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Piracy 101 for beginners

Hello friends, it is I, your favourite anti-capitalist. After a lot of interest from people looking to get into piracy, I have compiled a guide for anyone who wants to become a pirate but doesn't know where to start. This is a long post, so I'm gonna put a cut here, but if you want to find out, keep reading!

This information is all up to date as of October 2024.

OBLIGATORY DISCLAIMER: all of this stuff is from my personal experience with torrenting, but please use your own common sense - piracy is a crime in many parts of the world, please stay safe and be careful. I’m a simple internet user part of a larger quest for the liberation of knowledge – this guide will cover the precautions you should take and my advice, but I’m not psychic and I don’t know every possibility so please don’t hold me accountable for anything that goes wrong. I’m just here to share my two cents.

Always remember that PIRACY IS AT YOUR OWN RISK.

Okay, boring stuff over - let's get started! I'm going to try and be as comprehensive as I can and there is an FAQ section at the end, but do feel free to send me an ask if you want something clarified!

Is piracy necessary?

I know you came here to read about piracy, but before you start diving in, it’s always worth checking if the thing you want can be acquired through non-piracy means. In the case of movies, here are some places to check first before you start your swashbuckling – you might be pleasantly surprised!

The Internet Archive. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – the Internet Archive is possibly the greatest resource on the internet. It has tons of free films, books, music, software – you name it! Here’s a list of films that can be found there.

YouTube. Yep, I know, this might seem like the last place you can find copyrighted content. However, there exists the wonderful thing that is known as the public domain. These films are free of copyright and can often easily be found on YouTube.

Tubi. Now, if you’re like me and not from the US, this will take a VPN to access (more on that later) but Tubi is a great place to watch free movies that doesn’t break a single law. Given, most of the movies on there aren’t exactly Hollywood blockbusters, but they have some solid picks – I usually hate streaming services with a burning passion but if you have an adblocker to get rid of the annoying interruptions, you’re set – you don’t even need an account.

Odnoklassiniki. Odno-what-now? This is the Russian in me speaking, but Odnoklassniki (often abbreviated to OK) is basically Russian Facebook. It’s mostly used as a social network in Russia, but you can upload long videos on there, and given the difference in copyright laws, you can find a lot of older/more obscure films.

Video search. This may seem odd, but your search engine is truly your best friend. Now, I use DuckDuckGo like any privacy-minded person, and I recommend you do too – for the sole reason that if you try to search for videos on Google, all the videos will be YouTube sponsor links and the like. If you’re a connoisseur of random old made-for-TV movies like myself or other similarly obscure media the DDG video search is great. Simply search “[movie name] [date] full film” or something of the like and filter the length to “long”. Look at the duration – if it roughly matches the length of the movie, there you go!

Magic! I mentioned OK before because nine times out of ten it ends up being an Odnoklassniki link anyway. Sometimes it does take a little bit of clicking around to make sure it’s not accidentally a Spanish/Russian/Swahili dub of the movie, but this is still a good trick to know if you’re looking for more obscure films.

Now, you’ve scoured the Internet Archive, Tubi, YouTube, and Russian Facebook, but nothing gives – those damned producers have their grip on your movie of choice far too tight. And so, here’s where the fun begins.

Before you begin

Before stepping foot on your pirate ship, there are a few safety things you need to know about. These are essential because they'll keep you and your computer safe when pirating.

VPN. This is the single most important thing that you need. Basically, when you connect to the internet, your device is given a fancy little number by your WiFi network that basically shows your location - this is called an IP address. Now, if you're doing something a Little Bit Dodgy, you don't want people to know where you are and which network you're connected to. This is where a VPN comes in. VPN stands for Virtual Private Network, and what it does is basically makes a private little bubble by encrypting your connection and routing it through a different server in a different country, hiding your IP address and keeping you safe (overly simplified but that's more or less it). Basically, your IP address will say you're in Japan when you're actually in England. Deception! There are a lot of VPNs on the market, and a lot of them are paid, but if you're broke like me, HotSpotShield is completely free, has really fast servers, and it's super secure! [Note: a previous version of this guide recommended Proton VPN. I would no longer recommend this VPN given that they've highly restricted the number of servers accessible to non-paid versions, not to mention that their filters block torrenting (P2P) traffic so nothing loads anyway.]

A good adblocker. A lot of sites are full of pop-ups, trackers and spammy viruses, so an adblocker is a must. If you're on Firefox or Chrome, uBlock Origin is an amazing free extension that does the job. For Safari, I recommend AdGuard (or, y'know, switching to Firefox).

Okay, so you're all VPN'd up, connected and adblocked. What next?

From my personal experiences, there are two main types of piracy: online piracy and torrenting. Also, please note that usually, I pirate films, so I'm not the most knowleadgable about software/music piracy, but I'll try to be all-encompassing.

Online Piracy

Online piracy is kind of like Piracy Lite. I'm calling it online piracy because it's using the regular internet (clearnet) to access sites which provide films/books/files over the Internet. This kind of piracy is usually more accessible, and there's a strong chance you've already partaken in it!

Online piracy for films

You're probably familiar with sites like sflix.to for watching free movies - they're something of an open secret. The way sites like this work is that the actual video files are stored on external servers - that is, they're not on your computer, they're on some server somewhere else. The website is basically just a viewer that allows the video files to be relayed over the internet to be watched on your laptop. Online piracy is more about access than owning.

Pros

Really accessible. You don't need any other applications or anything fancy - just open the site and watch!

