#kinda like how this sketch style came out

[gabibiart]

Soft Taash because it's my birthday and today's peachtober prompt was "daisy"

[marigraphia]

I've had this pose ref saved for a while and the Superman set photos just gave off the same energy 👉🏻👈🏻

The reference is this photo of Katharine Hepburn as Antiope and Colin Keith-Johnston as Theseus in the 1932 play 'The Warrior's Husband' (and I'd love for people to turn into a draw your otp meme pls pls pls this pose is so good)

And also, of course, the Superman (2025) set photos

[ashenberry]

[ID in alt]

hi hey hello. you should go check out @u3pxx 's piece for the mea culpa zine I just made a fun and silly continuation of it because im normal about it <3

more fun and silly shenanigans under the cut

[ID in alt]

[whomstsnek]

Happy Hades II!

Excited for the game to come out (hopefully) soon, + I saw a YouTube video of some of my fav artists making their own "Godsonas", so I thought I'd make my own lil deity :3

This is less of a sona than it is an OC, but either way here they are! I envision them as either a god of rot and decay, or blight and pestilence, undecided which. I think maybe they're a random encounter rather than an Olympian/boon? Like randomly in chambers (after you've taken so much damage maybe?) they'll appear. Beat them in a fight, like a miniboss, and they'll grant you a boon or some other reward. I think they'd have a debuff along the lines of "Caustic touch" or something that poisons the enemy and does small amounts of damage over a period of time, and/or slightly weakens them.

Personality-wise I think they're very odd and creepy, and are particularly obsessed with the health and wellbeing of mortals, especially their lack there of. I see them as very one track minded, always looking to spread their diseases as war and wide as possible. Interacting with/killing Zagreus (or Melinoe, if they were to appear in HII) would be fascinating for them, as no other god would be susceptible to mortal diseases.

If you survive the miniboss encounter I think their voice line would be something like "One of these days, I'll eat you alive, just...wait...." or "All good things must come to an end, one day or another. I'll be seeing you, godling...". Alternatively if you lose the voice line might be something like "Wither away, little godling! Not even you can escape my grasp..." or "You were made to rot, to waste away, it was only a matter of time..."

[crabsnpersimmons]

I got my hair cut the other day and of course I had to draw the dca boys running a hair salon:

Sun would be so effortlessly charming. Always chatting away with customers, explaining each product he uses and how to best maintain and style their hair.

Moon I can see being popular with the less chattier customers (like me) but over time they begin to open up. I imagine he hums while working. Otherwise, he's all ears for the newest gossip.

(The clipped up hat idea came from @bamsara's solar lunacy doodles!)

Also I love the popular headcanon that the dca can speak other languages, so I can imagine them being a hit with the aunties.

The full sketch page under cut! And some of my other thoughts

Other thoughts about this... AU? Can I call it an AU? Feels kinda small for an AU, but whatever:

Eclipse works there too! Haven't decided if it would be canon or fanon Eclipse, though I really like the image of 4-armed Eclipse working on 2 clients at once (plus, the nickname Clip is perfect for this scenario)

of course they're great with kids! They'd be able to console kids that get scared of getting their hair cut. Sun would do a little trick and tell them how good and brave they are all the way through. Moon would console them and hum a soothing song (or hey maybe they notice the kid's wearing a disney shirt and starts humming some showtunes). Every kid gets a candydrop and a balloon on their way out.

y/n works at the hair salon as a part-timer and does tasks around the salon like sweeping, arranging bookings, washing hair, etc. They don't really care too much about their own hair, but the boys are always offering to style it, dye it, braid it. With y/n's permission, the boys always toy with their hair—patting it, combing their hands through it, brushing it over y/n's ear, ruffling it.

[unknownanomoly]

I have decided to continue the trend!~ but cats instead! I personally think the cats came out better but that's only because I have drawn cats my entire life and I never drew lambs before joining the cult of the lamb fandom. Also I wanna say a few things. I'm sorry for anyone's lambs I misgendered in the last post, also for aveloka this took me about 2 hours, one hour rough draft sketch another hour for full sketch/outline. And I think that's it for now... anyways, cats!

@oneofthosenightbees I love Narinder's cloak so much! very creative! and also thank you for the picture of my lamb! I squealed so loud i thought I woke my family @bamsara the face was hard but I loved drawing them so much, again cloak was really fun, the cloak on like all of these Nari's were really fun to draw tbh @cotl-flower-crown I love the fluffy cloak thing, and just how angry they look! @melled42 your lamb sadly didn't get into my last post since I started following you after I made that, but I drew your Nari! I love them very much and having them as a hairless cat is very creative! I love the idea!

