#i tried a bit different style maybe? i tried to do no lineart

[sygneth]

If you can just let me know if it's okay

To call you when I'm lonely

song (listen) | late night sketch, wanted to try something out

[natinkart]

FULL FEM FORTRESS LINE UP

i finally FINALLY finished this lineup. those fuckers are in my head more that they should be. after writing my ideas for them i HAD TO DRAW THEM, i had such a clear image in my mind. the only one I've drawn before where engie, medic, sniper and scout, but those were just sketches.

if you wanna read what I wrote about them you can find the three posts here: defense | offense | support

full lineup, sketch lineup and design thoughts under the cut:

i always like the sketches more but i love the clear lineart, it makes the character more readable, so now it's time for some design thoughts:

engie - she was the first, she has seen everythin- no ok wrong franchise. i meant, she was the one i was more certain of. the outfit didn't change from the og but i made her have two small pigtails. i always viewed them as a cow girl hairstyle, and they're also practical. a stable hairstyle that keeps your hair out of your face.

heavy - the sleaves where kinda an instant idea i KNEW i had to incorporate. so i did a bit of reaserch on traditional russian clothes and their patterns. they seems to be very geometrical with not more than 5 colors, which two of them are white and black, usually at the seams or borders of the clothing. so i tried to do that. i really like how it came out.

demo - not much to say aside from me winging the hairstyle. i honestly didn't know which one to give to her, but i knew i didn't want a long hair style. maybe one day i'll draw her without the hat.

scout - she is the one with my favorite design. i LOVE how it came out. i fell it express her cockiness the best. i tried putting her in the og outift but eh, i prefer this one.

soldier - this is literally just normal soldier. i tried to but more "femminine" traits in her face. but still, just soldier with boobs.

pyro - it's normal pyro, with some stickers cause why not.

medic - she's my love. my beauty, the absolute perfection. i love her and every time i draw her she becomes more and more creepy. and i love her so much. at first i was unsure about the hairstyle, i tried to but her in a high bun but it didn't fit the face shape, so i just gave her a side swoosh. also you may have noticed she has the nurse hat, well, that's just because i think it's cute, and i mean, she is a field doctor and usually the women there where red crosses so, made sense to me.

sniper - ah, my beautiful, unkept woman. i had a hard time making her face look rugged without giving her 30 years more and doing that on women is actually pretty difficult. i had one time an art teacher saying to me "every line on a woman's face gives her 10 years more" and holy fuck if that's true. the second problem was the body type. a lot of people do her slim, and at first i drew her like so, but i found myself appreciating a bigger waist line, creating a sort of square siluette.

spy - finally the beautiful femme fatale. i will ALWAYS have problems with spy's suit color. i can't. it always feels so wrong aaaa. but that aside, i did a simple google search for 60s women's suit and i kinda went with it. it's a bit different from the og spy suit but it's also different from modern suits, so i had a bit of an hard time adjusting the jacket.

my asks are open if you wanna know more of them or if you wanna see them in some specific scenario!! and if you like tf2 i also did a team furtress lineup with explainations.

consider supporting me on my KOFI, i recently opened commissions!!

[goldenshrikecomic]

Hello, this is gonna be a long one and I hope I don't bother you too much with it but you have something great going and and I think maybe some advice for someone like me who wants to do a longer comic and I took heart in that one ask you recently answered were you said you are plenty of pages ahead of the readers to not get paralysed by a deadline which seems like a no-brainer now that I read that with my own two eyes black on white but I had not thought to maybe go about it that way and I needed to have someone spell it out for me apparently. So to my question.. see, I have a skeleton of a story I have key scenes that need to happen and that I want to happen and I am sure in between things will shift and change and grow and a part of me can't wait for it to happen but- How do you start. How do you get going. It is in my head I have some written notes but most is in my head and I do not want it to remain there and rot I want to draw and tell the story I had in mind but I feel.. paralysed on the starting line of this journey and I am unsure how to go from there because my mind gets caught up in estimates of if I post one page a week that is "only" 52 pages. That seems so little. How many years would it take. Can I do this. And then my mind fires up in passion because I am willing to commit I want to do this I need to do this and I have a good idea of how to pace myself and how to go about it. I have the beginning of it on the back of my tongue and the tip of my fingers I can imagine it so vividly I wish I could animate it (if that wouldn't take up even more time and be insane I would) But somehow I still feel stumped on how to start. How to get over this first hurdle. It might be the executional dysfunction playing a huge part in it, maybe I am overthinking to much and stand in my way because of it, but like... How did you start your comic. How did your journey on GS begin? I know this was a bit of word vomit I am sorry but you are an inspiration and you seem to go about things (from what I could gleam from the asks) in a way that feels like it could work for me too and the way my brain functions but I do not know how to start? I dunno if it makes sense I am no english native and my thoughts are hard to put into words.

This ask has been sitting in my inbox for a while because it's such a loaded question. I have plenty of asks in this tag about my comicing process, so check them out maybe. This reply got lengthy! The more I wrote the more I noticed I feel very inadequate trying to give people tips on making comics. It's such a trial and error process.

I've seen plenty of advice for people wanting to start out comics to just start small, come up with a smaller story to get a feel of it before you go big. And I absolutely understand it in hindsight because I would've done many things differently if I had just tried it out first, but it's not what I did. I wanted to make a big comic, and a big comic I made, as my first project.

I don't think about the years these things take, but it'd absolutely ease your worries if you could come up with a simple style and be able to make pages faster. I've stripped my comic of shading and gotten more lenient with myself when it comes to backgrounds. You absolutely need to cut some corners if you want to make more than one story during your lifetime. It's a limited time afterall! Being able to turn your sketch into a lineart without having to redo everything with a careful hand would help a lot already. And colors, they take a lot of time.

This is not how I went about it in the beginning, but I'd love to tell you to write those things in your head down before you start. Leave holes, just write in what you know because you will forget some cool details if you keep them in. Write the starting point, middle and the end, even with just couple of words. Add things that interest you in the middle of those points. Do you want a sad arc for your character at some point? Write it in. Come up with what makes it happen. Weave it into the other scenes. If you know what's to come, you can add foreshadowing to the earlier scenes. Even if you didn't know what would come, you can take something from earlier scenes and make it foreshadowing. Writing is a fluid process. You can jump around and add things, you don't have to approach it by putting one block next to the other. Once you have the elements you want, you just have to tie those things together. It's the hard part. And you will change your mind about many things when you get to draw your characters and see them doing the things you've written.

The start! I always say it's the worst part, but I've started to think it might be the second worst. I think the worst part comes after you've started and worked for several ten pages on fumes and you finally run out of juice. Picking up after that is hard, for me at least. But if you can manage, it should get easier. You know your characters better by now, and they carry some of their own weight.

Make a canvas. Think about the scene you want to start your comic with. Night or day? Calm or busy? Just doodle, BIG and loose. Add some frames by just drawing lines, move things around, resize. What do you want to portray with the first page of your comic? I like to establish some of the world or atmosphere, and only then move on to the characters.

Don't try to be perfect, in fact leave that first canvas completely unpolished and move on to the next one. What should this page tell? Will you show the character? I'd leave the establishing shot of them as the last big panel. The rest of the page should build up to it. The last panel is important, it's a hook to turn the page.

Come back to polish those pages more only after you have a few of them done. The most important thing is to get yourself away from that first page, because the first page is scary. After five pages you can move things around and start adding ears to your spheres. You've started a comic now. You can go back to the first page and make it nice, because you already have opened the path to continue.

IT'S HARD. But it's rewarding. It's not for everyone but it's awesome if you can make it yours.

[desultory-novice]

Dess Late Night Art Rambles...

So the more I look at my latest Fontaine piece, the more I'm like, damn this is clumsy. It's not just the anatomy. Or the posing. I forgot Adeleine's hat pom-pom and her tights (no wonder she's freezing!) and reversed the triangles on Noir's scarf.

Silly confession time: I don't talk about it often but I have this occasional bizarre fear that people are going to think I'm faking my "good pieces" because the quality difference between one of my bangers and my artistic flops is immense. Like, it surprises even me that they come from the same digital pen. ^^

(I can on occasion dig deep and discover why that's the case: did I use references? did I clean up my roughs before drawing over them? did I warm up before drawing? am I tired or in a bad mood? Still, there are other times I just can't explain it.)

It took talking with a friend to realize what it was about this one that gave me this sense of...vertigo? Because it's just a little joke piece. Just a short illustrated gag about an event during my day I felt like talking about. And if I had just uploaded it as a rough sketch ala this...

