how it works — eleven live steps

from one pencil stroke to a creature that blinks: eleven steps of the same recipe, drawn live, in order.

a stroke is not a line. it is a filled ribbon: the pencil wanders, then winds somewhere it liked.

the skull is an ellipse with five knobs — width, height, shape, tilt, and how much it wobbles.

tone is hatching, never a flat fill. a wash of graphite reads as paper, not as plastic.

ears are the cheapest personality in the whole system: six kinds, one size number.

hair is drawn over the skull outline, so the line underneath stays visible. it always shows.

sockets first, so the eyes sit in the head instead of on it.

eyes carry the mood. beads read young, rings read wrong.

the mouth is four points at most. more points make a person, and a person is harder to like.

marks are the accident: a patch, a scar, freckles, or nothing at all.

the body is a trapezium. the limbs are three-point paths, so an arm can reach.

then the object goes in the right hand, and the eyelids get a timer of their own.