@ballad-of-the-lamb I love how annoyed your Nari looks! and also their outfit was really fun! Also sorry about the lamb thing, idk which lamb to chose so i choose the first one i saw! but still, I love your Nari very much! @xmajordumps I drew them from when shamura was threatening them, I hope I did it well since you know, they were kinda covered in blood and all! but really fun shaped and all! they look so angry! (why are all the narinders so angy?) @slate021 I love drawing fluffy cats so much! I love drawing fluff in general and your Nari satisfied the fluff meter. @faery-the-diamond Yours is so simple and yet somehow so complicated, I love your AU and how the lamb is a crown and Nari pretty much needs to tend to everything in the cult, its kinda funny tbh, I love your Nari!

@acis-arts so adorable! They look like a child, I just wanna pick them up and kidnap them! (im gonna kidnap them) @neon-virus yours looks so nice, and such like a gentleman, so handsome! Can I adopt them? And if not can I kidnap them? And if not well too bad, their mine now @seffen yours looks like it's gonna take your eyes out and then watch you slowly die of blood loss... so in other words adorable demon that I wanna hold even if it hates me! @voidheartkisses Adorable! so innocent looking! I loved drawing them, their fluff, the ears also, I've never drawn ears like that before! @alllgator-blood Just like the lamb I love the shapes and I love how your Narinder's personality is like! It's so funny! @foxritz Yours looks grumpy, maybe it's just how I drew them? but the fluff was fun and also the ears were also quite different from what I'm used to so It was also fun to draw those!

@plenty-sheep-in-the-sea from what I know you don't have a lamb that is posted yet so sadly I couldn't draw a lamb for you in my last post! But your traumatized young Narinder is adorable! @unwri-ten I loved drawing them, they give such a sassy drag queen kinda vibe, if that make sense (?) @aubeezz Yours is adorable and fits with how I drew your lamb very well! I love the cheek fluffs! Adorable! @skyartworkzzz thank you for pointing out the gender thing, again I'm sorry about that! but moving on! Your Narinder was really fun to draw, the little cheek fluffs on the side remind me of my own narinders cheek fluffs! I also love the cloak! @rampantram Yours is absolutely lovely, I love your art style a lot! Just as fun as drawing your lamb! I look up to you a lot!

@ghosts-and-glory can yours age or does their fur just fall out? anyways! I love your AU, the storyline is amazing and when I first found you I sat there rereading like every comic kinda thing I could find on your account like 50 different times! @aveloka-draws Yes I'm ok. No it does not take long. I loved drawing your Nari, they look confused but pissed, and yet again all Nari's look pissed no matter what, the outfit is also really fun! I love drawing your style of characters, their so pointy and fun... if that also makes sense in anyway...?

Here is my Narinder! He's based off of a mink color point cat! So instead of being black, he's a brown cat with black smoked patterns, or known as the Siamese markings! He lost all memory of the bishops being killed and himself defeated, so Lamb helped him through it until he gained his memory back, and when he did he became a lot like Shimura. He was pretty much mindless in a way... I just wondered around aimlessly and wouldn't respond, sometimes he comes back but very rarely, Lamb worries about him a lot. the cloak was made by lamb as a welcome gift to make Nari feel for comfortable in the cult! Also the thing on Nari's finger is a butterfly! It's his butterfly friend! No name yet but if you have ideas but tell me, I'm terrible with names! Sometimes he has panic attacks which make his eyes cry blood, plus whenever he opens his third eye it instantly starts bleeding. He also has eyes on the palms of his hands but you can't see them at the moment, he can see how people die with them!

[beddybites]

Do you have some REALLY old sketches or drawings of kny characters you could show us, like maybe before your artstyle developed? 😋 (Idk I'm just so curious how you ended up with this fluffy adorable style bc I LOVE IT T-T)

oh my god i absolutely do--

lets use muichiro as an example

the first drawing was from 2019, to give you an idea of what my art looked like at the time

i had no idea how i wanted to go about drawing humans. at the time it was drilled to me i should draw more realistically, so my work suffered greatly. this is why the hair is so messy and the face just looks so... walten-filesy, i guess

the second drawing was from early 2023, when i tried drawing muichiro again as a result of catching up on demon slayer!

i was still not drawing humans, so you can tell i was kinda experimenting a bit with the brushes. i color picked from his official design

i stopped drawing him for a few months, as i really hated how it turned out. i ultimately gave up on my art for a bit

then, at the end of the swordsmith village arc, i tried again. i ended up getting really attached to all of the hashira, so i drew them little profiles-- as shown in the third image

this is where you can see im staring to develop my style properly. i came to terms with the fact that i wanted a more cartoony style, and i started to embrace it. i also made my own color palette to better fit my art style

from then on, i was fixated on demon slayer, and with muichiro being my favorite, i drew him constantly. the fourth image was drawn a couple months later, after the baby hashira craze

you can see how much it was changing. the detail in the eyes, the way i drew the hair, his palette, etc. through constantly practicing and drawing him, i developed my style more and more

the fifth image comes from the "hugging muichiro" series, in which i had to draw muichiro nine different times

i began studying art styles i really liked, and particularly analyzed the way muichiro was drawn in the manga. i loved his hair, and tried to replicate it in my style. you can also see i revised the palette a bit more to better compliment my work!

finally, the sixth image-- my more recent style!

his current rendition really just comes from me having drawn him so many times. my style just grew and grew and grew! i modified his color palette even more, making his hair more blue tinted and giving him a cool color palette

that saying "practice makes perfect" really does reign true tbh. the reason my style is the way it is was because i kept practicing and revising my work, and i would adopt things i like from other people, such as gotouge themself

i hope this helps!!!

my art literally started off looking like That. trust . everyone has potential!

