This image is so beautiful it almost brings a tear to my eye.

AAAawww, thank you!<333 :D

Tutorial? Awesome
I'll look into this later this week :)

Great! If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask! I hope you'll enjoy watching them :D

Thank you so much!!<3

Now I just need $10 left, because I know where to spend them >)!

Gorgeous drawing! The lighting on her and DAT anatomy, all that volume and shapes of muscles is so amazing. So pretty!!!

Yay! Just send me a note when you're ready! :)

Thank you so much! Rendering muscles are too much fun, haha!

everything is gorgeous and your videos are inspiring aa ;v;

I am so thrilled to hear that, thank you!<33 Don't hesitate to ask if you have any questions!

Jeez... you're ability with value, color, and form is just..... my gosh.... Thank you for making a tutorial on this. It provided some really amazing insight!

Aww, you are too kind!<333 Thank you! And I'm really glad the tutorial gave you some insight, nothing better than that when learning new stuff! :D

Absolutely gorgeous piece and a VERY informative tutorial!
Thank you so so much for putting all that effort into this for free *_* I love you! (and your smudge brush <3)

I'm so glad you think so! I was a bit afraid it might not be very informative with me just rambling away, and with the language barrier I thought it might be not that insightful and perhaps a bit boring as well. So thank you for telling me! And I'm glad you're having fun with the brush! :D

And what about this multi-horsey pic you streamed week ago?

What about it? :)

Where can I find it?)

Oh! It's on my mature account, link is on my main page here! :D

Why the hell... do you need another mature account?)

Because I don't want it to haunt me for future job offers. Hence why I don't let people reblog my mature art :)

Well, why won't you follow example of scale, who has no problems of posting mature art even at exhibitions? Your art is awesome, and awesome artists can presume on posting whatever they like.

Aww, thank you! It's just that I think the social norms in norway wouldn't exactly do me any good if a future employer found out I did porn :/ So it's just a case to be safe than sorry! But if I end up freelancing full time, that wouldn't be a problem :)

Heh, my actual employer knows of me, drawing porn. She's an adult woman, she has no prejudices and understands everything.
Anyway, good luck for you, leading a double life :)

Lucky you! I wish most people weren't so squeamish about porn, I mean, everybody is in some way involved anyway.
Hehe, thanks!

Aw wow this is so gorgeous! I really love it :)

Aww, thanks!<333 :D

Mithril your amount of improvement since I last saw your work is truly staggering, inspiring to say the least. Congratulations!

WOW. Thank you for the AWESOME comment! You totally just made my day here, you're someone I really look up to, so this was such a huge boost for me. Thank you! :D<33

This looks absolutely gorgeous <33333

So happy you liked it! Thanks for providing me with such a lovely character to draw!

I don't get a lot of art of her, so it is greatly appreciated! Kinda inspires me to give more loving to Pepita and draw her more.

I just want to say, thank you for your time it took you to do this. You're very kind.

I'm an artist myself, and I watch these things because I love watching how others like me work!

I really appreciate you putting these videos together and the drop box idea is really cool!

Aww, and thank you!!<33

I love watching youtube videos as well, have learned so much by doing so. Especially about how to be as a person, as many people talk about their experiences with customers, how to behave on line and how to be professional.

Yeah! I figured that would be a cool idea, and as people always ask to see my PSD files I thought I could let them download them for a small investment :)

I started talking to myself around the 3rd video. Mumbling things like "I see you use one layer to paint, I too like to live dangerously." I'm very jealous of your skill, how long have you been painting?

Haha, that's hilarious :DD

Aww, thank you! I first started in late 2005, I believe I uploaded my first picture in december 05 after drawing on it for a week, spending hours upon hours looking at tlkfa art, haha. I believe I still have it somewhere!
Long story short: I used to loathe drawing as I always had that one friend that was better than me, so I never did draw unless I was told so for school projects or etc. However, my parents persisted that I should get a hobby, and after trying out ten different or so different activities that never really caught my interest, I decided to do the thing I hated the most as it would take longer to get good at, and therefore keep my parents off my back.

Oh my good god, Mythril... <333. Its gorgeous.

Aww, thank you so much!<333 :D

Dude. Duuuuuude! This is ridiculous skill.

Thank you!! :D<33

Wow this is just a beautiful photo, you're colouring, sense of lighting and posing are fantastic.

And though I be a gay man, I shall just say: Dem hips

Thank you so much for the wonderful comment!! :D<3

It's all in the hips :33

<3 you for the vids. Always interesting to see others working, plus dont worry about your english!

Aww, thank you! :DD<3

Thank you so much fpr your tutorials. They're really helpful!

