Art Trades Roundup 2013: Nothing but a bunch of Yeah Yeah Yeah's.

Several years ago I decided that I would dedicate a chunk of the towards doing art trades. Being hardly the greatest of artists I wanted to get in all the practice I could and step outside my comfort zone, and at the same time see other people's own takes on my designs to better develop them and identify my own flaws.

For the most part this is what I got out of it, and certainly I've had some great experiences. For the third year running however, there has been a portion of the tradees who would never respond back. I would keep up my end of the bargain, always, and try my best. There were some who did get back to me who advised for a variety of reasons why they couldn't finish their end of the trade, and for that I am thankful that they contacted me. There was also people who never got back in touch, and while it's frustrating that this happened, I understand there are some things in life more important than an art trade.

I'd just like a bit of acknowledgment sometimes, you know?

Ultimately I've come to the conclusion that art trades only seem to be worthwhile for artists who have been long time friends online or artist's who are commission worthy enough that they can pick or choose their trades. As a result of this, I think It'll be unlikely I'll be returning to trades in the future.

Anyway, enough moaning. Here's the first half of the roundup, featuring my end of the trades. Characters all belong to their respective requesters unless stated otherwise.

Garnet for Sonten.

Character from Sonten's webcomic. I really like doing characters of different skin tones and Sonten's style was different enough that I felt like I wasn't just covering old ground. I've only had a chance to check out a little bit of their comic but It's interesting to say the least and well worth checking out.

Daniel for PsychoticKing.

A simple everyday person. I wasn't sure what to do with the background and I think I could have probably tried harder with that. Overall though I was pretty pleased.

Blastoise girl for CG-Crayon .

Humanised Pokemon character. I wanted to emphasize the strength of the water Pokemon's final state but I don't think I pulled the muscles off very well. This pretty much led into me doing a lot of muscle practice with I still working on at the moment. CG-Crayon hasn't done his side yet but he did have a pretty big backlog last I checked so who knows. The character is his creation but as you all know the Pokemon elements belong to Nintendo.

Red for Intissaria.

Another simple character for Intissaria who I did some work with last year. Again, no response on their end but they did make good on their last trade after a lengthy hiatus, and I know they've been dealing with some issues of late so I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt.

Bruce Banner for Wildjenmonster.

I can't say no to the chance to work on a Mark Ruffalo. Natuarally the character belongs to Marvel and Mr Ruffalo's image is his own.

Magician for Monoklo.

Quick nondescript character for Monoklo. This was another one of my attempts at trying something a little more dynamic. Because I suck at perspective I went for a pretty standard profile, which ended up making it a little less dynamic than I had planned. Still satisfied with it overall but it didn't archive what I intended.

Amelia and Cillian for Clchriskl.

Some nice romantic stuff. I was a little worried about doing this because it seems like an eternity since I've drawn something that wasn't f/f or m/m. In the end it turned out exactly as I wanted it and I'm really satisfied with what I did with the background. Clchriskl still has yet to get back to me with their end, they last posted a WIP months ago, but at the very least they've responded to my messages so hopefully something will turn up shortly.

And that's the end of part 1. I really wanted to do more trades this year but it was hard finding people that were interested in doing any. I even got turned down because someone said they didn't think my art was good enough to warrant a trade. Fair enough but wow don't worry about my feelings. Part 2 wrapping up all the artwork I got in return will be coming up shortly.