#I need to incorporate this into my art right the fuck now

[astralnymphh]

patterned palmistry ⋆ | ellie williams headcanons

༺ ellie x witch!reader headcanons/scenarios ༻ ☽𖤐☾

✧˖ ° 🕯 bright blessings!

an: being the witchy little gremlin i am i just had to throw some hcs together for myself but ofc i'd share them here🙄ive been practicing witchcraft since i was 15 so it felt fitting to incorporate it whenever i brace my delusions at the bootycrack of midnight that r all abt ellie 💀 regardless this def isnt gonna be my only witchy hcs post i just didnt wanna spoil all my ideas right away <3 tags: MDNI, slight nsfw (no detailed smut), boob jokes, witchcraft (obv), tarot, palm reading, mostly convos, flirting, not mentioned in the writing but u 2 r alrdy dating, playful bickering, more natural casual writing with some bigger words, no specific religion tied to the practice, generally a fluff piece, lowk cute moments. °________________________⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆__________________________°

I. ☆ ellie definitely had a peak in curiosity the first time you mentioned you immerse yourself in the world of the craft, her ears perked figuratively and were tuned in to learn what that entails. she may not forfeit a nip of skepticism right away but she's more than happy to engross herself in the idea of it. you'd stay up till first light rambling on about the 'rituals', 'divination', the history tied to it and why you practice it. you'd be lying in bed adjacent to her, heavenward to the ceiling, but interwoven in a warm and loving cuddle with her palm residing on your lap whilst you chatted.

"mmmmh-" ellie's hum churns 'round your bedroom, "so that's why you collect rocks."

"crystals."

"same thing," she drones an inwardly giggle, "which crystal will give me superpowers?" a witty remark springs from her tongue.

"babe.." you pout, acting offended yet none is taken.

"didn't mean it like that, y'know I believe you, it's all just new to me." ellie tapes an assuring kiss to your temple, "tell me about your favorite crystals, hmm?" 

⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆

II. ☆ now because of this, anytime you're out on patrol and delight the opportunity of scavenging, she always keeps in mind to find you flowers, rocks, unused candles and other oddities of nature.

"hey babe! I found a black candle for'ya." ellie bolstered a long glass cylinder filled with an opaque charcoal wax, wick still intact, "and- ..some wild lavender." her other arm swings from behind her back, twines of dusty purple lavender upheld in a pinch.

"fuck yeah, needed this stuff.." you graciously tweak the lavender from her, whiffing up its poignant scent.

"always on the lookout.." her voice resembles her proud countenance outwards, essentially, a dorky smirk.

⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆

III. ☆ obviously, the second you mentioned the art of tarot to her, she begged for a reading. whenever a card flew from your shuffling motions, she'd patiently wait for you to place it before her and then she'd swipe it up and admire the art piece detailing the cardstock.

"whew! look at the boobs on this one!" 

"oh- my god, of course you'd point that out." you snatch the card from her, shamelessly ogling the nude depiction that had her attention.

"you're looking at them too!"

"cuz' you said something 'bout it!" you flick the card towards her face, noting, "those are some nice boobs though." 

"why thank you~" 

"wasn't talking about you, idiot!" 

"eh, but.. urs' are the best." her hoarse tone binds a nonchalant flirtiness in its rumble.

"oh really? should we compare the.. four?"

that really stole her attention.

⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆

IV. ☆ the first time you entertained her with a palm reading, it had her all dappy and touched to the essence at the paltry contact you made with her hand. your fingerprints drafting her calloused palms with such a gentle focus on every river lining her hand. she just wanted to smother you with kisses.

"and… this is your heart line." your finger hovers the crevice of her palm-pads stretching from index to pinkie, "ah.. it's a broken one.."

"is that.. bad?" her juniper eyes study your expression meticulously.

"it just means u're closed off, stubborn, have some emotional trauma.. stuff like that." you mindlessly fiddle with her fingers, "lines can change though, so.."

she nods, taking in the insight. she licks her slightly chapped lips clean, "am I stubborn?" her voice rises partially an octave, bending playfulness in her question.

"mm.. no."