...or even this, which is far, FAR more rough but serves its purpose of adding a very quick visual to a joke that's really more about the text, it wouldn't have pinged on my radar as it did.

But...I've been getting some really nice compliments about my coloring lately, and also I was working on an illustration (for another (!!!) fandom) that I was using this thin line brush for and it was turning out really nice so I decided to try inking this + adding color.

...Without refining my gag sketch. >.>

I did try to fix some of the proportions -slightly- but there were several places where I threw my hands up in defeat because I was tired and antsy to have something to show for my pain...

:coughs in how Noir has his hand awkwardly hidden in his pocket because I tried like a dozen different ways of posing that arm before giving up. I didn't even -realize- how badly his legs are misaligned with his torso till I got to the coloring phase, else I would have given a shot to fixing that too. I DID realize that I had thrown height AND ground level out of the window on the siblings but I just didn't care which wouldn't have stood out to me the way it did had I stuck with making a rough:

That "I'm antsy to have something to show" mindset left me with lineart that was still incredibly messy with none of the charm of a sketchy or chunky rough sketch.

And the colors, oof.

I mentioned coming back from this morning's excursion with a cold but even that aside, I think that I've been trying SO many things since my color experiments (manga traces, effects illustration, pose practice, layout experiments, value studies,  hard/soft shaing, 3d enviroments, animation) that I ended up accidentally pushing (?) the process I had developed for that really nice coloring process out of my mind. (!!) Too many steps in a specific order and now when I try to reach for it I only remember half of them and I'm not even sure I'm doing them in the right order. Plus it was cobbled together from four different tutorials so it's not like I can just go back and watch a video and be done with it... I actually think that's getting at the core of WHY my "style" has that inconsistency that makes me worry people will think I didn't draw (or cheated) on my better pieces.

...I've just got a very busy head.

Sometimes I'll read or watch something and it will trigger an artistic breakthrough in me, and maybe I can replicate that the next day, or the next. But then, I pick something else up and what I was so good at the other day gets cycled out. It's kind of frustrating. I wouldn't go so far as to say "I'm not learning anything." But I do think my mind is a bit of a sieve and I'm not retaining everything I'm learning.

...Is this a "getting old" thing, or just a "exhausted Dess who is trying to cram learning a dozen different hobbies at the same time into a life that already involves multiple jobs and a clinical amount of stress and pre-existing health issues" thing? Probably the second...

Anyway...

Normally this is the time of night where, with a piece like this, I'd delete/hide it out of shame that it doesn't represent my "growth" as an artist (which may be more messy than I'm thinking if the above holds true) but I suppose realizing all this about myself and my art IS a kind of growth?! So, you can stay, silly art piece.

After all, is this not why I'm a "desultory novice?"

Though next time, I hope I can remember that it's actually OKAY to still submit one panel gags to my blog as simple 15 minute rough sketches, and that I don't owe it to the world to visibly increase in skill every time I make my presence on the internet known.

[minas-linkverse]

Do you have any tips or tricks on how to start a comic like this? Or even just how you got started?? I've had my own au for years that I so badly wanna put out into the world but I've been struggling with finding a good way to start it!!!!

Hm!! Ok!! This is a tough question with many different answers even just from me. I'll do my best to answer tho!! 😮

The main bit of advice I want to give, and which I think is vital to anyone creating anything:

☆ Know yourself.

When looking up advice for creating, people love to tell you that by doing things a specific way is the best and only way to go. Often advice of this sort has solid points, you should plan ahead, you should have easy character designs, buut... You don't have to.

I do not work well with outlines or scripts. I dislike sketching. You'd think that'd make being a long form comic artist impossible for me, but nope.

I know theres things I cannot do, so I've put all my practise to what I can do. My lineart style allows me to almost skip sketching completely, my scripts are more of an A to B structure than law. I improv 90% of the time when making pages. It's kinda like dnd with myself.

I would absolutely not reccomend what I'm doing to others, but I know it works for me. People can tell me I'm doing it wrong but its either wrong or no comic at all, SO. Suck it. 👍

Er. Rambling now.

My point is, figure out what you can and cant do, and do your best to give yourself the ideal work enviorment and process.

☆ Deal with being overwhelmed

Making just a few panels and suddenly realising its gonna take years to get anywhere is SO demoralising. It's gonna happen and its gonna happen again, and again, and—

But continuing with the earlier advice, you gotta ask yourself what would help you. Are you willing to sacrifice quality? Do you just need a break? Maybe you're like me and like to include smth you love in every update so you'll have something to get excited about making.

That feeling of overwhelm is trying to tell you something, so figure out what that is so it wont end the project for you.

☆ Start it

You wont like what you make when starting. I've never heard of an artist who has.

I'm not saying start this instant, not everyone is as into improv and flailing around as me. But I will say you'll never feel ready. Figure out the minimun of what you need to start and do it. Show friends first if youre afraid to post.

Also where to start? Well sure there's lots of good advice online about that, but you can also just doodle random stuff until you feel like diving deeper. That's what LV started with, just Twi and Wild hanging out with animals and some headcanons. It may not be the most tightly written work but theres beauty in the humanity of a mess.

☆ Extras

A "failed project" or "forgotten WIP" is only a failure if you let yourself feel that way. Yea it can be a hauntingly strong feeling thats hard to deal with... But it can be beaten. WIPS are proof you tried and not everyone can say they have.

Lv is far from done and I have no intention of dropping it, but because the journey has been so nice I'd satisfied even if I had to call it here. Its smth that helps me with the overwhelm... What I've made is beautiful even now.

Comparing yourself to others is gonna rip your heart out. I love that theres other links meet aus out there and hope the best for those artists but I caNNot follow any of them or I'll crumble to dust.

So Uhm.

Basically. Have fun and be yourself. 👍

Ps. Readability is basically the most important thing for a comic artist to pay attention to, that and not destroying yourself with details and rendering. 🙌 Good luck out there!

[zecoritheweirdone]

hey guys,, who wants to see this new dsmp au i've thought up of instead of working on my other countless, already existing aus.

still trying to come up with a proper name for it,,, right now the working title is shattered reflections...? buuuut i'm not too content with that yet.

the basic plot is, via ~wacky shenanigans~,, ranboo, tommy, and tubbo,, all from different universes,, end up getting misplaced together in the multiverse or something like that, and now have to hop from dimension to dimension, trying to find their way back to their respective homes(and maybe they'll find that the real home was the friends they made along the way).

still need to iron out a few kinks(how did this start, how do they travel, how does it end, etc etc),, but like. it's been rotting in my brain ever since the idea first came to my head, so i figured i might as well share it here? in case anyone else's interested,, dkdnsksms.

ranboo's from a magical girl-like au!!! why? mostly because i thought the idea was fun,, ekenkssjks. tried my best to emulate an anime style into the design, 'm hoping it came across? i've been imagining, if this au were animated like spiderverse,, they'd look a lot like how peni parker was animated,, dkdmskdm. you'll never guess what his magical girl form is themed on /lh.

tommy, as you can prolly tell, is from a royalty au! youngest prince of the antarctic empire,,, design is slightly based on some fanart i saw on reddit, by someone called em0kii, i believe? i say slightly because i only thought to search up "antarctic empire fanart" for inspo after i was done with the lineart,, and by that time it was too late for me to change it to something that better fit the cold environment the kingdom's based on(and by too late i mostly mean i was lazy),,, dkdjskj. still, though, i'm pretty happy with it!

and then there's tubbo! he's from a post-apocalyptic au B]. not one with zombies,, but... idk, maybe something exploded? haven't thought too hard about the cause, but just know that his world is in a not good shape. i'm sure it's fine tho. my main thoughts when drawing him were to make him less colorful and saturated than the other two,, since his universe is a bit darker than theirs,,,, and to make him look a little intimidating(big coat, goggles, scarf, lots of sharp edges, plaid). after all, if you're a 5' something teen in the apocalypse, living all on your own– you wanna try and make yourself look as big as possible to try and ward off as many threats as you can. and if that doesn't work, you can always just hit 'em with a bat.

bonus doodle under the cut:

tfw you wake up in the middle of a forest, with no memory of getting there, with two weirdly dressed strangers right there beside you. like. what the fuck.

[lixenn]

OCtober 2024 day 19: palette challenge #1

So. For this prompt I decided to try something a little bit different. I have never drawn anything where I truly limited myself to just one colour palette and I honestly didn't know if I could figure it out with my current art style. Which means in Lix terms: OVERHAUL YOUR ENTIRE ART PROCESS IN AN EVENT FOR THE LOLS!