Online piracy streaming sites are not actually illegal. Yep, you heard that right. There's a lovely loophole in the law that defines piracy as the downloading and distributing of copyrighted content. Because on piracy streaming sites, you are simply viewing the media, and not downloading it or sharing it, and also because the sites are readily accessible, you have plausible deniability and are not breaking any laws!

Instant relay. Instead of waiting for a download, online piracy allows you to start watching immediately.

Relatively high quality files. Usually, the videos are pretty good quality (expect about 720p or 1080p if your internet's good) and there aren't any weird unremovable pop-up subtitles in HUngarian.

Subtitles. Online streaming sites are usually really good with a large selection of subtitles in different languages.

What you see is what you get. You don't have to wait for a download only to find it was corrupted - usually, defective files are spotted and replaced pretty quickly and if they're not, they usually have multiple servers that you can switch to.

Lightweight. These sites don't usually use too much bandwidth, and as long as you have a decent internet connection, you should be good.

Cons

Buffering. This is probably the single most annoying thing about these sites - if your internet connection dips, the video will buffer. You don't need to worry about this if you have fiber-optic super-speed connection of whatever, but it makes watching things pretty infuriating sometimes.

Loading issues. See above - it's prettty annoying to try to skip to a certain point in a film or scrub back, because the file sometimes just won't load.

Pop-ups. Usually, an adblocker will take care of these, but these sites can be buggy and full of re-directs/ads/hot singles in your area.

Quality. 720p files are fine if you're watching a film on a laptop, but if you want to have a movie night on a big screen or a projector, it's going to be a little underwhelming.

Annoying mirror sites. Because of the dubious legality of the sites, oftentimes the same site will have lots of mirrors (remember, the site itself is only a skeleton viewer to play the files, so the sites don't vary much one to another). Oftentimes, certain mirrors wil be added and deleted meaning you might have to hop around different sites, which is annoying.

Torrenting

Torrenting is probably what you think of when you think of piracy - file-sharing and strange documents and downloading things. I know this all sounds scary, but it really isn't! Torrenting is simply another way of file sharing - instead of downloading from a single source, torrenting is using an internet protocol called BitTorrent that basically allows multiple users to share little pieces of a file with each other, which allows really large files such as film files to be transferred efficiently.

Torrenting is a bit more complicated, so here's your crash course if you want to get into it.

VERY IMPORTANT: Turn on your VPN. This keeps your identity private because torrenting, unlike online streaming, is very much Frowned Upon. Most VPNs have a kill switch, which means that if the VPN connection dips, you'll be disconnected from the Internet temporarily so your address isn't leaked - I'd recommend turning this on.

To use the BitTorret protocol, you need to get an application that can run it - this is called a torrent client. I'd recommend Vuze, but there are lots to choose from and they all do essentially the same thing - plus, they're all free!

Then, you're going to want to find a torrent site. My personal favourite torrent site is 1337x – it has up to date torrents and good download speeds. Search for whatever thing you’re looking for. [Note: a previous version of this guide recommended The Pirate Bay. I didn't know this at the time, but Pirate Bay has become really untrustworthy - this is because the "main" site was shut down a few years back so it exists through unstable mirrors that are often full of viruses. 1337x is actuall actively serviced, so the files are more reliable and load exponentially faster.]

You'll often be met with lots of different copies of the file you want, which can be confusing, so here's how you choose the right one.

Let's say I want to watch The Empire Strikes Back.

Wow, that's a lot of files. How do I choose? Well, if you look at the right of the table, you'll see a column that says SE. This stands for seeds - this refers to the number of computers ready to upload pieces of the file to you. A high number of seeds means that there are more people to give bits of the file to you, so it'll download faster. So if it's May the 4th and you're determined to watch Empire, you should go with the top file with 649 seeds. High-quality files are labelled as such, so just find the type you need and pick the one with the most seeds.

Once you click on the file, you'll be redirected to a magnet link. This is basically just a link that tells your torrent client to start getting the file, and the link should open the application automatically.

That's it! Your file should start loading in the torrent client. Once it's done, most torrent clients will create a folder in your hard drive where you can find your downloaded files and some even let you watch within the application. Congratulations - you've earned your pirate hat.

Pros

That file is yours forever. That's right - once it's on your hardrive, no-one can take it from you, ever.

No buffering! Because the file is downloaded locally, there's no lagging, pausing, buffering, skipping or glitching - just press play!

High-quality files. You can pirate in 720p, 1080p, even 4k, meaning that if you have a 4k projector or home cinema, you don't need to sacrifice quality.

Not reliant on internet - you can download movies for planes, take them to the top of Mount Everest, whatever.

Easy viewing experience. No ads, no pop-ups, no browsers, sites, glitches, lags, anything. All you need is some kind of media player and you're set.

Cons

Downloads could take time. If your WiFi is slow, then torrents can take a really long time to download, which is annoying. If you have good WiFi and a lot of seeds, it shouldn't be bad, but it's nowhere near instant.

Corrupted/broken files. There is a chance you will download a file and it'll have bright yellow porn ads all over it.

Can't view the file in advance - see the above, you don't know if it's the right one or not until you have it.

Higher risk of something going wrong. Given the higher number of moving parts in torrenting, there are far more things that can go wrong, like broken magnet links or corrupted files.

Frequently asked questions

I'm worried about viruses/malware/etc.

