(Not free, alas. Maybe available from a local library?)

Draw Like a Boss | Educational Books The Draw Like a Boss books are a unique, step by step approach to drawing. A teaching course inspired by Adventure Time, Monkey Island and Zelda. It is a 297 page juggernaut that excels at teaching pe...

A lot of people seem to like the Draw Like a Boss books. They have some RPGish gamification. I have read some of the first one, and it seems good.

www.drawlikeaboss.co.uk

A scrap of white paper with a big patch of deep blue ink with a little bit of a shimmer. Salt was sprinkled on the ink while it was wet, producing dark spots where the grains fell, surrounded by lighter areas with radial striations with crenelated edges.

Someone speculated that it might make a nice night sky effect with a blue ink. I tried it with the Colorverse Milky Sea blue and got a dramatically different result. This seems a little reminiscent of shibori.

#Ink #InkSwatching #InkSwatches #Stationery

A hand holds up a small piece of paper. The white paper has been stamped with a line-art potion bottle in black ink. The body of the bottle is painted in with a peach-pink ink. Salt was sprinkled over the ink while wet, concentrating the ink around the grains of salt and masking a lighter spot at the center of each.

Still from the ink salt sprinkling experiment.

#Ink #InkSwatching #InkSwatches #Stationery

Quick experiment to see what kind of texture I could get by sprinkling salt into water-based ink. I am sure I am not the first to think of doing this. For added amusement, I used the Colorverse Pink Salt ink from last year's Colorvent calendar.

#Ink #InkSwatching #InkSwatches #Stationery

Ground-level view of a large cluster of gold, pink and, white Arizona poppies surrounded by other greenery including some very young brittlebush. The poppies are all partly open, making cup shapes. The white flower dominate the lower part of the photo. The pink poppies show mostly above the white, with just one yellow-gold poppy on the left. Mountains an a bit of clear blue-grey sky are visible in the background.

#BloomScrolling #Photography

Progress on my apothecary-themed ink swatch book! (Part one)

#Ink #InkSwatching #InkSwatches #RubberStamp #Stationery

Final print reveal clip! There is a full un-narrated process video, too:

youtube.com/shorts/dGdY5...

#OpenPrintExchange #PrintMaking #ReliefPrint #CelticArt

A fox with Celtic styling (spirals in the tail, ears, eyes, and chest with an inverted triangular knot on the forehead) printed in two shades of brown on a square of white paper with slightly ragged edges against a crinkled, defocused gold background.

Celtic Fox print for the 2026 Open Print Exchange, made with a 3D-printed press.

More details at: evermorestud.io/celtic-fox-p...

#OpenPrintExchange #PrintMaking #ReliefPrint #CelticArt

A collection of pink Arizona poppies seen from ground level. There are about a dozen flowers visible. The flowers are a very pale pink with very thin closely-spaced vertical lines of darker pink. There is a little bit of deep orange-yellow at the very base of the flower calling back to the California gold poppies from which they evolved. The stems have little feathery offshoots of tiny leaves. The closest flowers and their stems are in-focus. The background quickly becomes completely defocused into splotches of green and pale pink.

#BloomScrolling #Photography

A close-up (macro) of a bowl-shaped pink poppy with four large rough-edged petals. The flowers are a very pale pink with very thin closely-spaced vertical lines of darker pink. There is a little bit of deep orange-yellow at the very base of the flower calling back to the California gold poppies from which they evolved. A bit of the green stem is visible. The far edge of the flower is out of focus, and the background is a blur of greens.

#BloomScrolling #Photography

Making a Potion Ink Swatching Stamp YouTube video by Evermore Studio

I whipped out a quick rubber stamp to use for ink swatching. Since a few people have asked me about making stamps, I made a three-minute short showing the process.
#Ink #FountainPenInk #InkSwatching #CelticArt #CelticKnot #RubberStamp

youtube.com/shorts/1b3C6...

Close-up (macro) side view of two California/Mexican gold poppies, closed into cone shapes (large end facing up). The flowers are orange at the base and graduate to yellow by the tops. The pair overlap slightly with the frontmost one on the left and about a third higher than the one on the right. The pair are off-center to the right of the frame. The background is out-of-focus greenery in which a few stems can be distinguished.

#BloomScrolling #Photography

A small (~2 inch) circular display sitting on a desk with a stack of books and a display rack full of pens in the background. The display shows a pixel art image: a huge muscled and slouching blue giant with white facial hair looms menacingly over a cloaked redheaded warrior with a great sword in a ready stance. The ground is covered with snow. There are a few scattered trees, both bare and pine. A mountain is visible through the haze in the background.

