Admin Post: Community Check-In for March 2024

[goss]

Today's the last day of March, and we'd love to have you check in and chat with us. How have things been with you this past month?

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

Our Round-up of entries for Drawing Challenge #63: Let's Move will be posted tonight, and a new monthly art challenge will be issued this week. :)

Comments

[goss]

I quite enjoyed this month's challenge, because my figure drawing skills could always do with more practice. I often struggle with proportion, and in my efforts to achieve exactness, I feel like my figures sometimes become too stiff or static, so using line of action in this exercise was a great way to capture that feeling of motion/life.

Many thanks to yhlee for sharing that write-up on gesture drawing, and to mific for running with it as a theme for this month. ^__^

[mekare]

>> in my efforts to achieve exactness, I feel like my figures sometimes become too stiff or static

Don‘t I know it… I often like my quick rough sketches more than the more involved pieces

[seleneheart]

My son gave me some oil pastels last year (2022) for Christmas, but I don't know anything about the medium, so I made one piece with them and then sort of forgot about them.

However, some my current issues with making art have a lot to do with the set up, equipment, clean up, and other tasks other than just making art (digital is a thing, I know, but I don't get the same tactile satisfaction from it). This is why Zentangle has been good, because it really just requires a pen, pencil, and piece of paper.

On a whim, I pulled the oil pastels out and sketched some quick black-eyed Susans in my toned paper sketchbook. They were SO satisfying. So easy to use and just play with. Like crayons, except blendable. I discovered that a large, sturdy blending stump works really well to blend them.

The set has six, but not the warm/cool primaries of most intro sets. I ordered a set of 36 of the same brand (Faber Castell, not expensive at all) and I've been experimenting, just getting stock photos and seeing what works. The oil pastels are just low pressure and fun. Highly recommend.

[dirty_diana]

I love oil pastels! They totally deserve to be more popular. It's so fun to just focus on colour and shapes and blending rather than getting bogged down in details.

[seleneheart]

Yes, exactly! I've found they work really well for organic things like food or plants, and not so well for hard, shiny surfaces (although that could relate to my skill level).

[mekare]

>> digital is a thing, I know, but I don't get the same tactile satisfaction from it

Same here.

Have fun experimenting!

[seleneheart]

I'm loving it!

[dirty_diana]

I bought a colouring book, and then some coloured pencils, which has led to me trying to figure out how tp use coloured pencils in original drawings. I'm not sure I've gotten the hang of it yet (my instinct is PRESS HARDER and apparently that's bad? next stop: how to blend) but it's fun.

[seleneheart]

Lol, yes, press harder is bad.

My preferred method of blending is mineral spirits. Although a colorless blender or a white pencil also work pretty well.

[dirty_diana]

It's counterintuitive, lol. I have baby oil (also good for oil pastels!) in the art supply box , so I was going to start blending experiments with that, but I will investigate the others. I think I need to figure out the best paper, too.

[mekare]

Glad you found a way back to making art! Sometimes it takes a colouring book (I usually get inspired by my daughter's).
I don‘t know if you‘re looking for inspiration or tutorials, but if you do, I found Kirsty Partridge's YouTube videos pretty thorough. Just don‘t get too intimidated because her goal are hyperrealistic drawings. She has some videos on the fundementals of the medium though.

[dirty_diana]

I love seeing how hyperrealistic artists work, I will check it out!

[yhlee]

Mostly I've been minimally keeping up with line drill (drawing circles in overhand grip - I never properly learned it but am slowly acclimating) and sometimes gestures on Quickposes.

Other than that, personal art projects: an 18"x24" mixed media painting, the first time I've worked that large, but which I'm really pleased with; and FINALLY starting work on personal 2D animation (test sequence storyboards; next step is the animatic for timing, eventually TVPaint) and comic projects (a 22-page prequel thing as a test case) on the grounds that I might as well do something I really love in my free time. :3

Watercolor remains evil. :)

I'm hoping to have more time for fanart in April. March got eaten by a book deadline. XD

[mekare]

Not gonna lie, I had to google overhand grip. I recognised the position on a photo, but I never use it XD

Thanks for reminding me about more regular quick sketch practice, I really need to get back to that.

Congrats again on your book!

[yhlee]

I had to be told up and down and sideways by THREE separate art instructors plus an artist friend before I finally caved for pencil/charcoal. On an iPad/Pencil it's pretty useless. XD I think it also doesn't help that I typically work quite small. But I figure it's good to develop the skill even if I don't always use it. XD

I used to sketch people in cafés or at fencing! Trying to do gestures of fencers even in drill (vs. bouts) is murder because you get like four seconds IF THAT to get the pose down, but it's fun because SWORDS. :)

And thank you!

[mekare]

>> I think it also doesn't help that I typically work quite small.

Oh I can see how that grip wouldn‘t work so well in small formats, and since I mostly work small too I now know why I never use it.

>> I used to sketch people in cafés
I haven‘t done that for ages, mostly because I rarely go to cafes anymore (and if I do I‘m never alone…) it was fun though! People on trains are good, too.

[mekare]

I love how many entries his month's challenge has gotten! It was fun seeing everyone’s different approaches and subjects. I also appreciated going back into poses again and leaving out details.

All in all I did three pieces, two for the challenge and one monochromatic watercolour study of a lovely pose from Mysterious Lotus Casebook. It was fun to try this approach again.

There are two WIPs I started which I‘m still trying to finish in the next couple of weeks: a Miss Fisher watercolour painting from The Crypt of Tears, and a pencil drawing of my still-current muse Li Lianhua with his sword.