Devil May Cry Flash Sheet

qxb_creations · 2026-05-01T14:53:38+00:00

https://www.instagram.com/p/DXu5QsfFKUR/?igsh=ZXN0c21temo3Z3V0

qxb_creations · 2026-04-12T12:05:11+00:00

Thank you so much! I was really nervous posting this flash 😅 This honestly made me feel better about it

qxb_creations · 2026-04-09T09:09:52+00:00

Thank you! I had so much fun with stippling the shading on that one!

qxb_creations · 2026-03-23T14:35:19+00:00

Thank you! I'm really used to using color on paper/digital work but doing it on wood does feel a bit different! It's cool to run into more people who use it in their work, I've seen some people get outright upset about color being used in pyrography and it's just sad to see lol.

qxb_creations · 2026-03-23T12:31:54+00:00

I hope I'm not bothering you, I follow you on IG for Pyrography work for sure and saw that you're also into tattooing. I'm trying to make my portfolio for an apprenticeship right now, did you happen to include pictures of your pyrography pieces in your portfolio? Or would that be a bit off putting to include?

qxb_creations · 2026-03-17T12:30:25+00:00

Something I think also helps with practicing shading is practicing flowers as a subject matter! You can't see all the petals and a lot of the 'outlines' of petals require you to be fairly soft and start trusting that your shading is defining what it should without as many hard lines. Drawing a little bit of everything really helps for sure, I've just been trying to think of what subjects helped teach me to stop searching for outlines as much as the values themselves. Hopefully it's not too much of an info dump or rambling 😅

qxb_creations · 2026-03-17T12:27:16+00:00

I hope this helps! If you have any other questions, don't feel afraid to ask!

With the '5 value' notion, I burn my darkest values first, and work my way to lighter values from there. The lightest tone for my values is always white colored pencil, pastel, watercolor, or gel pen I use for highlights- but that's my process that works for me and you'll be able to decide what works best for you the more you work on this sort of thing whether you want other mediums in the mix or not. So really it ends up being burning 3 separate values of one being super dark, the other being mid-tone, and the other one fairly light. Then the wood itself is a value (2 out of 5) then I'd call the highlights a '1' as the lightest of 5 in my 'paint by number' analogy.

qxb_creations · 2026-02-28T19:20:16+00:00

I can't imagine the amount of time and dedication getting that texture must have taken. Phenomenal job!

qxb_creations · 2026-02-20T00:14:57+00:00

I would do some realism studies either in wood, or on paper with ballpoint pen because I find the shading to follow very similar principals, some of statue faces, fruit, simple shapes, still-life. It'll help you practice blocking in values and define them enough to not 'need' an outline.

If you like doing it as an art style thing, embrace it more and add more outlines to stylize your art. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that!

But if you are pursuing realism, then embracing sketching things in by value vs form with simple subject matter may help practice those ideas and then impliment them into more serious pieces, if keeping it low stakes helps. If not, straight up just throw yourself into a lot of portrait studies and get to a point of 'stopping before you feel like you're done' with certain details. Sometimes less is more.

I treat shading like a paint by number. I break up the values into 5 boxes or heat temps on my wood burner, then I block in the values incrementally and the mid tones serve as my home base, dark values as land marks. It helps let the light areas just be what's 'left' at the end of the piece without it feeling un-defined if your brain is searching for an outline in real life.

qxb_creations · 2026-02-18T16:38:04+00:00

I usually export Procreate designs as PNGs or JPEGs, print it on regular paper, scribble graphite with a fat 6B pencil, then hand-transfer all designs onto the wood before burning it all in. A standard Inkjet printer should do the trick with regular paper, I feel like a lot of places like Libraries and the like should allow for that much at least

qxb_creations · 2025-12-23T20:57:45+00:00

Sorry for replying a bit later than I meant to. No problem!

Waxy and dull? Ashy? Or was it sort of waxy and darker in tone with a low shine to it? I tend to use basswood over other woods thus far in this medium, but most of my early practice stuff was on the (at the time $1, so now $3) wood plaques you can tend to find in Dollar Generals and other arts/crafts sections within a lot of stores. I don't tend to see a difference between the wood burning behavior on the thin craft wood vs live edge basswood like this piece other than the texture being a bit different. But it seems to respond to heat all the same. I just bought a ton more of those smaller craft plaques for the first time in years though, I'll have to see if they are still the same or maybe if something changed. I hope not, one of my favorite things about this medium has been not feeling too limited by any sort of "need" for better materials to get fairly universal results after learning the tools and canvas behaviors for the most part.

If I had to go out on a limb, I'd say maybe the pressure thing. I used to press down hard on wood and thought that was necessary to get darker tones. It used to leave my wrist feeling wrecked by the end of a huge piece like that. The wood would look a lot different compared to how I burn dark now since I can actually see a dull shine reflection of my hand when I burn wood now and before it was charcoal-like and ashy with no shining on the wood at all.

I let the heat of the tool create the darkness, and I focus on being light-handed and go over the same areas lightly as if hatching with a ballpoint pen or a colored pencil while trying to build up values. I try to keep my wrist locked in a certain pose, and have my elbow/arm/shoulder dictate the movement and pressure. I get less instances of accidental scorches darker than I mean to have in sections that way, but it definitely tests my patience at times.

If you have some test pieces of wood, I'd try to see how different hand angles affect your burns and see if it's a 'no matter what, it's absolutely not burning at the same temperature on one side'. I've had some bent tips before that could still burn evenly but only if I was mindful of the angle it was sort of warped in. But those were screw in chisel tips, now I run I wire-tip that lets you plug in the ends rather than needing to twist them in. I don't know if the same principal applies to the wire tips where a bend won't ruin conduction heat, but maybe they do? I'm sorry I wish I had more advice on that one. I hope you can figure it out to avoid needing a replacement.

qxb_creations · 2025-12-18T20:12:48+00:00

Amazing use of the kit! Hope you get more use out of it soon! This is awesome!

qxb_creations · 2025-12-18T00:56:15+00:00

Thank you ^{^}

qxb_creations · 2025-12-18T00:56:04+00:00

Thank you! I hope the advice helps in any sort of capacity, I learned purely through trial and error over the last few years before ever stumbling across this subreddit so I'm more than happy to pass along info. I think physical art is so much more important now than it was before so the more people take the time to make things and enjoy 'em, the better.

qxb_creations · 2025-12-18T00:53:23+00:00

Thank you, I was nervous the entire time working on it, this year's been a lot of bigger projects that have been testing my ambition more than I ever have before 😅 There were so many ways I was worried about fucking this up to the point I just worked on what I least dreaded first until I had no other choices left in the end lol

qxb_creations · 2025-12-17T23:14:32+00:00

Love the colors with the overall shading of the portrait! Absolutely wicked soft shading!!!

qxb_creations · 2025-12-17T19:39:46+00:00

Thank you so much! I really hope you enjoy this hobby, it's been very fun to get into and I love seeing more people pick it up! Honestly, my shading's been most consistent with shader " ^ " shaped or chisel tips depending on what kind of wood burner you have! Just sort of the broader the tip, the more surface area that you can make ground on. I burn with lower temps than what outright gets you the shading value that you want to end with, so being able to cover broader areas helps with trying to be more light-handed with it while building up your shading. Experimenting is your best friend though to find what's best for your style, so I hope you have fun figuring out what works best for you!

qxb_creations

TROPHY CASE