[wmnwntmefshfrme]

I FINISHED THEM. I DID IT. WOOHOO (crying)

edit: putting myself back in the trenches, more extreme though since i'm making character sheets LMAOAOA

design notes:

Yaira: nothing changed

Estrella: dead mom ponytail gone </3 i only did it in the og drawing of her bc its funny

Robin: ROBINNNN. IM SO SORRY I FORGOT THE PUFF BUNS UUEHEHHHHH- anyway, when i was planning out the designs for the other named npcs, i was like "why the hell are there so many gingers" so i made her have blue hair :3 to match with her confidence stat :3 also gave her yellow/orange eyes instead of green bc there were also a lot of green eyed npcs

Sydney: SKUNK HAIR. I DUNNO HOW I FORGOT ABOUT THAT YUMMY DYE STYLE. SYDNEY IM SORRY. i completely forgot i wanted to still have her natural hair (also just made pink bc teehee i like whimsy) to show

Whitney: not much changed besides the hair style. completely forgot i wanted her to be super gyaru OTL. gave her cheek piercings bc they're cute :3

Kylar: i lowkey started to not like how i did her hair originally and then came across all the sketches i made for the LIs and was like FLUFFY KY :3 ofc had to keep the emo bangs :3

Avery: nothing changed LMAOAOA

Great Hawk: FEATHER HAIR. I FORGOT I MADE A SKETCH FOR FEATHER-LIKE HAIR FOR HER. IM MAD AT MYSELF.

Black Wolf: not much changed, just made her hair longer bc why not

Alex: not much changed, just made he hair more of a red red, darkened her skin, altered her bangs, and changed the color of her bandana. still wanted to keep her looking like a cutie patootie

Eden: I ACCIDENTALLY GAVE HER A GIANT FOREHEAD THE FIRST TIME AND I DIDN'T MEAN TO SOBBING. not much changed though, just made her hair darker and have a green tint to it. look im trying to make my designs have lots of whimsy

Quinn: you can tell with Quinn LMAO. i just felt like she needed to have a distinct look since she's a special npc n all :3 classic purple and green color scheme for a shady character

Bailey: i'm gonna be honest, i was originally gonna go with a mean asian mom look for Bailey but then i was like "....what if muscle mommy"

Remy: i wanted her to look like a little shit. that's all

Briar: tried to go for a bit of a Jessica Rabbit and Rarity type aura. i really like her design and she could put me in the underground brothel any day :3 /j

Leighton: just an old hag, nothing special

Harper: wanted to make her look a little inhuman??? i think i got it with how dead her skin looks idk. also wanted her to look like a little shit

Landry: here's where the asian mom look went. i like her and Mickey's dynamic and they both just look like regular people (better for crime)

Sirris: Sydney if she was older. idk what else i should've done lol

River: old lady :3 hot old lady :3c (pt 1)

Doren: i wanted her hair to look fluffy as hell

Winter: old lady :3 hot old lady :3c (pt 2)

Mason: SEAWEED HAIR. that's all

Charlie: wanted to embody :3c

Darryl: she's very cutie patootie to me so i made her a cute patootie

Sam: wanted her to look like candy kinda. idk :3

Niki: i only made her hair a little longer and no weird two layer thing for the short portion

Zephyr: wanted her to look smug and also kinda cute???? idk, i didn't really have a vision for her

Jordan: also didn't really have a vision for her, but it did want her to gave similar eyes to Quinn

Gwylan: her i did have a vision for :3c she's a cutie patootie, that's all :3

Wren: thought a side shave would make her look cooler

Mickey: hairstyle changed a little. other than that, not much changed

Morgan: still a wet rat

Ivory Wraith: nothing changed (they have special eyes tho)

[ayyyvivi]

Hi I’m back :3

This piece was a lot of fun to make and for while I was absolutely hating it. I’ll probably end up hating it by the time I wake up and start seeing the details I could’ve added but at this sleep deprived moment I’m happy with the way came out!

