#unfinished workflow

[goodgifswithfreetoolschallenge]

UNFINISHED WORKFLOW 1

Making Gifs With Autodesk Sketchbook

NON-RECOLORED GIFS

Tool type: Graphic Interface (GUI)

Operating systems: Mac and Windows

Input: Frame by frame screencaps

_______________________________________

While this is most of the way there, I'm stuck on building this into a full tutorial. Just going to post what I have here in case anyone wants to build from it, or Autodesk updates any of the features.

Issues:

You can't crop the frames once they're in the Flipbook, so you either have to keep then at their existing screen ratio, or crop all of your frames somewhere externally (you could use GIMP, ezgif.com, or an FFmpeg shell script for this).

Captioning with a good drop shadow or outline. You can apply a drop shadow, but it isn't going to help much, and there is no outlining support for the text box.

Theoretically, you can do some basic recoloring in Autodesk Sketchbook by going to Image > Adjust and selecting among the options there. However you'd have to do this one by one for every single frame, which is far too tedious in my opinion to be worth the time and effort.

General Instructions to make a gif in Autodesk Sketchbook

You need to get frame by frame screencaps.

There are many ways to make frame by frame screencaps, including within various media players such as VLC. I only have instructions up for automating the process with FFmpeg currently. You can absolutely use FFmpeg* for this. It's where I got my frames for the gif above.

Note that Sketchbook can only export gifs at 12, 24, 25, or 30 FPS, so you want to screencap accordingly (don't use 12 FPS—your result will be horribly choppy).

Note*: Using FFmpeg for this, I had to export .jpeg caps (change .png at the end of the script to .jpeg) because for some reason, FFmpeg's .png outputs wouldn't open in Autodesk Sketchbook (PNGs are always best practice for screencaps because they're lossless).

Open the frames into a Flipbook

In Autodesk Sketchbook, go to File > New Flipbook > New Flipbook from Image Sequence...

In the dialogue box that appears, in the bottom left, click “Show Options”. In the “Import As” dropdown box, select “Midground”. Hold shift and select all of your frames then open. All of your frames should load into a Flipbook in sequence.

Navigating through the frames

There will be a bar at the bottom where you can pause and play your image sequence. It only shows so many frames at one time by default (but you can load and export with up to 1000 frames whether you can see them all at once or not). If you drag the edges of the box and drag the bar at the bottom, you can make the number of frames you can see at one time in the Flipbook toolbar larger. If you still can't see all the frames, you can adjust the beginning and ending frame in your view with the boxes in the left and right upper corners.

Adding captions (no outlines)

If you open the layers tab in the top toolbar, your layers tab will open and you can click into the foreground—a layer in front of your frame—and use the text option to lay captions over your frame.

You have to add your text to every screencap one at a time. However, you can do this pretty quickly using your keyboard's copy/paste shortcut (Command + C -> Command + V on Mac). Select Quick Transform in the top toolbar and select Rectangle. Drag over the entire foreground to select it—not just your caption. Use your keyboard copy shortcut. Leaving the Quick Transform active, click to the next frame in your Flipbook toolbar and use your keyboard paste shortcut. Your caption should paste into the foreground of the next frame and in the exact position you put your text on the previous frame.

Exporting to GIF

Go to File > Export Flipbook...

In the dialogue box...

Select Export as Animated GIF

Select Export All Frames (unless you want to trim the ends, in which case, use the second option to select the range of frames you want to export).

Uncheck Match Document Settings to change the scale of the image (your gif will likely be too large to upload if you don't scale down the size of all the frames on export). You only need to adjust the width or the height. The other variable will automatically match so your image stays scaled. For this gif, I scaled by a 540 pixel width.

The frame rate you should set depends on how many FPS you screencapped at. I screencapped at 30 FPS using FFmpeg so I selected 30 here, but if you screencapped a TV show manually frame by frame, you'd likely want to select 24 FPS.

Make sure "Loop Playback" is checked and hit Export.

Gif made with Autodesk Sketchbook.

[tsutan]

I don't think I'm really happy with my art rn, so after today's post I'm probably going to take a one-week hiatus from my daily art posts to not only catch up on college work, but to figure out how often I can post to make more polished work.

