art

sometimes, it's even theirs. (ask if you need anything tagged)

[apartasme]

block #no ID to avoid posts without image descriptions.

#my art -> art that is mine

#sketches -> what it says on the tin. less thought than what's put in for netches.

#netches → more thought than what's put in for sketches. inspired by the concept of the noodle.

#completed art -> arbitrary polish tag.

#my not art → anything that's not art but is still mine

Click the tags below instead for more mobile-accessible links ↓

theyearhathlept → sacrificialalt → apartasme

[ot3]

as annoying and off the mark as i find the truly hardline obsessive anti AI people i do like watching tech companies lose money and their ceos whine about it. wahhh wahh people don't actually want our product and it's hurting our bottom line and people online are meaaaan about it. ok dipshits isnt that the free market y'all're so obsessed with. try making shit that doesnt suck

[captainstarburst]

this is not to say you shouldn't make characters with strabismus- you should! i want to see people with my disabilities! but i think a little research can go a long way. i'd love to see it given more depth in writing than just being an indicator of intelligence (which it isn't and never has been!)

[piercingcomet]

[ID: graphic titled "THIS IS A VISUAL IMPAIRMENT CALLED 'STRABISMUS'!!"

below, are four drawings of a very fluffy creature with different presentations of strabismus. they're each labelled "hypotropia (eye points downward)," "exotropia (eye points outward)," "hypertropia (eye points upward," and "esotropia (eye points inward)."

the last has an arrow, with text reading "i looked like this when i was born!"

bottom text: it's not a quirky character design, it's a real disability!

it does not mean someone is clumsy, "stupid," or autistic

(ableist depictions of autistic and/or otherwise intellectually disabled people often have strabismus. why do you think this is?)

strabismus can occur from birth, later in life due to separate visual impairments, or because of physical trauma or strokes. it can cause permanent vision issues.

i'm partially blind in one eye!

when you design a character, think about if the traits you give them exist on real people! they often do!

what do you want your art to say about disabled people?

/end ID]

[ot3]

just because my art is not very good or interesting that doesn't mean i should have to work a real job instead of doing it. life is so unfair. i don't want to babysit customers i want to go draw or carve my new linoblock or fold more of my cranes or something sniffle sniffle

[eveligne]

I programmed an AI image generator with a soul so she can feel sad when you commission a human artist

[eveligne]

I created her as a rhetorical tool but I’ve been spending a lot of time comforting her without ever relieving her pain and now I’m rather fond of the thing. That’s motherhood.

[hannahlockillustration]

Added some recent drawings and print pre-orders on my Etsy!

[084392]

"what would she think of me now?"

[urgetocreate]

Felicity House (British), Blue Portrait, 2025, Pastel on paper

[pavora-art]

Backyard pen sketchin

[ninekills]

nikaido

[polkadotmotmot]

Elena Wuest - An afternoon Tea, 2026 - Oil on canvas

[yay-bunnies-zone]

sweet as fuck nice bunny

[taylor-titmouse]

taylor titmouse's guide for improving your itchio store page

(The Night Guest)

a few years ago i wrote a big angry post about how bad people are at marketing their own work and what they can do to be better at it. since then, the advice about twitter has largely become unnecessary and irrelevant, but the advice about what information you should be putting on your product page is still important and [through gritted teeth] nobody's fucking doing it.

so this post is going to be a step by step break down of what you can do to improve your itchio store pages to make them more informative and customer friendly. you're reading this because you 🫵 want to learn and improve. or you're just curious and/or like it when i yell. but either way taking my advice is your choice and if you don't feel like doing any of it you don't have to, much like nobody has to buy your books. if you've ever lamented why nobody buys your work but you're not making it easy for them to do so, it's 🫵 your fault and you annoy me immensely. take responsibility for your bad business practices.

anyway, let's make you better okay?

(and also note that all the store pages i'm using as examples are for adult works, but there's no explicit images in this post. you'll only see anything if you click through the links)

BANNERS

you probably already clicked and read through that image up there, because it was big and eye-catching and at the top of the post. i fucking Got you. that is, ideally, what the banner will do. while the banner is not strictly necessary, it's a "well, why not have one?" situation. it makes the page look more deliberately designed, and it's a great additional sample of what the customer can expect from your work.

if your product doesn't feature art, simply making an image with the title will also work well, as i've done here for A Hundred Hungry Mouths. that book didn't have enough interior illustrations to justify burning one for the banner, so i left the cover out of the "screenshots" field and edited it to be the banner instead. simple!