I wanna to say thank you to the peeps that liked and reposted my work my last piece got a lot of attention and it makes me happy to see that you guys liked what I made

I decided to maybe use these post to explain how I came up with it since I saw someone mention they liked how I went through my art process so I shall be putting some description on my work from now on >:3

For this piece I wanted to make Miles swing through the city in that pinkish sunset vibe from the movie but I wanted to make it a bit different than my other sketches of him going about New York and I guess different meant a backpack that was swung in a hurry and all his stuff flying out of it! I tried putting as much detail as possible for his stuff flying out even a hidden Gojo ψ(｀∇´)ψ

The buildings were a pain to make I’m still not entirely sold if I like them or not. And I tried to add lots of texture to Spider-man’s suit so it wouldn’t look so bland. My friend had mentioned to me that she likes it a lot better when she can see an artist brush strokes and it being blended makes things kinda flat and since then I feel like my drawings have looked a lot nicer! I guess I’m still getting used digital after drawing traditional for so long

OH! I should mention I’m really inconsistent with my art style for while I would panic because I know something artist must have is some kind of style for people to notice who the work comes from. Im kinda not like that I like being all over the place and I enjoy drawing in all types of ways so I know rn my work looks similar to Spiderverse but depending on how I’m feeling things can change so I guess my art style is being constantly inconsistent! Honestly this kinda gets more for during Halloween when I do my one inktober stuff so stay tune for that!!

If you guys got questions or suggestions on who you want me to draw next let me know! I know someone mentioned they wanted Spider-Gwen with a wolf cut so maybe I’ll do a quick sketch of that

[skittzdaskittle]

The most character ever

The brain rot is real fr

It took me like an hour to find all y'all because my dumbass didn't write your names down while getting reference photos XD

@maccamania-fnaf-sideblog i can't get over how much i love your art style and how you characterize himb

Also, your art style has the kind of shape language and posing that i like and am trying to go for

@goldenphone-jpg i don't know if this is your actual headcannon, but i knew i had to draw her, i know she's literally the woman from the movie, but i really like how you drew her, she looks very sweet

@account-name

I'm used to drawing organic shapes, so i didn't think i would enjoy drawing the phone head, but it was simplified well enough for me to get the shapes of it and stuff, very neat art style, very phone, very goober, 10/10 would phone again

@thebearme

Surprisingly very easy to get the shape language down, i really enjoyed drawing the goober, especially the hair and body :]

@horrorfcb

I don't know why, but something about his design really made me want to draw him, he looks very cool :]

He was originally going to be pointing at Golden Freddy, but he didn't look good enough so now he points at nothing XD

@mismess

I love your version of the man ever™️, he reminds me so much of Wally Darling, i already knew what i had to do for his drawing XD

@mrdrhenwardhykle

I absolutely love your disney movie esque style, it's so expressive, and you do wholesome and horror so well, i knew i had to draw your goober, i still need to look through all you foxy.exe posts :P

I figured i had to at least have one Ralph in imminent peril XD

@lacking-artdration

I can't get over how much i love your interpretation of him, your style is so great and i love how it can be very silly sometimes, i did the silly sketch and realized i had created perfection, so it stayed

@fazgoo-connoiseur-1987

Even though i don't really care for the hairstyle, of course that's just me, i can't get over how good the vibes are, like i love how you basically paint in the colors, and i don't know, i just kinda knew I had to draw mans, i struggled a bit with the hair but i still like how i drew himb

@frootylupey

Omg thank you account-name for telling me the name 😭

I really love how shaped the style is, and it was a bit of a challenge to interpret the character design into my style, but i really like how it came out

I knew at least one had to have the classic line, and i figured he should be the one to do it :]

Originally i was gonna try to imitate all your styles, but i gave up in the middle of the first one and i just decided that i wanted to draw your goobers XD

Bonus :]

[kindaasrikal]

Morro and Cryptor in the movieverse, in my style? More likely than you think:

My first ever take on the movieverse and it’s designs and it had to be this underrated duo.

Scenario: Morro and Cryptor have geography class together, and they’re both four days into their first week of school. Having barely shared two words with each other, let alone anyone else in the school, the two are paired up for a project. To make a volcano. Despite the two judging each other heavily, not getting along at all, constantly arguing and butting heads, they both rushed into the classroom covered in paint, paper, tissue, cardboard, and pearls. And then the entire class was covered in ketchup after the volcano accidentally blew up. They got a d- and got put in detention. From that day on they were known as horrible a*sholes you should never be around, unless they try to murder you.

In reality they would only try murder each other and are actually awkward teens with everyone else.

Ain’t got much for Morro’s story in this verse other than the fact that instead of running away he was sent over to train and learn under Mystake, only for her and Wu to realise he has no social life at 17 and so they send him back to Ninjago city to go to high school for the first time.

But Cryptor in this AU’s got a bit. Cryptor is a scrapped version of the Nindroid sentries that protect Borg tower. After Pixal, Borg wished to create Nindroids who could protect him and his tower from danger, and Cryptor was one of his prototypes. Cryptor was not supposed to have a consciousness, but as the only Nindroid sentry prototype that was based off of both Pixal’s code and Zane’s design, he came to life. After waking up seemingly abandoned in a scrap yard Cryptor runs off feeling betrayed and angry. Eventually, he gets taken in by this world’s overlord. Not entirely sure how he works in this universe yet so all he is rn is Cryptor’s rlly bad guardian who updated his design to what it is now.

