Hello !

As a fellow artist, I really admire your style, and would like to study it.

In that spirit, would you be OK to tell us a little bit about your process ?

I hope you have a great day and I look forward to seeing your future pieces !

Woah, this is high praise, thank you so much 🥹 And thank you for allowing me to nerd abt process hahaha, I love to talk abt this stuff! Drawing is so much fun honestly

For process, I'm not sure if you mean more the actual process of crafting the art, or rather the thought-process that goes into it, so I'll briefly cover both! I'll just talk abt my personal/fanart practice since I think this is what the "style" part refers to? As in, I won't mention process for, say, storyboards or backgrounds I make for animation.

Under the cut bc long answer!!

A piece usually begins with an idea, it's often inspired by something I see or hear, by something that comes up in a conversation with friends, by something I read in a fic, etc. And imo, the most crucial aspect of my creative practice is narration; it's the thing I strive to perfect and polish the most. What do I want to say with this piece, which story do I want to tell. Before I even start sketching, I usually have an idea of the intention I want for a piece, and with enough experience, at some point you start guessing what "visual devices" you should use to render that mood. E.g. if I have an idea that involves a really suffocating mood, a feeling of tension, one of the basic ways to go about it is to crowd your piece, have it more zoomed-in and in longer focal length so the perspective is flattened. Similarly, you'll often choose not to show your character whole (especially not their feet, with which they could flee!) or the floor (which is a way out for the character), you have many overlapping objects, etc. Knowledge of these "visual devices" honestly come with time, and sometimes they sound super basic, but they do the trick, and they're not hard to spice up and make more original when you keep your mood/intention in mind.

Then comes storyboarding/sketching! It's the most important part to me, because this is where you decide how you're going to tell your story. Sketching is the most exciting part, you can let your mind speak and find creative ways to spice up the "visual devices" you've figured out at the initial thinking step. I think one of the greatest advices I got, ever, was from my storyboard professor, who told us to always keep in mind that a picture (moving or not) is ALWAYS a 2D surface, and that it should be treated as such when storyboarding. I.e. when you board, think of your image as an arrangement of shapes on a flat surface, rather than a 3D scene. You can figure out the logistics and the perspective in lineart, but for storyboard, composition has to be prioritised over a well-constructed room, bc otherwise you'll just draw the same things over and over.

It depends on the pieces, but nowadays I prefer to just clean up the sketch rather than do a whole clean line on top of it, as not to lose the spontaneity and dynamism of the sketch. Lineart is about making things look pretty and nice to look at, but it's also a step where you can reinforce your initial intention with details. It can be details of anatomy (giving an expression, working on your characters' anatomy to make it expressive (what story does this body tell)), or of environment (what does this place mean for my characters, why are they here, what does it tell about them). For this I use truckloads of references!!!! Super important. Either from other artists, especially for anatomy details or line efficiency (matanai_ke, nisir0, nonebrainer on twt, whose styles I've been really digging recently), or from pictures/real life for enviros. No one's born with the ability to come up with a plausible baroque interior so get those refs! Lineart is honestly one of the steps I enjoy most, I spend the longest time on it because I need it to be perfect and tell exactly what I want to tell. I'm working on improving my linework quality because I feel terrible abt it ahjdsf

Then I do a coloursketch. My approach of colours is painterly (applying colours directly as they appear) rather than the neutral flats + coloured filters workflow, which do work great for beginners however, and I did my time in the mines with it as well asdjfh...... I usually apply an underpaint layer as shown below, usually then place lights first, and then work my way through all the elements.

