#coastytips

[coastyreef]

Hey fam can you help visualize how you draw furry heads? They're always so weighted to me and im tryin to do some perspective but it tough Love, Kai 😛😛

I’m not gonna lie, it’s all in this snout shape…this base is literally the base I use for every furry drawing and it has never failed me. Sometimes I’ll cheat and just do a rough circle for the snout or a line down the middle to map out placement, similarly to humans for noses and lips. If you look up those pup masks that the freaky people wear, you’ll see that the structure is actually pretty good reference for a simplistic snout shape. You can do this my furry ninja! Love, Harumi❤️‍🔥

[coastyreef]

this might be a little weird of an ask but how do you choose the backgrounds for your works? esp your furry art too. like all the little knickknacks and stuff?

I’m assuming you’re curious about my photobashing technique…. (Images and scribbles in the background of characters)

Honestly, a lot of the work is playing around with layer overlays and choosing parts where I want to erase or highlight certain details. I pick the vibe off the character’s aesthetic. For example, with the first image, the character has a colorful palette and space motif. Hence, the incorporated meteor news article and bright floral designs. A blend of space and quant nature aspects.

I like to think that my style plays really well into the feel of scrapbooking. That’s how I would best define my photobashing style. I mostly use random pics in my gallery and warp/overlay them in unrecognizable ways. I also utilize different texture brushes and emphasize a specific pattern. (Could be hearts, could be stars, could be swirls.)

The backgrounds I add really only serve the purpose of adding fluff to the overall image. But sometimes It’s a good opportunity to emphasize the character’s design. I’ll attach some hand drawn examples here that represent this idea.

Hope that makes some sense! Just think of the backgrounds not as environments, but rather the character’s aura. You got this

[coastyreef]

The one… the only… the most beautiful, charismatic, talented, and oh so very lovable, C O A S T !!!

🌺 INTRODUCTION - you may refer to me as Coast or Harumi, I am a multi-interest kind of guy, but I LOVE Ninjago. Like, seriously. I also dabble in animation and video gaming.

I will share some general information about myself, though I’m sure you might be familiar with my presence.

They/them pronouns

20 years

Waterjade CEO

Nonbinary princess

⚠️🐟 BFYI - I may not be entirely active on this platform, but I will attempt to share my art as often as possible. I’m mostly looking forward to showing love for my friends/mutuals/other artists posts! However, I still have my general discomforts.

Do not interact if you are a proshipper, 14 and under, and relatively weird/gross. Oh, and Llorumi fans, YUCKK!

🏖️ TAGS - My Ninjago art will be tagged as #coastyjago, but all art will be tagged as #coastydraws

Art questions? Check #coastytips before sending a message! I may or may not have already uploaded tutorial posts im regards to art advice…😳

🧩 EXTRAS - I am primarily active on Instagram (@coastyreef) however, feel free to read my CARRD and learn more about myself + other links/information.

I appreciate all of your support and love! <3 I am forever grateful.

[coastyreef]

Hello! I’ve been a follower of you for years now, and something I really enjoy about you/art is how you portray your characters/favs interactions and emotions. There’s something deeply resonating about how you portray their care for one an other. Any tips on that? I have ocs in my head but struggle to portray their emotions on paper. As well as a general fear of people disliking what I have to share. Also, my fav ship! I wish to share how I see them but I’m afraid of how I might be treated, even though it’s not out of the box. Thanks for reading !

Good question! First, to portray a character’s love style, you have to think about how the character’s personality. Are they withdrawn to touch? Do they wear their emotions on their sleeves? Maybe character A isn’t particularly vocal with affection, but rather expresses it through close touch. Maybe character B struggles to make personal connections, but softens their body language around the very few people they do trust. Those are things that breathe layers of personality into your character interactions.

If you’re asking on advice for getting over your audience anxiety, I say you should start small! Maybe share your ship art with a group of friends first, people who you’re most comfortable with. I struggle with a similar fear, it’s quite intense with me because I’m aware of the plenty of people who dislike me, openly at that. But if I’m honest, theres always that someone out there who won’t like your stuff. But there’s also that someone out there who resonates deeply with your stuff, a quiet, dedicated follower.

You need to remind yourself that the hate others feel is not a feeling that you can control (or have to!). It’s okay that it hurts you, but the hurt only lasts so long. You gotta just put yourself out there! Fandom spaces have always been tricky, but who can really be mad when all you’re doing is having harmless fun? So just enjoy yourself… and other enjoyers will trickle on in.

[coastyreef]

hi, i wanted to ask how you draw long hair like harumis? i struggle with drawing long hair and you always draw it so elegantly

OH MY FOD okay, I used to be super critical about how I drew hair. Like every drawing of harumi was difficult at some point because the hair was never doing it for me. I eventually fixed this problem (after years of troubleshooting) by growing my own hair out. I’m not joking, Harumi’s hair is literally just my hair. Having long hair made me understand how longer locs distribute around the head.

