In The Interest Of Giving My Hand A Break, Here's Something A Little Less Refined - I Really Just Wanted

“Sorry,” Stiles said, unsure of why he was apologizing. “I’ve never heard that song before. Did you write it?”  Derek looked uncomfortable, maybe a touch embarrassed, which was answer enough. “It’s good. I like it. It’s calming.”  The small smile he got in response melted his heart a little bit. Fucking hell, he was so gone for this asshole. Stiles didn’t know what he was going to do. He wished he’d never realized how much he loved him. Wished he’d just continued to think they were best friends and nothing more. It was slowly going to kill him being so close, and yet so fucking far. Clearing his throat, he brought the book back up to continue reading, muttering that Derek should keep playing. He did, his fingers plucking gently at the strings, filling the loft with soft music. It really was calming, and soothing. Stiles really liked it. He liked it even more when he realized Derek could honestly express himself with the guitar. It still wasn’t a voice, but it was something, at least. 

Actions Speak Louder than Words (ch18) by @isthatbloodonhisshirt

This fic is what spurred me to start doing sterek fanart back in the beginning of december - magic!stiles, cursed!derek, stiles/jackson terrifying everyone else as friends - an incredible 430K story with a completely endearing slow-burn and slowly unfolding exploration of the characters and their relationship, made complete with the perfect bow of cursed-mute-Derek because 'Derek's eyebrows have a language of their own but only Stiles is fluent' is my favorite and this author does it SO well. And gives Derek a guitar. Derek plays a guitar!!

Ella, consider this my loveletter to your works - they all, this one in particular, buoyed me through a tough time in my life and brought me back to a love of drawing that I haven't had in years and a fandom that has been so generous in their support of my silly art. Thank you for sharing your works!

And a huge thank you to everyone's support so far - the sweet comments in replies, the unhinged all-caps tags, yes-and'ing my silly ideas and headcanons, i'm just over here kicking my feet and giggling and definitely not getting teary-eyed over it no siree no lacrimal action happening here

Work in progress so heres a little video rendering of my process so far. I was inspired by these photos of Tyler and knew I had to draw it. (Sorry for the awful quality of the Video 😭)

Happy Valentine's Allison, your boyfriends' bestie has custody of their single shared braincell this weekend

(I discovered OCT's half horse half man yesterday and scott would totally appreciate it for the epic forbidden supernatural romance song that it is)

Other music headcanon posts: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9

I have had this and Skar's cover on repeat for 24 hours, it's a good thing my apartment has good sound isolation (((':

I can't express how much I LOVE the way you draw hands! They are just absolutely amazing and so SO expressive. Do you have any advice on how to improve? (other than the obvious, "practice", lol)

THANK YOU!! Hands are my #1 favorite thing to draw and i love using them and touching to enhance the feeling of a drawing so that makes me so happy to hear!! lol not the dreaded 'just practice' - I tried to put together an impromptu example for you: I’ve always loved drawing hands and include them in my art a lot but I can say for certain that there was a huge boost in my abilities when i started tracing from real life images to better understand the way fingers curve and deform around objects, especially - I’ll take a reference picture or two, trace, figure out which looks better and then try to re-draw it:

You want to draw a character holding a bottle? Alright, find an object that’s about the size you want, get your camera (a shitty res phone camera will do in my case), and get to it!

I like to do some variations because sometimes things just look *goofy* when you have simpler lines depicting them, so here’s 4 different ones:

Alright, next step - rough lines over to see how it translates to 2d:

#1 looks goofy so that one's out - I like #2 the best but the grip'll translate better if I close the grip of the two first fingers, so I'll do that (or retake the picture) and then re-do it on my own while eyeballing the reference i just made (I usually just draw the lines for hands directly but if i'm having trouble i break it down into rough shapes first) :

Think of it kind of like building a neat little reference library in your own brain - next time I want to draw a hand holding a bottle I can think back on this and what I picked up :)

Thanks again, hope this helps!

Wanted a cover for my 'I could see Stiles listen to this' playlist and since it can't be a gif - in which case it would have been this one:

- second best was a redraw of the lofi girl although the playlist is probably as far from lofi as you can get LOL

Link to playlist under the cut for those curious:

I've listed the ones I've done art for at the beginning but from there on I've just been adding whenever I came across something from my own liked songs that I could see stiles jam out to. Best on shuffle!

