Here's a question for you all.

I'm constructing a furry universe involving some of the characters in my gallery.

Now, Selkis in particular: she's a farmer, basically, so she's often out in the fields, in the sun. I've been picturing her wearing some sort of hat or other shade covering, maybe like a Coolie hat.

Here's the thing: almost all furry art with hats has the characters' ears poking through holes in the hat (like Pirate Jenny I posted yesterday): but is that very practical? Doesn't that defeat half the purpose of the hat?

Having owned a white cat many years ago, I know perfectly well that animals can get sunburnt ears, and skin cancer from it, too. In fact, there used to be a tattooist in my home town who specialised in tattoing the ears of white animals, to protect them from skin cancer.

So, why would furries wear hats? Would some sort of turban or khefiya be more practical?

Thoughts?

I'll have the house to myself next week, so I might have a go at doing some streaming.

Any recommendations? Most folk use livestream, it seems. Is that the go-to?

I've heard that they don't allow nudity, though? I was thinking of doing some pin-up style stuff, is all.

Feeling much better today, especially thanks to some convos with some awesome people on FA. You know who you are, and you rock.

That feeling you get when you do something you swore you'd never, ever do, and so you feel like a complete jerk.

Holy moley, I just realised tonight that it's my birthday in a week.

You know what reminded me? I was looking through our bills, and there's one due on my birthday. In a week. Yep, that pretty much sums up life at the moment :"(

My wife asked what I wanted. I realised that there's not a lot I actually want ... that we can afford, anyway. A new computer would be nice, so I don't have to fight the rest of the family when I want drawing time. Another lens for my camera. Other than that, I can't really think of anything.

Fucking bills, though.

I'm bored, so if anyone wants to ask me something, go ahead. Whatever you want.

It's not as annoying as the Assumptions one.

Name: Colin
Nickname: I haven't had one since high school
Location: Tasmania (the little bit hanging off the bottom of Australia)
Age: 48 ... for another couple of weeks at least
Height: 170cm - that's 5'6" in the old money
Zodiac sign: Leo
Any pets: 1 dog, 1 cat, 8 chickens, 2 fish. 1 cat and 1 cockatiel recently deceased.
Favorite thing about yourself: Art? Intellect? I dunno. Both of those make me sound like a wanker :D
Worst habit: Arguing
Fun fact: Trying to think of one I want to make public :D When I was little, our mothers used to dress my friend and I as Zig and Zag (Australian TV clowns) and go around pubs at Easter, collecting for the Royal Children's Hospital Good Friday Appeal. We were supposed to go on Graham Kennedy (Australia's answer to Johnny Carson) once, but I got sick, so my sister stood in for me. She got to sit on Gra-Gra's knee. Talk about unfair.

Identity, Sexuality & Personality

Gender identity: Male
Sexual preference: Female
Romantic preference: Female
Kinsey Scale" score: No idea
Relationship status: Married, coming up on 25 years!
Myers/Briggs type: INFP
Hogwarts house: Ravenclaw, probably

Routine

"Early Bird" or "Night Owl": Both. Never get enough sleep. Rarely in bed before 11, can't sleep in past 7 any more.
Bath or shower: I prefer to relax in a bath with a book, but usually showers for convenience.
First thought in the morning: RRRNhnnhgngnggggnoooooooo ...
Last thought before falling asleep at night: Usually thinking of a story plot or an art idea.

School/Work

Do you work or are you a student: Both. Full-time worker, full-time student. See what I mean about sleep?
Where do you see yourself in 5 years: I would like to be in the same job, but cut back a day a week to spend on writing and drawing

Habits (Do you…?)
Drink: A couple of homebrew beers a week, and the occasional late night dram of whisky.
Smoke: No.
Do Drugs: No.
Exercise: I think about it.
Have a go-to comfort food: Most of it, sadly. My home-made chilli cheese fries are a current family hit.
Have a nervous habit: Bite my nails, clench my teeth.

