1.7.23

Here's a closeup of Varan, one of my primary OCs. I was happy with how his expression turned out so I thought I'd post it. I have been stealing some time here and there to draw my little flights of fantasy, but I haven't posted any of it yet. My imagination has been taking me to some really grotesquely perverse places, you see.

6.6.23

Hi! Still alive! I didn't intend to leave this place lying for so long, but stuff happens. I finally felt the sufficient combination of motivation and horny to start sketching again. There's no overt nudity here, but it still feels perverse doesn't it?

12.2.23

Even though there's no canon to the scenes I draw, this does feel like a direct followup to the last pic posted. I painted it the night after, actually. I was hoping to get it to a more developed state, but no such luck! I'm still committed to hours and hours of freelance work every single day. I've only taken two days off this whole year. "And how's the freelance going?" Not great, thanks for asking. My wrist is really starting to hurt, and I'm getting quite bored on top of that. I can work through pain, and I can work through boredom. But working through pain on top of boredom? Death. I've had to slow the rapid pace I'd set for myself a few weeks ago, and can no longer draw and paint "for fun" after my work session. I was really hoping I could keep up the pace for just another month; I'd then have solved the extensive money problems which torment me. No such luck, no such luck!!

I do however have a confession to make. I was doing so well that my hubris got the better of me and I stopped following my own sage advice. Tired of nothing but meat, eggs and black coffee day in and day out, I started eating carbs again and the inflammation resurged... Lesson learned. Time for a 2 day fast and some serious dietary stricture. I shouldn't complain so much, but maybe complaining is preferable to the bragging I indulged in last time. But it's my blog, so I'll complain and brag and brag and complain to my little heart's content. What are you going to do about it?

3.2.23

I took the day off yesterday and took a train to the city. I had a relaxing time reading Apuleius's The Golden Ass on the way there, which I might talk about more in future blog entries. I spent the day at the museum with a friend. Unsurprisingly, I'm always drawn to the image of St. Michael subjugating the devil by bearing down on him with his foot. That wasn't the inspiration here however; I had actually started this the night before. The less said about pictures like this the better, I think. I'd like it to speak for itself. I did show it to a different friend, someone with whom I sometimes share such things, and he gave it a compliment I can't help but repeat:

"The blood makes it real. As does the pain and indignity of the thing."

It's one of the finest compliments an image of mine has ever received. But I'll stop fellating myself. There's a lot of issues in this picture I couldn't find an elegant solution for. But on the other hand there are some devices in use so subtle I quite astonished myself... Okay I said I'd stop. More so than most of the sketches and doodles I post this one feels worth finishing.

1.2.23

I know I don't post very often. But it's not for lack of doing art. I do too much art really. But not enough of this art. Lately I've been doing freelance work, 12 hours a day (give or take 2 hours) for almost two weeks straight. It's been getting to the point where by end of the day I start feeling a scary carpal-tunnely tinge in my forearm flexor muscles. Of course I do what any sensible person does and grab an icepack, sit for 10 minutes then pick up the pen again and go go go. "Take a break from drawing! Take care of yourself!" This isn't really advice, even though people mean well when they say things like this. The reality of art-as-profession is that the bills don't stop just because you do. And when you take time out, well, the work and bills both pile up. And you're going to need to extend the length of your daily drawing sessions or you'll never catch up. You have to keep drawing, even when your body can't keep up. This isn't unique to art either, you hear of olympic athletes competing, and sometimes winning gold medals, with injuries. Over the years I've developed a protocol for these sorts of things which I will graciously share with you herein. You can skip to the end of this aside if you've no interest in this subject.

Number one is pretty simple: make your work area comfortable. Sit up straight, monitor angled at a comfortable angle etc. etc. bla bla bla. When you need to take drastic measures to protect yourself, because you feel an RSI injury might be around the corner, one of the things you have to sacrifice is pen sensitivity on your drawing device. Drop it down as low as possible, so that a feather-light touch gives maximum pressure. Sadly there's no truly comfortable way to draw with a digital stylus, compared to a pencil or paintbrush, it's a basic design issue which likely won't get fixed any time ever.

