neopets again, so may I request your thoughts on the ghost color please?

It’s so simple, but I love the absolute HAUNTED expression that a good amount of the pets get when painted :D

Ghost is one of those very old colours that kind of suffers for its age, because it's... kind of boring? The concept is great, and I do like the way all ghost pets turn the same shade of teal with red eyes—it's very consistent both in terms of the colour itself and in terms of things like NPC characters and whatnot. I also like how the pets' expressions become more sad and spooky.

However, the execution beyond that tends to be lacking, as that's literally all there is to the colour beyond just a faint glow. You'd think that they'd make the pets semi-transparent, give them tails or wispy elements, stuff like that, but instead every pet is just "teal base with red eyes, glow, spooky expression". It's not terrible or anything, and once again it has a lot to do with how old the colour is, but it does feel pretty underwhelming.

You might think some of the blandness was caused by customization, but even pre-customization all the ghost pets were just drawn in their default poses. Sometimes the old art would give them a more exaggerated expression, but beyond that, they were still pretty boring.

However, just this year TNT released a bunch of "eerie" styles for this color with actual unique poses, and I have to say, these are a lot better. The dynamic Halloween styles they did were pretty good as a whole, but they also didn't feel all that necessary. These ones definitely were, as they don't just give the pets unique poses, but also take advantage of the new art to give them wispier, more ethereal appearances. Sure, most of them were sampled from art already on the site (the Flotsam above is based off a user shopkeeper), but if it works, it works. This does mean the styles are pretty inconsistent with the original art and expressions and aren't always on-point in terms of linework and whatnot, but there was so little there to begin with I can't imagine anyone complaining.

Favorite Species:

Techo: The Techo is a really good example of a pet design getting better over time. The pre-conversion art was literally just the default Techo—it didn't even have a different expression. Come customization, and they at least tweaked it to have smaller pupils and eye bags, which combined with the new art looking less overjoyed by default at least gave it a fun personality. Finally, with the eerie style, they redrew it to have what can only be described as a completely zoinked-out expression with irises around the pupils. It also now sports a floating pose with great shapes and flow, and some creative choices like more wispy elements and a complete lack of legs. It's really good.

Usul: The ghost Usul was always a bit unusual in that even pre-customization it always had flowing, raggedy ears and a slightly ruffled tail to match—a unique attribute that I really wish they had applied to more ghost pets with manes and long fur. With customization, the design actually got a bit worse—the eye bags were lost, it kept the same generic expression, and the tail didn't match the ears as much. However, with the new style, they fixed that completely; ears and tail now match perfectly and even the mane has been given the same ethereal look, with the pose and expression really standing out.

Hissi: This one's kind of cheating as I usually try to aim for pets that have both a good default base and a good style. The post-customization ghost Hissi, however, is as bland as can be—even the pre-customization ghost Hissi was absolutely nothing. However, the style is really good. I love the pose and the grabby hands, and the way big chunks are taken out of the body in an almost Wraith-like way.

Least Favorite Species:

Grundo: There are, strictly speaking, uglier species to pick from (pets with a lot of yellow, like the Tonu or Kiko, really don't work), but the Grundo gets this spot for being the blandest of the bland. Not only is there nothing interesting or unique about the design post- or pre-customization, but it doesn't even have a fun expression. In fact, it doesn't even have different eyes from a regular Grundo, because Grundo eyes are solid red by default, thus making it just look completely normal. Hopefully we'll get a style for this one one day that gives it something unique to work with.

[alessiathepirate]

Fast X

LAVENDER NAIL POLISH: Dante Reyes x fem!reader

Summary: Sitting at the table with Dante as he paints her nails, makes her wonder why he's doing that in the first place.

Notes: English isn't my first language. I apologize for any mistake I may have made while I wrote this short story.

For my friend who watched these movies with me during a movie night - I love you girl <3

Warnings: none

•••

She knew for a fact that there were many things in this world she should've considered as unnerving - like racing itself with all the possible consequences. Yet the scariest thing on Earth for her in that very moment was one of the most common things possible: nail polish.

She pulled off many dangerous stunts, she almost got caught by the police more times than she could count; yet that little tube full of colorful liquid was far more frightening than that.

She didn't choose the color, he did. He was the one holding her hand in place as he painted her nails to a light shade of purple too. Perhaps in another situation she would've found it a nice color and a nice gesture - but she found it scary instead.

He never touched her or made her do stuff before. She was never even tied up or anything. It was new - completely new and that's why it scared her so much.

"Am I going somewhere?" she asked as she watched him work on her nails - she was quite jealous when she noticed that he did a better job than she usually did.

The question was meant as 'Am I going somewhere with you?'. She never saw where he went, she only stayed at the hotel rooms he rented for the occasion. But he talked about it - he liked to talk a lot. It was more like ranting - Dom Toretto this, Dom Toretto that, he did this so I did that. That's why she ended up with him in the first place, because Dom Toretto did that.

The first day she had to spend with Dante Reyes was the first day she realized that being a part of Dom's family isn't that much fun all the time.

"We are going to a race, darling." he let go of her hand with a girly movement after he blew on her freshly painted fingernails, and for a second she thought that he's mocking her. "Now give me your other hand."

She did as her eyes lit up at the word - race. She hadn't had the change to take part in one since forever - or watch one at the very least. A race, she'll finally go to a race.

"Where?" Dante actually chuckled at the excitement in her voice - and she never thought he could chuckle without being psychotic or sarcastic.

"We're going straight to Rio de Janeiro." he took a hold of her other hand as he answered and soon her nail on her pinky finger was purple as well. "After your nails are done."

Her excitement stopped for a moment - Rio de Janeiro. Her, Dante and Rio de Janeiro. That sounded like a not so good idea, especially because she had a feeling that Dom will be there too. That's why she'll be there. So Dante can show her off - so he can show that he has her, a part of Dom's family.

