#simply the femur of whimsy and silliness that i missed so dearly

[fiendish-illos]

right, okay so as a celebration or something for the sudden explosion of popularity i find myself in, here's this

and now, i shall go in-depth about each phase i trekked and waded through like a heron in dolphin-infested waters. Phase 1: I had just begun Wings of Fire. I was small, innocent, horrorless (that I knew of at the time anyway but that's a whole other can of worms), and still had some good whimsy left in me in spite of It All. I had a simple style that had the charm of a young creature attempting to draw cool dragons. I also had no idea what digital art was. I was simply a sketcher, a traditional artist with a love for the pencil. I was a real good egg of a wee critter.

Phase 2: Still somewhat in the beginnings, and my art style developing rapidly. I took inspiration from as many artists as I could get my eyes on (specifically XTheDragonRebornX, the goat imo). Though not quite as innocent as I used to be, I was still chill and had now learned about digital art, but I had never once considered doing it myself (not yet anyway).

Phase 3: Gosh, this phase destroyed me. Well, rather, I destroyed myself. I'm not going to slander my younger self; I was in a delicate stage of my life and thus so was my art style as well. I had gotten into youtube channels like Inquisitormaster and whatnot, and I got. way too involved in it, to put it extremely lightly anyway. At this point in my journey I had also garnered the desire to begin digital art and post on DeviantArt (classic, classic). And thus, I began absorbing all the wrong tactics from all the wrong sources and trying to become a person that I was not, and it got me onto a path I don't think I was ever supposed to go down in the first place. Or maybe I was. I dunno, but the whole ordeal was quite ridiculous, quite ridiculous indeed. I dug a grave for the magic I saw and created in life I never should have, I'm afraid. It's hard to perceive by just looking at the style I had back then, but I was, in fact, quite dead inside from that choice.

Phase 4: After staring at the gravestone of my childhood silliness for a good long while, I finally realized the error of my ways and dug up those old bones of whimsy. I was finally learning how to adopt aspects of art styles that I didn't just think other people would like, but that I liked, as well. Though I didn't realize it then, I was taking a huge step into progress, and I commend my older self for that. I took inspiration from artists uhhh that one fish person and whatnot. I took on softer features, finding them to be more relaxing to draw than the sharper edges I had wielded in my previous art.

Phase 5: And here folks is where we can see where Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles infiltrated my life, and my sense of whimsy had returned fully at last. At this point, I decided to take a more cozy approach to how I drew, having the desire to draw like I was illustrating a bedtime story (it was in need of much work, but I improved I promise). I also knew much, much more about Wings of Fire and its faults, and though I was much less knowledgeable about how to go about it and some of the actual good things about it, I was much more level-headed than I was previously. And thus, I had the thought: "okay. I like Wings of Fire (in spite of its many imperfections), and I like ninja turtles (which has peak writing and storytelling and is just spectaculous in general). So, what if, perchance, mayhaps, I combined the two?" And thus, my Rise of the Wings of Fire (or whatever I'm gonna call it, I'm still mondering about the name) began.

Phase 6: After a long, grueling, harrowing journey of self-discovery and stupid decisions and all that jazz, we now see the art style I have now: semi-realistic with more expression than the live action Lion King would ever care to incorporate. Along with incorporating aspects of other styles that I like, I also decided to start including more animalistic traits to my Creatures (ie: blue whale eyes for SeaWings, porcupine/tenrec quills for IceWings, etc etc), which, in my opinion, greatly improved my art style, along with the fact that I began playing around with other digital brushes and filters (random noise my love). I'm still developing and learning, but overall, I'm quite satisfied with where I am.

And there you have it folks. If you've made it this far without getting bored, congrats!! you now know a little bit more about me than you probably ever cared to, which is fine by me. I may have paved this road but my man it was your choice to walk on it.