"why'd you hesitate?"

"well- the only times ur' stubborn is refusing to let go whenever you hug me- ur' a life-size sloth!" 

"I like huggin' you though." a puppy pout frowns on her lips, "you're like a pillow!"

and oh, how your heart capers a beat, "is that all I am, williams?"

her swift speech conjuncts, "whaddid' I say about that name?!"

"I don't know, I think you like it." 

"nuh-uh I don't!"

you pepper a haste kiss to her knuckles still forcepped in your clasp, totally deterring the crime you've just committed when a half impish half taken aback smile creaks her lips.

"c'mere." vaults from her tongue before she lunges her body forward and tackles you in a saucy position riddled with love bites. guess you'll be reading her palms in a different way tonight.

⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆ V. ☆ an bonus hc, you'd totally mention out of the void about her tattoo n the mystic meanings surrounding moths, like, its for sure one of the topics you'll ramble about one night cause you just feel so wise for knowing. "y'know, moths play a pretty large role in the metaphysical world." "really? i mean, i knew they had some kind of.. 'symbolism' to them-" ellie's hand rolls over the knoll of her forearm, reading the bumps glamoured in that beautiful inking. "yeah, like- luna moths represent transformation, renewal.. oh! and death-head moths are an omen of death.. an- and black witch moths mean either good luck, or bad-" ellie is amused at your prattle shown by her raspy giggles, legitimately having to conceal her scrunched face. "what?" "nothin' you- you're just so cute." "stop.." the embarrassment catches up to you, now having to hide your face to the shadows beneath your hands. her finger cranes out to hook and uncover your nerdy grin, assuring, "never stop tellin' me bout this stuff, ok babe?" a wide delighted beam syncs on her cheeks. goddess above, her dimples and nasal lines are to die for. ⋆༺𓆩☠︎︎𓆪༻⋆

𖤐

in general; she's a curious dork n will ask you oh so many questions, i mean, she loves space and a futuristic sci-fi comic for crying out loud, she's alrdy so imaginative so ofc she'd be open to a realistic amount. she'd also be so respectful and helpful n defend ur practice with so much love. maybe she'd pick up some little traditions and customs like folding letters a specific amount of times, drawing little pentacles, mixing liquid in specific directions, just the simple things that grow on her.

[pepsiconcoction]

oh remembwr when changbin said when he angry all it takes is physical touch or any act of affection for him to turn into putty and how he said hannie instead of being th wfirat to apologise or something just waits with open arms and breaks down when the other person comes to him first WELL IMAGINE A FIC THAT INCORPORATES EITHER OF THESE WITH A LITTLE ANGST WITH HAPPY ENDING WITH READER🫢

thank u anon, i will also do the jisung one, so keep an eye out!

Lion Tamer | Seo Changbin x Reader

pairing: seo changbin x fem!reader

tags: angst, miscommunication? a little suggestive at the end, like one swear word, good ending dw, other member makes an appearance

requested: yes!

wc: 1,130

Changbin is known for his short temper, that’s just a fact. He’s easily antagonised, resulting in some hilarious, unexpected, or very occasionally scary outbursts. He is quick to jump up or shout, and hard to calm down. Not many people have mastered the art of lion taming, but you? You’ve somehow perfected it. It wasn’t a conscious thing you did, but it seems you have some unseen power over him.

Your power was discovered by chance in the JYP dance studio. You had been invited along by your wonderful boyfriend who clearly just wanted to show off, knowing this you agreed anyway. You’d be a hypocrite not to indulge him a little bit, right?

During a 5-minute water break, a conversation had started up about shoes. Particularly, platforms. Now, everyone knows that Stray Kids aren’t exactly the tallest, your boyfriend being the shortest of them all, so you could already feel him become tense from his place next to you on the leather sofa. 

“I don’t like them, they make me feel like my proportions are wrong,” Minho says from his place on the floor, flat on his back, limbs spread.

“I like them, our team needs them.” Felix contributes, resulting in a few laughs.

“Changbin maybe, I’d say the rest of us are fine.” Minho raises his head, smirking at Changbin.

“Hey! You’re not that much taller!”

