Or at least, I intend it to be relaxing. Hopefully it delivers.
4:22 minutes

Materials:

• Pen: Moonman Starry Glass dip pen, Mars: https://www.jetpens.com/Moonman-Starry-Sky-Glass-Dip-Pen-Mars/pd/31536
• Paper: Strathmore Writing Series 500, lined: https://www.jetpens.com/Strathmore-500-Series-Writing-Pad-8.5-x-11-Lined-50-Sheets/pd/15322
• Ink: Robert Oster, Rose Gilt Tynte: https://www.jetpens.com/Robert-Oster-Rose-Gilt-Tynte-Fountain-Pen-Ink-Shake-N-Shimmy-50-ml-Bottle/pd/25170

In which I talk about the paper, the paint, and the experience of oils versus gouache. Fun stuff, will do more.

Thank you Locals supporters! Your contribution to my art war chest here is what's powering these experiments and videos. For now I'm keeping them public but I may start doing some subscriber-only videos if you all are interested.💖

My initial review on receipt of the three oil paper products I ordered: the Canson pad, the Rembrandt block, and the Arches single sheets.

Thanks for your comments yesterday on the business post... all very provocative, in a good way. I'll try to respond to all of them today.

Some Alysha misc now, since I'm gearing up for the results of the Kickstarter!

Petrov is giving away coupon codes for every book in the Alysha series (and has some leftover coupons for Marda and the business book). You can pick those up here (and please do! The books are bought already, someone should use them!) https://twitter.com/PetrovNeutrino/status/1457344535843987461

Our own @JudasComplex sent along a sample of the Faith in the Service audiobook, which I've attached for your delight! I... haven't had a chance to listen to it. Don't ask me about my past week and a half or so. Putting it here will guarantee I get to it.

After hearing the amused comments during the livestream, I went ahead and added all the ship type illustrations I have inked from the 90s to the wiki. Glory in the rampant adorableness of their anthropomorphic stylings! See those ...

A little comedy today, at least in the link. Transcript follows.

Hi, all. Welcome to this episode of The Jaguar’s Heart.

A while back I was introduced to a comedy sketch about Cuban coffee by a Mexican comedian, Gabriel Iglesias. ( The sketch begins with him greeting all his fellow Latinos and then backing up to say ‘but we’re all different, aren’t we’ which is a segue into a demonstration of how different Hispanics speak Spanish.

It is hilarious. First, because I am a Spanish speaker and a linguistics hobbyist, and his portrayal of various accents resonated with my experiences in trying to make sense of them myself… Not always easy, since from culture to culture, slang and accent are often totally different (and sometimes grammar! Spaniards use a grammatical construct that has died out in many other Spanish-speaking countries, the plural “you.”)

I also loved it because the Cuban coffee part is real. I grew up with Cubans. I know how we are....

One of the most common things I hear (and say) right now is "the asymmetry is the story." Here's one about how none of us are innocent of the sins we hate in others.

Hi, all. Welcome to this week’s episode of The Jaguar’s Heart.

It’s been weeks since the Baen’s Bar incident and I’m still thinking about it... because the longer I do, the more I feel, overwhelmingly, that it’s obvious that the problem is deeper than “this forum was saying stuff that offended us.” We have to back up to the glaring fact that people on opposite sides no longer consider each other human. Nothing I say will matter because the people disagreeing with me don’t think I’m human. They have denied my humanity; they have not bothered to listen to my beliefs, or have fake-listened to them in that way that people do when they’re so ready to prove you wrong that they’re only using your speech to provide talking points for their own ideas.

We have forgotten how to listen.

Increasingly, we have also ...

https://studiomcah.com/products/blades-and-seeds-and-bitter-apples

A duel with paperclips and network cables... a paladin and assassin team... dinosaur aliens swept away by the storms... and more! After almost fifteen years, this collection of Hogarth's earliest and most eclectic fiction returns by reader request; the original four stories have been supplemented by an additional fourteen, ranging in tone from comedy to horror, and in genre from science fiction to literary fantasy. The three existing Jitesse stories are in this volume; so are the only two Tsipia-alien tales, and the single Zalitraeq piece.
An essential for the completionist, these stories illuminate the creative development of a prolific artist in her earliest years. Come meet the blade and taste the bitter apples!

It’s a real delight to hold this one in my hands because it was a reader request. As I talk about at length in the introduction, the original Blades and Bitter Apples was too short to issue as a ...

https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/72-2002-014-SmellOfIntelligenceCharacters

Yesterday's scan came up with this cool piece of the characters from the story "The Smell of Intelligence" (now available in Clays Upon the Sands, the second Jokka collection volume). From 2002, so this was before the story was in its final form (or possibly even written!) Certainly, I don't recognize the sentiment I jotted down under Duna's portrait.

Other pictures of these characters:

https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/loose-2025-0700-Chenji

https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/72-2002-079-FathaWebsiteGraphic

I'm definitely missing a handful. Just a sign that I need to keep scanning!

I found this one in Sketchbook 71, from 2002... which would be before a lot of the canonical books were written, which makes this list of potential Tarot cards with Peltedverse characters on it a fantastic historical artifact. Some of them still work (Alysha as Strength); others are a little less relevant now that the story's been written (Sediryl as the Moon!). But a lot of them are still great (like the Exodus as the Tower, or Margeaux as Death).

Here's the link in case the first one glitches: https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/71-2002-082-PeltedTarotList

In 2016, I returned to the idea with a few sketches, which you'll find indexed off this first one of Alysha: https://mcahogarth.org/gallery/image/112-2016-028-TarotAlysha

I'd make a very different list today, I think! What character do you think belongs to which card these days?