Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which The Horse is 20 Hands High
And I am 5'3"

They tell you when you fall off of the horse to get back on. I am usually very good at this.  This month, however, as mentioned on Tuesday, I'm just kind of... not feeling it.

That being said, I did manage to finish one digital piece based off of one of the first week of Cozytober's drawings that never made it onto the blog. You'll get all 31 pieces by Halloween, I promise. I want to see these images come to life!!!

Anyway, here's Prompt #5 - Cabin

"5 - Cabin"; Digital; 2023

I went for something of a storybook/illustrative look for this one, and I'm actually... quite pleased with the result! The original sketch was awful, I'll admit. Barely more than some scribbled lines that vaguely looked like a lop-sided a-frame cabin with a beagle puppy that looked more like a tamandua posed woodenly in the doorway. This at least looks like it's supposed to be a bit more sketchy!

I have... so much more art to do this week. I'm catching up, but it's only 5 days to Halloween, and I want to be finished completely. There's some great prompts to play with.

As for tonight, I'm going to work on at least one more sketch before turning in. The last few days of cat-pilling have taken their toll and I am pooped.

That's it for tonight's blog, sorry!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Have Another Art!

This week's piece is not what I hoped it would be. I wanted to have a fun bubble art piece with a lot of different points and a slow fade, but... I kept losing count of the pixels, kept slipping up and drawing over rounds, kept getting distracted, kept forgetting which direction the color-shifts were heading.

So instead I made a fun gradient out of squares:

"Square A"; digital; 2023
[GEOMETRIC]

I quite like the colors I chose for this, and while it's not the smoothest gradient I could have done, part of that is because I scaled it up about 500% from its original size (which was roughly 1" square). The other part of the reason is that I increased (or decreased) each RGB value by 5 (less on smoother rounds). I had a set of 6 colors that I wanted to hit and went from each to the next, adjusting with every round.

I hope to have another piece out eventually which has more colors (though very similar ones) and using bubbles instead of concentric boxes, but for now, we have Square A, and Square A is very nice, in my opinion.

What do you guys think? Do you have any suggestions for me, for how to make the process easier (without buying/downloading any Adobe products)? I'm currently using Krita & Paint.net.

I find Paint.net much easier for making pixel pieces like this, but Krita is great for painterly pursuits.

Anyway, that'll be my short little art blog today. For a piece that took 30 hours to complete, (due to the 15 or so previous iterations that failed miserably), I don't have too much to say on it lol.

For now, I think I'll focus on getting cozy for the night and working on a very poorly-thought-out crochet project that may or may not work.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Did A Digital Thing LOL

Since I've been addicted to Stardew Valley the last few days, you might be able to guess that I haven't been painting much.

You'd be right.

In fact, I decided to do a random colorplay study with Paint.Net!

"Devolution_Pink"; Digital Art; 2023
[GEOMETRIC]

As you can see, the project was... interesting.

That arrow in there is not a mistake - I used the different shapes in Paint.Net and then built a gradient off of that. the fuzziness of the image is actually intentional - I outlined each shape with a gradient from one color to the next and sort of played around with making my own gradients. I could make a much looser gradient if I wanted to, but I kind of like the slightly blurry look.

To be perfectly honest with y'all, I really love making bizarre little images like this. I like just going bonkers with colors and shapes. I'm trying to train my instincts so that I use better combos of colors, tighten my palette (my first instinct is to Use Everything Everywhere All At Once). I'd prefer to have a tight palette or a specific gradient to play with.

As for the rest of tonight, I'm going to be fiddling around with some more art, playing with my yarn, and maybe I'll throw in an hour or two of Stardew (I'm in Year 3 and Grandpa was Pleased!). I feel pretty cozy, and tomorrow is supposed to mostly be good weather and bright sun, so we'll see about that, too.

For now, though,

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

Oh yeah I have a blog...

So yes, I completely flaked this week on blogging. I'm fine - not sick or even all that exhausted. I was just playing too much Tears of the Kingdom to get anything done, like a dweeb. Before anyone asks, I am absolutely not going to hurt the Koroks on purpose. I get why people are annoyed with the lil dudes, but I'm not gonna magic up a rotisserie machine to torment them. They just wanna find their awkwardly located friends.