“Yeah? Stand up.” Minho doesn’t move. Changbin takes the challenge, sputtering, and stands up. He goes to walk towards Minho who is still starfished, but you grab his hand.

“Sit down, Bin.” You chuckle. He stops in his tracks and plops down next to you immediately, holding your hand properly.

“Did you see that?” Hyunjin says, throwing his head back laughing.

“Yeah,” Jeongin speaks up. “Y/n has some serious powers.”

This results in some laughter around the room while Changbin looks at you, eyes creased with an open grin.

“How am I supposed to say no?” He chuckles, and takes your hand in both of his, squeezing it gently.

Your powers also work in more serious instances. Like the time Changbin thought you were cheating on him, accosting you the moment he got home from the studio.

“Y/n, you have some explaining to do,” he said, entering your shared living room where you had been sitting, peacefully reading.

“What?” you blinked up at him.

“Don’t play with me, I’m not stupid.”

“Bin, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you don’t, of course, you don’t.” He rolls his eyes, crossing his arms. If you weren’t so confused, you’d be ogling his arms in the tight black t-shirt he’s wearing.

“I really don’t. Can you tell me what I’ve apparently done?” You put your phone down next to you on the sofa.

“You know, if you wanted to break up with me, you should’ve just said something.” That shocked you into closing your mouth. 

“If you wanted to see other people, I wouldn’t stop you. Well, I would, I’d definitely try but if you really wanted to break up I couldn’t stop you. I’d be pissed though because I love you so much and I thought our relationship was practically perfect. And we’re usually so good at communicating so I’m upset that you couldn’t just tell me what’s wrong, or what happened for you to have a change of heart. But seriously, a fucking soft launch on your insta? That’s just shitty.”

Soft launch? Insta? Oh.

You stand up, keeping a relaxed posture and facial expression.

“So are you going to leave? Because if you are, I want my hoodies back, especially the navy one, it’s my favourite one.” He’s slowly getting louder.

Honestly, he’s kind of cute when he’s ranting. You stifle a laugh, taking a step into his space.

“Oh, so you’re laughing at me now? Oh, yes! Let’s laugh at Changbin! Ha! Ha! Ha! So fun-” 

You cut him off by grabbing the sides of his face and pulling him in for a kiss. His mouth doesn’t really react but his hands do instinctively come to your sides. 

“Sorry, I had to get you to shut up.” You pull back, meeting a very emotionally conflicted Changbin.

“Bin. First of all, I’m not leaving you. Second of all, I didn’t soft launch. That was my cousin. He joined me and my aunt for lunch because he is in town at the minute. And lastly, you are so cute when you’re jealous.”

You get a front-row seat to the cogs turning in his head. You watch as his eyes widen and his face flushes a bright shade of red. You throw your head back laughing, still holding the sides of his head. The hands holding you have tightened their grip now, and he’s ducking his head down to hide in your neck.

“I am so sorry. I should be ashamed. Actually.” He cuts himself off and falls to his knees in front of you, arms unwrapping from around you to clasp them together as if he were praying.

“Please forgive me, I’m so sorry. A thousand times over. Hey, stop laughing, I’m trying to apologise. I should never have assumed anything,” he says. You catch your breath and look down at him, instantly bringing a hand to run through his hair. His hands return to you, pulling you into him, and he buries his face in your stomach, mumbling more apologies.

“Changbin, please, look at me.” You use your leverage on his hair to force him to look up. He looks up at you with big eyes.

“Get up.” You giggle. He immediately stands. 

“It’s okay, I can understand why you thought that, but you are also super dumb for even thinking that I’d do that in the first place. Why would I ever leave you?”

“I don’t know,” he mumbles, shrugging.

“Exactly, I have no intention to ever leave my wonderful, adorable, handsome-”

“Sexy.”

“Uh-huh, sexy, smart, kind, and sometimes jealous boyfriend.” You smile up at him, putting your hands on his shoulders. He ducks his head into your neck once more.

“I really am sorry, you know.” 

“I know you are.” 

You feel his arms tighten around you in a strong hug and the two of you stay there for a few seconds as he sways the two of you gently.

