Thinkings

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When I was a kid, my mom said a lot of wise things. But a few of them I was both paying attention when she said them and absorbing her meaning. One of these was probably because she repeated it at us a few times, probably about school and chores, and likely also when weContinue reading “Never Say Never”

One of my favorite Youtubers shared this (video below). While I do think there are *times* to try new things and dabble, I think I’ve felt relieved at axing the idea of trying to commit to everything all the time in my areas of interest! This is some great advice. I noticed something similar whenContinue reading “Grow Vertically”

Thoughts from the front line in the battle against entropy (journal entry 2018- republishing for a self reminder!) As a young mom and a pretty freshly minted keeper of my own home, I did the best I knew how. But there are things about keeping house beyond the chores that I wish I had understood.Continue reading “Keep It Simple, Sweetheart”

What’s up? I have these links in my pocket and I figure maybe I can just leave them here for other creators to use. Sometimes I need a free photo to make an image banner or to put a little visual interest on an article, or I want a certain resource to inspire a sketch,Continue reading “Free Image Resources”

Nikki recommends the Art Squirrel’s blog about digital art programs, ft Parrots. So many parrots.

Teach me to Draw! There is a lost vocabulary of drawing that it seems most art teaching has forgotten to formally impart any longer. I have a sense that this was more common practice in formal art schooling in some bygone era, since it seems to be common knowledge to a lot of old schoolContinue reading “THE AVDP Drawing Textbook”

I didn’t know these existed!!! As a frequent Krita user I’m very excited about these two *major* time savers. It’s not even so much the time they save as the peace of mind! In the first tip, he shows how you can set a save point to reopen a working set of tabs! This meansContinue reading “Tips and Tricks: Two Ways to Save Time in Krita”

We are stories begetting more stories, begetting more stories. Today a friend was writing some fiction with me and she bemoaned that we were coming to the end of the tale we had been developing over the past months. As I handed off part of the story for her to resolve, she said that itContinue reading “Stories Beget Stories”

Bobby Chiu shares a quick explanation of his experience between when knowledge in the specific field of art he was interested in was scarce, compared to the fire hose of today’s internet, with a hopeful note, not just a kids-these-days conclusion.

The following is an excerpt from a short story, in a book I set down and just picked up reading again. The period of the piece is during WWI. I found reading it was like suspending time through this comparison of sound— stillness vs activity. Yellow Leaves We weren’t expecting the noise. Could have hadContinue reading “Yellow Leaves”

Commission image for Exhausted Pigeon

When I was a teen, I found this book in the center aisle of a grocery store when shopping with my mom. Reading through it made me cry (I loved chickens and kept pet hens) as I sympathized for Dora who watched all the other animals with their babies before returning to her boring eggs…Continue reading “Influence: Dora’s Eggs”

Quotes from Ian McCaig

One of my all time, hands down, favorite resources for learning digital art. Simple, elegant solution. And you get to name the amount you want to pay for it, including free. How can you beat that?

Prose Fiction: child of poetry and journalism

I haven’t gotten ahead at all in planning or prepping anything for Learnuary, so let me just share a few videos that have struck a chord with me lately, concerning learning to draw and improving at it. Sycra has a whole series of videos called “What I Wish I Knew About” which is wonderful becauseContinue reading “Feel the Learn 2021”

The summer of 2020 was supposed to have allowed us more time to create and work on things. But like so many, I felt like I was mostly walking around in a fugue. Our household activities contracted into a bubble of a few contacts, but remained fairly active and in need of our parental involvement.Continue reading “Living”

I want to share one little epiphany from this manual called Creating Short Fiction by Damon Knight. It’s about you and Fred.

Commission: Darth Serus

Learnuary 2020: How to Cultivate a Wise Reader (advice I gleaned from Orson Scott Card’s book)

I’ve tried NaNoWriMo and I’ve tried Inktober. I’ve even tried a fun one called Story-a-day-in-May (which I might give another chance, actually). And even after a few attempts over the years, I’ve never gotten much out of them. I sort of look over the lovely things others make and remind myself that the trend ofContinue reading “Learnuary is Here”

The Etherington Brothers put out some wonderful FREE resources! They’re really fun to look at and they’re very compact and too the point, aiming to show you visually what they are thinking while they construct or represent things. The link below goes to a page of two hundred easy tutorial pages. Make sure when youContinue reading “Etherington Brothers Cool resource for artists!”

Commission: Voice of Sharon

Commission: Bomoor Thort

A sketch for a little artist’s challenge:

Commission: Doril

completed 4-10-19 I don’t have recent experience with vector art, or any interest in developing vector program skills at this time, but I’m up for painted logos! I will paint them at a high res so they can be reduced for different applications. Logo painting is charged by the hour ($15 per as of thisContinue reading “DagBeleGardian Painted Logo”

Commission: Amare