This is probably the number one thing that's asked when it comes to piracy (particularly torrenting). To answer this, it's worth noting how viruses and spyware works. A virus is an executable file - i.e. it's a bit of code - that, once downloaded, messes up your computer in various ways. Basically, it's a file that makes your computer do something. Video files like mp4s are... well, very much not that. Video files are just files containing information that your computer displays, and no programs or files to run. That means that if you download an mp4 file, you cannot get a virus from it because it's just technically not possible. However, it's worth noting that if you're ever expecting a video file from a torrent and get something ending in .exe or similar instead, then don't open it - always make sure you know what you're expecting so you know if there's a possibility of a virus. On the other hand, this is very much a higher risk when pirating things like software or video games, that do contain executable files, so be careful. I'm not the most experienced in that arena, but if you're just sticking to films, you don't have anything to worry about.

Oh no, my VPN disconnected whilst I was torrenting! Are people going to come to my house and arrest me?

If your IP address is accidentally revealed for two or three seconds whilst you're connecting to the internet, don't panic, because nothing will happen to you. As long as your IP address is hidden most of the time, a two-second blip isn't going to matter. This isn't to say don't use a VPN - please, always use a VPN whilst torrenting - but no one's going to come to your house if you accidentally turn your VPN off for a moment. Put it this way - the Internet is really big, and the anti-piracy people don't have the time or the need to monitor every single person, so as long as you don't do anything attention-arising, just re-connect as quickly as you can and keep going about your day. That said - the longer you stay disconnected, the higher you are at risk, so just be careful.

Where should I store my downloaded files? They're really big and taking up space.

A 1080p movie file can easily be up to 5GB, and 4K movies can up to 100GB. These can fill up space real quick, so I would suggest investing in a solid state external hard drive. They've become very inexpensive and you can get a very large amount of storage in a small, portable drive that you can keep safe and full of your files. I have a 2TB drive that I use for my film work that does just fine with storing my torrented files.

What happens if I get caught?

The big, scary question, and I'm not gonna lie, I don't have a definitive answer. The first thing is that this will obviously vary depending on where you live, but still, I think that piracy often has a lot of over-blown paranoia about it. Copyright infringement lawsuits and the like are often reserved for really major offendors - think large-scale businesses and corporations. I highly doubt that you, as an individual consumer, would be a high priority on the prosecution list. I'm going to say that probably the worst thing that you'll get hit with is some sort of fine, but you won't be sent to jail or anything unless you decide to hack the CIA or something. This is why VPNs are so important - they'll ensure that you won't have to worry about this.

Concluding notes & more resources

Thank you for making it this far! I hope you found this guide helpful and that you have fun sailing the high seas. Once again, if you have any questions, my askbox is always open. Piracy and torrenting is, at its core, about community and sharing, and there's a great group of people online to connect with. The Reddit r/piracy subreddit also has a really good megathread of more resources, and the best way to learn more is honestly learn from others.

Happy pirating!

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What to watch next?

kdrama edition

hey! just got done with a mainstream drama and looking for some drama with the same feels? got it!

comment the drama below if it’s not in this list

1. weightlifting fairy kim bok joo

lighthearted, funny, strong fl with simp male

watch next : strong woman do bong soon

where : bilibili.com

2. business proposal

office romance, strong second couple chemistry, savage fl and a bit airheaded ml

watch next : what’s wrong with secretary kim?, descendants of the sun, love to hate you (the misandry is a bit high for the first eps, bear with it if you can), romance is a bonus book, king the land

where : netflix, bilibili.com

3. vincenzo

ACTION!!! good looking men in suits, strong fl with senti dad arc, men with questionable morals

watch next : my name (contains triggering themes, watch at own discretion), the k2

where : netflix, bilibili

4. guardian : the lonely and great god

fantasy, meant-to-be pairings, AMAZING second lead romances

watch next : touch your heart (sort of like a grim reaper sunny au), the king - eternal monarch, tale of the nine tailed, doom at your service, my demon

where : netflix, bilibili

5. reply 1988

feel good, group of friends, slice of life, AMAZING platonic chemistry

watch next : hospital playlist

where : netflix, bilibili

6. true beauty

bromance, love triangle with happy ending

watch next : the heirs, boys over flowers (if you can handle lee min ho’s horrendous perm), f4 thailand (if youre interested in thai dramas)

where : netflix, bilibili

7. all of us are dead

zombie, romance, political/military questionable

watch next : happiness

8. crash course in romance

(requested by @starryalpacasstuff )

famous ml, headstrong and self reliant fl, both place value in their work and respect each other (at the end)

watch next : love to hate you, or if you want a mockumentary-style romance, lovestruck in the city is my go to!

9. bad and crazy

(requested by @hyeon-yi )

crackhead duo, bromance~, MENtal issues, crime crime, stabby stabby

watch next : the worst of evil, dp, the devil judge, beyond evil

10. hometown cha cha cha

feel good vibes, seaside town, sappy romance, CUTEST couple

watch next : welcome to samdalri

tell me other kdramas youve seen in the comments and ill add recommendations!

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Getting a new computer soon. Where’s that windows debloat guide people post every so often

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(Better Than Olive Garden) Chicken Gnocchi Soup

Follow for recipes

Is this how you roll?

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I want to write a book called “your character dies in the woods” that details all the pitfalls and dangers of being out on the road & in the wild for people without outdoors/wilderness experience bc I cannot keep reading narratives brush over life threatening conditions like nothing is happening.

I just read a book by one of my favorite authors whose plots are essentially airtight, but the MC was walking on a country road on a cold winter night and she was knocked down and fell into a drainage ditch covered in ice, broke through and got covered in icy mud and water.