What is your favorite…?
Physical quality (in yourself): Eyes. Strength.
In Others: Hm. Eyes. Voluptuosness. Oh, OK, boobs. Not necessarily big'uns, though. I love big boobs, but they're all nice in their own way, no matter what size. Hate fake, especially unfeasibly huge, fake ones. But really, physical qualities are secondary.
Mental/emotional quality (in yourself): Sense of humour.
Food: All of it :(
Drink: Tea or whisky.
Animal: Most of them. Except orang-utans, disgusting beasts.
Artist/Band/: Too many to name. The Triffids?
Author/Poet: Ditto. Hunter S. Thompson, J. R. R. Tolkien, Iain Banks, Philip Pullman, Phillip Reeve, Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein ...
TV Show: Walking Dead or Game of Thrones
Actor/Actress: Don't know. I don't like celebrities as 'celebrities' much.
Blogger: Judith Curry.

Trying to work on an illustration when there's a hard, wet nose constantly nudging your elbow

The damn things are proliferating like rabbits!

I just did some analyses of my pageviews, favourites, etc.

The porn wins, of course ...

Someone else needing money, which I don't have to spare. So just passing this on: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/5929791/

Got my end of semester Uni results by SMS last night. WAY better than I had hoped at my most wildly optimistic. If I hadn't bollixed up the first assignment in one subject, I'd have made it a hat-trick. I seriously did not expect these results.

 usernamelinhthasack is hard up for the rent, and offering quality work like this http://www.furaffinity.net/view/12950594/ for $20.

Unfortunately I'm skint myself at the moment, but if anyone else wants to have a look at their stuff and make an offer, go here: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/5927271/

I don't feel confident enough with my digital art to start offering myself for commissions yet, but seeing as I am actually a professional writer, I could probably offer writing commissions.

So, as a Special Introductory Offer, ha ha, I'm willing to offer one or two free, gratis, pro bono stories to whoever wants one. A couple of thousand words, I guess. Again, I'm new to this game, so really I want to test the waters, which I don't feel comfortable charging anyone for.

So, roll up, roll up! First in, best dressed!

For some samples of my wares, here are two silly little stories I knocked out earlier this year. Warning: pr0n (of course) :

http://www.literotica.com/s/the-antagonists

http://www.literotica.com/s/handyman-4

I've put up a simple tutorial on line work, which I'll expand on soon. I started doing some sketches to illustrate the concepts, but I'm just too tired to go any further tonight.

What's really exciting me is the tool I'm using to do the drawing - Manga Studio 5. I've struggled to find a digital painting tool that worked for me - Photoshop is too clumsy (and I've been using it for about 15 years!) and Painter is just far too fiddly and complicated, even if the results can be spectacular. But Manga Studio seems to be perfect for the way I work. I'm quickly getting my head around it, although some of the tools seem a little quirky, if you're used to, say, Photoshop, but I'm definitely sold on this program.

And I see I've scored some more watchers :o I'd better started updating more often!

Well, that's another semester of study over. Exams done, assignments in, now just to wait ... and think about what units to do next semester.

But now at least I'm free to read what i want to read, rather than what i have to read, and put some time into doing some stuff I want to do.

All study, no art. That's the way it goes at the moment. Oh well, only two weeks left in this semester!

So, last night I was up til 2am, writing a major paper for Media Studies.

On the plus side, I wrote it on the furry fandom. Well, that and Hardcore Punk. Strange bedfellows, you might think, but there was a method to the madness.

Many thanks to the wonderful Fred Patten for his contributions to my research.

Third paper down. Only a week late, eh. Only stayed up til 1:40 am on this one!

1000 words on journalistic ethics and freedom of expression. Two whole pages of bibliography! Everyone from Spinoza to Wilbur F. Storey to Salman Rushdie.

Fuck I'm glad that's over. After tomorrow, four blessed days of sleeping in! Hoorah!

