Smokie-Horse

Right now, probably this guy, the one and only Chris-Chan, Mayor of CWCville: On account of how I'm presently unloved, terrible at drawing, possess warped social skills, have an irrationally bloated self-image, shamelessly steal concepts from the creative works of others, speak in a bizarre accent and spend a considerable portion of my life living in entirely fictional worlds. I would just like to point out, however, that in terms of personal hygiene, employment status, grasp of the English language and (I hope) general sanity, I'm in marginally better shape than Chris.

I'll keep it brief, guys. I'm not a professional artist, or even a good hobby artist, but I sketch some of the things that come into my head sometimes just because I like it. But more recently, I've been getting some really powerful compulsions to draw more seriously, especially when I see all the great works of art that my talented fellow fans come up with in this fandom and all the others I'm involved with. It just makes me feel lazy, really. Now, I'm cheap, so I've tried drawing in several different ways - black-and-white ink, paint, using Gimp, pencils, markers, a couple other free art programs - and none of them seem to click with me, and I dislike pretty much everything I've drawn so far. Because all the artists I like use Photoshop, I can't help the feeling that it would help me out some if I got it myself. What do you guys think? Photoshop; worth the investment? (and a big thanks in advance to anyone who replies c: )

I could try, if you're really, really, really desperate. Do you mind pencil art? Or I suppose I could do it digitally. Example to the left.

First of all, I really hope that we're all not sounding nitpicky here. But anyway, there's a little light-shaded patch above her right eye, on the extreme top-left of her face. Other than that, I like it a lot, especially how you've handled the shading and the texture of her hair, and actually given her an original expression that clearly isn't lifted straight out of a screenshot of the original 'toon. Good job!

Welcome aboard, MuffinQueen! Looks to me like you're one digital art set away from taking us by storm.

I'm assuming that your friend was more than satisfied.

I can only name Canada, sadly.

A beef stock, egg noodle ramen with chicken mince, a marinated egg and chewy vegetables, and a glass mug of that spiced milk tea that they make in Malaysia. *sigh*

Extremely interesting.

Regarding patriotism, well, America's a superpower, right? They need a big army, and because they have a big population, they need people to behave and always trust the government. So the people that control their culture (which is a scary but true thing) manipulate it with things like films, games and TV shows and so on so that more young people think it's cool to fight wars and believe in !!!THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!!!. The Canadian government don't do that because they don't need to. I mean, I can't see Canada invading Uzbekistan or Tasmania any time soon, and I don't see Canadian citizens rebelling either. And I'm not going to say anything about countries fighting. If NATO picked a fight with China, Russia and their Arabian/African allies, it would just be incredibly stupid in every way.

That is much better! Well done.

Wow, you guys have it figured out. If you do what makes you happy, you've succeeded, and if you've succeeded, then ideally that success means that you've finally achieved what will make you happy. Life is a short thing, but at the end of the day all that does is make things simple: we're all humans, all made of the same highly compacted space matter and therefore fundamentally equal, and all that matters is that at the end of the road we look back, think about the decisions we made and the effect we had on the world and think to ourselves, "In the grand scheme of things, I think that turned out all right". Maybe that means you drive a sports car and work on the top level of a skyscraper. Maybe that means you live in a wood cabin with some chickens. Whatever works. I'm genuinely sorry to hear that, dude. For what it's worth, I hope that you have at least one person, online or in real life, who'll listen to your thoughts about yourself and your life and help you sort them out into something that makes sense to you. And if not, there's always a few sympathetic ears out there, as hard as it can be to find the bloody things...

(Raises hand) ...unless it's S.T.A.L.K.E.R., that is. Legendary game.

Well, if you really want critique, the girl on the bottom (ice cream cutie mark) seems to have something up with one of her forelegs because of the shading. And I had to stare at them for quite a while to notice that, so well done on all accounts! Extra points for having your own interesting style, too.

The game has brilliant mechanics that are ridiculously repetitive, which all balances out to make it an easy 8/10 in my opinion. But considering how many ways they messed with the lore and overall feel of the universe here, I just hope that this isn't the future of LotR; getting diced up by multiple companies and retrofitted into all these different little projects that all feel like they came from completely different original sources. So honestly, I would feel much more comfortable about the game if it had been set in a completely original universe. For instance, we travel to Norway in the time of the Vikings, and a portal to the underworld has opened and all these Dokkalfar or Jotunns or something appear and attack the Jarls en masse. So we're playing exactly the same game, with exactly the same plot, just with Vikings and their gods. And if they'd done that, the whole undying thing might have actually made more sense. Also, the protagonist basically has superpowers. That just doesn't feel very Tolkien to me.

I have no idea; perhaps. I know so many people with the "symptoms" that it really isn't funny.

I do, both in writing and in talking, but only when necessary.

I use an Artline fine-line pen, usually around 0.4mm thickness, for drawing and writing alike. If nothing else it's a good excuse for my equally poor skills at both.