Hello, all. It’s Smug again. A month and a half later since the last news update, what’s changed?

Well, I went to the @DeuceLeGoose Game Gallery meetup. I saw some ugly, stupid, skinny, and dumb-looking guy in a pink shirt there. Met a lot of faces, new and old. Got absorbed in pinball. Went to a Round 1 afterwards with @Tamago and found out I’m bad at singing Pantera. Y’know, the usual.

Other than that. Biggest thing that’s happened is me getting back into reading comics. Right now, I’m making my way through both famous mangas as well as comics I’ve always had eyes on. (Immortal Hulk is great if you enjoy body horror and horror in general.) Connecting back to my roots, reading comics both in issues and in paperback, has made me more motivated to start doing better in a lot of areas of my life. Especially in art.

Something nagging at me was the feeling that I wasn’t going in the right direction for some of my characters. I’ve got ideas for some backstories for some of my characters, some of whom I felt did need it, and some of whom barely needed anything at all to work for me. 

I’ll let you all in on a behind-the-scenes thing I’ve mulled over for literal months. Zaaru and Xandi, the big red man and the black girl, have changed a lot since their original inception. And not just because they’re shapeshifters. 

Zaaru was an eldritch horror alien space pirate dad, running from the law. Xandi only existed to say Zaaru was a dad. And then there was a wife who I never did much with. Then, as time went on, I got interested in making Zaaru a single dad. I also made Xandi human, which was a spur of the moment thing. But it fit her really well.

But then the paranoia sets in. Thoughts about how others would see her, how the human-alien child-parent thing would work. And so on and so forth. I wasn’t having fun with it, because I was trying to turn something I loved and cared for that WASN’T designed for mass appeal into a product. Something I could sell to you. And that was wrong of me, because my characters are mine. They’re not meant for sale.

Could I do it? Sure, if I gave enough of a shit about that. I could make a grand story like Marvel does with its characters. But that’s Marvel. That’s not just one man. That’s the work of several people, sometimes dozens. And I’m just one guy having fun on his own, making it up as I go along. You can’t commodify that. You can’t force the fun to happen. 

That was my biggest problem. The thought that I was obligated, even forced to make something as a product to be accepted produced some serious stress and anxiety. I began hating drawing my characters, because I wasn’t thinking of stuff for them to do, but how I’d be able to “maximize their potential.”

And it’s funny I mention Marvel. Because I’ve been reading and learning more about the Fantastic Four. How they were made, how the characters grew as the decades went by, and how different authors handled their origins and history. As my favorite team, the Four helped me understand that you don’t always get it right the first time, and art is more than just making something for other people. It’s about sharing your creativity with others, and encouraging them to do the same. It’s about sharing your positivity with others. That’s what the FF are about. That’s why they’re my favorite comic book characters.

That was one of the many trivial and pointless paranoid thought-storms that’ve been keeping me held back. There’s times when you really don’t need to overcomplicate things. Sometimes, the solution is just to have some fun and stop pretending you care.

Long story short, more art that isn’t the usual Ryl’Athels and Klash soon. And whoever that pink shirt guy was, if you see him out in the wild, tell him he sucks and he smells bad.

This week was one where I learned two important lessons: Time is the key to everything, and patience is a virtue for a reason.

I’ve been looking back on the art that I’ve been making for my entire life. Going back to when I first was on DeviantArt (about 2013), I was just making art for the fun of it. Letting my imagination run wild, making character designs that weren’t the most well-thought out, but still having fun.

But as I grew older and tried to be big on social media*, chased trends, being impressionable, not having your own thoughts, letting a single post trigger intense panic attacks, I couldn’t think about what I was doing. The atmosphere on these websites consists of flying shrapnel and smoke.

It’s also why I feel like my art got worse over time. I wasn’t giving myself the distance and the time I needed to process my emotions. I just kept thinking if I made characters, then everything would fall into place. But reality had other plans for what my hands wrought.

Looking back at my old art, I saw a lot of stiff body poses, same-y faces, cheap ideas, and safe artwork that didn’t challenge me. And looking back on the art I’ve made recently? I still see these issues. I’m angry. Angry at myself for letting this happen. It could’ve been so much better if I had just let myself have some time to breathe.

So why am I telling you all about this? It’s to hold myself up to a better standard and make it public to you all. So that if I ever slip again, you guys will notice and call me out for it. And maybe this’ll inspire you guys to stop fretting and start cooking.

Smug out.

Edit March. 16th, 2025 - Added some context for the third paragraph.

It’s that time again, everyone. Time I told you what’s been going on in the land of the Smug.

The biggest change these past few weeks is that I’ve been drawing more in my physical sketchbook than my computer. My computer’s become the thing I use to unwind, rather than an actual workstation.

One of the biggest reasons is because I don’t enjoy drawing on a computer as much as I do my sketchbook. If I need to render something, color something in, or give a sketch more fidelity, then I’ll boot the PC on and draw, then play a game or two and then shut it off.

When I drew art on my PC, it was mostly because I felt like I was obligated to keep up with other people. My brain was still working at a million miles an hour out of habit. Which is why the sketchbook is there. It’s more power-efficient, easier to access, and if an idea is bad, I can just move on knowing I didn’t commit an entire day’s time to rendering it out. 

Sometimes the best ideas are the ones you let go and let grow. You can cultivate them, give ‘em some support, but you can only do so much. Overdo it and you end up crushing them under your own anxieties and fears.

Anyways, that’s it from my end. I may not be posting more fanciful art in the near-future, but I don’t think Newgrounds cares about fancy. The people who care about my work just want to see me at my best. Hope you all learned something new from this. Smug out. 

