dragon-made-of-cats

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Watching my toddler figure out how to language is fascinating. Yesterday we were stumped when he kept insisting there was a “Lego winner” behind his bookshelf - it turned out to be a little Lego trophy cup. Not knowing the word for “trophy”, he’d extrapolated a word for “thing you can win”. And then, just now, he held up his empty milk container and said, “Mummy? It’s not rubbish. It’s allowed to be a bottle.” - meaning, effectively, “I want this. Don’t throw it away.” But to an adult ear, there’s something quite lovely about “it’s allowed to be a bottle,” as if we’re acknowledging that the object is entitled to keep its title even in the absence of the original function.

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I spent like 5 hours editing this gif frame by frame to make this shitty edit that I wanted to exist

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So, I saw this image on Facebook, and it was supposedly showing what Queen Nefertiti would have looked like in real life:

Now, I thought this AI generated garbage was just truly terrible on a number of levels; first off, she looks wayyyyyy too modern - her makeup is very “Hollywood glamour”, she looks airbrushed and de-aged, and as far as I’m aware, Ancient Egyptians didn’t have mascara, glitter-based eyeshadows and lip gloss. Secondly, her features are exceptionally whitewashed in every sense - this is pretty standard for AI as racial bias is prevalent in feeding AI algorithms, but I genuinely thought a depiction of such a known individual would not exhibit such euro-centric features. Thirdly, the outfit was massively desaturated and didn’t take pigment loss into consideration, and while I *do* like the look of the neck attire, it's not at all accurate (plus, again, AI confusion on the detailing is evident).

So, this inspired me to alter the image on the left to be more accurate based off the sculpture’s features. I looked into Ancient Egyptian makeup and looked at references for kohl eyeliner and clay-based facial pigment (rouge was used on cheeks, charcoal-based powder/paste was used to darken and elongate eyebrows), and I looked at pre-existing images of Nefertiti, both her mummy and other reconstructions. While doing this, I found photos of a 3D scanned sculpture made by scientists at the University of Bristol and chose to collage the neck jewellery over the painting (and edited the lighting and shadows as best as I could).

Something I see a lot of in facial recreations of mummies is maintaining the elongated and skinny facial features as seen on preserved bodies - however, fat, muscle and cartilage shrink/disappear post mortem, regardless of preservation quality; Queen Nefertiti had art created of her in life, and these pieces are invaluable to developing an accurate portrayal of her, whether stylistic or realistic in nature.

And hey, while I don't think my adjustments are perfect (especially the neck area), I *do* believe it is a huge improvement to the original image I chose to work on top of.

I really liked working on this project for the last few days, and I think I may continue to work on it further to perfect it. But, until then, I hope you enjoy!

Remember, likes don't help artists but reblogs do!

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isnt it insane that merry and pippin spent like the span of weeks apart in different countries and immediately made new besties whose lives they save in their final battles. like merry strikes the blow on the witch king that lets eowyn kill him and pippin pulls faramir out of denethor's pyre. and then eowyn and faramir ended up marrying each other. isn't that wild. were merry and pippin conspiring in the houses of healing like hey i think my new best friend would be great with your new best friend how quickly do you think we can get them to fall in love. was there great hobbit cacophony when faramir kisses eowyn on the ramparts. i think yes.

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[dragon-made-of-cats]

reblog this and tag with a food you no longer have access to (closed restaurant, state you moved away from, ex’s mom’s cooking, etc) that will haunt you until your dying day, mine are the spicy chicken sandwich on the employee menu at the fine dining restaurant I was a prep cook at, and the onion bagel from the kosher place down the street from my house when I lived in the city

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Real drawings of pirates by 3rd graders vs. three improvisers... 🦜

Watch the full episode on Dropout

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When you’re on your way home from the club but one of you almost died

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cracking myself up thinking about the movement towards simplified forms in cave paintings

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Hallmark Christmas movie but the salt-of-the-earth small-town guy moves to the big city and falls in love with the cynical career woman and they stay in the city and work side by side to make the world a better wait that’s Superman, once again I have just written Superman

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Art

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the year is 2043. william shatner, 112, is grabbing his aide's hand, begging her to get closer, his hold unexpectedly strong

"when kirk and spock had sex kirk was always the top. he never took it up the ass" he says, before immediately flatlining

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[dragon-made-of-cats]

Your a faggot kill ur elf

the fuck did my elf do

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Classification of Ace Attorney Official Art

Type A - Generic Promo Art with a lot of Dramatic Pointing

Type A1 - Oh Wow Look at How Many Characters We Have!!

Type A2 - Instead of Dramatic Pointing it’s Back-to-Back Posing

Type A3 - Ominous Giant Lawyers

Type B - All the Characters Hanging Out Casually as a Family

Type B1 - Seasonal Varieties

Type B1-1 - Phoenix is Fucking Drunk

Type B1-2 - Festival Time!

Type B2 - Gaming Moments

Type C - Illustrated Interpretation of Canon Scenes/Off Screen Moments

Type D - Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth Sharing Long Meaningful Gazes and Palatable Sexual Tension

Type E - What if… Chibis?

Type F - Fancy Outfits

Type F1 - OST Artwork Featuring Orchestra AU

Type G - Inexplicable