I Am Very Small and I Have No Money

Hello! Tired artist & writer with ADHD & too many hobbies. Blog may be multifandom w/ very sporadic updates.

[wildersfanart]

something like a homecoming

[shirecorn]

How I Study Anatomy

Everyone says NEVER TRACE!! THAT'S ART THEFT! Ok but we can do a little crime in the name of Learning.

Trace to learn, not to earn.

I like to take my own photos, but you can study whatever you want. Link back to original photos, and don't post copied artwork unless the artist is dead, cool with it, or both.

As always with learning, start every sketch with the intent to throw it away (trash for paper, quitting without saving for digital) This takes the pressure off and lets you make Bad Art, which is very important.

So let's make Bad Art of a Deer because I happen to have one handy

Start with a photo of your subject in a nice/neutral pose with all four feet visible. (so not like me)

Freehand copy it. Try not to stylize, focusing instead of matching proportions and pose. Don't get too detailed!

It's ok if your art looks terrible and has broken legs. I've drawn LOTS of deer so I have a leg up. Everyone's art sucks in their own eyes and here's where mine went wrong:

Either lasso-distort (recommended for beginners) or redraw a copy of your first sketch with your reference behind it (scaled to match the main body of your sketch)

Put the original and modified sketches together and compare the differences. Write it down if you want. This shows you where your eyes saw things the wrong size, so you can correct for that next time.

After learning about both deer and yourself, try freehand copying again.

Marvel at your newfound knowledge and skill!

but there's always room for improvement

You can stop here and move on to your real drawing, Or do another freehand-fix-compare cycle. I actually overcorrected my "draws heads too big" and veered into "heads too small."

Another note on tracing: Learning HOW to trace is more important than anything you could learn By tracing. Draw the Anatomy, not the outline. In real life, things don't have outlines, they have bones.

These are from the same shoot which is extra useful for consistency. The lines are minimal and follow where the animals joints are, and only important parts are drawn.

You won't know what Important Parts means right off the bat, which is where in-depth study comes in. You need to do learn the hard parts to do the easy parts right.

Next up: how to study bones and muscles.

[shirecorn]

How to study Bones and Muscles

"Study the anatomy study the anatomy" but they never tell you HOW. It's not "read a book," It's more like flailing around wildly and crashing your browser from too many tabs.

This is going to be about How to Make a bones and muscle chart. Because even if your art sucks, you learn so much more by doing than by seeing.

References I gathered: X X X X X X X X

Get Set up. Get a photo, like above, but it doesn't have to be the same photo. And now... gather reference.

We'll start with bones. Search up "[animal] skeleton" and get photos or super scientific illustration. Add in things like "top view" to spice it up.

Next, search "[animal] skeleton sketchfab." This pulls up 3D models that you can rotate in your browser. Remember that these are art and the anatomy is only as good as the artist, so pick a good one.

Time for bone!

The spine is the most important, and in a lot of animals it will surprise you. Draw it in over your photo and then add spikes because skeletons are punk. These are not scientific and I didn't count them because their number doesn't matter to art. So you better be referencing from scientists and not me!

The rest of the bones and some notes. These are my notes to myself about things I want to remember. My personal discoveries in anatomy that made my art better. You can make the same notes but also make sure you have your own thoughts on there as well. that's how you help yourself the best. Be as detailed or vague as you want.

Same deal with muscle. Here are my personal notes to myself. Label stuff that is important to you. I actually grouped a bunch of muscles together based on what is visible from the outside. Muscles are way more complicated than this, but Baby's First Anatomy Chart gets to be simple.

This is good enough for me because I have intimate knowledge of the other muscles working under and over these ones. Feel free to add as many or as few muscles as you like. You chart your own course.

This is very VERY much not an anatomical chart. I'm sure there's nerds out there pulling their hair out looking at this. But listen, it works for art!

And you know the wildest part about this?

I don't need to look at it to use it. The act of making your own anatomy chart puts that knowledge in your brain. Like how you can make "cheat sheets" even for tests that don't allow them - the act of making the sheet helps you remember what you struggle with most.

