Heard somewhere the biggest public health threat is convenience. Humans should endure inconvenience and boredom daily in order for their bodies and minds to stay alert and healthy. So, no modern conveniences for a day, sometimes taking cold showers, fasting on only water a few days. Stuff like that.

I asked myself, if space is a substance, how do we humans get around it? Maybe pointing up isn’t the answer, but rather pointing down. Once we can pass the mass of the Earth reliably and quickly, the technology developed may help us do the same going up. No guarantees, though. 🤪💡

Today’s pixel art piece is based on the Sketch Ideas app prompt: “Parrot Piloting a Mecha Suit.”

Today’s art prompt came from the Sketch Ideas app: “Hippopotamus Playing Badminton.” It’s 64x64 pixel art.

I have been dissatisfied with how the Divoom community is run for some time now. The rejection of one of my pieces today was the drop that overflowed the bucket. I don’t like how the app logs your location and accesses your full image library, nor how AI art is promoted and using the app’s built in pixel editor is required for art competitions. There are other avenues for pixel art, and I can still use the app to display my own pixel art. Maybe I can now use a sketchbook to sketch from life, as I’m supposed to do, and have ample time for now the daily grind of creating a 64 by 64 pixels piece is gone.

I had to delete an episode of two separate podcasts this week. If next week’s episode is just as inappropriate, I’ll unsubscribe of the one that is. No 1-star review, though, since it’s my problem being subscribed to a free podcast that wasn’t meant for me anymore. People change, podcasts change.

I think it wise to check your security settings regularly, since some app updates will add features you may not want. E.g. why would a drawing app need to know my exact location, or even my location at all? Contacts and photos access are tricky too, since those can be harvested for obvious reasons.

I want to create a pixel art animation of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit (out of copyright) playing the base guitar. I can’t play the base, draw Oswald on-model, nor know what a base guitar looks like. Trying nonetheless… (work in progress)

Finished reading: The Illusion of Life by Frank Thomas 📚

I finished this tome, finally! There’s a lot of pointers in this book to help with studying animation concepts. You won’t find exercises, nor tutorials in here, though there are many examples of the thought process of seasoned animators.

On February 15 we celebrate those who are happily single, me included. There’s no need to explain one’s preferences, nor any need to conform to old-fashioned societal norms. 🎨👾

Here’s the finished fanart pixel art piece, I called “Avengers Assemble.” 🎨👾

Some pixel art pieces take a long time to make. Two done, still five to go. I might even do a pixel mini-series.

I don’t like a root canal treatment, especially the after-pain is quite intense. There is a second sitting in one and a half week, with probably the same worrisome three days period of not getting much sleep despite painkillers. My marathon training is heavily influenced. I canceled my long run.

I have to remind myself, that some individuals are on social media to be mean, for lack of appreciation of social etiquette. If you block them they get furious, because in their mind they are the good guys. Mind you, even Al Capone thought he was a descent person. It’s those who doubt who often are.

Beautiful sign of pollution.

An art contest based solely on likes, is a popularity contest, which has little to do with art, nor technical quality, like concept, execution and presentation. You know, what results in commissions and hard cash. Those likes actually matter, the others by the general public, not so much. It’s lazy.

A new sign for a 3-star restaurant with a rat as its master chef. Free after the 3D animated movie Ratatouille.🎨👾

I was (heavily) nudged by Apple to upgrade to iPadOS 26 from 18. It works quite differently and I’m slowly getting used to it. It’s much better at multi-tasking, or should I rather say “multi-apping?” All I need now is a bigger screen, because shrunken apps aren’t optimized for it, at all.

Taking more time, especially breaks between sessions, leads to great improvement, though there are still issues with these “eyesight copies” of photographs. I have no idea if—and how—this amount of detail could be captured in a 64x64 pixel art piece, and be animated as well. Maybe the head only.

I’m starting to use CC photos of toddlers as references for my cat character. Problems mainly arise from not understanding the pose in the photo. Also real toddlers are four heads high, and I want to draw characters that are three apples stacked on each other in height.