Then she had a “miserable” 3 more miles to walk to the inn.

Babes she would not MAKE it to that inn.

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PLEASE for the love of the universe read anti-colonial science fiction and fantasy written from marginalized perspectives. Y’all (you know who you are) are killing me. To see people praise books about empire written exclusively by white women and then turn around and say you don’t know who Octavia Butler is or that you haven’t read any NK Jemisin or that Babel was too heavy-handed just kills me! I’m not saying you HAVE to enjoy specific books but there is such an obvious pattern here

Some of y’all love marginalized stories but you don’t give a fuck about marginalized creators and characters, and it shows. Like damn

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I have a very strange link to share that a friend sent me. No, not a "'friend', eh? *wink wink nudge nudge*". A friend who's very into artbooks and archiving sent me this.

There is an unbelievable wealth of art books and educational material that is inexplicably hosted on e-hentai.

A cursory look on my part shows that almost all of this is either translated into english or has been localized. There are animation books by Tezuka. There are just artbooks you can't get anymore. This one, I am told, inspired bloodborne.

Lots of knowledge for you archived before archive.org. I hope you find it useful.

It's still a hentai site. Browse at your own risk. You might see illustrated nudity! How terrible!!!

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the biological things on earth represent the only meat for billions of miles in every direction. the universe, as we have so far observed, is notably devoid of meat in all areas we've been able to study, EXCEPT earth.

we are living on the meat planet, the planet which for some reason compels the material contained within its atmosphere to turn into meat.

what do you say to that?

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I'm not sure why crispy chickpeas aren't everywhere as like a top ADHD snack because they are:

Delicious (so you will actually seek them out/want to eat them)

Crispy (a good stim for texture people)

Easy to make (super hands off, they just roast for like 30 minutes while you do something else)

Healthy (it's literally just beans! Such protein!)

Versatile (you can switch up the seasonings if you get tired of one flavor; you can also put them on/in a bunch of different dishes)

Cheap AF & forgiving of your timeline (a can of chickpeas won't go bad in your pantry if you don't have the energy to make something with them this week)

So here's the resippy.

Cooked chickpeas (I usually use one can)

Olive oil

Salt

Paprika or curry powder or rosemary or your favorite spice (optional)

Steps:

Drain and rinse your chickpeas.

Dump them onto a towel or paper towel and rub them dry a bit.

Remove any loose skins. If you're feeling extra you can remove all the skins; this makes them slightly crispier. I do not find this to be worth it.

Put them on a baking sheet (lined with parchment paper if you want to save yourself some cleanup). Toss with a drizzle of olive oil, a generous pinch or two of salt, and your seasoning.

Roast in your oven. I usually do 400°F for about 25-30 minutes, but this is pretty forgiving and you can do 425 for 20 minutes or whatever you want to do

Taste a chickpea. It should have an audible crunch. If it doesn't, put it back in until it does

When done, taste for seasoning and add any additional salt or seasoning you want. Proceed to devour them.

These are best fresh, but I still like them later on (if I don't eat them all right away). Store in an airtight container for a couple days at room temp or a few days in the fridge.

Enjoy!!

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⭐ So you want to learn pixel art? ⭐

🔹 Part 1 of ??? - The Basics!

Hello, my name is Tofu and I'm a professional pixel artist. I have been supporting myself with freelance pixel art since 2020, when I was let go from my job during the pandemic.

My progress, from 2017 to 2024. IMO the only thing that really matters is time and effort, not some kind of natural talent for art.

This guide will not be comprehensive, as nobody should be expected to read allat. Instead I will lean heavily on my own experience, and share what worked for me, so take everything with a grain of salt. This is a guide, not a tutorial. Cheers!

🔹 Do I need money?

NO!!! Pixel art is one of the most accessible mediums out there.

I still use a mouse because I prefer it to a tablet! You won't be at any disadvantage here if you can't afford the best hardware or software.

Because our canvases are typically very small, you don't need a good PC to run a good brush engine or anything like that.

✨Did you know? One of the most skilled and beloved pixel artists uses MS PAINT! Wow!!

🔹 What software should I use?

Here are some of the most popular programs I see my friends and peers using. Stars show how much I recommend the software for beginners! ⭐

💰 Paid options:

⭐⭐��� Aseprite (for PC) - $19.99

This is what I and many other pixel artists use. You may find when applying to jobs that they require some knowledge of Aseprite. Since it has become so popular, companies like that you can swap raw files between artists.

Aseprite is amazingly customizable, with custom skins, scripts and extensions on Itch.io, both free and paid.

If you have ever used any art software before, it has most of the same features and should feel fairly familiar to use. It features a robust animation suite and a tilemap feature, which have saved me thousands of hours of labour in my work. The software is also being updated all the time, and the developers listen to the users. I really recommend Aseprite!

⭐ Photoshop (for PC) - Monthly $$

A decent option for those who already are used to the PS interface. Requires some setup to get it ready for pixel-perfect art, but there are plenty of tutorials for doing so.

Animation is also much more tedious on PS which you may want to consider before investing time!

⭐⭐ ProMotion NG (for PC) - $19.00

An advanced and powerful software which has many features Aseprite does not, including Colour Cycling and animated tiles.

⭐⭐⭐ Pixquare (for iOS) - $7.99 - $19.99

Probably the best app available for iPad users, in active development, with new features added all the time.

Look! My buddy Jon recommends it highly, and uses it often.

