Owlivia

And last but definitely not least, thank you greatly to all donators for your generosity! Winners, please make sure to contact the prize donators individually to claim your prizes, and say a big thank you.

(Also, I'm away for a while on recovery- this journal is being scribed for me since I can't use electronics or my right hand- so when I'm a bit better I'll note the winners to arrange tablet delivery, in the meantime puff-fluff is my secretary so any urgent inquiries can be passed along through her )

So without further ado, here are the winners!

Contest :: Owlbbus [yipiy] by Skunkyfly

With most contestants focusing on the ominous and dramatic side of VenoM, this cheerful work really shone to me as an excellent representation of the happier moments. The bright, adorable, playful style perfectly captures the children's innocence, while careful attention has still been paid to the colours and patterns of the individual owls and the design of Čik'ala. All in all, a very fun and pleasing piece to look at!

Jay by Owlivia by Untilgledas1

At the other end of the spectrum, an excellent capture of Jay's darker side! Filled with detail, and utilising shadow to create a wonderfully chilling effect, it reflects Jay's chaotic nature. The addition of the birds and the moon indicate a great understanding of his character. Masterful execution and a keen eye for details keep me captivated by this piece, though that foreboding stance and glare keep me wary of staring too long!

Hazel Iera by JadedSihx

A perfectly balanced and elegant portrait, fitting for a noblewoman! The regal patterns around her are a lovely accent, and from her delicate pose to the fine details of her dress, it's a beautiful capture of Hazel in her life.

Your Prizes:

tl;dr: commissions closed, contest prizes to be posted in April

I'm in the middle of exams and am actually really struggling to find the will to go on, and I wish that was an exaggeration...

Gotta plow on though, I guess. Things only get better, right? I get little glimpses of hope sometimes, I hope if I keep going I can reach them one day.

I think I'm mainly ok now, physically, at least the doctors say so. Nothing can be done so just got to deal with it. And I'm not good at dealing with things, lmao.

I have some wonderful friends who have stuck by my side though, despite me not being here at all for a while- I love you guys so much ajhfdsfj I just want to give you the world and more, I wish I wasn't such a splinter in your sides and could do more than be a pain OTL Thank you so much

... wow my entries get more and more depressing

have some owls

I have no confidence in my skills any more and when you're in that state of mind it doesn't matter what anyone tells you, all you see is failure, and I couldn't possibly feel good about making people pay for that OTL

Thank you for everyone who supported me in the past, I really appreciate it

For the tablets, unfortunately I went back to uni before I could get the addresses, and forgot to bring the tablets with me to post here because I sucK ARHGHDHD OTL 

I've asked my mum if she would post them but she thinks the whole thing was a stupid idea and refuses to do it, so I'll have to send them out myself when I get back in April, or if I manage to pop home in the meantime.

I think that about sums it up... once everything's done here I might be leaving, so I just want to wrap things up.

Take care everyone

So the contest is over, and here are the fabulous entries! 

Results will be announced within the next couple of weeks, within that time I'll get round to commenting on everything... I don't know how I'm gonna judge them all, they're all so beautiful Q_Q

Please let me know ASAP if you don't see yours below, or if it's in the incorrect folder!

I'm sorry for being so slow and elusive and akfjsdf I have problems OTL

<da:thumb id="417024291"/> <da:thumb id="413358687"/> <da:thumb id="410218982"/> <da:thumb id="409105282"/><da:thumb id="409423132"/> <da:thumb id="408203931"/> <da:thumb id="395160652"/> <da:thumb id="394424949"/> <da:thumb id="387127054"/>

<da:thumb id="415759703"/> <da:thumb id="413676449"/> <da:thumb id="413665302"/><da:thumb id="413597042"/><da:thumb id="413187751"/><da:thumb id="413191619"/> <da:thumb id="394475532"/><da:thumb id="384677865"/><da:thumb id="389375717"/>

(People are asking me to prove it's me but uuuh I'm not sure how to... do you want a photo? I think it'll become obvious soon enough, nobody else is this dumb LMAO

Art will be up when I get my motivation back and I hope you'll see it's me from that ;u;

Plus if you have me on skype or tumblr I'm sure you've seen the stupid glee I have at being back XD

...there's nothing special or defining about me to make me recognisable, that's sad OTL)

I'll try to explain what happened even though I'm not entirely sure myself LOL

On Thursday evening last week I tried to log in and got greeted with the 'incorect password' screen. Now, I know it was right, because I have it on autofill; all I have to do is click log in and I'm logged on. So instead I typed it in manually, I tried every other possible password, and nothing worked. I clicked the forgotten password button but there was no email delivered to any of the inboxes I've ever had associated with this account, hence no possible way I could get into my account. I sent a request to deviantart to have my password reset, which is why I gave the timeframe of being back in a few weeks, since some people I know have had similar problems and had to wait a long time to have their passwords reset.

In the meantime I ran a malware check on my laptop, which didn't find anything suspicious, and my paypal, tumblr, email accounts etc were all secure so I don't think it was a keylogger or anything. Plus nothing else seems to be changed, so why it was just my password affected, I don't know. You can imagine this wasn't a fun scenario, with my paranoia; I thought my account was going to be deactivated, I thought someone was looking for dirt on me or was going to make me look like I was being cruel to friends. I cried on the night I lost the account, there's so much on here that means the world to me but isn't worth anything to other people.

Anyways, I think part of me didn't believe the whole thing since I kept trying my password in the meantime, and suddenly yesterday I logged in with it? Checking around, everything seems to be fine, the email's back to the same one and the password was changed back to normal... I've changed everything now though just in case. And now I seem like an idiot who couldn't enter their password right but I swear, it didn't work, you know how often I'm on dA and there's no way I would be off for this long if I could help it ono

I know a couple of people are wanting to do additional entries; if you've started a piece, could you please let me know ASAP that you have an entry in progress? The extension was unexpected, clumsy, and not very clear, so it's not a problem if you have, I just don't want to close the contest and leave people with half-finished works. If there's no news I'll be closing it this Sunday, if you need more time I can give you that as apology.

One other thing is that things have been... tough, recently. Please don't worry about me, I can handle it, but if I seem distant or moody it's because therapy has unearthed some stuff that I'm both relieved and distressed to learn; I don't like to share because I don't want to blame mental issues for anything, but it's hard learning you're more fucked up than you thought. 

In better news, I'm now working three days a week with the owls, which is a great balance to the three days of uni, with Sundays off. Next semester I'll try to bring up a camera and get some nice photos of them to share c:

I can't open commissions at the moment with such amounts of work, and if that's a problem, I can remove you from the waiting list- rest assured those of you on there will have first priority when I open. The Xmas holidays are only three weeks or so away, and I hope to get some art for others done then

Hope you guys are doing well in the meantime!