Which resulted in my first proper drawing of Trix, Val's sucessor and a true spitfire 🫡

More yapping under the cut.

Okay.

New art style tried out.

It was certainly and interesting experience because I completely winged the entire thing. I drew a rough sketch of her features and then just... messed around. I scrapped my intial try at the face and redid it and I'm not a hundred percent satisfied with it yet but I'd say for my first try this turned out pretty damn good.

And honestly while the face was a struggle the hair... My guys this was probably the easiest hair I have ever drawn digitally and I'm not exaggerating here. I could skip the entire lineart process by default so I just... layered the strands added some shade and highlight and it turned out so fucking good I'm still baffled by it. Like... I wanna draw here like this all the time but I also want the hair to match the rest of the drawing and it's jarring if I skip lineart with hair but have it with the rest of the piece. So either I just figure out how to properly draw without lineart entirely or I maybe adjust the way I do lineart I don't know what yet. Also I will need to experiment with different hairstyles just to see if this wasn't a fluke.

Btw this entire thing took me one and a half hours and six layers. SIX FUCKING LAYERS!!! THIS IS INSANE I NORMALLY NEED AT LEAST TEN FOR A FULLY RENDERED PIECE LIKE WHAT THE FUCK????? I had: background, face, eyes, hair plus two layers for light and shadow rendering. This seriously blows my mind like... dude... And I mainly used just one brush for this with just a bit of airbrush at the end for the rendering. I haven't touched any other tools either, I didn't even use clipping mask (which tbh i have maybe one for some of it but I just went: fuck it we ball).

Anyways conclusion: This is fire and I need to figure out what to do with this newfound power in the future 🫡

[tigerwolfproductions]

You’re challenged by Bookworm Becky!

Superheroine Wordgirl wants to battle!

My “as close as I can get to Pokemon” style is back! ... and just as confused as before.

Ah, the official Pokemon style. It changes with every generation, has confusing shading techniques in some gens, and I just kinda had to go with “the best I could manage” again XP (pretty proud of Bob’s tail flame though! That was tricky to do).

Moving on from my artist woes, it’s Becky and Bob Botsford and their secret identities of Wordgirl and Captain Huggyface! Been on a Wordgirl kick recently and since it came directly after a Pokemon kick, well, my brain inevitably crossed the two over. My brain also decided that it was enough of a masochist to want to take another crack at Pokemon style(ish), so here we are! I think the lineart has improved for the most part for human characters; I definitely felt more confident making Becky/Wordgirl! I actually based her off Shauna from XY... Not sure what urged me to do so, but I guess it worked so I ain’t complaining, haha.

Posing was actually tricky. I was originally going to put Becky in a bit more of a cutesy pose, but actually decided against it. She’s Becky Botsford, mild mannered ten year old. I figured, why not make the contrast between her and the Wordgirl pose all the more apparent? Ya know, put all her energy into the bold super-identity! So that I did, though I will say hands pointing at the screen is not a fav of mine to do at the moment, lol

As for Bob, I honestly didn’t really think of many difference there’d be between him and a regular Monferno, but I did add a couple of extra hair tufts to the back of his head. They’re there to represent the front hair tufts he has in the show :3 And of course he’s gotta be eating something, so I looked around and found a berry that would work for him. Not that he’d discriminate against most other berries, but I wanted one that made sense in some way, so a Shuca berry it was! They halve the damage from a super-effective ground-type attack, and have a “spicy-sweet-smooth” flavor chart and with Monferno being a fire type, I figured that spicy part worked out.

Speaking of, it actually took a moment of my time to brainstorm through what Pokemon to make Bob. It had to be a monkey, but what kind? First, there was the point of what type to make him, so I watched a few Wordgirl episodes and happened across a fight between him and Leslie and basically slapped my forehead because a doi- Fighting type for his ability to do Karate! So with that narrowed down, I tried to go through my memories for what monkey Pokemon were fighting types. Passiman came first, but they’re a bit too big for Bob to be. The Mankey line doesn’t quite fit in with his body type or nature, so I had to forgo that too. Then I remembered the fire-fighting starter monkey that made an obvious fit: Monferno! Which also works out because of course a ten year old would have a starter Pokemon as a main partner, and Monferno also shares the blue and red that Captain Huggyface’s uniform has.

Becky/Wordgirl wasn’t too hard to redesign outside of doing it in (the as close as I can get to) Pokemon style. The hardest part of Becky was the skirt thanks to shading, but I think I managed something decent. Second place actually goes to her book bag though. That main button was harder to nail down than I thought it’d be... As for the charms, I thought they could be a cute nod to two main things about her- the secret identity and her love of unicorns, which I figured would translate into a love of Ponyta/Rapidash in the Pokemon universe. Especially the Galarian forms, haha.

On the Wordgirl side, there was a bit more I decided to add. Most of it was dedicated to making her uniform feel a little bit more Pokemon-y, so I added some extra details to the boots and gloves then added pouches to her belt. The goggles were technically a part of that too, but also just because I like the idea of her one day adding them to her uniform (maybe one too many times of getting random goop in her eyes would make her consider it lol). I definitely like the results- I think it makes her look a bit like she’s wearing some sort of space hero outfit :D

As for what exactly this AU would entail, I’d like to think it wouldn’t change much from the main show. Becky lives in a city somewhere in Unova, living her daily life as a regular trainer that goes to a quaint little school with her partner Pokemon, Bob the Monferno (that’s totally normal to have as a starter in Unova; please ignore the part where she should have a Unovian starter). But in her secret double life, she takes on the odd supervillains in her city as Wordgirl, alien superheroine with a perfect vocabulary! But I do imagine Captain Huggyface would get to do more with his moveset of Ember, Close Combat, Mach Punch, and Focus Energy, (Becky unfortunately slacks a little on Pokemon training) as well as an appetite that rivals a Snorlax.

... Wow I rambled about my process. Well, thanks to anyone who read through it all; y’all have a nice day/evening!

[soaps-hoe-141]

Back Together

You might want to grab a snack before you read this one

Part 16

Pairing: Soap x Ghost

WC: 5k

Synopsis: Grocery shopping, furniture stores, and some good home cookin

Warnings: Soap bein a cheapo

Bargain Mart, the holy grail of deals and also the only place Soap ever went shopping anymore, the only place he needed to go shopping since the place sold just about everything you could think of. He had brought Ghost with him, even though the man seemed more than confused as to why they were about to even step inside the building. Soap led them inside stopping as they walked in the doors, he moved to grab a cart but paused glancing back at the man on his crutches and nodding towards one of the electric wheelchairs, “You should get one of those Lt. You’d look good riding in style,” Soap put his hands out revving an imaginary motor with a smirk.

The glare from the hazel eyes only turned his smirk into a joy filled smile as Ghost answered with a deadening tone, “No.”

Soap shook his head suppressing his smile, “Fine. Fine have it your way,” the Scotsman pulled a cart out of one of the rows and pushed it in front of Ghost letting him lean onto the cart as he took the man’s crutches and laid them in the cart instead. “Come on now, we have groceries to buy, my coupons expire tomorrow.” Ghost let out a huff and followed him as Soap headed for the produce first.

The Scot inspected everything he put into the cart much to Ghost’s annoyance. “Why couldn’t we just order some groceries to the house like I usually do?”

Soap gave him a look that showed the offense he felt at that and scoffed, “Because you get the best product when you get it yourself Ghost. If you let someone shop for you they don’t really care.” The tall man just watched him shaking his head a bit and grumbling as Soap kept walking. “I don’t have a coupon for bananas like you wanted but I do have one for a bag of oranges. Did you want those instead?”

Ghost shrugged as he answered, “I don’t know, I guess. I mean how much do a thing of bananas even cost? 10? 12 maybe?”

Soap gaped at him stopping in the middle of the aisle too shocked to move or even answer at first before blurting out, “Where have you been getting bananas Ghost!? Who has been scamming you?”

The tall man was confused, watching him and answering with a shrug, “I’ve never actually been to a grocery store before Johnny. I just have amazon deliver groceries to the house whenever I need something. Why? Is that…a lot?”

“Ghost, a bundle of bananas should cost like 2.50 a bundle at most, you poor, poor man. You must be joking, please tell me you are joking.” He waited to see the smirk in his eyes telling him what he wished to hear, but it never came. Just a blank stare down at him that made his head shake and fingers pinch at the bridge of his nose. “You are never to order groceries again, understand me? I’ll do your grocery shopping from now on, just text me whenever you need something.” Soap walked on through the aisles, ignoring the child-like pleas to leave from the tall man as he shopped, filling the cart up as they went. At one point he pulled ahead of Ghost, losing the man accidentally in the maze of the store. He found himself in the middle of the aisle that housed the art and school supplies.