One cool thing about Pixquare is that it takes Aseprite raw files! Many of my friends use it to work on the same project, both in their office and on the go.

⭐ Procreate (for iOS) - $12.99

If you have access to Procreate already, it's a decent option to get used to doing pixel art. It does however require some setup. Artist Pixebo is famously using Procreate, and they have tutorials of their own if you want to learn.

🆓 Free options:

⭐⭐⭐ Libresprite (for PC)

Libresprite is an alternative to Aseprite. It is very, very similar, to the point where documentation for Aseprite will be helpful to Libresprite users.

⭐⭐ Pixilart (for PC and mobile)

A free in-browser app, and also a mobile app! It is tied to the website Pixilart, where artists upload and share their work. A good option for those also looking to get involved in a community.

⭐⭐ Dotpict (for mobile)

Dotpict is similar to Pixilart, with a mobile app tied to a website, but it's a Japanese service. Did you know that in Japanese, pixel art is called 'Dot Art'? Dotpict can be a great way to connect with a different community of pixel artists! They also have prompts and challenges often.

🔹 So I got my software, now what?

◽Nice! Now it's time for the basics of pixel art.

❗ WAIT ❗ Before this section, I want to add a little disclaimer. All of these rules/guidelines can be broken at will, and some 'no-nos' can look amazing when done intentionally.

The pixel-art fundamentals can be exceedingly helpful to new artists, who may feel lost or overwhelmed by choice. But if you feel they restrict you too harshly, don't force yourself! At the end of the day it's your art, and you shouldn't try to contort yourself into what people think a pixel artist 'should be'. What matters is your own artistic expression. 💕👍

◽Phew! With that out of the way...

🔸"The Rules"

There are few hard 'rules' of pixel art, mostly about scaling and exporting. Some of these things will frequently trip up newbies if they aren't aware, and are easy to overlook.

🔹Scaling method

There are a couple ways of scaling your art. The default in most art programs, and the entire internet, is Bi-linear scaling, which usually works out fine for most purposes. But as pixel artists, we need a different method.

Both are scaled up x10. See the difference?

On the left is scaled using Bilinear, and on the right is using Nearest-Neighbor. We love seeing those pixels stay crisp and clean, so we use nearest-neighbor. 

(Most pixel-art programs have nearest-neighbor enabled by default! So this may not apply to you, but it's important to know.)

🔹Mixels

Mixels are when there are different (mixed) pixel sizes in the same image.

Here I have scaled up my art- the left is 200%, and the right is 150%. Yuck!

As we can see, the "pixel" sizes end up different. We generally try to scale our work by multiples of 100 - 200%, 300% etc. rather than 150%. At larger scales however, the minute differences in pixel sizes are hardly noticeable!

Mixels are also sometimes seen when an artist scales up their work, then continues drawing on it with a 1 pixel brush.

Many would say that this is not great looking! This type of pixels can be indicative of a beginner artist. But there are plenty of creative pixel artists out there who mixels intentionally, making something modern and cool.

🔹Saving Your Files

We usually save our still images as .PNGs as they don’t create any JPEG artifacts or loss of quality. It's a little hard to see here, but there are some artifacts, and it looks a little blurry. It also makes the art very hard to work with if we are importing a JPEG.

For animations .GIF is good, but be careful of the 256 colour limit. Try to avoid using too many blending mode layers or gradients when working with animations. If you aren’t careful, your animation could flash afterwards, as the .GIF tries to reduce colours wherever it can. It doesn’t look great!

Here's an old piece from 2021 where I experienced .GIF lossiness, because I used gradients and transparency, resulting in way too many colours.

🔹Pixel Art Fundamentals - Techniques and Jargon

❗❗Confused about Jaggies? Anti-Aliasing? Banding? Dithering? THIS THREAD is for you❗❗

As far as I'm concerned, this is THE tutorial of all time for understanding pixel art. These are techniques created and named by the community of people who actually put the list together, some of the best pixel artists alive currently. Please read it!!

🔸How To Learn

Okay, so you have your software, and you're all ready to start. But maybe you need some more guidance? Try these tutorials and resources! It can be helpful to work along with a tutorial until you build your confidence up.

⭐⭐ Pixel Logic (A Digital Book) - $10 A very comprehensive visual guide book by a very skilled and established artist in the industry. I own a copy myself.

⭐⭐⭐ StudioMiniBoss - free A collection of visual tutorials, by the artist that worked on Celeste! When starting out, if I got stuck, I would go and scour his tutorials and see how he did it.

⭐ Lospec Tutorials - free A very large collection of various tutorials from all over the internet. There is a lot to sift through here if you have the time.

⭐⭐⭐ Cyangmou's Tutorials - free (tipping optional) Cyangmou is one of the most respected and accomplished modern pixel artists, and he has amassed a HUGE collection of free and incredibly well-educated visual tutorials. He also hosts an educational stream every week on Twitch called 'pixelart for beginners'.

⭐⭐⭐ Youtube Tutorials - free There are hundreds, if not thousands of tutorials on YouTube, but it can be tricky to find the good ones. My personal recommendations are MortMort, Brandon, and AdamCYounis- these guys really know what they're talking about!

🔸 How to choose a canvas size

When looking at pixel art turorials, we may see people suggest things like 16x16, 32x32 and 64x64. These are standard sizes for pixel art games with tiles. However, if you're just making a drawing, you don't necessarily need to use a standard canvas size like that.

What I like to think about when choosing a canvas size for my illustrations is 'what features do I think it is important to represent?' And make my canvas as small as possible, while still leaving room for my most important elements.

