A Portrait of the Artist as a Quitter
In late 2018, I injured my back at work. The injury precipitated a nervous breakdown, as the pain from the injury wouldn’t go away, confirming my worst fears. I quit my job and moved in with my parents to try to recuperate physically and mentally.
And I tried to continue making art. I produced The Adventures of Yossi and Tal. I took up a handful of commissions and drew a few personal pieces for fun. But since 2006, I’ve been pursuing the goal of supporting myself with my art, and for all the thousands upon thousands of hours I poured into my creative endeavors, I never made more than $2300 in one year. That’s not enough to live on. That’s not even anywhere near minimum wage.
So I quit.
And quitting feels great, at least in some ways. I’m no longer a slave to self-imposed deadlines and the burden of creating and promoting content. I don’t feel bound to social media as a marketing tool. At my current job, I’m on track to make more money this year than from any other full-time work I’ve ever had. My time has opened up to exploring new hobbies and activities, sometimes just lying in the grass and staring up at the sky, and playing a whole lot of video games.
But quitting doesn’t always feel great. I grieve the loss of hope that comes from realizing just how high the odds are stacked against a professional artist. Success and failure aren’t a binary proposition, but it’s hard not to frame myself as a failure. And quitting wasn’t the outcome I expected when I started creating comics and looking for graphic design work. I wish it weren’t so hard these days to pick up a pencil and draw.
You know the world’s a mess out there. It’s daunting. And even if I managed to make a living wage off my art, I can’t shake the thought that comics won’t stop the worsening seasonal wildfires in the American West. Comics won’t stop the hurricanes and floods in Florida and Louisiana. Comics won’t stop white supremacists and the white supremacist apologists who enable them. People suffering from food insecurity can’t eat comics; the homeless can’t live in them. And comics won’t stand in the way of Russian forces as a prevaricating dictator issues orders of inhumane brutality against the people of Ukraine.
So it’s kind of hard to draw, knowing that it probably won’t solve the world’s problems and likely won’t do much more than pay my hosting bills. I’m not putting down the pencil entirely, but until I figure out a better way to approach this, it’s going to continue to be hard to draw.
LET'S RECOMMEND ARTISTS!
1:
I only recently started following him, but I like his stuff. In his gallery you'll find a lot of medieval and fantasy pieces, all with a grounding in realism and/or history. His latest project is redesigning characters (e.g. Asuna from Sword Art Online) in his style with an emphasis on practicality, which is a cool idea.2:
Ten hundred million millennia ago, Joe and I bonded over our appreciation for classic RPGs like Suikoden and Final Fantasy 6. He brings a well-developed and realistic style to all sorts of funky, fantastic, and at times dark subject matter, but often with a quirky sense of humor. He doesn't post as often on DA these days, but when he does, it's a treat, so give him a Watch.3:
Aurora never posts on here anymore. She's too busy tearing it up on Instagram. But you should follow here both there and here, because she draws magical girls, dope fashion design art, Transformers, and Voltron, and everyone likes at least one of those. And maybe if you follow her here on the Deev, she will post more here too.4:
I literally just discovered this dude the other day. Check out his gallery for some crazy nigh-photorealistic surrealism. Photosurrealism? The Tooth Tree. Also, the fan art mashup I never knew I wanted: Lemmings vs. M.C. Escher.5:
Julia Hutchinson's work first came to my attention through The Final Fantasy VI Comic, back in the mid-to-late 2000s when it started out on ComicGenesis. The FFVI Comic has since been put on indefinite hiatus, but here on the Deev and at her portfolio site you can still follow her latest work--some of which is FF6-related (stickers!)!6:
If you have ever wished there were more Akira Toriyamas--in fact, Akira Toriyamas who draw Resident Evil and Legend of Zelda and Naruto--then boy are you ever in luck. BielMegami's work is solid and sharp, he's got chops, and you should check out his gallery, especially if you are a fan of the Toriyama.Real talk: I have been on the Deev since 2006. I have made friends on here that have since deleted their accounts or disappeared entirely. I remember the days of CuteLucca. And because my initial list of recommended artists was so sparsely populated, I went through my faves, looking for the works of folks I'd overlooked. I found stuff from talented peeps whom I'd followed who had not updated since 2015, 2013, or even earlier. But everyone on this list of recommendations is still in the game, and they are well worth your time to give a look.