I do totally Ultrahand them and walk them over to their bros when possible. I find it hilarious to walk past NPCs who cannot see the Koroks because they're probably wondering why Link, the Hero of Hyrule, the Princess's Appointed Night, He Who Wields The Sword of Evil's Bane and who crushed the Calamity, is wandering Hyrule with his right hand in the air, eyes trained on an invisible point. Is he seeking Zelda? Has he gone mad? Is he secretly a Yiga spy? What is going on there?!

Anywho, yeah, I haven't got much work done.

But my most consistent Requester sent me a Request via Ko-Fi asking me to draw some Food (a new category), so I did succeed (after a loooooot of trial and error, believe me) in painting something fun in Krita!

"Taco Time"; Digital art; 2023
[FOOD]

I'm really proud of how this taco came out. I'm still figuring out how to use copy/paste, how to use layers, how to combine brushes and colors, etc, and this, I think, shows how far I've come!

Yes, it's a taco with lettuce & tomato. I just wanted to experiment with multiple ways to paint tomato slices, and yes, the beef is absolutely coated with cheese, but I think it looks tasty, don't you?

Now, this almost didn't happen because that fresh battery we popped in my 2-in-1? It was throwing errors. Dell's horrible obsession with OEM-only part compatibility really bit me in the butt. We had to pop the battery out and close it back up empty.

And my regular laptop was also out of commission, because it was very very sick, so I couldn't even throw on Krita on my main laptop with my XP Pen! My main laptop started randomly freezing and refusing to work. When we finally got around to troubleshooting the first thing my dad & I noticed was that my battery was starting to bloat - major bad news. That wasn't the cause of the freezing, though, because it was still freezing without the battery in it at all. In the end, my dad had me switch my hard drive into his old E7450. It's the exact same laptop as mine, but it doesn't have a crack on the side, the mouse buttons aren't jiggly, it's not full of my hair (yet), and the touchpad's matte finish has worn off in spots.

Also it hasn't frozen since the Swap.

We're waiting on a new battery for the 2-in-1 I use for art, but it still works when it's plugged in, so that's how I spent last night and this afternoon - painting a taco in Krita!

That's enough from me, I think.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which There is Some Art!

I've had a busy week, and most of my attempts to paint came to naught. I've wasted several sheets of paper, sadly.

That being said, I did have a couple of good GEOMETRIC pieces!

"BLOQZ" digital; 2023 [GEOMETRIC]

"Ellipse"; digital; 2023 [GEOMETRIC]

Now, clearly, "Ellipse" is a much more successful piece. I kind of lost control of the "Bloqz" pallette, but I stuck to 6 colors for "Ellipse". It's actually quite pleasant to look at!

I might throw that one up on the Threadless store...

Anywho, I'm happy with how this turned out. If you have any requests for next week's art (I'll be away from home, but I'll still be able to do a little art!), send me a coffee on Ko-Fi with a message telling me which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word) and I'll get a picture done for next Thursday!

For now, I'm going to go watch some videos and go to bed lol.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Did Art :)

So last week I randomly generated a number between 1-7 to determine which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric) I would draw from this week, and I got Geometric. 

Then one of my lovely readers, Z, bought me a coffee over on Ko-Fi and chose another category for me to draw from - Animal.

That means that I have two finished artworks for you!!!

"Bunnyboi"; digital; 2023 [ANIMAL] [Coffee]

I am.... so happy with how this little sketch came out! It's so cute and soft and sweet and I'm so impressed with the way I finally got some control over color and line. It's taking some time, but I feel like I'm really figuring Krita out.

Actually, the next image was created with me finally figuring out one of the things that bothered me so much about Krita and its color-picker. See, the default on Krita is the Advanced Color Picker, which is basically the square, circle, or triangle gradient that you click on to make your colors. I... don't like that, to be honest. It feels unnatural to me.

Turns out there actually is a way to manually input Hex codes into Krita, it just took a little digging on both Google and Krita to find. With the ability to take random colors on Coolors.co and plug them into Krita, I was able to make this week's Geometric piece:

"Lace Panes" digital; 2023 [GEOMETRIC]

I rolled some random colors, picked some random brushes, and scrawled out this fun piece for a Geometric fill, and to be honest, I'm not upset with the way it came out. Knowing now what I've learned from this piece, I think Geometric pieces will be a lot easier now. Turns out if you zoom in on the area you're going to fill and then carefully outline it with a freehand select tool, you can absolutely go to town on every single cell of a piece without overwriting the outlines! I look forward to making some fun stained-glass-like pieces now!

