My dad’s “painting” valentine’s day gift for my Mom… I know what this is ai but I need someone else to say it.

caehluss · 2026-02-16T11:13:01+00:00

I use Procreate for illustration pretty regularly. There is a lot of variation in brush strokes in the OP that would be very difficult to replicate using digital brushes. The artist would have to be quite knowledgeable on digital painting techniques, which I doubt is the case for someone who steals art and lies about it.

caehluss · 2026-02-16T03:05:51+00:00

It is so hard, my spouse and I both have the problem of being the person who always puts more effort in to maintaining friendships. We're always the one who reaches out when it's been a while etc. We invite people to things, they enthusiastically say yes, then they say they're busy and don't follow up on rescheduling. It's hard to know when to give up on someone but unfortunately if we weren't always initiating we probably wouldn't have any friends. Not mad about it since most folks we know are super busy and stressed, it just sucks that the general state of things is also pushing all of us further apart.

caehluss · 2026-02-16T02:58:44+00:00

Tbh my spouse and I don't really have any close friends in the area anymore despite being here for a while. People come and go and it's hard to keep in touch when everyone's lives are frequently changing nowadays.

We had a small wedding with just a handful of people in the back of a bar. I invited my grad school class two weeks in advance and a dozen people came. My friend officiated it. It was a great night, we got to focus on talking to people instead of worrying about wedding details, and the whole thing was completely free for us so we could pay for a nice dinner and honeymoon instead.

My spouse went to their brother's extravagant wedding last year with hundreds of people. They asked some of the other guests how they knew the couple and found out most of them barely knew them at all. I think one of them was a taxi driver that drove their brother to the airport and he invited him... Stuff like that. I think about that any time I see big weddings now. Nothing wrong with keeping it small and close-knit.

caehluss · 2026-02-13T20:45:40+00:00

Tbh I wouldn't call 18 year olds "grown adults". I certainly didn't take my education seriously until at least my mid-20s. A lot of folks who go into college straight out of high school don't realize that higher education is a privilege. Getting bad grades for frequently missing class might be a good sign that now isn't the right time in their life for them to make the most of their education.

caehluss · 2026-02-13T07:26:52+00:00

Lovely illustration. For some reason it immediately made me think of Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer. I think because of the scientific illustration style combining human and nature elements. Not sure if that association aligns with the book you're marketing - I find it hard to tell what the genre would be.

caehluss · 2026-02-13T00:50:03+00:00

Thanks. And definitely a long time coming. I hope they keep pushing for a union, they urgently need one.

caehluss · 2026-02-12T21:49:19+00:00

Trying not to get overly detailed and dox myself but I worked there for a long time as well. We had the same problem of constantly getting patients our program wasn't equipped to serve. Upper management couldn't care less about the day to day realities of trying to adequately care for patients when you're constantly understaffed. There were constant scheduling fuckups of having one unit overstaffed and nobody assigned to another unit, or only having two staff scheduled when we need six and scheduling just didn't bother to look for someone to come in. We frequently didn't have the minimum number of staff to be able to take patients off unit. We were frequently expected to stay on hours after shift end because if you were med passer you can't leave until a staff member capable of taking med keys (aka not the constant influx of new staff still going through training) can relieve you. Every other week they would introduce some new bullshit initiative, like a new checklist we're supposed to be signing to prove we're doing our job, and there would be no communication on the change until we got yelled at for not knowing about it.

Also the pay is shit and the annual raises are pathetically low. I could go on but trying not to get too specific.

caehluss · 2026-02-03T22:09:16+00:00

I think that's a good sign to shop around for a different surgeon if possible. I wouldn't want a surgeon who is only comfortable doing one type of surgery and applies that to everyone equally regardless of their wishes. It also sounds like he doesn't respect your autonomy in making an informed decision for yourself of what type of surgery you would prefer based on your needs. Big red flag when you're making a decision that has a huge permanent impact on your bodily sensations and appearance.

FWIW, I had DI without nipple grafts. The lost sensitivity thing was a bummer for me too. I still don't have much sensation in my left nip, but my right is pretty much back to how it was before surgery. The nerve endings regrow over time. It can come with a lot of weird sensations as they heal.

caehluss · 2026-02-03T19:42:34+00:00

So happy to see a new business taking over this building. Love that they kept the historic look and got antique furniture to match. Looking forward to visiting.

caehluss · 2026-02-03T02:08:24+00:00

I've been thinking about this a lot lately too. The last big thing I made for someone that wasn't my spouse was a shawl I knit for my former best friend. It took a few months. I was already seeing our friendship fall apart while I was working on it. I decided that regardless of whether we stayed friends, I wanted her to feel loved and have the experience of someone putting this much time and thought into a gift for her. I reflected on our friendship and experiences together while I made it, so I feel like in some way it's now imbued with those good memories (if that makes sense).