Imagine I have characters in a scene like this:

I made my canvas as small as possible, but just big enough to represent the features and have them be recognizable (it's Good Omens fanart 😤)!! If I had made it any bigger, I would be working on it for ever, due to how much more foliage I would have to render.

If you want to do an illustration and you're not sure, just start at somewhere around 100x100 - 200x200 and go from there.

It's perfectly okay to crop your canvas, or scale it up, or crunch your art down at any point if you think you need a different size. I do it all the time! It only takes a bit of cleanup to get you back to where you were.

🔸Where To Post

Outside of just regular socials, Twitter, Tumblr, Deviantart, Instagram etc, there are a few places that lean more towards pixel art that you might not have heard of.

⭐ Lospec Lospec is a low-res focused art website. Some pieces get given a 'monthly masterpiece' award. Not incredibly active, but I believe there are more features being added often.

⭐⭐ Pixilart Pixilart is a very popular pixel art community, with an app tied to it. The community tends to lean on the young side, so this is a low-pressure place to post with an relaxed vibe.

⭐⭐ Pixeljoint Pixeljoint is one of the big, old-school pixel art websites. You can only upload your art unscaled (1x) because there is a built-in zoom viewer. It has a bit of a reputation for being elitist (back in the 00s it was), but in my experience it's not like that any more. This is a fine place for a pixel artist to post if they are really interested in learning, and the history. The Hall of Fame has some of the most famous / impressive pixel art pieces that paved the way for the work we are doing today.

⭐⭐⭐ Cafe Dot Cafe Dot is my art server so I'm a little biased here. 🍵 It was created during the recent social media turbulence. We wanted a place to post art with no algorithms, and no NFT or AI chuds. We have a heavy no-self-promotion rule, and are more interested in community than skill or exclusivity. The other thing is that we have some kind of verification system- you must apply to be a Creator before you can post in the Art feed, or use voice. This helps combat the people who just want to self-promo and dip, or cause trouble, as well as weed out AI/NFT people. Until then, you are still welcome to post in any of the threads or channels. There is a lot to do in Cafe Dot. I host events weekly, so check the threads!

⭐⭐/r/pixelart The pixel art subreddit is pretty active! I've also heard some of my friends found work through posting here, so it's worth a try if you're looking. However, it is still Reddit- so if you're sensitive to rude people, or criticism you didn't ask for, you may want to avoid this one. Lol

🔸 Where To Find Work

You need money? I got you! As someone who mostly gets scouted on social media, I can share a few tips with you:

Put your email / portfolio in your bio Recruiters don't have all that much time to find artists, make it as easy as possible for someone to find your important information!

Clean up your profile If your profile feed is all full of memes, most people will just tab out rather than sift through. Doesn't apply as much to Tumblr if you have an art tag people can look at.

Post regularly, and repost Activity beats everything in the social media game. It's like rolling the dice, and the more you post the more chances you have. You have to have no shame, it's all business baby

Outside of just posting regularly and hoping people reach out to you, it can be hard to know where to look. Here are a few places you can sign up to and post around on.

/r/INAT INAT (I Need A Team) is a subreddit for finding a team to work with. You can post your portfolio here, or browse for people who need artists.

/r/GameDevClassifieds Same as above, but specifically for game-related projects.

Remote Game Jobs / Work With Indies Like Indeed but for game jobs. Browse them often, or get email notifications.

VGen VGen is a website specifically for commissions. You need a code from another verified artist before you can upgrade your account and sell, so ask around on social media or ask your friends. Once your account is upgraded, you can make a 'menu' of services people can purchase, and they send you an offer which you are able to accept, decline, or counter.

The evil websites of doom: Fiverr and Upwork I don't recommend them!! They take a big cut of your profit, and the sites are teeming with NFT and AI people hoping to make a quick buck. The site is also extremely oversaturated and competitive, resulting in a race to the bottom (the cheapest, the fastest, doing the most for the least). Imagine the kind of clients who go to these websites, looking for the cheapest option. But if you're really desperate...

🔸 Community

I do really recommend getting involved in a community. Finding like-minded friends can help you stay motivated to keep drawing. One day, those friends you met when you were just starting out may become your peers in the industry. Making friends is a game changer!

Discord servers Nowadays, the forums of old are mostly abandoned, and people split off into many different servers. Cafe Dot, Pixel Art Discord (PAD), and if you can stomach scrolling past all the AI slop, you can browse Discord servers here.

Twitch Streams Twitch has kind of a bad reputation for being home to some of the more edgy gamers online, but the pixel art community is extremely welcoming and inclusive. Some of the people I met on Twitch are my friends to this day, and we've even worked together on different projects! Browse pixel art streams here, or follow some I recommend: NickWoz, JDZombi, CupOhJoe, GrayLure, LumpyTouch, FrankiePixelShow, MortMort, Sodor, NateyCakes, NyuraKim, ShinySeabass, I could go on for ever really... There are a lot of good eggs on Pixel Art Twitch.

🔸 Other Helpful Websites

Palettes Lospec has a huge collection of user-made palettes, for any artist who has trouble choosing their colours, or just wants to try something fun. Rejected Palettes is full of palettes that didn't quite make it onto Lospec, ran by people who believe there are no bad colours.

The Spriters Resource TSR is an incredible website where users can upload spritesheets and tilesets from games. You can browse for your favourite childhood game, and see how they made it! This website has helped me so much in understanding how game assets come together in a scene.

