Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which It's Fanart Again lol
(And yes, there are mild spoilers for Tears of the Kingdom)

Okay, so today was gonna be some cool digital art but... I'm nowhere near done. I'm about 5% done, in fact. Maybe 7% max. This is a big project, since I'm crafting it pixel by pixel, and it's gonna take a long time. There's a reason that the file name is "da big wun" lol.

And I'm maybe playing a little too much Tears of the Kingdom for things to be good for me.

My initial backup plan was to draw you guys a couple Light Dragon shots - namely a funny perspective shot and then a copy of The Epic Moment of Awesomeness where you get the Master Sword. Seriously, that's such a freaking incredible moment, and I've never felt more like a truly legendary hero in a video game than in that one scene. If you know, you know. If you don't, and you don't mind spoilers, look up the cutscene where you get the Master Sword. It's super cool.

I cannot for the life of me draw the Light Dragon.

So I opted for something a little... simpler.

See, down in the Depths, you'll sometimes spot piles of rocks with ghostly figures standing on them. Each of these spectral people are holding a pristine weapon that goes with their race. Hylian Soldiers will hold regular Hylian weapons - Traveler's Swords, Royal Weapons, etc. Gerudo Warriors will hold Gerudo weapons. Gorons will hold Goron weapons. While I haven't seen any Rito, I'd imagine they'd hold things like Feathered Edges and Throwing Spears.

There are also Zora, who of course hold Zora Spears, Zora Longswords, etc.

I love the weird top-heavy design of the Zora. They have short legs and long arms, and you can tell they're Not Human At All, but they've still got enough human shape to seem friendly.

That friendliness is far less apparent in the Depths, because they have no faces.

Still, those pristine weapons are very nice.

So I drew one of those lonely spirits, holding their Spear, waiting for Link...

Probably scaring the life out of the Yiga who can't see them.

"The Depths"; pen & colored pencil sketch; 2023
[FANART]

I'd love to redo this picture in Krita at some point. I like the idea of it, much like I enjoy the design for the spirits. It's too hard to get the white outline with colored pencil, even having white gel pens, and I just managed to color over it when I tried to leave it open.

That being said, I'd also really like to keep practicing the Light Dragon, and I may even try to do something about the other three wandering Dragons at some point.

For now, though, I'm going to go find some trouble. If I'm very careful, I might be able to take down a Gleeok with my current armors...

And I do still have a lot of work to do on that digital piece.

I hope you guys are having good Art Days!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

(PS: The Something this week is The Moment from TOTK that I was talking about earlier, so uh, Spoilers Ahoy)

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which Today's Art is... Prestigious

Today's art was brought to you by Z, who bought me a coffee and asked for a DEDBERT drawing! I was, as always, very excited to draw my boy, so here he is channeling his inner Zatara and performing some magic for us!

"Prestige"; colored pencil & micron pen; 2022

Dug out an old sketchbook of mine to do this. Unfortunately, this sketchbook is too chonky to go in my scanner (if the thing is works again...), so I had to snap a pic and upload it.

I love how he always looks faintly bored with anything he's doing! He's just so... mono-expressive, and yet that single look conveys so much lol!

If you'd like to have a say on what I draw next week, feel free to buy me a coffee over on Ko-fi with a message telling me what category you'd like to see next. This week's was "DEDBERT", for instance!

Available categories are:

• Animal
• Vegetable
• Mineral
• Dedbert
• Location
• Geometric
• Word

Anywho, minor self-advertising aside, I'm looking forward to sketching and writing more this month.

Yes, it's NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), so I'll be working even harder than usual on my various manuscripts. I'm hoping to make some real headway this month, too.

I'm not, however, ascribing to the, frankly insane, wordcounts recommended by some people doing NaNoWriMo. No, your manuscript does not have to be 80k-100k words long for the love of God.

You're not Stephen King.

You're don't need to write 1200 words a day. You don't need to avoid sleep or food or hygiene to get your book done.

Just... write.

Just sit down and write a sentence.

Will you finish your novel this month? Probably not. It's an unrealistic expectation for a world where a lot of aspiring writers work 40-90 hours a week.

Just write one sentence after another as often and as long as you can without causing yourself undue hardship. Don't skip meals. Don't skip sleep. Don't skip hanging out with friends. Don't deny yourself your life while you're writing.

Your book is in you. You're just putting it down into writing. It's not as scary or complex as you think it is. You can do that. You can write your book.

And so can I!

By the way, if you're more art focused and feel a bit of FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) with NaNoWriMo, then you could try writing/drawing a graphic novel of some sort? They're usually much shorter than a novel, but that's because you're cutting out most of the visual detail in the writing process and putting it into the art process! I still recommend writing out a script for a comic or graphic novel - that way you have a plan for what you're going to do!

