Admin Post: Community Check-In for December

[goss]

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

Did you get a chance to take part in any fandom activities in December, 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, New Year's Resolutions, etc.

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We've had a wonderful year here at drawesome. It's been exciting to see our community growing and taking shape. We've been quite productive over the last 12 months, made lots of new friends here, and enjoyed encouraging and supporting each other. Wishing all of you a New Year filled with fun, creativity, love and kindness! :)

Comments

[goss]

I've been mostly working on RL art and craft projects in December, especially for gift-giving at work, to both staff and students. It's a tradition I always look forward to at this time of year. :)

Another little tradition is creating hand-made holiday cards and sending out to friends and family. This is the first year I've ever taken part in a holiday card exchange with other artists, so that was exciting!

I wasn't home for Christmas, as I am spending this time in Toronto visiting relatives, but I'm really looking forward to opening my mail when I get back. ^___^

I signed up for the Art Yuletide challenge, but might be submitting my entry a little late, as I won't be back home until the end of the week.

[kiki_miserychic]

Oh, handmade holiday cards are always so cool.

[mific]

Hope you’re having a great time!

[mekare]

Have fun in Toronto! December is always very busy but I love that you shre your creative gift ideas with us.

[olivermoss]

I did my first and second attempts at digital art. (Racy but not explicit, IronStrange, on my journal)

I took this picture which on some platforms had people reacting strongly to it, but on others it was ignored. (Racy but not explicit, IronStrange, at DeviantArt)

And that is about it, outside of some quick image editing to make banners or icons for communities.

[syntheid]

Using the string lights as a manifestation of magic is a neat idea :)

[mific]

Like all of this Tony-related art! The photo is cool, with the lights!

[goss]

Ooh, the picture with the lights came out really cool. Love the effect. :D

[kiki_miserychic]

Very cool use of lights.

[mekare]

That Tony/Strange picture is inspired!

[jainas]

The pic looks very nice, both christmasy and magical!

[syntheid]

Mostly I was working on the card for the exchange (which, for the record, went in the mail, but I'm not really sure exactly when everyone's going to receive it) which was... really hard for me to come up with something for ahah. I have some ideas about what I might like to try next year if we do it again, though. But I drew a thing for a friend, too. Did anyone else do a 2018 summary of art thing? That was kinda fun to see for myself a snapshot of everything I did this year.

Goal-wise, this past year I was working on completion and wrapping up some projects I've had languishing in a WIP state to prove to myself I could finish things to a state I felt okay about, but next year I want to work on speed, I think? Maybe limiting myself to 60 or even 30 minute paintings, at least a couple times a month. I have a hard time limiting myself because I don't really like the way my work looks when I spend so little time on it, but that's kinda the point, to figure out how to do loose, quick pieces I still enjoy.

As kind of a maybe-goal, I'm thinking about trying to find some shows or zines to submit work to in 2019, too.

[mific]

Ha, my last overseas cards go into the mail today, so will hopefully arrive not too far after New Years. Not that they have any relationship to any holiday!
I hear you about getting faster - I tend to obsess a bit over details and find it hard to do looser pieces. I like that painting for your friend - great colours!

[olivermoss]

Oh hey a Sylvari! Great work!

[goss]

I have some ideas about what I might like to try next year if we do it again, though

Me too! I was a bit rushed this year to get mine done before I left for vacation, but I do have an interesting idea I'd like more time to develop for next year's holiday card. :)

Did anyone else do a 2018 summary of art thing?

I haven't as yet, but maybe we can create a post at the community this week for members to share a summary of their art for the past year.

this past year I was working on completion and wrapping up some projects I've had languishing in a WIP state

That was a great goal to have achieved! I have so many WiPs that never get finished. Maybe making it into a formal task will help me complete them. :)

[mekare]

I had a bit of a blank spot too when I started looking for ideas for the cards. In the end I went with something simple.
That painting looks really good! I still want to do an art review after having done it for the first time last year.

[jainas]

I struggled a bit on the cards too... congrat for getting them done!

I did a 12 month recap, which is an accomplishement for me to have managed for the first time in many years! Some months were very productives and other not at all and I did have to go digging through some sketchbooks for some unpublished drawings, but I did draw every month this year!:) \o/
As for a 2018 summary it is a good Idea as well! I suspect it may be way more time consuming to make, but it is nice to be able to look back on all the thing one drew in a year!

Good luck with submiting for zines! I did it this year with fanzines, and had a lot of fun. :)

[mific]

I’m getting the last of my seasonal cards in the mail today, late as usual! I took on a few too many writing challenges for Xmas, which delayed the card project. I’d like to write more overall, but it takes me longer and while I’m doing it, it’s more of a struggle. On the art side, I did one piece in a secret santa exchange and will have another in ArtYuletide shortly - will add those links soon, after reveals.
My tumblr wasn’t deleted but I’m not posting to it any more - mostly using dreamwidth and AO3, with pillowfort as well to crosspost art. I’ve received a few cards from fellow drawesomers, which are great! Am responding individually. Most of my NY resolutions are about health and adulting, but I’d like to do fewer challenges this year I think, and go at my own pace more. Happy New Year to you all!

[goss]

Most of my NY resolutions are about health and adulting, but I’d like to do fewer challenges this year I think, and go at my own pace more

*nods* That's a good one to keep in mind.

Even though I'd love to take part in more challenges, I always feel bad when I can't follow through or submit late entries. This community has help me tremendously with following through on bite-sized challenges though. :)

[norsellie]

I did zero arting in December. But overall, 2018 was a good year for me for art, although very stop start.

