You know what sucks worse than losing to American U?

Losing to American U after flying across the country!

So today I fell as I was running to try and catch a bus and I suffered a contusion on my greater trochanter.

The greater trochanter is the bony prominence of the femur as it leaves the pelvis. The femur is not a straight bone. The femoral neck angles outwards from the pelvis until it reaches the rest of the femur. That point of attachment is not a smooth transition. The outcropping of bone is called the greater trochanter. (Yes, there is a lesser trochanter on the other side of the femur.)

http://www.sports-injury-info.com/i.....trochanter.jpg

The greater trochanter is a bony prominence on the hip. It is very close to the skin, and there is very little soft tissue between the skin and the bone itself. On a thin or muscular individual, that point will always be superficially visible.; as visible as the iliac crest and the inguinal ligament (I might discuss those if I happen to injure them. Which hopefully I won't.)

As a point of reference, there are many ligaments which attach to the Greater Trochanter (most importantly the vastus lateralis, one of the four muscles which make up the quadriceps) but none that actually cover the bony prominence.

Now that you all know, I don't want to see any more "tacked on" muscles over femurs and such. Ever. ಠ_ಠ

(Prognosis for recovery is 4-7 weeks of limited activity. No running, jumping, carrying heavy things, rock concerts, epic fights to the death, or teasing dineegla about how lousy the Chicago Cubs are.)

This.

So what did you all get for Christmas?

Or whatever you celebrate?

I GOT A ROCK. ಠ_ಠ

I am ICE COLD.

IIIIIIIICE

COOOOOOOOLD

Merry Christmas, folks.

If you don't like me calling out Radrab for being a hater, I can call you out for being...

um...

ummmm...

Nah, you're alright. ಠ_ಠ

Delaware lost to Penn!

At HOME!

By 10 points!

I guess the University of Delaware's Mens Basketball team gave their fans an early Christmas present: a pitiful display against the fifth-best team in the Ivy League!

Santa's delivering another 20-loss season.

When you open up commissions to everyone, you're going to get some that you don't exactly feel like doing.

But you have to do them anyway if the client has already paid you.

Seems like on this site, some people can continue to get commissions even though they seem to have an aversion to doing art for people that they might not find "yifferific". You might know who I'm talking about. I'm not naming names, but you probably know already.

Anyway... yeah.

Happy Holidays.

ಠ_ಠ

You went and did it, FA. You went and opened the floodgates of hell. Holy shit, this is WORSE than DeviantArt's drama problems. And DeviantArt has what, 11 million users? I'd be surprised if FA has 50k. But I digress.

Let's start here:

1) FA is a privately owned and operated site. The admins owe you nothing.
This is a fact. It's not debatable. It's not a matter of opinion. You cannot argue that FA is "for the furries! We have expectations and those must be met!" It's a wonder you all can use this site for free considering everything that is involved in running a complex operation such as this one.

FOR FREE.

Yes, that means you can pull up all the furry porn you want and give yourself the false illusion that you are "popular" FOR FREE. You can get your rocks off to all the furry porn you want FOR FREE. I'm trying to figure out where the "downside" is to all of that. The admins do all of it and provide it for no cost to the user.

2) There is no such thing as absolute security on the internet.
This is also a fact. It's not debatable. It's not a matter of opinion. You cannot argue that "FA needs to be super-super secure! The admins owe it to us!" Governments and corporations around the world spend billions on cyber-security experts who spend years training to counter hackers, and they still fail regularly.

People seem to be reluctant to accept the fact that anything you post on the internet is inherently insecure information and has the potential to be seen by millions of people. They want to think FA is sheltered, but it's not. Reality bites, but what can one expect when the partial reaction to a "photo meme" is one of hostility? Wake up.

3) The admins can see your notes and anything you delete.
This is yet another fact. It's not debatable. It's not a matter of opinion. What, did you think the site was built without a method of archiving things? (It explains why "Journal deleted by the user" shows up in the Message Box. I think it would have been pretty obvious just by that.)

Why can the admins do this? Well, for one, if you were being harassed by someone and you wanted to file a report to the admins, wouldn't it just suck if the guilty party were to delete everything before the report was filed? The admins would review, see nothing wrong, and go back to their business while the guilty party just went back to harassing you via notes and deleted posts.

Also, security. Yeah. Security. It's in their best interests to archive everything that goes on here.

I'm absolutely certain, though, that the admins have bigger fish to fry than trolling through your notes for no reason other than to get a kick out of trolling through your notes. If you write notes with the false illusion that nobody else can see them, well then you're just plain silly. Wake up.