Well, that's that paper done ... and another one coming up.

Still, the one just done was a damn hard slog - frickin' 'contemporary media theory'. Urgh, load of wank. Suffice to say, I disagree with almost everything in the subject.

The problem is, how to say 'this is a load of bullshit' with academic rigour. One problem was the word limit on this first paper: 1000 words was not enough to say what I wanted properly.

I didn't even get to quote Anchorman :(

I was going to do some more drawing when I finished writing this media theory paper, but ... it's two in the morning and I get up at six for work.

How, as an artist (visual, written, whatever), do you personally handle criticism?

I've been thinking about this particularly, after reading 'Kerouac's American Journey': Kerouac was incredibly sensitive to criticism: time and again he would show his work to friends and colleagues for appraisal, and if anything less than effusive praise was offered, he would react with fury, sulk, belittle his critic and basically have a massive hissy-fit.

What a jerk, I'm thinking.

Me, I love criticism. I figure, how am I ever going to improve if I'm never told what I'm doing wrong?

I have particularly fond memory of, and respect for, one of my old college Art & Design teachers. This guy was the exact opposite of the 'those who can't, teach' type who sadly so often seem to infest Art colleges: he knew his shit. He'd worked in the industry for decades, and was basically teaching as his retirement plan.

One of the things I really liked about him was his no-sugar-coating bluntness: if you did something that wasn't up to scratch, he'd say it straight out, and tell you to do it again.

I think I benefitted by being a bit older and more resilient than a lot of my classmates, who were straight out of high school. Some of them got really upset. Whereupon he'd say to them, 'well, what do you think your boss is going to say? An Art Director doesn't have the luxury of mollycoddling your artistic ego. Jeez, my first teacher, if he didn't like your work, he'd tear it up in front of the whole class!'

I really took that to heart: grow a thick skin, is what I learned.

I was reminded of this again recently when I got someone to read something I'd written. When they read out certain parts to me that weren't working, it made me realise exactly how hilariously bad it sounded when I'd used cliches or ridiculously flowery prose.

So I learned a lot from having someone else laugh at where I'd really screwed up.

Of course, that doesn't mean I take everything someone says uncritically myself: if I think a critic is outright wrong, I'll defend my work to the hilt.

The only problem is that sometimes i forget that other people aren't so thick-skinned, so I'll be as blunt in my criticism as I expect others to be of me. So sometimes I'm accused of being overly critical - but people who say that don't usually realise that I'm harsher on myself than anyone.

But anyway, what about you? How do you handle criticism?

Further to my last, I'll shortly be cleaning up a few of my submissions.

Basically, I've come to the conclusion that while porn may be an easy way to get page views, it's not part of my long-term agenda and will frankly only come back to haunt me in the future.

So, sorry if you've favourited the adult stuff, but it will shortly be gone. Download it now if you really want it.

Y'know, as (ahem) responsible adults in the digital age, we are always reminding kids not to do anything stupid on social media, so it behooves us not to go and make silly faux pas ourselves.

With that in mind, I've just removed a couple of journal entries, and given myself a good kick to remind me not to be so quick to shoot my mouth off on the internet (again).

I might also add that some people (you know who you are) have earned new respect from me for their professionalism, proving just how wrong I can often be.

I haven't been able to do any art (well, apart from actual work, as a graphic designer) or writing lately, because life keeps getting in the way.

I'm currently working frantically on a presentation I'm doing at a Con next week, on 'The history of anthropomorphic art and the origins of the Furry fandom'.

Fascinating stuff, but a lot of work.

And then Uni starts back, next week.

Well, I've been kind of quiet lately; not much drawing going on, but I have been writing, including the short piece of erotic (porn!) fiction I posted yesterday.

It's a bit annoying that it's had nearly 40 views, but no-one's commented. Some feedback would be appreciated, even if they hated it. You never know if you're going the wrong way, if no-one tells you.