#still trying to find my art style���

[gamerbot-22]

I’m really sick of this narrative of “you enjoy [popular media?] You’re a sheep!”

Maybe instead of trying to pursue some arbitrary intellectual high ground, you sit back and admire the fact that a single piece of art—whether that be a song, a TV show, a movie, a play, a video game, *whatever—*was able to speak to such a massive demographic of people. The art is doing what it’s *made* to do: touch people.

This is like all those dumbass boomer/millennial takes about people finding songs from TikTok. You know? TikTok? *The music sharing platform?* What does it matter if you found a song because of an edit set to your favorite show or a dance video? That music *found you* and it *spoke to you* and who *gives a shit* how it got popular?

People forget just how revolutionary beloved games like Portal 2 and Hollow Knight were/are. Hollow Knight is credited as having revitalized the metroidvania style of games in the public eye, and Portal 2 is still one of the *best* 3D puzzle-platformers you can get. I’m currently playing Tears of the Kingdom (another insanely popular game that I *like* but don’t necessarily adore) and I can’t help but think of how the Valve developers mentioned how hard it was to get players to look up before they added specific design elements to draw the eyes upwards. A relatively small team of people was able to fix a problem that AAA studios struggle with *to this day.*

This is all a bit over the place but like. My point is, fuck it, if you like the popular thing *then enjoy it,* and the people who give you shit for enjoying the popular thing should probably just block the tag and go back to their off-off-off-indie games that make them happy. This is a wild thing to give someone shit for.

What’s your favorite video game :3

There isn't one answer to this question. but uh hohh hohuh Outer wilds, Factorio, shadow of the colossus, terraria, Hollow knight, elden ring, civ 6, dark souls series, monster hunter tri and 4 and world, cave story, talos principle, Inside, half life 2, portal 1&2, Mario Odyssey, Rayman 1, metroid prime, metroid zero mission, skyrim,

[goodlucktai]

raised on little light (1/3)

rise of the tmnt word count: 2k pairing: leo & oc i've had this idea rattling around since the rise farewell comic earlier this year made it canon that the turtles had another brother and a sister floating around somewhere. we know who their sister is, so this is my take on that 5th brother. i hope you enjoy meeting him <3 big thank you to @soldrawss and @mykimouser for enabling my insane behavior (and thank you again to sol for drawing the art i included in this chapter!!!) title borrowed from northern attitude by noah kahan read on ao3

x

2020

Leo regretted his last words as soon as they left his mouth.

“Hero moves are totally your style”? As if Raph doesn’t have enough issues already.

But what he meant—what he would have tried to explain if there was time—was that Raph is his hero. He’s always been Leo’s hero. And if Leo could be anything like him, even for a second, even if it was the last thing he ever did, then he could be satisfied with that. 

It’s a silly thing to be stuck thinking about, laying on a torn up chunk of earth with a monster ominously lumbering somewhere below, looking for where it threw its toy. Laying there, feeling every bruise and broken bone, and hoping that he didn’t hurt his big brother’s feelings.

They’ll be okay, Leo thinks, trying to make it be the thing that gives him courage instead of just more homesickness. They’ll miss me, maybe for a long time, but they’ll be okay.

Leo’s supposed to be fighting for his life, but it’s all he can do to keep a grip on the photo in his hand, the only thing in this entire dimension worth holding onto. It’s all he can do to keep his eyes open when every blink is longer than the last. 

It feels like enough of a rebellion. The Krang looked annoyed that he was still breathing the last time it batted him through the void like a fly, which gives Leo the idea that he should probably be dead by now. He feels a detached sort of pride at how grown-up he’s being about all this. Better late than never

Leo waits for the Krang to come for him, dripping his blood and sneering his daddy’s nickname for him hatefully as it does, and hopes he made his family proud. 

Leo hopes he’ll go wherever Gram-gram is. It would be nice to know someone when he gets there. 

Movement in his periphery snags Leo’s attention. His brain starts throwing up warning flags, signaling danger—anything moving around in here is another parasite, or a Krang hound, nothing he’ll want to be sprawled out on a silver platter for—but he can’t summon any urgency. 

He turns his head and finds himself looking up at another turtle. 

