#tellih

Mostly, I think I feel relief. I've been working on this comic for years, and before it launched on originals I had already been working on it for years... I have other stuff I've wanted to work on, but it was just so much time and energy that I couldn't get anything else started. It's been a lot of holding myself back, a lot of burning myself out, and my brain still hasn't fully accepted that it IS over.

So I'm really ready to move on. I just hope the ending is satisfying, I'm happy with what I've done and I don't feel like I really had to sacrifice for it, I knew I was going to have 105 episodes like 50 episodes in.

I think there's a lot of things that people wish I answered in the story that I never intended to answer. I really prefer leaving much unsaid in my work, I try to be direct about the themes I'm including, but not as direct about conclusions of them... And even less direct about things that don't serve them at all.

Color harmony is a really complicated subject, so definitely remember to be patient with yourself.

Colors are significantly affected by how they interact with each other. A red next to orange will look different than a red next to green, which will look different next to blue... etc.

This is really important when it comes to making a color palette, because the colors you use WILL play with eachother, so you have to be sure they're playing nice.

This piece, for example, is entirely red. It's all the exact same hue, but the value and saturation makes the colors still distinct from eachother.

When making a rainbow, especially with 10 distinct steps, you have a lot of potential with your colors.

Personally I use HSB/HSV sliders when I'm illustrating. Hue, Saturation, and Black/Value. This lets me be as precise as possible when I'm selecting my colors.

I'll be explaining everything with these terms! (Hue, Saturation, and Value)

1: These colors vary only on hue 2: These colors vary on hue and saturation 3: These colors vary on the hue and value

You can see how much each of these will affect the colors and how they look next to eachother. Manipulating these factors can give you a lot of control over your palette.

Now, I'm varying which color is the "focus" of the palette. I'm also modifying every aspect of HSB to make them play nice.

4: This palette has a lot more yellows and oranges than the rest, and barely any/no blues 5: This palette is an even spread, 5 colors are warm and 5 are cool. 6: This palette focuses mostly on green 7: this palette focuses more on the purple and blue side of the spectrum.

If you're finding you're struggling well with green transitioning to blue and purple, then you can just have some more greens to make it feel smoother.

When manipulating all three sliders, you can make rainbows that are entirely tinted to a certain hue. This can get you really cohesive palettes.

8: tinted yellow 9: tinted blue/green 10: tinted pink/purple

When your palette is like this, you'll find that putting in a contrasting color will pop significantly more.

(These contrasting colors are pulled from the original fully saturated rainbow that I put together, #1. Notice how different the colors look here than they did in their original palette!)

You can use this effect as you please or avoid it as much as you like!

As always with art more information is key to making your decisions.

Exercises I suggest to understand color theory better:

Making pieces without using specific colors (try to make something look "Green" without using green)

Make a cool toned rainbow and a warm toned rainbow (every color has a cool and a warm variant) and draw something with each of them (one drawing cool, the same drawing warm)

Use red for shadows and green for light, and then draw the same thing with green for shadows and red for light (or any 2 opposite colors

Copy art and photography that has colors you like, but DON'T color pick until you're done to see how close you were (don't post pieces where you copied someone else's work without explicitly saying you did so, it's for study)

Paint from life

Take some colored pieces of paper and shine lights on them and watch how the light reflects off of the paper onto different objects

Here's some studies I did for one of my classes in school. They're old, I can't paint traditionally anymore without pain. But what I learned was still important whether or not the art is old!

I also suggest keeping these timed, All of these were under 1 hour (traditional) or under a half hour (digital). The more practice you get, the better!

And, if you can practice in different media (I understand it can be expensive, take up a lot of space, or even be painful), I personally find that each media has different pros and cons and forcing yourself to work within the limitations of a particular medium will teach you a lot!

(digital still lifes)

(gouache studies)

(Acrylic studies)

(digital copies)

I hope something in here helps!

How could you be late to ask me something about my comics? It's never too late!

I've pretty much got the whole story planned, yes. I actually intended to start this story back before my first comic, Millennium, but some character design drama got in the way of things so I postponed it... And then I started making Time and Time Again for work, right when I was planning to start it, so it got pushed back again!

So We Were Legion has been on the backburner for me for about 7 years now, and I am just ITCHING to get it started. so I'm MORE than happy to talk about it!

Obviously I wont tell you the entire plot, as that's pretty big spoilers and also subject to change, but the characters are pretty set at this point and I love them dearly

Luciel (he/she/they) is a lucky, upbeat mermaid. They easily make friends, but are a bit of a homebody and really just enjoy living in the middle of nowhere at the bottom of the sea, and definitely are NOT looking for an adventure.

Zagan (he/him) is an asshole. He's a demon and really good at what he does, and a bunch of people want him dead. Which is, honestly, the plot.

The two become supernaturally tied together, and have to hold hands when on the surface, or Zagan will die. This hit to his cool guy aura (being attached to the cutest, sweetest mermaid to ever exist) is really bumming Zagan out and making his work (stealing souls) extremely difficult. One of them is way better at accepting this situation than the other.

Between a lot of drama, intrigue, and mystery, the two grow closer together as Zagan learns to unravel his toxic masculinity and accepts a more gentle way of living, while Luciel learns to confront situations, rather than evade or put up with them.

Aaaand obviously they fall in love and the power of love saves the day and fixes everything. because I'm the one writing it and this is how I am as a person.