“Okay, grovelling over,” he says suddenly standing up straight, dazing you slightly. He suddenly grabs you, easily throwing you over his shoulder.

“What are you doing?” You nearly shout as he begins to move.

“Making it up to my wonderful, understanding, sexy girlfriend! Unless she has any complaints with the proposition?” he replies, and that’s when you realise you’re headed in the direction of the bedroom, and you throw your head back laughing again.

“No complaints here!”

taglist (lmk if u wanna be added!) : @lethallyprotected

[ccrites]

i've been thinking of getting a tattoo for a long time, not only because i want to, but also to cover an old stick'n'poke i got when i was 15.

and so it got me thinking of the 141 tattoo artist!au. and oh boy.

Kyle would be an absolute sweetheart. not judging the stupid decisions a teenager made. more like "you wanted a tattoo and you went out of your way to get it, that's awesome. now how about we enhance it instead of covering it, whaddya think pretty girl?" and he'd draw around it, incorporate it into his art, go over the parts that are faded and uneven, then, when he's finished, wipe it gently and go "there, what should've been your first real tattoo" with his blinding smile and a promise to also be the one to do your next one

Johnny would be excited about finding creative ways to make parts of the stick'n'poke incorporate into other elements, make it so you'd never know it was there. but he's also a bit of a freak! making sort of mean comments about, "such a stupid decision, you were but a wee lass and ye didn't know what you wanted! thank god Johnny's here ta' fix ya'". It doesn't help that the tattoo you got was somewhere hidden, somewhere your parents wouldn't see on summer vacation (think where your underwear would cover it, or under your bra straps!) and he'd be such a creep! Sitting closer than absolutely necessary, looking at you too intensely. At the end, he'd suggest a truly hidden tattoo, "Only for me to see, bun, whaddya say?"

Ghost would be the type to frown behind the mask and look at you meanly, and you're afraid that he'd judge you for doing this kind of thing (you had your reasons, okay? some rough period in your life, you needed catharsis, and you were too young to get a real tattoo) and he'd be really condescending, all "there's a reasons youngins can't get them. Cuz' it's a stupid decision to make." and he'd huff and draw the most exquisite art you'd seen, all black, bold lines, and way, way bigger than necessary to cover the small tattoo. If the tattoo was on your hip, he'd extend it from your waist all the way down to your knee, make it flow with your curves, accentuate the stretch marks, and you can't say no because you absolutely adore the style. if the tattoo was on your ribs (bra straps, remember?" he'd extend it under your tits, bring it back over the clavicle, make it to be seen. and the pain. oh the pain. "you said you wanted catharsis, right?"

John would absolutely be on Ghost's side, with "there's a reason they don't let kids get tattoos" and you hear the underlying what a fucking mistake, and you see how he judges you... it makes you want to get it from him the most. Until you get to the consultation, and he tells you to get it lasered off first. But it's so faded, it should be easy to cover, no? you argue. he won't budge. So you get the expensive laser. it sorta hurts mentally, because you got it done with your best friend, and you always assumed you'd keep it there, underneath another layer of ink, where only you would remember it. It takes a few sessions, but then the skin is clean, a blank canvas for John to paint on. and paint he does. it's the most gorgeous piece you could ever imagine, you can see the inspiration Ghost draws from him, all bold shapes that flow into each other and compliment your body. Your skin is raw and pink when he's done, and you get up to admire the work... until you get a closer look in the mirror. you know exactly where the old tattoo would've been, and you'd expected to not be able to place it, under the new art. in its stead, two letters, black, bold, beautifully intertwined.... J.P. ... He'd put his lips next to your ear as you stand in shocked silence. "You're my canvas now."

