Zerna

Howdy!

Been a hot minute since I posted a journal around here, but here's some general life stuff for funsies! Commissions are closed for the month of October while I get my current list of them finished up first! September was a month of challenging myself to see how many commissions I could take/work on before starting to feel burnout. I took 23 commissions last month, finished 18 of them before Sept 30, and I'm still holding up really well, so that was a successful experiment! ...Just probably can't do that EVERY month around a full time job, that's for sure, lol.

This month, I will be focusing on Adopts, YCHs, and a bunch of spooky Halloween-themed art, including a massive collage of 30+ characters hopefully right around on Halloween itself :'> I also have a big 11+page comic in the works that I want to buckle down on this month, and probably a few more livestreams as well! We'll see how that big to-do list goes, but the goal is there!

Also really considering getting a black cat this month--my GF and I already plan to name it Spooky.

And a general plug, I'm also around Twitter a fair bit these days: https://twitter.com/TheZerna

Anyone doing anything fun for Halloween or got some get-together plans? >0>

~Zerna

I am enjoying the last day of the long holiday weekend and taking some time to deeply mull on some swirling thoughts. First off, really looking forward to 2022 and everything it will bring! I'm so excited to see what the future will bring, and to make plans and goals and actually achieve them. I have goals to snatch my friends from a few places across the USA and bring them to visit me to snuggle them in bundles of warmth and welcoming and to CRUSH THEM IN MARIO KART. >8') I have goals to get hardcore into swimming multiple times a week, and to take vacations more often, to visit my girlfriend's home state and family with her, and to improve art and to be as good a commissioned artist as I can for my commissioners.

I've been seeing a lot of artists opening commissions and MAN OH MAN, it feels like there's a very strong obsession with including LONG, intimidating pages of Terms of Service and Legal Warnings, these days. It's so off-putting to see, makes me not want to commission an artist because of hoops that have to be jumped...anything from signing terms of service, to adding them on a personal/separate platform, to filling out an ENTIRE GOOGLE DOCUMENT just to order a nice character bust or something. :[ Such a genuine shame...maybe I'm not the only person put off by this trend lately? Idk man. I've been taking commissions for over a decade, and this trend of making it feel like a robotic business arrangement is disheartening. I understand artists have to cover their asses, and the harrowing, looming culture of NFTs and Blockchain technology are very intimidating for all content creators as a whole. But making people fill out forms for things feels SO impersonal, like you're ordering a Custom Window design from a Macy's. I've always felt like ordering commissions from artist is...or should..be more than that. When people order commissions from me, it's one of the most fulfilling feelings in my world... Here's this PERSON, saying that I'm WORTH their trust and money to make a vision of theirs come true---or the even purer act that they just want to put their characters in my hands to see what I can do with it?? And I in turn try to give them my thoughts and genuine appreciation on their characters, and I just... hope I come off as genuinely caring, and that I will never make taking commissions seem like Just Another Business. Because that's not what it is to me, and never has been, and hopefully NEVER will be, even if I achieve that dream some day of being able to support myself just off of art and commissions.

I have another goal this year to comment more on people's art. It's abundantly clear that getting caught up in the Stream of Media is a very difficult trap to get out of. This culture of Click and Scroll constantly without taking more than a few moments to even dully gaze at a piece someone put hours and hours of heart and soul into, then times that by a thousand on a daily basis. Just because that's what life is right now doesn't mean we have to roll with it though...so new goal of making more appreciative comments and posts in general.

I also want to livestream more...and put out mini comics and fun character things like I did in the past. I was put off from doing so over the last couple of years because of the shift in DA's culture and slowing feedback, and even now I have those doubts of "maybe I should just draw what's popular or trending, that'd get more feedback", along with thousands of other artists with similar doubts, probably.

But god what's the POINT of that, if what you're drawing isn't enjoyable? What do you care about the comments, the feedback, when its on something you didn't even enjoy making? Would it be worth it, months down the road, in the end? Maybe, for some of us, it would be. I suppose that sort of decision, too, is just part of life.

Anyway, just some thoughts spilling out, hope everyone had a nice New Years and has set up some goals they're really looking forward to reaching this year. <3

~Zerna

Hey everyone, hope you had a lovely holiday, maybe got some lovely snow and enjoyed hot cocoa or coffee <33 Been ages since I posted a journal. Things sure have gotten quieter--or maybe life's just busier...either way! Hope you're all doing alright!