Will update everyone on how that goes daily at the usual art post time :)

[stillmother]

i always say artists should not limit themselves to the sketch->line art->flats->shading workflow for digital art bc it is stifling but then i often limit myself to that and then i get mad bc i dont like certain steps. girl you dont have to do them

[iliketangerines]

pov you randomly facetime johnny while he's busy working and you're fucking yourself stupid on a dildo that HE CUSTOM MADE FROM HIS OWN COCK AND BALLS and he's just so caught off guard like

made by you

a/n: @partycatty last request!!!

pairing: johnny cage x afab!reader

warnings: nsfw (MDNI), soft!Johnny, needy (like really needy) reader, masturbating (?), praise kink, phone sex, not proofread

Johnny rubs his eyes with one hand, squinting them at the unfinished script of the video game

the pen in his hand shakes as he circles and scribbles in comments about what he liked and what he didn’t like about what the script writer had put in

he wonders if he had hired an idiot because the dialogue sounded stiff and the staging of the scene seemed to make no sense

perhaps he should just hire a new editor and write his own script and then send it to an editor to have them tweak any small details he might’ve missed

his hand reaches out for the coffee cup next to him, and he lifts it up only to find it empty

Johnny looks up from his script with a disgruntled look, lips curved downward and eyebrows furrowed as he stared at the empty cardboard

throwing it into the wastebasket beneath his desk along with the three other empty coffee cups, he stands up from his seat, hearing the bones in his back creak and his knees pop with pain

he groans and presses both of his hands to his lower back, stretching out after spending so long hunched over his desk trying to edit this ridiculous script

maybe he should just go to bed, wake up with a fresh head and fresh eyes

Johnny glances once more over to the script, the red pen decorating the paper at almost every corner, and he lets out a displeased hum

for as much as the weight on his eyelids felt heavy, he really wanted, needed, to get this done tonight, at least before the next shoot happened

he checks his phone for the time, greeted with the sight of you as his lock screen, a bright smile on your face with the sunset perfectly framing you

you hadn’t been able to come with him this time to shoot the current movie, a new project at work had a deadline that happened to cross over into the workflow of the shoot, and you couldn’t afford to slack off

every day and night, he would text you updates about his day, how he felt, whether the food was good on set tonight, and you tried to do the same, complaining about your colleagues, your boss, the traffic getting to and from work

it never failed to make him smile as he read your texts

lately, however, the actors had pressing questions, the cameramen had questions and positions to be marked, the stuntmen needed more clarification on the moveset

he hadn’t had much time for you, and he tried his best to respond to you, typing as fast as he could with one hand as he went on lunch breaks, eyes glued to his screen whenever the actors needed a short break before they could continue

it was absolute hell for him to not be able to talk to you so freely

Johnny steps out of his trailer, trudging over to the coffee machine, checking his phone for any new messages from you

there are a few from a few hours ago, telling them that the dinner party you had been to had been a bust and that one of your colleagues had passed out from drinking too much

he smiles at the text and goes to text you back, quickly pressing the buttons on the coffee machine to give him the largest coffee possible, when your face shows up with your caller id

that was strange, it was past midnight for you usually you’d be fast asleep at this hour, always claiming you needed your beauty rest to get an early start on the grocery shopping on the weekend

nonetheless, he picks up the call, “hey sweetheart, what are you doing up so late?” and he blows on the steaming coffee in his cup and takes a sip

“‘m miss you, miss you Johnny,” you sound breathless, words all slurred together and slightly too high-pitched to be normal

panic strikes through his heart, had something happened? were you safe? had something happened? Shang Tsung?

the memory of you being at the dinner party flits into his memory, and he realizes that you’re probably just drunk and a little needy for him, just as needy as he was for you

“are you drunk? you should go to bed, honey. drink some water before you do.” Johnny takes another sip of his coffee as he starts striding back to his trailer

he wonders if you’ll be able to get up in the morning, you always complained so heavily about hangovers, he’ll send you a text in the morning to remember to take some medicine

“no, not drunk, want you, Johnny, hah-” you practically whine into your phone, and Johnny stops in front of his trailer, hand frozen, his phone tucked right between his ear and his shoulder

suddenly, with his phone so close to his ear, he can hear the faint shuffle of the bedsheets, the way you breathe heavily into the mic and the familiar wet squelch of your pussy

