Mystic

My Lilliputian Kara with my favorite art supplies, a thread of granulating watercolor fieldtests (Kusakabe's Harmonia line)

The Twilight Zone 7/4/25 Marathons

@thenightgallery.bsky.social Haven’t seen you post this here or on Twitter/X yet, so just in case: We’ve got 4th of July Marathons on the schedule for both H&I and Syfy this year!

And as is my new habit for the Marathons I compiled both onto a spreadsheet! ✨: docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

Finally got a better photo of that folding landscape

Art - enjoying art and making it, is what makes life worth living.

YouTube video by Becca Hillburn: Comic Artist Will Phoenix Rise Again? Finally Putting These Inexpensive Watercolors to the Test

Happy Tuesday! Tuesday is update day, and today I have a fieldtest for yall, where I put Phoenix #watercolors to the test.

#artsupplies #painting

youtu.be/IxQGSoe9Ci0?...

Roses!

A green-eyed calico tabby cat looking to the side with a puzzling look on her face. Her pupils are huge indicating she’s either paying rapt attention to something only she can see or she’s about to attack me.

In case a kitty would help.

I emerge from the depths to say:

The phone you ordered with should not have to physically be with you to pick up online food orders.

This is prejudice against the tech illiterate that need someone else tech savvy to order on their behalf.

—Signed the tech savvy person in this equation

If you are spending lots of time reading or engaging with content that makes you feel worse but you can't seem to stop, please get help. You need support to build coping skills, and there are lots of people trying to exploit anyone who doesn't have those online.

A flowchart that goes as follows: "What breed is my cat?" This leads to the question "Does it have papers from a breeder?" if the answer is "yes" it leads to "It is what those papers say it is." If the answer is "no" it leads to "It is a cat."

Periodic reminder that over 90% of cats are not a "breed". The vast majority of longhaired tabbies are not Maine Coons. Most grey cats are not Russian Blues. Most black cats are not Bombays. They're just lovely, perfect mixed breed cats that come in all colors and coat lengths!

YouTube video by Becca Hillburn: Comic Artist Why Did They Do This?! Grumbacher's Kuretake Clone

It's Tuesday, and that means another #artsupply review is live! This week, I'm exploring Grumbacher's new Japanese #watercolors, swatching them against Kuretake's Gansai Tambi, and painting an aurora!

youtu.be/mewvTSu6QKo?...

Kinda funny to think about Chobits in 2025. We did ultimately move in the direction of tech replacing face to face human interactions and human jobs, but not because we made humanoid robot replacement people. Instead we made our tech small and as non-human as possible, just rectangles.

YouTube video by Becca Hillburn: Comic Artist Definitely NOT as Good as Gansai Tambi, but Still Fun! Lightwish Madisi Watercolors

Sunday is a chance to relax and make art for a lot of people, so if you enjoy a little background company, or enjoy art supply reviews, I think you'll enjoy this week's review! Swatching! Painting! Pros and cons!

#artresources #cozyvideo #artyoutube #watercolor

youtu.be/os3kkYAIY9Q?...

I have the ALT code for them — wait for it — memorized.

A reshare for my friends who are busy during the day!

I shared the printable lineart on Patreon for Patrons who feel like coloring along!

#artresources

Patreon.com/nattosoup

At the very least I look forward to now being able to recommend the series if/when I see calls for
recommendations I think it would fit.

I have now finished the series and stand by my original assessment.

It’s not a “bad” series, it just failed to captive *me personally.*

There’s some good stuff in there (I LOVE Jamie!) but Is like the series a lot more if it could’ve somehow been condensed into like 1/2 the length it is.

Oh I forgot to explain

* Because I’ve been listening to the audiobooks. Physical reading is still my preference but I just don’t have the time for it like I used to.

Hopefully Book 3 will surprise me and be this whole amazing thing on its own and everything will make sense and have been worth it.

But for now at the very least my verdict is I don’t think I’ll be in a hurry to re-read this one once I’m finished.

We’ll see.

And I still don’t really understand how this series came to me as a recommendation after I said Soul Screamers is my all-time favorite.

There are similarities, sure, but not in the ways you normally expect recommendations to be similar, if that makes sense.

I genuinely can’t decide if I like it or not.

The only way I can describe what’s “wrong” per se is that whole plot is an incredibly slow burn.

Things keep happening! But it’s always so unclear what anything is going to mean later and almost no payoff is immediate.

So on between the everything else I’ve been reading* the Mara Dyer series.

I’m almost to the end of Book 2 now & I can honestly say I have never read another series that I thought was so infuriating but also want so badly to finish.

I would obsess a little less if I felt I had enough embroidery floss to make multiple, but I think *at best* I’d only have enough for 2, and that might be pushing it, so I’m trying to stick to just 1 *really good* one.

I started on Crochet Beret V2 some time ago but the amount of times I have undone and redone the stitches from roughly the halfway point onward is RIDICULOUS because I can’t stop obsessing about getting the shaping and etc. *just right*

🙃

I’d say another Soul Screamers novel from her instead because I love SS to pieces, but the series was wrapped up nicely so I’m not even sure what the best path for 1 more entry would be, unless it’s the beginning of a sequel series with a new main cast which does not feel in spirit of the question…

Third entry in “The Stars Never Rise” by Rachel Vincent; So many unanswered questions all because other people (I think her agent?) insisted “duologies are the new trilogies!”

For the record I don’t think video essays are bad or you shouldn’t watch. Just know there is insensitive to follow the video-community’s agreed upon opinion because there’s financial gain. Just let the perspective help inform, but don’t let it dictate. It’s important to feel things yourself in life.

So I had to clean/organize a pile of stuff earlier today and found a spool of embroidery floss in it that I’d sorta forgotten about. I think it might be just the thing I need to make Enid a crochet beret more to my liking.

Don’t know if I’ll get to it tonight, but we’ll see. 👀

YouTube video by Becca Hillburn: Comic Artist Handmade Watercolors Gone Wrong: An Honest Review of Case for Making's Watercolors

If youre interested in buying handmade and small business watercolors, I review them! Today I'm unboxing, swatching, and painting with Case for Making's watercolors. CfM has a physical shop in California, and I'm excited to see how their handmade #watercolor s perform.

youtube.com/watch?v=lP3e...

Floral watercolor bookmarks from a class I taught with local public library earlier this year! I finished editing the tutorial version yesterday and hope to share it with Patrons soon, along with printable linearts.