As for next week's Guaranteed Category, we've got... Location! So next week I'll 100% have a Location image finished.

If you want a say like Z had this week, you can send me a coffee over on Ko-Fi (it's not super expensive, I'm pretty sure it's just three bucks US) and leave a message with your donation telling me which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word), and I'll make a piece based off of that category for next Thursday!

How are all of you guys' art projects coming along?

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Tippy-Tapped My Way To Art

I brought a cup of water upstairs last night, fully intending to make a watercolor or two, but instead I started playing around on the Art computer again, so all of my art is digital this week!

It also got delayed because this afternoon, a power transformer caught fire near my house and my dad and I were watching it shoot flames for an hour or so. So you know, uh, I was a wee bit distracted. That being said, the art is finished!

"Garden Myopia"; digital; 2023 [LOCATION]

This was a really fun piece to make, and I'm so happy it came out like this! To me, it kind of looks like what a garden would look like if I took my glasses off lol. But it's very restful and lovely, if I say so myself.

"Rocket Rocks"; Digital; [MINERAL]

I am way happier with today's Guaranteed pic (Rocket Rocks) than I thought I would be. I randomly generated the colors and the rest came together quickly! I'm really happy with how the shading & blending worked on this one!

So yeah! That's this week's work!

I just rolled next week's guaranteed category and it is.... GEOMETRIC! We have finally broken the Mineral curse!

If you want to have a say in what else I make, feel free to send me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a message telling me what category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, or Word) and I'll draw it!

I'm gonna go back to watching videos with my boyfriend and working on more art :)

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Did A Geometric Art!

I'll be honest, I haven't thought much about art this week. I started working on my promised Geometric piece.... yesterday.

Should I be drawing every day? Yes. That was my goal. I have not even met it by 10%. That's okay. I just haven't had the focus. Maybe I will soon?

Regardless, I'm pretty happy with how yesterday's art came out!

"MiterSquare"; digital; 2023 [GEOMETRIC]

Today's piece was made in Paint.net using a sequence of colors in 20x20 pixel squares, each spaced one pixel apart around. I'm quite pleased with the variety of colors and tones I got!

I wish I had more to report on, art-wise. I just haven't felt particularly inspired. I think it's this yoyo weather. I woke up to snow again. We've been having warm days lately, but no, yesterday and today were in the 30s. Boo.

And I'm still sleeping poorly. New pillow hasn't helped. New sheets have not helped.

In fact, I still overheated last night until about 7AM, when I woke up cold.

Did I get up to go draw or write? No.

I kicked the sheet and light blanket off and pulled my red fluffy blanket over me so I could sleep for two more hours.

Because I'm a horrid little goblin who hoards sleep, I guess lol.

Anyway, I think I should go drink some water, since my lips are dry and my eyes are itchy, and then I might try to sketch something for next week. I'll be out and about tomorrow, so I probably won't get much art or writing done then.

Next week's Guaranteed Category is MINERAL! Oh boy, let's try not to have any... inappropriate designs, I guess lol!

If you'd like a say in what I draw next week, feel free to send me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a message telling me which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word) and I'll draw or paint something in that category. If you pick the same category as me, that means I have to do two pictures in that category (two minerals, for instance). If you pick something different, you can tell me whether or not I'm allowed to roll it into my Guaranteed Category (if, say, you want an animal, but you're okay seeing what I come up with for animal + mineral, tell me!).

Anywho, that'll do it for me tonight. I'm already pooped, and I need that water.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Made Art!

This has been an eventful week. The storm knocked our power out from a little after 10pm to nearly 3am, and I don't handle power outages very well. I stress out because I don't like being cut off from my friends. That's the Millennial in me, I suppose. But yeah, the whole day was pretty wretched, and yesterday had me very anxious about the power because the wind was still high.

And yet, I still managed to do art! I was given a few prompts (Vegetable twice, Animal once) and I filled them!

"Roots"; ink sketch; 2023 [VEGETABLE]

"Bunnable 0.1" pencil sketch; 2023 [ANIMAL]

"Bunnable 1.0"; pencil & ink sketch; 2023 [ANIMAL]

"Bunnable 2.0"; digital art; 2023 [ANIMAL, VEGETABLE]

As you can see, I kind of got stuck on the bunnies this week lol! I love rabbits. Lop-eared rabbits are my favorites, and little loppy buns with pink noses are the best.