I'll be opening commissions again here in hopefully a week or so, the last couple months were crazy busy with a new house and the holidays and all.

Does anyone have some good group suggestions to join? Ones that are active and hopefully alien/sci-fi themed in general? I'm looking to branch out and join some new ones, the current ones I watch are pretty quiet. Maybe even some alien/IZ discord servers that are chill.

Anyone have some thoughts or musings to share? Maybe goals for the new year? :)

~Zerna

I keep forgetting the Journal function is even a thing. To start with, sorry commissions haven't been officially open for so long, things on my end have been busy, so they won't 'officially' be open for a while. Main reason is, I'm getting a house and moving into it with my lovely GF Cocoroot ! <33 Life in general's going pretty dang great-- still posting art here and there on DA and Twitter, I don't think that will ever fully stop, but it's certainly not at a flow like it used to be, and hey that's okay. That's just how life goes sometimes. =w= And despite that, I've genuinely never been happier in my life than these days, it's that feeling of 'everything coming together' and I'll be riding that for all it's worth.

I hope the pandemic and other life things are easing off for you guys as well, heaven knows many of us deserve a break--but hey, if nothing else, it's "Striketober", and there's been a massive wave of people across the USA going on strike against rough working conditions, and that's a real ray of hope for job relationships in the future :')

Anyway that's all I got, hope you all have a good weekend!

~Zerna

Hey all, gonna hit you with some lame first world problems so feel free to skip this. I don't share much on DA lately, especially in journal forms or EVER personal stuff but hell, why not?

Man I am so FRUSTRATED by social media and my art lately. I never get art block. I can typically keep going and going and do 12 hour livestreams and stuff but geez, lately my creativity has these spikes then hits rock bottom. Which REALLY sucks, because I have these big, grand plans for a webcomic that would be SO MUCH FUN if it can just see the light of day. Thank god for commissions and adoptables--they're like this rock of artistic motivation I can cling to. Something I'm eager to do, and get done, and do more of. Something I have ENERGY for, and something that will guaranteed bring a smile to at least one person. But when it comes to personal art, the motivation is friggin GONE, replaced by those feelings of "why bother" or "this is too hard to be worth it" or "there's better ideas out there" etc. Not just gone, but SAPPED dry.

And as shallow as it sounds, a big part of that loss is just...how social media is these days. How dead DA feels, how little feedback there is. My GF and I talk about it a lot--how a piece can get THOUSANDS of views then like...2 comments. It makes sense though. We live in a time in which we are bombarded by content virtually 24/7. We actually can't AFFORD To give attention to stuff--even when it's good stuff. Even when we WANT to. In fact, ESPECIALLY when its good stuff, because social media elevates all the good stuff and we are spoiled with access to THE BEST, all the time. Which is cool! Great! Awesome ways to support talented, hard-working creators of all kinds out there! Hell, even I barely interact with other artists these days, for just these reasons. Click scroll, click scroll, click scroll, next next next.

But damn I am feeling left in the dust. I guess I had my time to shine, back in The Day, at risk of sounding old. For so long, I've have a tiredly accepting, optimistic view that if I just keep chugging along, and trying, and making my art, the following will come naturally over time. That's how I FIRST started to find success in this little corner of the art sphere, after all. But I am realizing that's an outdated viewpoint, and the world of Content is much more complex these days. Harsher in some ways, more accepting and easier in others. I lost the confidence and easygoing joy I had in making art, especially humorous art, and in turn I think people felt that, and naturally drifted off.

So I'm sorry my content isn't what it used to be, genuinely.;; Sorry I'm not putting out mini comics and fun inter-character interactions like I used to, stuff that would make people smile and made me smile. It's a lot of self-disappointment lately and feeling like I should do something else, but also having nothing else I particularly want to do. I just want to be good at THIS again, dammit. Which I know is a feeling HUNDREDS of other people have, too, but...maybe just don't voice it for those same thoughts of 'why bother'.

Sadly, no decisive action or thoughts to wrap this up with, just...a sighing despondence. Only musings to let out into that big void that is the digital landscape, maybe in hopes of attracting some big revelation or change in opinion or even just kindred spirits.

Hope you all are well, may your weekend and its associated relaxation come swiftly to you.

~Zerna