I am so happy you found them helpful! :D

This is so insanely gorgeous, I'm going to have a lot of fun looking over your process when I have the chance, thank you for sharing! Your colors and painting style are very striking and unique, and I love how how consideration and attention to detail you put into your work. Lovely! :)

Wow, thank you for the supernice comment!<33 I really admire how your art looks and always tells a story, so this was very inspirational to hear, thank you!!

I have a question! How do you decide on your colors? If a color on a picture given to you of a character is bright, how do you decide the color?

If you mean by bright as in saturated, I keep the shadows desaturated and the lights saturated and closer to the original color.

If you mean by bright as in light, I do the opposite; keep the shadows saturated as desaturated shadows can give the colors a very ashy-greyish tone, which doesn't look nice on lighter skintones/pelts :(

I need help with colors, I've tried to make sense of color theory and mood, I get it but, I have a hard time toning down the saturated of a color. "Finding the right color." it's very hard.

You do it so well though!

Colors are not my strength, but I do advice you to look at some movie stills, for example Wes Anderson movies or Danny Boyle for some inspiration? Try to draw on darker surfaces, don't draw with a white background, because then your eyes start to compensate for the bright white by favouring more saturated colors. When drawing on a dark; neutral brown could perhaps help you out in making your foundation more desaturated?
Colors are indeed very hard! I really admire those who can make it look so effortlessly :)

Thank you! I hope that my tips will help!

They do help! And that's a very good idea! I sometimes draw on grey, maybe brown would be best.

This is otherworldly. I love this.

Wow, thank you! That is very kind of you :D

wooow this is gorgeous ♥

Aww, thank you very much! :D<33

I just now realize this is actual a tutorial thing. How nice of you to share! I will def take a look at these videos once I can, I love to learn myself detailed soft shadings. I am a cell-shade artist so soft shadings are kinda tricky for me :O

Aw, thanks again! Do let me know if there's anything that was unclear, I'll happily try and explain it for you! :D

You are too kind, thank you so much! ♥

This is insanely beautiful!

Aww, thank you kindly! <3

Thank you for these videos. Since I lpst my job I have more tha enough time to wake my artistic veins up again.

Sorry to hear about your job, I hope you get sorted out soon!

And happy to be of assistance in the meantime to help you get back into your artistic side! :) I have a lot of speedpaints/timelapses in the same account, in case you like those as well!

I'm always intimidated to use references and therefore never use them - as it shows with my art "quality" - 'cause I never know when I'm using them too much. In other words, I don't know when it's considered referencing or understanding or tracing or copying or learning when I'm looking at a photo of any pose or body structure or body part. I'll never be a pro, but I really do want to learn so I can be far better from where I am now, but references and heavy tutorials intimidate me so much. I'd need something like in-person training with stuff like this. TwT

Sorry to hear that! I used to be under the impression that using reference was considered "cheating" and that you should always draw from memory. Oh boy how wrong I was.

If you can, always use a reference, however, I think you address a valid point which where the line between using a reference and tracing is. Sadly, there isn't a clear and universal definition to that, but I believe as long as you're not overlaying an image and then tracing the outlines, you are good to go! If in doubt, everything that you're looking at for reference on a different screen than the one you're drawing on I think most, if not all, would consider using a reference and not tracing.

However, using references are super important because you need to fill up your visual gallery with references used in the past to learn anatomy, muscles, movement, values and so on. If you've painted a bicep while looking at a reference from many angles 50 times, I can assure you drawing a bicep without is going to be pretty spot on.

If you don't know where to start though, I highly recommend looking into Stan Prokopenko's work at proko.com. I would also advice you to start improving in three areas first, lets say anatomy, gray-scale rendering and values, so that you don't feel intimidated or upset when the background looks off or the colours are a bit muddy. When you feel like you've stagnated on the first three areas that you chose to focus on in the beginning, change them up and start working on something else before coming back again. That way you don't feel so overwhelmed by what you have to learn and it feels a lot more achievable!

Hope that helps! Best of luck! ^^

Yeah... "Drawing from memory's" kinda where I'm forcing myself at right now and am not really good at it either as you'll find out if you check my Gallery. ;uwu Well, either that drawing method of looking in a mirror or, say, my hand. Not exactly that helpful either. lol

Glad you understand where I'm coming from! No universal definition? Oh, man, that sounds even more difficult to determine which way's the best way then. ;>w< lol Overlaying? What do you mean? Like, I sure as Hell know I wouldn't - digitally speaking - put a layer on top of a pose, draw all around the edges of it carefully and call it my own as I'm sure that is tracing. lol But what if I still wanted to put a layer over the pose/photo and attempt to break it down into multiple shapes via sketching and just keep it to myself without posting? Is that still overlaying or even a sin? And different screen, huh? What if I have the pose/photo in the same sheet I'm working on in my drawing program, but it's off to the side of the canvas? I don't wanna turn my head too far. ;>w< And even then, if I can't draw on top of it (especially with the pose/photo having, say, lowered opacity), how can I tell for sure I'm replicating the pose and posture 100% accurately? I never will on the first try. Or even the first 10. Or 100. ;>w<

Can references be both photos and artwork, or just photos? And where would I even begin with anatomy and which part to study the easiest? ;w; lol I've never painted a bicep or anything decent-looking! ;>w< Never looked at anything in more than 50 angles either. Maybe 2-3, but that's it. Where would I even keep all those references? In one folder? Multiple?

