mx. kit chimera

But you don't even have to be good at art to get something out of making art. I joke that painting is my version of touching grass because it makes my brain gears click back into alignment.

You can't hit UNDO in traditional art, which sounds terrifying, but I think is actually the key. A traditional painting is a place to make mistakes and then figure out how to keep going. To learn that you CAN keep going.

And sometimes it's nice to just make little potions and find out what happens when you mix them together :3

I put together this list of resources that really help me - present tense because I use them all the time.

https://mt.kanjon.art/ https://www.youtube.com/@MtKanjon Whether you're new to art or returning after a long time away, Mt Kanjon's videos are great for fundamental art tips digital and traditional, but also for the WHYs of making art in the first place, and how to keep at it when making stuff feels tough! Absolutely motivational~

https://linktr.ee/color.nerd The color chart I used in my Gamut Gamut Overload cabinet is by Color Nerd! I reference his charts and near constantly tbh. Go get you some free resources! He explains the science of both additive color mixing (RGB digital) AND subtractive color mixing (pigments, traditional). So much color science and appreciation for the history of how we understand color - with credits to the color scientists who got us this far. I'm gonna link a twofer video where he explains a part of my next resource. https://youtu.be/EACRRXynk1w?si=EKhjb1Jz66OM5zxP

https://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/water.html Handprint is the most out of date site on this list, but still REALLY useful for understanding Why Paint Does That. https://handprint.com/HP/WCL/pigmt6.html This page in particular explains that paint names are proprietary garbage, but more importantly it also teaches you how to read the numbers and symbols that unlock the SECRETS OF PAINT-Paint-paint [echo]. Okay actually they just describe pigments, which are ground up color rocks. Get in, we're doing Chemistry! A quote from Bruce MacEvoy that puts into words the feeling I myself am hoping to convey to you, but like, eloquently: "I built this site because watercolor lifted me out of my life in a way that placed me back in my self. It made the world I saw incredibly more vivid and unexpected: it taught me to see, it taught me to teach myself to see." This man has Opinions on paint, but also brings the facts to support them. His work directly influenced other resources on this list, like the next resource:

https://artistpigments.org/ Do you like swatches? OH BOY are you gonna love this site! I really can't overstate how useful this one is, it's like Handprint for 2026. Use Mixbox for color mixing predictions, which replicates real paint mixing.

oh, you wanna know about the booth book stack?

https://linktr.ee/gurneyjourney https://www.youtube.com/jamesgurney Yeah, it's Color and Light by James Gurney. If Heaven is real, it's Dinotopia. Gurney keeps up with tech and is still making free videos about plein air painting with gouache on his youtube channel. Information-packed substack, too. The book Color and Light is helpful in understanding how lighting and atmosphere changes the way we see color.

https://linktr.ee/notsorryart https://www.youtube.com/@notsorryart When I was getting back into art, tiktok led me to Sari Shryack of Not Sorry Art. Her bright saturated paintings of dollar store aisles and still lifes of nostalgic plastic bits were a discussion of growing up impoverished, and I'm still in awe of how her work can say so much. Her paintings and art lessons gave me the courage to use the bold bright colors that make me feel things. She offers a ton of free lessons on youtube, but the book Modern Still Life: From Fruit Bowls to Disco Balls focuses on the process of painting, you know, a still life.

https://linktr.ee/70sscifiart VRChat is a bit like being able to walk through the kind of places I'd only seen in weird book covers, which were a core inspiration to younger me. Worlds Beyond Time: Sci-Fi Art of the 1970s is a fancy physical version of the curation Adam Rowe has been doing for free on tumblr for years. I kid, but he does incredible work tracking down information about paintings and painters who mostly went uncredited at time of pulp paperback publication.

Part 2 coming after Furality, and I'll explain why I think watercolor + gouache is the most affordable and effective paint medium to start with. I'll show my modular setup that works in small spaces, bc I, like y'all, am just making stuff in my bedroom.

it was a weird year. here's the art stuff I put skill points in: cold wax oil painting: I feel like I'm understanding the medium a lot more, impasto is best pasto? mixing everything takes a lot of physical energy though. I painted a bigger canvas board for the Nighthawks parody than I'd tried before, which let me achieve more detail gouache: I technically painted a few things in gouache, but I think I mixed more color palettes for possible paintings than I made actual paintings :< I think I'd like to use it more in 2026, maybe do more sketchy things with it? I wish I could it over pilot ink, but alas printmaking: I'm trying to be social again irl while adapting to a new place - a few art classes are now accessible to me in this location and an intro to printmaking class seemed the most accessible. the process of printmaking by hand has such good puzzle solving and thinking backward, it was like a good brain scrubbing BLENDER (3D): lawks, I thought I'd be done obsessing with this program by now, but there's so much to learn it's like peering into the abyss. it's so so good to get into a flow state with, I might be addicted? the progress feels incredibly slow at the time, and often painful, but it's very cool to build things I normally have trouble visualizing. I've been modeling a room at The Whitespring (Fallout76) for more than a year now, but I've learned so much about blender via this one project? I've been modeling it for a cozy space in VRChat but also learning animation and textures and compositing in blender itself *stares at GenAI like a cow looks at an oncoming train* -also made a few new avatars for VRChat (so some Unity skills too ig? mostly building all the menus with VRCFury haha OH but I did focus on optimizing avis to below 50mb this year)

it's not anywhere on these images, but I continued learning about DaVinci Resolve (video editing), too.

Deira Neo toxiposm credits

key:

*texture edit by mx. kit chimera (substance painter) ~mesh/armature edits by mx. kit chimera (blender)

Deira Neo*~ - https://marivr.gumroad.com/l/DeiraNeo

HYPO - Dreamland Ears & Tail*~ - https://houseofheretics.gumroad.com/l/vmfec

Rodent ears*~ - https://aantara.sellfy.store/p/rodent-ears/

Jace hair*~ - https://zinpia.sellfy.store/p/male-hair-pack-01/

''Hair Texture Pack'' Free - https://cicieaaavr.gumroad.com/l/cicihairtex

Chain Crop Top* - https://vinuzhka.gumroad.com/l/yvgso

Ripped Jean Shorts for VRChat - https://saikura.gumroad.com/l/Jorts

Sequins Slip Dress* - https://goodsoup.gumroad.com/l/slipdress

"Play to Win" Sweater (Renipuff) - https://payhip.com/b/NspH2

Realtime OSC Watch, the "No Watch" for VRChat 3.0 avatars VRCFury - https://fuuujin.gumroad.com/l/NoWatch

Quest Comptible Flow Toy ☁ Cloud Portals ☁ - https://gmsbox.gumroad.com/l/cloudportals