My Brush Pack Is Finally Done!

posts that make me want to rip my heart out part 5

Child safe version of the actual comic I wanna post

In the third photo Ringling is actually just showing scad the new pokemon cards he got from ebay

Mine also peed everywhere? Just be aware of that because I very much was not and after handling my rats I very much often smelled like pee. Not sure if it's a male rat thing but I searched it up and rats apparently can't control their bladder so they just continuously leak pee...

Some things I wish I knew when first getting a rat:

You don't need to spend hundreds of dollars on a cage. Rat owners get so pissy over getting name brand fancy cages that can survive 12 world wars when you can actually just stack some cheap larger rabbit/guinea pig/ferret cages. I put a $60 dollar cage on top of my fancy ass $200 ferret one and my rats love it. No injuries or spontaneous exploding into smithereens like rat owners think will happen. I line the sides with cloth and it helps a lot.

If you're American, Oxbow is your friend. I used them with my rabbits years ago when I had them and they're great.

DIY decorations are fun but it gets exhausting after a while. If you want to play it safe, just using hides, hammocks and chew toys work!

All natural cages are cool if it's like an aesthetic thing but in reality they rot, get stinky and gross very fast. Very nasty and smelly.

Rats DO NOT like chew toys for cats or dogs. They love paper, wood, cloth, sticks, pumice, etc.

A rat injuring another rat is not by default always aggression. Only time I've seen it happen is either 1) They're sick/in pain, super grumpy and you need to get them to the vet or 2) You're still bonding them and someone got angry because they're still strangers. Best to rule it out both before neutering or seeking other options for aggression.

how do you consistently draw the same character without it looking weird or off every different time?? also how do i coordinate faces, i always make the eyes too far apart or too big or too small or make the mouth too close to the nose or chin edge. If you have any advice I'd really appreciate it since it looks like you have your art shit figured out 🙏

Oh man SO so much of it is just practice, and you're not alone! I honestly think everyone struggles with a sort of "generification" of their characters' features the more they draw them, even seasoned professionals. There's a tendency to just sort of average everything out into an unrecognizable mush over time, and it takes a lot of conscious effort to push back against that.

Here are a couple tips and tricks that I've found to be helpful over the years:

Make turnarounds and model sheets. There's a reason animation/game studios do this, and it is because we are all still bad at drawing a consistent face. Despite being gainfully employed. What are we, graphic novelists?? We wish. Anyway it's a great way to familiarize yourself with your character's face from multiple angles, and it gives you a single source of truth to return to anytime you need a refresher:

Gather real-life reference. Anytime I'm designing a character I'm pulling together a ton of reference of actual people who look, to some degree, like the character in my head. It's always a collection of analogues, never just a single person, but it can be a great cheat sheet for understanding how your character might move, emote, etc:

Make a 3D model. I know it seems daunting, but with the advent of programs like Blender and Nomad Sculpt it's becoming remarkably more accessible. Heck, even James Gurney was sculpting maquettes out of clay for Dinotopia back in the day! It doesn't have to be particularly detailed—just a sort of proportionate lump will do—but it's another great way to have dynamic reference that you can rotate and light accordingly:

Practice, practice, practice. Make expression sheets for your character! Either right there on the spot, just start drawin' expressions, or you can slowly collect drawings of your character that you like, as you draw them, and compile them all in one place for your own reference. Need to draw your character's head from a weird angle? Maybe you've already drawn it before and you can copy your own homework! Doesn't count as stealing when the call's coming from inside the house 😎

I'd love to pretend there's a magical point where you can just immediately rotate your character's head in your brain like some sort of photorealistic apple in a twitter meme, but a lot of the time it's reference, hard work, and whole lotta repetition. 😐👍🏼

Source: The Boy Who Collects The Stars 星をあつめる少年

by Natsu

Simple Comic Panel Tutorial 

please kindly visit my PATREON page  ^^

Hello! I've rewritten this ask like five times so I'll just come out and say, you're one of my favorite artists, thank you for all the good stuff you put out, it's inspiring <3 I wanted to ask, what's your method of studying anatomy and expressions?

Thank you! <3 Ngl the last time I studied anatomy with effort, I was a kid in high-school. The only book I had on the subject was the Anatomy for the Artist from Jeno Barcsay. It was huge and detailed, literally muscle and bone deep, but I think my brain is wired more for the feel of things than the understanding 😅

I try to find nude or mostly nude pics for anatomy stuff. Adult photo sites rule as a source, people contort their bodies in all sorts of weird ways and I can usually find someone with the build I'm looking for.

When I sketch based on a ref, I try to pay attention to the silhouette, negative spaces and alignments. They help me correct mistakes.

And obviously I love to exaggarate things. (Evident on the waistline and pulled up leg here.)

Same with expressions, I guess. I try to push them but stay within the realm of believable. It's so easy to make a face look uncanny or creepy or w/e with a smile too wide. I have had a couple commissioners ask me before to tone down the initial expressions on their characters, and I think that was a nice reminder to pull me back to reality lol It can get especially weird with long narrow faces like Buttons'. I find it a bit tricky to make him have a large open smile while fitting it all on his head.

sometimes i really love being an adult bc like if i was 17 and asked my mom for 7.99 to support one website slam dunking another as it goes down in flames she would roll her eyes and tell me to save my money for better things but now that im 28 i have full autonomy over my money i can just. spend 7.99 because i think a joke is funny and it made me laugh