Ugh, sites like those, I have to pay for such content, and I can't pay. I'm Canadian and use e-Transfer. And even then, I don't wanna pay for anything period. I just wanna get lots of good and free references that can truly help me 100% as well as everyone else. And where would I even start with anatomy? Literally all of it is intimidating. ;_; Also I'm not familiar with gray-scale rendering? What's a visual example of that? And I don't even know what you mean by "values." Just shows how terrible a furry artist I am, huh? ;uwu How will I know when I've "stagnated" those first three areas (whenever I attempt them that is)? And what if all three areas are intimidating? Like, what part do I start with first? Where can I practice, who can I practice with in-person for free, and how long must I practice on one piece of anatomy (i.e. hand, head, genitals, torso, etc.) before moving onto another piece of anatomy?

It... kinda helps but also doesn't??? Only 'cause I'm confused and don't have much art experience (well, no "serious" and actually decent art anyway). ;^_^

If you don’t have a visual gallery in your head from drawing from reference and having a decent understanding of the shape and volume of what you’re drawing, drawing from memory is insanely hard and you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself if it doesn’t look right. Even the best of artists use reference daily, so looking into incorporating that into your workflow would help you out a lot!

I would say tracing/overlaying to understand the shape and flow for learning purposes is fine, but I would not publish it without noting somewhere that it was traced for learning purposes with a credit to the original image just to be safe.
Using reference to look at on the same canvas but off to the side, or on a different screen and publishing it would be fine without backlash, as you looked at it and tried to replicate what you saw without overlaying and tracing the image. When referencing the whole image (portrait for example) most people credit, but when referencing parts of the image (leg muscles or an item of clothing like a jacket) most people don’t. Hope that cleared things up!

Most people try and stick to real life references, so photos and still life studies. When using a drawing as reference you might pick up that artists weaknesses and bad habits in the drawing, and also it’s a bit of a danger zone when it comes to plagiarism so I would stay clear of using other people’s art as reference.
Using other people’s art as inspiration is normal, be it the colours, mood or theme, to help create a “mood board” for your drawing.

Some people like storing their references in folders, or you have artists like me that look up specific references on google (like a leg muscle on an anatomy chart for medical purposes or armour from a specific time period for example) and just draw from looking in the browser on a separate screen.

You will probably have to look at something from thousands of angles, even when you are considered a skilled artists there’s always a different angle and reference to learn from. There is no set number from when you stop, because you don’t, you just continue using references when you don’t feel knowledgable about what you’re drawing.
There’s a saying that you need at least 10.000 hours of productive work to get good at something, and that’s the hardship and beauty when it comes to art; after years of practice you are never fully trained and there’s always something different to learn.

It’s fine if you don’t want to pay for anything, but most learning content ain’t free sadly. Be it a school, a course or private tutoring, most of these things cost.
If you choose to learn yourself you have to be persistent, self-sufficient and resourceful, and seek out knowledge by yourself and try out and find clever ways to improve that you feel works for you. That’s why I gave you some ways of doing that yourself, but this worked for me, so it might not work for everybody. However, you have to put in the effort, there ain’t nobody there to hold your hand through it if you choose to do this without the guidance of a teacher or mentor, but there are people like me that can give you small bits of guidance along the way.

If you want to know where to start, just pick up the pen and start from where you are now. Find references for the image you have in your head and use them as best as you can at your current level. There isn’t much more how-to than that, sadly, but you can find comfort knowing we’ve all been there and that if art was easy everybody would be doing it. Or do still life studies for example, that’s also a way to go forwards.
You’ll know you’ve stagnated when you feel you’ve stagnated.

You practice at home drawing at your desk, when you’re outside looking at the colours around you and how light bounce of different surfaces, when you’re sketching on a napkin while waiting for your meal to arrive, when doodling on the side of a paper essay you’re supposed to read before your class. You can practice everywhere, all the time.
If you want to do it with someone, reach out and ask if anybody would like to draw, or join an art club after the pandemic blows over. Watch streams, interact with the people in the stream and ask the streamer what they’re doing and why if they don’t mind you asking questions while they work. They might give some useful insight into why they choose to do what they do, and perhaps even things they choose not to that can sometimes be even more helpful.

Best of luck!