Admin Post: Community Check-In for October 2018

[goss]

So, it's been a couple days since October (and Inktober) ended. My apologies for the delay in our monthly chat post. How have things been with you this past month?

Did you sign up for or take part in any fandom activities in October, 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 November and the coming months ahead, and so on.

Comments

Inktober

[goss]

I knew going in that this month was going to be a busy one, so I decided to concentrate my Inktober efforts on the first week of the month. I'm pretty happy with all the pieces I produced over the first 7 days.

For the next 2 weeks, I got the idea to do mini drawings daily to create a larger composite image. I like that it took the pressure off me feeling like I had to execute a fully realized concept every day. I took my time with details and textures in certain areas, but did stream of consciousness type doodles for the most part. Not too bad overall, I thought.

Real life got in the way for the last half of the month, but I'm glad I at least made an attempt and was able to contribute to the collective in some small way.

I absolutely enjoyed seeing what everyone else was producing each day. It was wonderful seeing so many different takes on each prompt. I am in awe of those who were able to produce artworks every day this month. Hats off to you! Also, congrats to all who helped start the challenge off with a bang! It was so much fun that first week especially. :D

Re: Inktober

[mekare]

I am definitely taking that idea of combining prompts into a whole to make Inktober a bit easier next year.

I absolutely enjoyed seeing what everyone else was producing each day

Yep, that‘s my favourite part. And the interpretations of the prompts. :-)

[olivermoss]

I was a terrible Inktoberer. I tried to make a few high quality pieces rather than daily things. And I got a bit burnt out when my most complicated piece when over like a lead balloon within the relevant fandom. I did draw nearly every day at least.

I have a few projects I am looking to for December:
* Fandom Stockings! I will be very happy when that is starting to ramp up again. I usually do about a dozen fills for it. I volunteer to do stuff for low-fill stockings and that's often half of my fills. Last year's info post is here if you want to get an idea of what the event is like.

* Ironstrange Advent: Winter Edition. I was not able to do the Halloween advent because I had too much on my plate. I will be doing stuff (possibly writing tho) for the winter one. Announcement post

* I really, really want to make two designs using this tutorial to make journals for holiday presents. I don't know if I am going to be able to manage it, esp as I don't have photoshop or a decent tablet.

* I've picked what my next fan art will be, and hopefully it will have broader appeal that stuff I did in October. Both drawing and writing I did stuff that was really, really niche. Stuff that might get more of a reception would be a great energy boost right now.

* Partially to motivate myself, I made this progress post over at my own journal.


I may comment again with more upcoming challenges if you are making a list and checking it twice. There are likely a lot of MCU holiday things coming up.

[mekare]

And I got a bit burnt out when my most complicated piece when over like a lead balloon within the relevant fandom.

Awww no, that's terrible! I think, especially during Inktober, stuff just gets buried because so many people are just posting so much stuff or are busy creating! I know I really wanted to read the other challenge participants works of my various bangs but I didn't get to it at all. I hope some more people find your piece!

At least you have some fun things to look forward to!

[olivermoss]

That is definitely a pitfall of Inktober. I think if you can do it daily and them have a solid sketchbook tour at the end, that interests people, but that is really hard!

[mekare]

Well yes that is really hard but I don‘t think people are only interested if they can see a book full of drawings. People seeing your stuff depends on so many factors (time zones are one that I regularly forget) and I think the size of the fandom has something to do with it too.

Just, don‘t let this keep you from arting. I know it‘s disappointing, especially after you‘ve put a lot of work in. Some of my pieces are almost completely ignored (on AO3 or Tumblr) and I often don‘t know why. You just have to keep going.

To quote Neil Gaiman incorrectly, just make art, no matter what happens around you

[mekare]

Hey everyone! October was very busy (like last year). I did a post about how my challenges went (and are going) here.

I got a lot of art done which was great but I hope I can keep up the energy to finish my ongoing challenges and to keep motivation to start the new ones!

Some things: minoanmiss already posted about Art Yuletide which was great fun last year. Also there are opportunities at perfect_duet to make a small contribution for their advent calendar.

