Ask Celeste Rdz C.

note taking

bonus:

messy! ...no, but really, I am a disgusting sketcher; I'm never gonna be one of those people who can just. go straight into inking without needing a billion guidelines and changing things every thirty seconds. I like to feel things out and try stuff before I know if I'll like it and, uhhh, basically machete my way through it like it's dense jungle foliage!

there's a lot of jabber and more examples under the cut, but I also found this process gif I made and...I think chickened out of posting. so it can be a preview, I guess!

I usually start with a super-rough thumbnail, not trying to draw anything better than basically stick figures, just figuring out rough layout/composition/what essentially I'm aiming to draw. I can't overstate how much my art improved once I started doing this step instead of trying to jump right into doing a solid drawing -- it is SO much easier to figure out the bones when I'm not wasting time trying to make it look nice yet (plus I don't feel bad about trying different things and discarding ideas, since they're still just stupid little doodles at this point).

my recipe for drawing hands!

(small note that this is a shortcut that is more abt style and ease than anatomical accuracy. it helps to take time to really properly study hands, makes it easier to bend the rules a bit like this and have it still look good!!)

So you've learned the 12 principles of animation but don't know where to actually apply them? Fear not!! For here is my step-by-step process, very very condensed, into one singular giant GIF.

Hope it helps!

queen of diamonds, upright + reversed 💎

A thousand thanks to @funtergeist for this precious piece, I haven't stopped smiling since they sent it over this morning 🥹💞