Kelci Crawford, Comic Artist

Day 4 of the challenge, and I missed the midnight deadline. Bugger.

Lately I’ve been rather “AUGH” with deadlines and procrastinating, and I hate procrastinating, so that adds a whole new layer of “AAAUUUUGH” to my plate. And when I’m feeling really overwhelmed, I draw monsters…like this one.

He popped up in my head earlier today, but just the head part with the eye out of its throat. I made up the rest of it as I sketched it.

This is WAY different from my usual flare, so sorry if this freaks you out.

Day 3 of the Digital Sketch Challenge.

No lie, I whipped this one out (that’s what he said) the fastest so far. This only took me about fifteen minutes, lol.

This time, I really wanted to play with the smudge tool in MyPaint. I like its effects. :D

Woohoo! Just before midnight!

This is Day 2/sketch 2 in the 30 Day Digital Sketch Challenge! (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, check out my journal entry on my page).

This time I wanted to make a quick sketch of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which I’m in full support of. I support them because they’re all people about my age or a little bit older (nearly all of them are just out of college) and all of their efforts to make names for themselves have been frustrated because of the economic crisis caused by Wall Street corruption.

That’s the basic summary of it, but it’s much more complicated than that. If you want to have a debate with me about it, please send me a personal message, because I want to try and avoid debates being had in the comments below.

Thanks, and enjoy!

So I have started a new challenge on myself!

Every day for thirty days, I am going to make (and post) a sketch done digitally!

The rules are that the sketch must be done in one day, and take no more than one hour. Fanart IS allowed.

I’m doing this challenge for a few reasons:

1) I want to practice my digital sketching skills.
2) I want to stay in the practice of drawing everyday.
3) I want to practice what I don’t know.
4) I want to share it with the world!

Here is my first sketch in this challenge: a cat ninja.

Because of one of my current comic projects, I’ve been on a bit of an anthropomorphic kick, especially when envisioning anthros as bad-ass warrior types. I blame my current fixation on Kung Fu Panda and martial arts movies.

Critiques are welcome for this sketch, especially since digital is a medium I’m still fairly new to. KEEP IN MIND, however, that my arsenal of digital media is limited: I can only work with an open-source software called MyPaint. I don’t own Photoshop. There will be some features that I cannot access because of that.

With that said, I hope you like it, and I hope you look forward to more sketches from the challenge!

WARNING: the following blog post is about sex. Children must read this post.

So I was reading my campus newspaper when I came across an….”interesting” article in the Forum section, where students are allowed to say anything. The article discussed the importance of saving sex for marriage (click on the link and it will take you there) and why they should wait to “unite in this intimate way”.

I’m not really surprised about her stance. She had also written a previous article wherein she mentions the “blessed Pope Benedict” whatever number he is now, so it’s safe to say she’s Catholic.

I’m not saying all Catholics are like this, but I think I can assume, that since she proclaims sex as “the ultimate expression of love”, that she is a virgin.

Only virgins (and poets, and virgin poets) see sex as “the ultimate expression of love.” I know for a fact that it’s not.

That’s right. I’ve had sex. A lot.

(Not a LOT a lot, because I’m not a slut, but enough to know what I’m doing).

And I will say this about your first time having sex: I don’t care if the first time you ever have sex is with your husband, your boyfriend you’ve been dating for three years, or some guy or girl you picked up at the bar…your first time having sex will be AWKWARD.

Firstly, you have to get over seeing another person’s nads. Secondly, you have to get over the worse fear of showing the other person YOUR nads. Thirdly, and this is a problem mostly for the girls, there’s a membrane called the Hymen that still needs to break, and I will say this: it doesn’t always break completely the first time. It may take multiple times to have sex before it can be comfortable for you. So your first time having sex won’t really be enjoyable. Sorry. Fourthly, the partner will realize that since this is the girl’s first time, that he’s causing her pain, so he’s indecisive whether to be gentle or to hammer it in to get the pain over with, and things get all kinds of weird.

If you really love this person and are willing to get over all this awkwardness (and potential pain), then kudos to you. Not everyone is. That’s why there are sometimes break-ups (and the really expensive break-up, the divorce).

Sure, sex can be an expression of love, but I am of the firm belief that sex is just a bodily function: it’s like sleeping or pooping. Everyone does it, and it’s necessary for us to function like people. To treat sex like it’s sacred would do it a disservice. It’s like treating every burp as if it were an act of love.

This is not to say that sex isn’t fun! I WILL say sex is more enjoyable the more times you do it with the same person, because you will know what turns your other on (and, more importantly, what turns your other off).

I respect this girl’s right to say what she wants to say. I just hope that she keeps all these points I just made in mind.

Sex isn’t sacred. It can, though, with a lot of practice and the right person, be a LOT of fun.

So keep banging away!