it went by so fast

The art diary is still alive after a whole year, while not being nearly as perfect as it could, was definitely a learning experience alltogether. If anyone else thinks of starting a blog I'd highly recommend it, I wouldn't have made as much progress if I went without it. Even for you non artists out there, I still think starting one pertaining to your personal growth on something is worth it.

Speaking of personal growth, I hope all of you thought about what your new years' resolution will be. Ignore all the cynics who say it doesn't work, it doesn't work because they never tried it, and therefore does not exist for them. You only have one day to start something that can be measured as cleanly as January 1st, why not?

Also, I just want to say thank you to those who stuck with the blog (sometimes more than me). Without you, this blog would have only had a portion of the posts it had. This website shows how many people visited anonymously, but I know their names anyways. Thanks for keeping my blog in your bookmarks, won't let you down.

Also, here's an earlier concept sketch I did for the imp above. I'm the end I decided to take it the more stylistic route, didn't feel as boring and there was more I could do with it. Realism is not always ideal.

we are in fact trying harder

Just a sketch for the blog, 100% done from memory and 100% got the garment wrong. Spent more effort than usual today, although I forgot to record my time, however I did keep mental track. I will do that tomorrow. I spent roughly 4 hours drawing out of a 12 hour day, cut my sleep short to fall asleep early.

didn't try hard enough

I didn't take it seriously enough, even though I lied to myself into thinking I was. I didn't do what needed to be done, at least, not always. I'm not talking about the missed posts, although that was a result of it. What lacked this year was the effort I put in.

I thought I was the kind of person who could think "I could choose to do this thing that I want, or that thing I need to do", and then chose the thing I needed to do. After looking back it is clear that I was not that person, and while the quality of the blog posts were a proof of that, were not the only ones. It's also something I felt internally whenever I thought to myself - I feel like I could've done better today. And 99% of the time, I think I could've.

I got too comfortable, somewhere in the back of my head I knew something was wrong, but proceded to turn a blind eye by thinking I was doing fine, without any grounded reasoning or measuring to support it. I should've kept track of my progress, should've kept track of my hours put in, should've kept pushing myself. So I could measure myself against my past-self, "am I doing better than I was yesterday?"

I don't want to disregard the effort I put in, I did more than I ever had, but it wasn't 100% - and for what I'm going for, I think I need something pretty close to that, and what I did was not near it. I've been thinking about this for a while now, not knowing how to explain it, keeping it in the back of my head. But after a few months of dwelling on it, I think I'm being honest with myself now.

I was on the right path, but didn't do enough to keep me on it, straying away for too long at a time. Video game binge here, anime and YouTube binge there, an annoying amount of hours just lost to vices. Not saying these things weren't ok, they're great and even good for you in moderation, but that would be the last word to describe what I was doing.

No more reminiscing, nothing's going to change what I did, or rather, did not do. Instead, I want to share something that I think might be interesting if anyone reading this feels the same, if they feel that they aren't trying hard enough.

I have an idea, if someone were to sacrifice things that were important to them, such as their usual time spent on friends, hobbies, relationships, all in the pursuit of something the cared deeply about, wouldn't it show compared to those who did not make those sacrifices? If you were to give up luxuries that stood between you and your goal, would you not be closer to it than the you before?

 I want to find out if that's the meaning of true effort, and I want next year's blog to be about that. Nothing too extreme of course, I'm going to keep in touch with friends and watch a couple anime episodes here and there, but I won't spend the same time I did on those things like I did before, especially games, those can actually go for good.

That's my new years resolution, also, thanks to everyone who kept their eyes on my blog. I see the amount of people who visit each post so you have not gone unnoticed.

anniversary approaching

The anniversary's approaching so I have something in the works but also something else as a bonus. 

Photo not related. In fact, you will be hard pressed to ever find me post something anthropomorphic again. No offense, just not my taste.

Merry Christmas 2022

Merry Christmas everyone, hope it was a good one. I was out and about all day so here's a sketch. I got some clothes and money from relatives, and got some gifts for close family as well. Had a family get together but not everyone could come, it was still good though. Terribly cold weather for down south though.

and the best eraser award goes to

The best eraser period are the MONO erasers from Tombow. Japan yet again takes another crown in office supplies who would've guessed.

Also, here's my handsome Squidward, who I barely used an eraser on.

wallowing as caveman

So I bought a new motherboard and it comes in January 3rd, so we should be back on digital by then. Until then I'm drawing and watching anime. Might see some mouth studies tomorrow

meaningless graphic shapes

Just needed a post in, was going to do something with the shapes but I need to fix my sleep schedule. I don't know if nuns have a cross on the white neckcover, also winged everything else.

WHELP

Well, long story short, my computer is done. At least, it won't display bios even - just gives me a VGA error which I know is false. Anyways, unless by some miracle that my PC decides to work (I've tried everything almost), we're not ending this year with any digital bangers. That means traditional work only until further notice, the expression of this character is not far off my own.

Speaking of, I drew this guy based off a favorite character of mine from memory. It looks so bad however that I won't even associate it with him any more than that. What, think it's easy? Go draw a byclcle in perspective without reference, see if it looks like you wanted.

getting the minimum

Wild take, this little scratchy lines I'm making, like the disconnected and feathering lines in the corner on the left shoulder, probably not doing good for my art - will work on that.

I want to draw wholesome things

I remember when I watched my first slice-of-life anime when I was around 14 or so. I said "yeah, no way am I watching the rest of that", back then it just struck me as boring and a waste of time. Where's the action? The plot arcs? The hero & villain dichotomy? Until these past few years however, I am a changed man, and whole-heatedly claim myself as a SOL enjoyer. Also, those things can kinda be in slice-of-life anime, but usually way less intense.

