3 new sketches. I actually read an art book in order to learn how to do them. Really helped a lot, though I can tell I have a lot of practice ahead of me.

I haven't been doing much recently. I had two weeks of nearly solid submissions because the MMO I usually play was unplayable.. due to my PC breaking and having to resort to my laptop. Now it came back, and I haven't been drawing much. But.. I'll have more to come in a few, maybe even by this afternoon. Stay tuned ^^

Been a while, eh?

Well, hopefully this trend will continue. I'll try to add more doodles on here just to keep myself moving. I haven't really done much, most of my time has been taken up with DOMO and work. I've got a new thing coming though. I inked it last night and either today or tomorrow I'm going to pick the brain of the Book of Change webcomic artist for tips on coloring on the computer. I'll upload it for all to see once I get it done, though hopefully I'll have at least the rough inked version uploaded in a day or two.

On a sadder note, CPU fan and modem died this weekend. Got the latter replaced, but the former is going to take a bit longer. ... *sniffle* Keep it together, Mark.. keep it together.. *sob*...

For the one of you who watches my deviantART page, for the few of you who check it now and again, and for the remainder of you who randomly find it, this weeks updates are forthcoming. I've got a few things I'm working on and already have completed. A few should be up by tonight, a few should be up tomorrow, hopefully everything will be up by Friday at the very latest.

Just thought ya'll should know ^_^

Art, like so many things, is both a natural and a learning skill. A wonderful blend of nature and nurture. Talent, if we consider talent to be a measure of ability which is derived from said balance, can vary from the one end of the spectrum, where neither a persons genetic makeup wires them to think on the right side of the brain nor their environment is particularly right-brain-friendly, to the other side of the spectrum, where the child is a 12th generation sculpture born into a family of artists and philosophers.

Me, I happen to be on the logical side. I always seemed to seek a clear solution from point A to point B. I've always excelled at mathematics, and always performed horribly at storytelling and essay writing. So, obviously, all my previous attempts at capturing nature and emotion with my pencil have failed miserably.

I would say, they continue to fail miserably ><

But, with each completed piece of cra- er, sketch, I know I'm one small step closer to creating acceptable work.

Now, I can't just jump from the comfortable, sane left side of my brain to the crazy wilderness that is the right side. To do so would be to throw myself into an unstable chaos, and I won't be able to cope with the overpowering internal 'fight or flight' response, and I'll ultimately choose to dive deeper into my comfortable left-brained recliner and be less inclined to leave again. So, with that in mind, I progress slowly, and I try to find and maintain a balance.

To balance myself, therefore, I shall not only keep my previous work at hand to learn from, I shall use this journal to keep a running list of things I need to keep in mind. The highlights for this time are: bones and clothes.

Female figure 1 and 2 clearly demonstrate the 'bone' aspect. When I drew the first, I was rather pleased with it. The curves were smooth and sexy, and I was getting the hang of drawing breasts and shading under them. I showed it to a few people, and they said that, while it looked good (obvious hollow compliment to boost my self esteem) the torso wasn't quite right.. the curves don't do that. I looked at it. I looked at it some more. I compared it with some stuff I had found online. I then noticed, on one picture on the internet, they drew a shade line (for lack of a more proper term..) which was just an arc, above the tummy and below the breasts. Lo and behold, it was to represent the sternum. I looked at it for a while and, in my attempt to make my pictures more like what I see using the simplest techniques I can find, I doodled it in. I looked at it for a while, thought to myself "Well, that looks good. I should keep using that." The problems with the torso were, at that moment, the furthest from my mind. Until, that is, I got to thinking what that line represented. I followed the curve down to the side of the body, and it hit me like a sack of bricks: I completely left out the rib cage.

So, I've been making it a point to include the rib cage in my progressing work. I know there are a number of other bones that are important (collarbone, hip bones), but first things first...

The second thing I found myself lacking in is wonderfully demonstrated by my recent submission, Brandon and the Book. I drew the body nice (rather buff, actually..) but when I went to ink it, I realized, the poor bastard didn't have any clothes! I was inking right over his skin! For the armoured cat-girl, I drew the body first then drew the armour over it. I should have learned there that that process is good; body first, coverings second. I think my problem with Brandon was that I was so focused on other things (rib cages, body position, etc) that I didn't even look much at his legs, so it just didn't click. Hopefully, my next submission will fix that.

So for all you budding artists out there who make a lot of stuff but it just doesn't look right, trust me that there is a reason, and it's really quite simple. Ok, well the reason is simple, but there are a multitude of ways things can look wrong.. about as many ways as there are muscles and bones in a human body, if not more. It's a lot to keep in mind, but there are tricks and shortcuts, so don't give up hope ^^

So I submitted my first piece of artwork to Deviant Art.. deviantArt.. deviantART.. um.. Imma call it Deviant.

Grammatically, that can be taken one of two ways.. my first submission, or my first artwork. Surprisingly, they're both pretty close to true. It's not my first sketch.. but it's pretty damn close to it. I would say, that's my second sketch where I was actually trying to draw something decent. Obviously it was touched up a bit in Photoshop, text was added, etc. Regardless though... I dunno. I put it on Deviant, and decided to make a journal entry marking this momentous occasion.

The lovely young lady who I should be drawing for (she opted to help me practice) gave me permission to upload here as well as the fan art section of her webcomic forum, which you can find here:

[link]

I know it's not great, but I hope to improve my skill in the future.

By the by, my avatar was drawn by a friend of mine, not me. I've used it in everything I do.

~(V)