She tried to ignore that thought, she should talk about something else.

"Why purple?"

"Lavender." he corrected her with an 'are you this dumb' look on his face.

"So why lavender?" she asked as she purposefully changed her tone on the word lavender.

"Because I have to match my car..." he explained. "And you have to match me."

She tilted her head a bit - trying to hide the sudden pain in her heart at what she just heard. Only then did she notice that his nails were the same color as hers.

"Must be a nice car." she said instead of questioning it any further. "And a nice choice in color. It's pretty."

"Yes, that's what I'm talking about!" Dante spoke up with a shout as if she'd be the first one to think so. "You see, sometimes we have to let go of all that masculinity. And on the other hand, it'll look good on you too."

She didn't know if she should be flattered or not.

"You know." she began saying as Dante finished with the nail polish and let go of her hand completely. "In a different world we'd actually be pretty good friends."

"We'll be in this one too. Eventually." he put the nail polish aside and crossed his legs as they sat at the table together, looking at the other without saying a word.

Is he mocking her, she had to ask herself again.

If she didn't know about his vendetta against Dom, she'd maybe consider him less psychotic, but still kind of crazy. Maybe then he'd be more funny too. Dante sitting there with a bathrobe on, with his hair up in two small buns was actually funny and oddly enough, friendly. He still seemed strange, but he seemed less like a guy who murders people for fun.

"Continue on with the princess treatment and we might be." she joked. "Will we wear matching clothes too?"

"Of course we will!"

"Of course we will." she repeated. "Because you're a show off."

"I never said I wasn't."

"Dom will be there, won't he?" she asked with a slight head tilt. "That's why I'm going with you. So you can show me off."

"Clever girl..." Dante praised as he patted the top of her hand with his. "But you should go get ready, because this will be a race you won't want to miss." he then stood up and left her alone in the kitchen - but later on he shouted: "I'll go wash my hair until you get ready!"

And she laughed. Not chuckled quietly like she used to - but laughed.

Perhaps if Dante would be a bit less psychotic, she could let herself like him a lot more. Perheps she'd actually like him.

Then, perhaps, she'd actually have the bravery to admit to herself that she already does.

[werewolfoffeverswamp]

tbh i dont know if i’ve ever made a single piece of art i actually like in an academic setting. they’re always haphazardly done last minute and the subject matter is always so. hm. it’s a little boring. the only times i think i’ve come close to making something i was proud of in school is when i was pushed to my mental breaking point and i just started fucking doing whatever i wanted. so today i’m rating them

in my sophomore year i was in sculpture class and had to make a smooth plaster sculpture. the amount of manual labor required to sand down a sculpture that had to be at least 3 feet in some direction is not something i wanted to deal with. as you can see my sculpture is not smooth. the design i was happy with— the sculpture itself i was not.

it was titled “Mistakes” or something along those lines. my classmates stood up for me in critique when my professor said it was lazy and unfinished. not one of my peers said a bad thing about it. we smashed the sculptures apart behind the building when critique was over. i still want to cry when i think about it, it was an extremely special experience for me.

10/10 i actually wish i still had it and i have been meaning to make a tiny version out of clay. such a special piece to me, very formative

this piece was made at the end of my college career when i first started testosterone. i wanted to make some sort of tribute to it for my final piece— i’m of an extremely divided mind when i think about it. there are parts that look clunky and not developed properly… thrown together, as i believe my professor Jason said. i am, however, happy with certain technical aspects of the piece! the formation and shading of the hand and the syringe is something i really like, and did a lot of layering to achieve. i used a paper cutout to make the repeated syringes on the bottom left, another new technique i tried and was happy with the results of.

the text WAS thrown on last minute in an effort to spice up the piece but it’s a reference to the song Crosseyed and Painless by Talking Heads. it’s a song i’ve always identified with in a gender way, with the first few lines being “Lost my shape, trying to act casual./Can’t stop, I might end up in the hospital.” i felt on the verge of collapse constantly in the early days of my transition. it was like i had lost my shape and was destined to end up hurt in some way. i wish the text was more well thought out, it could have been done in a more uniform way and i think it would have looked a little better.

the wasp head is also a reference to an old oc of mine, who was a man with a wasp head named Gene. i wish i would have used different colors, the black and yellow i used should have been warmer. mars black instead of ivory. whatever again it’s technical stuff.

6.5/10 i could technically go back and fix this one bc i still have it, but i have better things to do rn.

the hand dino came into the world in a fiery manner. for the final project we had to make a piece with the dimensions of minimum like 4ft by 4ft, and by this point i was burnt out and the most exhausted with art i’d ever been (besides maybe sophomore year ig 🤔) and i told my professor i couldn’t do a project that big. he made the mistake of telling me to do what i could manage, which ended up being a roughly 12in by 12in piece of oil painting paper.

in many ways i like the concept of this piece. the idea of it. it’s fun! it’s combining realistic elements with cartoonish ones in a way i enjoy.

however. looking back, i genuinely think it would have been a cooler concept on a bigger scale 😭 which is so frustrating.

7.5/10 i wish i’d had it in me to do it better.

and how could we forget dear body horror babe? made in my first semester of sophomore year and done with ink and charcoal and conte crayons, it was an assignment one of my more eccentric teachers wanted us to do where we randomly splattered ink on a paper using ink-covered coins and tried to come up with a drawing just from the happenstance of where the ink coins landed.

i chose a more abstract route and basically turned every ink splat into an eye and tried to come up with somewhat distorted body imagery to evenly fill all the space on the paper. you can find a lot of stuff going on in this piece.