Of course, I still fancy the dramatic, edgy, action-packed shows every now and then, a lot of my favorites take those titles. But I've been getting to thinking recently however, if I could make a story - would it be wholesome, or... not wholesome? (whatever the opposite of wholesome is). Realistically, I don't think it would be either, and probably do something in the middle, a serious story with wholesome moments intertwined. But I definitely wouldn't mind doing something wholesome, compared to my naive 14 year old brain.

I got started thinking about this when I was watching this game called Ib, the art in the story isn't exactly what I would call technically difficult, but it has a level of feeling to it. It looks like the artist tried very hard to bring out who the character was through their image alone, and as a result looks (at least to me) very charming and earnest. I want to be able to do the same with my work, but I think that calls for spending more than an hour on any given piece...

Not saying that is OK by the way, it's a really bad habit and something I need to work on if I want my skills to get anywhere.

bun enthusiast

 

Boring to draw, but quite easy, a win-loss hairstyle.

That is all.

animey

 

 

Sorry lads, a bit of a low-effort post streak going on. However, I've been itching to put in some work so please stay tuned. On a side note, I think my anime faces are a lot better looking back into the beginning of the year, especially my first post.

How do I even form

 

Low effort all-around today, didn't even do any drawing except this, Tried drawing details on top of some form, especially where the form turns, such as the strip going along the nose and cheek. Tried doing the same thing with the head circles but couldn't really show it turning direction well, unlike the nose and cheek. I'll be spending time figuring how to do that better.

imagine the hands are good

 

Made a nyx noggle drawing, a noggle is like a bobblehead figure but a little but more proportional, took like 10 minutes. I play her often, especially in arbetrations, prime variant of course. The reference was like 1 inch tall on my screen so I guessed a lot of the details. Especially the hands, pretend those are hands.

Or not

 Well, did a rough sketch on a design I thought up only for this post. I didn't have anything in my head other than "fast" and "triangle shapes". This is one of those screw ups that I wouldn't usually post and throw it out from the blog, which has happened many times. Initially, I thought I would just say no-way to posting it and scrap it, but then I felt like the entire seriousness that it held fell apart. I got to thinking, if I took my work more seriously because it was going to be seen by other people, then I would have incentive to make it as best as I could. But, I said screw it, who cares if it doesn't have a good composition, form that reads well, or has a interesting design... right? Nah, who am I kidding - I care, and therefore will most likely be re-doing this one. When, who knows at this point, I surely do not.

I should draw warframe (at all)

 

 

Quick 10 minute sketch from the poster-boy himself. 

 

I've been playing Warframe longer than I have done art (2014), but I don't think I've ever drawn anything from the game at all. Mainly because when I was a beginner, it was so daunting to draw the frame's each and every squiggle, crack, and edge that were intricately carved with. Well, after I got better at art I realize that's no longer the case. Even without color and details, anyone who has played or even seen the game knows who this is, regular players could probably guess from the silhouette alone, maybe giving myself too much credit there. 

 

Surprisingly, Excalibur is still my most played frame, even though I mained Saryn Prime for most of my memory. She's not far behind though, and is easily the strongest frame in the game, so I may have to pick her up again sometime, definitely drawing her soon.

Manga when?

 

Couldn't show any of what I worked on today so this will have to do. Sketched out a small little idea for a panel in a manga or something like that, all of that perspective studying this year paid off it seems. Not in the sense that it was difficult, just that if I didn't know the details and the "why" perspective works, I wouldn't have been able to draw it up this fast and how I wanted. The diminishments would be correct, but the placement of objects wouldn't want what I wanted compositionally, and the scaling would likely be incorrect.

Would you like a tip in these trying times

 

So the family stuff had a bit of a part two today but things are looking a lot better now. I made some pencil sketches for the blog at a family member's house, but I forgot to take a picture and left them there. Instead, here's a little tip that helps with nose placement especially with anime/flat style eyes. Got this from the artist I've been studying recently, TenTen. I kinda figured this out before hand when I was dealing a lot with 3d models, but this diagram explains it best. Mouths are kind of a different thing though, you can place them anywhere and they will have a different "effect" or feeling. Like with anime mouths, you can place them forward, back, high, low, and they will all give of a different vibe, yet still look "right" - if the it fits the piece.

Pretty rough day

 I managed to only get some rough sketching in before hearing about something that warranted a family emergency. Things are a lot better but not out of the clear yet, also moved (unrelated) so packing and unpacking after all of that has made the day a bit of a drag, so a low effort post for today it is.

Gone fishing

 I've been passing out way earlier than I usually fall asleep so that is the reason for my absence. I've been doing a lot of physical work lately, well it's mainly just working out a lot, but I also went fishing with my dad recently. I was walking through a lake wearing one of those heavy fishing waders while my dad taught me the ropes of fly fishing. Spent half the time learning how to whip the fishing line back and forth getting control over it, way harder than those spin fishing rods. I spent the other day doing roughly that for 7 hours and it was a workout on its own. Needless to say my body is now in recovery mode.

Also, regarding my head and hair drawings, I've think I've gotten much better recently. Let's pretend the eyebrows are more than 2 strokes.

Skullguys

 

Some heads in perspective, I'm definitely better in this than I was before, although I am using a book as a guide from the Chinese artist Tenten. Not drawing from it but I learned some useful techniques and this is my application. The nose on the bottom right is too high and isn't diminishing properly into the right plane after seeing it again, will fix when I can but probably won't post it. Some other things I'm noticing but that will have to wait for another time. Using a text screen capture and google translate to translate the book, not a fun time since I have to re-arrange a lot of the text but it seems mostly accurate so that's good.