And after all that complexity? Your simplification will be based on Real Knowledge and you'll put those random circles in the right spots.

Look at all this hard work you've done. Eventually this will be second nature to you.

Show me what you make! I'd love to see what creatures yall make anatomy charts of.

[shirecorn]

Photo Reference Packs

I put together some photo packs and uploaded them to my gumroad. You can use them and this guide to study! So far there's only a Doe and a Fawn pack, but if I get sales I will put in the effort to do more for deer, horses, cats, birds, and anything else I can point my camera at.

Doe Pack

Fawn Pack

[fakelawyerbug]

I've seen a bunch of "fandom etiquette" posts on my dash today and I'm going to say something that is maybe going to be unpopular but;

The absolutely pervasive mentality that unwanted criticism or critique shouldn't be given and should be ignored is why fans of color don't stay in fan spaces.

And I am not going to mince words here:

A lot of you are racist. A lot of your fan works are racist.

That might have been difficult to hear. And if it was, you should probably reflect on why that was.

"Fandom etiquette" has created a space where fans of color either bite our tongues and eventually leave or say something, get dogged on, and then eventually leave.

So much of "fandom etiquette" seems to be about insulating creatives from Feeling Bad and hostility to any kind of negative feedback is a pretty big contributor to why bigotry festers in these spaces.

[iridescentoracle]

#imo the potluck analogy applies- it would be rude to critique someone's icing technique at a potluck bc it wasn't as good as at the bakery #but if they had decorated their cupcakes w hate symbols it wouldn't be rude to tell them that's gross and gtfo #in fact it would be inappropriate to NOT say anything in that situation #or to complain that another guest who did point it out was 'ruining everyone's potluck' #and pointing out racism in fan works is 100% the second thing not the first! (via destructions-daughter)

[shijiujun]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY XIE LIAN ❤️

[unadulteratedhideouttrash]

[samdrzn]

So a few years ago I had this idea where SY introduces DnD to QJP as "strategy training" and SQH ends up coming over every week or so to be the DM. (Ofc all of the scenarios are written by SQH) (under SY's supervision bc you can't trust that man) and SY helps with monster-related stuff and convincing YQY to let SQH spend more time outside of An Ding Peak (or smth idk)

Anyway 3 years later here's a short comic inspired by this idea

(MF plays the wizard, NYY the barbarian, and LBH the paladin)

[wiisagi-maiingan]

Hi people who work janitorial positions, as housekeepers, as waste collectors, in factories, in construction, as mechanics, and all the other vitally important jobs that keep our society churning but that no one ever wants to talk about. I love you. I hope your employers and your unions are keeping you safe and that you're getting compensated fairly and getting benefits.

[socialpants]

There's an awful trend in reading that's this CinemaSins kind of rejection of abstract concepts and suspension of disbelief, that makes people say it's bad writing when authors use descriptions that aren't immediately one to one with physical reality.

Like it's bad when a "tattoo is undulating" (as opposed to... "drawn in a wave like pattern on the skin"?), or when hair is "wet wheat from a late Summer field" (as opposed to "sort of brownish light yellow that dries lighter, but is not actual wheat stalks growing on someone's head but kind of reminiscent of the color and texture"?), or when when ice cream tastes like midnight at the fair" (as opposed to "ice cream flavour bringing back memories of undefined ice cream flavours that are individually popular but always tied to a memory of late evening at the fair ground and probably smelling vaguely like popcorn and sugar"?).

Please. We have to get back to understanding abstract descriptions that evoke feelings and memories and mental images or things we haven't experienced yet. This hyper utilitarian way of reading and judging text is killing fiction. it's robbing you of experiencing things you haven't actually personally experienced.

[aquilacalvitium]

I remember learning what similes and metaphors were when I was like ten

Do people not learn what those are anymore or have they just forgotten?

