A little late, but happy new year! Here’s reminiscing the things I get to draw in 2023, since things got busy in December and I didn’t get to do the December recap nor to draw much that month. So here’s my art summary recap for 2023, choosing only one art for each month!
Down the Memory Lane
Some reasonings on each month’s choice as we walk down the memory lane:
- January – Yaoyao [Genshin Impact]
It’s the year of the rabbit! I was looking forward to Yaoyao since she was teased in one of Genshin official art, so I was happy to draw her. Her rabbit companion is so cute too! - February – My OC
I made a new drawing of my character, updating it with my latest outfit design I made last year. Kind of a new ‘official art’ of my vtuber persona, I’m pretty happy how it turns out and the outfit feels less basic than before, hahaha. - March – Serizawa [Suzume]
I watched Suzume and it was a pretty and interesting movie, in particular Serizawa caught my eyes and I wanted to draw a silly small fanart for him! A rare occasion for me to draw a fanart of a Makoto Shinkai movie and I had some funny responses when sharing it, so I wanted to keep it in. - April – Hoshino Ai [Oshi no Ko]
On the rare chances I get to do non-chibi digital paintings style in 2023, both of them are Oshi no Ko (the other one being Akane). Hoshino Ai is a character I adore and want to portray well. I wish I can do better, but it feels like a good warmup to practice my digital painting every now and then. I guess I should do more of these so I won’t forget. - May – My OC
I reached my 1k milestone on Twitch! It’s still a surreal moment as I often feel some self-doubt when it comes to streaming and feel bad not being able to stream as much in 2023, but I’m thankful I took the chance to keep trying and through it, I get to meet some new friends as well having a bunch of fun memories. - June – Various magical girls
I did the color wheel challenge featuring one of my most favorite subject – magical girls! I drew my favorite characters for each color from different series I like – from Heartcatch Precure, Sailor Moon, to Shugo Chara and Cardcaptor Sakura. I love how vibrant the colors look when it’s all put together! - July – Hoshino Ai [Oshi no Ko]
It’s a bit hard to show it in a small size and I was debating over to put in the product photo or not, but I wanted to stick to the artwork. This month I made a merch product I always wanted to make years ago – candy bag charms! I made it printed by Vograce with my friend Kirara’s help, and I’m happy to finally see my work as a candy bag charm. It’ll be available to order for my next conventions – Doujima, Kira Kira Art Market, Cocoma and more as long as stocks last, and comes with photocard bonus! - August – My OC (Non-chibi)
Updated my stream assets for another birthday stream of mine – I wanted to have a non-chibi drawing of my own character for my starting screen, so here it is! I know my progress is slower than many others when debuting new assets, but I’m glad I get the chance to upgrade and spice things up little by little each year with new transition animation, start/end/BRB screens, overlays, and debuting my new 3D model. - September – Hoshimachi Suisei [HololiveJP]
I spent quite a long time working in this piece, the idea is to draw different versions of Suisei based on the art style referencing her different music videos of her original songs (the ones I had in mind in particular are Next Color Planet, Ghost, Template, and Michizure). I made these into star hologram stickers for Comifuro and glad it reached out to fellow Suisei fans who like them! - October – Kokoba LINE Stickers
I finally made one of my art checklist from years ago – Kokoba LINE stickers! I made chat stickers of my own chibi before, but I want to make one for Kokoba too. I gathered opinions from friends’ help on which expressions they’d love to use, and I hope it ends up with something others will have fun using in chats. You can check out the LINE stickers here! - November – Furina etc. [Genshin Impact]
I’m happy to get to draw more silly Genshin fanart this month! It’s a choice between this and the mini comic I did about me getting distracted while my friends tried to guide me to speedrun unlocking Fontaine for Furina, but I think it will be hard to see in small scale so I pick this one instead. I adore Furina’s design and character and her demo trailer is so much fun to watch, so it made me want to draw it (like Childe dropkicking enemy lol) - December – Mica [NIKKE: Goddess of Victory]
The following is the only art I get to make in December – a fanart of Mica from the game NIKKE, with its Snow Buddy outfit from the latest Christmas theme event. I don’t have much of a choice, but I do enjoy this piece as I experimented here and there with my coloring style, hopefully to decide some changes I can bring on my next art pieces forward.
Previous Art Summaries 2020-2022
Here are some of my older art summary from 2020 to 2022 for comparisons. Honestly there are often times I wonder if I have just grown stagnant and seeing others who have more clear differences of growth over the years, but I am working on the feeling that I am simply grateful to be able to draw more of the things I enjoy over the years considering all things happening.
I learned to fix some of my struggles before with color palettes in which there are times I made the contrast too low and the colors too similar to one another, and there are times I feel the faces look a bit wonky with some hairstyles or poses I’m not familiar to draw with. I keep telling myself that any progress is progress as long as we do not stop and keep moving forward, so here’s cheers for 2023!
As usual, thank you for those who took the time to read through my ramblings and supported my work throughout 2023 and years before. There are times I was caught off guard and feel a bit shy to know people I know are reading these, but it honestly makes me happy.
Anyway, wherever you are, and whatever you are going through, I am wishing you all the best for the new year. I hope you took time to rest and find things to be grateful about, things to look forward to your days in 2024, and may all things go well for your plans and dreams. Cheers, and take care!