I used Krita to trace Bunnable 1.0, which I had scanned (which was a pain, the scanner did *not* want to work) and then I filled it in with color. Honestly, I think I've just been using the wrong brushes to trace in the past. I used a watercolor brush this time and I think it turned out well! I based the clovers all over the bun on a tablecloth my mother has, and I had a lot of fun working on it.

If you'd like to see me work on something, feel free to shoot me a coffee over on Ko-Fi and tell me what category you'd like (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Location, Dedbert, Geometric, or Word) and I'll work on that category! Sometimes, if I'm given one category and I can see how it would cross over with another, I'll combine it like I did with the Animal/Vegetable crossover for Bunnable 2.0!

As for next week's Guaranteed Category, we're looking at LOCATION, so I'll be doing at least one piece of art based on a location next week. What location will it be? Well, we'll just have to find out next week, won't we?

For now, I'm going to continue my new trend of getting ready for bed amazingly early and not falling asleep til about 2AM.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

PS:

"Lights Out, Dedbert"; Pencil Sketch; 2023 [DEDBERT]

There is text on the page I drew this on in my sketchbook. That writing reads:

"BC of course the power went out at 10PM on a Tuesday... 3/14/2023)"

At the bottom of the page, I scribbled:

"And right in the middle of work!!!"

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Got A Request!

This week I received a Ko-Fi request from the ever delightful Z who asked for something in the way of "MINERAL" for this week! He did add (in private) that I should try to keep this one G-Rated, since I did have that one mineral piece that was... shall we say... "upstanding"?

So this week, instead of choosing a rod-shaped mineral like an Emerald or other beryl, I chose the humble, bubbly Malachite! And to celebrate my 2-in-1 getting its new battery so it charges correctly and doesn't refuse to turn on, I did it digitally!

"Malachite"; digital art; 2023 [MINERAL]

I'm quite pleased with how the shading and highlights on the stone itself turned out. If I was to change one or two things, it'd be to add an underlayer with shading as well, so it looks less like a flat image. That might also be caused by the fact that there's an outline, which also flattens images.

You may have noticed this bears a lot of similarity to my favorite abstract art/geometric design element "bubble art", and I'll admit, I just really, really love the weirdness of concentric circles and ripples. It's probably from my lifelong fascination with water or possibly volcanoes. Why volcanoes? Because they change topography by pushing up on the earth. A volcano is similar to the splash of a drop of water in a puddle. Seismic activity tends to treat the earth more like a liquid.

This has been your brief window into how my mind operates: volcanoes = ripples = water = bubbles = art.

If you would like a say in what I draw (and a surefire way to force me to have something for the art blogs lol) then please shoot me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a message telling me what category you'd like to see (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word) and I'll do my best to get it up here!

I'm going to try to challenge myself this week, too, so I'm going to roll an 8-sided die. 1) Animal, 2) Vegetable, 3) Mineral, 4) Dedbert, 5) Location, 6) Geometric, 7) Word, 8) roll 2x.

I rolled a 3 so I'll try to have another mineral of some sort here next week!

Anywho, the rest of tonight will be spent drawing and typing so I can get more written down for my manuscript (I wrote 135 words last night!). Hopefully I can hit the next story beat tonight, because it's a good one. Got plans for this Main Character that don't involve just futzing around in a rotted out village.

It's not a post-apocalyptic story, either. Or fantasy. Or Sci-Fi. It's... Fiction. Just Fiction.

And I'm having a blast!

I hope you guys are having as much fun in your creative projects!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

This Week Has Been Weird

So I normally complain about how tired I am and how I can't sleep and wah wah wah, but man, this week has been * ~ * w E i R d * ~ *

I slept almost all day yesterday. Seriously. Got up at noon. Went to bed at like midnight the night before. Did the same last night and slept til nearly 10AM. It's snowing, so it's all quiet out there like I like.

Don't know what it is about taking care of a couple of very old, shockingly chill (though occasionally naughty/ridiculous) Jack Russels, but I've been helping out on Mondays & Tuesdays, and it has meant totally-zonked Wednesdays and barely-functional Thursdays every time.

Frankly, I'm okay with it. I have rarely slept so well.

Kind of annoying to miss out on a whole day of progress, but that's just life.

Speaking of progress, uh... not much has been made on that shawl. I've worked on it for a total of... less than 20 minutes.

I cannot be sorry about that when I've actually finished three separate pieces of art for you guys today!