Some pieces I did unrelated to Inktober:

My Due South Bigbang pieces went live, here is the masterpost: https://mekare.dreamwidth.org/103744.html

I did an extra Diefenbaker with gold ink: https://mekare.dreamwidth.org/104174.html

I finished an older watercolour piece of Mon-El, and did a portrait of Daredevil's Karen Page: https://mekare.dreamwidth.org/104856.html

Non-art:

I stared watching the new series of Doctor Who but I'm taking my time. Also watching Daredevil season 3 which I like a lot. I finished the audiobook of Call Me by Your Name (which is a Yuletide fandom this year! Yay!). I also made a resolution to read my unread books... started on a recent purchase of Annie Proulx whopper Barkskins. I really liked the cover and the summary.

I hope everyone is doing good and there were no challenge related burnouts this year! (last year was bad for me).

[minoanmiss]

I feel like such a traitor. Iv'e been writing and thus not drawing! I will be back as soon as they stories stop burning up my brain!

[mekare]

Aww don‘t say that! Your creative energies just had a different outlet! I‘m still planning to read your stories.

[syntheid]

I only did a couple things for Inktober after all, and didn't even really use the sketches I'd made of the concepts following the prompt list; I should post those sometime anyway though. Mostly I've been working on finishing up a digital painting I started that was supposed to be following a skillshare class, and character portraits for D&D.

For November... I'm considering designing a card to send out, I haven't done one in a while. Though I'm still pretty busy/burnt out on other mundane life stuff, so we'll see, I might, as I sometimes do, push that idea out to Chinese New Year instead of northern hemisphere winter holiday ahah.

[mekare]

Oooh Chinese New Year, that‘s a good time and inspiring in itself. Looking foreard to see your digital painting when it‘s ready.

[yhlee]

My only fandom activities in October were for trickortreatex, which is...due to reveal soon?

I did a reasonable amount of Inktober and then fell off the face of the planet because I had a week-long conference late in the month. I did a ton of quick portraits of people at the conference, though, so I was drawing, just not to the prompts! And I did some more fencing sketches (very specialized interest, I realize, LOL).

I'm continuing work on a personal Tarot project, mostly in watercolors and sometimes in inks, and wondering if I'm brave enough to do art Treats for the Wrapping Paper subchallenge of Yuletide.

[mekare]

Since Oktober is all about the regualr practice it sounds like you did very well!

Wait, what, what is this thing I‘ve never heard of? IS Yuletide for artists now too???!!!

[yhlee]

It's an optional side challenge that people can opt into and all art gifts have to go into the Yuletide Madness collection because they don't meet the main challenge requirements by definition. (Well, unless maybe you wrote a comic that had 1,000 words in it?!)

There isn't really a moderator for the subchallenge as such--rosefox reposted the challenge from last year by copy-pasting.

https://yuletide.dreamwidth.org/143157.html

[mific]

Whew - I'm really late with this, due to a big writing challenge I only recently finished, and RL work stuff.
I just did a ginormous round-up of stuff I've done since July over on my DW journal, so I'm just going to link to it, as most of it's art.
Aaand, now facing several seasonal challenges, but only one's an art one. However, I'm starting to plan doing more small daily artworks to be seasonal New Years cards for friends. If you'd like to be on the card list, message me on DW with your mailing address. :)

[goss]

If you'd like to be on the card list, message me on DW with your mailing address

Hey, it occurred to me that since December's just around the bend, and drawesome is a central place for artists, it might be a good idea to create a community post specifically for discussing or organising seasonal card exchanges. Thoughts?

[mific]

Yeah, I think that’s a great idea! Are you thinking that something like that could be our seasonal challenge? So like an exchange, where you join in and get randomly assigned to make a card for one of the participants and someone else makes a card for you? That should be manageable. Maybe also have the option of sending someone a digital pic if they preferred to print it at their end rather than sharing an address? Then get the recipients to post a pic on the comm of the card they received?

[goss]

That would be an interesting challenge idea, provided we have participation. I think maybe we could do a post to gauge interest..?

I'll put up something to get community members' feedback this weekend, and we'll see whether to keep it at a casual card exchange, or make it part of an art challenge.