Admin Post: Community Check-In for August

[goss]

Tomorrow will be the last day of the month, and we'd love to have you check in and chat with us. How have things been with you?

Did the time fly this August? Did you get the chance to take part in any fandom activities or have you been working on any personal art projects? Are you currently trying to meet a deadline? Feel free to share upcoming challenges that have got you excited, any frustrations you've been experiencing, possible goals for the next month, and so on.

Comments

[goss]

Where did the time go? This month just flew, and now that summer vacation is over for me, the new school term starts this week. I'm sorta excited to meet the new batch of students and introduce them to the wonderful world of art, but mostly I'm just bracing myself for the hectic academic year to come, and looking forward to my next vacation already. LOL.

Art I made this month:
1. The Defenders Big Bang - Defenders/Avengers art in the style of Fraction's Hawkeye comic.
2. Drawing Challenge #5 - Triskele (Derek from Teen Wolf)
3. RL Sketch - Raindrops
4. Drawing Challenge #6 - Wynonna Earp

Other August Activities:
- This month, I recced Captain America fanart over at fanart_recs, all of which were crossovers with other fandoms.
- Posted a whole bunch of awesome Wonder Woman/Captain America art recs at my journal.

Possible Ideas for sketching next month:
- I am loving the idea of Harley Quinn/Deadpool. Hoping to make fanart for that ship.
- Drawing Challenge #7 - Black Sails. I'm leaning more towards drawing Anne Bonny.

I am hoping to stay motivated even with the busy school term, and to continue with my goal of devoting a little bit of time each week towards my own artwork. This community has been really valuable in providing me with a structured plan for drawing practice. And I'm happy to see others also expanding their creativity through the comm. :)

[syntheid]

I missed Wynonna somehow, but I like the monochrome with the fire, looks cool. :)

[goss]

Thanks! Glad you like the contrasting effect. :)

[mific]

I forget that northern hemisphere people have been on vacation, especially academic people - hope the new term goes well. The Wonderwoman/CAP recs were excellent - reminds me, I must go post a last art rec for August now.
Lots of lovely art! And PIRATES to come, yay! I think the Harley Quinn/Deadpool combo is a great idea - looking forward to that as well.

[goss]

reminds me, I must go post a last art rec for August now

OMG, me too! Last day of the month...

[mekare]

Happy new school year! I've been back in the swing since The start of August (and I'm so so glad it didn't cull my art productivity so far).
Structured plans are key! I do absolutely NOTHINg without them. That's why term breaks are always so hard for me. I have lots of unstructured time and end up not doing the things I don't have time for usually.
So anyway, drawesome has helped with that a lot in July. :-)

[goss]

It's funny how the more packed my days are, the more I'm able to schedule in and successfully accomplish all the things that need to get get done. But during vacation time the opposite happens, where whole days will go by unaccounted for, the hours just magically flying by. :b

[mekare]

Yes the month really went by very quickly. I am sort amazed at how productive I've been artwise, I didn't post anything at all in June, and then with the start of drawesome seven pieces in July and six pieces in August.

I am off sick today but still I'm very much psyched about participating in the dcu_bang and marvel_bang. I signed up for four interesting stories. I really love to do illustration, somehow that's a lot easier for me than coming up with my own ideas. And regarding that, I whooped for joy this morning because an author I really admire bomberqueen17 left a comment on an illustration from July for her story A Face Built for Getting Punched - one of my favourite poly-Avengers fics.

Anyway what with the current challenge and my BigBang arts I am going to push myself because I'm going to draw a lot of characters that I have never tried before:

Supergirl: Kara and Mon-El probably
DC: various batfamily members (I've only ever done Bruce and Dick)
Marvel: Clint (Hawkeye) , Peggy Carter and maybe Tony
Patrick O'Brian Master and Commander: Jack and Stephen

I also hope that work and the new two week deadlines for challenges will keep me being productive in fandom.

[goss]

I'm going to draw a lot of characters that I have never tried before

\o/ *cheers you on* \o/

(Also, it must have felt so good to get such an enthusiastic feedback from the author of the fic that inspired your illustration. ^____^ )

[mekare]

You should have seen my Cheshire cat grin! I read it over my morning coffee and am still so thrilled.
Getting author feedback is the best.