It’s the very last thing he expected to see. They both just stare at each other for a moment. 

The newcomer appears to be a few years older than Leo, based on the broadness of their shoulders, and half a head taller. Their skin is more gray than green and their plastron is so pale it’s closer to white than yellow. Their carapace, what Leo can see of it, is a deep blue-black and they’re covered, skin and shell both, in white spots. Two of the spots on their face give the impression of eyebrows lowered in a glare, but they don’t seem angry at him.

The turtle is completely unfamiliar to Leo, which is saying something. He thought he and his family had the monopoly on… this whole situation. 

Disquieted, Leo remembers that he’s supposed to be the only turtle here. That was a very significant part of the decision he’d made. 

It must be a hallucination, he decides, instantly comforted by his own reasoning. That makes sense. He just wished that if his mind was going to conjure him some dying company it could at least be someone he knows. An imaginary Mikey or Donnie or Raphie for one last hug. One last affectionate forehead bonk. An “I still love you,” if that wasn’t asking too much. 

Don’t you cry now, he scolds himself sternly when his eyes start to blur and burn. It’s not about you. 

With a resounding crash of metal against stone, the Krang finds them at last. He’s snarling something that Leo is too slow to piece together before he cuts himself off—surprising the hell out of Leonardo by acknowledging the hallucination. That’s not how that works. 

“Another pest ,” the Krang hisses. His serrated teeth glint when he draws his gummy lips back in an ugly smile. His tone is oily and unpleasant when he adds, “You’re less colorful than those other ones. I would have remembered seeing you. Where were you when your accomplices were fumbling about in my Technodrome like the stupid creatures they are?”

“We won,” Leo reminds the alien, even though it makes him cough. His lips are warm and wet now but he won’t think about why. “Blew up your ugly ship. Who looks stupid now?” 

“Shut your mouth!” the Krang roars, going from slimy to homicidal in about three seconds. Leo cringes, every ounce of animal instinct in his body urging him to hide in his shell and ride the rest of this nightmare out. 

The spotted turtle snaps, “Don’t talk to him.” 

It would have made sense if he was looking at Leo when he said it. Don’t engage, don’t bait the big monster that could kill you with as much effort as it takes you to blink, et cetera ad nauseum. If only he’d had a nickel for every time he heard that. 

But instead the turtle is looking at the Krang, and he’s radiating the kind of cold-blooded murder that you mostly only see in movies. He has one arm flung out in front of Leo like he actually means to use it to stop the Krang from getting any closer. 

“Don’t even look at him,” he goes on, sounding seconds away from baring his teeth. 

This guy is significantly unaware of the danger he’s facing, and Leo ought to warn him about what enormous clusterfuck he’d just wandered into. Leo ought to say he appreciates the reptile solidarity, but you should definitely run, new guy. 

But this probably isn’t actually happening outside of his own head. And besides, Leo has to focus really hard on his numb fingers so he doesn’t drop his photo. 

“I’ll look where I please,” the Krang says, as unbothered by the hallucination as he was by Leo’s entire family. “Starting with that fool head of yours. I’m interested in whatever backdoor led you here. If it’s my way out, well —”

Adrenaline surges through Leo, and he’s hardly aware of moving before he’s lurching up and shouting out, “No!” 

He can’t get out, he can’t. Leonardo won’t be able to trick him again. He won’t be there to help this time. 

“I do have one thing for you,” the spotted turtle interrupts to say, reaching over his shoulder for what turns out to be a compound crossbow strapped to his back. 

Leo doesn’t know a lot about archery so it’s weird his fictional turtle does, crank-cocking the weapon like it’s an extension of his arm. He watches cluelessly as the turtle slides something very purple out of his jacket pocket and notches it into the groove where the bolts are supposed to go. It’s definitely not a bolt, but it’s a piercing-type projectile of some kind, and it fits in the crossbow like it was designed with crossbows in mind. 

The turtle aims the bow at the Krang, who clicks the claws of his metal suit on the ground the way Splinter would drum his fingers on the kitchen counter when he was waiting on the microwave. The Krang looks condescending and mildly curious, like he’s watching dumb little animals do something they’re not trained to do. 