The big auction is going for one more day. Don't miss out!

fighticewithdice.com

Pixel art by @xiekenator (on Instagram).
#TTRPG #DiceGoblin #TTRPGAccessories

Close-up (macro) of a back-lit open bowl-shaped California/Mexican gold poppy. The bloom angled slightly to the right. Striations are visible on the petals, which show a gradient from deep orange at the base to a bright yellow at the tips of the petals. The stamen casts a shadow that shows through the petal facing the viewer. The background is entirely out of focus splotches of green, black, brown, and grey.

#SilentSunday #BloomScrolling #Photography

A medium brown journal is engraved in black with an intricate circular Celtic knotwork design in the middle and knotwork corner ornaments. Tan hand stitching is visible along the top, right, and bottom. Protruding from under the journal on the right is a cobalt blue kirigami bookmark cut with a Celtic key pattern design. To the left of the journal are four rolls of washi tape of different sizes decorated with colorful Celtic knots, key patterns, and spirals in blues, reds, purples, and metallic gold. These items all sit on a textured white surface reminiscent of snow. Below, in an uncial typeface, is written "Sentinel Scribe Bundle."

The huge Fight ICE with Dice auction is live! Here is a direct link to my contribution. Even if you are not into TTRPGs, you might find some use for everything in this bundle.

fighticewithdice.com/products/sen...

#CelticArt #CelticKnot #WashiTape #Kirigami #Stationery

Pixel art by @xiekenator (on Instagram): a huge muscled and slouching blue giant with white facial hair looms menacingly over a cloaked redheaded warrior with a great sword in a ready stance. The ground is covered with snow. There are a few scattered trees, both bare and pine. A mountain is visible through the haze in the background.

The community of artists creating handmade dice and other TTRPG art are having a huge auction supporting organizations providing legal defense for immigrant communities in the USA. Check it out and grab some of these amazing pieces at:

fighticewithdice.com

#TTRPG #DiceGoblin #TTRPGAccessories

A field of bright yellow-orange wildflowers (probably African daisies) and their attendant stems and leaves fills the frame with dozens of blooms visible. Flowers across the bottom, particularly the lower right are in sharp focus with them becoming more blurry and abstract into the distance. The blooms have a single ring of approximately sixteen yellow-orange petals. The centers are filled with a dense cluster of little black-tipped orange spikes.

We had a few colder days at the château this week, but are back to summery weather now. Some of the wildflowers in the garden are starting to crisp up, but there is still quite a show.
#BloomScrolling #Photography

Close-up (macro) of an orange wildflower (probably an African daisy) with ~25 petals. In the center is a circular area of tiny black spheres, surrounded by tiny orange flowers, each topped with a tiny ball with vertical orange stripes. Surrounding that is a jagged ring of black coloration on the base of the petals. The background is out-of-focus splotches of green (vegetation), yellow, and orange (other blooms).

#Photography #Flowers #Bloomscrolling

A yellow honeybee with characteristic black stripes stands sideways, perched on the flowering purple seed head of a basil plant. The background is out-of-focus with splotches of dark green, lighter green, and little more purple.

Lots of visitors in the sunny château garden today!

#photography #flowers #BloomScrolling

3D-printed wax seal proof-of-concept.

#Stationery #WaxSeal #CelticArt #CelticKnot

An orange-yellow wildflower (probably an African daisy) in profile. The sun shining from above and opposite makes the petals seem to glow. The petals are a little weathered with the edges and tips curling a little. The green sepal and some of the stem are visible below the bloom. The background is mostly dark and out-of-focus, with a few other blurry flowers visible in the distance.

#Photography #Flowers #Bloomscrolling

I finished my out-of-sync #Inkvent!

#Ink #Inkvent2025

A bright yellow wildflower with approximately 16 petals and a spiky orange-and-black center (probably an African daisy) at the end of a green stem sticks up in the lower right third of the frame, angled about three-quarters towards the viewer. The background is out-of-focus blobs of yellow, orange, and green.

From the Château garden this afternoon.

#Photography #Flowers

More commentary and photos on my blog:

evermorestud.io/pen-display-...

I made a walnut pen rack with off-center Celtic spirals inlaid in padauk to contain the @Retro1951 pens on my desk.

#Stationery #Maker #Lasercut #Pens #Woodworking

Today's thematically unpredictable inksperiment! Check the shimmer on that red.
#Ink #Inkvent #Tomato

Two-minute build video for my acrylic glass dip pen stand.
#GlassPens #PenHolder #LaserCutter #AcrylicBending #Pens #Maker

A green glass acrylic dip pen stand made with a curved strip bolted to a roughly trapezoidal base. A notch accommodates the shoulder of the pen at the top while a circular cut-out at the bottom keeps it from sliding. The elegran dip pen in the stand is violet with a clear tip. It sits next to a bottle of violet ink on a tray with a mother-of-pearl bottom and black sides.

While waiting on materials for another project, I made a stand for my new #JacquesHerbin glass dip pen with some of the glass green acrylic.
#GlassPens #PenHolder #LaserCutter #AcrylicBending #Pens #Maker