Inktober - Week One

Inktober is here, and with it comes my first post. I've always been looking for an opportunity to post something but it felt too intimidating to just start. One thing I love about Inktober is that there are no excuses! It encourages you to post that day. So I'm being forced to embrace and tackle my mistakes in the name of progress. I very nearly forgot about Steemit until almost a week into October, so instead of making a post for each of my drawings all in one day, I decided to wait until the week finished and combine them into one post.

Without further ado, here are my first seven entries:

Day 1 - Swift
Since the prompt for this day was "swift", I wanted to draw something with action in it. The first day of the challenge, I did not have a good pen, or any pens at all for that matter, so I spent a lot of time trying to find one. I started with a blue gel pen that felt good to draw with, but did not mark consistently. So I switched to a black ballpoint pen for the guy. I don't like how the girl turned out, partially because of the pen, but also because I need a lot more practice.

Day 2 - Divided
By the second day I was a little more prepared, as I had already rounded up pens the previous night. As the prompt was "divided", an image of two people facing opposite directions came to mind. I like how this one came out, even though I made a couple of mistakes here and there.

Day 3 - Vampire (Poison)
For day 3, I finally decided to go out and get a pen! I had had enough of drawing with inconsistent pens. I picked up a Japanese calligraphy pen from a local art store because I didn't have the money to buy a good pack. In addition to the official Inktober prompt, I was also following an "improvement prompt" I found online for each day and decided to reference both of them for ideas on what to draw each day. For this day, the other prompt was "mouths/teeth" so I initially wanted to draw a someone biting into a hand. After taking a couple reference photos, I realized I wasn't going to get a good angle that I wanted and also get more practice drawing teeth, so I dropped the biting part and decided just to draw an open mouth and make a vampire.

Day 4 - Underwater
Few things feel as cathartic and evocative as the feeling of floating underwater. I felt this drawing would resonate with people who sometimes feel that lonely yet comforting feeling even when they aren't in water. I really love how this one came out, as I don't feel like I had to make many corrections to it.

Day 5 - 2B & 9S (Long)
For this prompt, I actually went with the verb "long", as in "longing". 2B and 9S are playable characters in the game Nier: Automata, and I wanted to portray a longing between the two. I actually messed up in quite a few places and I don't like how this one came out, but I still love the idea. I'm planning to revisit this piece at a later date.

Day 6 - Samurai Jack (Sword)
Ahh, Samurai Jack. I grew up with this series but I never got to watch the final season play out until recently. I finished the fifth and final season this same day and figured it was very appropriate material for the prompt, "sword", as Jack's mystical sword is the only weapon that could defeat the main antagonist of the series, Aku.

Day 7 - Nanachi (Shy)
For this day, I'd finished the incredible fantasy adventure anime Made in Abyss, and wanted to draw a character from the series. Nanachi is a cute rabbit creature that acts bashful at times, so I decided she would be a perfect fit. I'm quite proud of the helmet.

That's all for the first week. From this day forward, each entry will get its own post so I can keep myself responsible for posting consistently. Thanks for checking out my art!