4) The admins are human.
This is once again a fact. It's not debatable. It's not a matter of opinion. Dragoneer is not a dragon. He's some dude who lives in the mid-Atlantic who keeps FA running. I know a lot of you seem oblivious to the faces behind the monitors, but it's true. FA is nice for having facades and masquerade, but when you actually get into the meat and bones of it, there are people there. Like, actual human beings.

That comes with the little down-point of making mistakes. Human error is a part of being human, sad to say. I know people's "fursonas" are perfect, but it's not the same for the people behind them.

When someone makes a mistake, they rectify it to the best of their ability and move on. That is what has been done in this situation. Now you can go and say "well we deserve more! Or we're all going to leave!", but that doesn't rectify the situation (and the vast majority of the people don't have the proverbial stones to actually up and leave FA. They want the attention too much to actually make a stand in something they really believe in.)

5) Full time staff usually require payment.
DeviantArt Staff are paid via salary. Their creative people are paid via commission. FA admins, to my knowledge, do not draw an income from their FA admin work. It's all on a volunteer basis.

And yes, it's a grueling position. It's more than just lording over the masses with your special symbol and your admin abilities. You actually have to do things. Things that would normally qualify as a full-time job in its own regard. How do I know? I spent three months as a DA admin. But hey, if you don't believe me, ask katmomma or skifi how much time and effort is involved in being a volunteer administrator.

Full-time coders generally don't work for free. Full-time security staff generally don't work for free. On a site that is completely free to use and supported entirely with donations and ad revenue (for a tiny niche market, at that. Don't fool yourselves into thinking mainstream advertisers want anything to do with the furry fandom. It's the ugly truth), there usually isn't anything built in for the overhead needed to pay for two salaried positions.

And what, you think you can just write an application on Monster.com and expect people to respond to "full time coder/security specialist wanted. Must be willing to tolerate furry porn, low pay, and excessive amounts of drama. Inquire at ____"?

6) The world does not stop because you have a hissy fit.
Whoops.

lol so apparently this is all mass exodus and shit

I'm not going anywhere. The drama shitstorm + people not growing a hypothetical pair + high school 2.0 couldn't keep me away so hacking won't either.

lolwtf

In other news... AnthroCon 2011.

It's on.

Like Donkey Kong.

ಠ_ಠ

Also, Pennsylvania tax licenses are a pain in the crotch.

It doesn't matter if the Phils go back in time and get Tom Seaver, Nolan Ryan, Cy Young, Randy Johnson, and Don Sutton...

They're not winning another World Series with that whack ass bullpen.

Hell, they might struggle to win the division. It's like the Old Man Club + Cole Hamels in your rotation. I'd be surprised if Roy Oswalt isn't in a Hoveround by the end of the season.

"Thanks for going to the NBA a year early, Larry, so I don't have to watch my team's layups get swatted when VCU rolls into Newark and crushes Delaware by 45 points."

Yeah, that's what's up.

Just be thankful he won't be doing that to your whack-ass team.

This is NOT first-come, first-serve.

Here's how it works:

1) Send me a note if you are interested. Have a concept in mind. And by "concept" I mean "descriptive, informative, and gives me something to work with."
2) If I feel I can finish the piece in a timely manner (i.e. by Saturday the 18th), I will accept.
3) 50% of payment is due once a sketch is approved. The other 50% is due after the finish is completed.

I am putting this out there now: this is for a fully painted piece. As such, it will be quoted for price accordingly. Prices start at $100 and increase depending on complexity. For the purposes of this commission opening, I don't expect any piece to cost more than $175.

Yup, that's it.

Not mine. ಠ_ಠ

Anyway, people are always asking me what I mean when I talk about "weak composition".

http://artorder.blogspot.com/2010/1.....and-lines.html
This should help answer a few questions.

Composition is one of those things that a lot of artists struggle with, myself included. But the only way to get better at it is to stop bitching and start practicing. If I hear anyone else whine about "not getting" composition I swear I will smack them over the head with a dying seagull.

You didn't see anything... ಠ_ಠ

---

I am planning to attend AnthroCon as a dealer. My questions to you are this:

a) If I did an AC 2011 limited edition sketchbook (16 pages of sketches, drawings, and stuff I haven't posted anywhere) and sold it for, oh say... $10 with a free sketch on the front insert, would anyone be interested in buying it?

b) If I offered limited edition archival prints of some of my paintings (i.e. the ones that don't involve other peoples' characters), which ones would you be interested in purchasing, if any at all?

I do plan on bringing my paints with me to Pittsburgh and offering Painterly Portrait commissions on-site for $30 apiece (that's $30 for a HAND PAINTED 5.5" square portrait of your character.) Also sketches, sketch cards, some other stuff. I'll keep myself plenty busy while I'm not being an art whore selling my wares.

