DELTARUNE RELEASE DATE!!!

Deltarune 1-4 releases on both National Ketchup Day and National Start Over Day. I now have Deltarune comic ideas for Start Over Day to celebrate. I can't wait for June 5th.

In the meantime, I should probably replay Chapters 1 and 2 so I'll have a save file with the shadow crystals and everything. Man, can't wait to possess a teenager against their will and force them to make friends with everybody. (Unless I decide to do Snowgrave... which I might. Good thing Deltarune has multiple save files!)

Is the weather celebrating the holiday? Why the heck is it snowing, it was like 75 degrees (Fahrenheit) just last week.

I'm pretty sure fish don't live in trees... or juniper bushes.

Wow, this fish is some sort of genius!

Aww, how cute. Fish is making friends with Douglas and Frog. He even rolled a nat 20! (I didn't make the frog, btw. That was a Christmas gift from a friend.)

Anyways, if you want the pattern to make a fish of your own, it's under the cut.

Random Doodles

I'm going to be honest, I'm also venting a little bit. This is all vent art (sort of?) because I've got a cold and I want to complain about nothing in particular. I don't feel physically better, but drawing does at least improve my mood.

Shakespeare therapy bot. I clearly don't know how to use gradient maps... and it's supposed to be kicking its legs but I failed at expressing that.

How come dreams can be so much cooler than your artistic skills? The sword was so much cooler in my dream, but I can't remember exactly what it looked like.

I don't know, I feel bad about about complaining. Even irl, I don't really admit to those moments when I'm frustrated or annoyed, because I feel people will like me less or something. I apologize if my ranting is annoying. Also, the above picture was supposed to have glowing eyes in the darkness but I just couldn't figure it out.

Funny story, I composed that little piece while having dinner with some of my ASL class. I was pretty much as quiet as I am during class, even though I could have spoken aloud. I just didn't have much to say, but it was nice to hear the voices of my classmates. I have also composed music while playing Mafia with friends... and while bowling with friends... I guess I'm a bit antisocial even when I'm being social?

I want to explain this one a bit. I made a character who is an enchanted suit of armor, and drew them as a suit of plate armor with a great helm. A knight in full plate armor would normally wear a different sort of helmet, so I did some research and made up some in world reasons for why this character would have a certain sort of helmet. That's fine.

The problem is with me feeling bad about not knowing a lot about armor or history. I felt like that made my story, my character, and me inadequate, and this is usually where my creative paralysis comes from. I love learning about different things and implementing those things in stories and art, and I consider that a beneficial trait that I have. It's just also a really bad trait because I have a tendency to turn it up to an 11.

This same thing happened when I wrote some lore about a steampunk Undertale AU. I felt it wasn't good enough because I couldn't figure out the infrastructure of the Underground. It's okay that I don't know everything about factories and the Industrial Revolution (though I will probably read some books as research, because I do like learning in order to make my stories better).

Anyways, that's some art and some venting. It feels a little bit weird not to act like I'm all fine and dandy, but hey, we've all got problems, right? I don't really like ignoring that and acting like I'm fine all the time, thus me letting out some of my frustrations in this post. They're very mild frustrations, but it does still feel good to complain a bit.

Ok, so, I had a cool dream a couple of weeks back, but I totally forgot about it, but it was this fairy tale type thing and there was a narrator. But, you know, I forgot about it because I didn't write anything down after I woke up.

But last night, the narrator came back to me as I was falling asleep. This was the only thing I was able to wake up enough to write down, but now I remember the whole dream.

How come my brain can come up with cool lines like that when I'm not even trying? Anyways, I could probably make a comic based off this dream, once I'm not sick. But seriously, how cool is that line?

Make Up Your Own Holiday Day!

In addition to listening to my Agatha Christie audiobook, I will be committing my own crimes by continuing my Undertale Yellow genocide playthrough.

Don't mind the bad art quality, I have terrible art block (and a cold), but this holiday is one I'm sure a lot of people would like to know about. I hope you have fun celebrating! (It's also National Spinach Day and Manatee Appreciation Day.)

Working on an Afghan

Most of the way through my second skein of yarn, about a quarter of the way through the pattern. I think I really needed this, it has been way too long since I crocheted or knitted something, and I've never done a project as big as this before.

Taking breaks from art to do some crocheting from time to time is really good for my mental health, when I remember to do it.

