I CAN draw cute things, I just generally choose not to. Savor my uncharacteristic wholesomeness while you still can, I'll go back to being the stereotypical "Newgrounds artist" soon enough.

Also, completely unrelated, but something I wanted to show you anyway: I was digging through one of my old drawers looking for my passport or something when I came across a lot of my old art projects from high school. This particular one holds up way better than it has any right to hold up, and still cracks me up (I think it was a parody of some Street Fighter X Tekken promotional art I was seeing a lot of at the time):

Digging through my old art projects also was a much-needed reminder for me that whenever I first start something, it looks bad, but if I keep working on it for years and years, eventually I'll get competent, so long as I don't give up. I've been drawing with pencil, pen and paper since I was six years old, so it's no surprise the traditional art I made ten years later at age 16 still seems somewhat competently-drawn. On the other hand, my early Photoshop and Maya illustrations from college look like absolute ass and I genuinely can't believe I was convinced these early attempts at digital-only art would get me a job at the likes of Pixar right out of college (they didn't). Trust me, you do NOT want to see them (and I certainly don't think they're worth the effort on my part of scanning and then uploading them to NG digitally like I did with "Billy Goat X Parakeet" here). I am getting better with each project, but unfortunately I'm still nowhere near where I want to be in translating my traditional art skills to the digital realm, although I'm convinced an animation project I've been working on all summer will be a new high watermark for me, once it finally comes out in 2025 or...2026...

Still, it's a good reminder that I shouldn't pressure myself to already be the best when I am first starting something, and as long as I keep working at it and don't take too long of a break in between and accept valid criticism, I'll eventually get to a point where I'm finally proud of my digital work. Also, I need specialize after spending so long dabbling in all sorts of art software, mediums and styles--as much as I would like to, I don't have enough years in my life to be a skilled master at everything from Photoshop (and its growing list of alternatives), Maya, 3DS Max, Blender, ZBrush, Substance Painter, 2D animation, 3D/CG Animation, cut-out animation, stop-motion animation, SFW, NSFW, etc etc etc. I do seem to like 3D modeling (especially now that I can make base meshes and sculpts with just my phone on days where I'm otherwise too busy for practicing "proper" 3D software) and seem to be improving the fastest at that at the moment, so maybe I'll focus my efforts there for now.

Finally, seeing the crappy stuff I made in Maya + ZBrush in college vs. the increasingly-passable stuff I make in BforArtists (a free Blender fork that I feel emulates the layout of Maya very well) these days should hopefully put to rest the idea that licensing expensive "industry-standard" software like the Adobe Creative Cloud is a requirement. Yeah, you might run into shallow recruiters who will turn you down mid-interview just because they're not convinced your Nomad (sculpting app) skills will transfer to ZBrush and they don't have the budget or time to so much as train you on ZBrush's different (but not too different) UI. But if you want to "git gud" at any aspect of digital art, don't hold out until you can actually afford these subscriptions or find a way to pirate them without corrupting your current hardware in the process--start NOW on whatever FOSS software or phone app will fit your specific needs, find out what you enjoy and don't enjoy drawing or modeling, and focus on what you enjoy the most for the next 10-15 years of your life. You'll get better with time. If your current computer or phone can only handle SNES or N64-type visuals and textures, then that's actually good--it means you will learn to be better at optimization than 99.9% of so-called "triple-A" video game companies such as Activision, Square Enix or any other studio that pooped out a terrible Nintendo Switch port of a game that barely runs at all on a PS5--despite being a "remaster" of an old PS1 game.

Whew! Motivational rant over. I guess the point is, I'm a slow learner and need to be patient with my own art journey--but at least some color pencil drawing I did of an angry goat and a rabid parakeet when I was only 16 still looks kind of funny.