STEP-BY-STEP: Connecting icons (Patreon)

First art related post on Patreon! Testing out the waters here, starting out with a look into how I put together a connecting icon commission from March. I can't believe how the time flies an I'm happy to see some improvement in my workflow or rather how I would make things faster these days while still gaining the same end result. I still find this more loose approach to shading (slides 4 and 6) so relaxing and still use it as a part of my creative process, I just clean it up on the layer rather than save that part for the rendering. It might look messy but it really helps me to focus on bigger areas first and avoid making the image too cluttered - something I try to keep in mind especially with icons that I try to keep as easy to read even in smaller sizes.