11/10 but also not done at my lowest point, just during the steady decline.

ok can i be frank for a second. i fucking hate this piece. so what you’re seeing is an 8ft by 4ft thin block of particle board, carved by hand in low relief to ink and print on old bedsheets.

my professor for this relief class was strict about the theme of the class, which was political art. she insisted we make art relating to a political topic and our beliefs on it. and this isn’t to say political art is bad in any way, but it’s truly not something i want to FOCUS on creating necessarily. the fact that it was MANDATORY is the issue here. one of my classmates refused to make purposely political art and instead chose to make a beautiful piece of the sun and moon as lovers. i wish i had just done the same and refused to make strictly political art. if i’m honest i just wanted to make an epic wood carving scene of a dark and eerie night outside draculas castle. instead, as you can see, i chose (somewhat arbitrarily in an effort to make the project into something i could enjoy carving) environmentalism.

technically i don’t mind this piece. the composition is fine and the detail in some areas i’m very proud of. other areas not as much. my teacher also forced me to do what i think is over-carve some areas to fill the piece with texture. i do not like it and i wish i had kept some areas fully un-carved, even if it didnt print right. i don’t care.

also what’s worse about the whole experience of this piece is that it was part of an event called Blocktoberfest and my school partnered with a local state college to make and print these huge blocks on their campus. the reason this is bad is bc the state college students did whatever the hell they wanted for their designs and we saw some really cool subject matters, from aliens to occult symbolism. and their school’s art department had a couch in it and ours didn’t. :/

also blocktoberfest was an insane amount of physical work bc rolling those big ass rollers in ink and then a giant block and then ink and then the block and ink and block was a lot of effort. i was sore after it. and it lowkey felt like me and my classmates were doing all the work and like maybe 5 people from the other school were helping. whatever. whatever anyways

1/10 genuinely pisses me off to look at. wish i would have just done draculas castle

^i also think it’s worth mentioning about this professor: no one really liked her. she made it very clear that she thought there was a right and wrong way to create art. and she fully believed she was right about everything bc she was old and wise. and she was also gay so maybe she had some credit. but her art to me always felt a little uppity and she was also really rich. she let us visit her studio and we did our final critique there of a piece i made that i absolutely hated everything about. i dont even have a picture of it bc it pissed me off so bad. she also was lowkey racist towards a few of my classmates so i really don’t like her.

anyways that’s all the pieces i want to review currently. let me know what you guys think about em if you want. i hereby ask for you to critique my art.

the difference between making art for a deadline vs making art purely bc you enjoy the process and outcome is so crazy. it actually makes me sick with sadness. i don’t have the resources to create freely yet. anyways art under the constraint of academia is so frustrating for me specifically. like whatever. whatever

[grimmcheems]

More of my Crimson King AU🗣🩸👑

🗣Long hair Armin reigns supreme. Enjoy these disaster gays.🗿 I made a post months ago with this same concept but diff drawing (the Armin Zofia one). They hate each other (Reiner’s personalities fall in love with Armin and Armin eventually tries to make the best of the situation bc he has no other options= they have hate make out sessions and take care of four children but Dw guys THEY ARENT A THING (at least not to armin but they are to everyone else around them and Reiner’s delulu ass)) the girls are fightinggg in the lower corner lmao

Trust I will provide more context later with the more arts I make to cover this. I’ve been all over the place these past couple of months and this last month with finals.

This took me forever but was worth it. I rly had fun drawing Reiner but he was also a pain bc I had to keep reworking his face because of how complex it is, his facial structure is so out of my usual range. Also I haven’t forgotten about my dozen other AUs💀😭 Ill get to those when I get to those, I've just been overwhelmed d with how well received they are and its like…..people actually like my ideas?!?!🤨😭🗿💖✨so thanks to those who have been sticking around for that

Also like why was this just hard to draw overall?!? Like Armins hair had maybe four hours in total of me working on, I had to keep reshaping the top and planning out where different shades would go. This was in my drafts for maybe like two months (prolly longer) before I went back to it to actually try and finish it. Imma be real yall, a lot of my stuff ends up being unfinished so I’m happy I had enough will power to finish this one bc I actually love how it turned out. My art from now on may look a bit wierd bc I’m gonna start trying something new with coloring/rendering, but what’s new? A lot of my stuff isn’t cohesive to begin with.

[your-unfriendlyghost]

hi broski ummmm what programs do you use for art and what brushes

I use procreate! For lineart/sketching I usually use a slightly modified version of the Shale brush in the default procreate “calligraphy” section- just w/ the streamline feature turned down to zero and more like…size variation? (Idk I modified it a year and a half ago I don’t completely remember what I did lol)

Then for my grayscale comics, like these,

I use this Copic marker brush w/ just straight up black and varying levels of opacity. Usually I don’t use blending brushes in these, but in my most recent one I did.

For my colored stuff tho I use a lotta this pencil brush for everything (shadows, highlights, base flats, etc) and then depending on whether I want something more painterly (like the ocs on the left) or more cell shaded (like stevepop on the right), I either use soft texture brushes or a chalk brush (I cannot for the LIFE of me find where this chalk brush came from?? I’ve been digging but idk I can’t find it outside of my duplicate??) for highlights

Some other brushes/brush sets I use (all of them are free as of rn ‘cuz I’m broke):

Habook Brushpack (specifically the rectangle one- it puts down flat colors nice and fast but also doesn’t annoy me the way most “ink” brushes do!)

Laurenillusrated Brushpack- I use these mainly for skin, they’re really nice. (Also, @laurenillustrated is on tumblr- her art is so pretty, it’s like a storybook istg. Check it out if you haven’t it’s AMAZING)

I’ve recently started using @loish’s brushpack too, and I ADORE these brushes. I used them a TON on the Christine poster. You can get them by signing up for Loish's Digital Art School, which is a great collection of art resources as a whole, and it’s totally free. Would absolutely recommend

And finally, for the halftone texture I like to put on everything, I use the Halftone Hospital Basic Tone Kit. All of their brushes are fantastic, definitely check them out if you like the look of traditional art but also like the lower supply cost of digital art lol. Or just in general, ‘cause they’re great

(Then for the paper texture overlays I love so much, I usually use stock photos tbh.)