VGMaps Similar to the above, except there are entire maps laid out how they would be played. This is incredible if you have to do level design, or for mocking up a scene for fun.

Game UI Database Not pixel-art specific, but UI is a very challenging part of graphics, so this site can be a game-changer for finding good references!

Retronator A digital newspaper for pixel-art lovers! New game releases, tutorials, and artworks!

Itch.io A website where people can upload, games, assets, tools... An amazing hub for game devs and game fans alike. A few of my favourite tools: Tiled, PICO-8, Pixel Composer, Juice FX, Magic Pencil for Aseprite

🔸 The End?

This is just part 1 for now, so please drop me a follow to see any more guides I release in the future. I plan on doing some writeups on how I choose colours, how to practise, and more!

I'm not an expert by any means, but everything I did to get to where I am is outlined in this guide. Pixel art is my passion, my job and my hobby! I want pixel art to be recognized everywhere as an art-form, a medium of its own outside of game-art or computer graphics!

This guide took me a long time, and took a lot of research and experience. Consider following me or supporting me if you are feeling generous.

And good luck to all the fledgling pixel artists, I hope you'll continue and have fun. I hope my guide helped you, and don't hesitate to send me an ask if you have any questions! 💕

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horror sub-genres: romantic

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even more random youtube videos i enjoy

I promise this story about fonts is interesting

a goofy history of classic doctor who (1963-99)

Legends Summarized: Arthur's Knights

merlin being sassy for 15 minutes straight

The Curious Life of a Mars Rover | Nat Geo Live

The Experimental Phones of the 2000s…

the criminally underrated costume design of Jennifer's Body

8 Terrible Science Takes

Hands (2024) | A Student Short Film on Female Friendships (Shot on Sony FX6 & FX9)

Stanford Computer Scientist Answers Coding Questions From Twitter | Tech Support | WIRED

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I made Hungarian mushroom soup and it's a little too delicious to be real

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Caramel Cheesecake Bars 😋🍰

Ingredients:

Crust:

2 cups graham cracker crumbs

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted

1/4 cup granulated sugar

Filling:

3 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened

1 cup granulated sugar

3 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Caramel Topping:

1 cup caramel sauce (store-bought or homemade)

1/2 teaspoon sea salt (optional)

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 325°F (163°C). Line a 9x13-inch baking pan with parchment paper, leaving some overhang for easy removal.

In a medium bowl, combine the graham cracker crumbs, melted butter, and 1/4 cup granulated sugar. Press the mixture firmly into the bottom of the prepared pan to form the crust.

In a large bowl, beat the softened cream cheese until smooth. Add the 1 cup granulated sugar and beat until well combined.

Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in the vanilla extract.

Pour the cream cheese mixture over the crust and spread it evenly.

Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until the center is set and the edges are lightly browned.

Allow the cheesecake to cool completely in the pan. Once cooled, pour the caramel sauce over the top, spreading it evenly. If desired, sprinkle with sea salt.

Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before cutting into bars.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cooking Time: 45 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 5 minutes + chilling time | Servings: 24 bars | Kcal: 320 kcal

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So You’ve Finally Switched to Firefox: a Brief Guide to a Some Very Useful Add-Ons.

This post is inspired by two things, the first being the announcement by Google that the long delayed Manifest V3 which will kill robust adblocking will finally roll out in June 2024, and the second, a post written by @sexhaver in response to a question as to what adblockers and extensions they use. It’s a very good post with some A+ information, worth checking out.

I love Firefox, I love the degree of customization it offers me as a user. I love how it just works. I love the built in security features like DNS over HTTPS, and I love just how many excellent add-ons are available. It is a better browser than Chrome in every respect, and of the many Chromium based browsers out there, only Vivaldi comes close.

There are probably many people out there who are considering switching over to Firefox but are maybe putting it off because they’ve got Chrome set up the way they like it with the extensions they want, and doing all that again for Firefox seems like a chore. The Firefox Add-on directory is less expansive than the Chrome Web Store (which in recent years has become overrun with garbage extensions that range from useless to active malware), but there is still a lot of stuff to sift through. That’s where this short guide comes in.

I’m presently running 33 add-ons for Firefox and have a number of others installed but disabled. I’ve used many others. These are my picks, the ones that I consider essential, useful, or in some cases just fun.

Adblocking/Privacy/Security:

uBlock Origin: The single best adblocker available. If you’re a power user there are custom lists and scripts you can find to augment it.

Privacy Badger: Not strictly necessary if you’re also running uBlock, but it does catch a few trackers uBlock doesn’t and replaces potentially useful trackers like comment boxes with click-to-activate placeholders.

Decentraleyes: A supplementary tool meant to run alongside uBlock, prevents certain sites from breaking when tracker requests are denied by serving local bundled files as replacement.

NoScript: The nuclear option for blocking trackers, ads, and even individual elements. Operates from a “trust no one” standpoint, you will need to manually enable elements yourself. Not recommended for casual users, but a fantastic tool for the power user.

Webmail Ad Blocker: The first of many webmail related add-ons from Jason Saward I will be recommending. Removes all advertising from webmail services like Gmail or Yahoo Mail.

Popup Blocker (Strict): Strictly blocks ALL pop up/new tab/new window requests from all website by default unless you manually allow it.

SponsorBlock: Not a fan of listening to your favourite YouTuber read advertisements for shitty products like Raycons or BetterHelp? This skips them automatically.

