Despite the ups and downs over this year, I’ll recount the art I’ve done over 2025 and my pitch my plans for 2026!
December Sketchbook
Back in 2024, I purchased a new iPad Mini after months of not having one. Like with the previous ipad I lost back in November 2022, I wanted a portable means to draw digital and get in more practice. Funny enough, instead of using the iPad as my Procreate machine, I ended up using Pixquare more often for commissions and game dev art.
Dog Kingdom Art Direction
Like most internet artists, I don’t like drawing backgrounds; but for Blackmask’s development, there’s no choice but to figure it all out. So I’m doing what I can to figure out how to make my environments interesting to draw for myself.
Doing all this helped me drum up cool world-building ideas, that might save development time. A fun idea for the dog folk to have peephole windows in their doors to stick their heads out to greet people.
With my writing for Blackmask, I’m refining the art direction and themes of the various kingdoms in the world. I spend my time on an architecture grind, looking at buildings and histories to match themes I’m going for. I shoot to go beyond, “fantasy version of real life country.” Doing these is part of my daily “frog swallowing” to get myself to draw an environment sketch under a theme, starting with the Dog Kingdom.
Right now, I’m working with the theme of “Freedom Vs. Security” with a Dogs Vs Wolves thing that Cole, my raccoon protagonist, stumbles upon. With this “Walled Garden” sketch, I wanted to use the grated fence to subtly look like jail bars. It’s on the nose when I explain this but, it’s something to lean into.
Sirititus, the Dog society is this authoritarian kingdom under a leader with a simple world conquest motive. While my Rudwulf, wolf clan, tilts toward sword and sorcery barbarian warrior nomad stuff.
The wolves overall have been a struggle to give more to because, they started as typical nomadic raider hordes that my Cole has to fight or sneak around, and I wanted to give more motives to them.
The function of the dogs was first going to be wolves. With some wolves having a more “civilized” society that would be trying own control the territories of other wolves, similar to Romans conquering their surrounding societies.
The big thing between the dogs and wolves I’m pushing is how similar they are with separate “breeds” being a culture divide than specific breeding thing. In the big Blackmask lore, they’re the same to other animals, but dog societies arbitrarily separate wolf societies away for their own ulterior motives.
Through more brainstorming, I continued the theme of the dogs having a higher order they’re obedient to, so I started making sketches beginning to gesture toward a religion they’d have. After all “Dog” spelled backwards is “God” so dog paladins and clerics are a natural fit.
Much of this is in flux and I can’t worry about pondering every tiny societal detail to what’s basically enemy characters who patrol dungeons and fortresses Cole must infiltrate for his own goals. This shit’s ballooning enough, and I’m fighting to not dumpster it all.
Cat Empire Relook
This personal visual development grind also got me doing cat themed buildings along with the dogs. The ear shaped rooftops might be on the nose, but it’s a start.
Obviously, the cats have a rivalry with the dog kingdoms, with their own means of espionage and warfare. No matter high an army can build their walls, Cat Warriors will find a way to scale them.
Lion Knights
The Lion Knights of Felira are the world-class fighting force of the mighty cat kingdom. Donning armor and maned helmets, they venture into far lands to enact the will of King Lionide IV in the inevitable journey to conquer the world for catkind.
The Lion Knights are a blended force, with the majority female lions, donning maned helmets to look cohesive.
The Lion Knights are a huge thing I want to explore, but there’s still much that’s still needs to be elaborated on. Big Cats and Small Cats can’t fit in a similar category like the canines, so I need to figure out what their motives can be.
Lions making a society makes logical sense as group hunters, but cats in general are more individualistic, so it’s a puzzle to dive deep into what they can do that hasn’t been done a million times. But I’ve done something unique with Foxes, so I can’t give up.
Olivia the Dragon More Draws
Another batch of Olivia drawings this time in a old school cheerleader outfit. I don’t want to distract myself, but she end up in many of my sketchbooks. Many times, Olivia pops up to cover my unwillingness to draw buildings.
Human Sketches
Sketch to see if I still remember how to draw humans. I could stand to go back to do some figure drawings as I’m sure I’m falling into bad habits as a general artist.
My human designs aren’t as creative as my animal designs, yet I wonder if I could still try. I still ache to be a comic artist, but that dream is in the toilet. I can’t think of any ideas that do will for more human designs but it does well up in my head from time to time.