However, if you’re not a long hair haver, look for ocs who have long hairstyles and figure out what kind of strokes that artist uses in their style that make it look good. For me, I do this kind of wispy strand pattern in most, if not all my art. ⬇️

It also depends on what kind of hair type you lean to. Harumi’s got wavy hair, so naturally I draw their hair to be more flowy, elegant, and light.

You just practice seeing hair as “pieces” rather than a whole part. I found that once I started drawing the hair in separate chunks, it made more convenient to depict the flow of strands with more control. (This was a long process since I grew up drawing primarily furry art, so hair was just a bigger version of fur to me HAHA)

[coastyreef]

I’ve been really struggling with posing and composition for my art and I can only find myself doing basic stiff standing designs, vs fluidity + nice composition for personal art. I love how you put your pieces together, and how your designs are often so expressive and posed well… do you have any suggestions in regards to this stuff?

Honestly… I recycle the same kind of poses a lot of the time HAHA, I do have a little pose breakdown in my tag #coastytips I believe, so feel free to check that out!

For compositions/personal art, I think the trick is to either make expressions the focal point, or have outside forces that give the illusion of movement/fluidity (hair/fur/clothing/general color strokes)

Here’s some notes to accompany my recent works to kinda point out what I mean

I hope that will be helpful to you! Don’t be afraid to breakdown works from your favorite artists or try replicating a certain style choice that you admire or want to attempt for yourself <333 ^u^

[coastyreef]

This is probably very specific but do you think you can do a tutorial on how you draw stretch marks and or cellulite? I'm trying to get better at drawing bigger bodies!!!

I don’t think there’s really a proper way to depict it since it can take different forms for different body types… but I’ll drop in some examples of Nya’s, her most prominent stretch marks are placed on her upper arm skin fat, sides of her tummy, and her upper thighs/booty. I kinda do loose, wavy strokes that follow the flow of the body. I fondly refer to her marks as her ‘tiger stripes’ because of this (I love fat girls)

My best word of advice is to consider where the character’s fatness is, then place your marks where most stress/weight is put on the body. Bigger body types tend to express stress marks nearest to the most fat distribution on the body. Some marks take the form of shorter, chunky folds, more…lasagna looking? Maybe that’s a strange way to put it, but it looks a lot like layers of wavy pasta. (Turned over and asked my fat girlfriend and he said that this imagery is accurate.)

Don’t stress too much about it! Some stretch marks are darker, some are lighter. Some appear softer, others may appear more puffy.

[coastyreef]

hey, I’m in a bit of a slump design wise and i wanted to ask if you have any general tips, or even any of the good ol heap of Coast wisdom, how do you figure out designs to work on for posting/selling? additionally, how did you start off growing? i post adopts and all that jazz but i really want to try to at least START building a community. i have a few hundred subscribers but i get extremely limited (5-10 favs usually) interactions and my adopts dont get traction. i know its a bit shallow to ask but im just trying to look for advice instead of getting all sunken about it. thank you!

I’ll share the same advice that I shared to my private account followers! (Not sure if you’re a mutual of mine or not)

1) Building community: In my wiggler days, I joined a lot of art discord servers. Specifically once’s catered towards adoptables or happened to be owned by popular designers. Post your work frequently, and do some free/cheap adopts to draw in attention to your stuff. Start building your connections there and making friends who will become your long term supporters.

2) Join adopt accounts!!! I used to apply to all kinds of closed/special species as an admin/guest artist. I’d also join multiple collaborative adopt selling accounts. (Accounts run by multiple artists who use their collective following to post adopts and gain traction.) These were really efficient for good credit in the community, and it also allowed me to observe fellow artists and absorb business styles.

3) Toyhouse views are rolled in best by raffles. DO FREE RAFFLES!!!!! Make it a requirement to enter by subscription or favorites. This forces the audience to view your work, and potentially leave an impression on those who might be intrigued by your art style. Unsubscribing is always free if they don’t like your things, but most, if not the majority of people subscribed to you for your raffle will continue to stay subscribed beyond the raffle date.

4) Don’t get discouraged by your peers who may sell their stuff at a higher rate, let it encourage you! Start with your prices small, allow trade/art offers as add-on to even out the audience offer range. You want your work to be obtainable! I never really set my stuff at a high price, even after all these years of designing characters and selling. (Most of my stuff starts at $25-30) (the bidders dictate the final price)

5) Make designs based off whatever concept is most trendy and popular. Doesn’t have to be a consistent thing, but you can definitely gain more audience if you make work based of media or styles that the community gravitates towards. Put your own unique spin on it, I encourage that. People love their trends, but they love to feel unique about themselves just as much.

Always branch out into different palettes, styles, patterns!!!! I never consistently post a certain theme or specific art style. More people often commission me for their custom personal design preferences because they see how my work is very fluid in aesthetics. I often hear positive feedback about how appreciative people are of my inclusivity and wide range of flexibility. Maybe take that to mind when you sell your own work ^u^

Hope these tips help you my fellow designer! I’m always happy to offer my help ❤️❤️❤️