Blue eyes roamed the sketchbooks, the different pencils and pens for lineart, and the different kinds of oil pastels that seemed to call to him, they had been his favorite media before he had stopped drawing a few years back. However, the price tag shot his desire down nearly immediately. Besides it had been a while anyway, he’d probably fuck it up if he tried to draw again. He nearly jumped out of his skin when a deep voice spoke behind him, “What are you looking at this stuff for, Johnny?”

Soap turned to look at the masked man, taking a deep breath to calm his heart before he shrugged, feigning nonchalance, and continued down the aisle shooting back over his shoulder, “No reason, come on let’s go Lt. We still have to stop by that furniture store, I saw an ad online that they have a sale on right now.” He didn’t stop to look back, continuing on to the registers. As they stood in line he cast a worried look over at Ghost who was leaning over on the cart heavily, probably too much walking around for one day already. “Hey Ghost, I’m gonna go pull the car around. Here’s my Bargain Mart card, make sure they scan it before you pay, my coupons are loaded onto it.” He handed the rewards card over to him and then pulled out his credit card, “And here you go.”

Ghost took the rewards card without issue and then shook his head, “I’ll pay for it, just hurry up and get the car.” Soap’s brows furrowed and the big man waved him off, “Go on.” He sighed and shoved his wallet back in his pocket as he left Ghost to handle the checkout line. He met the man back near the front as he pushed the cart out the door. Soap jumped out, helping Ghost into the passenger seat before he loaded the groceries and got them back on the road.

Soap hummed along to music only he could hear as they drove, before he parked the car again, this time at the Furniture Depot. “Do you still want to go inside? We don’t have to if you’re tired or your leg is hurting.”

Ghost nodded almost immediately, “I’m fine, let’s go Soap.” The man seemed almost excited to be going inside here. The tall man opened his door first and the Scotsman hurried to meet him around the car, pulling his crutches out of the backseat and helping him out of the low seat.

Once more Soap led them inside the store, met immediately with a salesman who was shooting a wide smile at the both of them that faltered just slightly when he looked at Ghost’s skull mask before he regained his composure and asked, “How are you two doing today, gentleman?”

Soap glanced around the store, “We’re doing ok, thanks.”

The man waited for him to say anything more before he continued, “So, is there anything I can help you with today? Anything in particular you’re looking for?”

The Scotsman glanced back at Ghost, giving him a curious look, “What do you think? Which room do you want to finish next?”

Ghost glanced around the store as well before shrugging, “The bedroom maybe?”

Soap gave a quick nod and looked back at the man who was still giving them both that customer service smile, “That’s perfect, we actually have a sale going on for all bedroom furniture right now, if you can believe it. Right this way,” he led them through the store back to where a few fake bedrooms had been set up to showcase the furniture. “This is one of our more popular sets, the queen size metal frame bed. It has a matching vanity, dresser, and nightstand, but in my opinion it is lacking in storage space especially for the price.” Soap looked up at Ghost, hazel eyes staring hard at him before Sopa shook his head to the salesman. 

“No problem, we have plenty more. Now my personal favorite is this one over here,” he directed them to a different bedroom set that was a gray wood with a wide grain that matched the granite countertops in the kitchen. Soap shot a look at Ghost who was still watching him instead of the salesman, his hazel eyes a bit softer this time and flicking away the moment he had been caught again. The salesman caught their attention then and gave them his pitch, “Now this is the one that my wife and I have in our master bedroom and she loves it. It’s a storage bed, queen size as well, and has a full matching set for the entire room. And in addition to the regular sale, it is also on a closeout sale so it’s more than half off. We have the last ones in transit now from the warehouse, you can take it home by tomorrow if you buy today.”

Soap nodded as he inspected it closely and turned his attention to Ghost as he asked, “Do you like it?”

Ghost glanced at each piece individually before nodding, “Affirmative.”

The Scotsman suppressed a smile at his lack of enthusiasm behind it and looked at the salesman, “How much is the whole set?”

“3,300 with the dresser, vanity, and the two nightstands,” the salesman answered with a proud smile.

Soap however blanched at him and shook his head, “Yeah that’s not gonna work. Our budget is 2,800 right now with the hospital bills and everything. I'm sorry.” The Scotsman pursed his lips feigning disappointment as he backed up, “Come on m’eudail.” He wrapped an arm around Ghost’s back looking up at him and thanking God that the salesman couldn’t read his expression through the balaclava cause he could plainly see Ghost’s intense confusion about what exactly Soap was doing.

They turned and headed for the door before the man stopped them with a loud, “Wait! Just a second,” he caught up to them and Soap turned to look back to him. “Let me go talk to my manager, I’m sure I can knock a little more off the price for you two.”

A thankful smile lit up the Scotsman’s features, “Thank you. If you could, that would be amazing.” He watched the man retreat towards the back of the store and turned to look up at Ghost who was still watching him and Soap realized he still had his arm wrapped around the Lieutenant’s back. “Oh sorry about that Lt. I was just trying to sell the bit.” Ghost narrowed his eyes and Soap elaborated, “He thinks we’re together, Ghost. That’s why he brought up that he and his wife have the same set even though he isn’t married.” At the quizzical look in his eye he held up his hand and pointed to his finger, “No ring Ghost. Besides, you can get a great deal if you start playing the sympathy card.”

Ghost rumbled out, “I don’t have any hospital bills to pay Soap. And, I could have afforded that, I don’t need any more of a discount.”

Soap sighed and shook his head, “It’s not about what you can afford Ghost. It’s about making sure that big furniture loses.” 

He tapped a finger to his temple a couple times before the salesman reappeared from the back with that customer service smile still plastered on his face. “Good news gentleman, my manager agreed to the 2,800. It’s all yours tomorrow so long as you pay today.”

The Scotsman looked up at the tall man with an ‘I told you so,’ look and Soap could see the smirk underneath the mask as he nodded, “Ok, we’ll take it.” Ghost paid for the furniture set and they left the store.

Soap drove them back home, singing along to the playlist as he always did. He noticed Ghost staring a couple times but ignored the look he was giving him, continuing to sing as loud as he could. He helped Ghost out of the car when they got home, taking the groceries in himself. He loaded his arms down with the bags refusing to make a second trip back out to the car out of principle. Soap went immediately to the kitchen, only glancing momentarily at Ghost as he sat on the couch in his black hoodie and shorts with his cast up on the couch to rest what had to be an aching leg. He put the groceries away, letting it occupy his mind as he did. He kept out a small pork loin and set aside a couple potatoes and some veggies to go along with it.

The Scot washed the potatoes and peeled them then cut them into quarters. He threw the quartered potatoes into a mixture of vegetable oil, salt, pepper, minced garlic, flour, beef broth, white wine, thyme leaves, rosemary leaves, and bay leaves. He stirred it for a few seconds dipping in a finger to taste the mixture before nodding slowly to himself. “That’ll do,” he then went back to the veggies he had sat out, dicing a large onion, two small tomatoes, some celery, and two medium sized parsnips. He let it stew as he trimmed the small pork loin and cut it into small cubes, trimming off the thickest parts of the fat and leaving some to help season the stew. Soap threw the pork in then, stirring again and making sure it was thickening properly before he nodded to himself muttering quietly.

He turned, fixing to go see what Ghost was doing when he was met with the image of the man sitting at the kitchen island already watching him. “What’s for dinner tonight?”

Soap felt heat traveling up his chest and trying to settle on his face as he answered, “Pork stew, me mum’s recipe. I’ve never cooked it by myself so I hope you like it.”

Ghost peeked around him at the pot sitting on the burner and nodded slowly, “I’m sure I will. You were putting a lot of work into it just now. You don’t put that much work into something you don’t think will be worth it. I know you.” Soap couldn’t help the small smile as he nodded. The tall man watched him as he sat on the stool beside him, leaning forward against the bar with a yawn, his head resting in his hand. “I uh,” Ghost started as he pulled a bag off his lap and sat it on the counter before pushing it towards the Sergeant. “I got you this. When we were at the store,” the hazel eyes looked down at his hands as Soap opened the bag.

He pulled out a sketchbook and a pack of lineart pens and pencils, staring down at the box of oil pastels as well and letting out a light chuckle, unable to look up at the eyes he knew were staring holes into him now. “Ghost, you didn’t have to get me these. I haven’t even drawn in years. I’m probably shite now.” The man ran his thumb across the cover of the sketchbook and finally managed to turn his eyes to look up at Ghost, “How’d you even know what to get?”

