2025 Art Wrapup
JAN - FEB - MAR - APR - MAY - JUN
JUL - AUG - SEP - OCT - NOV - DEC
This year’s art output was a bit strange, but here’s all my biggest/most favorite/learned-the-most-out-of-them pieces of the year. Notes below!
JAN - “Haunted Siblings are Haunted,” Sweetheart and Ruma Camoran ; This was one I had taken from a notebook sketch to digital format. I usually don’t like doing that because my proportions on notebook sketches can be weird, but I remember having fun with that one :] And the lighting ended up being very nice.
FEB - “CASPINA!” Caspina/Caspian, Glarthir, Sweetheart, and Baurus ; I made like nothing for February lmao. The Caspina doodle page was just a silly one to include and started the first ideas for Caspian’s and Baurus’s sibling rivalry relationship.
MAR - “Normal Dinner Time,” Iren ; I remember this one just being an excuse to fuck around with some edits and colors. I really liked how the knife color turned out and how the hand positions came along. I need to draw Iren more.
APR - “Dawn is Breaking!” Mankar Camoran ; This piece was massive and sat in my WIP pile in the colored stage for so long before I got around to rendering it. It reminded me why I hate drawing backgrounds and geometric shapes but I think I was able to get around most grievances pretty okay! I ended up not being super satisfied with his outfit but the piece hasn’t lost its fondness on me yet.
MAY - “that new death animation huh,” Uriel Septim VII and Raven Camoran ; This one was a neat challenge. It was for an art contest which ended up being a blast over on the r/skyrim discord server. I don’t want to say I “struggled” with anything because I was never feeling despaired while making this piece, but a lot of things were certainly HARD to do. Raven’s hand position, getting the right angle on the Razor, the geometric shape of the Amulet of Kings, simplifying the Mythic Dawn mask, trying to figure out experimental proportions for Uriel’s face, I remember Uriel’s HAIR gave me grief too? Thinking back, there was a lot of stuff I had to do over, but I remember being really satisfied with the outcome. The only thing that I’d change looking at it now is how I rendered the blood, I don’t think the texture is very convincing or consistent, but even so I was pretty happy with it.
JUN - “Dori! (Gift)” Dori ; This was for a “Secret Summer Solstice” event. I got to mess around with Dori’s deep black markings and had a lot of fun with the lighting that way :]
JUL - “Trying Something Out,” Velehk Sain ; This was my face overhaul for Velehk, one that I’m still trying to absolutely nail down. Unfortunately for Velehk I’ve made her trans woman journey even tougher to accomplish in the process, but that’s all story stuff.
AUG - “ALL IS NUMB,” Baurus, Martin Septim, and Ruma Camoran ; I fucking loooove doing animatics. This one was really fun but also quite the challenge? I DID struggle with this one, absolutely. The first scene wasn’t bad; there was an angle turn on Baurus’s head that I struggled a bit with in the second scene; I aboslutely gave up on making a decent-looking Imperial City for that wide shot lol; the Martin scenes were fine actually I liked those; making Baurus run toward the camera didn’t come out perfectly but I was and am still proud of it all the same; Ruma taking off her helmet and the camera zooming into her eye is my favorite part; the camera zooming out of the sword is my leas favorite part just bc I really don’t like how I drew Baurus and the angle on his arm is all wrong, I’d love to redo that scene if I could; Ruma tackling Baurus was supposed to look way different and I’m still not absolutely sure it’s very convincing in the final product, but I think it’s okay enough to pass; final scene was fine I liked being able to do the red shatter again :]
SEP - “Echo is Having a Good Time,” Echo ; I remember drawing this after some fucking STRESSFUL days and it was a really good reliever. Any excuse to draw Echo boobs covered in blood tbh
OCT - “Ruma Armor <3” Ruma Camoran ; This one, WOOF. I remember I used to hate drawing so much detail on a single piece, but this one was really fun. I’ve been enjoying adding more and more details to my art and this was a really good way to demonstrate that. I think the only thing I’d change is her thigh armor and making her feet bigger (didn’t realize I had fallen into a habit of giving characters too-small feet) until ~a week after this got done lol).
NOV - “Sanguine Vampires,” Sam Guevenne and Echo ; The whole Sanguine vampire concept is one of my favorites, but the original idea only even started because I wanted to draw pirate Echo. Then I started thinking more and more and a few canvases just fell into place. I think Echo is very handsome and this story decision ended up being very beneficial for fic planning.
DEC - “Who needs lights anyway,” Sanguine ; I really enjoyed every part of this one. It’d been a while since I’d rendered something with glowing markings, so that was a bit tough, but I think I got into the swing of things after a bit. Fun fact, the original version of this image was actually completed in November, but I had to draw/edit on a loincloth for him to be able to post it to tumblr, and that only got completed in December, so I’m counting it as December art :]
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I don’t have a lot to say for the end of this year’s wrap up. I was definitely a little less productive than last year but that was on account of 1) having an aboslutely shitty roommate my junior year that stressed me the fuck out and 2) senior year academics just kicking my ass in general. I’m not really that upset with the art output, I think I just need to learn how to manage commission timing a bit better, bc that + school + other creative focuses really bogged down my ability to make art freely and the subsequent enjoyment of that. And that’s my fault entirely, but a good lesson learned. When I re-open commissions, I might only open the smaller slots and leave the fully rendered option unavailable ú_ù just to give myself less of a workload.
Other than that, I’m on my last semester of undergrad and have applied to grad school. I’m not really worried about not being able to write during this, I’m just curious about how and when I’ll be able to finally start putting pen to paper with my fics. Unfortunately I am still in heavy WIP phase, though I’m thinking about changing up how I do planning so I can maybe get faster at writing the actual fic stuff? Idk yet. I’ve never felt a real sense of urgency to get TDI done (or even started for that matter, lol), and I’m having a lot of fun planning things out, but it’s kind of gotten to a point where ALL I’m doing is planning. So much of it is just my own divided attention and then repeatedly sanding out details and throwing out things that do and don’t work. I’ll try and give a good rundown of what I have so far.
I have the story. I have all the events of the story laid out, start to end, I know all of the big events and when they’ll happen. The things that I’m buffing out rn are connection points, getting from point A to B to C in a logical way, and filling plot holes and discrepancies. A lot of this year has also been dedicated to making better character arcs for the whole cast. I refined Rakell’s motivations, Sam and Miraak got MAJOR arc updates, I had to iron the fuck out of Ancano’s and Erandur’s arcs, Echo’s arc was more refined, and Delphine’s arc has gotten better through bouncing off of everyone else’s. So much of what’s left is just detail stuff: figuring out where conversations go, making sure I have enough character interactions between plot points, cutting out unneeded lore and reestablishing much-needed lore, all while trying not to get bogged down and maintaining flow. Once again, I will not make any promises for TDI to start next year, but damn it feels good to hope.
So, that’s really it. Thanks for all the love on my blog :] I also had an event happen this summer that made me realize I have not been making a very good fandom experience for myself, and it was only a couple weeks ago that I finally finally felt like I was able to interact with the fandom without isolation or insane guards being up all the time. Again, that’s been a me problem, but one that’s gotten fixed :] I’m really looking forward to another year and posting more silly shit. Mmmwah everyone UзU
