Everything I draw ends up wearing a bow-tie

Doing these backgrounds for the comic makes me want to go to Sweden

TL:DR- when is imitation not the ultimate form of flattery?

(Answering this publicly because I’ve had similar asks before and it’s something I might as well cover for everyone. As for you zilliah, you don’t have to show me the work in question and I’m not mad at all- this is something that happens to every artist who experiments, and every artist should experiment.)

If you’re feeling uncomfortable with your work, then that’s a sign that you should take a step back and evaluate it; stop. Look. Think. What it is about it that is making you feel that way?

Learning new styles is very good for you artistically, but it isn’t the same as copying styles- of course, that is how you learn about new styles, in the beginning, but it’s crucial to move forwards from simple imitation and go on to use it as inspiration. Pick up the traits from different methods that you like and smush them together to make something new. Find something else you like, do it again. ‘The best artists steal’ doesn’t mean copyright infringement or being lazy pays off, it means you have to steal knowledge and convert it into something original. You have to steal intelligently. Do so, and you can commit the perfect crime- you can become an inspiration yourself.

Never post something that worries you. Sometimes it’s tempting to, simply because you’ve drawn it, but hold back, look at it, look for what worries you; there will be a reason for it. Do not be lazy. Do not ignore that uncomfortable feeling. Do not pass it off as you being silly. Trust your instincts. Find the reason. Learn.

If you feel as if you’ve become stuck in a rut or can’t get away from a style, try going in a completely different direction; do some more drawings in a totally different technique or a new medium, go back to your 'old’ style, see what you’ve learned that you can apply, find your groove.

Basically, if you feel like something looks too much like someone else’s work, then it isn’t your work. I don’t mean that in the sense that they will hunt you down and skin you for copying them, I mean that it will not feel right for you, and will never feel right until you figure out what the problem is. Nobody is going to force you to, the challenge is to overcome the inclination to let it be because hopefully nobody will notice. Don’t give in to apathy; you’re better than that, prove it.

Don’t limit yourself to one style, but don’t copy- learn. Kick your butt back into drawing pictures that feel like your own work so you can shove it in people’s faces and say OI. LOOK AT WHAT I DID. I DID THIS.

Righto, carry on then.

A little TLDR spree, don’t mind me.

Just an observation that’s niggled me for a while, I guess.

I’ve just been catching up on a bunch of webcomics that I read, and occasionally I would delve down into the comments.

I know, I know, you’re already saying; Mod, really, comments? What do you expect? This is the internet. Reading the comments and then complaining is like sticking your hand in a blender and then wondering why your fingers are so short.

It’s okay, I’m not talking about hate or creepers or anything like that, but it’s something that I’ve seen all over the place, and it just, I don’t know, I’ve never understood it.

It’s the people that will find that one mistake; that one tiny, insignificant continuity flaw that the artist has missed (a seam here, a pocket there, a flower with a different number of petals from before), and they jump at it like a rabid piranha that hasn’t seen a side of meat for a month. Sometimes it’s passive aggressive “hey what happened to the ***? snark snark”, or just overt waving of the hand “OH HEY MISS, MISS YOU DID THAT WRONG, HEY EVERYONE LOOK THEY DID IT WRONG”, and I just find it morbidly fascinating.

Do people actively enjoying doing that? Do people actually spend time looking for these mistakes? It’s like going to a museum hoping to find some crack in a marble statue to insert a crowbar into it. Stranger still, when they find a mistake (and it is inevitable that there will be mistakes to find), it’s as if they expect some sort of reward, or feel some sort of achievement for having found it.

Does anyone else see how bizarre this is? Or is it just me? Is it just me that marvels at this obsessive scrutiny that ultimately does nothing save make the artist feel bad about themselves, whilst this hoarder of misplaced artifacts revels in some sad, distant, sardonic glee at having triumphed once again against the person creating what they (presumably) love? Or why else would they be looking at it in the first place?

I don’t know, I’ve just never understood it. I don’t think it makes me angry, I’m not sure what it makes me, bewildered? Disappointed, perhaps. It just strikes me as a fantastic example of why humans are and always will be complete idiots.

Yours truly included, mind you.

In conclusion;

Augh I can’t get a photo of it but my fingers are cracking from (failing at) playing guitar

does this mean I get to be a cool kid now?

Can I join the club yet?

No?

O-okay…

I friggin hate cleaning up animation.

SO

I will chose one thing to draw that lands in my ask box within the next hour

so that for the next hour I will clean up this freaking animation and have something to look forward to when I come back.

You’re only allowed one suggestion so MAKE IT A GOOD ‘UN CHAPS.

Look. No. Just, no. I appreciate the interest but really, stop. There is absolutely nothing that you can say to persuade me to

I hate you.

So much.