I've basically been sick since the beginning of the month... Progress on stuffs has been non-existent, and I overall feel like death. I'm on an antibiotic, and hoping things turn around soon.

Well, this is unfortunate. Once again I'm sick... It's a lot harder to focus on art while I'm feeling like garbage. I'll try to make some progress though. I've been working on the new little comic I posted last week. Of course, I realized that I should probably make concept art for important characters before just slapping them into the comic. Sooo my next piece will be a ref sheet for a goblin girl, who will be the protagonist's companion.

I've been making slow but steady progress in drawing over the last couple of weeks. I'm trying to push through my recent brain fog and make more of a habit of this. I finally got started working on a webcomic I've wanted to do for a while. I'm hoping to have at least something to share by Monday.

Drawing. I fuss, I tweak, I erase, I redraw, I edit, rinse and repeat. I mentally beat myself up over a piece. I get frustrated. Sometimes I think about giving up. But then... after a few hours of work, I take a step back and say... "You know... that actually looks okay!"

Don't let the bumps in the road dissuade you. Figure out what you dislike. Learn from your mistakes. Improvise, adapt, overcome. And most importantly of all... USE REFERENCES. Like... I was struggling to draw the hands in this piece... so I just plopped my hand on the table and took some pictures with my smartphone to use as a reference.

My Lifelong Passion

Circumstances have changed in my life, and now I find myself with more time to dedicate to art. And I've been doing just that. Piece-by-piece, I've been creating what I want - how I want it - just like I've always wanted. I've wrestled with so much internal turmoil over the years, but I think I've finally decided that... I'm okay with doing this as a job. I know the threat of burnout looms on the horizon - the fear of coming to hate the thing I love. Nonetheless, I can plan for it. Prepare to handle it when that time approaches.

To Pay the Bills...

Now the next big hurdle is... finding a way to monetize art sufficiently before my savings run out. I've spent the last few weeks padding out my portfolio. I've also set up at Ko-fi and a Patreon. Of course, I still need to build up more of an online presence if I hope to find people willing to pay for my work... I suppose branching out to stuff like Twitch and YouTube could also be helpful, but I'm still undecided on what exactly to make in terms of videos - aside from art streams. I do plan on doing animations, but those take a very long time to make. I guess it wouldn't hurt though!

For the Time Being...

I guess I should just stay the course. Keep drawing. Keep active of relevant social media to remain visible. And never stop drawing.

Wow, it's been nearly 12 years since I first found Newgrounds. I've been on and off a few times since then. Now, with the great Tumblr exodus, I've noticed a lot of people migrating over here, so I thought I might give it another shot. We'll see what comes of this.