[valtsv]

this is going to sound like such a little sibling ass take but i genuinely believe that being a little bit annoying is actually a greater sign of maturity and self awareness than being universally likeable and on good terms with everyone

[valtsv]

if some people find me annoying and can't stand me because of how i think and act then that means i'm a fully realized human being with my own personality and opinions and free will and not just a reflective surface for other people's desires, which is in fact a good thing despite what people who want you to just be a reflection of their own opinions and desires will tell you, and why being considered "cringe" or whatever doesn't bother me at all

[valtsv]

also it's really funny when you're confident enough in yourself to know that people not liking you isn't always a sign that you're the problem. like there's something undeniably hilarious about being aware your mere existence has the power to piss someone off and ruin their day and i recommend embracing it.

[spice-ghouls]

[teaboot]

Oh fucking thissss

[professorsparklepants]

I've made this post like six times but it still fucks me up the China's mountains just look like that. Like I spent decades thinking it was stylistic but no, they just have different mountains over there.

[professorsparklepants]

For reference, here's what my local mountains look like:

Here's the general art style Chinese mountains are drawn in:

And here's how some of them actually look:

[dreamsequencer]

What the FUCK

[adelicateculturecell]

I’m specifically reblogging this here because I know there is a geological reason for this and I know at least one of you has to know it.

[tharkflark1]

thank you 

[sepdet]

Let’s jack up Florida a mile so that instead of forming sinkholes it does this!

Here’s another karst formation you’ve probably seen:

Aka Pūtangirua Pinnacles in Aotearoa, when Post isn’t getting funky with filters

[Wikipedia]

Here’s some in Madagascar.

[Wikipedia, Tsingy de Bemaraha, Madagascar]

Karst is also responsible for most cave formations, from stalactites and stalagmites to cenotes in the Yucatan:

[cc] Jorge S Maïssa, Hubiku Cenote, Mexico

to the giant caves of China and Vietnam:

[cc] Doug Knuth, Hang Son Doong

China’s probably got the best of both, though.

[luna-azzurra]

A non-writer asked me "but where do you get your ideas" and i genuinely did not know how to explain that it's not a place. it's not a website. it's not a folder. it's that i was on the bus and a woman was holding a paper bag very carefully and something about the way she held it made me need to know what was inside and then i needed to know why she was sad about it and then there was a whole person and then there was a whole story and the bus had already stopped and i missed my stop. that's where.

[orpheuslament]

do any of you guys remember that sculpture of theseus & the minotaur that lowkey looks like theseus is riding the minotaur like his life depends on it

[gutsheapofrawiron]

this one?

[justfriendsbestthings]

Is the lowkey in the room with us?

[glitched-eyes]

Saw this when I was in London this summer, I stopped my friend to point at it and said "holy shit it's the statue of Theseus fucking the Minotaur" in the middle of the very busy museum.

[beardedmrbean]

[toastycyborg]

I scrolled past this without second thought. Paused. Thought, wait, I've never seen a crane on the road. Scrolled back up. No answers. Typed this response, then noticed the book's author. What a whirlwind

[orcboxer]

Basically they bring it in piece by piece and assemble it on-site, using a smaller mobile crane (trucks with crane attachments) and once the crane itself is assembled, the top part can use hydraulics to climb up and down its own mast, so it builds itself taller like this

There is however no explanation for BJ Nomnom

[toastycyborg]

That is genuinely fascinating, thank you!

[earhartsease]

the crane ouroboros

[yorickalas]

He has more.

[marianarira]

All the torso animated studies.

[krintou-squids]

🎍🍃🌸

[lexazqqc]

🌱

[imsobadatnicknames2]

I know I already made a post to this effect but it's so baffling to me when someone defends the fact that headphone jacks are slowly but surely getting phased out by smartphone manufacturers with some variations of "wireless headphones are more convenient anyway" bc like. If we're talking about convenience what I like about wired headphones is that they conveniently have a single plug that makes the same damn pair of headphones universally compatible with every single audio-output-capable device I own, from my phone and my computer to my fucking gameboy and my casette player, it doesn't get any more convenient than that.