Heck, if you're an artist who wants to branch out into writing, you can also use Visual Storyboarding to help you work out what you'll write! Basically, just storyboard out a scene, image by image, and then try to write out what you just drew - describe it! Writing is just describing life, whether or not that life you're describing is or was happening in the real world.

Anywho, that'll about do it for me. I'm a little bran-jellied from the art and I'm gonna try to figure out my next move in my manuscript.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which A Beautiful Day Was Also Busy!

Full disclosure, I finished today's painting yesterday and the sketch on Monday. I didn't work on anything else because I knew I'd be busy today! It was a crummy day yesterday, gray and cool and not at all inviting to head out, but today has been gorgeous. I spent most of the afternoon enjoying the sunshine and 65℉/18,3℃ breezes.

First I took a leisurely stroll down to the shops where I buy snacks and bought my guy some cheddar popcorn (if you're paying more than a dollar, you're paying too much, the weird religious Brim's popcorn is just as good as Smartfood) and candy and some Cokes. How is Coke still in business? They'll lose the public because it's about a dollar more expensive in a six-pack than Pepsi! Then I popped next door to buy myself a lime Jarritos and some Lindor truffles - two milk chocolate, two dark chocolate. You can tell that the Food Service here in town serves the Asian restaurants (two Thai places, a sushi joint, two Chinese restaurants! In a town with less than 10k people!) because they sell black vinegar, sambal, Chinese cooking wine, rose water, and more, wholesale!

After my snack run, I toddled back to my place, waving to the nice City Workers who were clearing up the brush piles by the side of the road, and got the cat ready for her walk. It took very little effort to slip her into her harness and get her out into the sun. It took more effort for her to leave the neighbor whose dog looks just like my childhood dog, Sam, alone. What a silly cat!

It's a good thing we headed back inside an hour later, because the hawk, who has had extremely poor timing lately, finally caught something! It was a starling, I'm pretty sure, but it was... brutal. The cat was enthralled.

So were the crows, so the hawk vamoosed with its prize.

After that I made myself a bowl of chicken broth with a bunch of dumplings (beef & chicken bulgogi, in fact!) and settled in to correct the edges on the painting so I could present it to you!

"Cactus Practus"; pencil & pen on sketch paper; 2022

"Dream Prickles" watercolor on watercolor paper; 2022

I'm still not 100% satisfied with the overall violet effect in the background, but I learned a lot about how to blend out colors while working on the cactus itself! I'm so happy with those transitions, too. I'm learning a lot, recently!

I think my next painting will be another abstract. We'll see!

As for me, it has gotten late. The day fled before me like scream-laughing toddlers before a mock-roaring uncle at a family reunion, and now I am sleepy and cozy and quite satisfied with my work, both predrawing and painting!

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which Sometimes Projects Change...

I've been working since the first of October on a special project. In it, I planned to have 31 pictures drawn, painted, sketched, etc. In each picture would be an animal, a plant, and a mineral that are native to my home state.

If that sounds overambitious, it's because it was.

Especially without a proper understanding of exactly what plants, animals, and minerals exist here...

So I reduced the number of pictures from 31 to 4. That seemed far more doable.  That was last week. It took me until last week to start really painting.

And then I learned something else:

I cannot draw minerals yet.

I'm not going to show you my failures. They hurt to look at. They are in the trash, and I cannot learn by observing them, only through failing, trying, failing again, and trying some more.

That brought me to this week. The last week of October. With nothing to show for it.

How frustrating!

So I started painting.

"Sweets'; watercolor & pen on watercolor paper; 2021

You may be able to tell from the blurry image there that I'm not too thrilled with this one... It's too simplistic, too wonky, too a lot of things, but I do like those colors, so that's good!

The watercolors I used for all of these, btw, are all either from my Emooqi set or from my Arteza watercolor pencil set. This one is all Emooqi, though the black is just some Pigma fineliner.

Next, I decided to go a little more naturalistic...

"Three For One Special"; watercolor and Pigma micron; 2021

I love pumpkins, though not as pies, so just painting a trio of lil pumpkin bros chilling on a table was fun! This paper is also Emooqi paper, which is why it has that odd diagonal ripple to it. It holds water weirdly and cannot possibly be a rag paper - it feels like sketchbook paper to be honest, but if that's the worst part of my Emooqi set, I'll take it!

But it's still a little simple, yeah? A little plain and obvious. What about something horror themed? Something... spooky.

Something downright Shakespearean?

"Toil & Trouble"; Watercolor and Pigma Micron; 2021

I am... so proud of this piece.

Each of the ingredients you see are included in the Witches' brew at the start of Shakespeare's Macbeth - which while not vegan is considerably more vegetative than I thought.