It ended up with so many of my hype favorites hahaha. if you put this on, say 'actually, what would realistically happen in this scenario is...' in the mirror 3 times and open a can of coke, you'll summon a ghostly apparition of me that'll poorly but enthusiastically dance in your kitchen.

So while I know Stiles canonically is probably a classic rock guy going by his shirts (although you cannot tell me the kid doesn't jam out to lady gaga's the fame monster), are you really in a fandom unless you project aspects of yourself onto characters?

Specifically an unhinged case of 'will listen to absolutely anything' taste in music - I'm the 'never pass the AUX cord' in my friend group.

The song in question (that i had on repeat enough one year that it was on my spotify wrapped) under the cut!

Other music headcanon posts: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9

I just quite like the idea of Stiles zoning out to some strange beats :)

Hello~ I am late to the party but for the Artist's Asks, 3, 4 and 14 :D

Hi Ella! o/ <3 Never too late, thanks for sending them ♥︎ Artist ask game

3. your favorite piece(s)?

The piece I did for Actions Speak Louder than Words still holds such a special place in my heart, being the primary drive for starting to draw the boys - the rough sketch for this was the first teen wolf fanart I'd done in more than 10 years! Also my first time drawing Derek ever haha. It took a lot of practising especially Stiles before i was able to finish it, but for the better part of a month I'd keep going back and working on it bit by bit.

The Heart Boner drawing gets a special mention just because it went from idea to finished drawing in just over an hour (the song came on and i put it on repeat until i finished) and perfectly encapsulates the kind of intense focus I've been enjoying since mid-december haha. It's also just the right amount of silly and tooth-rotting cute for me!

4. piece you wish got more love?

Honestly, none - I'm still completely taken aback at the response to everything, I was expecting maybe 5 people to interact! If you've ever reblogged more than 1 of my drawings with a comment in the tags, you best bet I recognize your handle when it happens, I get so excited every time LOL

14. whats your favorite thing about drawing?

There's the fact that I get to create whatever silly little thought comes across my mind, however niche - sort of in extension of that I love that drawing is for me, with no outside expectations or deadlines. I get to have this one thing that is subject only to my own whims: whether completely redo a piece, leave it for a month and then return, even just abandon it - I am free to do so. I can choose only to draw things that make me happy and that is amazing! It's really nice to have a hobby that's completely separate from my professional life - although it did come in handy for some very over-the-top diagrams for a couple exams, especially neuroanatomy lol

with how much this site loves its writer ask games, im astounded ive never seen one for artists, soooo

ARTIST ASK GAME!

1. what medium do you use most (if applicable, what software)?

2. most popular piece?

3. your favorite piece(s)?

4. piece you wish got more love?

5. how would you describe your art style?

6. favorite thing to draw?

7. easiest thing for you to draw?

8. thing you struggle to draw?

9. whats something you always come back to when drawing?

10. how do you deal with artblock?

11. do you listen to anything while drawing?

12. describe your process while drawing

13. talk about a wip you like!

14. whats your favorite thing about drawing?

15. least favorite thing about drawing?

16. how do you motivate yourself to draw?

17. what is something youre confident about in your art?

18. something you feel like you need to work on?

19. where do you find inspiration?

20. is your workspace, digital or not, organized (not neat, organized)?

21. what do you think your artstyle would taste like?

22. do you have a favorite color palette to work with?

23. how many artstyles can you work in confidently?

24. whats a compliment about your art that has always stuck with you?

25. what size canvas/paper do you use?

26. what do you physically draw with (pencil and paper, tablet, etc)?

27. do you ever have multiple wips going at once?

28. whats a piece you would like to redraw at some point?

29. do you use a lot of references while drawing?

30. whats something youre proud of about your artstyle?

31. which fandom have you drawn the most for?

32. have you done a lot of collabs?

33. have you taken a lot of classes for art?

34. whats something you still like from your old art?

35. if you had one piece of advice to give your younger artist self, what would it be?

(remember to give the person you reblog from an ask!!)

Have a wip shot - it’s been a while since I last went on a render bender so I guess it was due lol

Truly doing this on nightmare difficulty trying to draw a relaxed, happy stiles 😂 he mirin’

webcomic hosting sites

i am tinkering with the idea of starting what'd be a longer comic, but i'm out of touch enough that i am only now finding out that smackjeeves shut down ages ago despite having a comic i updated weekly for years on there LOL

whether you're a reader or creator - any recommendations to hosting sites?