Welcome to Gaia! ::

I consider it something of a natural talent that I'm able to make the world a more beautiful place just by being in it.

ヽ(ﾟ▽ﾟ*)乂(*ﾟ▽ﾟ)ﾉ yay for Tes! It turned out so cute (≧ω≦)

rofl rofl rofl Priceless! I so wanna see that movie with Steve Martin! rofl rofl rofl

What is this nonsense of which you speak?!? gonk eek

A little late to remind you of this now but in case it might be relevant for future reference, you could have always made a note of such in the order form. That's what the "additional notes" section is for. You could also always just choose a top you like and note that if it's colored, you want it to be a different color.

I know very well that sometimes the items on Gaia could come in better colors. Back when the night jewels only came in red and blue, I would color the one I'd draw on Ryzan purple because it suits him. Then later Gaia came out with a purple one. Sometimes I wonder if they're stalking me....

Seems that I did miss that. In any case, notations of anything you find important should always be made. If you spend a long time trying to get a certain look, definitely make note of it. Never assume the artist will figure it out on their own, especially if it's a quick drawing because most of the time, the artist isn't going to care if they get something wrong in fast sketches. I honestly probably wouldn't have even drawn your earrings if you hadn't mentioned them.

Sometimes I give more information than the artist probably even cares to hear or will utilize simply because I'm persnickety. Takes a while to actually fill out an order form that way, but I make sure I get what I want out of it... unless of course the artist decides to completely disregard all of it.

In other news, I haven't started on Flame yet because I haven't quite been in the drawing mood. I tried sketching something to get in the mood, but all I accomplished was abusing my already worn down eraser into an even smaller nub that I'm sure is going to be a pain to dig out and replace. I guess the up side is that when I do start on Flame, it'll be with a brand new eraser.

Somehow I missed this the first time I read the order and I've mostly been going off the reference image since then sweatdrop But one thing I want to clear up: I personally do consider "athletic" and "muscular build" to be two different things. Why? Because it's two completely different ways of working out to get that kind of body. Athletic is a leaner build, gotten by regular exercising and often times focuses on endurance in the sense that you do a lot of repetitions of something {like push ups, sit ups, lifting weights, etc.}. Muscular build, on the other hand, rather than endurance it's just to build up muscle... some of it being more for show rather than functionality. For that, you do less repetitions, but more intense work outs. For instance, with weight lifting, instead of doing a lower weight and lots of repetitions, you would do a very heavy weight and very few repetitions.

Muscular build is also higher maintenance because it adds bulk to your body frame. What this means is, if your muscles are no longer toned, you will look obese even if you have little body fat.

So to summarize: "Athletic build" {at least my definition of it} would be something more along the lines of Bruce Lee, whereas "muscular build" is more like Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Now... with all that out of the way, I'll go ahead and say this: As much as I like drawing you as Icy.... I hate drawing your mule stressed But here he is anyway stare I couldn't really make heads or tails out of the flame tattoo, so I was kind of winging it. I think it might look a little more like vines than flames, unfortunately stressed ... but that's just one of many things that went wrong with this drawing. I really should have looked up reference images.

Mitri is up next.

I'm with dame, I love him! heart I didn't think he'd turn out that good with the way I explained his build, and yet that's how I saw him in my head, more or less. You may hate drawing Flame, but you're the first artist to draw him to my satisfaction. 3nodding

Thanks for explaining the difference between builds, though I see him with both since he's not as small as Bruce Lee but not as large as Arnold either. His frame is large due to his height, so that's why I didn't want him "skinny" looking. I think the way you've drawn him is how it should be. whee