After some drama yada yada, Cryptor joins the school as the only openly known Nindroid. He and Morro joins at the same time and do not get along, yet they only ever hang out with each other because villains who were generals of armies in another life just kinda click.

Willll probably add more to this explanation and maybe photos of the sketches and such later when it’s not 6am and i can see the sun rising. Oh also the background was not made by me it’s a free to use photo on Ibispaint X.

[drawnfromthedead]

Quick sketched of how I might want to draw Toriel for future fan art.

I made her a soft yellow instead of white to tie back to flowey, I also faded the purple of her tunic to show age and further soften her appearance. I gave her double horns because of that one goat kind that has absolutely ridiculous horns (they're awesome!!)

I draped her slaves for a more religious? look that I feel matches someone taking care of and running ancient ruins (which are often either cities, royal homes or religious places. They seem too small and without many inlets for residing for a city, and I doubt Toriel would be wanting to associate her home with the home she just left so weather it is or isn't she could treat it as a holy site or as just a historical one? Idk). I also gave her an old styling of hip bag (usually worn under a dress but for the looks I put in on the out) and a scent pouch I drew in a way to make her silhouette more goat like.

The symbol in game to me kinda looked like an angel as well so to push that forward I moved the pieces slightly to make a more obvious angel shape. Honestly for such quick sketches I'm very pleased with the amount of thought I put in and also with how well it came 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!!

[estrangedandwayward]

Woo first (successful) watercolor portrait

Sketch and a little back story under the cut

So I've got a project I want to do involving drawing aegon, so I wanted to practice with a couple of standard portraits because I realized though I've probably done at least in the low hundreds of portraits with charcoal, And a few with colored pencil or marker, but I've never actually painted one. Most of my art is still of people, but usually full bodies and very small so I don't really have to worry about facial details all that much. Anyway, I tried last night to paint aegon

It started off well, I liked the sketch a lot (even the nose looks good), the line art was fine (I even gave him an earring because I saw that Tom glynn carney has one irl) but oh god it went badly fast, the shadows were too dark, I brought in the green way too soon so the whole thing had a weird undertone, the expression looked weird, I was getting impatient so the colors were smudging together. I tried to fix it with a little bit of gouache and that made it SO MUCH WORSE

He looks insane hungover. His eyebags (which i considered key in capturing his 'ive been drunk for the last 23 hours' essense) we making him look 50 years older than he was supposed to. I just decided to scrap it, didn't even peel the tape off, didn't bother doing cross hatching on top and went to bed. I decided to give it another shot tonight and I'm very happy that I did because I LOVE how the second attempt came out. It was also honestly pretty fun to paint, kinda wanna do more, haven't done portraits in a while so it might be fun to get back into it. I'd love to do one in my more impressionist-y style or one fully with gouache or with weird or interesting color pallettes idk

Point is, glad I didn't give up because now I have one more painting that I like

[forasecondtherewedwon]

trading paper dolls

Fandom: Masters of the Air Rating: T Word Count: 2228

Summary: Tired of the pin-up girls, Alex draws Buck Cleven in a similar style, never intending for the sketch to fall into the hands of Bucky Egan.

“You even lookin’ at that paper? Ain’t seen you look at that paper in five minutes.”

Alex smiled to himself as he redirected his gaze to the sketch he was working on. Macon was right: he hadn’t been looking. He didn’t need to. He’d done half a dozen of these sketches already since getting forced into this camp and they were all the same—a collection of curves. Eyes, cheeks, lips. Shoulders, breasts, waist. Hips, thighs, calves. Little round rear, if the request came with a specification for that kinda thing. He had his style. He could draw pin-ups in his sleep.

“I thought your neck didn’t work,” he reminded Macon without twisting his own to look up at him in the higher bunk. “Guess it works just fine for snoopin’ over my shoulder.”

“‘Snoopin’’?” Macon echoed, sounding affronted. “Bullshit, snoopin’. Ain’t no privacy here to violate, Alex. You don’t want me to be able to see over your shoulder, you better go sit on the roof.”

Alex released a soft snort and kept sketching. His latest connoisseur of provocative art wanted a brunette. That was easy enough; Alex added a quick outline of hair—more curves—and shaded it in.

“You get tired of that?” Macon asked a few minutes later. Apparently, he’d abandoned the book Alex had brought him.

“Why, you get tired of the smokes these boys are payin’ me to draw ’em?” Alex shot back.

“Not drawin’—drawin’ that. Your little paper dolls.”

Paper dolls. Alex hadn’t thought of it like that. (He liked Macon too much to be insulted; even if he had been insulted, it wouldn’t be enough to put even the smallest dint in the loyalty they had to one another. Nobody was going to watch out for them like they’d watch out for each other.) The drawings were sweet, in a way, with the coy smiles and O’s of surprise on the girls’ mouths, with the way their delicate fingers twirled telephone cords and pressed with childlike thoughtfulness into their dimpled chins. They belied what the boys who asked for them claimed to want: somethin’ sexy to look at while they pulled themselves off whenever they were alone. Or felt alone. Or even felt alone enough.