Sometimes my underpaint is bright and saturated, sometimes it's more muted and darker: again, it all depends on the intention of the piece! I do this to visualise better and to contextualise the colours I'll paint on top of this base. The yellow in the top-left screenshot gives a warm touch to the wood-browns, even though they're not actually super saturated! With the bottom-right, the pink gives a colder aspect to the teals/greens and makes them more "aggressive", as it's their complementary colour. It also bears a narrative purpose: on the bottom-right screenshot, I wanted pink to seep from the edges of every shape, and purposefully left the edges jagged and rough instead of cleaning up the painting perfectly. Bright pink like this is not only a crazed colour, but it also represents Doflamingo, and in this case, it fit the intention to have him and this madness as the backdrop of a scene that doesn't involve him, but to which he is the unspoken key and center (Monet is hallucinating/projecting that it's Dof looking down on her, when it's actually Law). As if his presence was underlying the very materiality of the scene.

God that was long. Then comes rendering, which I hate with my guts because I don't know how to do it and if I could get away with only colour sketches for the rest of my life I would!!!! I hate spending time on colour details and rendering materials and polishing brushwork I just hate this step :')

And finally, compositing!! Slap some grain* on this bad boy, slight chromatic aberration in the corners if we're feeling fancy, perhaps a bit of field blur... chromatic aberration is to mimic cameras! it's a physical effect of the lens, and having it on illustrations give them a more cinematographic quality.

*in a non-destructive way I BEG!!!! Quick grain tutorial for the poor souls who still merge everything -> filter -> noise!!! 1. Create a gray layer with HSV at 0, 0, 50 2. filter -> noise as you'd normally do 3. set blending mode to overlay so your grain is more visible the darker your colours are (like for a real camera! grain is an artifact created when there isn't enough light in your captor) (I won't get into the maths of overlay but it's quite fascinating, basically it multiplies the value of pixels that are V>50 and "divides" the value of pixels that are V<50, while pixels that are V=50 like our initial grey layer, it doesn't change the value of the pixel underneath it) and 4. set opacity to ~20% depending on what you want or need

and tadah! you have an illustration. how cool!! there are still many things I need to work on, but it's a very fun exploration everytime :'D I feel glad that I've reached a point where I somewhat know what I'm doing, it made drawing so much more fun in the past year. Good luck w your own endeavours!!!

family

Previews of my SFW and NSFW pieces for @sircrocodilezine !! You can shop at opcrocodilezine.bigcartel.com 🐊🐊

bloodsport

more of these!! redraw of the cover of the album 'Bloodsport' by sneaker pimps, w dof because of course.......

six feet deep below the street the sky came crashing down

second piece for @opdoffyzine, this one was for the nsfw add-on, Heavenly Pleasure, and also in collaboration with my dearest @hazeism who wrote hawser's smolder (rated E, 1k8 words) THE most banger fic ever for me to illustrate <33 I'll never not be obsessed with Loguetown dfwn so. enjoy....

Whatever happens, the pleasure is all mine

My piece for the SFW part of @opdoffyzine! Made in collab with my dearest friend and most incredible writer @hazeism, who wrote HIPPOPOTAMUS PARADE (Rated G, 1k5 words) to go along with this piece. I said it everywhere and will say it again, I'm delighted and so, so grateful that we got to make our brains float in the same soup for a few weeks/months to create these monstrosities <3

Breaking my normal policy of no reblog on main, but since des right here decided to shoot an arrow full of love right into my heart, I'll also take the opportunity to highlight how much of a genius she is <3

For context and for nostalgia's sake, Normal, Abnormal (BruAbba, rated E, 2k9 words, finished) was, I think the Very first fanfiction that I read that made me think "who in hell decided that fanfiction is an inferior genre, this is the best written story I've read in years" and. yeah. Yeah it was ajhjdsfh...

Other works that WRECKED me are six rounds don't make a right (BruPro, rated E, 13k words, finished) and maybe even more...? I should have never asked for black leather (ProMis, background BruMis/BruPro, rated E, 15k words, finished) that is still probably the One fic that shook me up the most, ever. It's still one of my favourites, too. She says she wants her writing to feel like my art, but I ALSO want my art to feel like her writing ahdfdhs in the way all the poetry and cinematographic quality of her work flows and deliver all these feelings with a rhythm that is incredibly unique and completely mastered.

