Oh! Hi! Sorry I wasn't expecting you so soon. Let me just *knocks over ink bottle* Ah! No, don't sit there, I'll just clean that up while you go and *knocks over second ink bottle* Bugger! No. Right. I've got this. Don't worry. If you could just stand in the corner whilst I *knocks over third ink bottle* You've got to be kidding me! Agh! Hey though, silver lining: Imagine how much worse this would be if they were open.
Now I'll let you into a little behind-the-snips secret: The way I begin writing these updates is by copy-pasting the past fortnight of my work diary into a blank text file, removing duplicate entries, then rearranging the main points into grouped clusters which I can spin out into a section of waffle for an update. This is to ensure I keep track of the myriad things I'm juggling in my memory-deficient noggin, and also to ease the task of structuring and fleshing out a substantial chunk of writing.
On this occasion however, once the duplicate-culling was over, I was left with only three words: Octobink, Commissions & Nothin'. And so we begin at the beginning.
Octobink, if you can't recall anything besides the awkward name, is my ongoing challenge to draw 32 little ink illustrations throughout October depicting mine and my friends' OCs. This is primarily to go about improving my inking abilities with a brush, although I'd say the rewards have largely been in getting used to using brushes generally and the quality and layout of the associated sketches. That said the pieces do seem to be generally getting better and better, although saying so at the half-way point may be asking for trouble.
The method I've been using (at least up until now) has been thus: Thumbnail on some scrap paper to get an idea of the shape of the piece; Divide an A4 piece of printer paper into 4, and sketch the pieces thereon; Stick this sheet with some decreasingly-adhesive painter's tape to an increasingly-glitchy, second-hand light-box; Cut up some nicer paper (Kent printmaking paper, which is not really suited for inks but it's cheap and I've got it) and stick it on top of the sketch to trace in ink. And, time permitting, apply ink wash mixed in the underside of crushed coke cans. Big spender over here.
We'll see if the light-box's dying USB-mini port lasts long enough to keep this process up or if I'll have to resort to carbon paper tracing. That'll mean drawing the piece four times. Lucky me.
As ink continues being splashed around my desk in the foreground, commissions have been reactivated in the background. Not much to report there besides my continued efforts to earn rent, but the highlight of the process is that I'm back to having a working tablet! The Huion warranty saga is, for the moment, complete permitting me to at last return to the lands of digital noodling and, more importantly, work.
The funny thing was that, being in the midst of Octobink as I was, after setting up the new tablet, transferring over the screen protector (I'm not paying £40 for a new one of those, bubbles or not!) and testing that it worked... I immediately put it to the side for a couple of days to get back to inking. What an anti-climax, eh? All that time waiting and at the end of it, just... nothin'.
That's right, the long-threatened February Nothin' animation has graced me with a giant hole in my timetable. This was, in essence, my treat to myself for putting up with two months of warranty nonsense, something that I knew would bring me some joy.
I don't animate often, but it's enjoyable to work for an hour, then sit back and watch those scribbles you put down come to life in front of you. About 20% of my time spent on this was just watching it play on loop at various points. 😅
Having completed this I dutifully added it to our expanding roster of stream commands. So now you too can see February's floppy earrings dangling all over the baffling ending of Shadow of the Comet and into the spoopy hijinks of Pumpkin Jack! Then why not subject their wibbly ponytail to the frosts of a Saturday Valheim stream, before using them to point out what I spend most of my time doing during Sunday friend doodle streams!
So what's to come? More of the same, I'm afraid. Except the animation, that shiny has flown for the moment. I hope.
Octobink is still very much in full-fettle and I'm riding it right up to the line in terms of timing. I've also got some solid commission work on my plate this week, so little time for fripperies. I'm rather hoping, once the present commission wraps up, to get back to finishing part 2 of the Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened Highlights before spooky season passes entirely. But those are my current foci and if you don't like them, well, I have others.
Thank you ever so much for you continued support which, hopefully, can now be supplemented by actual work. You've very much kept me going through this technological dearth but now it's catch-up time. I couldn't have done it, or many other things, without you.
Look after yourselves,
Crispy 💜