(if you don't want to figure out a good banner size yourself, mine are 1120 x 325 pixels with transparent, rounded corners)

BOOK COVER

i think this one is a no brainer. i hope to god it is a no brainer. if your book has a cover, make sure it's set as the first screenshot (if you're not doing the banner tech i mentioned above). i won't advise you on what a good book cover is, because that's a whole other post and wildly subjective. but you should have one. even if it's a sketch collection. even if it's just an illustration from the sketchbook with a title edited on. it will look so much better than nothing.

hopefully you also already know that though, so here's some itchio specific advice. what itchio considers the cover is actually the thumbnail that displays elsewhere on the site. you are much better off making a discrete edit for this rather than uploading the actual cover. compare the thumbnails i made by hand for r/l monroe's books vs the thumbnails for the early books i didn't bother with.

one of these looks professional. one of these looks lazy, and there's a reason that section is relegated to the very bottom of my page. if you don't want to go the length of a bespoke thumbnail, take your book cover (or whatever illustration you want to use) and set your square selection tool to a fixed aspect ratio of 6.3 W to 5 H. find a good crop, then resize it to 630x500. perfect thumbnail.

SAMPLES

this is the thing that makes me the angriest. it makes me SO angry. so many of you are out there making your store pages, trying to sell me prose writing or your comics or your artbooks, and then not showing me any of your work. i'm grabbing you. i'm shaking you. what is your fucking problem. what are you THINKING. have you ever bought a book at the store without reading a little first? would you buy a graphic novel without flipping through the first few pages to see if you like the style? no?

SO WHY DO YOU EXPECT ME TO? WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

this is so basic. i should not have to keep telling people this but it keeps happening. PUT A FUCKING SAMPLE UP. TAKE SCREENSHOTS OF THE FIRST PAGES OF YOUR WRITING. GIVE ME THE FIRST FEW PAGES OF YOUR COMIC. SHOW ME AN ILLUSTRATION OR TWO FROM THE ARTBOOK.

they don't even have to be the full thing! with my artbook collections, i'll pick a few crops and make one condensed promotional image. or i'll take one good one and slap a banner over it. i put something. you can check out different examples/styles of this on The Womanulet, Poker Night with the Arizona Dogs, and Return to Shadow.

for all of my prose writing, i include at least the first 1-3 pages of the book. you are actually delusional if you are a prose writer and you're trying to sell your book on the cover and pitch alone. you have to show me that you can write, and give me a chance to tell if i'd like it. i cannot think of a good reason not to. if you're embarrassed to have any of the writing public, you should not be selling it. if you don't want to give any of it away for free, get your head out of your ass. who do you think you are. there is no good reason not to include a sample and i don't know why so many of you don't.

OKAY THINGS GOT A BIT HEATED THERE SO LET'S TALK ABOUT TEXT

we're going to cover sales copy now. it's hard to write. it is absolutely miserable to write. but you have to. if you're trying to sell me a story, you have to tell me what it is and who it's about. who is our protagonist? what challenge are they facing, or what are they setting out to do? who will they encounter, and what might happen to them? you don't have to tell me the whole story, but you should set my expectations. let's break down the example pictured above, from The Night Guest.

Ever since the death of her husband, Mrs. Arakawa has run her inn alone. There's never been a guest the seasoned innkeeper couldn't handle… but she's never had to host a hungry oni. It'll take all her wits and wiles to survive the night in his service--or else she may find herself in his mouth.

in three sentences, i've established who the book is about, the conflict, and the sexual hook. there's a sexy widow, there's a scary oni, and they're probably going to fuck nasty style by the end of the book. that's enough to get the idea of what this is and whether you'd like it. it can be difficult to know how to pitch a story without spoiling it, so this is something that takes observation from other books, and practice. it is hard! i hate doing it! but it's vitally important to getting the reader onboard with your work.

but mr. titmouse! you cry. i'm not selling a story! i'm selling an artbook!

okay. you can still tickle my balls about what's in there. here's another example from my hades 2 artbook Return to Shadow.

Sometimes there are games that, had we been born into a better timeline, would prominently feature awesome sex. Bad endings, romance scenes, flagrant eroticism. Hades 2 is one of those games--beautiful, fun, and with monster designs that deserve to be appreciated for the fantastic fuckmobs they are. Together, we can imagine this better timeline.

it's a bit more slick, a bit more sales pitchy, but that's fine. there is no narrative here beyond 'boy i sure wish hades 2 had porn in it'. i'm enticing you into a space. it's a book of hades 2 porn. don't you also want to look at hades 2 porn? wouldn't that be awesome? i think it's awesome. i want you to also think it's awesome. you (as author) should be convincing your potential customer that what you want to share with them is awesome.