Anyhow, these are some of my favorites. But I do use others too, and this all came from years of playing around and finding what I like! I had this phase about…1 1/2-2ish years ago where I hated my art style and nothing was coming out right. It pushed me to try a bunch of different brushes- in retrospect I don’t think the brushes were what made it better, I just improved over time, but I had a lot of fun trying out different brushes. So definitely try ‘em out and experiment, because it really is a fun time :))

(As for my workflow, I talk about that here if you wanna know more about how I draw!)

[jabberwockymoreau]

The Columbia House, Sims 4 version

So, a while ago @codename-adler made a post asking people to drop their hcs for what the house in Columbia looks like, and since I was in the mood to play the Sims that day, I figured it would be a fun exercise to try and build what I picture in the game. It took me forever to finish it once I had figured out what I what I basically wanted it to look like, but here it is:

Before sitting down to work on this I roughly scoured the books for what scant descriptions there are to be as accurate as possible, and this is what I found: There is a downstairs bathroom and it has a window (specifically between the shower and the sink), the twins' rooms are upstairs on opposite sides of the hall, Nicky is downstairs past the stairs (as seen from the living room), the living room and kitchen are connected, and there is both a living room and a den. Also there has been no mention of a formal dining room afaik but there is a table in the kitchen, so that is what I went with. Also no garage, just a driveway.

Further I figured the house was pretty blandly suburban, probably a little older and smaller to make it cheap, so that is stylistically what I went with. The living room is open to the hallway and split level, half because of the age thing, and it also influenced the way I went about furnishing the house. I figured Nicky and the twins had probably sourced most of their furniture either from cheap stores (like ikea) or got older stuff for cheap from yard sales and the like, and otherwise I tried to capture an early 2000s vibe. So, here's the floorplan:

A more detailed house tour (and a lot of me rambling) below 👇

First the downstairs hallway. Not much to be said about it: There's a small console to the side for keys and mail and a mat by the door for shoes, plus some plants to make it look a little nicer. Imagine there are family pictures in the frames over the stairs. (I gotta say I do love love the retro vibes of the door though.)

Next up is the den. While half the reason the living room is open concept is the imagined age of the house, this room is the other half. Before I started this, I wasn't sure if there was a difference between a living room and a den, so when Neil heads to the den to sleep at the end of tfc I imagined him heading to some sort of living room space - and then thought it would be nice if there was a direct line of sight to the front door where Andrew was on the porch, keeping an eye on the others, so that Neil isn't fully removing himself from the small family moment they're all having. But since I wanted to be accurate I googled it, and turns out I'm wrong. However, since the den is at the front of the house you kind of have a view on the driveway from the recliners, so the hc is somewhat intact ;)

Also the octagonal shape of the room half killed me because it made the roof all weird and that influenced the upstairs bathroom and it was a whole thing. But I was looking around the game neighborhood for inspiration for the outside and saw this octagonal front room and fell in love, so I had do it. For the furniture it's canon that there are at least two recliners, and I imagined it to be this smaller secondary family room/computer room, hence the small, old TV and desk. The computer is probably a little older than would be realistic, but I couldn't bring myself to give them the imo even more unrealistic tower with a flatscreen monitor, so it is what it is. The Sims 4, despite not being that new, is pretty bad with 2000s era furniture.

Then we have the infamous downstairs bathroom and the probably most detailed description of anything in the house. The window sits between the shower and the sink and is frosted. Unfortunately that isn't an option in the sims, so I put up some shades. But otherwise it's a pretty small and simple room.

The living room was a lot of fun. I tried to make it colorful because I feel like Nicky would try to make it look cheerful, and it's also where we have some of the biggest mixing of aesthetics. On the one hand there's an old cabinet, but then we also have some Billy bookshelves and a very cluttered Lack coffee table (side note why tf do I know all of these Ikea names?) and the most 2000s standing lamp in the back (I swear we had one of these). The armchairs I feel like are something picked up from a yard sale while the couch is more new. The fireplace is original to the house. And then of course there is a hi-fi system in the back. In game that's just a record player, I think, but realistically they would have at the very least a cd and casette player on top of that.

Next is the kitchen, which in my original draft was included in the open living plan, but that felt too open, so I changed it to an archway (in addition to changing the layout some). The cabinets are very old, the fridge and stove very basic and clunky, and I feel like that sort of glass dining table is a very 2000s thing (although I may be wrong about that). Now looking at the screenshots I think the chairs might be a little too contemporary, but I'm not about to go back and change anything. It's a very yellow room, but it fits with the generall blue/green/yellow color scheme I mostly went for with the house. Cheerful but in a pretty inoffensive way. This room is also the only one where I used some CC, because I just had to have a wall phone and the Sims 4 just does not have older technology.

And for the last downstairs room we have Nicky's bedroom. This is one of my favorite rooms in the whole house, and it came together so easily once I had the bed picked out, it was really fun. This is the most color in all of the house, which I felt fits Nicky, and then I went for this sort of hybrid adult/teen aesthetic because he's sort of caught in that transition phase. On the one hand we have a cleaner look, a framed painting, centered bed, nothing too messy despite the loud colors, but then in the corner we just have the pride flag and some posters taped to the wall in a way that looks very leftovers from a teen/young adult phase. Also please imagine there is a picture of Erik in the photo frame in that corner.