“He told me to tell you he’s sorry he couldn’t be here to see this part,” the spotted turtle says, and then shoots without a second of hesitation or unnecessary dramatics. 

The Krang bats the projectile away, or tries to, but it explodes on contact with his armor, and suddenly all Leo can smell is burning metal. Then burning meat. 

The Krang begins to scream, clawing at something defiantly purple with a mind of its own that eats straight through him the effortless, immediate way corrosive acid chews through soft tissue. It moves like nanotech, covering as much of the Krang as possible in a manner of seconds and clearly designed to consume whatever it touches like a school of cartoon piranhas. 

Donnie would love it, color scheme and all. 

The Krang stumbles drunkenly, howling like a creature possessed, and Leo and his turtle companion both watch silently until he tips over the edge of the hunk of torn earth they’re on. Gravity is nonexistent in this dimension, so he doesn’t so much fall as sort of drift in another direction while he’s distracted with the purple stuff that’s doing its best to eat him alive. 

The last handful of minutes have been so bizarre that it’s actually going pretty far in convincing Leo that none of it happened for real. The Krang hasn’t actually found him yet. This is clearly a dream. Or a pre-death electrical storm as the neurons in his brain fire up to fizzle out.  

He tips his head to the side again to stare up at the archer, who is putting his bow away with perfect confidence that whatever that purple thing was, it will do the job. 

“Who are you?” Leo asks stupidly. 

“Gio,” the probably imaginary turtle replies.

Leo’s mouth runs off before he can stop it. “Just Gio? Like Cher?”

God, he thinks. That was stupid, Leo. Not the time or place, Leo. You’re in the prison dimension. You’re dying here and you can’t even cut the jokes now? Raph was so right about you.

But the imaginary turtle surprises him by smiling slightly, the corners of his mouth pulling just barely upwards in a way that somehow completely transforms him. Not the time or place for jokes or smiling at them but here they are. Like company.

“Giorgio Hamato,” ‘Gio’ says. That lands in Leo’s ears as something remarkably worth making a lot of noise over, but he can’t begin to unpack it. And after a second, he forgets what the remarkable part was. His mind is a deck of cards that got shuffled too enthusiastically and ended up scattered all over the floor. Gio doesn’t seem to mind when Leo just blinks at him, adding, “I’m here to take you home.”  

“Pretty sure Uber doesn’t come out this far,” Leo mumbles, the words a paint smear, all thick and wet and muddy. One of his teeth feels broken and it’s keeping him awake, a blistering ache that cracks through the back of his mouth like lightning. “And I’ve got, like, zero bars.”

This is how I cope, he thinks, watching the bigger turtle absorb the second bad joke in as many minutes. Leo’s blinking fast so he doesn’t cry. He’s trying to focus on anything but the pain radiating through his whole body, and the swallowing darkness all around him, and the ruins of ancient metal ships looming where they float unrestricted by gravity, and the ballistic howls of a pissed-off pink alien still dealing with whatever the heck this Gio guy did to him.

He can’t focus on any of that because all of that is scary and he’s already terrified. He needs to not be terrified because he doesn’t want to be that kind of ghost when he haunts his family. He wants to be the friendly, funny kind, the kind that gets to stay at the end of the movie, the kind that will make silly faces at Mikey so he doesn’t get scared, and leave sticky notes for Donnie to remember to charge his phone and drink enough water, and cover Raphie with an extra blanket while he’s asleep because it gets cold at night but he always leaves his bedroom door open for them.

If Leo’s friendly and funny, if he helps, he’ll get to stay. He didn’t get to stay the first time, so this time he has to make it stick.

Larger hands wrap around his. It doesn’t register for a second, and then it does in a big way.

Leo jerks his head up. Moving just that much hurts like his ribs are broken all the way down and the bones in his leg have all melted into liquid agony, but it clears some of the fog away.

Someone is holding his hands in the prison dimension.

An alien like the Krang wouldn’t know the first thing about the human gesture, the togetherness of it, so it’s not some mean trick that’s being played. And it can’t be an imaginary turtle that Leo dreamed up, after all, because kindness would be the last thing he’d give himself.

Possibly very real Gio says, “Fuck Uber. Whatever that is. And don’t repeat that word.”