"Side Eye"; graphite on sketchbook; 2023 [DEDBERT, ANIMAL]

This first image is a fun little sketch of our boy Dedbert giving a Look to a confused little squirrel. This was composed and sketched during coffee while the snow fell softly, right before the snow stopped, in fact lol! I love drawing little scenarios where Dedbert, who is actually only about the size of my head, is much bigger than other animals. I have a Beanie Baby nearly his size, after all...

"Independence"; Digital; 2023 [WORD] [GEOMETRIC]

Did I use the ol Red White & Blue to signify Independence? Yes. Did I also use the letters of "independence" to plot out the shape here? Yes. It's been a hot minute since I did any bubble art. This one was made in Krita with a few different brushes. Sadly, my 2-in-1 tablet computer croaked, so I did this using my XP-Pen and my normal laptop, which... doesn't always work out great for me. See, when I use Krita on the 2-in-1, it lets me draw around things without buffering. On my laptop, it buffers and that's why the lines are more jagged. It's very frustrating.

You know what isn't frustrating? This last piece:

"Mountaineer"; digital; 2023 [LOCATION]

Oh boy am I satisfied with the way this sky turned out! This is another blender/brush combo experiment and I'm thrilled with how it came out. Especially the way the colors are blended on the mountains. That's the blending stump on Krita used against several other brushes in multiple colors. The sky is all pens with the first wet blender in Krita. The water was made the same way. The trees are several brushes and pencils in shades of green blended down with the cotton bud blender, and the ground is one of the watercolor brushes with a pallet knife blender run around it.

I will keep experimenting with ways to blend colors and build depth, I think, because it's really fun to experiment.

All of these images this week were requested via Ko-Fi, so if you'd like a say in what I paint or draw next week, feel free to drop me a coffee over on Ko-Fi along with a message telling me what category you'd like (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Location, Dedbert, Word, Geometric) and I'll make it happen, no matter what life tries throwing at me. Come dogs or blizzards or insomnia, I will make the art!

Speaking of making art, I have been working on that manuscript, still. Today's word count was a whopping 365! That means that since last Thursday I've gotten 1077 words done. Not as good as some weeks (I missed a few days like yesterday, wrote less than 100 on others) but that's still more than my goal of 700 words a week!

And how about you guys? How have your creative projects been going? Have you guys been getting anything done? Are you looking forward to working on something artistic? I hope so!

As for me, I'm going to go back to bed - yes, I'm still sleepy and cozy and dopey. I'm okay with that. I got three pretty okay pieces of art and over 1000 words done this week. I did good.

And so did you.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which Art Was Made

Oh boy has today been a weird one. My cat had to go to the vet for a checkup, so of course she chose this week to be off her feed and a little barfy. Her appointment lasted less than 20 minutes, wherein the vet said "she's fine" and now she's eating again.  The dork.

But yeah, cat's fine.

So now I can focus on important stuff - like art!

I did draw every day this week, but boy were some of those sketches embarrassingly derpy (we're talking barely more than a pile of graphite spaghetti), so here's the best I did:

"Nyan"; mechanical pencil in sketchbook; 2023 [ANIMAL]

"RIP Mouse"; mechanical pencil in sketchbook; 2023 [ANIMAL]

"Scribbletree"; mechanical pencil in sketchbook; 2023 [VEGETABLE]

"Crowmouse" digital; 2023 [ANIMAL]

I'll admit, I drew the same subject matter twice because it was the weirdest thing I've seen all month. The crows we have around here have such an overabundance of non-prey food that I forget that they can and do hunt. I guess the mouse was too easy to resist for the crow who snagged him. Regardless, it was a fascinating series of events that nearly put me off my brie.

As for next week, we'll see if I can get seven decent sketches! I'm not gonna hold my breath, it'll take a lot of drawing practice for me to improve greatly.

I'm going to try anyway.

How are your guys' art projects going? Anyone have any art plans for February?

And if you want to have a say in what I draw, feel free to buy me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a note saying which category you want to see (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word).

As for me, I'm going to go obsessively watch my fellow Zelda nerds break down the Nintendo Direct trailer we just got for Tears of the Kingdom and then play a bunch of fun videos for my boyfriend.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Am Way More Tired Than I Thought

So I haven't really done a lot of art this week. I'm disappointed in that. In fact, I've only made one thing. I'm proud of it, but it's just one thing, and I wanted seven.

That's 14.2% of my goal met.

That's 85.7% of my goal remaining.

Oof.

