Overview of some topics when it comes to drawing characters who are burn survivors.
DISCLAIMER. Please keep in mind that this is an introductory overview for drawing some burn scars and has a lot of generalizations in it, so not every “X is Z” statement will be true for Actual People. I'm calling this introductory because I hope to get people to actually do their own research before drawing disabled & visibly different characters, rather than just making stuff up. Think of it as a starting point and take it with a grain of salt (especially if you have a very different art style from mine).
Talking about research and learning... don't make your burn survivor characters evil. Burn survivors are normal people and don't deserve to be constantly portrayed in such a way.
Consider supporting me on ko-fi if you find this to be helpful.
Edit: How are people seeing this post where I specifically talk about burn survivors being normal, real people, and still tag this as "TW body horror"? Not a single one of these drawings or pictures is a fresh injury. All of them are healed. How the hell would you feel if someone tagged a photo of you as "trigger warning: gore"?
Disabled people are not your fucking body horror. Grow up.
Hello!! Was just really curious after the recent pages but how do you adjust the colors of your characters to match the scene they are in? Sorry if they was worded funny but it always looks very lovely :)
Sure!
First I put their regular flat colors down (I do bgs first so that I'm making the Characters Fit Into The Scene instead of Fitting The Scene Into The Characters)
2. Then I slap a layer with the layermode "color" on top. Sometimes I colorpick a color from the bg to use here, but sometimes I just go with what looks the nicest to me. This is a really desaturated scene so I picked a very desaturated green/blue
3. But just with the color layer the characters still really stand out! Sometimes that's the vibe I want, but this is a moodier scene. So to darken up the colors I put a multiply layer with a very light color over top of them. This scene is blue, so I chose blue.
4. Scene specific, but on top of that I put the ""shading"" scribble texture to imply their wet fur
5. and then on top of all of that I put the multiply gradient that I use for shading in this comic.
I don't use all of these steps all of the time, it just depends on the scene.
Sometime I will add a "lighten" Layer if warbler or another very dark furred cat is in a scene to help the blacks blend in more OR if it's a night scene, have them stand out against an already dark bg.
I also like to add some lower opacity normal layers to have characters "blend" into the bg if they are not the focus of the panel. It helps keep the readers eye on what I want them to look at as well as creates depth.
Do you know what would solve, like, 100% of Warriors' background characters having no personality problem?
and I'm so serious:
nominative determinism and aptronyms
in other words: the cat's name should be what they are.
You know what everyone remembers about Runningwind? He's fast. You know what everyone remembers about Lionheart? He's brave.
STOP legacy naming RIGHT FUCKING NOW. Prove you can give Hollytuft and Honeyfur and Sorrelwhateverhernameis a personality, or start fucking calling them Sweetflower and Sparkclaw and Shadowstep again.
hey if it’s your first time being food insecure because of snap benefit cuts, hi! this ain’t my first rodeo and i’ve got tips.
1. dried beans and rice are infinitely cheaper than the canned/microwave stuff. just wash, soak (in the case of beans!), cook, and you’re done!
2. on that note, beans and rice, when eaten together, make a complete protein that is easily digestible by your body. if it comes down to it, you can live off that alone for a good long while.
3. when shopping, prioritize ingredients over premade meals. a frozen pizza is just one pizza, but flour, tomato sauce, and cheese can make many pizzas.
4. dry pantry goods will get infested if you’re not careful. adding a dried bay leaf to dried beans, rice, flour, etc. works wonders for keeping out weevils and other nasty stuff. adding a few drops of peppermint oil to a spray bottle filled with water will keep mice away if you spray it on your baseboards, too.
5. canned veggies is veggies. canned fruit is fruit. you ain’t too good for it, so get those micronutrients if you can.
6. potatoes are super nutritionally dense and a good source of fiber. use them to stretch meals. just don’t store them next to onions because they’ll sprout way faster.
7. coupon clip like a crazy person, and get ready to use the math skills you swore to leave behind in high school. saving pennies starts with getting the most for your dollar. if all cabbages are $1.00, get the biggest cabbage you can find. if tomato sauce is cheaper by the ounce in a quart jar compared to a pint jar, get the quart if you can. be smart with how you spend.
8. lentils are a great way to stretch any kind of ground meat. they’re really cheap and if you’re like me and can’t cut meat out of your diet completely for health reasons, they help it last a lot longer.
9. portion control is so key. if a meal is meant to make four servings, make it last four servings. it’s better to be a little hungry four days in a row than stuffed for two and starving for two. weigh it out if you have to.
10. never say no to free food. whether it’s potlucks, community events, religious gatherings, or student food pantries, a free meal is one less you have to cook for yourself. pro tip: hit up wednesday night suppers at churches, shabbat dinners at synagogues, and sikh gurdwaras pretty much any time for a free (if not really cheap) meal. you might have to endure some proselytizing, but as long as you’re respectful and mind your business, you’re golden.
you're so good at the jumalanpelko style! Would you be willing to explain how you approach it?