[goss]

Glad you had a good year! :)

[kiki_miserychic]

The latest big art project I finished was for a themed Christmas party this month. It made me want to get back into creating art on a more consistent basis. I only produced two larger art projects the whole year.

I’m currently setting up my yearly bullet journal, which is sort of like a giant art project. I’m going to include an art projects section for what I want to do.

[mific]

I love that icon. Bullet journals sound like fun!

[mekare]

In December I did the Due South Secret Santa, my art for that is not quite revealed yet (visible but anonymous for a couple of hours yet). I’ve started filling some stockings over at fandom_stocking and I have also been reminded that I signed up for a pinch hit of this year’s Due South C6D Big Bang.

I had a very good and productive art year, I’ll probably do last year’s art review meme in the next couple of days.

I hope you all have a happy and creative New Year!

ETA:

Due South Secret Santa art
Person of Interest Advent Calendar art

[jainas]

Happy new year Mekare! \o/
I don't remember if I commented or not, but I loved the style of your POI art! :)

[jainas]

In december I kept on drawing and I did a lot of art-related stuff:

- I adapted a few of my inktober drawings in black & white (I need to finish the serie) https://www.instagram.com/p/BrBHVi4B2gf/

- I did way less chrismas cards than last year, just a few for the exchange (I sadly didn't have the time to do one for everybody) and they were a bit more... experimental than usual. :D But well. I hope people enjoyed them anyway. ^^ https://www.instagram.com/p/BrIWo30BE__/

- I did some silk screen printing with dubious results, I really need to practice more! https://www.instagram.com/p/BrLaIgahVkn/ and https://www.instagram.com/p/BrLbFF7h9dq/

- I started a new animal serie
Most with the same small format and similar compositions with a a background circle made of abstract patterns with a fiew golden touches:
- Crow https://www.instagram.com/p/BraGkNUhFaH/
- Octopus https://www.instagram.com/p/BrgH-gqhTux/
- Spider https://www.instagram.com/p/BrhU0ePBfKx/
- Ravenstag https://www.instagram.com/p/Br5O3LXBN9c/
- peacock https://www.instagram.com/p/BsArqAGhhSn/

Two A4 outliers with a similar yet different style:
- panther https://www.instagram.com/p/BrxLOB-BWSd/
- whale https://www.instagram.com/p/BrvV17ZBF7f/

I also soft-launched my etsy shop (https://www.etsy.com/fr/shop/ArtofClem) to get it out of my to do list but need to put on a bit more work on promoting it, add some-more products, and probably adjust some prices. Pricing is so hard! ^^


I did a 12 month art recap : https://www.instagram.com/p/BsDTQ3AhE4N/ (for the first time in many year I was able to claim a drawing for each month of the year! \o/)


I'm also in the middle of internet identity cleaning and straigthening.

I thought hard on what to do and where to put my art now that tumblr is not that interesting anymore (I was already strugling with it). I can keep posting my fanarts on DW, but most of my art is not fannish, and I was losing my mind crossposting everywhere (or forgeting to), and I also want to keep my "mainstream" art as apart as my fannish nickname as possible. I don't want family members finding my Shape of Water porn while looking for my drawings. Peoples in fandom knowing my mainstream handle is less of a concern. I also needed to separate a bit more my art-handle from my irl accounts so I could keep those private while still sharing my art with my close circle.

So what I did is I switched my instagram feed from my irl facebook page to an @artofclem fanpage, with automated crossposting from insta to facebook https://www.facebook.com/artofclem/
I then recreated a new private instagram account for my irl stuff.

I still have two "spots" of cleaning to do:
- one is my tumblr jainas-art: I can't automate crossposting toward it as it's a secondary tumblr, and it get very few hits anyway. I wonder if I should just scrap it, or change it's name just in case and then let it sink into the depths of tumblr. An other solution is to keep it for the fanish stuff, recreate an @artofclem tumblr with automated cross-posting from instagram and start fresh
- more tricky is my deviantart. I have been using it for more than 12 years and it's a very comprehensive view of my art history on the internet, pictures from my time in art school and fanarts included. I dont want to get rid of it, but it has stuff that has nothing to do with @artofclem. I guess that if I want to keep using deviantart to host my art (do I? I'm not even sure), the solution is also to create a brand new @artofclem account.

So many questions! :) It's still an ongoing project, but I have made progress, and I think it's important for the future to clean up a bit my internet presence.

[seleneheart]

I second the idea of a new deviantart account. I have my fandom stuff and my *real* stuff in two different accounts.

[seleneheart]

I just joined drawsome a little bit ago, at the urging of mekare, so I haven't had a chance to participate very much. But it's one of my goals for the upcoming year!

I participated in the artyuletide exchange this December for the second year in a row. I had a great time researching the prompt and coming up with ideas.

[goss]

This is also my second time at Art Yuletide. Great to have you here at the community, and hope you realize your goals for the year ahead! :)

[fifty_fifty]

I did try to get a couple of Merthur Christmas cards done, because I said I would for a few friends. But ended up completely over committing myself with fic commitments for Merlin events (I'd do fanart but I honestly don't feel like I'm good enough yet to submit fanart for a fest).

So all I ended up getting done on that front was the basic outlining: https://i.imgur.com/4FomQqK.jpg

BUT, I did get it done in January in the end. So I guess I will link to the finished piece at the end of the month. I ended up re-purposing and making it a New Years card, only a few days late.

Edited to add: Oh, I just remembered I drew some mistletoe as a divider for a fic: https://i.imgur.com/VZovA83.png, so actually I did draw something.

[goss]

Thank goodness for the "New Years" greeting alternative. Almost all my Christmas cards end up as New Years greetings instead, because I never finish them on time. :b

The mistletoe is a great idea for a divider. :)