Math is unkind sometimes.

Regardless, I still made one thing. Mostly I've just been tired. I am still having trouble sleeping - staying up til 5AM, crashing til 11AM... it's not good. I need to be more consistent.

Which is, of course, why I haven't had as much caffeine today as usual.

I drank more water today than yesterday, I'll be taking my Vitamin D later so I can metabolize the calcium from my coffee (I take it with cocoa mix made with powdered milk and cool it with half and half, so there's calcium in it, I swear lol). I had breakfast, even!

Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow.

Maybe I'll draw. Maybe I'll write.

The writing, at least, is largely consistent! I'm proud of that! I've only missed one day so far, I think, and I've gotten so much done!

But my art is suffering, and that, I don't like. So I'll try again tomorrow, which is all anyone can do.

Tomorrow is for trying.

For now, though, there is a cat in a silly hat sitting in the snow.

"Snowcat" digital art; 2023 [ANIMAL]

Is it lumpy? Yes. Is it wonky? Also yes. Is it FREAKING ADORABLE?!?!?! Absolutely, and so I am very proud of my Snowcat. Look at those derpy eyes, the lil teefers... So cute.

I hope to do some more and different art soon, but for now, my little snow cat is good, and I love him.

If you want to have a say in my art, feel free to buy me a coffee over on Ko-Fi with a message attached telling me which category (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Location, Dedbert, Geometric, or Word) you'd like to see!

For now, I'm going to watch silly videos and plan out more pictures. Maybe add more words to my story.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

In Which This Week Was Rocky, Art-Wise

 I didn't manage to draw or write every day this week, and that makes me sad. I'm not angry at myself - the days I didn't write or draw were days when I was either exhausted or uncomfortable. I needed rest. I rested. That's all there is to it.

I'm not sad because I "failed" in my resolution. I'm sad that I didn't get to draw on those days because I love making art.

I did make some art, though, and I've done a lot more writing this week than I thought (feared) I might! Over 450 words since Sunday, in fact! (And yes, I am aware that 452 words/4 days is over 100 words per day, but half of those days were actually between 40-60 words...)

"Fox"; pencil sketch; 1/6/2023 [ANIMAL]

"Doodlebug"; digital art; 1/11/2023 [GEOMETRIC]

"Dream Sea"; digital; 1/11/2023 [LOCATION]

The fox was scrawled while I was 2/3 of the way asleep that evening, and it was haphazard at best. I think I might try to make an abstracted version of it eventually, like last week's abstract nude. Maybe shades of brown or orange?

"Doodlebug" was a lot of fun to paint in Krita. I took one of the larger pens and a black tone, drew random shapes with my eyes shut and the image zoomed out, and then painstakingly filled each section with blues chosen at random, using a different brush for each color. I really enjoyed making that one, and I'd love to experiment with other line-weights, colors, and patterns.

"Dream Sea" is very much an experiment. You can tell just by looking at it that I was running out of steam at the top, but I'm incredibly happy with the way the water looks! That effect is not something I could easily replicate with watercolor. I took several tones and weights of magenta/lavender/purple and scrawled them across the piece haphazardly in different directions. After that, I used every single blender in my basic version of Krita and went over the whole piece repeatedly. I'd love to try it again some time and maybe make a cityscape or something!

Regardless, art was not easy this week, so I'm hoping that after today, it'll get easier. You may notice I haven't got any art from today proper. That is because I don't think I can make any art today. My knuckles ache and my eyelids feel grainy, so it's another sore and tired evening for me, I guess. That's not the end of the world. I'll make more art starting tomorrow, I'm sure!

I have some ideas regarding pixel art to experiment with, after all!

That'll do it for me, today. If you want to have a say in my art in the coming week, send me a coffee with a message telling me the category you'd like (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word) on my Ko-Fi, and I'll prioritize your category so it 100% gets made next week!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Did All The Art This Week!!!

I'm shocked at how much art I was able to crank out this week! I promised myself I'd try to at least sketch every single day, and I did! I have 5 pictures from the 1st to today, and I'm incredibly proud of myself! I'm posting these below with a format of Date (month/day/year); "Title"; medium [tag]. The tag is what category I would consider the artwork in.

1/1/2023; "Possum"; pencil sketch [ANIMAL]

On the first, I sketched this awkward little possum hanging from a branch. It was a quick sketch that used one of my mechanical pencils and a few reference photos, though I invented the pose.