Smug here. Think there's been enough radio silence to justify a li'l more talking on my end. I'm not gonna pull a Valve time.

Things have been going a little slow in the land of the Smug. After pushing out that one comic, I e. I've been dabbling with Krita, which I do like, but I've only used it for making digital art look like traditional art. I'm still using Clip Studio Paint to render my work, but I'm slowly getting the hang of using Krita for projects with a bigger scope.

Outside of that, you've probably noticed the sheer amount of characters that I've drawn over my time here, and how most of them have changed in looks and background. I tend to think way too hard about this shit, resulting in a lot of change for the sake of change. I need to be comfortable with being myself. It's hard, but nothing worth doing is easy. Hope this gives you all a peek into what's been going on behind the scenes. Take care of yourselves. Smug out.

Hey. Been a while.

Sorry about the radio silence these last few weeks. I know that I would usually post something rendered every few days, but I've been suffering from some massive burnout (and some IRL stuff as well), trying to refocus myself and get out of my head, nothing easy to say the least.

New stuff to come when it's done.

Here's some scraps that I didn't like enough to fully render.

Here we are again. The end of another calendar year. I'll make this short - I'm proud to have found a community of artists here that treated me with respect and love, things I didn't really think I'd ever get. But this year, thanks to my own efforts and the encouragement from others, I did. Thank you to you all.

To celebrate, I've made a gallery of what I think are my best works of art this year. Next year, I've no idea what'll happen, but I plan to make the most of it. Stay safe, stay sane, and don't let the bastards grind you down. This is Smugarug, signing off. For now.

Merry Christmas, everyone. Smug here. I’ve got good news and bad news.

The bad news is that I’m no longer going to be posting super-lengthy introspective news posts about my feelings towards my own art. Not only do my feelings constantly change, it’s also cringey and makes me look like a hypocrite when I inevitably go back on them. I apologize to anybody who enjoyed reading them, but I refuse to let misery have company.

The good news is that I’m going to move on from this (and the previous mistakes I’ve made) and just have a good time drawing whatever I find fun. That’s really the core issue I’ve been struggling to get a grip on - I wasn’t having fun with my art.

But, thankfully, I think that issue is solved via shutting my mouth. If I have anything pressing or meaningful to say, then I’ll make a news post about it. If it ain’t, I won’t. It’s almost TOO simple, really.

Anyways, hope y’all have a good Christmas and New Year’s, and I hope you stick around. This year has been a tough one for me, but I’ve managed to survive and thanks to the support of my friends and Newgrounds, even thrive. See you when I see you. 

• Smug

P.S. The bunman returns. Cuz I can’t think of a better mascot. Satan Rat’s still dead. I think Skruffy stepped on him.

123 fans, compared to 122 fans, is a way cooler number. Imagine getting to 1,234 fans. Glad you guys all enjoy my art enough to stick around. I hope to keep delivering better art even in the new year.

But I got a question for you all. What do you want to see more from me? Anything from specific characters, a style you'd like me to continue drawing in, maybe even new places and faces. Let me know in the comments below.

Well, well, well. Finally got around to getting this. No buyer's remorse here. Newgrounds has been a nice place to rediscover myself. I also changed my username because nobody would remember SmugerryARugerry. Anyways.

I've been shaking u how I view myself and the art I produce. It's taken a lot for me to exit my usual comfort zone, but like I've said, "The less bullshit I have, the better off I'll be." And this is true for both my real life and my art. That means you guys will see less frequent uploads from me, but I'm sure nobody will mind. I hope to make a change for the better, for MY OWN better.

I don't want to be stuck in an endless self-abusive loop of paranoia and second-guessing. I have to get out of my own head. Because little did I know, I was only making myself more miserable by staying attached to the OCs and worlds I made, and that wasn't the right move. Never grow too attached to your characters, they said. They were right.

So what does this mean for you? I dunno. What did you want from me? I know what I want from me. And I think that that's all that matters, really. It's for me. And then you. Not the other way around.

...

Acceptance is a bitch, ain't it?

Hi, all. Smug here.

A lot of you may have seen my previous updates in the past. Some of you may have noticed that I was struggling with nailing down just who I was.

Turns out, there wasn't actually anything wrong with me. Or, well, nothing wrong that wasn't normal.

Y'all read the title. Y'all already know what the fuck goin' on. I didn't, because I didn't think it was a crisis, I thought it was just ME. Turns out it wasn't. I was just going through a very, VERY agonizing time of my life. I wasn't enjoying the art I made, I wasn't challenging myself, I doubted everything and everyone around me. But as I get older, and the lower my bullshit tolerance gets, the more I realize what was important to me. And then there was my art!

Boy, if I have to be honest, I think my art fuckin' BLOWS. It's rigid and stiff and fuckin' boring as hell, which was at odds with how extreme and wild I felt my art COULD be. And yet, when I did try to get wild, the results were cool, but they lacked substance and lasting power. And during this crisis, it's been hard not to see that doing all of this was not only necessary, but practically natural. It's all part of the process.

Igor and TPAB rule, by the way.

So, what now? Something wonderful happens. My ability to have fun is coming back, and my old rigid and stiff dogma is slowly shedding away. I can look forward to making art again. And, hell, I might sound corny saying it, but I'm starting to appreciate and remember all the good that's happened to me. The people I've met throughout my life, the ups and downs. We remember the past not to erase pain, but to accept that it was things we did, both good and bad. And I'm not perfect; I'm not a saint. But the pain I felt was never to break my spirit. I was just tearing my shame and guilt to pieces.

A coworker told me that you can't drown your demons. They always learn how to swim. And hey, if you're reading this, and going through the same situation? Don't worry. You'll be alright. The important thing is to always sail forward to clearer, less demon-infested waters.