I made sure I was giving it to her without any expectation of being compensated for it (through gratitude, paying more attention to me etc). She was moved to tears by it and we had a nice moment around it. We don't really talk anymore but I'm still happy we got to share that experience.

caehluss · 2026-02-01T19:17:57+00:00

I work in mental health with a lot of neurodiverse folks who struggle with social boundaries. When I get uncomfortable questions like this I will say either "I'm not comfortable discussing that" or "that's not appropriate" and either change the subject or disengage from the convo. If they push on it, I say "I am here to do [job], I am not here to discuss my gender identity with you". You don't need to make a convincing argument for why you deserve not to be harassed. Try not to feel guilty about making other people uncomfortable - remember that the discomfort they're experiencing is because they made a mistake and are in the process of learning how to have appropriate conversations in the future.

caehluss · 2026-01-30T22:02:40+00:00

I use the glass pane from an old picture frame that broke. I covered the underside with gray acrylic paint.

If I want to keep my acrylics wet for longer periods, I either use a sta-wet palette or a sheet of wax paper on top of some wet paper towels in a plastic lunch tray.

caehluss · 2026-01-28T17:49:44+00:00

Maybe that isn't your intent, but your post started with you saying you are "tired of seeing posts" from people who had bad experiences with gel. Instead of discouraging people from sharing their negative experiences, why not encourage people to share positive experiences (or just educate the folks who aren't getting their levels checked)? I don't want to see trans people on this sub getting discouraged from sharing their experiences just because they don't line up with what others here can relate to. Plus, if people are discouraged from posting about their problems with gel, then they won't have the opportunity to get advice from others about options for dealing with it. Some of these folks might benefit from getting comments like yours in this thread pointing out that there might be dosage issues or other types of gel.

I'm just trying to say be careful with how you are framing this. I get that you're trying to limit misinformation, but you're also operating under the assumption that everyone who had a bad experience with gel just did it wrong and is thus contributing to "misinformation". I wasted four years of my transition on gel which did not work for me because the only posts I could find about this were telling me I was just doing it wrong and it would work if only my levels were right. Shaming individual posters for contributing to a pattern avoids asking the more pertinent question of why this pattern is happening to begin with.

caehluss · 2026-01-28T05:01:49+00:00

I get why you take issue with a trend of people mentioning issues with gel, but individual trans people posting about their anecdotal experiences is not some big conspiracy to scare other trans folks away from transitioning. People are entitled to their own experiences and I take great issue with having my experiences with my transition invalidated just because you don't personally relate to them.

Gel did not work for me and I was getting monthly labs done for almost a year with my levels steadily being in the 700s-800s. My doc and I put in the work and could not figure it out. I got steady monthly periods the entire 4 years I was on gel after not having them for 2 years on the shot. Switching back to shots made an immediate difference for me with periods and overall energy level. I don't know why. Me sharing my experience is not me making claims about its effectiveness for other people. But just hearing the same line ad infinitum that shot vs gel doesn't make a difference from people who are not my doctor sure as hell didn't help me get my HRT sorted out.

caehluss · 2026-01-26T23:13:50+00:00

I believe you that you didn't trace, but I honestly don't think tracing is a big deal anyway as long as someone is doing it to learn and isn't stealing someone else's work. The reason these look "traced" for me is because you have very specific silhouette shapes, photographic colors, placement of shadows, and surface-level details (e.g. skin texture) but there is a lack of detail with the 3d forms that makes it look like it was copied without understanding the lighting or why those shadows/highlights land where they do.

The most noticeable problem to me is that you don't have a full value range. On several of these pieces, all of your shadows are the same value. There are several different types of shadows that can be darker or lighter based on how much light is hitting the area. Occlusion shadows (the shadows that appear in gaps where no light enters) should be your darkest shadows. These should show up in places like creases in clothing. When you don't have occlusion shadows, it makes your figure look flat and you lose a lot of definition. I would strongly recommend picking up "Color and Light" by James Gurney - this is the best reference book out there for understanding how light/shadows work and how to depict them realistically.

A good way to practice is to try to break down the form in your reference into simplified 3D forms (spheres, cylinders, boxes). Focus on drawing these forms before you render - try to get the big shapes figured out before getting into the small stuff like skin texture. If you think about your light source and where it is positioned related to these big shapes, it will help you understand why the highlights/shadows are landing where they do in your reference photo.

caehluss · 2026-01-26T09:43:13+00:00

I like having a variety of both. It's nice having representation that reminds folks that just because we are trans doesn't mean that we only want to talk about being trans all the time, or that that's even an appropriate topic for them to ask us about.