1/2/2023; "Silence"; pencil sketch; [ANIMAL]

Along with my daily drawings, I'm also trying to write at least 100 words in one of the stories I'm writing. The story I'm working on now involves snow, a very unhappy person, and themes of brokenness and repair.

1/3/2023; "Abstract Nude 01"; pen and pencil drawing [GEOMETRIC]

I don't do a lot of nudes, but I liked the idea of trying to use positive and negative space, texture, and shape to suggest an image. I like how the neck turned out, but after that, I kind of forgot to add the negative space and things got hectic. I still like the image, though.

1/4/2023; "Banana"; digital painting [VEGETABLE]

In my ongoing quest to master Krita, I painted this scribbly banana. I'm actually super pleased with how vague and slightly unsettling the soft background is compared to the jagged scribbliness of the banana itself. Also, I know a banana isn't a vegetable, I just use the VEGETABLE tag to denote any plant or fungus or lichen. Bananas are berries. Look it up if you don't believe me lol.

And for today's art, I present to you...

1/5/2023; "Abstract Nude 02"; digital painting [ANIMAL/GEOMETRIC]

This painting was a lot of fun, if a bit difficult, and I think I'm going to be exploring more of this style in various colors. In fact, I think I'll get a bit of help from that Coolors website that generates palettes. I consider it both GEOMETRIC and ANIMAL, since it's a human (animal) and also abstract (which counts as geometric for tagging purposes).

Since I don't have a lot of experience with bodies, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to convey a Large Person, but I think I did pretty well, even if I had to adjust the left breast a few times to make it stand out less. I'm really loving experimenting with Krita, too! I'll be continuing the art next week, gathering all the art until Thursday and then posting it all at once. Sometimes, I'm sure, I'll either miss a day or draw something incredibly dumb or oversimplified. I'll almost certainly have some really ugly art, too, but I think it's important to accept that not every piece is going to succeed. It's good to know when to stop and try something new.

If you'd like to have a say in the stuff I draw during the week, feel free to head on over to my Ko-Fi and send me a coffee with a message telling me what category (ANIMAL, VEGETABLE, MINERAL, DEDBERT, LOCATION, GEOMETRIC, WORD) to work from, and I'll put it up with a little thank you. If you prefer anonymity, let me know that, and I will simply call you a Kind Patron.

That'll do it for me this week, guys!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

In Which I Drew A Little Guy

 

Sometimes, I sit down to do my art and I draw for hours and am unsatisfied entirely. I look at what I've wrought and grimace. I tear the page away or ctrl+a, delete. I try again.

And sometimes I plop myself down with a cup of coffee, scroll down my Twitter feed on my laptop, and inspiration smacks me like Hacksaw Jim Duggan with a 2x4.

Today was the latter.

I was sipping my morning brew, doomscrolling like a proper Millennial, and then I saw a post from @PossumEveryHour on Twitter. This post, specifically.

I don't know if you've known this about me, but I am a sucker for everything this picture is:

• small
• cute
• possum
• just a little guy

Love me some possums.

Would I probably be a bit freaked out if I saw one waddling towards me on its adorable-but-weird ratty hands & feet? Yep. Would I pet it? Absolutely not, if it was wild. But I would absolutely be obsessed with it. I'd back away and keep my distance while babbling quietly about how he's just a little man wandering around, and isn't it so wonderful? Isn't it such a cool little guy? Go have a good time lil dude!

So yes, I'm a bit mad for North American possums.

And I've seen the Australian ones. They're precious.

But North American Possums are very relatable. Obscenely short life spans, looks like it's gonna cut you but is actually scared witless of you, cooler-blooded than most mammals, beneficial without being noisy about it, eats whatever it bumps into that doesn't run away...

It me.

So of course I had to draw my own Little Guy:

"Awesome Possum" digital art; 2022

Yes, that's a lil possum. Yes, I'm still trying to figure out how to use Krita.

It's just a little guy, peeps. Look at that little guy!

I love him.

Anywho, that's gonna do it for me because the Christmas Crunch continues today. I have 3.25 items to make and 2 to finish.

I hope to draw some more, too, though maybe not today. It might take me a few days before I'm ready to start more art.

If you'd like a say in next week's category of art, feel free to shoot me a Ko-Fi with the category you'd like (Animal, Vegetable, Mineral, Dedbert, Location, Geometric, Word) and I'll fill that prompt!

For now, though, Go Enjoy Something!

FC