Then we're moving upstaris with a very uninspiring first look at the hallway. Nothing really here, a hall closet and a plant but otherwise not much effort put in here. I do wanna say that in reall life the measurements of the house would be a lot different and so this space would probably be smaller (i tried to make it so with the closet, but it still feels a little big)

The upstairs bathroom(s) unfortunately suffered from the roof that sits around it, making it take up more space than I wanted it to. I think realistically it would all be one big room, with the laundry next to the showertub combo and the toilet beside the double sink, but because that would have been too little going on for the size the room would have taken up in game, I split it up into a separate toilet, laundry in the hallway extension, and then the bathroom with the tub and the double sink. I do like the decals in the toilet room, I think either those are leftover from previous owners of the house and Nicky refused to take them down or he put them up in order to make the room look a little less boring and the twins absolutely hate them. I also really like the brown color scheme of the tiles, it looks very old fashioned and I like that.

And lastly the twins' bedrooms. First up, Aaron: I picked green and black for the color scheme and then the very light wood color that all of this very basic Ikea furniture comes in to lighten up the room somewhat. The layout is also very open, so that the black doesn't come across as too oppressive. Here we also again have like on the one hand some framed prints to seem a little more sophisticated mixed with just posters put up over the desk. I went with a gamer theme for those, which given the canon presence of a gaming console (not pictured in the living room) felt right. Like obviously it belongs to all of them, probably, but also if I had to pick who uses it the most that's Aaron. Also making these rooms I developed this hc that the beanbags in the dorm are just taken from the twins' rooms, so I made sure to give each of them one.

And last but not least, probably my favorite room in the house because I'm biased af: Andrew. I legit got a little emotional furnishing this because I love him and it was so fun to imagine what his room would look like. The main color is obviously black, and the basic furniture is all the same as in Aaron's room, just in a black swatch. The whole thing imo teeters between cozy and overwhelming, and the layout certainly adds to that with the Kalax separating the room instead of being shoved to the side. But when I put the furniture down before moving it to its intended places I sort of just had it standing there and it felt right. I'm not sure if in actuality Andrew would dislike not being able to see the door or if he would prefer having an obstacle like that between the bed and door, but I do like the effect it creates. Then we got this punching bag which I also felt he probably would appreciate, and lastly in my head the red wall is because Nicky put his foot down on painting the whole room black and so Andrew picked the most aggressive, terrible red just to be contrarian (but it does match with some of the posters and the punching bag and everything). Also over both of the twins' beds is the closest the game has to glow in the dark stars, which I imagine Nicky put up and while they complain that they're not little kids they actually do love those a lot.

And finally some close ups of some areas/details that I loved putting together:

And that's it. This has been a long post so I hope you enjoyed the pictures and all of my thoughts. I had a lot of fun building this, anyway, and this is the Columbia house in my head now lol.

[novantinuum]

Ohhhh gosh... okay, so it's very, very hard to limit this to just one thing because I engage in so many different artforms. So I'm gonna select one (or maybe even a few, idk ahahah we'll see what I find) piece of work from each of my lil hobbies.

Writing

If I was pressed to make a list of the writing work I'm most proud of for any variety of reasons, then... in no particular order, here are my four picks:

Contact

This is one of the largest plotty multi-chapter fics I've actually finished- usually, if I finish a multi-chapter, it's like a series of vignettes or short one-shot like scenes. But with THIS one, I had a very specific story I set out to tell, re: Steven getting cracked and his family coming down to the wire when it comes to getting him healed, and I finished said story!

I still stand by the character work in this one to this day, and quite like what I did with the dialogue.

A Memoir of the Marks Unseen

I've already mentioned this fic recently, and that's for a damn good reason- it's intensely personal to me, and I spent the good part of a year intensively pouring over it.

I believe this fic contains some of my best descriptive prose to date.

Advocate (CW: Fic deals very frankly with the topic of attempted suicide.)

This fic isn't perfect in my mind, but I will always be super glad that I finished it up years later, because I've had it in my drafts since 2020. It was just... always the sort of story that was almost too close to home for me, ahah. I overtly had to switch the POV from Steven to Lars between outlining and actually writing this to make working on it possible. In the end, I think that was absolutely the right choice.

Also, I'm always a sucker for writing Lars POV anyways, it's actually really fun.

knowing, loving, being (CW: Fic is rated Explicit. Mind the tags.)

Specifically, I'm thinking about One scene in chapter 2 of this story. (The snippit shared here is Not explicit, no worries.)

There's one scene that was SUCH a bitch to write, and let me tell you why...

It's because I had Steven split in two during it, but made the executive decision that I did not want to give names to either component, because I don't think they'd canonically want to name themselves. I still stand by that headcanon when it comes to canon adjacent stuff. But holy SHIT is that hard to execute, especially when the scene in question involves a lot of physical blocking later on, and you have no ability to signal who is Who without constantly using epithets.

Well, I eventually came to the genius idea that I could simply lean in to this confusion and write from "both" of their POVs at once in one weird mixed up smoothie, to sort of... give that impression of the two of them seeing from each other's eyes, but in a written form. And I genuinely think I nailed it in a really creative way. I don't think I'll ever write something this technically intricate ever again, tbh.

Artwork

Objectively, I believe these are my best executed pieces. I selected one from each fandom I've been an active part of over the years.

The Gravity Falls one was for the annual Stanuary event, with the prompt "Con." The piece is titled "The Thirty Year Con" to represent Stan's journey living under his brother's name all that time.

I enjoyed playing with textures and light for that Trollhunters piece- if I were to do this piece now I think I would try to entirely paint it instead of just stopping short at colored line art, but it still looks quite vivid and striking when compared to my art today, and I still quite like the way I rendered the crystals in the back.

The Doctor Who piece is one of the few times I've genuinely taken a stab at realism, and while it's not perfect I still think it did a pretty good job at capturing Capaldi's likeness.