Obviously exercise is healthy, but if you're drawing 12-14 hours a day you probably don't have time to make it to the gym. Be smart though, do some dynamic warmups and some basic calisthenics. I find that handstands against a wall really alleviate my shoulder pain.

Listen to your body. When it's stiff and in pain, it's telling you something. You'll get dull pains when it starts getting inflamed. Catch this before it turns into full-blown RSI and you're forced to rehabilitate. At the beginning of my art journey I developed tendinitis because I just wasn't used to drawing so much (an astonishing 5-6 hours a day lol). I had to take a month and a half off. Doctor's orders. Most freelancers do not have the wiggle room for a break like this, and besides it's not fun.

Ice is your friend. Grab an ice pack out of the freezer when you get that dull, crampy sensation and let it sit for 10-15 minutes. You can actually get away with murder ergonomics-wise if you keep icing every couple hours. It gets the inflammation in the area under control pretty quickly provided you've not let it get out of hand.

Your diet can increase or decrease your body's inflammation. If you're really concerned about it, do a one meal per day intermittent fast, and eat ketogenicly, no carbohydrates, and especially no sugars. You can stay caffeinated with black coffee or tea. When your body is in ketosis it actively reduces inflammation. This might be considered an extreme measure, depending on what your habits and schedule are like, but it shouldn't be overlooked. And if you're in a situation where you need to keep pushing at all costs, extreme measures may be necessary.

"What about stretches?" I hear you ask. Well, I'm conflicted on them, and the science is a bit divided on them too. I think that many seem rather stupid and are more likely to exacerbate injuries than treat them. Dynamic warm-ups and mobility exercises seem like they'd give better results than applying pulling force on an inflamed muscle for 30 seconds at a time.

Here's a really contentions one. No masturbation. That repeated wrist motion is not doing you any favors, lol. At the risk of getting all TMI (on the blog where I post my erotic art) I've had almost no desire to masturbate at all, I've been so busy. Very interesting how it works.

As I was saying I've been pushing it very close to the edge with these drawing sessions. On saturday night I had to stop abrupty because my forearm really let me hear about it. Afterward I laid in bed fretting about how I'd overdone it and how I'll need to rehab and how I can't afford to. I had to take Sunday off. Which I did, for most of the day. But when I got home from my walk in the cold, I grabbed an icepack and, well, I drew for about 6 hours anyway. And miraculously, I didn't hurt myself in the process. Monday it was back to the long sessions. You'd think I'd be completely fed up with drawing now that I'm putting in 80 hour weeks. And yet yesterday, after another marathon session, what did I end up doing? I opened Clip Studio Paint and started painting this pic of Alwyn.

As you can see he's looking quite happy this week. Maybe because I'm happy. I keep flying close to the sun and getting away with it. Don't worry I won't keep this up for much longer. I'll drop things down to a sensible 8-10 hours when I'm all caught up with the things I need done. Don't mistake this post for glamorizing the destructive tendency toward overwork that plagues the commercial art profession either, just sometimes you need to do it, and there's a sense of pride you inevitably get when you can actually pull it off...

22.1.23

I've finally gotten something resembling a website up! It's a little kitschy and retro, I swear that's just the way it wanted to turn out. But that seems to be the general idea on neocities so who am I to question it? I try not to question anything when I'm in the midst of creating something.

It's funny, normally anything related to coding or programming makes my eyes roll into the back of my head, but I've had so much fun putting this together. It just goes to show that you can happily learn anything if you've a genuine desire to.

I think this is what determines whether or not you progress or stagnate (or regress) in your art. I've done all three at different times in my life. Over the last few years I totally felt myself stagnating. I'd stopped thinking, almost stopped caring entirely. Drawing had become a completely mechanical process. In short I'd stopped wanting to draw. It was something I was doing simply out of force of habit because I had bills to pay. I couldn't go on like that, I had to make this account for my gay cringe personal art. I needed to draw for no one other than myself.

Naturally, what I end up drawing is completely self-indulgent and embarrassing. I actually feel really weird posting it to be honest. But I think that has to mean I'm onto something. Maybe that's just how it feels when you're sharing something that means something to you.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION!!
20.1.23

Yep, I'm making a website and you can't stop me!

You can expect it to change around a lot. I'm still figuring out what I want. Also none of the links work yet.