#...side note but

[sensitiveheartless]

Where do you get all your ideas for these drawings and how do you actually find the strength to do them? Also what happens if you finish a piece and aren't satisfied with it?

Oof, oh man let's see...where I get my ideas from is a tough one, because I get bits of ideas from a lot of different places, and then they just ping around in the circus of my brain until they combine into something I want to make. And with soukoku specifically, there's something about them that appeals very strongly to my sense of humor (not just my sense of humor of course, but it was that aspect which drew me to skk initially), and that makes it easier for me to go "oooh, I want to draw them doing this", or "wouldn't it be funny if they—", etc.

Basically, because I think about them a lot, that leads to things like, say, me listening to the Little Mermaid soundtrack one day while cooking and thinking "Hey, wouldn't it be funny if Chuuya was Sebastian and Dazai was the french Chef" and then running with it and writing a very very weird oneshot. Or, me taking a walk in the snow and thinking "hey what if soukoku were walking in the snow and then Dazai flopped over and started being dramatic about being Snow White" and then my Snow Day comic happened.

As for how I find the strength to do them (and unfortunately I feel like this isn't going to be a very inspirational answer): for me, drawing is a way that I process, calm myself down, and just...express myself. Ah, for example, that recent "Operation Quiet Heart" comic I made recently! I binge-drew that in about two days, because several things had happened to make me Very Stressed and Upset, and so I drew something silly but also comforting because I knew it would make me feel better. And it did! By the time I had sketched it out I had gone from a state of "I am about to either start biting people, or burst into tears" to "Okay I can manage this actually, it's not that big of a deal".

At this point, honestly, it's worse for me when I don't draw. A while ago I hurt my drawing hand while gardening and had to rest it, and in less than a day I started trying to teach myself how to draw with my non dominant hand, just so that I could make something. That's how feral I was going, not being able to draw anything. (I'm actually slowly getting better at left-hand drawing! Can't really do lineart very well yet, but I've occasionally used it for very loose coloring/non-precision stuff when my right hand needs a break.)

It's probably not the healthiest, but...I figure there are worse things I could rely on. Drawing daily has helped me get through some of the worst parts of my life so far—even at times when I couldn't express what I was feeling in words, I could still draw. I think that's just how my brain is wired, sometimes visuals are easier than words. (I like writing a lot, but it's definitely harder for me.)

Aaaand as for what I do when I don't feel satisfied with a piece—I'm gonna put the art ramblings under the cut, since this is already getting long—but the tl:dr is that it depends on how stubborn I'm feeling at the time :D

For example! Sometimes I finish a piece and go "eh", and then I just leave it!

Like this one! I don't hate it or anything, but after a while of messing around with it, it still wasn't quite what I wanted. Close, but not quite. Didn't quite like how Chuuya's hair turned out and such—so, I decided it was a learning experience and left it at that. Maybe I'll come back to the idea at a later point, but honestly I had no plan when I started this one and was just vibing, so I didn't take it as much of a loss.

And then sometimes I get really, really stubborn about a piece, and keep working at it until I get it to look how I want. For example, this one!

This one took me a WHILE, even just to figure out how I wanted the poses to work. I kept drawing sketches, turning off the layer and then trying again on a new layer. So first we had this:

But I felt like adding Dazai to this pose would be awkward, because he would be so eclipsed by Chuuya, so I tried again.

And nope, still didn't like it. having the profiles like this felt too stiff somehow, even though I liked how Dazai was holding on to him. (Also here's an example of me coming back to an idea later, because I recently made a side-profile-facing-corruption-piece that I ended up actually vibing with)

So, I tried again.

I don't have the full undersketch for this one, because I mangled it while drawing, but here—you can vaguely see what I was going for, mostly with where Dazai's arms are positioned. So I had the pose, but then of course there was the process of actually coloring it, and that was a whole other thing. Oh also Chuuya's face took a WHILE for me to get to a place where I didn't hate it.

Here I was mostly just trying to figure out base colors(and the background), and I ended up redoing almost all of it because I was being really sloppy—especially with Dazai's bandages and the curse marks on Chuuya's arms. Also Chuuya's head was a bit too large in proportion to his body, so I ended up selecting all those layers and shrinking it.