“I’m quiet, not stupid Johnny. You were staring at it like it was the love you had left standing on the shore before deployment. With all the savings you got me at the market and then the Furniture Depot too I had some money left in the budget to get you something to show my appreciation.” Ghost’s eyes were so soft beneath the mask it was hard to look away, but Soap didn’t have a choice as he felt his heart start to pick up, his cheeks heating up.

The Scot cleared his throat and returned his gaze down to the art supplies, “Thanks Ghost. I appreciate the gift.” Ghost nodded then and tilted towards him to nudge his shoulder as he opened everything to inspect it a bit closer. The smell of the food permeated the room as it cooked making both of their stomachs rumble in anticipation.

Ghost pushed up from the stool heading back towards the living room, “If you need me I’ll be in the living room.”

Soap nodded and watched him leave before he made his way back to the stove slowly, pulling the lid off the pot to stir and inspect the food. It bubbled slowly, the sauce had thickened and everything was cooked through already. He stirred it for a few more seconds before he grabbed a couple bowls and spoons, poured a couple glasses of wine, spooned out food for the both of them, and opened a pack of rolls on the counter and after grabbing one for each of them he headed back to the living room to join Ghost on the couch. Soap handed off one of the bowls and then one of the glasses and glanced up at the TV as he pushed back into the corner of the sectional, legs drawn up as he tasted the food. It wasn’t exactly like his mom made it but it was fairly close. He glanced sideways as Ghost pulled his mask off and took a bite. He heard a low noise and his face fell, worried that he hated it before the man turned to look at him with surprise on his features not saying anything as he shoveled more into his mouth.

He let out a relieved sigh and went back to eating while watching the Lieutenant, enjoying the quiet noises and the expressions on Ghost’s face more than any TV show could ever give him. Soap watched as he dipped the roll into the leftover sauce, soaking up every drop before he sat the bowl on the table. Ghost sat back holding the glass of wine he hadn’t touched yet, sipping at it slowly and nodding to himself, “It was good Johnny. I’ll give it to you. I really thought I was gonna be washing my mouth out for a week.”

Blue eyes narrowed at the tall man before he shook his head, “I feel like you just insulted me but tried to cover it with a little sprinkle of praise. That doesn’t make what you said nice, you know that right Ghost?”

Ghost hid a smile behind another sip from the wine and Soap finished his own bowl of the stew. He took the bowls leaving the big man to watch his show as he cleaned up and packed away the leftovers before storing them in the fridge. The Scotsman didn’t go back immediately though, taking a few seconds to more closely inspect what Ghost had gifted to him before heading back to take a seat on the couch. His hand moved without much thought, the light pencil dancing over the paper as he transferred the pent up thoughts out through the pencil. Soap didn’t even realize when his eyes drifted shut looking down at the paper, not even noticing when Ghost took the sketchbook and the pencils, closing them without looking and putting them on the table before throwing a blanket over the Scot and laying back down on the couch to go to sleep himself.

Soap woke early the next morning, neck stiff from laying on his side without something to hold his head up. Ghost was on his stomach, his arm hanging off the couch and breathing heavily in his sleep. He stood slowly checking the time on his phone with a sigh. Ghost had been sleeping fairly late into the morning so he had some time before the man woke up, he could probably get to the base, get Ghost’s truck, and get the furniture they had bought…in a dream. Sadly this was not one, not this time anyway. Soap sighed and went to change, finding his duffel bag empty of fresh clothes. “Damn it,” he mumbled to himself before heading down the hall. Ghost wouldn’t notice one pair of shorts and a shirt missing, hopefully. He stripped quickly down to his underwear before going through the boxes and pulling out a pair of shorts and a long sleeve t-shirt.

He was about to pull the clothes on when he heard that voice that always seemed to sneak up on him when he least expected it. “Why are you stealing my clothes?”

“Fuckin hell Ghost!” Soap turned on the tall man, holding the clothes in front of him with a tired glare glued to the other’s unmasked face. “Keep that shite up and I’m gonna put bells around your neck. Quit sneaking up on me you big blaigeard.” Ghost snickered as he moved out of Soap’s way, following the shorter man on his crutches, and shutting the bathroom door in his face. “I’m going to go get your truck from the base and then pick up the furniture when they open.” He paused as he pulled the shirt over his head and the shorts on around his hips. They were too big, obviously, so he tightened the drawstrings and tied them off before pulling the sleeves up past his elbows so they didn’t dangle down past his hands. His face felt hot as he looked at himself in the mirror, wishing to himself that something else had accompanied him acquiring Ghost’s clothes. Maybe a sweaty night or a lazy morning. A languid roll of his hips against Ghost’s, or devouring his mouth to discover a taste he hadn’t yet been able to.

Soap hung his head for a second, shaking it slowly as he pushed the thoughts back with a sigh. He couldn’t do that, wouldn’t do that. Not when he knew how the other man felt about it. But, was it so wrong to wonder? To dream about it? Yes, it was, it was wrong for him to feel that, to want and think that. He was Ghost’s friend and the Lieutenant had made it clear that he didn’t want anything more than that so secretly pining for that, desiring more than what Ghost was willing to give, just didn’t sit well in his own stomach and he couldn’t imagine how it would feel to the other man. The Scotsman opened the bathroom door again to Ghost standing there looking down at him with a look that made his skin burn even hotter though he pushed by once more unwilling to let the tall man see it. Those hazel eyes would haunt his dreams for years to come, “I need you to promise me you won’t do anything stupid while I’m gone. Please I’m begging ye, because if you do anything stupid Price is gonnae have both our heads on a spike when he gets back. Copy?”

He heard Ghost take a seat once more on the couch behind him as he grabbed his things, listening as the Lieutenant answered back, “Copy that Sergeant MacTavish.” He eyed the back of the blonde’s head, surprised he hadn’t yet put the mask back on. They were in his home though so maybe he was just tired of wearing the suffocating fabric in the place he was usually able to just relax in, Soap knew without a doubt he would probably feel the same way.

“I’ll be back in maybe…” he tilted his head one way and then the other as he tried to judge the time, he had always been poor at doing that on the spot, before he gave up. “I’ll be back whenever I’m back. I’m gonna take a run to the base then go swing by the Furniture Depot and pick everything up. Be back soon, Lt.” He heard a grunt of acknowledgement and hesitated in the door before he shook his head and headed out to get what they needed done for the day.

--------(Ghost POV)

The tall man laid back on the couch, an arm behind his head and a nagging boredom in the back of his mind. When Johnny was here it was a bit easier to ignore it, to focus on the Scotsman and his burning blue eyes. The scar that cut through his dark brow brought a heat to his own skin as he wore those scars and marks so shamelessly. The black tattoo on his forearm and the one on his back that he had only seen whenever he snuck up on the half-naked man like today.

Without him around though he was left to his own thoughts and desires. Soap had been gone for only fifteen minutes when his boredom won over and he was up and moving around, headed through the kitchen into the back room he had told Soap was of no interest. A washer and dryer sat on one side, and sewing, crochet, and knitting supplies sat on the other side of the room. He eyed the supplies before moving towards them, pulling out an unopened box and opening it with one hand. He dug through the power tools with narrowed eyes before smiling as he pulled out a compact circular saw. The big man gave a quiet nod before he headed back to the living room with an extra battery.

Ghost tested each of them, lips pursing in annoyance when he found that they were both dead. He unplugged the phone chargers in the wall and plugged in the charger for the power tools battery packs letting them sit as he went back to watching the show on the TV. Hazel eyes flicked anxiously to the light on the charger every so often, unable to really focus on the show. The thirtieth time he looked at the charger and still saw the red blinking light his eyes began to wander the room, knowing he would be climbing the walls soon if he didn’t do something.

That was when the sketchbook sitting on the table caught his eye. He hadn’t looked last night but he had been tired, plus Johnny had been sleeping right there, it would have felt wrong to look at it. Hell it felt wrong to look at it now as he reached a hand out to the cover, fingers pausing on the matte black. Soap had sketched half of the night away last night, the pencil dancing over the pages for hours, so long even that he had fallen asleep with the pencil and the book both in his hands.

Ghost tapped a finger against the black cover, reaching up to scratch at his neck as he tried to stop the urge to open it. He shook his head slowly, it was wrong, that was a private expression of himself that Soap had expected it to be respected. It was wrong and he knew he shouldn’t do it. He sat back on the couch, trapping his hands in his armpits to stop himself from opening the cover. That lasted all of thirty seconds though before he sat forward again and thought to himself, ‘Just one and then I’ll close it.’ He opened the cover, turning the book to the side to look down at the picture Soap had outlined on the page.