Johnny practically rips the door open in his hurry to get inside, “oh honey, i know, what do you want? tell me.”

suddenly, the coffee in his hand seems redundant, not when adrenaline rushed through him, the thought of you so desperate for him on the sheets sending all of his blood rushing downwards

he places the coffee on his desk and sits on the edge of his bed, pressing his phone as close to his ear as possible to hear you

“want you, want you to kiss me, mark me all over, want you fucking me right now,” you pant into the phone, a low drawn out moan escaping you

Johnny swears his hand is dangerously close to cracking his phone with how tightly he grips it, and he presses his free hand against the bottom of his chin, still trying to remain calm as thoughts of you naked and covered in a slight sweat filters into his thoughts

“i wish i could, honey,” he lets out a sharp exhale through his nose as he tries to imagine what you look like, the soft caress of your skin against the sheets, your eyes that glossy faraway look, lips turned into a slight pout, “tell me what you’re doing right now.”

“mm, wearing your shirt, your favorite, missed you, i miss you,” Johnny resists a groan at the image of you wearing nothing but his shirt, the purple one that had cost too much money

still, it was worth all the money, especially now that you were wearing it right now, all needy and whiny for him

“what else are you doing, honey? c’mon keep talking to me, you’re doing so well.” he encourages to talk more, to fill out the details of your want for him so that he can fuel his own imagination of you

“riding, riding you, but it’s-i-i can’t,” you sound pained at the end, your voice tinted with tears

“hey hey, what’s wrong, what can’t you do?” Johnny presses his chin further into his free hand, trying to decipher what you meant by you riding him

he wasn’t there, but you wouldn’t take on another partner just for this, you wouldn’t do something like that, at least not without his permission

Johnny closes his eyes, listening to you whimper, voice slightly warbled through the phone line, “can’t make myself cum, can’t without you, please, Johnny.”

you sound so desperate for him, and he exhales through his nose, almost proud of himself for ruining you for anyone else, but he could stroke his pride later

“honey, why don’t you facetime me? show me what you’re doing, i’ll guide you. how does that sound?” he hears your small sound of confirmation on the other end, and he pulls his phone away from his ear and waits for your caller id to show up again

as soon as it pops up, he clicks on accept and is met with the sight of you, the phone resting on the headboard of the bed, slightly tilting as you move away after setting up the camera

you look divine, better than he remembered, better than anything he had ever seen actually

his heart slightly aches at the sight of you, just as desperate as you to see each other again, to feel your touch on his skin, to feel your warmth hold his soul

Johnny sucks in a breath and concentrates back on you, how he can slightly see your chest through the unbuttoned front of the shirt, how your thighs slightly trembled as you ride a toy

your baby hairs stick slightly to your forehead, and you look breathless, lips parted in a moan and your brows furrowed upwards as you sink back down onto the toy

he stares at it, rummaging through his mind which one it could possibly be when it suddenly clicks in his head

you were riding him, him as in the prank gift he had given you on your birthday before presenting you with your actual gift

Johnny thought you had thrown it out, but you had kept it and now you were riding it, riding him and his lips slightly part in surprise

as he stares at you, you continue to ride the dildo and let out a long whine as one hand travels downward to rub harsh circles onto your clit

it snaps him out of his shock and back into the moment as he coos at you, “you look so gorgeous, so pretty on my cock.”

a slight hum escapes from you as you stare at the camera with half-lidded eyes, drinking in his praise, and Johnny has to bite his tongue to keep himself from cumming into his pants at the sight alone

“that’s it honey, slow down your hand, you’re being too rough on yourself,” he says it gently, voice a little breathy as he strains to control himself, and you listen obediently, your fingers on your clit slowing down into small gentle circles

you whine pitifully, wanting more, but you listen anyway, trusting him

the fact that you do so easily in such a vulnerable moment fills him with something more, something proud and smooth, like gold shining underneath the sun

“good, you’re being so good for me, sweetheart. use your other hand to pinch your nipple,” he stares, unblinking at his phone as you follow through, legs shaking as you ride him slowly, whimpering as you twist and pinch your nipple

Johnny can’t look away, not, he drinks in the sight like you were the stars in the sky, the galaxies flying in the universe, a marvel, a miracle, a beauty to behold

because you truly were, something wonderful and marvelous and more than anything you would ever know