Jumalanpelko style breakdown!!!
Hellooo! I’ve had a few people now ask me about how I replicate the Jumalanpelko style, so i’m gonna do a breakdown of the comic’s artstyle and what you can do to make your characters look like they’d fit right in the jumalanpelko universe!
The way Sysi designs cats is very interesting to me. Compared to other artists I see drawing cats, Sysi tends to focus much more on pose and shape to convey who a character is rather than color or pattern.
Each character is completely distinguishable from the others without any color. This is how the comic gets away with those constantly shifting palettes and two-colored scenes as well! Having an incredibly defined facial shape is key to the comic’s style.
I’ll be breaking the faces down into four parts for better understanding.
Base, eyes, nose+mouth, ears.
Continue under the cut! (this thing gets looooong)
The base shape of every character’s head should be different from the others, defining them as a certain character. There are exceptions to this of course; sometimes people look the same and cats are no different!
Eyes in jumalanpelko are very simple. The edges near the outer corner of the eye tend to be thicker than the edges near the inner corner, and eyelashes on cats are more of an extension of the eye than an extrusion.
Eyes have a lot more faces than other parts of the cat. They’re very smooth compared to things like the body, and that’s because the eyes want to draw the viewer in. The head is the focus of the cat, and a smoother shape is easier for our brains to define.
The nose and mouth are always connected to one another by a line. That line usually is thicker near the nose and thinner near the mouth, and makes a little Y shape.
The noses sometimes change in shape, but the most common nose shape in the comic is 3-faced triangle, especially from far away. In more detailed shots, the nose will indent and form a more rounded shape.
Mouths in jumalanpelko are always connected to the nose line. Most of the time, they avoid the typical :3 shape seen in a lot of cat art, and instead function like cartoon human mouths for the most part.
The wider a characters mouth gets, the more faces will appear. If a character’s mouth is conveying an expression of anger, the shape will distort and become squiggly, along with there being more faces. Lines usually also appear around the edges of the mouth in these poses to convey more emotion.
Ears of characters usually look attached to the head in one big blob. They’re not defined as separate from the head, and are more of an extension of it. They always look very connected to the cat, and Sysi often draws them as one big piece rather than separate from what I can gauge.
Ears also have insides that are almost always the lightest color on the cat. The insides are usually not following the shape of the ear and are instead mostly just lil circles, unless the ear is pointed down in which the inside is triangular and colors the entire bottom of the ear.
Moving on to bodies!
Bodies can get away with much less shape definition. Cats are liquid, after all. A character’s pose should reflect who they are as a person. Suncat in the comics always looks very relaxed around guard, and sits straight when interacting with other colony cats. Upon suneve, she is shown slouching much more.
Guard is always on edge, and his poses reflect that. His poses are much more rigid than other cats.
Senior Guard (Mesi) holds her head low, and is often laying down looking deflated and lethargic.
A cats pose is very important! It gives so much to their character.
Bodies should be simple in shape. They’re usually bean-like in jumalanpelko, with definition for the back legs and shoulders when sitting.
When a cat stands, they lose that defined body shape, and return to a bean.
Feet have two different shapes in jumalanpelko depending on the situation.
When a cat has their feet planted on the ground, they’re shaped kind-of wedge like. When off the ground or interacting with their environment, they’re usually in a clover-like shape. Each cat also has 3 toes.
Color and patterns
Now focusing more on pattern and color, there’s a few rules present in jumalanpelko.
The cats in the comic have to be drawn over and over again, as is the nature of the comic. To prevent Sysi from going insane, he makes all their cats super simplified.
Each cat can have no more than 3 fur colors. Every cat in the comic abides by this rule.
(using a frame from the comic as it has many cats, this is from page 1 of god’s favorite.)
Even more complex designs such as Kuutamo are still limited to 3 colors.
Markings for characters are very limited and simplified. If a cat has stripes, they usually have no more than 3 or 4. If a cat has spots, the same applies.
As for shading, the only time I shade these goobers is when there’s a part overlapping with another part and both are the same color.
As for misc stuff, keep fur shapes simple and don't add too many random strands of hair. Fur in the comic is most often present on the forehead, cheeks, chin and tail. I try to limit myself to 5 tufts per area, but also i sometimes (most of the time) do not follow this rule. Just try to keep shapes simple.
Also! Kittens in the jumalanpelko style are almost always desaturated, and don't really emote. They usually have no mouth and their eyes are blue-ish. Along with that, they're incredibly fluffy and their shapes are not as defined. There should be very little contrast between the kittens base color and their markings, and that contrast will increase as they get older.
Anyways thank you for reading my silly jumalanpelko style guide! I'm not perfect with how I replicate the style, but these are the little tips I use to help me get at least pretty close!
Let me know if I missed anything that you wanna know more about, i threw this together from 3am to 5am and so theres probably a lot of things i didn't go over
