On making fanart, and assuaging associated notions of guilt

I spend a lot of time doodling. It's a comfort, amongst other things. I've done it since I was a kid, and since then I've also learnt to be embarrassed by inferiority; my mother studied and practised fine art, and my older sister has an aptitude for capturing form and translating it into beautiful creations. It's hard not to feel fiercely inept when being gently encouraged to "maybe focus more on the writing, that's what you're good at." 

"Oh, you make pictures?" says the therapist. "Well, it's marvellous that you're finding a healthy way to be expressive!" How do I tell them that the only thing I am expressing is over-investment in fictional characters and a need to disguise the fact that my comprehension of the basics of drawing is primitive at best.

BATKIRK

(Recent commission for slash/night poster)

New sketch in progress for a slash fiction event in Brighton

New Hannibal picture! Charcoal, red ink and general angst.

I made another Hannibal thing.

The metallic paints didn't show up so well under my scanner and the 'disintegrating antler' effect is subsequently fuzzier than planned. I'm not entirely happy with it and if I were a better artist I'd know how to fix it. But!

[Also this took so much longer than the last one:

http://muffichka.tumblr.com/post/87287919984/white-tinted-charcoal-on-black-paper-90 ]

Was feeling nostalgic about Young Avengers, so here's a sketch of my favourite ladies (sorry Leah)

The Inevitable Feast

[Pencil, ink and acrylic in place of watercolour because I keep forgetting to buy the right sort of paint]

Hassun (detail)

Started working on a bunch of creepy pics that have yet to manifest into anything proper yet

So it’s been that sort of a day…

This is such a stupid thing but... I've been trying to combine my need to get better at drawing with my...problem. The problem being that my sketchbook is filling up with half-realised bits of creepy Hannibal art, because apparently this is what helps? Whatever. 

So, a few weeks ago I started this as a sort of doodle, sort of sketch. I had plans for it. These plans involved colour, detail, blood and refining. It was going to be something I could be proud of. 

Except, I put it in my bag, and some hours later, I put a freezer pop in my bag. Which I forgot about (there were a lot of painkillers involved). That would be what the weird stain in the top right is about. 

So, along with most other projects I've started, it was going to rot and fester (possibly literally; it was a cola flavoured pop, and those things smell bad). And then the new official posters came out today (which I am not going to link to this because they look amazing and not like a half-arsed sketch covered in goo, and despite a leaning towards self deprecation, I am not wholly masochistic) but the similarities made me think that maybe I should try and finish at least one stupid project so that if the same sort of image materialises elsewhere, I can at least think "Oh, I had a good go at that", rather than "here is my soggy impression of something that was possibly heading in a similar direction."

TL;DR: Here! Look at my half-finished, half-arsed, freezer-pop-soaked almost fan art!