Cheeks heated up as he looked down at his own image, the outline of his face taking up most of the page along with his neck. Soap had outlined a few scars along his jaw and the one that cut through his lip. He was looking out of the page, a smile suppressed on his face with a glass raised to his mouth. It wasn’t tediously detailed but it got the message across that he had been Soap’s subject last night. He flipped to the next page, he was further away this time. The balaclava covered his face, his chest was bare though and a hand was holding a towel wrapped around his waist, the day Soap’s mom had showed up at his apartment while the Lieutenant was there. He saw a few outlines of his tattoos, namely the sleeve on his arm though it was almost like Soap couldn’t quite remember what it had looked like because there were annoyed scribbles and eraser marks on it, the rest of the picture unfinished.

Again, Ghost flipped to the next page and his eyes widened in surprise before he shut the book quickly, staring down hard at the cover in front of him. One hand held the sketchbook closed and the other was on his mouth, unable to look away from the book but also unable to open it back up. He must have lost track of the time because when he heard the door knob twist and the front door open he hurriedly put the sketchbook back on the table leaning back into the cushions and feigning being relaxed as he pretended to be watching whatever the fuck was on the TV.

-----(Soap POV)

He pushed open the door, pulling a heavy box in behind him, his chest heaving with the effort as he leaned it against the wall of the hallway. Soap glanced at Ghost sitting on the couch and took a deep breath before saying, “I got everything Lt. You wanna put the bed together first and do the rest whenever we get around to it?” He got a stiff nod from the man who was scratching at the beard growth on his face and avoiding his gaze. The Scotsman watched him for a few more moments before shrugging and shaking his head to himself before he headed back out to go get the other boxes. After lugging in the five different boxes Soap shut the door and leaned over to catch his breath. It took a few seconds before he could stand back up straight and leaned over the back of the couch beside Ghost. “Alright you coming to help me or am I putting this shite together myself?”

Ghost cleared his throat and glanced at the boxes leaning on the wall before standing up from the couch, “I’m coming.” He watched the big man grab his crutches up before he headed down the hall to the bedroom.

Soap followed pushing the box until he saw the charger and compact circular saw sitting on the ground by the wall outlet and yelled down the hall at him, “Were you going to use that while I was gone!?” Ghost turned the corner glancing back down the hall but not bothering to answer. “Hey! You don’t get to hobble away, get back here!” Soap continued pushing the box down the hallway after him, “I told you not to do anything stupid!”

Ghost merely shrugged as Soap turned the corner and answered in a gruff voice, “I didn’t. Thought about it, but I didn’t.” Soap glared hard at his back but held his tongue, the man wasn’t wrong. He hadn’t done it at least. Still didn’t make it ok but they could discuss it later, after they got this stupid furniture put together.

[hinamie]

Hi Hina! How are you? I just want to start off by saying I love your art 💞 it reminds me of cookies... or bread (does that make sense??) and i just wanna eat it up (please take it as a compliment 🙈)

I have a question... it might be a bit silly but I hope you don't mind. I've been trying to get back into art myself, used to love it as a kid but somewhere along the way I just stopped... I'm not sure what happened but it's something I still love doing and want to do. One problem I had tho (and still have) is that I don't have my own style? When I was little I would usually browse through art and if I see something I like I tried to recreat it, but in the end it looks exactly like the original art (the amount of times i had to convince ppl that I didn't trace it.... I really didn't)

I think it might be that I don't have an initial start process 🤔 when I start drawing I'd look at my reference and just put those shapes right in as I see it... there is no sketch or lineart just a final product. And now I don't even know where to start? Am i over thinking it and should I just go for it... or do you have any tips for a beginner?

I'm sorry this is kinda long and feels like a ramble. Please feel free to ignore ♥️

no need to apologize!! i’ve talked a lot about my thoughts on the art style fixation that a lot of people get trapped in, but the tl;dr of it is draw first and style will come naturally later so don't paralyze yourself into a slump by believing that you Can't draw without solidifying your art style

also smth i feel like i've mentioned before sdfsgfj but i was very much in the same boat of just copying art i liked 1:1 when I was younger so i definitely empathize with your struggle of not knowing how to start branching out into your own stuff . copying was good practice but i was definitely treating it like a crutch . but u know that’s where doing fanart really helped for me because since the characters Exist already i can treat them like little dolls fr me to dress move around, n it overall feel less like i’m stuck floundering completely trying to conjure up a 100% original piece. 

that being said, if fanart is something you’re into, maybe u can use that as a way 2 push yourself also! u can still look at references (in fact you Should look at references) but rather than copying what you see exactly, maybe u can try drawing character in a different pose, or from a different angle ! it doesn’t have to be anything super complex or elaborate, just get into the habit of not drawing exactly what you see so u slowly build confidence in your ability to compose your own piece. eliminates the “did you trace that” aspect also!

as for u saying u have a lack of start process, i rly do recommend sketching .  not only is it practice and a good warmup, it’s a visual brainstorm !! sketching is how u get ur ideas down on paper its like working with yourself to chip away the scraps n hone in on the idea u want to convey. plus with sketching there’s no pressure to make smth that looks “good”, the whole point is that it’s unpolished ! n i find what happens a lot of the time is i dont realize i even Have an idea until ive been sketching fr a bit and i realize Oh i can make smth out of this :) 

i hope smth here was helpful!! i'm very happy u like my art and i wish u the best of luck creating your own <3

[cowboysuperhero]

hi i realize i don't talk as much here as much as i do on twitter which. maybe i SHOULD talk here more because there are no character limits. okay so.

first image (aug 2022) i think was like. one of the first times i actually tried to reference and i had to trace bits of it and i didn't know HOW to reference. and i barely understood charlie as a character. did not understand how he would dress had not even settled on his tattoos. could not get the colors to look right so i think i like. put him at 90% opacity to make it work.

between that and the second one (sept 2023) not only has there been SO much character development (future version with a beard now exists. he has been electrocuted. he is now jacked. he is transgender.) but i have done so many anatomy sketches that i didn't have to reference at all. yes i still should / do / will but i didn't feel like i needed to just to get it done.

and i picked all the colors by hand i didn't use any layer modes. the shadows here are actually the base / local colors and the lighting is added in on top and i used actual color knowledge to do that. like how i learned that if you use a desaturated warm tone against a more saturated warm color, it makes the desaturated one look blue and that's how you get 'blue' light on warm colors without it looking weird.

i found a message from last year when i sent the first image as an example of how i "have clothing folds figured out in my style, maybe not realistically but they look good" and looking at the folds on that versus the new one is like...no i did not. i don't know why i thought that.

this obviously isn't like a 100% fair comparison since i didn't bother to shade the first one and i'm pretty sure i was experimenting with a different lineart brush / style (which is why i'm not commenting on that here) and i did actually redraw the chair image one-to-one already but. i was looking through charlie's gallery and this just stuck out to me like WOW. holy shit dude. jesus christ.

i will never ever ever get over how much just becoming deeply obsessed with a character makes you improve. to give you an idea he hit 69 images on toyhouse (lol nice) in october 2022. it is SEPTEMBER just under a year later and he is now at THREE HUNDRED SIXTY (360). I AM NOT JOKING. not all of those are by me but a lot of them are! i did studies SPECIFICALLY so i could draw him better. please note i had literally never done studies before and like i said did not know how to reference. i have never been so obsessed with a character before charlie and it's the best thing that ever could've happened to my art. AND me.

[mywaywardcupcake]

For the fandom asks!!

4, 14, 15, 19, 22 (for any character), 23, and 24 (again, any character!!

4. Is there a popular pairing you don't necessarily dislike but aren't too invested in?

Not really. I mean there's plenty of ships that I don't really supply any content for, including like I would say the big 3 but it's more because I don't really think of then often....I guess that's technically the exact definition...

14. Is there a character or ship you were so sure you would never write/draw but now you've changed your mind?

I mean, I think the majority of things I've made are pretty much all wish or Jou, so this is a bit harder to think of. I will say going by who I liked when I was younger, maybe Ryuzaki/shrimp? I have ideas I want to do with them, but when I was younger I don't think I would have ever thought about them?

15. Have you noticed your style change over time?

Yes! Absolutely. I mean it's still developing but I have at least seen an improvement!