For that reason, and because I mentioned Julia Hutchinson's Final Fantasy VI Comic, I'm gonna give an honorable mention to:
: Clara Kerber is also adapting FFVI into comic form, and she's still rollin' out the pages. She's got over a thousand watchers, but hey, her art skills and commitment to her project merit mention. If you, like me, still can't sufficiently scratch that itch for additional FFVI content 25 years after its release, Clara Kerber's artwork can help sate your craving.
Artist's Notes
Hairstyle References
Survey
Thanks to everyone who took the Sasha style survey! Let's get the Sasha style selector up in here for reference and take a look at the poll results:
The first graph shows which styles respondents selected when they could choose as many styles as they wanted. The second graph shows the results when respondents had to pick a single favorite. As you can see, J was the runaway favorite no matter how you slice it, and B, G, and K also garnered consistently high popularity, whether as first choices or general likes. And if you look closer, the data reveals some interesting trends, so: let's get statistical.
To begin with, it should come as no surprise that long styles proved to be popular choices. Almost 50% of all your choices came from the bottom row of long styles, and the middle row of medium-length styles also outperformed the top row of short styles. Straight styles (B, F, H, and J) also made up a popular category, pulling in around 40% of votes, compared to curly and wavy styles, each of which came to roughly 30% of the totals. Perhaps the simplicity and easy upkeep of a straight style fits Sasha's personality well?
I tried to pick a diversity of lengths, textures, bang styles (or not), and so on, but two-thirds of the styles have a side part. And the third of styles with a center part (E, F, H, L) only got about a fifth (20%) of your votes! And as you can see, the top four styles in either category are side-part styles. Does Sasha simply look better with a side part? Or can she rock a center part--just not particularly the center-part styles featured here? What do you think?
Style I got some peculiar results. It scored big in the general-likes category (second only to J!), but only one of you picked it as their absolute favorite. Is it a nice style for a fancy occasion, but not one you'd expect Sasha to wear day-to-day? That's one interpretation. You see a similar effect in the data for A, which was generally well-liked but only one person's first pick. Of the short styles, it shared the top "Likes" spot with B, but got heavily outclassed by B in the "Favorites" category, even though B is a higher-maintenance style.
On a more subjective note: my favorite, K, was also several of you folks' favorite. B and H, two of my other top styles, both performed reasonably well with you guys too. Look what good taste we all have when it comes to hairstyles for Sasha Braus!
Thanks to everyone who took the survey, faved, posted comments, or gave the Sasha Style Selector a lil' juice on social media. It was fun interacting with you guys over Sasha's hairstyles, and I may try making another one of these. If there's another of the Attack on Titan gals that you'd like to see a style selector for, or some particular styles you'd like to see for her, please don't hesitate to let me know.
I was really pleased with how this one came out. For starters, I actually did some research and picked styles specifically to complement Sasha's face shape. I guess most anime characters will have heart-shaped faces for stylistic reasons, but still! The preliminary work went a long way into making this a better piece.
A few hairstyles surprised me with how much I ended up liking them. B, for instance: it was fun to draw all those sharp flicks and the different shapes at play in the style, and I like the bangs in Sasha's eyes. H also turned out better than I expected; the straight-but-messy layers and the blunt bangs suit Sasha well. And I'm not generally a fan of the super-short pixie cut, but with C, I made a good-faith effort at making the style work, and dang if Sasha doesn't kinda halfway pull it off.
As far as favorites go, I'd put B on there, along with J and K. Longer styles are always nice, and I think either of the latter two would also look good put up in Sasha's trademark ponytail.
I didn't go into the piece with any preconceived styles that I wanted to draw for Sasha, which meant that I wasn't just filling up spaces to round out the hairstyle selection. And honestly? One way or another, I like every single style here. I don't think E is gonna make anyone's toplist, though--the best you can say is that it's goofy and kinda cute, and you can't really take Afro-Sasha seriously. But part of the fun of these is seeing a character try on a few styles that she wouldn't wear every day.
Anyway, thanks for listening to me talk about hair. If you, too, would like to talk about hair, here's a hair question for you! Is there another of the Attack on Titan gals that you'd like to see a style selector for, or some particular styles you'd like to see for her? Drop a comment and let me know.
Coldburn
This is the sci-fi comic book that my brother, David Ferrell, and I have been working on over the past year and a half. The first three pages are posted at Webtoon, and further pages will be posted over the next two months.
We're entering it in the site's Sci-Fi Comics Contest, where we stand a chance to win up to $30,000 and a slot as paid featured creators on Webtoon. It's predominantly a popularity contest, so please vote for us, Like our pages, and share. We're counting on your support!