The punchy breath Leo chokes in is going to punch out again as a laugh or a sob. Leo squeezes the bigger turtle’s hands, photo crinkling between them, suddenly tethered to something in this void and hysterically certain that he’ll die for real if Gio lets go.

“I’m sixteen.” Leo’s voice wobbles. He doesn’t know what to react to first. He doesn’t understand how this is happening. He holds on. “I can say the fuck word if I want to, I’m practically an adult.”

Gio’s face does something it hurts to look at. His eyes are dark and sincere, the shape of them entirely familiar. There’s a warmth inside him that permeates the gloom. A star belonging to a much larger galaxy, but more significantly, belonging to the same crooked constellation Leo belongs to.

I know you, he thinks, surprised by the truth of it. I do. Where have you been?

“We’re going home,” Gio says, the certainty in his voice like one of those huge stones a river parts around, unmoved by the currents and crashing water. “I know the way out. Don’t worry about it. Close your eyes.”   

The worst thing that could happen has already happened, Leo thinks. There’s no reason not to trust him. There’s nothing left to lose. He closes his eyes.

He feels himself drawn in, tucked against the built-in armor of a turtle chest, head resting on a broad shoulder. He’s been carried like this a million times before. He didn’t think it would happen again. Somewhere along the line, he’d been picked up for the last time and put down for the last time, and now he’s here, where no one who loves him can reach him, to scoop him up when he falls asleep on the sofa and take him to bed.

But Gio lifts him up like he’s still a kid. The Krang is bellowing hateful promises in between the grating shrieks of pain, promises of what he’ll do when he gets his hands on Leo, but all of that is far away. 

Leo isn’t afraid anymore. He isn’t going to be a ghost.

He’s pretty sure he’s going home.   

[lilybug-02]

I mean, if you make some more of Dewi's adventures, I'll probably make music based off it. There's just something about your art style or your writing that really flips a switch in my head. Case in point- I reread your "Lost and Lucky" comic and came up with this.

I don't know, it was like, looking at your comic, it was obvious what instruments I would choose, how they would merge together, etc etc. You make it a lot easier than it usually is for me to create music based off of characters, stories, etc.

You're really inspiring, and my vote is definitely for a hollow knight sequel, partly for the selfish reason of wanting to make more music based off your art. Hope you liked my little piece!

Okay, again, I am so so sorry for the late response. I've been looking at this for DAYS trying to find the right words to express just how beautiful and kind this is. Genuinely still cannot understand how awesome it is that my work inspired you so much to compose music and draw an amazing fan art. And like AHHHHHH OH MY GOD. The bell tone of the song mixed with string instruments is so precious. It gives me the impression of a what a background song would sound like while reading it like a children's book. And then the artwork. OFIbaklsj dbgkfjabdfgfasdf its so cute. they are HUGGING. LIKE

I just. AHHHHH Seriously wanted to thank you. This is so cool. And I am totally making a Dewi Part 2! <3 Just for u

[hrrtshape]

FAME DR — moments, in which i knew, i’ve made it. 

⋆  hearing my song at a random café – i’m just vibing, sipping an espresso, and suddenly my voice floats through the speakers. people around me are humming along, totally unaware that it’s…..ME!!!! me!!!??

⋆  seeing my face on a billboard in times square – i’m there with friends, acting all casual, but inside i’m screaming because it’s just… me. huge. in times square. 

⋆  getting DMs from celebrities i used to fangirl over – notifications blow up, and there’s that blue check, THEM, sliding into my DMs saying they’re obsessed with my new song or film or whatnot want to meet up.

⋆  having a designer send me clothes with a handwritten note – just open a package to find an exclusive jacket with a note: “this piece is so you. can’t wait to see you wear it.” WHAT?

⋆  walking into a room and people literally gasping – at a party or event or literally just a whatever place, and the whole place goes quiet for a beat when i walk in. heads turning, whispers starting—everyone is in awe. okay, beyonce. okay…

⋆  finding fan art of myself online – fans post these breathtaking drawings and edits, capturing every tiny detail of an outfit, facial expressions, and they’re actually better than anything an official team could come up with. 

⋆  watching paparazzi chase after me in a cute outfit – i just.. step out, dressed, and suddenly there’s a whole crew of photographers losing their minds trying to get shots of. 