Thank you for the cheerleading and good luck with your own projects!

[mific]

Ooh, squee - I love Bomberqueen's stories and it's so neat that you got such a great comment - it was an excellent artwork of Bucky and Nat. And go you with the marvel and dcu challenges, wow!

[mekare]

Thank you! I have taken on quite a lot but for now I'm confident I'll manage it.

[dirty_diana]

Supergirl: Kara and Mon-El probably

*\o/*

[mekare]

Hehe Karamel karamel... I still can't get over it. And yesterday I watched a video of them behind the scenes and they were so sweet!

[tarlanx]

The month flew by for me too! I did manage to finish one of the challenges BUT it's also for a gift exchange so I cannot post it here yet *sigh* At least drawesome inspired me to create art this month :)

[goss]

drawesome inspired me to create art this month

Aww, that is wonderful to hear! ^___^

Looking forward to seeing your response to the challenge whenever the exchange goes live.

[mekare]

That's great to hear. Looking forward to teh revealed art.
Btw, is that Merlin/Colin I spy in your icon?

[tarlanx]

Yes it is :) It's from a piece of art I created for a Big Bang

http://archiveofourown.org/works/1179462

Sadly the author deleted their story.

[mekare]

Aw no. Shame about the story, but the art is still there at least. :-)

[lizbee]

I am moving house! My life right now is Boxes and Packaging and Will An Uber Take The Cat, His Litter and Food Trays (all cleaned) And Me To The New Place?

But in my spare time (heh) I've started drafting a zine about cats I have said hello to in my now-ex-neighbourhood. It's nice to have a project again!

[goss]

drafting a zine about cats I have said hello to

Oooh, that sounds interesting!

Good luck with your moving. :)

[mekare]

Urgh moving is horrible, hope everything goes well.

[syntheid]

yikes, it's the end of month ahah.

I got as far as doing a sketch for the "Heat" prompt, and then I've been trying to play with watercolors to see if I can actually get the colors like I want. So here's a preview (technically it was done in light blue colored lead so this is the desaturated and contrast-upped version), and I'll finish it eventually:



I've also been playing with drawing Asurans (from Guild Wars 2):


but mostly my sketchbook is just full of me attempting to mix colors in watercolors and uninteresting value studies.

(whoops, hit the wrong reply first time)

[goss]

I got as far as doing a sketch for the "Heat" prompt

It's great how you can take a pic during the sketch stage as a "Save", since there's no real life "Undo" button when it comes to using watercolours. BTW, you could always just post it to the site at this stage, as a potential WiP, to be completed with colour at a later date.

Hey, I remember doing this thing a long time ago, where I didn't want to ruin my sketch and so I made a photocopy of my drawing on thin watercolour paper, and then painted upon the original. If it got ruined, at least I had the other copy to try again. Don't think I ever used that second copy, but it did give me the freedom to let loose at the time.


drawing Asurans (from Guild Wars 2)

I have no idea about the fandom, but your drawing is SUPER ADORABLE. ^___^


my sketchbook is just full of me attempting to mix colors in watercolors and uninteresting value studies

I was mulling around an idea for the theme of "Heat", where one could do a study of warm colours, like an abstract piece, to fulfill the challenge. Maybe if you have anything along those lines in your sketchbook, you could submit them for the challenge.

[mekare]

Hey thanks for posting your art! Looking foreard to seeing the finished sketch. And that second one is too cute! Your watercolour value studies might be a nice resource post for the comm. I'm also still figuring that out.

[adafrog]

Wow, I haven't done anything this month. But I really enjoyed looking at everyone else's art. :)

Of course, I am always in the fandom activity of reading fanfic. :D

Hoping next month won't be so stressful in RL, but not holding my breath.

[goss]

Of course, I am always in the fandom activity of reading fanfic. :D

I hear ya. In my downtime, given the choice between watching tv and reading fanfic, I will choose fanfic every time. *g*

[mekare]

Well, and you left comments-very important! :-)

[dirty_diana]

I'm super in the middle of writing to a deadline right now but my fifth interest came up Captain America so I'll see if I can accomplish anything for it? idk, enjoying seeing everyone's art though!