If I could redo a part of this piece for Steven Universe I would change how I shaded/lined the falling rose petals, but beyond that this is still my thematic magnum opus for this fandom when it comes to art. I had the concept blast into my mind like a freight train one day, and I'm so glad I managed to bring it into full fruition. I love how much metaphor I managed to pack into this one, ahah.

And then finally, I still really, really love this Legend of Zelda piece I did- I'm SO happy how the split down the center between present and past came out, and also the fire detailing.

Video Editing

So, my top four favorite edits have to be (links go to their tumblr posts):

Oh, No!

So, this is that SUF edit I did that blew up in the fandom a bit.

There's very few times where I am capable of banging out a video so goddamn fast, and this was One of those times. I envisioned the broad bones of this edit in my head while listening to the song in the car over and over, and slammed the bulk of it out over a 24 hour period. I really like how I managed to make so many clips so thoroughly relevant to the lyrics of this song, and also think I pushed iMovie to its absolute LIMITS on making this video work, LOL. iMovie really doesn't like letting you do fast slam cuts, but I formulated a fairly reliable method for doing just that while editing this, and it's one I've put to great use elsewhere in the years since.

Strawberry Swing

This is one of my first big SU edits, and probably my best stylistically, since I was still using Adobe Premiere for this and could edit out audio background noise a lot better than I can now, ahah. I think this edit sums up all of my feelings on what keeps bringing me back to this show.

I love that I got time to give pretty much every major character a moment to shine in this one, a moment to showcase their growth over the course of the show.

(love you 'till the) end of the earth

I still ADORE the beginning of this edit, and how I framed things there... If you'll notice, for every single couple I start with a very specific location shot and then a key early moment in that couple's relationship- well, those locations correspond with WHERE those early moments took place. It's their "meet-cute," of sorts.

And then also, the video begins and ends with a shot of Earth. I think that's a fun parallel too.

Dear lord, you don't want to know how hard it was to edit a relationship video like this with so few shots of Rose and Greg, though. I had to budget their shots out to make it work.

in all the universe, there’s no one else who can know what you’re going through…

This was a very interesting edit to make because it was one of the rare times that I had no lyrics to lead me- it's just an instrumental! With that in mind, I had to formulate my own "story" for the video to follow, which is harder said than done, very often.

I love what I ultimately came up with here, re: this edit basically being a chronological summary of the major sources of trauma Steven lived through over the course of his childhood. The audio voice lines are kinda rough at parts because I no longer have the tech to splice out the background noise, but I did my best, ahahah.

Cosplay

My favorite two pieces I've made myself for cosplay are these:

My 3D printed royal bow, which I literally had to set down for a good year or so because I got so frustrated while painting the details on it, LOL-

And then this cape, which is entirely hand made, with all the details machine embroidered on. All of those edges you see? I had to run every single edge through my sewing machine with a silk stitch. It took fucking forever, but god did it turn out really nice. I did this as a beginning sewer and I still am quite proud of it.

_

Think of my StrawPage kinda like a tumblr anon askbox- feel free to send me comments, questions, silly doodles, song recs, whatever! This is a replacement for the tumblr askbox because I was getting too much spam on here.

[shannonmanorart]

TWST Process!

So I got a comment this morning asking if my Ignihyde piece was a Memoji---a thing I immediately had to google to even know what that means lol I'm not mad, no shade to OP but it really threw me for loop to be asked if my art is a customizable avatar.

I know this blog is mostly my fun little sketches or side projects but I am a professional artist! Even if this is a silly little side project to keep my brain from falling it the abyss, it's still my art I drew with my own hands and it's important to me for people to know that!

Process breakdowns below the cut! it's not very detailed but figured i'd be fun to show a peak behind the curtain!

First things first! I do all of these in Proceate on my iPad! These are very casual and just for me to have fun--I'm very burnt out after my associate art direction job on Hit Monkey so I'm just trying to give myself a tiny piece of joy so I can get myself back to drawing my web comic and merch for cons/my store.

I draw each dorm in their own file just to keep things from getting too cluttered. The group shots I do separately in another file. So I'll finish them, flatten them and paste them into another file to size them up together/add backgrounds/effects. I included screenshots to show the breakdown of the original drawings along with the group shot. Nothing too fancy. Also forgive all the unnamed layers x_x I am usually incredibly organized but typing on my iPad annoys me so I tend to not name Procreate layers. You can see where I thought about it by naming ONE layer.

Here is the timelapse for The Ignihyde boys! You'll notice I keep Ace+Deuce in the file--I use them as a base reference for the stylization. I stylize everyone a bit differently but I try to maintain some consistency. I also reuse some bits of their palette as a piece of that consistency. You can also see me go 'oh yeah Ortho's hip thing goes all the way around so we should see it behind him........oh no. nvm that looks bad.' lol

What was most important for me to sell with these two was the difference of their personalities. I was aiming for that 'Someone will die' 'of fun!!' vibe haha So I wanted Idia very compact and to himself while Ortho is energetic and friendly. I also wanted to bring some design elements of Hades face to Idia's face. His bangs cover it up but I gave him a long nose that starts right from his brow the way they stylize them in the movie. I also gave them more color to their skintone but kept Idia more ashen/desaturated--I liked the idea of him looking kinda grey to match Hades instead of just pale.

Here's the non-default brushes I use--Jingsketch brushes are available here and the free comic brushes I got from Di Brushes. I'm usually a default brush kinda person but Procreate's default textured stuff wasn't really doing it for me anymore. I really like using stuff that looks more like pencil or pastel. I've also been addicted to adding noise a lot to my pieces. I know that's not the most original thing in the world but idk, it looks cool. My group shots always get a layer of noise.