[luckyshouse]

the reason why fetish art and acceptance of sexuality is so insanely important is because shame is what drives the pedophile. shame and secrecy, they never learn to look their sexual expression in the face and never learn how to engage with it in an adult way with other adults. and that is partially due to the shame and harassment put onto people with strange and unusual kinks and fetishes, and partially due to their own trauma and refusal to admit that they are a sexual being and have agency over their sexuality. one thing i've noticed about all groomers and all pedophiles is that they act as if their kinks, fetishes, and sexual needs are uncontrollable. a separate part of them. something uncontrollable and something that will exist no matter what. i believe this is also why there has been very little success when it comes to rehabilitating known pedophiles, especially when considering once you do something once, it opens up the doors to continuing the same behavior because you got away with it before. but the thing is, sexuality will always, always be fluid, and people need to channel that into something else in an adult way. your sexual needs ARE your regular needs, they are the same as any other desire or need, and they can be shifted or changed when you actually care about the people you are affecting. there are so many people on this website right fucking now who are my age, and my heart bleeds for them because i know what the internet is like. i know what it is like to be bombarded by constant disgusting sexual content from as soon as you can read, its something i'm very aware of. and these people are being told that theres no fixing their sexuality, that these genuinely malicious fetishes and kinks that were pushed onto them as children have caused them to be forever pedophiles. and that they need to convince people that thats okay. but what they need is for someone to sit them the fuck down and explain to them that what they are doing is literally actively creating more people like them right now, that their CP and their incest work is literally at this moment being used to groom more kids into thinking this is ok. they need to be sat down and explained to that yes kinks and fetishes are entirely normal, they are something you should learn to incorporate into your life and expression and identity if you feel the need, they are things you need to talk to with OTHER real adults about. because we are animals, we are sexual beings by nature, and it is important for human development to open up these conversations. but shame and regret and untreated trauma keeps these people in these cycles of trying to justify some SERIOUSLY egregious shit just so they can get off without examining their trauma, or examining WHY they're getting off to this in the first place. i honestly find it really deplorable. i thought we were supposed to be the ones ensuring this shit wouldn't ever happen again to kids, and yet here we are, 2024, all the people i grew up with who i saw get groomed over and over and over and over on this website are now making posts about how looking at pictures of children getting fucked and reading stories about a brother preying on his sister is completely fucking normal. i'm sorry to burst your bubble, it isn't. your posts stink of untreated, unexamined trauma, you have let yourself become a slave to your libido that isn't even yours anymore. i don't know how to explain to these people that i am not conservative for saying this, and i don't know how to explain to these people that incest and pedophilia is literally the white mans tool for purity and control. it isn't kinky fun time, it isn't just a devious taboo. grow the fuck up. it is a white supremacy tool that was used AGAINST you to indoctrinate you and you fell for it hook line and sinker and are now trying to convince people you aren't guilty. you are. and you will be guilty until you take a moment to step back and look at yourself in the eyes, and ask yourself why that specific power dynamic is seemingly the ONLY thing that can get you off.

There are plenty of other fetishes and kinks that have almost the exact same sort of power dynamic, the same sort of humiliation or control or risque-ness out there. The issue is, these things ARE actually taboo, they are seen as the ACTUAL SEXUAL DEVIANCE, because they are intrinsically connected to art and homosexuality. that's how i know none of you mean anything you actually say, i know that none of you actually give a fuck about human psychology or "pro-kink" or anything like that because you straight up only use the excuses you use to get away with your fictional CP. i want there to be a happy ending for us, i want there to be spaces for us to express ourselves, i want to see people learn to interact with sexuality in a healthy and fun and unique way. I am so fucking tired of seeing my entire peer group take the tools that rich white pedophiles have pushed onto us and use it on eachother and younger generations. it makes me sick to my fucking stomach. Grow up. Get into other things. Stop trying to get other people to manage your trauma for you. I do not forgive you, and your posts attempting to shove your guilt onto me mean fucking nothing. You can only say "you sound like a conservative homophobe" so many times to me without sounding actually fucking insane, knowing my pedophile conservative father would be patting you on the back knowing he taught you well. You're a coward. I want to see you grow a pair.

[dontmixpaintinyourcoffee]

Working on some designs for the White Witches! The concept of them is so fucking creepy and unsettling I love it so much, so naturally I have to draw them. But before I get to do that, I have to figure out how the fuck to do that- so welcome to my process! This is gonna be long as hell, so I've put it under the cut for the sake of convenience.