Eye of Newt, for instance, is mustard seed. Wool of Bat relates to holly! Tongue of Dog is just a petal from an herb, same with Adder's Sting, though Fenny Snake and Blindworm are both actual reptiles. I also have the leg of lizard and owlet's wing on there, though the owlet in question is a moth, rather than a baby owl.

Finally, I decided to go for a less chaotic image and tried that Emooqi paper again, this time using only pens and watercolor pencils:

"Witchgarden"; watercolor pencil and gel pen; 2021

This is the witchgarden - a collection of plants (and one fungus) with witchy names! The branch is a witch hazel, the pink stalk is "Witch's Moneybags" (Sedum telephium), the green stalk is Witchgrass (Panicum capillare), and the yellow feathery plant is "Witch's Hair" (Desmarestia aculeata), and that little yellow blob is "Witch's Butter" (the fungus),which is a jelly fungus that grows usually on trees. Of course, you can also see the glittery black widow spider I added at the end!

I didn't like the bubbles/circles at first, but now they're really growing on me!

So what do you guys think about my October project? Did I meet expectations, or did I fall flat on my face?

I hope you've all kept creative this season!

Next week, I hope to have some other art, too!

That'll do it from me tonight - I'm pretty tired and I have some writing to work on tomorrow.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk - Derp

 

In Which Today Embodied "Derp"

I slept like a brick once I got to sleep last night. At first, I was just in a light cotton blanket, and to be honest, my torso felt amazingly cozy and warm... but my arms and feet were FREEZING. So I switched to my blue fleece blanket. I was deliciously cozy for the whole two minutes I stayed awake...

But apparently I did overheat a bit, because I was so dehydrated when I woke up that my brain was pulsing.

Thankfully, I was able to remedy this with a tall cup of water and a cup of coffee, and I got on with my day.

You might expect, this being a Thursday, that meant art, right?

Uh...

I kinda spent half of today thinking it was Wednesday.

Starting when I got up at 11AM.

I treated my dehydration headache with, like I said, water and coffee, sat with the cat for a bit, checked my Pokepelago islands in Pokemon Moon...

I lounged about pretty comfortably until my mom came home from work, and then I made us some sandwiches for lunch. Nothing fancy, just a couple toasted cheese sandwiches.

I still thought it was Wednesday.  In fact, I thought it was Wednesday when she headed back to work and I decided to pick up snacks for Sunday!

It wasn't until I was signing the receipt for my bottles of Jarritos and Mexican Coca Cola (plus some local chips and some peanut butter cups...) that I noticed that it was, in fact, Thursday.

And then I had to walk home, knowing I hadn't done any art.

You'd think that after getting home, taking off my mask, putting away my purchase, and washing my hands, that I'd remember to do art, right?

Nah.  I'm dumb and lazy, so I wasted a few more hours on Pokefarm Q hatching poison types for the Type Race (Team Acid Downpour ftw, yo!) while watching Ask A Mortician videos and listening to Vaporwave.

But... this is an art blog, right?

I did art... right?!

Yyyyyyesssss...... kinda

What I did was a sketch.

100% in pen.

On an index card. So it's also super tiny lol.

"Derp"; pen on index card; 2021

I think both the subject material and the title are pretty indicative of the day, right?

I started with the eyeball and worked from there, if that helps. I might play around in Paint.net and see what I can do in there eventually.

For something without any kind of undersketch, I'm pretty pleased with my lil derpy lizard thing!

What do you guys draw to warm up with or if you want to scribble something out quickly?

And don't forget to...

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I Swatch & Thumbnail!

I'm not very good about the leadup to a piece (as is evidenced by every work of art I've made...) so today is all leadup! I was given a Christmas gift by my grandmother - a pack of 70 colored pencils by a company I've never heard of (Nicole) - and decided I should do my due diligence and test out how they work!

The Pencils in Question

The first thing I did was take every single pencil and swatch them out. For those who do not use, follow, or know art terms, that just means that I tested them! I started from the back of the box to the front, left to right, row by row. I ended up with a messy grid that let me know what to expect on my toothy, soft sketchbook paper from these pencils, and I also ended up with that weird feeling I always get after inhaling the waxy smell from crayons for too long, so bonus? All's I know is this: I don't mind the smell, but it makes my eyelids feel heavy and gummy, so maybe that's an allergy?

Regardless, I swatched out all seventy pencils and discovered there were probably a lot of doubled colors. I don't mind this - I'll probably use up the doubled colors pretty fast (peach, brown, gray, black, etc). I also noticed that the neon colors are... very neon! It's hard to look directly at the neon yellow lol. I kinda hope I find some black paper to test them on...

And then I sketched out a little picture of Dedbert riding a slug up to some snowdrops. Why? Why not?!

The Swatch & The Thumbnail/Sketch!