Getting closer, I fixed the curse marks and messed around with Chuuya's expression more (but I still didn't like it). Only now I felt like Dazai and Chuuya's heads were too zoomed out and small in this composition (also I tipped them too far back and now it looked like they were falling in a weird way), and also I wanted to add something else because I felt like Chuuya's hands were drawing a bit too much attention (plus it was a messy hand and I didn't feel like fixing it), so I decided to add a graviton to cover the hand and make that lower corner dark. I really wanted the focus to be Dazai's arms holding on to Chuuya.

So I changed Chuuya's expression again, adjusted the angle, zoomed it in, added the graviton, and then messed around with filters to get the colors more how I wanted them to look. And THEN I decided I was done, because I didn't want to overwork it, but yeah! That was one of the times where me being very persistent with a piece actually wound up with something I really liked.

Long answer short: sometimes when I don't like a piece I keep trying until I do, and sometimes I just let it be a learning experience, and try a different approach the next time.

#ask box #these were really interesting questions #thank you anon! #I hope this wasn't too much information aksdfjskdfjks #so much of me doing art is just throwing stuff at the page/canvas until something sticks #ESPECIALLY when it comes to painting #I'm getting better at doing quick and simple comics in my style but paintings take a lot more effort and time for me #*draws back curtain on my process* behold: a parade of clowns #...side note but #honestly I have really lucked out by finding people who appreciate me being weird #like #I was not expecting people on here to enjoy my stuff when I first started posting #but then people were really nice! #if i can make literally anyone laugh with my comics I'm absurdly happy #I really appreciate how kind people have been about the shenanigans I draw

[goatsorcery]

im so done with seeing articles about kids and screen time that doesnt mention parent behaviors even once. “kids are always on their phones” so are the parents! which the kids look to for how they should behave! ipad babies didn’t chose to only play on their ipads, thats what their parents gave them!

an anecdotal example: when i was a kid, all my parents would do in their minimal free time was watch tv and then they would be surprised when in my sister and i’s minimal free time we would also only watch tv/play video games. they scolded us for not reading books, but they never read books. they scolded us for not going outside but they never went outside.

“kids are always on their damn phones” my mom is in her 60s and opens up candy crush anytime she’s sitting — it isnt just the kids

#side note but ipad babies are such a rich people thing too #like you’re gonna give your kid something that cost $400 and has an easily breakable screen? #that goes for smartphones too

[astronomical-bagel]

#ok no but for real this is genuinely my friend group. #the only one that's a little iffy is the anime catgirl bc 98% of us are dudes. with the exception of me and one other #we even have a union guy 😭 #side note chilchuck's name would 100% be Chris if he was a real guy. he's such a Chris. (I mean it COULD be chuck but. Chris is better) #dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #senshi of izganda #izutsumi #marcille donato #laios touden #chilchuck tims #chilchuck #falin touden #astronomically random

[darishima]

made a chart of the straw hats' skin tones with the colors being screencapped directly from the episodes, to show how much they've lightened. this is more than just an "artstyle change" or "design evolution" or "just the timeskip" this is blatant racism/colorism. it's fucking ridiculous and i don't understand how toei is continuously getting away with it please reblog btw, i think this is something people should see

#didnt include chopper/brook/jinbe for obvious reasons but i think even choppers fur has gotten lighter brown #even nami and sanji the characters who were pale from the beginning have gotten PALER #fucking INSANE how much usopp has lightened when you look at it side by side like this. and franky too which i never really took note of #and by “screencapped directly” i mean like i literally screenshotted the characters and zoomed way in #and cropped a square of their face/arm #and made sure it was in average outdoor lighting not mood lighting/dramatic lighting so this is as accurate as possible #one piece #usopp #luffy #franky #nico robin #nami #sanji #vinsmoke sanji #monkey d luffy #zoro #roronoa zoro #casey posts #toei animation #toei #straw hat crew #straw hats #one piece discourse

[moonlightmagical]

AND ZAC OYAMA JOINS THE RANKS OF PLAYERS THAT READ THE FUCKING BOOK, BRENNAN

#supported by number one menace emily axford #side note i love this picture so much #dimension 20 #fantasy high #fantasy high junior year #fantasy high spoilers #d20 #fh #fhjy