No, Alex knew what he was really giving them: a little reminder of tenderness. Tenderness even above femininity, because only one guy had asked him to draw a gal in something see-through, another in a negligée (Like Rita Hayworth in Life, he’d said), and the rest had just wanted to see anything that wasn’t a uniform. Props? A tray of muffins coming out of an oven, a basket of kittens, a field of wildflowers. Things that spoke of home comforts and abundance, that evoked softness and pleasing scents. If these drawings of his were like paper dolls, it made sense, because the boys were playing with them—playing make-believe. And so Alex didn’t mind that he’d done six of these already. It made the white boys happy. It passed the time. It kept him and Macon in whatever pitiful item counted as a luxury on this day, this week. If Alex were to be here as long as some of the boys had been here already, he figured it’d help having something to occupy his mind.

“Not yet,” he said, and drew a pair of sunglasses dangling from the girl’s hand, then put a look on her face like she knew you’d watch her bend down to pick them up when she inevitably dropped them. “Anyway, what else would I draw?”

“Pin-up Hitler?”

They both cracked up.

“Alright, alright,” Macon said as their laughter trailed off. “How ’bout these boys?”

Alex lifted his pencil from the paper. That was another one done.

“Our boys?” he checked distractedly, examining his work.

In the silence that followed his words, he could just about hear Macon rolling his eyes.

“The boys in this bunkroom,” Alex corrected.

“Yeah. Think you could draw ’em?”

At this, Alex swivelled around to look at Macon, eyes narrowed and unimpressed.

“Of course I could, but I shouldn’t.” Expression clearing, he raised his eyebrows questioningly. “Don’t you want them to like us? Trust us?”

“Maybe I don’t like or trust them,” Macon replied. Alex sighed, then Macon added, “I never said show the drawings. Just do it for our entertainment, shit.”

“And what are you paying me in for this entertainment?”

“In the promise that I won’t snitch to the white boys that you doin’ pin-ups of ’em,” Macon said, chuckling.

Alex grinned and shook his head.

“I’ll think about it.”

“Well, you know. If you ain’t too busy.”

They laughed harder this time, until Macon swore and laid back, rubbing his neck.

Alex did think for a while. He sat there thinking, then got up and walked over to the window to take a look at the bleak view as he thought some more, then sat again. His pencil was there on his bunk. He had more paper. The other guys from their bunkhouse weren’t about—walking someplace, or scheming, maybe. Buck Cleven had let Alex in on the general idea of a breakout, which was significant, but he knew he was still a newcomer, still on the outside.

It was that frustration that made Alex pick up the pencil. It was the fact that Buck had been the only one to initiate a conversation with him that made Alex choose him as his subject. He just knew his face best, had looked at it openly while they’d talked. Round eyes, full mouth. Not so different from his regular paper dolls.

When Egan and Brady wandered in, Alex calmly slipped the sketch of Buck behind the commissioned drawing of the brunette with the sunglasses. When he got the chance, he’d hide it someplace better, but he doubted there was a more suspicious group on earth than his fellow kriegies; if he tried now, it’d give them reason to distrust him, and if they discovered what he was attempting to conceal... it would be hard to explain.

He retraced lines he’d already drawn, darkened the girl’s hair. Brady and Egan were playing cards on the other side of the room. Alex was thinking about casually lying back and pulling out a book he might tuck the drawing of Buck into when DeMarco swung through the doorway and announced Nazis were ordering men out of the neighbouring hut to toss the rooms.

If he hadn’t had to help Macon down from the higher bunk, Alex might’ve had time. If he could’ve done more than flip the pages over, they might not’ve been noticed. If he hadn’t submitted to Egan’s authority as a superior officer and let him be the last out of the room, ensuring the rest of them got out safely, Alex might not’ve worried as he stood outside in the cold, waiting for Egan to follow them out. Waiting, it seemed, for too long before Egan stepped out and the Nazis shoved past him on their way in.

When it was over, Alex walked back inside to find that one of the pages he’d left on his bunk was no longer there.

—

Bucky leaned against the side of the hut, fingering the folded paper in his pocket. He’d creased it in half quickly, and the edges didn’t line up, giving his fingers something to worry as he stood there, mind swooping and turning like one of the planes the man to whom the paper belonged flew.

It hadn’t been nosiness driving Bucky across the room once DeMarco, Brady, Jefferson, and Macon were out. It hadn’t been mere curiosity. Bucky knew Buck had spoken to the new guy, Jefferson, about helping them work out the topography surrounding the camp. Bucky’s fear, when he saw those pages left behind, was that one of them might have featured some kind of map. And then all their gooses would’ve been cooked. The Nazis would’ve known they were thinking of escape more seriously than a distant fantasy that involved a place to get a steak dinner instead of the crap food that barely kept them alive. Rifling swiftly through Jefferson’s pages was self-preservation—the preservation of the whole group of them. Bucky hadn’t expected to find what was now in his pocket.

