#i'm starting work next week so i'm anticipating less time to draw. but i haven't been drawing all that much lately anyway | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

zarvasace · 7 months

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PROGRESS POST

(10/4/23)

This is partly for accountability and partly just to get all this out of my head! This last month or two have felt so hectic, getting used to a new work and sleep schedule and all. I'm still not quite there.

If you're curious about what I've been working on and what my plans are in terms of writing and art for the rest of the year, read on. :)

I will say, though, that if you want more of a specific AU or story, the way to get it is by asking questions and leaving comments! Asks and comments remind me about things I'm doing and get me excited about them again! I have these plans, but I also am very good at chasing inspiration to unknown (and sometimes unimportant) corners!

By Fandom

Linked Universe Projects

I've been feeling less motivated to work on LU stuff, but I still plan on at least finishing what I have open, so you can look forward to some of that!

Writing

Disability AU—one small mobility trio fic in the works. A few vague ideas for doing backstory fics.

Council (1931 vampire AU)—this is still the "backburner to backburner" fic, but I do have some fun ideas. I just have been distracted with other things! I think this AU is a lot of fun and I'd love to do more with it. We'll have to see.

The Marvelous Misadventures of Wind and His Merry Band of Maybe-Human Misfits—chapter 7 (out of 9 or so) is in progress. I have it all outlined out, and it's fun to work on, but I have (again) been distracted! This is, I hope, going to be my main December project. It'd be nice to finish before it turns 2 years old next summer. Oops.

I have several other WIPs that aren't very exciting and probably won't see daylight, but they're there if I feel like them

Art

Coloring book—I'm part of the coloring book project! :) I have already finished 1/2 drawings, and they went so well, I'm considering doing more.

Shatterproof manga page—still on my radar! I'm doing the end scene from dazzling diamond danger, and my ambition keeps outgrowing my time.

Four Swords Projects

Writing

Fairytale AU—man I've started this Vidow BatB fic literally five times. I have an almost-complete draft sitting at like... 20k?? iirc, but I kind of hate a lot of it. I also like a lot of it. It's a bit difficult for me to work on rewriting something in that situation. Anyway. Another December thing probably.

Fright Fight—I have ideas for every week, but am currently unsure if I want to draw or write for them. Most of my October will be focused on filling these prompts!

Vampire Lords AU—I have strange as severe is this my fate open right now, with a fair amount of material... it just needs to be edited a bit. I do want to keep working on that, I've just... well. Distraction. A common theme. XD I might be feeling another little bite fic coming on, too.

Art

Fright Fight—see above

Fright Fight part 2—I have a few side things to do for this, like making graphics that I haven't quite finished yet. They shouldn't take long, I just gotta do em!

Non-Fandom

Stickers—I am in the process of drawing some stickers! Yay! These are for my work, but also just for me. I want some Halloween stickers. This is a backburner project.

Nanowrimo project—I need to spend some time figuring out a few things to really get going on my princess-verse. I'm going to be doing Nanolympics this year, so hopefully some of their preptober stuff will help!

Hearts Linked Together—my super-cool Linkverse. XD I love my dumb timeline, and all the characters, they're just filler drawings that I haven't had time to continue.

Secret Zelda project—I really really need to do this! I can't say much right now, but it involves a fair amount of work, both writing and art. I think I haven't gotten very far on it yet because I'm intimidated. Stop that.

Zine edits—I worked really really hard on an art piece for a LoZ zine coming up! This week is critique, and I anticipate a few edits later.

By Month

Facebook posts—a lady I know wants to commission pretty quote images to post on her Facebook. I need to reply to her text. And do them.

September

I primarily worked on the fic Blood-Sucker's Guide to High School. I also worked on and submitted one fic and one piece of art to two different zines, which I hope you'll see soon.

October

If you care, you may have noticed I'm not doing Whumptober this year! Part of this is because I'm a bit burned out from the above, and part of it is that the prompts just didn't seem very inspiring to me this year. Maybe that's just my mindset. I haven't been in a very whumpy mood.

I'm planning on filling weekly prompts for @fsfrightfight this month and maybe chipping away at some other fics, in addition to one more zine contribution. I'm also going to be planning for November and doing some scattered art work here and there.

November

NaNoWriMo! I considered skipping this... but I'm feeling really inspired and motivated to do it, especially with October as a break. I'm going to write some original work, and that will be the focus of my November. I'll likely get some other art done, too.

December

I hope to dedicate this month to finishing things up from this year! That means working on "backburner" projects.

#i speak from the coffin

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pioneeroverc-my-5000th-sideblog · 3 years

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so uhhhhhhh it's time for another HOW MUCH DID I FAIL AT IMPROVING? check! In the four months since my first check I did studies 7/16 weeks, had art block 4/16 weeks and did some sort of 'finished' personal art 12/16 weeks (obviously these aren't mutually exclusive). That's less than the previous period (12/14 weeks of study/5 weeks of art block - not that art block is a desirable thing), but I feel like I did get more out of it this time by building on stuff I'd already learnt.

Study-wise, I did 1.5 (almost) lessons of Drawabox, 100 heads, learned how to construct heads with the Loomis method, some work from Arthur Dow's book on composition, and 50 film thumbnails, along with a bunch of random situational 'how does this work' things like landscapes, rocks and a bunch of hands for no particular reason. I also did 30 minutes of figure drawing on 31 days, usually in streaks of 5-7 days in a row and then nothing for weeks D: BUT any progress is good progress!

The biggest struggle I face is being unmotivated to do anything, and especially studying as it has EXTREMELY negative connotations in my mind. I'm currently looking for a way to reframe that because, as long as I have the space to figure out my own revelations, I actually really enjoy learning things - there's just a really big mental energy tax to pay to get started because my brain hates the idea. I've recently (in the past month or so) found a lot of success in making my studies more tailored towards something I want to work on, but I still need to push on with the very basic fundamentals (Drawabox) and that's... slow going. I'd drop it if I wasn't seeing results, but my sense of 3D space is really improving AGH

On to the improvement metrics!

Anatomy/gesture: doing a lot better with gesture in sketches, but it doesn't translate over into finished stuff yet - learning a lot through doing those 30min figure drawing sessions. Structure is getting better. Taking into account the fact that I'm currently shifting my whole 3D worldview/approach around, I'd say that this has improved more than last year.

Backgrounds/perspective: haven't particularly practiced this, but getting better at drawing more complex stuff. Probably around the same as last year.

Composition/storytelling: making some bolder choices. Worse than last year though

Colours/values: not sure I've improved here. Struggling more with values, I guess because my shading is getting more complex. Worse than last year.

Lighting/rendering: improving as I get a better sense of 3D space. Prob about the same as last year but I did less painting this year so that's good

Plan of action for the next four months: DO BETTER!

In January 2022, I want to look back at my art progress and feel satisfied that I've 1/ managed to find more interest in studying and 2/ tried to get to 80% 'good' with the stuff I've finished, which will naturally mean using more references and learning. I'll try to do one 'big' piece per month, but also sketch (and post) a lot more since that gives me a lot of variety and I've improved rapidly doing it in the past.

I'll try to remember to track art block/study every week and aim for 10/16 weeks of studies, with a supplemental 50 days of figure drawing (just the 30min sessions). I anticipate that I'll be able to get close to this figure as I'm getting better at 'picking myself up' after art block and depressive episodes. Just need to keep doing it and it'll get easier.

#art improvement #end of four months

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