More recently I read the woods, the weaver and the wildcat (OgaTsuru, rated M, 3k2 words, finished) and god. SHE KEEPS GETTING BETTER!!!! I will always hold the JJBA pieces dear and treasure them (because as she points this is how we met!!! 4 years ago!!!!! and they influenced me so much, I was barely 3 years into drawing at that point and had no idea what I was doing lol), but the progress in her pieces is stellar. Begging all of yous who are into Baldur's Gate 3 especially to go read all of her recent fics because it'll open up your eyes to what excellent and deeply moving writing is!!! This is it idk how to wrap this up I'm emo now!!!

🎨🎨🎨🎨

🎨 ⇢ link your favourite piece of fanart and explain why you like it

Oh this is....hard lol.

Okay. Making a rule I won't link BG3 or art I've commissioned for BG3 as that's all very close to home, but I will link my biggest inspiration in art, which also spills into my writing which is on here and twitter - @pocketwei But I'm going to link twitter links as the art pieces are old and I can't easily find them here, and idk if Mei has posted them here - anyway.

These two:

I'm biased heavily towards the first one because she drew this short series of artworks inspired by my fic of the same name. But her style and emotion evoked from it stirs me so deeply. I have particular emotional attachment to these two. But even her One Piece art which I know nothing about OP or anything, or her landscapes from games I don't play, they just move me so much.

I want my writing to feel like her art, it's so narrative and heavy with feeling and meaning and there's just new things to feel and find in it everytime you look at it, even years later. And I want my writing to do that too.

Also, because we beame friends through her art and during her drawing for JJBA and these pieces just mean a lot to me for that too <3

youths

edit: not sure how popular this actually is outside of me and the 5 sickos whose Spotify I tune into occasionally but this is referenced from the SUEDE album cover by the eponymous band!!

right hand left hand

hiiiii I've been having a Grand Time lately planning out and making stuff for a potential ✨DofuWani artbook✨ so hum, I'm starting to scout interest and see possibilities for a release later this year (tentatively I'd say around September)

I'm conducting a wee interest check for physical release, that you can fill out if you're so inclined....!! kithes <3

witch's consorts

and all around the night sang out like cockatoos 🦩❄️

I'm so happy I found you here. We weren't mutuals on Twitter but I LOVED your art (and you seem like a genuinely chill person), so when i couldnt see your twitter account I kinda panicked :,) Well, that sounded weird but I hope you'll take this as the compliment it was meant to be(?) - Thanks for sharing your amazing work here too!

aldshfh anon wym weird this is incredibly sweet and kind ;; also I love how you worded this like I'm dead and departed when I am, in fact, in self-imposed social media detox jail bc I'm late on time-sensitive work, so I'll just set my twitter back up this week-end or next week when I'm done with these tasks!

Thank you lots for your thoughtful message though, I really do appreciate that you took the time and energy to write me these things <3 much love to you!!

Mister Prince for @yamiyamiart... done for AllSan gift exchange 2024 (NSFW bonus under the cut)

adding the boards here for ao3 reupload because the discord links died......... thanks discord :thumbsup:

zx again for @zhongxiaoexchange

Hey! I saw you posted that you've made the Memorabilia zine PDF free in the name of digital preservation and, I was wondering, have you considered uploading it to the Internet Archive? That way, it would be in a collection of archived digital texts. I'm not sure if it helps your Ko-fi store to get free downloads on it though, so totally understandable if it's better for you to just keep it on there instead :)

Hi! Oh actually that's a genius idea, I haven't thought about it! "helping [my] Ko-Fi" was never the intended purpose (and even the opposite, which is part of the reason why I've hesitated to make the book public for a while), and the Internet Archive is actually much more appropriate for this purpose of conservation. Thank you for the suggestion, I'll look into it

the trouble with your brother