Sketch dump, and a mini-rant on jobs, college, and art.

Hi there, stranger. Do I know you?

...

I'm sorry I haven't posted in so long. I've been pretty busy with all sorts of insanity--piano and archery and, you know, drawing--and every time I sit down with my laptop, the last thing I feel like doing is writing a blog post.

But now I'm sick, and all I can really do is sit on the sofa anyway. And I'm tired of reading my Dietrich Bonhoeffer biography - though it's a very well written biography - so I'm finally going to post these doodles I've done lately.

Headshots.

 Left to right: Rachael, Annie, and Poppy.

Hopefully you already know who Poppy is. If you don't, she's my personality-less little scholar from my MBTI dystopian society.

Rachael is a random character I came up with recently while I was hanging out at a friend's house, and Annie is her best friend.

Sagey-love. <3

 Yeah, I totally have a crush on this character. He's my baby, okay?

Rachael.

And this is the first drawing I did of Rachael. I have a few other sketches of her, but I forgot to scan them.

Her proportions are a little off, but she's a fun character to draw. I may or may not be a little bit obsessed with her...

I was going to post my Magic Thief fanart too, but I think I'm going to save it for it's own post, in which I'll also review that series. Because they're actually pretty good, but almost no one has read them.

I'm thinking about doing art commissions once I start my Etsy store. Okay, I've been doing more than just think about it. I'm pretty much certain that I'll be doing them. In fact, that'll probably end up being the main focus of the store.

I just love drawing--and being able to make money off of something I already do every day, and love doing, just sounds like a smart option. You know? Even if I'll never "make any real money" doing it. Even if I have to get a "real job" once I graduate. (Or before, if I decide I need one.)

This is the way I see it--I don't need a job right now. I still have two years till I'm done with high school, and I don't really plan to go to college. (It's still technically up in the air, but I don't think I'll be going.) There's nothing I want that's too expensive to get for Christmas or my birthday. So why waste the few years of freedom I have left on some minimum-wage part time job, when I could just as easily be making similar money on something that I love to do, not to mention earning experience in the field I want to go into? Doesn't this way just make more sense?

Sorry, I'm starting to rant. This is something that's been on my mind a lot lately, and I just needed to get it out.

Monochrome.

My memory card broke recently, so I can't scan any pictures until I get a new one. *sigh* This is frustrating, since I have several sketches I want to show you guys (including some Magic Thief fanart and my first attempt at using the Sharpies my little brother got me for Christmas). I guess you'll just have to wait until I find a new memory card. Or steal one of my siblings'.

I have an obsession with monochrome. I keep drawing things like this...

I was at a friend's house for the weekend to celebrate her birthday, and while I was there I doodled this on her sister's iPad.

A few things you should know about Spike:

• His real name is Matthew J. Scott. Nobody's really sure when or where he acquired his nickname.
• He likes pink. Don't judge.
• Some people are intimidated by his spiky white hair and punk-ish clothing, but they shouldn't be. He's really sweet.
• I just came up with him yesterday so he's not very developed.

That's all the new artwork I have to post at the minute... I'm in a drawing mood, though, so I might end up pulling out my pen tablet and doodling something. If that happens, you guys could end up with two posts from me in one day. :O

NOT MY ART. But isn't it adorable? <3

Also, Josie and I did an art swap during the December drawing challenge (er, well, not really during. She just finished mine up last week, and I haven't gotten hers emailed off yet, because broken memory card. >.<). AND LOOK AT ME I AM SO CUTE. She's such a good artist I can't even. *fangirls over drawing*

Dystopian world-building involving MBTI, school uniforms, and a curly-haired girl.

I don't know why, but this idea has been pestering me like crazy for the past few days. What if, in the future, there was a country whose society revolved around personality types?

Wouldn't be too far-fetched for an INTJ to decide that s/he wanted to organize the world a little better, and type everyone in it to find their "ideal" location in the country. Trust me. I'm already on that path.

So I've been doodling characters and maps and floorplans to a ridiculous extent. I have a document made just for random observations I make on personality types - which has mostly digressed into me rambling about the different between "F" and "T" types - and I just finished up a quick sketch of a school crest.

A school for ISTJs, mind you.

World-building aside, this is what I have so far for the story:

"At the age of fifteen, every one in the country of ___ takes an important test. This test - or inventory, if you want to be specific - will determine their future. After their personality type has been recorded, they are sent to a school, where they will learns skills specific for their type. During their senior year, they will choose from a list of possible professions, and, after graduation, begin working in that job.

It's a foolproof plan, except for one thing.

There is no personality type that matches Poppy Wynd."

So basically since I decided my world wasn't interesting enough, I had to make up some conflict. Meaning I have a "personality-less" fifteen-year-old named Poppy.
(She actually does have a personality type, but that's a bit of a spoiler. I'm still figuring out how much of the story I want to give away.)

Some pictures to illustrate:

Miss Poppy. If she had a determined personality type, there would be a crest on her jacket. Since she has no type, she gets no crest.

This looks really confusing now, but it made perfect sense when I drew it. The colors are for the various personality type "groups," and the crest is what an ISTJ would wear. And there's a big splotch around the crest because my art program decided to spaz.

Haha, Maebh (Mave). She has nothing to do with the aforementioned story. Just a character in a book I'm hoping to illustrate.

I hope you've enjoyed this trip into Dee's brain. Tune in next time for "A Ramble on MBTI Types, and the Slight Differences Between INTPs and INTJs."

(I'm being serious here, though. I might post that.)