New Favorite Brush

I don't know, I've been looking for a brush that has a sort of messy or rough quality to it so it doesn't feel so digital, but pencil brushes, while great for sketching, are a bit too rough looking for my taste. I tried out this brush during a random sketching session and oh my gosh, the flow of it is so nice. It is so much easier for me to do thick and thin lines, and it's actually a lot of fun to try putting on hatching. It's so expressive, and it's making me like art again.

Also, I like the idea of Gaster being the "man who speaks in hands" because he's deaf (or hard of hearing). I'm taking an ASL class right now, so I'm signing every day, and my teacher is crazy good at communicating. Her stories are the best (and more than one have been about her getting pulled over by the police).

Anyways, I think it would be a really fun challenge to draw a comic where at least one of the characters is deaf or just doesn't speak. (In some AU stories in my head, Frisk has selective mutism and sometimes prefers to sign). And the thing is, drawing sign language has its unique challenges. When you write about someone speaking in sign language, you can just describe some of the signs and provide translation. When you animate or film sign language, you can capture all of the necessary signs on the screen. But in a static drawing, you can only do one sign, you can't make or describe the necessary movements, and the difficulty with comics is choosing which signs to illustrate. Luckily, there are rules, and I know the basics, so I might try a comic with sign language in the future.

Why I Keep my Old Art

I used to hate this piece. Like, as I was writing it I was consistently beating myself up about how bad of a composer I was. So I gave up, but I saved it anyway, even though I was sorely tempted to delete this song. I came back to it after a few weeks, and found out that I actually like it. I think there's potential here.

Stuff ranging from early 2023 to mid 2024. I feel good about these. Like, I know I can do better now, but it is so much harder for me to feel proud of what I can do in the present. However, I find it comforting that I can be proud of my past self, and it gives me hope I can feel proud of my current art someday.

So yeah, it is important to keep your old art to keep track of your growth (and maybe laugh at how bad you used to be), but I think it's also important to keep your old art for how good it was too. With these pieces, I am a lot more forgiving of mistakes and a lot more capable of seeing the good, just as I would be for another artist. The thing is though, the artist that drew those was me.

I like those sketches I did years ago. If someone else had done them, I would not call them a failure. And considering that I have improved since I drew these, that means that I am not a failure. And yeah, sometimes it's hard to believe that, even as I feel proud for my younger self, but at least I have that pride to give me hope that I will believe it eventually.

Also, keep your old art in case you make a stylistic change you don't really like and want to go back to a previous style.

Little Gerson Headcanon

Okay, so, I don't have any good reasons for this headcanon, but every time I think about what jobs the monsters would get after the barrier is broken, I always put Gerson as a librarian.

Like, his Deltarune counterpart wrote books, so that might be part of it, but in Deltarune he was also a teacher and I just... kind of don't see it? At least, not for Undertale Gerson, and I am 100% certain that this is just me, but Gerson just gives me librarian vibes.

Like, I know for a fact that he would have great book recommendations, and that he would joke around with the parents while the kids ran around and looked through books, but he would also be really good with the kids too. Even the shy ones.

He'd also talk about monster history like he does in the game. That's not really a librarian thing, but obviously Gerson loves to teach. I just don't see him as a teacher as much as I see him as a librarian.

You know what? Maybe this is because all of my favorite librarians were "old" people who had a lot of energy and enthusiasm, and Gerson fits that in my head. It's kind of funny, I can't remember actually talking to those librarians myself (I was and am pretty shy), but I never felt bored when my parents socialized with them. I really enjoyed listening to them talk about stuff.

One of those librarians introduced five or six year old me to the Angelina Ballerina books, which got me into ballet (which I still love, even if I don't dance anymore). And I can totally imagine Gerson doing that for someone, human or monster. And the thing is, that's totally something he could do as a teacher too, and probably did do in Deltarune. Sculpting is a love of mine that I would have never discovered if it weren't for my high school art teacher (same with music and composing from my orchestra teacher.)

So yeah, I guess my personal experiences make me think of Gerson as a librarian, and not really any canon information about him. Usually I don't base headcanons off of just pure vibes but Gerson's cool, and libraries are cool, so they should go together.

So, I totally forgot the holiday and somehow looked on Google Street View and decided to draw this place in County Cork, Ireland... and the green color scheme was also completely unintentional as well, I just wanted to draw in green... I was halfway through this before I realized.

