daleof:

Please protect my beautiful high femme mermaid son. Inktober day 14 (im a little behind oops)

Here’s yesterdays Inktober in case you missed it!

(Source: snoothaver)

3:38 pm  •  16 October 2016  •  70 notes

sammyborras:

A friend of mine stopped doing the small press comics circuit in 2015, and it’s made me think a lot about how we need to be more careful about ‘encouragement posts online’. You might say something that would kick yourself into action, but there’s actually people out there who don’t respond in the same way, and it can actively discourage them. So yeah, I think it’s important to tell you about what happened (because other wise you’d just never find out about this stuff, right?) ….

So it started with arguments over fan art which caused the scene to get sour and hostile to new people. To me it highlighted a divide in attitudes. Relaxed ‘zinesters’ who believe in using self publishing to make whatever you want, whatever the quality VS. those pursuing a professional career, striving for the very best they can achieve and ultimately trying to use self publishing as a stepping stone to greater things. 

At that time people would say things along the lines of ‘if you can’t afford to table at a convention without the fanart, then your work isn’t good enough to be here.’ … I think the thought behind this was to encourage people to ‘STEP UP YOUR SMALL PRESS GAME.’ but it’s completely without context right? You know if you’re not trying your best and it’s ok to tell yourself to up your own game. But we’re all coming from wildly different backgrounds! You don’t necessarily know who is working full time with 3 kids and drawing comics whenever they possibly can, and who is working part time with no responsibilities to anyone. What if I’m already regularly crashing from the work load and I can’t work any harder? my comics could technically be at a high standard, but the ideas aren’t mainstream enough (we are self publishing them in the small press after all.)  (this is also ignoring that both comics and illustration industries have fashion styles which change over time - you could just be unlucky with how you prefer to draw)

My friend responded to the situation with ‘well if I’m not good enough, I guess I’ll stop self publishing comics and zines then. I’d be making a loss without the fanart anyway.’ … my heart broke a little bit.

And this unhealthy ‘STEP UP YOUR GAME’ attitude towards work seems to pop all all the time online. People beating themselves up over not working hard enough. Kicking themselves loudly in public (online) and everyone agreeing with them. Reinforcing this weird idea that we could all always be doing more and that we definitely have to become some sort of crazy obsessed comics machine that does nothing else. Sell your soul to the comics gods or GTFO.

I’m actually guilty of doing this myself. I’ve mellowed out over the years though. When I was being treated for an unrelated anxiety disorder, my therapist pointed out that I was regularly working myself up if I thought any amount of time had been wasted rather than used efficiently. We’re people, not machines and we don’t have to work all day every day, it’s perfectly ok to take breaks. In fact it’s probably healthier to regularly take scheduled breaks than to work until you burn out.

My friend read some more posts recently which have lead them to quitting freelance comics and illustration work altogether. Which is just crazy because they’re very skilled at drawing (better than I can draw). I think we need to remember that you can’t just write something like ‘be prepared to give every ounce of your being to your comic project or you may as well just give up right now’ without considering that someone with a different disposition to you might read the same thing and think ‘Welp. OK. Bye.’

Keep kicking yourself into action if it works for you, but consider whether or not you need to air it publicly? And choose words carefully if you do decide it’s important to you to share it.

I really hope that my friend ends up coming back to the small press world some time in the future. But until then - please be kind to each other - AND TAKE BREAKS <3
Sammy

Very important!

2:23 pm  •  15 October 2016  •  820 notes

daleof:

For Inktober day 11 I drew a goofy self indulgent self insert for Valerie Halla’s New Moon Alley. Please read her comic Goodbye to Halos!!

Bumping yesterdays Inktober!

(Source: snoothaver)

2:53 pm  •  12 October 2016  •  11 notes

daleof:

Inktober day 9! A lil bass playing bun for batongmalaque!  As you can probably tell I ended up missing a couple days because the weekend was kind of awful and stressful but hopefully I won’t miss any more!

Here’s #inktober day 9 again!

(Source: snoothaver)

5:00 pm  •  10 October 2016  •  18 notes

daleof:

Inktober day 6!

Here’s yesterdays Inktober!

(Source: snoothaver)

5:27 pm  •  7 October 2016  •  12 notes

daleof:

Inktober day 5! It ghosts? It ghosts.

Here’s yesterdays inktober!

(Source: snoothaver)

3:33 pm  •  6 October 2016  •  19 notes

daleof:

Inktober day 4! I was trying to draw a friends fursone but it turned into a drawing of a different friend oops.

Here’s yesterday’s Inktober!

(Source: snoothaver)

4:21 pm  •  5 October 2016  •  17 notes

cat-boots:

fluffy axolotl snoot monster!

[commission for @daleof]

It me! Pls consider commissioning cat-boots if u want a cute fursone!

6:43 pm  •  29 July 2016  •  317 notes

Oops I kept messing around with that colour study from earlier.

11:42 pm  •  11 April 2016  •  12 notes

mirandaharmony:

You can get these baby gator pins in my shop! I’m really excited about these :)

Look at what my friend Miranda made!!

(via mirandaharmony-deactivated20180)

11:32 pm  •  30 March 2016  •  607 notes