Something that a lot of people do when they're starting out is abusing the soft brushes in their graphics program. Either that, or abusing the blur function. Some people color a picture really well, then they think "oh darn it's too stark! it doesn't blend with the rest of the picture" and they just run a Gaussian Blur filter over the entire thing.

So what's my point? Basically, don't make the same mistake I do when watercoloring - thinking that only wishy-washy pale colors will look good. Don't be afraid to be bold and make your images sharp and crisp! The results are usually much better.

Darn. My entire elbow is stained with graphite because I left an unfixed drawing there.

Okay. I've had this account for a day. Now what?

I'm trying to post a couple more posts so that I can see if my new layout (thanks loads to lily !) works - right now it's a bit iffy. I think it's because the Tabula Rasa style changed again, so the userinfo box is now at the bottom.

Created a writing community at mithril and an icon one at anduin .