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"Tutorial" on how to draw an OC with dwarfism (well, some of it).

Boring tired disclaimer: Keep in mind that this is an introductory "drawing" "tutorial" and has some generalizations in it, so not every “X is Z” statement will be true for Actual People. Which happens to be true for everything in general.

You are heavily encouraged to do your own research because this does not contain everything you should know before making a character with any type of dwarfism.

Consider supporting me on ko-fi if you find this to be helpful.

i want to binge watch a series i want to do stupid shit i want to sneak out at night i want to dye my hair ridiculous colours i want to wear a shit ton of makeup i want to lie in bed half the day doing nothing i want to have sleepovers

i feel like i’m just 9 year old me with an aged up body, fuckass irrational feelings, and a phone

i feel like i’m being treated like a 9 year old with a phone.

i just want my fucking “reckless youth” while it lasts

- Jazz and Azz having third eyelids and forked tongues, translucent skin and little scales along their cheekbones. Jazz’s fangs are narrower and hollow, because he’s poisonous; Azz, though his clothes make him appear long and narrow, actually has significant muscle mass in his shoulders to reflect his constrictor nature, and he has to watch himself while hugging Iruma or Clara because sometimes he gets the instinct to tighten, and tighten, and TIGHTEN his hold on what is HIS.

- Sabro’s teeth and skin shining with gold and silver and bronze. You can hear him coming down the hall, like a walking suit of armor. His claws grow in the shape of black steel daggers; his front teeth are technically flat but sharp as a pair of shears, perfect for snapping off a piece of metal, and his lips are heat resistant and black.

- Clara’s teeth are, of course, sharp. Every single one is a tiny little fang, no molars, no incisors, just teeth all the way down, with claws to match. Everything she eats looks like a cookie cutter shark has gone to town on it, and she has a set of tiny scars around her lips from accidental self-injury, and marks along her arms from when her siblings were teething. Connor and Murph have their own sets of feet, and when she wants, they act like a pair of wheelies—pattering forward, eight steps per slipper, and gliding her down the hall.

- Elixabetta… changes, ever so slightly, depending on who or what is looking at her. Her undertone is a constantly shifting rainbow, her eyes just that shade of hazel that seems to be every color at once. Never settling in one form, always exactly what the beholder finds most attractive.

- Kerori standing still can get mistaken for a lovely statue, or a horrifyingly perfect frozen corpse. Blue undertone, white lips, skin smoother than ice. You can hear the crackle when she moves, and her hair shines like hoarfrost.

- Purson never being quite solid. His edges blurring, his voice fading in and out. Similarly, sometimes Lied fuzzes in and out like a badly aligned TV, suddenly hard to perceive and other times WAY too sharp to be real.

- Caim giving off the same uncanny valley as a deer standing on two legs. Familiar, but Wrong. And then he opens his mouth and makes it worse. Allocer’s empty stare like a blinded predator that still knows EXACTLY where you are, moving like a tiger seconds from pouncing, muscles tense. Retractable claws and every once in a while, he’ll hiss or yowl.

- Gaap’s limbs sometimes twisting in the wrong directions, extending too far or flexing wrong to fit into a humanoid body plan, before he quickly tucks them back into place, always pretending to be less horrific than he is. Little glimpses of chaos when his hair flicks the wrong way, leaving those who see it blinking spots out of their eyes, only for it to show up in their nightmares.

- Agares SEEMS normal enough, his weird hairdo not withstanding… but the longer you spend with him, the more enticing a nap sounds. He’s right, everything is so exhausting all the time… a little nap wouldn’t hurt, right…? And when you give into it, all you’ll dream of is an infinite spiral of orange, draining you down and down and down until you’ve forgotten there was ever a world beyond it.

A value study of a concept drawing I did of Dante's transformation in my Pantheon universe. He was murdered by his ex husband and thrown overboard of his own ship he was captain of. Poseidon then offered him a deal that he would hide him from Hades and give him the opportunity to get his revenge if he enters into the Sea God's service.

People- wool animals are not killed for their wool/hair. Yaks, angora rabbits, angora goats, sheep, alpacas, llamas etc… We SHEAR THEM. Not Flay. Shear. With clippers.

Or some people just gather what falls off the critter, or in the case of “chien” which is dog fluff, you brush that off them.

Healthy happy animals make good fiber. It is monetarily foolish and useless to abuse your animals because then their fiber is bad. You can debate points of husbandry and some parts of industries need change so fight about that.

This piece was from my digital media class, and was inspired by my research into the mystery cults and the syncretism of religions going on in the ancient world. Particularly how Dionysus' cult interacted with Ancient Hinduism, and how aspect of both him and Shiva were molded together and added into each other's aspects as death and rebirth gods. I was having a good time chewing on that thought for my Pantheon Project, which led me to working on his design for my original world.

He is both Dionysus and Shiva, depending on who is perceiving him, and where. As a wandering diety he has places of worship and power all across the world Pantheon is set in, though he mainly has 2 locales. One in the Aegean and one in Bharat, and those two places each feed his two halves.

“But wanting a place to belong? That was selfish of me.“

The summer Hikaru died is a queer youth horror that uses the concept of impurities and monsters to discuss queerness, grief, identity, homophobia, and much more. “Hikaru“ refers to the impurity that has taken over Hikaru’s body to grant the latter’s wish to stay beside his best friend, Yoshiki. As “Hikaru“ lives on as a human, he starts developing feelings, preferences, and an identity of his own - the line between Hikaru’s thoughts and his start becoming blurry.