THE INFORMATIONAL PARAGRAPH

whether you find this one necessary depends on the work. i think it's always a good idea to have somewhere to give contextual information about your thing, and if you're working in erotica you've got to have somewhere to put your features and warnings. this is also a good place to put your comps and inspirations--a good way to set your reader's expectations. basically, anything that doesn't fit into the narrative pitch, you'd put here.

here's an example from Chique: The Sunken City:

Chique: The Sunken City is inspired by RPGs and hentai games, and contains three short stories, each an encounter with a denizen of Sodden, exploring different associated kinks and fetishes. Books in this series have no reading order.

tells you what vibe the book has, that there are three different stories within the book, and that it can be read without reading any other books in the series. straightforward, easy to understand. no problem.

for adult books you don't have to be 100% thorough when listing out the featured kinks, it's okay to just hit the highlights. i've become somewhat agnostic about this in the era of "if you even mention a naughty word we'll Get you" internet. but i would suggest you put as much as you feel comfortable revealing, and what would be most attractive to a reader. you don't have to list every individual sex act, just remember that this is part of your advertising. you want the person who's really into what you're cooking to know that it's on the menu.

THE OTHER LITTLE INFORMATIONAL PARAGRAPH

this is self explanatory. please tell me how many pages there are of your comic or art book. tell me the wordcount for your prose. MOST of you are already good about this and don't need me to tell you to do this. but if you weren't already doing this, a) i don't understand you b) start doing it.

I THINK THAT'S MOSTLY IT

you've been so brave and tough for letting me yell at you this far down your dashboard. i hope you've learned something and will change your behavior for the better. i want you to make money. okay? i yell at you like this because i want you to make money. i want to GIVE you money. but you have to make it easier for me.

to wrap up, here are my other general pieces of advice to make your itchio page look and function better

if there are multiple books in the series, put a link to the rest of them somewhere on the page. i put them at the bottom, as you can see on this Roger book from the middle of the series.

i personally prefer itchio pages that are styled for dark mode. black always looks good in the background, and #232323 gives you a nice neutral gray for the text area. however, making the page match the palette of your book cover is also a good choice, so long as you keep it legible. no white text on light backgrounds and vice versa.

bare minimum, make the links the same color as your cover. it will immediately tie the page together and make everything look more deliberate. the less 'i made this in two minutes and left everything default' you can make your page look, the better. have some pride, you know?

not an itchio specific piece of advice but ohhhh my god put your links in your bio. put your links in your BIO. PUT THEM IN YOUR PINNED POST. PUT THEM SOMEWHERE!!!! you cannot expect me to scroll your account to find links you posted a week ago! or even an hour ago! put it in your bio or pinned post!! do not make me work to give you money! you are wasting valuable self-promotion space on DNIs that nobody cares about.

okay that's it. that's everything. you made it all the way to the bottom. i'm so proud of you. slaps your ass. now get back out there and fix your shit.

(if you found this helpful, how about buying one of my freakin' books?)

[kelpforestdwellers]

Ok this is a long shot but, crafts minded people, can anyone think of any crafts that fit this absurdly stringent list of requirements?

Can be done in low light.

Can be done lying down flat.

No mess, ie paint or small beads that could get lost in a bed.

Can be done in intervals of 5-10 minutes - easy to put down and pick back up without messing it up.

Does not require a lot of arm movement - can be done with just hands, with upper arms and elbows at rest.

All necessary items can fit in a fairly small pouch, like a pencil case or toiletry bag, to remain self contained and take up minimal space.

Setup and takedown takes a couple minutes max.

Learning curve is cognitively gentle, ie no complex knitting math type thing.

Please feel free to reblog and appreciate any suggestions. It's difficult finding fulfilling activities compatible with my disabilities!

[kelpforestdwellers]

Ahhh I didn't expect so many responses! 😭 Thank you all so much! I can't wait to start looking into them in more detail.

For now I'll just clarify - lying flat on back or side. If I could lie on my stomach that would open up a lot of options because it would be much easier to look down at something I'm doing in front of me with my hands.

And I'd be able to lay the activity down on a surface and use both my hands to engage with it. As it stands, I need to be able to both hold up the activity where I can see it (if it's vision dependent) and do the activity at the same time.

[kelpforestdwellers]

Bonus points if it involves music or sound! Maybe I should learn to play the ocarina.

[kelpforestdwellers]

I can't convey how touched and grateful I am that so many people offered so many applicable ideas. I feel like my life could open up in ways that I didn't think were possible.

I've picked just one to start with. I want to try everything! But I am now too old and sensible to indulge that impulse. I'll start with one, and if that becomes habit or doesn't work out I'll try something else.

Not gonna say which one yet, because I think there's some truth in the concept that talking about something you're gonna do in advance can sap the motivation to actually do it, by prematurely triggering the internal reward signals.

I would also take it as a personal kindness if you would consider reblogging this. You all have created a treasure trove in the comments that can be life changing for people in situations like mine, and I would love for them to get the chance to see it. I have very specific requirements but I'm sure many of these ideas would be helpful for people in a variety of circumstances.

[captainstarburst]

this is not to say you shouldn't make characters with strabismus- you should! i want to see people with my disabilities! but i think a little research can go a long way. i'd love to see it given more depth in writing than just being an indicator of intelligence (which it isn't and never has been!)

[necrolita]

[ghoti-and-us]

Shaun Tan - Moonfish