The first is from like 2019? Maybe 2020? Then, like the most recent two and even from those I'm noticing a difference from that middle one until now. My style is still developing as I use references a lot, and I always feel like it keeps shifting depending on the reference I choose? I definitely feel like I've gotten more confident in my lineart and how I do that!

19. What's your favourite thing about [fandom] (the people in it, not the media you're all enjoying together)?

I love this fandom so much. I love that, for the most part, people are so kind and encouraging of each other (at least with the ones I've been interacting with)! We can all be a bit silly, but it's so much fun.

22. Give us a headcanon for [Shizuka]

I headcanon her as having diabetes. I saw someone post one time that whole thing about Jou asking Yugi if he needed insulin. When someone is shaky, like insulin wouldn't be great because when you're shaky, it's usually due to low blood sugar, and insulin would lower it further. Anyway in the post it was talking about how Jou seemed to have an understanding of it but was a bit off and what if it's because Shizuka had it and he had some understanding of it when he was younger. Anyway, I kind of latched onto that idea, especially with her having health conditions that we don't really get to learn about.

23. Has your favourite character/ship changed over time?

Answered here!

24. What's your favourite thing about [Honda]?

His loyalty and love for others. Boy is for real a ride or die for the ones he loves and cares about. He would go to the ends of the Earth for Jou. And he was so concerned (or jealous) about Jou's new friendship. I also love how he tried so hard to come off as this stoic cool guy, but he is a big, loveable goofball who is into romance. Absolutely adore him!

[1ore]

Hey, sorry if this is a bit out of the blue, but can I ask what programs/brushes you use? I've been trying to learn how to paint digitally, but it often feels so sterile, and I really struggle with it. I envy how well you are able to achieve a traditional look with digital tools, and would love to learn your secret.

I'd love to see a tutorial/process video by you too honestly, but that's more just wishful thinking - I know you probably have a lot going on.

Cheers, either way! (And wish me luck)

oh my god. I went and did all that organizing and almost forgot to let you know! I put together a tag containing all of my resources/materials/art process stuff. It also has every timelapse video I've done. Each video has process rambling + lists of brushes / materials used in their YT descriptions.

I have a hard time talking about my process like I'm any kind of authority, but I tried to think about it a little and share whatever i've found helpful, answer questions I've been asked in the past or struggled with myself, etc.

Re: emulating traditional media specifically:

ok, first of all. Disclaimer: it's not all about the tools.

but if you're a hack like me it sure feels that way!!!!

When I moved from Photoshop to Clip Studio Paint, a big growing pain for me was finding real media tools that felt good to use. It's pretty obvious in the art I made during that time. Both the tools that ship with the program and the tools made by the community felt like they for completely different styles/workflows than mine. It was a struggle to adjust, and I'm still feeling it-- I don't feel like I have *my* sketch brush, or *my* workhorse painting brush. I miss my brick shithouse lineart every day ):

BUT. but. I've found some keepers along the way. Even the ones that aren't perfect analogs are still pretty great at what they're meant to do. If you're thinking about using Photoshop or Clip Studio Paint, then I can share those toolsets-- I list a few of them in my 'about', and I talk about them in more detail on those timelapse vids. I'm very picky about how my tools handle so they're probably not for everyone, but maybe you'll find something that makes digital art a little more bearable in there.

There's also a lot to be said for the little things, like slapping a paper texture on that bad boy and calling it a day. Even just applying textures to the canvas before you draw does a lot to make the drawing experience feel like it has... idk... warmth, dynamism. Tooth. It's cozier in there when I can see the paper. Admittedly it's been so long since I last looked at my sketchbook that the harsh fluorescent lights of the blank canvas no longer faze me, but it's still good for the eyes and the soul.

Other tools/programs:

Apart from the stuff I use(d) in my main workflow, I've also played with some other programs that are specifically geared towards emulating traditional media.

Realistic Paint Studio - Reasonably priced real media art program that has a decently beginner-friendly interface. This is probably the one program that came with brushes I genuinely liked, right out of the box. They feel good to use + the engine does a pretty nice job of emulating wet media in particular.

Some draws:

^^^ This was a style emulation of the wonderful Fiachmara's art, and also a gift to her, featuring her character Gealach. Didn't originally intend on sharing this publicly, but I think it illustrates this program's knack for inks.

It can also do most of the digital art cheats that I need to do in Clip-- it has analogs for the selection tool, layers, clipping masks, etc. It does not have a brush editor, so you need to be sure that you like the brushes it ships with. I also find that none of the brushes scale up large enough to accommodate absurdly large canvases (5000x5000px+ ) so you'll be stuck working at... well... normal canvas sizes. (Gealach above was about 2000 px wide before resizing-- pretty reasonable LOL)

My only real complaint is you can't export your art without the canvas texture applied to it. One time the textures bugged out on me, and I couldn't get them to fix themselves (you can see the carnage here, RIP.) I've been scared that it'll do that again to me someday, but it's been completely stable apart from this one random flub.

And hey, it's got an Actually Good Pencil Brush, so. There's that.

Rebelle 5 - hoo boy this is big $$$$$, but the brush engine in this one is just. bonkers yonkers cool for emulating real media, especially oil, acrylic, and watercolor. (I'm admittedly lukewarm on its charcoal and pencil brushes. You can create your own brushes, but there's not a huge community that's into making custom brushes yet.)

It's a mighty little art program as far as I can tell. Has most of the bells and whistles Clip does, which is a lot of things that programs like Realistic generally won't have, but are kinda necessary if you want to get into the weeds with like... Advanced Digital Art Skullduggery. (things like gradient maps and tools for ripping lineart from scanned drawings. I think that's honestly it, as far as things I do in clip that are clip-exclusive.)

Doodles:

Rebelle asks you to think like a traditional artist when you're using its tools, particularly its watercolors. Ironically, I Do Not Like This! I want to have my cake (real media tools) and eat it too (dont want to use my brain). But I think it might appeal to you for bringing some of the process into the digital space. If nothing else, it's novel to watch the paint dry.

(thats a real mechanic in rebelle)

((its fantastic, but I am allergic to it (see point one) (((dont want to use my brain ): )))))

if you play with the demo and find that it scratches that real media itch for you, might be worth reaching out for a student discount or something like that. They have educator licenses and student licenses and generally seem like a pretty accommodating lot.

Another disclaimer: these are just the tools that I've played with recently and have used enough times to talk about. There's lots of other stuff out there that I've tried but didn't like, and it could very well be that I didn't like them for the same reasons that you'll love them. There's a ton of really good free/open source programs in particular that I feel like I would be using if I didn't already have my workspace carved out. Krita and MyPaint stick out in my mind. (MyPaint was my main program for a Long time in highschool. come remember my baby art with me. )

ok its 3 am I need to close this out:

I'm tapping my other disclaimer again. Tools are not the end-all-be-all of making digital art that emulates traditional media. Pieces like No Dominion and this pic of Dia and co. required some actual neurons to fire when I was figuring out how to tackle them. But for me, finding the right tools and creating the right workspace for myself was a stupidly big part of getting comfortable with digital art. I have to take care of the little QOL things like that before I can even begin to worry about the big things OTL

[faerynova]

Hello! I love your art and writing ^^ I’m currently developing a story of mine and you inspired me to include illustrations in my fics! Do you have any art/writing tips?

Pls have a good day!! ^-^

i do! this got a bit long so it's under the cut. good luck with your story!!

1.) STOP CARING

This is the main advice I’ve been giving out for over a decade, and I stand by it. You will never match the perfect image you have in your head. It’s not a failing, it’s fact.

Scribble down hair instead of drawing perfect ringlets. Let the shadow be incorrect. Don’t be bothered about the lineart not perfectly connecting. Stop trying to redraw that other eye twenty times. Let it rest.

I’m most happy with my art when I stop trying to make it perfect and crisp. Nowadays I usually go directly from sketch to finished color because I hated how my lineart never measured up to my sketches. So I eliminated it! That means there are stray sketch lines among the colors, the lineart is choppy (if it exists at all), it’s not always colored perfectly inside the lines, and sometimes the proportions aren’t correct. But I don't care.

In writing, it means I write in short chunks and snappy sentences instead of long fantastical descriptions and smooth transitions from scene to scene. I love that kind of writing, but I wasn’t enjoying writing when I tried to do it like that. When I stop caring about the “image” in my head, I can speed through thousands of words in a DAY because I’m not worrying about it.

Don’t get so wound up in perfection. No one else can see the image you have in your head except you. No one else cares about the image in your head! No one is beating you up for it, and you shouldn’t beat yourself up for it either. Just let art happen.