First we gotta go over what we have. I haven't seen any official art of White Witches, only of the Manus and some Hunters, so we gotta work off of the narration. The first notes I took were from Arc 2, the first ever appearance of a White Witch.

These are the details I got from that scene:

White robes

Gloves

Long sleeves

Long white veil with light green and blue embroidery

Lower face showing, eyes covered

So all of these needed to be incorporated somehow. Step one was messing around with the veil and the robe silhouette.

Silhouette

This part was easy enough, I wanted to stick with the church theme so I started looking through nun habits. I didn't want to exactly copy any specific style, but it felt like an appropriate starting point. What I ended up keeping was a heavy lean on triangles and rectangles.

Veils

This was probably my favorite part to experiment with. The veils are described as covering the eyes, but not the lower half of the face, so you can see the mouth clearly. This detail actually spawned a whole train of thought that massively influenced my design going forward but we'll get to that later-

The first idea I had was to just take a regular veil and make it sheer at the bottom, like a gradient. But I quickly dropped that, it felt too same-y, and with colors it would blend right in to the rest of the white robes. The whole point was to bring a focus to the face. What I ended up sticking with was this!

Once I had it down it seemed so obvious- a split veil! I just put a split across the bridge of the nose and bam, suddenly it made sense. The triangular cut and the cascading folds just kind of happened, it felt natural with the rest of the shapes I had been drawing. A friend said it reminded him of moths, which felt oddly fitting given their association with magic in Arc 1. In retrospect, I think I was subconsciously inspired by early appearances of Blue Diamond in Steven Universe. Not intentional, but I do love how it turned out.

Other Uniform Details

This is the "later" I mentioned earlier, because I am obsessed with the implications of this veil. It's very specifically said that a White Witch is never without her Manus or a Hunter, and the first one we ever see is flanked by two hunters. They are, fundamentally, still seen by the church as threats.

So with that in mind, one goal expanded into two. At first my goal was to make them unsettling, but beautiful. Like porcelain dolls. The church doesn't parade their cruelty around, they dress it up in fine robes and narratives of redemption.*

* This is some extrapolation on my part. It's mentioned in Arc 2 that most witches regard White Witches as "traitors". That implies that their imprisonment is not common knowledge. If it was, they would be "captives" or "prisoners". Even if they turned themselves in, I highly doubt they were signing up for whatever the fuck is going on in that church.

Now I have my second goal: make them clearly, but not obviously, trapped.

This gave me a really clear direction to move in, because now every piece of fabric has an extra practical purpose. For example-

There is a myth that making eye contact with a witch is inviting a curse upon yourself. The veil helps with that. Blocking their eyes eases the anxieties of any passerby or audience (and makes real spells that require direct eye contact impossible). It also heavily obscures their vision, making them reliant on their Manus to move around effectively. The mouth is uncovered so that they can always be monitored for recitations or chanting. Symbolically, the veil could parallel the blindfold of Lady Justice. If the narrative spun by the Church is that the white witches are willingly working in their service, then there is a sense of self-redemption to it. Turning wicked skills to the service of what is good and holy. Repenting as an act of the pursuit of justice. Obviously made all the more ironic and gross by the true nature of the whole thing.

The long sleeves are beautiful, and add to the general elegance of the uniform. They are also deeply impractical. The length makes them easy to trip over, the weight of the fabric makes them difficult to roll up.

There's a sketch on the first image by my friend who suggested that they could have twin trains coming off of the skirt, like moth wings. They create a very sleek and elegant design befitting the image of the Church. They're also easy to step on or grab in the event of a runaway witch. Naturally I took his suggestion.

This is what I meant by "clear but not obvious". None of this stuff is hidden, but most people aren't going to notice it. Someone like Zachary probably would, because he would be thinking from the perspective of how to escape or fight back, so he'd pick up on those details. But the general non-magic crowd isn't going to be thinking about that at all. They'll assume that a lack of literal chains means that there are no prisoners here. So the Church gets to keep a squeaky clean image with the public at large while still acting as a prison.