“that’s it, just like that, speed up just a little bit, good, so good for me” he watches as you bounce a little faster, your fingers against your clit just a bit faster, your pinching at your chest just a bit rougher

“haah, ahhh aghh, Johnny, please, please,” you can barely speak, mewls of pleasure interrupting your own thoughts

“let go for me,” it’s all he needs to say as you moan loudly, and you sink down fully onto the toy, fingers rubbing against your clit desperately as your thighs tremble and twitch

he watches as you ride through your orgasm, as your breathing slows, as your body slouches over, exhausted and spent

“you did so well, so well for me,” he isn’t sure if wants to push it, to tell you to try and get yourself cleaned up, and he decides against it as you lower yourself to the bed and grip onto a pillow, no doubt the one on his side of the bed

his fingers itch to stroke your hair, to massage out your muscles, to hold you close in his arms and fall asleep next to you

Johnny settles with watching you fall asleep on the bed and then ending the call, sending you a text message asking how you felt and to call him when you woke up

setting his phone off to the side, he drags a hand over his face, the image of you riding the toy, the toy based off of him, buried deep inside of you

he stands up and rummages through his drawer, he needed a change of his clothes before he went to bed

[kimikitti]

Rollo: The impure corruption of magic has taken another soul. Obi you've been bewitched! Seduced!

Obi: What took you so long to figure that out?

Sebek: Waka-sammmaaaaaa

(Do I need to explain myself? No I won't. This was supposed to be a low effort sketch comic. But I am apparently unable to leave anything as unfinished. So... I did a thing. NGL this has somehow been the most difficult and easiest comic I've made so far. There were many points where I thought this looked way too ugly. But i stuck it out and Im very satisfied with the result. (Especially the hatching on Malleus and Obi's shoes)

Once again I learned a lot from this. I think that I want to focus more on finding a workflow that is faster moving forward. I want to be able to short hand the complex designs of the twst characters better. I will also be looking into type setting and speech bubbles. I tried to do some more creative stuff with them but idk if it's noticeable. I included the comic without the speech bubbles below. Little brownie points if anyone can figure it out (LOL JK don't look its not that impressive))

[favouritefi]

Sketches and such many unfinished due to my erratic workflow

[glitchyrobo]

Hey If you wouldn't mind what is your 3d animation process? I am super curious, It's a wonderful style

Keeping it brief cuz otherwise this post would be waaaayyy too long

I model, animate, and render in Blender, with textures made with Aseprite or Krita.

I model polygonally without subdiv (except for specific effects, but that's the exception), then UV unwrap, make the texture, rig the model if needed, and then animate!

In terms of the shading/lighting, which I'm assuming is what you're most interested in, I use a set of Toon BSDF nodes mixed together with an Emission node added in afterwards to recolor the shadows from black (which is impossible otherwise in cycles, at least in blender 2.93!) I use Branched Path Tracing with just 1 sample, as well as 0 diffuse bounces. This, in combination with using just 0-size sun lamps and disabling diffuse bounces on all objects (under Object Properties → Visibility. It also allows for very fast renders (on the order of some seconds per frame)

I also often make custom shader node trees for various effects. Sometimes these are as simple as some noise mixed together in some way, and otherwise I end up with sprawling node groups in order to get effects like an Affini eye, or the accretion disk of a black hole, or even something especially involved like using ray marching & SDFs to have some 3d shape 'projected' into the scene without using additional geometry! Shaders are really phenomenal and rad and I'd encourage anyone who's interested in making 3d art to experiment with some. The Book of Shaders has some good introductory material, though it appears to be unfinished as of right now.

Texturing is just as important a skill as writing shaders, and the two can work together! If you've seen my animation of the light feral control ship with the big eyes, the smaller cycling lights on its hull are controlled by a manually drawn shapes of varying value that are then used as a greyscale mask to control which are lit up at any given time. ("create some greyscale mask and then use it for some animation purpose" is a super common part of my workflow tbh!)

Stylistically speaking, I have a personal rule to avoid 'smooth gradients' in the final frames. (Hence the toon shaders!)

I said I'd keep this brief, so I'll just quickly wrap up by saying that once I've rendered a sequence of PNGs I'll encode it into a h.264 mp4 video with ffmpeg with the '-tune animation' (among other) options, which encodes better for my style of large-blocks-of-contiguous-color than the default options.