I really like the way these colors work, and I hope that in the future I can use them for a better thought out project, like a faux stained glass effect or some kind of dreamy scene. For today, I just wanted to test the supplies out. I'll probably test them with the gel pens, my sharpies, and also maybe the pack of highlighters I have. I think that'd be fun to see how they all interact!

The Swatches

The grid I have is kind of misleading because Column A is actually the last row of the box and Column G is the front with Row 1 being the left hand side and Row 10 being on the right. Still, I know what I'm looking at and I suppose that's what matters? It's a very pretty set of colors. They should blend into each other nicely once I find an inexpensive blender or make one from rolled paper. It's been forever since I had one.

"Snowdrops"; colored pencil & ballpoint pen; 2021

As for Dedbert and his slug? I want to try using this scene with a few different mediums, so look forward to seeing this in gel pen, just ballpoint pen, crayon, Sharpie, and possibly more! I will be getting back to my fruit dragons at some point, too, and I hope to start reintroducing the watermelon dragon into my work!

That'll about do it for me today. I'm exhausted and I kinda just want to curl up with some more lemon tea and check out the new safety eyes that came in today for future amigurumi projects.

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk

 

In Which I *Have* been working! I promise!

Oh boy are Thursdays a struggle, guys. I know what I want to be painting, and I'm working hard on things, but... I'm doing such small details that there's really nothing to show for it. Yet.

So I had to do a sketch instead!

"Otter Bliss" mechanical pencil & ballpoint pen; 2020

I've mentioned that I've been watching an orphaned otter named Joey, right? Because I have. A lot.

So here's an homage to the lil guy, floating in blissful sleepy peace, lil shark toy on his tummy, fake kelp floating behind him.

It's been a little difficult to draw lately, since I'm mostly focused on writing, but I'm pretty proud of that sketch, and I look forward to scanning it in and then working on it digitally!

I don't usually talk about social media in this blog, I don't like asking people to smash that like/subscribe whatever button or to comment and/or share, but I'd really dig it if you can Retweet the Tweet you maybe used to get here or hit Share if you found it on Facebook? Regardless, I can see y'all seeing my blogs, and I really love that you're here!

Anywho, I have writing to do, baby otters to stare at, and spooky ladies on roadtrips to watch, so I hope you are all doing alright, and I hope you're safe and that your projects are going great :)

Go Enjoy Something!

FC

Thursday Art Walk: HIM CHONKYBOI

In Which I Have Made Comic?

You might have noticed that I have a soft spot for chubby critters. From Dedbert to Totoro to fluffy lil Chinchillas, I love round chonksters. I am a round chonkster, so maybe that's my narcissism showing through, but regardless, I love fatty critters making their way in the world (provided it's not holding them back).

And one of the most famous fatties in the animal kingdom right now is Chunk the Groundhog! This lil chubbins has a whole family now, though when I first started watching him it was just him and his girlfriend, Nibbles. Now they have three kids, and it's just... it's precious.

But Chunk has this certain way of doing things, and I thought it'd be pretty funny to draw it out for you guys:

"Chunk In The Wild"

This paper is actually too big for my scanner, hence the poor quality, but I plan to (eventually) redo this comic in digital someday - it's too cute not to!

So go check out some Chunk vids if you need a pick-me-up, or if you just like brazen, tubby animals, and...

Go Enjoy Something!
FC

Thursday Art Walk 313

In Which There Is A New Friend

So, for a while now, I have been bringing you pictures of my boy, Dedbert (seen at the top of basically every blog for a while now), but he's usually by himself. I don't want you to get the wrong idea, though. He's not a lonely birb. He has friends.

"Friendship"; ballpoint pen on sketch pad; 2020

I plan on coloring this in later, and if I can get my drawing pad working, I'd love to start doing digital art of this pair.

... it's also now occurring to me that I have never asked Dedbert his friend's name. This isn't the only bunny he's friends with, either - he's got a small brown and white adoptive brother named Benjamin, after all. (I've had BB since I was very, very young, almost as long as Patches, the plaid-pawed bear, and Mr. Bear, the white bear with the red bowtie).

I think I may start making pictures of all of Dedbert's friends and family, actually :)

That might be a lot of fun.

Anyway, it's pretty crummy out today - cloudy, drizzly, not that warm. Thankfully, this drizzle should stop soon, but it's still going to be hovering just above freezing (and it will feel colder) tonight. Thank goodness for gloves and hats and scarves.

I'm also thankful to everyone who pops in to check out what I'm doing, lately. I see you in my analytics, and even though you're all quite quiet, it's good to know you're swinging by. Dedbert and I are grateful.

I think that'll about do it for me, today.

I'm going to go check out how my Dedbert's siblings are doing, since most of them moved into the closet to hoard the VHS tapes...

Enjoy Something!
FC