But yeah, that's it! These are purposely kept pretty simple so I can knock each one out in about two hours or so. More detailed dorm outfits obviously take longer--I hand drew all the patterns on the Pomefiore kids like a mad man. Every time I erased the edges, I went 'I should probably copy and paste this' and then never did. I love making things harder for myself lmao

See y'all in Diasomnia! (I also have plans to draw my MC and Grim so Diasomnia won't be goodbye~)

[wheneverfeasible]

Get to know me (tag game)

Thanks for the tag @augustjustice and @steviewashere! This will be fun!

✨✨✨✨

Favorite Color -> Black, followed immediately by that kind of deep dark red where it has shades of black to it almost.

Last Song -> Poison (Hazbin Hotel)…it’s been my brainrot song all year.

Currently Reading -> Stranger Things: Suspicious Minds by Gwenda Bond. I’ve been trying to work through all the different ST books but this one is taking me forever because I hate Brenner 😒

Currently Watching -> In a rewatch of Supernatural right now. About halfway through season 8 I think. And then whatever else catches my interest if I’m not feeling it at the time.

Currently Craving -> Boba 🧋🤤 A new modern Vietnamese place opened up next to work so I’ve been trying their stuff and I just had a Thai tea with honey boba and it was soooooo good.

Coffee or Tea -> Yes. Just…yes. What I like or want depends on my mood and circumstance at the time. A lot of answers to either/or questions are situational for me tbh.

A hobby you would like to try -> I would like to take up actual horseback riding. And archery and swordplay.

An AU you're working on/thought of -> I am currently working on an omegaverse Steddie fic that takes place post-S2 and before S3. I am also working on a No UD mafia AU that was originally just going to be a one-and-done thing but nope, too into it to let it go now.

No pressure tags! @derythcorvinus @katyawriteswhump @scoops-aboy86 @stevestark @fkinkindagauche

@steddiecameraroll @secretly-kait @mundaneone @endlessmusings1801 @intermittentmania

[upsidedownsmore]

Hi!! I was wondering if its okay to ask what brushes u normally use in krita? I love your art!!

Thank you so much!!! I only use the ones available in Krita by default and I tend to jump around based on what I think will work best for each piece, but I can give a little rundown on which ones I use the most and what I use them for :)

Here's an image guide with each of the brushes I've used and that I recommend checking out:

I'll highlight my favorites as well with some examples where they were predominantly used! (though in some cases multiple or even all of these brushes were used)

Marker Details:

Varying opacity and size makes this one my favorites for sketching, especially since it can easily be nearly transparent or fully opaque which helps with value range.

I also like using it for silhouette sketches!

It can also be used for final linework, but it takes more work to get to a full opaque and its lack of texture makes it a little less interesting than Ink-7 Brush Rough imo.

Ink-7 Brush Rough:

Really good for linework, especially for comic styled drawings with it's slight texture, varying weight, and opaqueness.

Also good for just filling in entire areas with a single color as well as non-smoothed shading!

Wet Bristles Rough:

Actually just an amazing brush, its pressure sensitivity is crazy.

Blends strokes like paint and can vary in size and opacity.

Also has a nice subtle texture!

Amazing for smoother coloring and shading, especially if you want a more painterly style.

Watercolor Texture:

(hard to show examples of this, just assume that I've used it in any piece that has smooth shading lol)

Not the best for painting/drawing on its own, however I've found it to be really useful when set to white or black on an overlay layer for adding extra shading and/or highlighting on top of the shading I've already done.

I usually shade individual figures, objects, and parts separately, but using an overlay layer with Watercolor Texture (or even Shapes Square) on top of everything helps make the entire piece feel more cohesive.

Also adds a hint more texture!

Another thing to note is the importance of layer modes!

I know that you asked about brushes specifically, but many of these brushes (particularly those to do with effects and textures) work best when experimenting with different layer modes other than Normal. Overlay is generally a safe bet and most of the best for, well, overlaying multiple layers for interesting effects. But please try out all of them at any given opportunity, sometimes things like Burn, Color Dodge, Soft Light, etc can have more interesting effects!

In addition, mess with filter masks! You can even edit where they apply by drawing on the mask directly! HSV/HSL Adjustment (also accessible with ctrl+u) in particular is INSANELY useful for fiddling with the colors and balance of a piece, from individual layers to whole groups and drawings. I also really like blur filters, often times I'll duplicate a layer and make the bottom one blurred to add a glow affect to something without losing its definition.

While this latter stuff isn't about brushes specifically, its generally very important to how I use and experiment with all these different brushes!

Anyways I hope this helps!! I kinda went overboard with this post, but I had a lot of fun writing it! Thank you again for the wonderful ask!! :)

[creatively-cosmic]

Hihi! I'm the anon from the MN talk sprite ask I'd love to hear about your sprite genius science haha :-D

Ps to say that I'm a huge fan of your work just in general

first of all THANK U SO MUCH WAAH....... im so glad you like our stuff TvT !!

second !! ill hop to the sprite explanation right here! i'll put it under the cut bc it might get long eheh

and a note: im using csp but this should work with any program! i previously used ibis for my talksprites before remaking them ^^

for my example subject, i'll be using ace! they'll be my best example since theyve gotten more use so far!

quick notes about the background; i always export my canvas as transparent to give the image that they're just a Part of the post/environment. the nametags and gradients are optional, but i feel the gradients help fill dead space and add a bit more to it- the nametags help in emulating the feel of video game dialog too (i dont tend to have the patience to actually make pokemon textboxes because i have to do it manually, so putting this over post text is my next best option.. makes it easier for chattier people, and gives screen reader accessibility as well!)