[multidimensionbb]

MCYT WIP Purge: FAQs from the signup sheet!

hey guys! i'll be answering questions asked on the signup sheet in this post. as more questions are asked, i'll edit and update this post. if you asked a question, check here to see if we've answered it!

Does the WIP have to be fully finished? This event, unlike most events, will not penalize an unfinished final project by dropping you from the event. All unfinished works will still be included in a general honorable mentions post; however, if you do not finish your WIP, you will not get your own team post on the account during the posting period. The ultimate goal is to finish, but we don't want to discount the work people do get done during the event!

Will we have to be in a VC? VC events will occur, but they are in no way required! Things like sprinting events are also not required. You choose your workflow.

If I intend to sign up with a pre-selected supporter, do they have to fill out the signup form too? Yes! When teams are assigned, there will be "solo" and "pre-selected" options, so whoever you want on your team needs to sign up to get a link to the event Discord.

Can I sign up for more than one support role? Yes! The support subclasses (as I call them in my head) are just there for easier sorting of warrior preferences during team selection. If you think you'd fill more than one role, you can pick whichever you think are fitting!

Will there be guidance on WIP selection? After the participants join the Discord, there will be a week or so where WIP selection is the focus. If you're struggling, us mods can give you a hand, or the other participants may spark some motivation!

Is my role solidified on this form? Nope! Your role will be solidified at the time of WIP submission and selection.

Are we required to communicate in real time (instantaneously)? Nope! Please make sure to include your time zone on the submission form, though, to set teammate expectations for communication early :^)

[kiwi]

Hi! I just wanted to ask for some advice or maybe insight on how kiwi overcomes obstacles.

I'm an aspiring artist but I severely lack discipline. Whenever I'm doing a project I end up getting distracted and obsessively starting a new project. Which results in nothing getting finished and too many projects to do.

How do you deal with keeping discipline/focus?

much love!

im gonna be so real with you anon, i wish that i had a good answer for you. i really do. cuz my life would be significantly easier if i knew the perfect answer to self discipline.

as far as i can tell, mastering self discipline is something that most people work on through their whole lives. im still in my early 20s and dealing with a lot of the same organizational struggles i dealt with my whole time in school, so im not sure how much help i could possibly be. but i'll try!

plenty of my projects go unfinished, and i think the main ones that get finished satisfy one or more of the following:

- it's a commission

- i finished it in one sitting

- it's a project im using to procrastinate on something else

^knowing these things about myself, i find that i can finish more projects by weaponizing my procrastination. by working consistently on a commission project over several days, i can "reward" myself by taking breaks to draw other stuff that i can finish in one sitting, which fulfills that center in the brain that's satisfied by completing something. if im exclusively working on projects that take multiple sessions to finish, its easier to feel unsatisfied, like im not getting anywhere.

you could try putting together your own observations about the projects youve finished- are they focused on a subject you really enjoy? are they small, easily digestible projects? are they all similar, or all wildly different? you might be able to come to some conclusions about the best workflow for yourself that way

last i want to point out that i think it's okay to not finish stuff. it's okay to abandon projects, and no matter how disciplined you are, it's alright to let go of ideas you're not that invested in anymore. i think it's kinda great that you're exploring a lot of different ideas and getting so excited about them that you have to drop everything else, and i hope that your path leads you to ideas that grab you.

until then, maybe tone down your expectations for projects, so that you can call them finished much easier and make space in your brain for the next thing! anyway, i hope this was at least somewhat helpful :') good luck

[andersam5]

i know this comic most likely isn’t on your mind at the moment but will don’t look down ever be coming back?

Oh trust me, I'm very aware of how unfinished Don't Look Down is. I did have the entire script written out (I'll have to try and track it down in my files) and when I was writing it I was experimenting with a different workflow. It obviously didn't completely work out lol

I think I also got too far bogged down with the mechanics of the story and trying to find that balance of "Make things threatening but the status quo is to stay more or less unchanged by the end" If that makes sense. I'm still very much learning by ear how to write stories for comics. I feel like I'm much better writing straight up stories/fics and I've been having trouble translating those skills into writing for comics,

I'm definitely keeping all the notes and scripts I wrote and would love to return to it someday once I can break out of the perfectionist nature I seem to have gotten locked into while I was making it

[kavaeric]

Unfinished painting of Kathid and Alaese I decided to abandon while experimenting more with the new workflow.