I realize it's six months away but it never hurts to get a jump on things.
Also I might have to open up commissions to cover my dealer registration fee.

will get nothing. ಠ_ಠ

I just thought I'd mention it.

And you will get an answer.

Be advised if you ask something ridiculous, the only answer you'll get is a derisive snort.

NOW ASK AWAY! ಠ_ಠ

Adam Dunn signed with the White Sox. It makes me sad. Now I can't go watch him strike out four times per game at Nationals Park anymore.

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TL;DR: Layers. Light to dark, then light on top. Loose to tight, thin to heavy.

ಠ_ಠ

I've never complained about the ad placement on FA, but the ones on the tops of profile pages are intrusive and disruptive to the visual flow of the site.

Am I the only one who feels this way about the issue?

ಠ_ಠ

Pardon the semi-Journal spam, but I yoinked this from  codyvfrost because artists love nothing more than talking about themselves.

And then there's me. ಠ_ಠ

1. What are elements of your style?
I hate that word, "style". It's very constricting. Style is like personality; it's there, but if you start to think about it, you begin to typecast yourself and everything you do seems "forced". I will say, however, my work is linear (as opposed to painterly - yes, even in those "Painterly Portraits") and has a definite emphasis on texture. I tend to favor desaturated palettes in both my traditional paintings and drawings and in my digital images. And my compositions are generally static, even in action scenes.

2. Have you had formal training? (e.g., college, personal instructor, etc.)
Montgomery College + Virginia Commonwealth University. Before that, the only art class I had was in the 5th grade. Go figure. I suppose I came into this art thing pretty late for someone who suddenly decided he wanted to do it for a living.

3. Was it useful or did you find it better to learn on your own?
That's a difficult question. I wouldn't call it "better" or "worse". There are some things that you really do need to figure out for yourself (like this thing everyone starts to call "style"), but for the basics like perspective and proportion - constructing figures, that sort of thing - it's far more useful to have someone there explaining it to you and answering questions personally so you don't feel like you are fumbling in the dark trying to grasp a concept.

4. What are your tools of the trade?
I could go on and on about those... I'd say ask enydimon if you didn't believe me, but he has passed on to the realm of "lol I left FA".

Watercolors-
I have a palette of 24 single-pigment colors, picked for various properties (opacity vs. transparency, granulation for texture cause I'm a texture slut... staining properties, wet-into-wet activity, etc.) Occasionally I'll change one color out for another, but generally I don't mess around with them. They do what I need them to do. I don't use all 24 colors in a painting - usually I limit it to 6 or 7 in any given piece. It's just convenient to have them all laid out there instead of fumbling around with tubes.

Along with those are watercolor paper - my preference is Twinrocker 200 lb. Cold Pressed but it's woefully expensive ($10 per a 18" x 22" sheet), so I usually settle for Arches 140 lb. Cold Pressed, which comes in pads or individual "full size" 22" x 30" sheets. I stretch the paper out on Gatorboard - reinforced waterproof foamcore - which lets the paper dry without buckling.

I have too many brushes to count, but generally I like Kolinsky red sable rounds or Kazan squirrel mops. I've never been comfortable using flats for watercolor. If I need to make a really big wash or wet a large area, I'll use a sea sponge.

Acrylics-
I have a palette of acrylic paints as well, though it's all in tubes and the colors can change on a whim. I like painting on Bristol board or Illustration board using synthetic brushes or bristle brushes. Or anything, really. Acrylics are so versatile I could probably paint using a Slim Jim and have it turn out half-way close to what I want it to look like.

Ink-
I. Hate. Microns.

I'll use them for sketch work, but for inking my artwork I have a few quill pens (Hunt 107, Hunt 56, Esterbrook 354, Hunt 101) that I use along with acrylic ink (I don't have a preference between Liquitex or FW; as long as it's lightfast I'll use it). I also have a cut-down Princeton oil Round Kolinsky red sable brush that I use for inking as well.

Digital-
I work with both Corel Painter (9.5) and Adobe Photoshop (7) on a Wacom Intuos3 6x11" pen tablet. It's worth noting that the tablet pen nib that is currently in my pen is actually a cut-down toothpick. Yes, it works.

Et Cetera
I use a no. 2 pencil for any pencil work I have to do. Value studies are done using charcoal and white chalk on grey-toned paper.

5. Would you, or do you work on art for a living?
That's sort of the idea behind going to school and studying art, isn't it?

6. Do you know another artist who would fill this out?
No, they're too busy fapping.