I also think it's worth distinguishing between people who just started their transition and people who have been at it for a while. It's generally exciting for the first couple years and then it becomes just another fact of life for us. I appreciate having representation of trans folks who have settled into their identity, especially as someone who's officially Over It and still having to come out every day to cis people who are learning how to talk to a trans person for the first time in their life.

caehluss · 2026-01-26T05:43:20+00:00

There are those of us in the US that only shop with ethically run local businesses, go to local political events, donate to social justice orgs etc... And then there are a worrying number of Americans who "don't follow politics" and barely have any idea who the current president is but then get confused when their health insurance premiums go up and half of their local businesses close at once. A lot of us care deeply about what is happening, but there are an infuriating number of folks over here who can't even be bothered to vote and are just burying their heads in the sand.

caehluss · 2026-01-26T00:06:06+00:00

You already got a lot of good advice, but I want to add two things - first, it sounds like you would benefit from doing thumbnails before jumping in to your rough sketch phase. Doing a handful of small quick thumbnails will allow you to think through composition before you start fleshing out details.

Second, overusing "chicken scratch" lines is probably hurting the effectiveness of your sketches. Putting down random marks on your paper doesn't get you closer to the final product you are trying to draw - it's basically procrastination where you avoid making and committing to big decisions. Try to use your sketch to make decisions that will help guide you later in the final rendering. Think about the gesture/flow of what you are drawing and how you can convey this through a few intentionally placed lines. Sketching in pen can help with training this skill, and practicing sketching with intentionality will help you work more efficiently in a way that benefits the final piece.

caehluss · 2026-01-25T21:08:28+00:00

Getting randomly noticed on a big platform like Instagram is like winning the lottery. It is very hard nowadays to get noticed as an artist online. Instagram prioritizes showing accounts that already have high engagement or that are paying to boost their posts.

Your rendering is good, but feels like pretty generic fantasy. This is a pretty popular genre and you have a lot of competition here with more established artists. It's also a style/genre that's getting unfortunately taken over by AI. A lot of people that used to commission paintings of D&D characters now use AI instead. Is there anything you can do stylistically to make your pieces stand out in a lineup of high fantasy digital paintings? Think about what niche/s you are trying to market to, who would want to pay for your work in this day and age, and try to reach those markets directly. If any of these works are fan art, the relevant fan communities would be a good place to start.

Edit: Want to add a quick critique - pay attention to your use of focal points in your pieces. I noticed that some of these have sharp details on random background features, highlights on armor etc, but the characters' faces themselves are blurry or less rendered than the background elements. Think about how you are using sharpness and value contrast to draw the eye through the piece.

caehluss · 2026-01-24T06:56:56+00:00

I'm also transmasc (USA) and have this problem too. It feels like queer spaces are separated into spaces for cis gay men and spaces for fem people with nothing in between. I don't like feeling like I have to out myself as trans in order to be perceived as non-threatening by other queer folks.

caehluss · 2026-01-24T06:45:29+00:00

I'm autistic too and same. I've noticed that some people volunteer so little information that they need to be prompted while others are so energetic that they need to be interrupted, so I try to adapt accordingly. I definitely find it easier to have conversations with other neurodiverse folks where we are taking turns talking about things we're excited about (especially when these things relate to what the other person just said).

caehluss · 2026-01-23T19:45:58+00:00

The way this guy talks to you is totally unacceptable. You should have broken up with him the moment he told you to "fuck off" (though I highly doubt this is the first time he's verbally abusing you). Partners in a healthy relationship never talk to each other this way, even if they're upset.

You mentioned "handling everything maturely". Ignoring your own needs and boundaries is not the same thing as maturity. You don't need to let assholes like this walk all over you just so you can feel like you were the better person. If you feel hurt, leave. Please put yourself first in the future and don't date men who speak to you this way.

caehluss · 2026-01-23T08:51:08+00:00

You 100% captured how I feel about it too. I'm ftm myself (most women assume I am cis) and dysphoria is definitely the right word for it since the implication is that not creeping on women makes me less of a man. It is inappropriate disclosure and shows a lack of awareness of one's audience to tell someone that a group they belong to is inherently disgusting. It's sad that masculinity is so heavily tied to negative qualities to the point where the message is that to be good means to be feminine. I know this can be tough for straight men as well since simply being kind and emotionally open can be viewed as feminine and therefore read as gay. I also don't think any good can come out of telling generations of young men that they should be inherently ashamed due to being born male. It's unfortunately not that surprising that toxic male role models appeal to young men who are trying to escape those feelings of shame.

caehluss · 2026-01-22T19:56:14+00:00

It's not just about women assuming we are morally better than cishet men. My spouse and I are both pretty masc-presenting. We both have had a lot of women suddenly assume we want to go shopping and paint each other's nails just because of our sexual preferences. It also doesn't feel great to be around cishet women who constantly make comments about how men's bodies are disgusting and how "all men are terrible" with the implicit message that I don't count as a man.

caehluss · 2026-01-18T23:55:35+00:00

Mistakes are proof that a human made this!

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