This one gets a little heavy and it’s not a sketch dump, so feel free to ignore it since I’m going to put Actual Content in a separate post.

I kind of hate how often I’ve come back to the site, posted something with the intent to start using it more frequently, then fall down a memory hole and just kind of blank about it for literally months. So, so sorry, friends. 2021 has not been the best or worst year, it feels sort of like I’m just kind of getting my bearing again after you know. All that. (gestures at 2020)

To catch everyone up on my antics these days, there’s uh, not many of them. I recently did get a screen drawing tablet and I never realized how much easier it makes inking, which has always been my least favorite part of The Process. I’ve also been experimenting with colored lines and line-less styles a bit more but I have a ways to go before I’d say I was especially good at it. Actually I’ve been having something of a crisis of motivation and feeling like my work has plateaued lately that’s cut into my productivity, but New Toy is helping a bit.

Been dipping a foot into the Vtuber world a bit, I haven’t made or commissioned a model yet but it is something I’m interested in. I worry a bit about it coming off like a bandwagoning move, but since I like to keep a piece of my art onscreen most of the time, I thought it would be a neat extension of the idea to make an animated stand-in for myself. I’ve helped a couple of friends with character design, which was really a lot of fun. I like making up new characters as it is, and seeing my rough takes turned over to a pro illustrator is a lot cooler than I even expected. Sometimes I get touchy when people springboard off of my work, but in the case of XiaoJing’s finished models I felt more inspired to try and refine my style. My goal is to be able to draw and rig a proper Live2D for myself at some point, but it’s not a huge priority (as much as I keep pestering friends for feedback since I have a definite vibe I’m shooting for.)

Of course, on the other hand, making a laundry list of Known Flaws in my work I want to improve sometimes bogs me down a bit too when I look at my age, skill level, and what people around me can pull off. Clip Studio has a very handy 3D pose model tool which I worry about leaning on too hard since my mind’s eye’s anatomy tends to be pretty off from what a model wants to represent in the same poses. I’ve also been trying to improve my use of color. As mentioned before, I’ve been trying to mess with colored lineart again, to varying effect. and on a recent commission I tried for a more thorough rendering look instead of my usual cel shading since I thought it would work well with a cryptid themed piece.

It’s… hard to stay motivated sometimes, still. I hate to whine about it anymore, but the general lack of feedback my work tends to get kind of hurts my drive to keep at projects, even if they never really leave my heart or mind. Last week, a thread got me digging through old pictures trying to look for trends in improvement but it’s kind of all over the place instead of a satisfying curve of any kind. The most reliably ‘good’ swath I noted was probably 2016 following the official first daily sketch project, when I was still ‘warmed up’ and had a bunch of encouragement from new friends. Quality kind of dipped when I was drawing less frequently in the following years, probably bottoming out that year I took off from commissions and barely drew anything for myself since I was getting burnt out and depressed as shit. I think things are going better lately. Or at least I’m taking them better. For a while, I’ve had sort of a ‘nobody cares” mantra alternately comforting or decelerating me depending on the day. If something I’m working on turns out poorly- hey, nobody’s watching. If I put a couple evenings into a drawing I really enjoy and nobody sees it, oh. Nobody’s watching. I’m not fishing for compliments or attention here, forced or too-broad compliments tend to make me kind of paranoid, if anything. It’s my fault for being poor at promoting myself or my work or maintaining relationships. I guess I just always sort of hoped what I do would speak for itself and/or dumb luck would kick in.

I have positive things I should really be focusing on, I’ve had the chance to contribute to a Guardian Legend-like, designed a couple VTubers, handle art direction for RGL, and my Eishi/Dixie comics were doing alright until I got a perfectionist streak and refused to actually finish like three different works in progress. I’m looking to wrap up the ‘demo’ edition of Critical Heaven soon, and I may double back and finish Irrgarten since it was pretty far along. I would really like to bring back the girls and I had a Revolver reboot mostly planned out, but that’s kind of on the back burner for personal reasons. If anyone out there is still reading this stuff, don’t worry, I don’t think I ever could give up creating entirely. I’m just sorry there’s such a wait between updates these days. Take care of yourselves, and don’t be shy if there’s an artist or author or musician or anyone in your life who entertains and inspires you. It means more to them than you know, and even those that feel too big to approach are just people in the end.