A couple of years ago I created a blogpost titled, 'Digit-Eyes,' where I said a couple of things about how much of a struggle it was for me to conform with digital art, given that I am more adept with the good ol' pencil and paper (You can check it out HERE). 

To be honest I still find digitalizing my art, or doing art digitally intimidating, mainly because I get frustrated easily when I don't understand how certain tools work hahaha! Slowly, I am overcoming that stubborness, and lo and behold I was able to create 2 coloring books created via Autodesk Sketchbook!

As part of my efforts in helping out our peers who needed financial assistance during Enhanced Community Quarantine I did 2 coloring books, one is OUTSIDE THE LINES which features fashion illustrations heavily influenced by Japanese street fashion- and basically clothes I wante to wear for myself ♡ hahaha! The other one is SWITCHING PLACES a collaborative work with my incredibly talented friend, Alex Esmeralda, where our main theme is mixing influences of eastern and western pop-culture, hence the creation of Sailor Princess Bubblegum 😂

I enjoyed coming up with the idea of Princess Bubblegum wanting to be Chibi Usa from Sailormoon, like she wanted the whole costume and even the right weapon, but she still has her crown and a handy Erlenmeyer flask 🧪 <--- I know test tube yan, wag kayong ano dyan!

Initially I had no plans of actually adding color to my artwork, but after getting stuck with the coloring part of my illustration/line art of Marceline The Vampire Queen artwork I vowed to do as part of my Six Fan Art Challenge entry (I know late na, wag kayong ano dyan), I decided to experiment and see how well, or bad, will my coloring skills be if I test my coloring skillz on this Sailor Princess Bubblegum.

It took me a couple of days to finish the coloring, because unlike how my drawing habit is when I was younger, after a couple of minutes I tend to burned out 🤷‍♀️ When I was younger whenever I started on a drawing I make sure to finish it all including the coloring part, otherwise I'd lose interest on it and won't touch it ever again! But as I grow older, and become a bit OC-OC with my artworks I learned better to remind myself that I don't have to finish an artwork in one sitting.

Another thing I learned recently when doing digital illustrations is to color against a gray background. At first I thought this is a nifty guide to ensure everything is colored, even the white bits, just in case you'd like to make its background transparent. While yes that sounds like a good reason behind coloring against a gray background but there's actually a more aesthetic/color theory-based reason why this is a good practice. I learned from a bunch of youtube tutorials that doing this practice helps make sure that your colors won't be dull, especially for skintones! I actually tried coloring this artwork in plain white background, and the skin color ended up looking frail and pale! But when I revert to this technique, the skin color became a bit vibrant!

Also, I think coloring this way also helps in learning more about shadings and shadows, something that I am still struggling with 😔

Check out that white eyeliner wing😛

I know I still have a looooong way to go until I get to master doing digital art/illustrations, but right now I am genuinely excited on doing more drawings and learning along the way! Before I used to get so insecure about my lack of resources, thinking that my humble Galaxy Tab A or 3 year old Wacom Intuos (whenever I opt doing drawings on my laptop) + Free Autodesk Sketchbook App makes me feel inadequate, but after spending A LOT of time being one with my tools (ay lightsaber lang teh?), I realized that it's not about having the state-of-the-art tools, it's about your eagerness to hone your talent with whatever resources you have on hand.

Another thing that used to bother me is my insecurity regarding my talent, because whenever I see those IMBA artworks from Deviant Art, Pinterest, Instagram, and Tumblr, I feel like shrinking in a corner and feel like my artworks are nothing but trash. Obviously, that's wrong, because rather than see those other artworks as, "competition", use them as inspiration to push you to improve your talent! Lastly, the best way to gauge your improvement is not comparing what you created with other artists, but comparing it with what you have created in the past ☝️ The only person you should be competing with is your past self 😉

Tadaaaah, here's my final artwork of Sailor Princess Bubblegum ♡ 

Will definitely post more to keep track of my improvement 😉

Love Always,

Nicole 💗