Looking at it made him less sure of how to feel, and so he kept teasing himself instead, stroking the edges of the page without taking it out of his coat. Part of what he felt was relief; since it wasn’t a map Jefferson had been drawing, there had been no close call. It also meant Jefferson wasn’t stupid, hadn’t left anything so valuable, so incredibly damning, sitting out in the open like a present for their jailers. But that line of thinking got tangled up with another of the emotions the paper provoked in him: impulsive, hot-headed fury that Jefferson would do a thing like that, would draw Buck like that. Bucky wanted to demand Jefferson tell him who the hell he thought he was to put that down on paper. Only, a confrontation would’ve escalated immediately into a scene—Bucky didn’t trust himself to handle it coolly, not this—which would likely mean having to explain exactly why he was so angry with Jefferson. Buck would see the drawing. Onlookers would see a fracture in their group and think they were weak. It was no fucking good, and so Bucky stood there touching the paper until he couldn’t stand it any longer and, after glancing up and down the corridor between the huts, slipped the page out for further scrutiny.

It was a good likeness; Bucky had known it was Buck right away. If he fought back all the other complex feelings he had about it, he could appreciate that Jefferson had a talent. Bucky cast his gaze around again, then permitted himself to enjoy the drawing on the basis of its artistic merit alone. That was certainly the shape of Buck’s face. Those eyes could belong to no other. He could see what Jefferson had intended with the pose—Buck’s chest thrust forward, his ass pushed out—but it wasn’t as exaggerated as many pin-ups Bucky had seen, and there was still a recognizable Buck-ness in the set of the shoulders, the way the forearms crossed and rested on the bent knee. Jefferson had put Buck in the room they called the library, one of Buck’s shoes planted on a chair as he stared unflinchingly at his observer, those eyes that could belong to no other set in the face with a shape Bucky knew well. And the mouth. The mouth was unmistakably Buck’s too. Like this, Buck could acknowledge what a pretty mouth it was, how swell it would’ve looked on any female pin-up model, but how right it was on the face of his best friend.

Bucky swallowed and refolded the paper. He undid his coat just enough to stuff the drawing into the breast pocket of his shirt, a little closer to his body, a little more secure, he told himself. He possessed no plan for what he’d do with it. Buck, of course, could never see. Jefferson sure as hell wasn’t getting it back; Bucky decided that having to wonder what had happened to the drawing would have to be sufficient punishment for having the nerve to do it in the first place. In a tight moment, Bucky knew he might have to eat the paper. He might have to chew and swallow, forcing Buck’s confident stare and plump lips down his throat. He would hold this depiction of Buck inside himself, break him down and digest him. No one could take it from him. No one would know.

He sniffed and flicked a finger across the end of his nose. He strolled along in the shadow of the hut and, just before stepping out into the pale winter sunshine, pressed his hand to his chest over the place where the drawing rested. No one would know.

Conscious of the need for his shoes to not wear out in case the ideal escape conditions presented themselves, Bucky kept his steps light as he crossed the dirt yard. One of the guards was watching him and Bucky offered a sarcastic smile.

“Beautiful day, huh, Fritz?”

He kept walking until he found Buck. It seemed he was always walking until he found Buck.

They were not yet out of things to say to one another, and there were always new silences to not fill. They could talk close—what petty grievances did they have about the smell of Crank’s socks, the way Murphy had started chewing his fingernails?—and they could talk far—making up baseball scores for the teams back home. Bucky was comforted by their talk, by the undemanding presence of Buck at his side.

Buck was talking to Jefferson, and when Bucky sidled up, he slung an arm around Buck’s shoulders, feeling the paper in his pocket crumple slightly. He looked at Buck as he carried on speaking like Bucky was no interruption. He watched Buck’s lips move, listened to the low, slow, sure sound of his voice. Feeling Jefferson’s eyes on him, Bucky shifted his gaze and stared back. I’ll keep your secret, he told Jefferson with a lift of his eyebrows, and you keep mine.

[orchid-prince]

My 1st Year of Drawing through Fanart

I really started in July, so it’s not a full year, but taking a look back at where I started in 2024 is pretty cool! Checking for improvement, noticing where I was struggling. I can even see what skill I was trying to pick up at the time based on the jump in the skills quality/the lack of focus on others. So before the year ends here is:

✨My First Year Trying to do Art✨ through the fanart I’ve made! Enjoy!! <3

Would you believe it took me 3 tries to get freaking BILL CYPHER right ?!? This is V2 actually but it’s a good indicator of where I was starting.

This was the first day I decided drawing was fun for me. I woke up, and immediately picked up my pencil to spend all morning drawing, without truly realizing it. Keep in mind I didn’t even have a pencil to draw with before this session, the other work in this notebook are, like, all pen.