Basically, I'm having way too much fun with this. And now I have a solid idea of what I want these guys to look like! Next up will be settling on designs for Little One, Pointer, and Middle! (Speaking of which the utter disrespect of calling her "Middle"???? That was one of the details that made "As violently as possible please :D" a very satisfying moment)

[ash-and-starlight]

Ciao Ash I’ve been following your work super closely for a few years and I now feel like I can ask you this, especially since you seem to be so kind with everyone and always explain yourself so well!

I work in illustration and I’ve been drawing for 10 years. For the kind of illustration I do, I rarely have to draw characters. I can draw people, in a very detailed manner too (portraits and studies and such) but when it comes to incorporating characters in my illustration style, I just can’t seem to get it right. Especially with characters who don’t exist so if I want to do fanart, I always have to do it in a way that is not very coherent to my illustration style. Which is unfortunate since I’m in a lot of fandoms and would really like to make fanart I like.

I rely on references a lot, so if I have to draw someone who exists in my style, I struggle and study and put a lot of work and time in but then I’m mostly able to. But characters from fiction? Absolutely not. I especially struggle with consistency: the character always looks different every time I draw them, no matter how many notes on their physiognomy I make…the fact that’s not a real person I can copy the features of on paper really hinders my practice. I also struggle with immediacy and synthesis: since they never look the same I always end up over - characterizing them and that is the opposite of how I illustrate.

How were you able to maintain such a consistent and stable look to these characters? Is there something I don’t know of or that I haven’t been doing and that I should? You really inspire me and I admire your work SO much! It’s remarkable how you built such a recognizable look.

Ti prego aiutami sto diventando pazzo in culo se non risolvo questa cosa voglio disegnare i miei blorbi !!!!

All the love,

Elio

Ciaooo aaa ty for the nice wordsss :’))

and ok i will try to answer as best as i can bc i’m not a professional in the slightest and also i basically have the diametrically opposite problem as you 😭 90% of my art is blorbo oriented i’m a blorbo artist first human being second. but it’s not like i have the charisma uniqueness nerve and talent to stray much from that.

ANYWAY that being said i’m sorry to give you the Very Hated answer of “u just gotta practice” but i think that’s true! i think drawing characters outside of studies (which are always nice and good etc) might not be something you’re used to, and u just need to stretch your drawing muscles a bit in that direction too!! style and consistency are something that develop organically, so i’m sure that if you keep trying you’ll look at your art one day and be like “oh shit this works!”

Usually when i draw characters i’ve never drawn before i make little studies/portraits to figure out how to draw them (evidence 1/2/3/4) which i think could be a pretty low stake way for you to practice? like maybe you can start off with one referenced portrait and then try to draw the same face from other angles but without looking at that reference and just try to figure out what are the important features that make that face recognizable? Expression sheets are another way u could do this, and then you’d have a nice self made reference board for next time.

or you could start smaller and draw different shapes of eyes/noses/mouths etc to get the hang of it, and once you’re satisfied start building your character with the features you’ve drawn

lastly i cannot stress this enough draw that blorbo NOW!! get fucking obsessed with that freak!!! let them fuel you with the brainrotting blazing passion of 28473 suns and you’ll manage to draw a hundred beautiful faces without even noticing

spero che tu riesca a cavar fuori qualcosa di utile da questo sfaso 😭 in ogni caso sono sicura che riuscirai a disegnare i tuoi blorbini devi solo smadonnare un po’ quando necessario e andare avanti 💕

grazie mille ancoraaaa mwah

[annwhiskers]

Art school Portfolio project 1

Please, Go Home

Art school didn't end up happening for me (I'm going to do something completely different and more secure, and keep art and writing for myself for fun), so I thought I’d share my portfolio projects here.

Buckle up, this'll be long as fuck.

This is a story I’d been working on for years, since 2018. I’d rewritten it several times, until in 2023, I got the chance to come up with my own project at design school. Immediately, I knew this was what I wanted. I wanted to make this story into a real book. And I wanted to make it all by hand, cause bookbinding seemed cool to try.

I had to come up with 2 ideas to do.

