Michael Stanton

!!!!!!!! What do you know! It worked! 😛 😛 😛

The sky doesn’t look too terribly blended to me, @david. 🙂
My thing is, I can tend to stress too much about details, and my paintings end up looking kind of crowded. I tend to ignore the forest for the trees, you know what I mean? I think that also explains the tendency I have to over-describe things in my writing. 😉

Here… I’m going to try…[Read more]

Birds and fish, @david? Ugh. *shudders* I cannot draw either of those to save my life. Awesome for you that you enjoy them! 😀

The most painful, I think @aella (and what I’m having to do now as I edit 🙁 ) is cutting characters completely and totally out of the story. It’s not the same as killing them— it’s like you get to know them, and then you’re just like ‘Sorry, you guys have to go because… whatever’. And then they’re gone. Boom. Just like that. Nonexistent. Not…[Read more]

Oh yes, @aella, the dragons are the WORST!
And yes, I know characters don’t like being killed off, believe me. Villains especially. The worst part of it is when you go back and edit— and technically they’re already dead, but you’re having to work with them again while they’re still alive and able to complain about what you did to them at the…[Read more]

What made you love it in the first place, @hannah-c?

Welp, that’s what I get for creating characters with a more dominant nature than my own @Daeus.

The especially bold one I mentioned above is actually somewhat justified, though— I mean, I wouldn’t feel too happy about it either if someone made me lose my hand. 😛

@Daeus it hasn’t gotten quite that bad yet, though I do make sure I have a dagger or two about me when I work with my villains. For the most part the better-natured of my characters stand guard over me against the wilder ones, though that may change when it comes time to write their stories. 😛 They can’t seem to be able to grasp (or else don’t…[Read more]

Sometimes I consider myself to be more of a chronicler than a storyteller, who answers to the rather bossy demands of her characters to write their stories or be haunted forever! (Yep, now you all know how crazy I am.

Um… hellooooooo— that’s ME ALL OVER!

@overcomer, they can be quite bossy can’t they? I’ve even had them threaten me…[Read more]

Ooh… that dolphin is gorgeous.

I find that when I work with pencils it’s more to sketch out a rough, quick idea than actually finish a polished piece of art, so most of my pencil drawings are pretty messy with a lot of unnecessary lines just marking out where I want things to go if the drawing ever translates into a painting. But the few…[Read more]

I use acrylic— I actually prefer it to oil just because I work very fast and in many layers, which is difficult to do with a slow-drying paint like oils. Oils I like because they don’t change colors (whereas watercolors fade and acrylics deepen) but for quick paintings I prefer acrylics.

I love the colors in that painting, @David. I also like…[Read more]

Nice— yes, ink definitely has its problems. 😛 It’s kind of like woodburning— have you heard of that, @david? Basically you take a really hot metal pen and burn a drawing or words into wood. It’s really fun, and the end results can be awesome if you know what you’re doing.

I’m an artist! Welcome to the forum, David! I do oils, acrylics, watercolor, graphite, ink (to a small extent) and digital art. I prefer acrylics, though oils isn’t too bad either. It’s just they take for-ev-er to dry!

I hate colored pencils. 😛

@overcomer, @hope is going to hate me for saying this, but she let me read the first draft of Rose of Prophecy’s sequel (cuz I do her cover art), and let me just tell you, you are in for a real treat.

No, it was genuinely helpful @overcomer. Even if I didn’t end up using any of the corrections (which I am— I’ll probably do what you suggested with the shattered shield and snapped bowstring) it makes me step back and look at my work in new ways, which is always good.

Yes, I have written the story— my WIP, actually. Or more like a WIE—…[Read more]

Oh, I’m having plenty of fun, actually! All those character introduction scenes I had a blast with starting out? I get to do ’em all again! 😛 And improve them!

I. Love. Working. With. My. Characters. It’s probably the number one reason why I write. 😀

Thanks, @overcomer. 🙂 I really appreciate your meticulousness. 😉 I’ll definitely take all those corrected lines into consideration.

Yes… I had so much fun with this poem, because it was special to one of my main characters. His mother used to sing it to him when he was little— scared of the dark and of thunderstorms. Near the climax of the…[Read more]

Ooh, nice topic! I can just ramble without worrying about whether or not I’m being coherent… COOL!!!
Right now I’m working on mopping up the mess of a beginning my WIP has… or had, would now be a more accurate word. It was really, really, really slow and rambling getting started, so I’m working on streamlining it and pushing it off strong on…[Read more]

Oh wow @overcomer, totally no rush— I’d no idea you were actually going to do an in depth evaluation of either poem. 😛 Not that it won’t be welcome— but you really didn’t have to if it was too much trouble. I was thinking you would just skim over it once and tell me your general opinion.
So… no pressure. 🙂

Wow, though, I really…[Read more]

Awesome, @spradlin! Very inspiring. That’s something I personally struggle with remembering, so it’s a good one to keep in mind. 🙂