[fagtainsparklez]

so my younger cousin is flying in to visit from brazil on sunday, and will be staying here for like, the entirety of july. which, don't get me wrong, is super cool! i love the kid! but it felt like a super weird move, considering his parents are the SUPER strict and borderline helicopter parents. even the smallest prank/roughousing with him/his little sister would lead to a strict talking to from his parents, he couldn't ever do anything without their clear permission, that sort of stuff. so letting him fly at alone at 16 to a whole different country and stay there for a whole month seemed WILDLY out of character. additionally, it just felt like a super last-minute trip. it's not like we have any plans to do when he gets here, and the flight itself and stuff only got booked like, midway through june.

and i was talking to my mom about it, kind of trying to nudge some answers out of her, and after a while she went, "yeah, i think they're sending him over here to get away for his boyfriend. see if the distance breaks them off." which, first of all, surprised me because last i checked, they didn't KNOW he had a boyfriend. literally everyone in the family did EXCEPT for them because while that entire side of the family being semi-conservative, his parents (mostly his dad) are EXTREMELY old-fashioned. so clearly something already went wrong. and considering the only reason the rest of the family knew is because one person found out and it spread like wildfire, i have a sneaking suspicion he wasn't the one to tell them, either.

and second of all. they're sending him HERE. to try to make him forget his homosexuality. i couldn't do anything but just wordlessly gesture to the multiple pride flags scattered around my room, then to myself, because really? he has like two other cousins in the us and they're sending him to me? honey i am about to introduce this kid to queer scenes you have never even heard of. he'll be returning home with labels only shrimp can perceive

#icarus speaks #i fully believe she's correct btw #they are. not the brightest people. and honestly probably believe this is something that could work #cause i can see the logic of get him away and hopefully he'll realize it's a phase. which is Likely what they think #but oh honey you have a big storm coming #side note this is the SECOND time someone's been outed without permission on that side of the family 😭 #bitches learned of my transgenderism SO quickly #also even if that's NOT why they sent him here. i will still be rocking his world #they have given me Infinite Power and i will use it to make this kid's life as queer as physically possible

[dillyt]

Great news for uninsured adults in the USA who want a COVID-19 booster! It now appears that ALL CVS locations are now active participants in the Bridge Access Program. The Bridge Access Program gives out free Covid-19 vaccinations to 18+ adults who otherwise can't afford one, so if you have a CVS near you, please go get one! For others who don't have a CVS near them, please go to vaccines.gov, click on "Find Covid-19 vaccines", fill out which vaccines you prefer (you can mix different vaccines if you have to so i reccomend just marking all of them for the age groups you need), and when the next page loads mark the "Bridge Access Program Participant" option to see only locations that are Bridge Access Program participants. Hopefully, other places that aren't CVS will start participating soon, so just check back every so often to see if there are any updates. The CDC Bridge Access Program website also has more details on what locations will be participating, but only CVS is appearing as an active participant on the vaccines.gov location finder at the moment.

#covid19 #covid #coronavirus #vaccines #covid vaccine #bridge access program #CDC #signal boost #please share #coronavirus vaccine #covid19 vaccine #covid 19 vaccine #novavax #moderna #pfizer #also interesting side note but i havent been able to find any vaccine other than novavax near me #perhaps this is just a regional thing or maybe novavax is cheaper to make so those are the most common? #anyway thats why i made sure to tell people its okay to mix up because im going to have to bc i got moderna every other time lol #mayyybe other vaccines will become available in the future??? but ive had close family catch covid left and right so im not waiting #also does anyone know why the bridge program only bridges access to 18 or older individuals? #like i knew the gov didnt care about children but god damn lmao

[gingiekittycat]

I forgot how lonely it is to write original fiction.

Where are the kudos? The subscriptions? The comments? The people cheerleading me chapter to chapter? Where are the kind words and compliments and reassurances that what I'm writing isn't complete crap? Where are the unhinged emojis? The asks on Tumblr? Where are my mutuals in my dms apologizing for not reading the latest chapter right away (side note, you know you don't have to apologize at all, right??). Where is the fanart? Where are the recs?

Where is my motivation to keep going?

It's something I've been thinking about a lot, actually, lately. How the experience of writing fanfic is so unique. How you already have an audience, willing and waiting and captive. And that's really it, isn't it? You have an audience. It's almost performative, writing fanfic. It's being on a stage, a one-person show (or two, if you do it with a friend); it's getting live reactions to your performance, it's feeding off the energy of the crowd and informing it back in a feedback loop; it's improvised, sometimes, in almost-real-time. It's building something that you couldn't have built by yourself. A thing that takes on a life of its own.