2.) USE REFERENCES / STUDY

It’s not cheating I promise!! Use that stock photo, ask your friend to check your work, google “hand pointing” and “person sitting cross-legged” and “kitchen chair” as many times as you want or need.

Find a photo or drawing you like and recreate it. See how the light bounces in the photos, learn the curves of the lineart or paint strokes to better understand why it looks how it does. Use the color picker and experiment with pens and brushes and get messy and dissect it piece by piece-- proportions, composition, colors, everything.

In writing, I’m not sure if you can do the same thing, but imitating a writing style is still going to stretch your brain in ways you probably wouldn’t have thought of before.

(If you recreate art then don’t claim it as your own obviously, but it’s one of the best ways to learn!)

3.) NEVER HIGHER THAN BEAUTIFUL

Okay, stick with me on this one because it’s a metaphor. It’s actually a sentence I’ve borrowed from my choir director.

Every voice is different, and different people sound good in places other people wouldn’t. The full saying is: Never higher than beautiful, never lower than beautiful. Never louder than beautiful, never softer than beautiful.

An alto (low ranged) singer isn’t gonna sound good trying to stretch their voice up to high notes that they don’t have the range for.

Someone who can only sing high notes softly shouldn’t try to belt them out and make their voice crack just for the sake of volume.

Pushing yourself is good! Maybe that alto can learn to sing higher notes, maybe that soprano can learn to sing louder without cracking.

But that kind of stuff takes TRAINING and TIME. You cannot force it out, the product isn’t going to be beautiful.

This applies to all kinds of art!

Challenge yourself, learn more, stretch your limits, but NEVER SACRIFICE YOURSELF FOR BEAUTY AND PERFECTION.

If you’re stressed because you can’t imitate that one style you saw, if you’re breaking your wrist to churn out art, if you’re erasing sketch after sketch because you can’t make the drawing on the paper match the image in your head, if you force yourself to write longer chapters because you think they’re too short, if you keep trying to cut your paragraphs because you think they’re too obnoxiously flowy and flowery, you’re going to hurt yourself, whether it’s physically or mentally.

You’re good at certain things, and other people are good at other things. Don’t compare yourself to other people, and take your time learning the skills you don’t have without burning yourself out.

Which, of course, circles back around because it’s a reiteration of the first and most important rule:

Stop caring so much.

Wanting to be perfect is a hard habit to break. It’ll take time to unlearn, and that’s okay. Learning and unlearning both take time. But you will do so much better for yourself if you look at art as a vessel for creativity and fun rather than an obligation.

TL;DR: Art is work, but art shouldn’t be so much work that you hate it or yourself.

[inkdemonapologist]

I'm struggling to find my style to draw people. I don't know if I want them to look cartoony or more life-like, especially for batim. How did you find your style?

TL;DR Version: How do you find your style? By letting yourself experiment, drawing for a while, and never locking yourself into one way of drawing something.

Longer Version: My honest answer to the question "how did you find your style," I think, is that I didn’t. I kinda bounced around trying out anything that I thought looked cool, and eventually people started telling me that I had a distinct style because all the little pieces I had stolen over time added up to something that was uniquely mine. I can’t stress to you enough that 90% of my artistic decisions started with “Ooo, I like the way that artist draws hands! [tries to draw them the same way]” and then it’d just change over time b/c I wouldn’t be able to perfectly replicate it and I’d tweak it to match what I think looks cool and I’d end up with my own version.

More thoughts:

There’s a reason so many artists say not to worry about style, but advice that’s just “don’t think about x” is pretty hard to actually act on, so I think the advice I might try to give is to try things that look interesting, and keep yourself open to whatever is fun for you.

Like…. you don’t have to only draw one way to end up with a style. Some people shift their stylisation for every project or every piece, and other people do have one really consistent look to their work, but usually when that happens for someone who is comfortable in their style, it’s because that person has discovered The Most Fun/Satisfying Way To Draw for them. The way you find that is by trying different styles or elements that look fun or cool and absorbing the bits that work or make sense to you.

You can draw cartoony people sometimes and life-like people other times, and you can work on improving whichever one happens to appeal to you in that moment. If you draw a bunch of lifelike batims but then wonder if maybe you shoulda drawn them all cartoony instead, you aren’t locked in — you can try drawing them all cartoony and seeing how they look and find out if you like drawing them that way. You can switch back and forth, make them realistic for one fanart and cartoony for another. You can always try out shifting your style, and then draw with that stylisation again sometimes if you like it, and never do it again if you don’t. I think it’s actually good practice to try things that interest you — you may not use it, but you might learn something that can apply to other styles of drawing.

The truth is, I think, that style is a lot more than we usually think of. We think of things like proportions, or the specific abstractions we choose, whether we use thick or thin lines, exactly what shape we make eyes — but those are all surface changes. When you draw a lot and try out different choices and different styles, then there will also be choices that maybe you don’t even know you’re making — aesthetics that look cool to you, ways you’ve learned to compensate for your weak points, elements you put a lot of love into because they’re fun. And honestly? A lot of that stuff will shine through even when you change the surface qualities. You can draw cartoony and realistic and both can look like “your style” if you’ve drawn in both aesthetics so often that your personal choices and preferences and how you’ve made that stylisation work for you show up in both. The way I handle lineart is a big part of my style normally, but the lineless colour palette challenges I did are still in “my style.” If I drew with more cartoony proportions, it would still be “my style.”

That said, I also think it’s okay to happen upon a style you like drawing in and just, stick with it forever if that’s what gives you joy. It’s just that trying to FORCE that to happen, trying to Pick One when there’s many different styles that appeal to you, might just make you feel more and more indecisive, whereas embracing and developing any styles that you find enjoyable or satisfying might be what gives you the building blocks you needed to give everything you draw your own personal flair.

[cloudsrust]

😳👉👈..its uh. lobotomy anon-and I have one (1) question.

How the heck can you do clean line art?? I've tried but the attempts don't look good

Mhhh- dunno how much I can help with that ‘cause, to be honest, my lineart is rarely actually clean sdhgsdsd. (most good lineart in my art is like an illusion caused by my editing/coloring ahah.) What I can say is that the pressure (especially for line width)  and the stabilizer change the art game A LOT- 

(Note: I gave the same care and the same time to each of them- also used the same sketch.) The stabilizer is especially a life saver if you want smooth/clean lineart but don’t have the firmest hand (Like me- who got it all the way up to S-7 on my SAI :,>). So don’t ignore it like I did for my first hellish year of drawing-tablet art;;; Those two aside- Personally, I tackle the lineart in three different ways (that sometimes overlay with each other). 1- Actual lineart: I just finish the sketch and after days of pondering over it I force myself to line it. With this one you just gotta be decise with your lines, this means no jagged lines trying to follow the sketch underneath or very slow hand motions, just one decise stroke. Undo and repeat until success-! Example -of me suffering and deciding to color instead of continuing the lineart sdhdhsd:

(*Sigh* Some sacrifices must be made to appease the lineart gods- so sometimes parts of the sketch will just be a guide of where the thing is supposed to be instead of a base to line;;)  2- Clean sketch: You keep on searching and cleaning the sketch, layers over layers, until it looks like a “messy lineart”. Then you carefully clean them lines! Example of what I mean by “messy lineart”:

(The only “sketch” worthy parts still visible are in the ribbon and in the arm- the rest is quite easy to clean. The masks and eyes, for example, are practically ready to be used in an actual “clean lineart”- just need to clean the particles). 3- Painted over: I haphazardly make the lineart and then I take my time painting over the mistakes or unclean lines- usually at the end of the piece.  Example: ( a bit messier than my usual, but still shows it)

(Some pieces look a bit weird ‘cause I had to remove the blood layer to show it better- but you can see what I mean if you look at the fingers and nails in the foreground, oh and also at the eye-!)

What these three “methods” have in common is a lot of trial to see what sticks and/or what is the most comfortable option ouo (there are days when I’m all about that pure lineart, while others I just want to chill and slowly clean or paint over a sketch.) There isn’t really a unique way in which you can do clean lineart- I mean, from what I see from your art.. maybe the “painting over” one might work for you! Because I can see that in many places there are clean lines (like the teeth in that first post- heck those are looking hella clean and precise!)- so I think you struggle more with the consistency of that precision more than the lineart itself, and since you also seem to have a painterly style for shading- I think that painting over the lines to clean them could do for you-! It also works with pieces with a simpler style btw.

These are just how I see it myself, can’t really say much else since I dunno what exactly makes you think your attempts don’t look good so-;;; hope this is in some way helpful or at least understandable?