the trick is to keep breathing

Well, sigh. We had Bogdog practice tonight, which was actually pretty good considering the fact that we haven't played together in over a month. And the plan was to go hit the Dugout afterwards. However, towards the end of practice I developed a massive headache - the kind that sort of stabs you behind the eye? I get those often, or often enough to know the only thing that makes it go away is Advil and Quiet.

So anyway, I stayed home while the boys went out to do their karaoke thing. Luckily for me, I felt alright enough to try some drawing, although I can't seem to commit to anything tonight for longer than 5 min. It was nice to be drawing again though. IMO, every little bit counts.

Anyway, here are tonight's sketches: Agrias from FFT, for cockeyed_art, and FFIV's Rydia and Rosa, because I just felt like sketching them. None are fantastic but Rosa turned out ridiculously cute and I kind of want to squish her.

I practice sketching a lot on notes in class - I've been practicing a lot this semester, haha - and I'm starting to get my art-related "groove" back. When Katy and I bought our tablets last ...what, August?, I really hadn't been seriously drawing in like forever, and I could tell when I sat down. Now I'm not saying I'm a fantastic artist (as you can see), but it has really taken me a lot of time and a lot of practice to get back to the place where I'm like, yeah, okay, that looks like a face and that looks like a person and that mostly looks like I want it to, I guess.

Sketching can be difficult for me. Sometimes I'll be doodling on paper and the next thing I know I've drawn an almost-perfect Quistis that I really like, but those are few and far between. Usually sketches (read: shit in the margins of my polymer science notes - hey, it makes studying fun!) come out looking somehow fugly or fucktarded, like the eyes are uneven or the hair's all fug or something's just wrong. And I sketch too. I'm not like katmillia who can draw a perfect line in her sketchbook and also makes me want to vomit from jealousy and the pretty. I draw like 300 lines to get the curve of a face right. And by right I mean CLOSE ENOUGH

Since what I really want to do is develop tablet skills, too, what I'm trying to do is basically to do low-pressure, nice-and-lazy, fun sort of sketches (like these) to help me develop the tablet-eye coordination I so desperately need.

I mean... I don't know. This is lame of me but with all the thinking I've been doing the last few months about how I spend my time and what that means, I've realized that I don't want my 20s to pass me by without putting some serious effort into actually learning to draw. It's all about seven_beacons, in the end -- I want to get Beacon into art form, somehow, even if it's just illustrations to a written piece, whatever. Ideally I want it to be a comic. And if I'm going to work this hard on a LAME ASS DEGREE, I can try to put a little bit of time and effort into "art studying" to help me get better.

This entry got long, and my headache is coming back. Time for more water and, probably, bed.

edit: my cat is absolutely the cutest thing ever. I'm finishing up this entry and she's sitting RIGHT next to the desk chair, staring at me. every time I look down at her she either meows or squeaks at me, like hey mom, pet me please. five minutes ago she actually got up on her back legs to bat me in the chair all pay attention to me!!! I think I'm going to go let her cuddle with me in bed. Rydiakitty, I heart you.

I am pretty much a posting fiend this morning, so I apologize. I had a batch running and kind of almost lost my sanity, so HA.

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Fun Thing the First:
cockeyed_art! This is an art community between myself, katmillia, and rosencrantz. The goal is, really, to get everyone to use our (SHINY NEW) TABLETS and to develop better drawing skillz and to draw regularly and all.

There's a weekly "challenge" where all that happens is someone prompts two characters, M and F, and we all have to draw at least one by the next week.

If anybody out there likes to draw and wants to play with us, feel free! We're currently working in FF IV, VIII, X/X-2, XII - but there are reference pics every week if you don't know a character. There are some "rules", but the only important thing is to not let 1,000 cock jokes offend you. If you're cool with that, you're game.

I'll also be posting the art in brokenprism, for anyone who watches that journal. I figure I should keep fanart out of this one so that hilldo doesn't make fun of me and stuff. So watch BP for my really crappy art! Or just watch cockeyed_art.

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Fun Thing the Second:
I am totally off on a cruise this weekend. Ha ha. See you suckers on Tuesday.