This one didn't work out but I think it's a composition problem; the actual rendering technique is fine. I figured it'd be better to post this rather than let it sit unseen in my art folder

Weasyl / FurAffinity

[winding-maze]

The October 2023 art journal is now up! Per tradition, it is 100% public. :)

I show the process of making 3 paintings. The main focus is to show differences in workflow when working on different art: a commission, a failed/unfinished attempt, and a personal work.

SWTOR commissioned illustration

Lies of P fanart, unfinished and not shown anywhere before! (Pino with short grey hair)

Sherlock & Jon Halloween picture, another personal piece

BONUS: #Repostober retrospective!

You can read it here: https://ko-fi.com/Post/Monthly-Wrap-Up-October-2023-W7W0QNBJE/

[opinated-user]

aww, i'm not the Brittany Gallade Stalker anymore? guys, i lost one of my titles. i don't know who i'm anymore! as long i'm still one Brittany then i guess i'll be fine... but also... i hope i don't have to tell people to not go bringing up my posts to LO. not because i mind she responding, i know she'll anyway if she feels like posturing about something, but because i have said many times before to not interact with her, period, just to see a reaction out of her. i encourage people to not interact with her at all. the whole point of this blog is to spread awareness about her and deplatforming her. i can't do that if people just keep validating her platform by going to interact with her. plus, we all know she'll only use it as more fuel for her own victim narrative so, really, why would you want that? i know it's possible that LO send herself that message, but just in case i want that said: don't interact with LO. don't watch her videos directly, don't try to get a response out of her. moving on... who is going to tell LO that this the very first time she openly talked positively about the art of her wife? (it's rethoric, don't actually do that). by that i mean, she just uses the art of MO, whines in stream about how MO isn't drawing pokemadhouse fast enough, whines about how she has a life that impides her being exploited even more and talks about how many more fanart she'll keep ezqueezing out of her.

oh, and i'm meant to assume that the quality of her art has nothing to do with why you aren't showing your avatar anymore in any of your videos?

those two pieces of art are actually an example of the kind of problem that people do notice with MO. when she's doing things fast enough for you not to whine about it and churning out as many fanart as you want, it looks rushed. it looks unfinished and halfassed because you constantly tell her to make art that way. that can't be healthy for any creative person, just about in general. the fact that she's not even being paid for it speaks badly of you as a partner and a boss. that's not me saying it, it's a fact. one piece of art here and there is just a perk of having an artist as a partner, but you very much has abused that by having MO making entire animatic, multiple visuals for videos, an entire webcomic that you want fully coloured, animatic for that webcomic and all without any paid at all. but when MO can have all the time of the world and there's no wife telling her to forgot anatomy, it looks just so much better. for one, the color choices for the character designs are miles better than whatever is that you're asking her to do for your OCs. there's more flare, life and drama in that one picture of the green character that has ever been in all of pokemadhouse. i don't know why you won't just let her dress saige with something nice for once.

i literally said that MO on her own is a decent enough artist. funny enough, that's the one point that all critical blogs agree on. it's really quite transparent the kind of gasligting you're doing when people can clearly see me saying as much in that message, but still choose to present it otherwise and just ignoring entirely the rest of the point. your constant request for art from her and telling her to halfass it to make it as quickly as possible are my issue. a seasoned artist can do with a quick workflow because they know what they're doing, but MO is not there yet. so all you're really doing by using her like a slot machine for more art and fanart with your weird ideas of "right proportions" is keeping her away from actually learning. for the record too: i call you LO because Lizzy and Courtney, with Lizzy's blessing, wear the last name Orchard better than you. we went over this already.

[spores-and-petals]

✨ WIP Wednesday! #6 ✨

He angy.

˚₊‧꒰ა . ——— ˗ˏˋ ✮ ˎˊ˗ ——— ˖ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Tiny WW this time!