AdNauseam: I don’t use this one but some people prefer it. Rather than straight up blocking ads and trackers, it obfuscates data by injecting noise into the tracker surveillance infrastructure. It clicks EVERY ad, making your data profile incomprehensible.

User-Agent Switcher: Allows you to spoof websites attempting to gather information by altering your browser profile. Want to browse mobile sites on desktop? This allows you to do it.

Bitwarden: Bitwarden has been my choice of password manager since LastPass sold out and made their free tier useless. If you’re not using a password manager, why not? All of my passwords look like this: $NHhaduC*q3VhuhD&scICLKjvM4rZK5^c7ID%q5HVJ3@gny I don’t know a single one of them and I use a passphrase as a master password supplemented by two-factor-authentication. Everything is filled in automatically. It is the only way to live.

Proton Pass: An open source free password manager from the creators of Proton Mail. I’ve been considering moving over to it from Bitwarden myself.

Webmail/Google Drive:

Checker Plus for Gmail: Provides desktop notifications for Gmail accounts, supports managing multiple accounts, allows you to check your mail, read, mark as read or delete e-mails at a glance in a pop-up window. An absolutely fabulous add-on from Jason Saward.

Checker Plus for Google Drive: Does for your Google Drive what Checker Plus for Gmail does for your Gmail.

Checker Plus for Google Calendar: The same as the above two only this time for your Google Calendar.

Firefox Relay: An add-on that allows you to generate aliases that forward to your real e-mail address.

Accessibility:

Dark Reader: Gives every page on the internet a customizable Dark Mode for easier reading and eye protection.

Read Aloud: A text to speech add-on that reads pages with the press of a button.

Zoom Page WE: Provides the ability to zoom in on pages in multiple ways: text zoom, full page zoom, auto-fit etc.

Mobile Dyslexic: Not one I use, but I know people who swear by it. Replaces all fonts with a dyslexia friendly type face.

Utility:

ClearURLs: Automatically removes tracking data from URLs.

History Cleaner: Automatically deletes browser history older than a set number of days.

Feedbro RSS Feed Reader: A full standalone reader in your browser, take control of your feed and start using RSS feeds again.

Video Download Helper: A great tool for downloading video files from websites.

Snap Link Plus: Fan of Wikipedia binge holes? Snap Link allows to drag select multiple hyperlink and automatically open all of them in new tabs.

Copy PlainText: Copy any text without formatting.

EPUBReader: Read .epub files from within a browser window.

Tab Stash: A no mess, no fuss way to organize groups of tabs as bookmarks. I use it as a temporary bookmark tool, saving sessions or groups of tabs into “to read” folders.

Tampermonkey/Violentmonkey: Managers for installing and running custom user scripts. Find user scripts on OpenUserJS or Greasy Fork, there’s an entire galaxy out there of ingenious and weird custom user scripts out there, go discover it.

Browsing & Searching:

Speed Dial 2: A new tab add-on that gives you easy access to your favourite sites.

Unpaywall: Whenever you come across a scholarly article behind a paywall, this add-on will search through all the free databases for an accessible and non-paywalled version of the text.

Web Archives: Come across a dead page? This add-on gives you a quick way to search for cached versions of the page on the Wayback Machine, Google Cache, Archive.is and others.

Bypass Paywalls: Automatically bypasses the paywalls of major websites like those for the New York Times, New Yorker, the Financial Times, Wired, etc.

Simple Translate: Simple one-click translation of web pages powered by Google Translate.

Search by Image: Reverse search any image via several different search engines: Google Image, TinEye, Yandex, Bing, etc.

Website Specific:

PocketTube: Do you subscribe to too many YouTube channels? Would you like a way to organize them? This is your answer.

Enhancer for Youtube: Provides a suite of options that make using YouTube more pleasant: volume boost, theatre mode, forced quality settings, playback speed and mouse wheel volume control.

Augmented Steam: Improves the experience of using Steam in a browser, see price histories of games, take notes on your wishlist, make wish listed games and new DLC for games you own appear more visible, etc.

Return YouTube Dislikes: Does exactly what it says on the package.

BlueBlocker: Hate seeing the absolute dimmest individuals on the planet have their replies catapulted to the top of the feed because they’re desperate to suck off daddy Elon sloppy style? This is for you, it automatically blocks all Blue Checks on Twitter. I’ve used it to block a cumulative 34,000 Blue Checks.

Batchcamp: Allows for batch downloading on Bandcamp.

XKit Rewritten: If you’re on Tumblr and you’re not using whichever version of XKit is currently available, I honestly don’t know what to say to you. This newest version isn’t as fully featured as the old XKit of the golden age, but it’s been rewritten from the ground up for speed and utility.

Social Fixer for Facebook: I once accidentally visited Facebook without this add-on enabled and was immediately greeted by the worst, mind annihilating content slop I had ever had the misfortune to come across. Videos titled “he wanted her to get lip fillers and she said no so he had bees sting her lips”, and AI photos of broccoli Jesus with 6000 comments all saying “wow”. Once I turned it on it was just stuff my dad had posted and updates from the Radio War Nerd group.

BetterTTV: Makes Twitch slightly more bearable.

Well I think that’s everything. You don’t have to install everything here, or even half of it, but there you go, it’s a start.

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everyone's like wehhhhh why doesn't doctor house gets suuuueeed! like my man. literally every patient he sees is someone that's been trying to find a diagnosis for ages. i could live with a little medical malpractice if it were coming from someone ready to break into my home to look for allergens and not simply half heartedly listen to me before suggesting I lose weight and take ages of back and forth arguing to order a single test

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