It's an experience you can't get writing original fiction, and, honestly, not having it is making it hard to write something original at all.

#This is an ode to fandom in a way #Also side note like #How tf do you create OCs? #How I ask you??? #Writing #Fandom #AO3 #Fanfiction

[yeehawpim]

a comic with some norse mythology

#original comic #comic art #norse mythology #religion and lore #fenrir #tyr #my art #my comic #real story i listened to neil gaiman read that section of norse mythology in a youtube video and cried lol #side note go check out norse mythology by neil gaiman it bangs

[asweetprologue]

did you guys know that octoroks appear in every zelda title except Twilight Princess

#the BANE of my EXISTENCE #when I started playing the ORIGINAL 1986 GAME and these motherfuckers were ALREADY the biggest nuisance in the game #forget ganon what fucking octopus cursed all of hyrule to a thousand thousand years of death by octorok #zelda #legend of zelda #skyward sword #a link to the past #ocarina of time #link #totk #botw #my art #side note i've decided to start post any fan art I do on this blog instead of my little art side blog because it's just easier for me

[moshaeu]

@havanillas’ mer au…

#honkai star rail #hsr #hsr fanart #honkai star rail fanart #aventurine #hsr aventurine #dr ratio #hsr dr ratio #side note… e0s1 came home!!! #waiting for robin and topaz now… i need ip3 and my pretties

[thesociallyanxioussociopath]

Part 3 of Alastor's really bad awful day~ What's worse than having to go on a fake date with your rival ? Your other rival (one-sided) deciding to play paparazzi, of course.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 4 (end)

#hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel fanart #radio demon #alastor hazbin hotel #charlie hazbin hotel #charlie morningstar #hazbin hotel lucifer #vaggie #my art #had to separate part 3 and 4 because it was too big of a post it didn't look nice #on a side note I feel like I'm getting better at drawing Alastor's hair ! Though I still hate his 50 shades of red color palette #radioapple #kinda? #I just like when they annoy each other

[queerdraws]

Fanart for a snippet of my most favorite heartbreaking moment from swordsmans's fic bone-breaker ospreys mate for life (rated E)

#zolu #luzo #one piece #comic #i love this fic i love this fic AAUUGHH!!!! #this scene exploded my heart #okay so artist note luffy only has forehead bandages in SOME panels in his post-raid outfit #he doesn't at the post-raid party itself but he does on the hillside spectating the momo / marine guy fight #so i guess he just got a knock on the head at the party or something?? #his cheek bandage also switches sides between when he's recovering post-raid and the party #u never realize how impressionistic oda is w detail stuff until u gotta place patterns on clothing n bandages on boys #anyways very happy w how page 4 turned out #luffys autism stare n big big smile

[cassandragemini]

its so crazy that for the last 5 years a small but annoyingly vocal online group has been acting like mob movies of all things are pretentious and inaccessible cinema. yeah the godfather is kinda slow but these are movies about criminals who shoot people

#that family guy bit is right it does insist upon itself but it has a valid point to insist etc etc #crow.txt #side note if you do wanna watch a good mob flick and the godfather was a bit too slow for you please watch goodfellas #its one of my favorite films of all time i love it so much #while i do like the godfather and i recognize how important it was for film history i like goodfellas a bit more

[litfeathers]

I'm just thinkin' about how Eda pushed Raine away because of the curse.

She was afraid to let them in. She was afraid to ask them for help, or share how she was feeling...she was scared to show the side of herself that was messy and dangerous and painful and (in her mind) unlovable.

But when she finally let Raine see who she actually was...

...this was their reaction.

...they love all of her. Including those messy and dangerous and painful parts.

#it's loving raeda hours in this chilis tonight #raeda #the owl house #also side note she and willow have a lot to talk about in terms of burying emotions ahaha....ha #for the future spoilers

[mewcharm]

okay man

#my art #art #artwork #artists on tumblr #digital art #splatoon #splatoon oc #splatoon 2 #splatoon fanart #splatoon 3 #splat3 #octo expansion #splatoon side order #side order #agent 4 #agent 3 #pearl #pearl houzuki #pearlina #pearl splatoon #marina splatoon #off the hook #splatoon marina #neo agent 3 #side order splatoon #agent eight #captain 3 #pearl drone #splatoon 3 side order #1k+ notes club