⋆  hearing my voice as someone’s ringtone in public – walking in the streets, chilling, and someone’s phone goes off with my song. 

⋆  a little kid dressed as yours truly for halloween – like, full-on little diva mode and their parents are so proud of their mini-star!!!!!! internal screaming.

⋆  seeing fans camped out with signs hours before an event – i’m arriving, and there’s personalised signs. i feel like madonna or someone. like, people like me that much!!!! me!!!! 

⋆  seeing a poster of me in someone’s room — it can be super casual; film or one of those music posters but they still have it in their rooms?? on their walls??? 

⋆  hearing other artists name-drop me in their interviews – people i’ve perhaps looked up to, who inspired me, are now saying things like, “well, I’d love to work with her; she’s killing it right now.” it’s giving favourite artist’s favourite artist !!!!

⋆  my favourite high-fashion brand using my song in their runway show – watching videos of the models walking to my beat during paris fashion week. It's iconic. it's cinematic. it’s unreal. it makes me squeal for a bit. just a bit.

⋆  random people copying my hairstyles and outfits – i go on instagram and tik tok to find tutorials on how to get my curls, my makeup, or even my attitude. fashion style. body type?! oh my god. i’m a BLUEPRINT!!! 

⋆  fans quoting my interviews back to me – they remember all of those cheesy one-liners and even throw them back in comments and in person. 

⋆  being the reason someone starts making music or art – a fan gushing, saying, “i only started singing because of you.” 

⋆  catching people on the metro secretly taking photos of me – i’m reading or vibing with a friend, and i glimpse at someone trying to snap a photo discreetly. i get that little downturned smile because?? hello?? COME HERE I DON’T BITE??

⋆  fans running entire accounts just for paparazzi photos – i find out about multiple fan pages dedicated to catching and sharing every single glimpse of me, from coffee runs to red carpet shots. wild. also very smile-inducing.

⋆  people naming their pets after me – i hear fans saying they have a dog, cat, or even a fish named after me. it’s cute, and it makes me feel like i’ve officially entered pop culture.

⋆  meeting someone who cries when they see me – they’re sobbing, overwhelmed, and i’m trying to hold their hands, saying, “it’s okay, it’s okay, oh my god, stop crying, i’m going to start crying!!” 

⋆  being used as stantwt gif’s — okay. yea, i’ve made it. no comment.

⋆  people selling out an outfit as soon as i wear it – i wore a certain dress, and boom, it’s immediately sold out everywhere. i’m officially. officialy setting trends without even trying.

⋆  fans knowing my coffee order by heart – people are out there replicating my exact coffee order and sharing recipes, so everyone can feel a little more like me??. spreading soy milk propaganda <3 

⋆  being an inspiration behind fan tattoos – people are getting my quotes, my NAME, or even my films or albums inked on their bodies. okay. OKAY….wow.? 

⋆  people taking photos at places just because i’ve been there – spots i’ve casually visited are suddenly iconic locations for fans, and they recreate my exact poses.

⋆  finding out my song were played at someone’s wedding – it’s their special day, and my voice is part of their love story??? 

⋆  getting letters from people who say i’ve changed their lives – fans sending handwritten letters, saying how i saved them, made them stronger, or helped them believe in themselves. <3 :( :) (:AWE. 

⋆  noticing my name carved on trees – i’m literally engraved in people’s memories and spaces. can i cry now? 

[globgon]

Still trying to find a my art style

[ladyblackbirdart]

“Everyone in my life has changed. Promise me you won’t change.”

I’m still trying to find my style for the arcane characters so my art might be a little clunky until I find my footing. Here’s Vi as she loses herself and her principles, releasing The Grey upon her own people, her 𝙨𝙞𝙨𝙩𝙚𝙧, for the one person that’s shown her kindness in a very long time. Only to be betrayed moments later. I have so many thoughts about act one and so many hopes for act two.

[lightningant]

I've never seen characterizations of Tom and Harry the way yours is. I love how neurotic and messed up they both are -- they're *SO CUTE* too. <3 <3 <3

Tom is just so exhausted and cynical and Harry is a manic catastrophe with sooo many crossed wires and they're HILARIOUS. XD

And just so well written, I cannot tell you how distracted I was for at least a week after I read what you had for your fic -- I truly, truly admire your narration and dialogue and characterizations (I already said that but PLEASE I LOVE THEM SO **BAD** >O< ) Soooo funny and well made.

