Little Guys

Twice a year I draw a sheet of small designs, post it, and give the whole day to whoever claims one. No customisation, no consult, first come first served. This sheet was eighteen designs, mostly insects and plants, plus one twenty sided die that got claimed within about ninety seconds of the post going up. I was so pleased about that.

Small is harder than big, which surprises a lot of people. Under about an inch and a half, everything becomes a compromise between detail and longevity, because every line you add is a line that will spread into its neighbour over a decade. A beetle with correct elytra striations at 1″ is a beetle shaped grey smudge at forty. The other challenge on a flash day is purely physical: twelve tiny tattoos in nine hours means twelve stencil placements, twelve setups, twelve breakdowns, and your line quality on number eleven has to match number one.

I draw flash at final size, never scaled down, because designing at 4″ and shrinking is exactly how you end up with lines that are theoretically 0.3mm apart. If it doesn't read at 1″ on paper it doesn't make the sheet. Anything with detail closer than about 1.5mm got simplified until it survived, and honestly the beetle lost two thirds of its striations and looks better for it. On the day everything ran on a 3RL at a consistent low voltage, one pass, no second guessing. Speed on small work comes from having made every single decision the week before.