It’s clear that “Hikaru“ represents a queer person who has come out (the impurity coming down from the mountains) and in the last few episodes of the show, he thinks about going back up so that he wouldn’t cause harm to Yoshiki and everyone else.

As a person who’s had multiple crises about gender, sexuality, and identity in general - I understood the turmoil he felt when Yoshiki and him researched about Nonuki-sama. “Why does he want to know so bad? In the end, I’m a monster, what’s more to say? I am known to cause harm even if I don’t understand how.“ His thought become more reflective of what the village says. That monsters are nothing but harmful. That they have no emotions. That they should never think they can belong. When I was 15, I was ashamed to find out that I’m agender (a person who doesn’t identify as a particular gender). I figured that I would be “difficult“ for people to understand. I believed I wouldn’t be loved easily. I thought, “In the end, they know I’m some weird label that they’ll never care about. Why should I bother explaining myself?“ I called myself a man, and tried fitting into manhood to drive away that shame of being something complicated.

“Maybe if I go back to the mountains, everything will go back to normal again. Nobody would get hurt.“

Shouldering something that is out of your control and blaming it all on yourself was what “Hikaru“ did. Doing something self-sacrificial for something/someone you love so you’ll remain as a savior in their heart and not as a burden (which is the true self) was what I would’ve thought if I was in his place. I often had the tendency to protect other queer people from any kind of bigotry. But it always felt like they wouldn’t have it as hard as me, knowing I sound arrogant when I think of it. “I’ll never understand what you have gone through or how you feel,“ is what I hear from everyone. The words that follow these ones are kind, supportive, and something I will always be grateful for. I can’t say I don’t have anyone who accepts me. In that sense, I had it much better than anyone in the show. But in the end, it was only that. They can’t do more, and they know so. They would never understand. That fact builds up in my chest like fat, and I would be struggling to breathe for the next few minutes.

“Hikaru“ definitely has emotions, goals, and wishes, but he’s unaware because of his rigid mindset that he’ll never belong and that he’s not supposed to. “Hikaru“ ‘s repetition of “I’m a monster after all.“ is something that I’ve also said to myself, in a way. “Difficult“ is what I labelled myself as. I know there are other people like me, and it’s not like I’ll never find love. Maybe love doesn’t need to necessarily come from a romantic partner. But all I wanted was that sweet high-school love, silly crushes, and having that hope that they like you back. For someone like me, that wasn’t plausible.

When I first watched the show, I related to Yoshiki more. I still do, for multiple reasons. But there was one thing I wanted to relate to, which was being a boy. “Hikaru” ’s identity was incomprehensible, while Yoshiki’s was clear cut. He was a homosexual male - easy to understand. Despite being proud of being a queer and understanding all kinds of identities, I didn’t want to be lonely. That internalized shame of being something weird and the fear of not being seen, and therefore loved, took over me. There were people around me who were trans masculine. If I was a trans man too, I’d find a community quickly. - That was what I thought before I came out. It soon ended badly; it didn’t feel right, and the stress of not being “man“ enough for anyone OR myself started affecting my daily life.

A few months after, I was rewatching the show for my English assessment. “Hikaru“ resonated with me in a way I didn’t expect. It was tragic, like I was seeing myself repressing what I haven’t even allowed to discover. After I told 2 or 3 people that I’m agender, I didn’t feel like I was lying through my teeth, which was a first. I started acknowledging what I felt, and that it would be difficult for certain people to understand immediately. For all the queer teenagers, or adults, who are still figuring out, take your time. It’s definitely not easy, and the horrors will come to you at some point. But you’ll endure.

I’ve read all the chapters in the manga up until now, and I wonder what “Hikaru“ will perceive himself in the end. I have some hope that it’ll have a happier ending so let’s see. I have no clue on how to end this article, so this is all of my thoughts in one picture:

it effects everything.

being trans is easier when youre white.

being gay is easier when youre white.

being disabled is easier when youre white.

being a woman is easier when youre white.

being autistic is easier when youre white.

oppression is eased when you are white, as you get extra privileges, and your whiteness is seen as a positive characteristic that in some ways counter-balances your other forms of being a minority. whiteness controls everything.

you are automatically way more innocent in your own oppression as a gay, trans, disabled person because of your whiteness.

three things:

1. it’s true

2. white people get pissed when i bring this up/wear this shirt

-the video is from a time before sharing files across devices was trivial, which is why it looks so bizarre. my brother took the original video which i believe was a snapchat video which somehow got uploaded onto my parents’ computer, where my brother showed it to me. i immediately recognized the comedic gold and insisted on getting my own copy, so i re-filmed it on my own digital camera, which is why my brother is narrating what the video will be about before it starts. i then managed to get it onto my tumblr through a series of dark magic rituals. this is why it has an old mac toolbar AND a weird caption AND a vidlab watermark. simpler times indeed

-i was not involved in the act of exploring an abandoned mine shaft (extremely dangerous, do not do this) or touching the wild animal (extremely dangerous, do not do this) or hanging out with my brother (extremely dangerous, do not do this) and i do not endorse any of the behavior depicted here. leaving me notes and comments explaining that this was a bad idea is not a productive use of your time. i have known that everything my brother and his friends do is stupid and dangerous my entire life but at least in this instance we get to enjoy the fruits of their poor choices

-preston was fine. he was scratched up and got some rabies shots but this was not the first, last, or worst injury incurred by a young man who decided to follow my brother’s recommendations for what would be a good and cool idea to do. (his best friend was taken from our house to the ER six times over the course of middle and high school.) to my knowledge the ringtail was also fine despite his encounter with the cast of temu jackass.