[goss]

my fifth interest came up Captain America

Cool!

Good luck with your writing deadline. :)

[mekare]

Oooh I'm loking forward to it! And hope you have some productive writing time. :-)))

[goss]

Man! You have been wonderfully prolific with the fanart this month. Go, you! \o/

(Heads-up: Your Big Bang art links all go to the same AO3 page.)

[mific]

Duh - the perils of copy-pasting!

[mific]

Agh - I can't edit the links as it's a comment and you replied to it, which locks it. Sorry but I'll delete and repost it - can't figure out any other way.

[mekare]

That happened to me in my introductory post. It's annoying and I don't think there's a way around it.

[mific]

August was a busy month, and mid-winter here in NZ so pretty cold at times, with lots of storms. Luckily hardly any power outages interrupted my writing and art time though, so I'm calling it a win and there were lots of reasons to stay indoors and potter with fannish stuff when it was raining and cold. 

I did the August drawesome challenges which was fun. It's good to be pushed to do actual traditional-art drawing again - something I haven't done for a few years. Not as much of that in August as in July, and I'd like to do more in September.
Song lyric challenge - I Was Born Sick (CAP - stucky - digital painting)
Squiggle #2 challenge (spiral) - Is It Gone Yet? (SGA - Rodney McKay - pencil, colorized)
Squiggle #2 challenge (spiral) - Moya (Farscape - Moya - digital painting)
Word #2 challenge (Heat) - Daredevil (Daredevil - digital painting)

Also did lots of Big Bang art in my "blended digital art" style (part collaged and massively adapted references with some photoshop effects, part digital painting from scratch)
Art for Whitchry9's story (Defenders gen, all but Matt are de-aged into childhood). Used my Kid Art AO3 tag for this, because I don't see why Kidfic is a thing but not Kid Art. :)
Art for Returnsandreturns' story (Defenders, Matt/Foggy, a bit NSFW as naked torsos)
Art for Melagan's story (SGA, John/Rodney, motorbikes and romance)
Art for Nagi_schwarcz's story (SGA, Lorne/Zelenka, parenting, domesticity, adventure, and another use of the Kid Art tag.)

So a lot more art than writing in August overall! (a couple of shorter Stargate fics for exchanges)
Looking forward to doing more traditional art in September and I'm planning to actually hit up an art shop and get some supplies rather than resorting to a pencil and a black marker! But what to get ... in the past my paintings were done from a kid's paintbox, i.e. el cheapo gouache, and I didn't really draw. There was a larger oils phase before that, and in the middle a brief crayons stage. I've never tried watercolors and I'm so impressed by people who can work in that medium. Guess I'll go browse and see what takes my fancy, anyway. :)

[mekare]

Yay art shopping! I'd love to have an art shop here, for now I'm still using materials that are ten years old or older. Then I'll probably order online....
And you have been so productive! I'm going to leave some comments on your non-challenge realted stuff soon. :-)

[amberdreams]

August has been a bad month on many levels, and I haven't done as much as I'd have liked. I hope to catch up on a few drawesome challenges as well as crack on with some art and fic commitments on my to-do list. I've got art to do for Wincest Big Bang, SPN_reversebang and I just signed on for the DCU bang and am waiting for my author's draft.

I did manage some art this month - fitted in one life drawing session, and did some designs for a Hare sculpture trail which is happening next year (won't hear until October whether any of my designs are picked though). Oh and I did some stuff for GISHWHES, and this pirate art for the Quickybang https://amberdreams.livejournal.com/507314.html

[mekare]

Hey high five for a fellow dcu_bang artist! Good luck with the other bangs! When are the reveals for the SPN stuff?

[amberdreams]

Reveals for SPN RB? After claims when everyone is matched up, which should be 25th September :D

[mekare]

Er, sorry got confused. I meant when are the art and fic going to be posted.

[amberdreams]

Oh right, not until 10th November when posting starts. :D

[mekare]

Ah cool. Thanks. Will be looking forward to it then!