Anyways, Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Environment Thumbnails

Thumbnails are a lot harder than they look, and environments are very, very hard. Weirdly enough, coming up with the dumb idea of Prince Charming's Legal Team gave me the motivation to make a few thumbnails, and I actually had fun! Who knew having a fun little story to tell could make things like backgrounds enjoyable?

Dumb Character Concept

So, here's Prince Charming's Legal Team. You might think this is a case of an idiot prince who gets into so many scrapes that he needs a legal team to keep him from causing wars and getting thrown in jail, but nope! This idiot prince is in charge of the legal team!

So, basically, these guys look for loopholes and ways to fulfill the requirements of curses and spells. This is because Prince Charming here noticed that a shocking amount of princesses were having to marry the princes that kissed them awake, and he felt that that was an old-fashioned way of doing things. So in order to free those princesses (and the princes, he has experience with this sort of thing) he put together a legal team that deals in magical contracts.

The one who does the real brunt of the work is the dwarf lawyer, who has many decades of experience with spells and magical contracts. We've also got the half-elf twin sisters, one a wizard and one a rogue. The wizard is training to learn the ins-and-outs of magical legalese (so she can make her own spells legally binding). The rogue is in legal trouble, this is basically community service because Prince Charming made a deal on her behalf. The storyteller has a near encyclopedic knowledge of fairy tales, and so can quickly identify the type of curse, spell, and who or what might have caused the spell. The knight is an enchanted suit of armor the prince had made, foreseeing possible danger in this line of work that would need protection.

And Prince Charming is the wallet. And also kisses princesses or toads when they can't find any real loopholes, after the lawyer drafts a disclaimer stating that there was no romantic intention behind the kiss, and that neither party is obligated to marry the other. Again, he has experience in this realm.

Anyways, I kind of want to draw these characters more and tell their stories, who should I do first?

I don't know, either this is a fire knight or some sort of will-o'-the-wisp possessing a suit of armor. I was just trying out some brushwork stuff.

Why. Have I not. Used this stuff before? I got a big container of clay for my birthday last year, never used it because I didn't know the best way to heat it up, and it's amazing!

This is my first time working with Monster Clay (I've used regular clay before, the type you fire in a kiln) and it's pretty great! It's definitely a lot harder to smooth things out when you can't just spritz it with water, but it also holds details a lot better than regular clay (I should say easier, I have made some pretty detailed things, the details just tend to wash away if you use water to help smooth your sculpture).

Sans was a great choice for a first project, since he's made with nice big, simple shapes. I had a lot of fun doing the wrinkles and folds in his clothing, but his face was so hard. It's probably still not quite right, but you should have seen some of my earlier tries. Not my best work. Anyways, I think it would be fun to maybe scan and 3D print him and add a bit of paint. I'm not willing to ruin my clay with color.

There's a little video and some process type pictures under the cut.

Wunderland Doodles

This is just me doing some practice doodles for Wunderland. I'm feeling confident enough that I can get a decent start on the comic, but it has been forever since I've drawn Alix and I need to remember how I did it back then. Plus, my art has improved, so I do need to figure out how to make my characters look better but still recognizable. I really like how my size chart thingy turned out.

A lea (pronounced like "lee") is an open area of grassy land. I didn't feel like drawing a lea, but hopefully you can imagine one as you listen.

Butterscotch or cinnamon?

If Majora's Mask Link fell into the Underground- 1

There is no way I'm not celebrating the Legend of Zelda's 39th anniversary, but I'm not sure if I'll have the time to do the art I want, so I made sure that I at least had this comic up. I have rough plans for several others (including one with Bremen's Mask and the Canine Unit, heh heh). Of course, I'm terrible at drawing Link, especially his hair, so it might be a bit difficult.

I find it funny how similar Frisk and Link are. Both are left handed, both do not speak, and both have the choice whether or not to fight.(Link can wear the stone mask to become invisible to monsters, another comic idea I'm looking forward to.)

You know, I used to play Majora's Mask and Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker on the Game Cube. We don't have a Game Cube anymore, of course, but we can still play Wind Waker by putting the disc in our Wii and plugging in the Game Cube controller. I really wish that Nintendo would just release Wind Waker and Twilight Princess on the Switch. Goodness knows, people would buy it.

Anyways, I might do some more Zelda art today, but if I don't, I can at least say I celebrated.