🎀My baby spinel!!!🎀 I adore her🥰

Is the art good, not really, but you can tell who she is and at this point that’s kinda my only goal. If it looks like ‘em it’s close enough for me.

Side note: This is the piece that instilled the fear I will mess up any nice sketch by coloring it, a fear I still have to this day.

She may look decent here but in my sketchbook she’s ruined foreverrrr XD

Ok…maybe there’s a pattern with the kinda characters I’m compelled to draw.

Aaaanyway this is where I started focusing on hair more, the spikey look was my thing in the beginning while I was still trying to figure out how hair works. Lowkey I’m still trying to figure it out.

Also WHY DID I DRAW THE EAR LIKE THAT?!? What was I even going for 💀

Fun fact: Daria is my benchmark for progress! She’s been my favorite character since I was a teenager & she’s made of pretty simple shapes. I imagine when I get more confident I’ll take more liberties with how I draw her, like Jane, instead of trying to make it a one to one mimick.

Also bonus Sir Integra Hellsing, she was my first attempt to an actual anime style especially in the hair. And similarly to jinx you can tell this was more focused on learning on drawing her hair rather than her face. This was a trend for a few weeks which did come back to bite me in the ass with this next piece

Ya know what I didn’t see a theme with the characters I draw before I started making this post, and now I definitely do.

But OH you can SEE my struggle with her on the page🤦🏾‍♀️! This genuinely took me 2 days to do because her face frustrated me so much I rage quit till the next night.

After this I went back to practicing eyes and finally trying finding out how to draw mouths and lips in different ways and positions to avoid this problem (Didn’t work, I still often refuse to draw a face if the hair/body is pretty)

And to top it off I inked it & accidentally made her lids look like eyebrows, so now I have a fear of inking 🙄 Thanks Catra >.>

Now THIS is where I actually started staring at my hands for a good 30 seconds after drawing like “MY HANDS MANAGED TO MAKE THIS??” Because this was only 6 DAYS after I rage quit on Catra. Yet I can make this?!!? What?!?

This was genuinely just supposed to be a doodle to practice using his big ol’ grin to learn how mouths work cuz he’s all mouth and teeth. But lowkey, still have no idea how this and the next one happened. It was a weirdly good art-day for me but I had never been more proud. And shockingly I’m still really happy with how these came out, usually I get pretty ‘Meh’ on my favorites after a while. Maybe even kinda nitpicky, but these two feel like my magnum opus for the year.

^^Look at this!! If I could inject this I would! Angel Dust with Pinchers is the BEST version. I will not take criticism.

This, similar to Fizz, was mostly for his eyes and to try to get the flow of hair and fluff down.

By this point I discovered if I find which of my favorite character has a design quality that is unique that correlates to the skill, I can trick my brain into picking up the skill through hyperfixations and sheer force of will.

Aaand welcome to Valentine fails to figure out expressions and head positions, ;-; someone give me back my 3/4 front facing view cuz obviously I can’t do anything else.

This was the most low effort fanart but Marcy became a pretty easy character to draw by this point so I attempted a spooky vibe to try something new. Unfortunately they all just look traumatized, yet that kinda works for her character.

This is the point I started having a little problem, towards the end of October and beginning of November I screwed up.

I usually tried to draw every day if not every 2-4 days. Right before this I skipped over a week, for some reason tho that made me feel like my quality has begun slipping. Like if I don’t try to put lines to the page every day even if I’m just doing circles and not drawing anything productive I’m ginna lose all my progress and go back to square one. This Anya (from the game Mouthwash) is from my 4 inch doodle book I got to combat this problem.

While I’m not particularly proud of this one I will say if July Me saw this I think she’d be really proud and actually love it. So I chose to as well. Besides I adore that sweetheart Anya in any form she takes!

And last but never least: KEN TAKAKURA AKA OKARUN!!!

This is by far my favorite of my most recent drawings. Playing loosely with his shapes was pretty freeing, since I have a very stagnant idea of lines and forms, especially with hair, so getting to do Okarun was fun. His hair and collar felt very ‘scribbly’ to me which was actually fun because I wasn’t so focused on exact shapes how I usually am.

It’s not perfect (like those lopsided ears) and it’s not a direct mimick like Fizzarolli but I still really really like it.

If you go back and compare this one to even my first three I feel like I’ve gotten so much better in the last 6 months. It only makes me wanna keep trying!

***************

If you read all this, firstly thank you!!

Also keep drawing, draw every day you can. Or pick up the pencil right now and start, idc if you think it’s “bad” idc if you make 100 “bad drawings”. Art is first and foremost about having fun, feeling good while creating. Not just to get good at it, which ,not gonna lie, was my focus in the beginning. But what’s actually FEELS good in the moment is to finish up a picture and be like “WHOA I MADE that! It didn’t exist before, I made it exist!” Everyone deserves that feeling.

So pick up the pencil and get to it!

The world deserves to see what you can create <3