I'm completely overwhelmed by the response to Jack. Seriously, I don't think I've had so many favourites and comments in such a short time since "The Scoundrel and the Princess" got a DD. Thank you so much to everyone who's faved Jack so far. You guys rock.

I wrote my first news article, based on my last journal, and that's proved to be incredibly popular already too: Art and arrogance. Whew. I had no idea it'd take off like that. But it's awesome to see such support for those sentiments.

It's also given me an idea for a contest theme! I'm thinking a "be inspired" type of thing where you look through my gallery, pick out anything there, and use that as a starting point for writing a story or drawing a picture or whatever. I want something with room for creativity, and I think this fits the bill. And I don't want to have the usual first, second and third place, but rather one prize for "best technique" and one for "best idea" and whatever else I can think of/afford.

What d'you think of that idea?

In other news, I thought it might be interesting to see, step-by-step, how a drawing comes together, so I made some videos using WIP shots I had. There's one for "Captain Jack Sparrow" and one for "I Am Charlize Theron". They're only a little over a minute long each, but hopefully interesting! I've never made videos before so any tips on what to improve are welcome too!

Lots of firsts this week!

Oh yes, and I finally managed to find an Irish art supply shop (corkartsupplies.com) that lets me buy supplies online using my card, so I was able to buy more Bristol paper! It's impossible to get locally and most websites won't take my card, so I usually have to jump through a few hoops. But not this time, so hopefully I'll have new paper soon!

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Works in progress:

Jack Sparrow drawing - 100% done svenjaliv.deviantart.com/art/C…
"Roman" wood carving - 80% done
Jaina & Jag painting - 30% done
"Mage" painting - 10% done
Lovers painting - 5% done

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I'm reading ASOIAF at the moment, so my brain is full of dragon. Well, not literally. Thoughts of dragons, I should say. Anyway, with that in mind, this week's features are going to be all about... yep, you've guessed it!