We're unfortunately not doing these weekly anymore. Since my workflow is incredibly slow, I'd end up releasing every panel on these WWs and by that point I might as well just give y'all part 2 in it's current unfinished state LOL

They'll most likely end up being a monthly thing, at least on my side (but 🍂🐾 will drip feed y'all the 20+ doodles they do daily, I'm sure)

˚₊‧꒰ა . ——— ˗ˏˋ ✮ ˎˊ˗ ——— ˖ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Psst, don't forget to check out the masterpost for HCSPAU if u haven't already 👁️

-🌘✨

[kandismon]

Do you have any tips for those who wish to create a webcomic?

I do apologize if this has been asked before!

this is a pretty big question that would probably be easier to answer if you had any specific things you'd like to know about!

but i can give you a summary of general things i've learned over the years!

disclaimer: these are my personal experiences, if any of this sounds like something that doesn't fit your workflow or preferences, please disregard!

if you've never made a webcomic before, i would personally recommend starting small. do a short oneshot first to see how it feels instead of diving right into your multi-season 2000 pages big epic story, because i feel like the workload can get really overwhelming really fast if you go from 0 to 100 right away. some creators thrive on that but it was definitely not for me. i have a lot of failed and unfinished projects sitting around because i was too ambitious and didn't know what i was getting myself into. later on i started drawing short comics for various fandoms & ships i was invested in deeply, and those got progressively longer until i suddenly felt ready to seriously tackle one of my original stories again. which was when i finally started working on #MUTED!

don't worry about sticking to the strict 60+ panels weekly schedule that you see a lot on platforms like webtoon for example. unless you've signed a contract, you make the rules and decide how much and how often you post. i've seen a lot of creators burn themselves out over that when there really wasn't any need because no one was forcing or paying them to churn out so much all the time T -T) you can still find an audience and success with a slower pace (for example #MUTED was released with 2 episodes a month, 1 ep usually had around 20ish panels iirc)

finished is better than perfect. if you're a perfectionist this can be difficult to accept, but i promise most people won't look at your panels for longer than 1.5 seconds. some wonky lines here and there don't matter much, it's more important to get the feelings across imho.

vector layers (for inking) are your best friend \o/

imho having a pretty clear outline for your story can be really helpful and take away some stress, knowing where the story is going without having to constantly sit down inbetween chapters to come up with more plot is a blessing and i wish i had been better about doing that with #MUTED. i did have a rough outline but a lot of holes in between chapters and in the end some things i would have liked to explore more never got touched on because my planning was bad and i wasn't able to find the room in the story (like some emma back story, more about jasper's family dynamics, also a bit more of a deep dive into kai's relationship with his family) (also towards the end i felt pretty burned out and just wanted to move on haha) [i'm not saying to plan every scene right from the get go, there's always room to adjust and remove or add stuff while you're working on the project, but a few important anker points here and there are important, at least for me!]

shortcuts are also your best friend, use all of them. 3d models too!

when you start publishing, don't get discouraged by algorithms and statistics and numbers (i say as that's something i still struggle with daily LOL), agonising over these things is pointless because they're mostly out of your control, focus on things you can actively do to be proud of your work. also instead of comparing yourself to others, instead compare yourself to past you! look how far you've come compared to the you from last year :>

i hope any of this helps, sorry for rambling lol if there's ever any specific questions, my asks are always open and i'll do my best to try and help out!! i'm also still learning and don't consider myself to be a person who really has anything to teach to anyone, but i can share my progress and experiences and hype you up if needed, hehe

good luck with your comic!!

[tadpole-apocalypse]

Your art is definitely improving ever since you did those tav portraits. It inspired me to do the same as a warm up and jumpstart my own art-making workflow. It's really amazing how a quick sketch/drawing can help overall improvement over time

Thank you! Yes you are so right; drawing consistently and drawing a LOT is really the best thing you can do for your skills and workflow and overall drawing speed. Games like bg3 are perfect for it because most people on tumblr have screenshots ready to go and are super happy to see art of their ocs; everyone wins!

Ofc for me I tend to go overboard so it’s important not to overwhelm yourself. Not everything you post has to be a finished, final illustration, people are happy to see art of any kind and I can’t speak for other artists, but I personally love when artists post their in progress drawings, wips and unfinished sketches as I like seeing a piece of art in all its different stages; so I decided to start doing that more.

I’ve barely drawn anything in years so I’m gonna ride this bg3 hyperfixation into the ground 🤭

Good luck with your art journey!