They're realistic! Tom and Harry are so messy and also normal people at the end of the day who make mistakes and aren't super cool all the time (really, they're utter dorks, and you TOTALLY show thatt) but also they're competent and scary and stubborn and you just have suchh a nice blend of their facets and I JUST....aghhh, I love itt.

Also I ADORE your designs -- I love how Tom is so sickly and neat (you said it best "Victorian child with tuberculosis" LMAO), and Harry is so IDK, he's just a Guy but in the most wonderful way -- I'm not actually good with words :,))))

I just love your art style in general, it's like, realistic yknow. You don't get rid of normal people "imperfections", they're a part of the design or enhance them -- I don't think the word imperfections is right, I just mean like, you don't exclude non-conventionally attractive aspects of bodies or facial expressions??? Idk, I'm trying here, I really am. Just, just, just I like it a lot and I wanna be like that toooooo >.<

IIIIIIII dunno if I have accurately gotten anything across or even given an actual good compliment in this entire thing but anyways you're very cool and awesome and also PLEASE forget that I said they were Babygirl I've never used that word before in my LIFEE and don't know if that was right at all -- if it was nevermind I meant it all and am so cool -- ANYWAYS bye :,)

I don't think I've succeeded in lessening my embarrassment but uhhhhh, I hope I've at least articulated myself better :,)))

Askbomb swag. Thank you, this message was so sweet :) I shall try to match energies.

One of the things I love most is that the kind of person who puts up pretensions is, innately, trying to hide something about themselves they find sub-par. Tom isn't just a scary and incredibly powerful domineering sigma male who is a master manipulator, he is a person who is actively attempting to turn himself into that man, and in my fic he is still a teenager and still tripping his way through that mental image he has of himself. The two worst ages to ever be are 15 and 20; fifteen, when you are ready to shed childhood but don't know what maturity looks like just yet, and 20, when you are ready to become your own person and achieve adulthood, picking your way across existence-defining beliefs. And his only friend for the past like, 7 months? has been his 16-year-old self who has the single-minded objective of looking cool and mature to his adult self. A hell of his own making.

Harry is also 20. He is one of those 'unusually mature for his age' kids and he has an inflated sense of his own righteousness and capability, despite being the actual one with the emotional range of a teaspoon (he just knows to keep it himself). There is no way Harry would detect he is having a manic fit, especially if he is having one that is triggered by his arrested feelings on Sirius. It's incredibly fun writing him perform this extremely risky and reality-altering plan and his plan was "idk, kill him?" and picking shit up off the ground whenever he sees it, the DADA position included. our hero.

Beautiful tragic terminally ill gothic prince / fit jock is really a match made in heaven aesthetically. Cannot get enough of it

Thank you for art compliment too ^_^ I used to lean more to anime fandoms so Harry Potter really let me stretch my legs on more 'normal people' facial features like big noses and soft chins and I'm glad it's clear how much fun I'm having doing that. Yay! Though one of the compliments I've always gotten that I've always been proud of is how distinct the way I draw expressions is.

No no...you're right. Tom is absolutely a babygirl. And Harry...well he was certainly Ginny's babygirl, and I'm sure a part of him is really itching to have someone put their hand on the small of his back 😔

[littleststarfighter]

I hope it's okay to mass reply here because so many people replied I don't even know where to start. I’ll try and reply to most when i get time. I’m again sorry for this post and the last. I’m going through a really depressing spot in my life. Perimenopause doesn't take prisoners. Things are also changing for me in my life and I don't know what will happen to me. I’m selling my house and going to live with my sister till I get back on my feet as I’m unemployed. The stress is hitting me. I don't know if I’ll even get anything as it’s a harder world to find work, well full time work, out there for many reasons. I'm scared.