ANYWAYS, now for the actual Building of the Sprite!

where i usually start is with a base sketch of their neutral expression. i have two for All of the modern/updated talksprites, because i had initially wanted to put them at an angle to add a bit more flavor to them.. ultimately though, i stuck with the symmetrical style for my personal quality of life. i find it easier to work with and add to- i just have to be very meticulous about getting the proportions right is the main thing ^^'

now, from the sketch is the natural next step of Lining shit! and heres where the method of madness starts, because a big part of this entire thing is...

this . im so sorry about this image.

if you look at the layers, you'll see the general order of operations! basically i try to look at it as different Pieces, or Assets. its like a paper doll that you're assembling- the pieces that go behind need to go all the way in the back, then you build up. the back of someone's hair goes behind everything, then their body. then their clothes, then head, face, face accessories, bangs, and finally cartoony emotes on the very top if that's your style.

generally, i try to set my layers up for maximum customization- mixing and matching it the key for making my talksprites as versatile as possible. so stuff like having a base body that you can add changes of clothes too, using clipping layers to add shadows that would go over everything, that kinda thing.

but overall, having layer stacks worked out like this is the MOST important part, imo, for doing these talksprites. when it all comes together, the result is a clean basis for mixing and matching however you might need for both expressions and appearance. i keep everything in folders of Lineart, Shading, and Color as well, just in case i need to revisit or add to something premade later.

speaking of adding- this also allows for you to easily make any future assets for changing appearance and expression! i personally do it case-by-case, as i can't ever anticipate every expression or article of clothing i'd Ever Need. when something new is needed, i'll just make the new thing, and then it's just another piece to have in the mix! it's pretty nice! :D

tip: god remember to name your layers/folders. i used to Not and it made finding the pieces i need so hard. doing this method will result in a LOT of layers. be nice to yourself and name things accordingly!

now focusing in on the most important part of an expressive talksprite, heres the face, and the best way ive found to stack the layers so far. within all of these layers are the pieces of expressions that can make countless matches if you add enough to them. fun!

now the Eyes. the eyes . the eyebrows and mouth are pretty straightforward you just Draw and Color them and boom theyre done. but i want to draw special attention to the Eyes because figuring out how to do these were probably the thing i struggled with the MOST. its a system thats a bit more in depth than just. Doing it. here's what we got though.

the optimal stack for maximum eye expression that ive found? do lines and the coloring for those lines. SEPARATELY.

the idea is to make irises fully round so you can move them around or have wide eyed expressions without any weird cutoff in parts you failed to draw (looking at my old sprites. sighs). but to avoid having to delete or erase anything, the iris folder needs to clip onto the eye whites folder so you dont get stuff like

this . yeah.

and another thing i had to learn the hard way is that if your character has stuff like eyebags or makeup, and this is the reason my "lineart layer" has folders, if that if you put that stuff on the white layer, the irises will sit over THAT as well as the whites, resulting in some annoying little things.

see: ace's eyebags in the whites layer, VS ace's eyebags in the lines layer.

ofc this is unnecessary if you dont add that kind of detail to your own characters- in that case, the lines layers can be as simple as just being lines!

with all that, the eyes more than anything are layers i recommend having properly named. you'll need to have the right whites with the right lines, so being able to find the two pieces with the same names is important! else you could get fun bits like this:

i dont think eyes are supposed to do that.

and generally, that's the most important parts of making these that i'd say! i have a few more tips, but theyre mostly little things that are moreso optional that i'll rattle off real quick-

for shading, i just use solid black shading with a lower opacity (i know, booooo). it's the quickest and easiest way to ensure they're both consistent, and covering everything in the same way. tbh i dont every see shading as necessary for these- but it adds just that bit more of depth and extra visual appeal to it imo

a general rule i use for characters with facial hair, which is Several in missing numbers; beards go with the head base, mustaches should be redrawn with every mouth. when someone with a mustache or stubble is talking, its usually gonna be moving and contorting with the shape of the mouth:

having it be static can range from a little off, to just Weird with more extreme expressions. but thats mostly because my style leans more realistic- if you've got a more toony style, i dont think having a mouth overlapping a mustache a little will be too bad!

this is just because i put a lot of detail into stuff and is SUPER optional, but one thing i do is have two different head bases for whether a mouth is open or closed. the jaw is opening is gonna result in the chin going a bit farther down, as opposed to it being closed! all i did to make it was take the original head base, grab the jaw area, and lower it a few pixels, then filled in the gaps. work smarter not harder

when moving the irises around, i prefer to duplicate the base layer. usually to get things to look right, you'll need to move the irises independently, so its good to just have the original stay as it is because getting it back EXACTLY how it was might be difficult. plus, you can keep the moved ones for reuse later! ^-^

if your art program allows for a universal symmetry ruler, awesome! make sure you know exactly where to put it later to add to your character! and if you use a program like clip studio (like me) where the ruler only applies to one layer; at least for csp, i can put it on a folder and it applies to everything inside that folder, so i just put all the assets in one Big folder and put the ruler there. i dont know every art program, but hopefully that still helps??

if your character has strands of hair that rests in front of their shoulders like ace's wisps or leafs big old strands, draw them as a part of the bangs or put them in the same folder so they properly sit atop everything else!

ace doesnt have any hands yet, but those would go at the very top of the layer stack. heres our lovely assistant for an example!

and for now, thats all i can really think of!

these talksprites aren't ideal for a lot of bodily motion, but for stuff like that, i figure thats where hand-drawn pieces come in. generally, i have these setup to make work on updates a bit easier, as it takes me a while to draw entire original pieces (and i struggle to focus. this is in fact why the blog suddenly went quiet again), but i still want my posts to have that visual flair to them! doing an entire visual of a character from the ground up is a fair bit more work than just. drawing a symmetrical mouth onto a guy, so i've found this whole mix-n-match type of talksprite thing a godsend ^^

anyways !! i hope i explained that well enough- good luck with ur endeavors, and i hope i get to see it!! :O

and please feel free to shoot any other questions my way if you need anything else!! im always happy to explain and help :D

and as a blog teaser for whoever gets all the way down here, a little something for your time... ive hired these three trainers to stare at you