And, what a time to feel crappy. MCR are hinting at new things and there's an American tour. I’m both excited and hitting a panicky feeling I wont be able to keep up. I've just been feeling really down over my art because of all that. New fandom blues I think. I’m trying to find my place in MCR fandom and not knowing people and thinking people don't really like what I’m drawing. Because it stands out too much with the realism. Loosing a lot of friends in the Steddie fandom just killed my desire to draw that too even though I still want to draw for it . I just feel that what I've been drawing isn't good, you know. And it’s all because I draw realistically. It’s not a popular style and I draw really stiff like I’m positioning Barbies (well, Kens) . When I look at popular art it's not how I draw at all. And I've been upset about it. Plus, being unemployed and continuously being turned down really stresses you out and makes you question eveything, you know. I feel so damn old and unwanted in life. I know it's silly to always want to be liked as it doesn't always happen. I need to remind myself to draw for me and draw what I find fun and it'll be okay. But it’s so hard when you wish you drew other ways.

Sorry I’ll try to get overcome this feeling, but I wanted to explain what's been going on in my head. Though thank you for evey kind message. It meant a lot.

Can folks be honest with me. Does my art style put people off?

[bugtails]

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Lan Wangji Goes To Lotus Pier AU: Part 5: Flip Slip.

(Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 4.5)

[snow-body]

grimm: no homo

[cartwheellou]

He looks so charming and curious! I can tell you put a lot of effort into the coloring, what with all the scale detailing. I think the scale patterns look very nice, especially on his face.

Digital art can be a very different beast from traditional. Sorry in advance if anything I’m about to say is obvious, or you’re already doing it. Theyre all things I didnt know to do when I started transitioning from traditional to digital art.

Sometimes, the lines you draw on the traditional version look great as is, but when you digitize it, it just feels so wonk. Treat your traditional drawing as a rough draft. Focus less on tracing the traditional art, and spend more time looking only at what you have digitized and going, ‘do i like how this looks?’ It can help you from, at the end of the process, from going, ‘why did it turn out like that?’ And if its still not working out, turn off the traditional art layer and try freehanding it.

Inverse advice, while still making sure you spend time zoomed out looking at the whole piece, zoom in to draw lines. Yes, even further. It will make your lines straighter and help you bend that curve in the direction you want it to go. Then you zoom out and check it looks like you thought it would. It will also help you add detail where you would otherwise be afraid to put it in a traditional piece, like adding lots of detail in a folded wing.

What drawing app are you using, and what hardware do you have access to? Its stupid how much my art improved leaps and bounds when I switched to a better app and got a second hand tablet instead of using my laptop trackpad (if you can, use literally anything besides a laptop trackpad.)

Explore whatever app youre using a little more. Find a different brush, or at the very least, change the brush thickness depending on what youre drawing. It can be nice to have big, bold lines around the edge of the form, or to define his head from his body, but they suddenly seem clunkier when detailing his wing shoulder. A brush that changes thickness based on pressure is great for that, but again, just making the brush smaller does the trick too. The smaller brush will also help make added detail feel less clunky.

And whatever you do, dont berate your artistic skill if you dont like your digitized stuff. Its a different skill that you havent built yet. I can tell from this drawing that youre a good traditional artist, and you can be a good digital artist as well (after a series of what feels like failures but is actually just part of a learning process). Most of the stuff that Id pick on in this drawing are the product of unfamiliarity with digital art, and not having access to a tablet with a great drawing app and a pressure sensitive stylus. You can do great digital art without it, but it is harder and it does restrict your style.

Once you feel comfortable with it, try drawing something digitally without uploading a traditional rough draft. I actually found it a little easier!

I did a traditional drawing a few weeks ago and I decided to turn it into a piece of digital art :D

I would really appreciate some advice on how I could improve this :)

(yes I know he isn't grey idk what I was doing)

[donutfloats]

Been playing Cult of the Lamb, it’s fun

I’m definitely normal about it lol

[ariotofrobins]

Kastle ♥️

[esprei]

your art makes me so happy like istg you dont even know 😭🙏

also give my boy emmet a joltik and tell him i said hi :3

"Hello, anon! Thank you verrrry much for this Joltik. I will take great care of this little passenger!"

Emmet thanks you anon! that Joltik is going to a wonderful trainer! and I thank you too, so so much! 🥺💖💖💖 that means so much to me you don't even know! 😭💖

[xxrat--punkxx]

Repair day