Translation:

Subject 1

Book. Specifically a novel (written by me). I want to make illustrations of the characters, design the inside (text and design thingies and everything), design the cover. Print and bind it myself. Illustrations of the characters are in it, I’ll try to finish as many as possible, but I probably won’t be able to finish all of them. Then I’ll leave blank pages in and stick the remaining illustration in later. (I did finish them all, so I didn’t need to do this.)

Why? I love books. I read them a lot and I’ve been writing for years. Now I want to make a professional looking book myself. And of course I love to draw, I want to incorporate that too. I’d like to have completely handmade versions of the books I’ve written. I’d like to learn bookbinding.

Subject 2

Graphic novel. I want to learn to tell a story visually. And I want to experiment with color more.

Why? I like to read graphic novels. I want to tell and draw stories, and get better with color.

A mood board of what I wanted, I chose the book.

Translation:

Inside book

Physical book

Character illustrations

Little drawings

Dust jacket

Translation:

Little drawings

Inspiration

Finished product

Why? The main character writes and doodles in a journal. When he’s anxious or his head is full, he doodles a certain type of pattern to calm down. More of the design of the book is based on this. He also sometimes draws little things that he likes.

Translation:

Inside

Fonts

Novels always have a serif font as the standard. Standard book font: Adobe Garamond Pro.

Other than that, I want to use quite a lot of different fonts that resemble handwriting for the chapter titles. The titles are quotes from a character in the chapter, each has their own font as their voice or handwriting. Sometimes, the characters write too, that’s also in their own font.

[A list of fonts.]

Preparations

I made parent-pages for each type of spread that I needed. One with only text, one with an illustration and the start of a chapter, and 2 with only the start of a chapter on either side of the spread. And I made a bunch of paragraph-styles for all the types of text that I needed. I have 2 sections, 1 for the front matter, 1 for the rest.

Translation:

Final product

Here are a few spreads, I won’t show all of them, because that’s 308 of them.

Here I have a spread with an illustration, a basic page with a little drawing in it, and a regular chapter opening where I use one of the other fonts for the title. The titles are quotes, and the font shows who said it.

Translation:

Cover

Research

Adult Fantasy Romance. What’s already out there? (Put a bunch of YA there, but whatever)

I want illustrated, probably with characters. Detailed or silhouette.

Sketches

Colour

Translation:

Final product

Color choice. In the end, this is the illustration I went for. I showed the two bigger color choices from the last page to a friend, she said with the purple one, that the characters nicely sprung out of the image because of the orange. But the green one was more relaxed. I thought the green one fit better with the vibes of the book, but I really like the purple one too. I ended up switching the colours of the text and the characters, so the characters sprung out like the purple one.

Subject. The twigs are around it, because one of the main characters (the right one) often draws them in his journal. They’re also there in the rest of the book, in his journal entries. He’s writing in it on the cover. Left, he’s reading a book, because he does that often, and others in his family do so too. The two shadows are their grandfathers, who also knew each other, which the main two don’t know. Those two have quite a bit of history.

Title. The story is about them meeting each other, and they’ve both been away from home for various reasons. They push each other to go back to their families, that’s why it’s called ‘Please, go home’.

Font. It’s one of the characters fonts, orange left. I wanted to use one of the main characters’ fonts, and I liked this one better.

Translation:

Dust jacket

I put a description on the back, quotes on the front flap, and normally there’s an ‘about the author’ on the back flap, but I didn’t feel like doing that, so I put a short text there to give more context to the book itself.

Sorry about the shitty quality of the next few.

Translation:

Character illustrations

Inspiration

Sketches

I sketched some poses I could use. Other than that, I’m not planning to sketch a lot, I’ve drawn all these characters before and I already have a good idea of what I want them to look like.

Style experiment

I tried something painty first, didn’t like it. After that, I experimented with the background. I didn’t want the colour to go all the way to the edge, because I didn’t want to have to deal with bleed and trimming. In the end, I didn’t give the background any colour, except black and white lines, as you can see in the final result. I liked the effect of only the character having colour.

Translation:

Rune

Earlier drawings

Sketches

Final product

In the book, it’ll be greyscale.

(All the next few have the same text except the characters names, so I won’t translate again. Except if I did add some text somewhere.)

Translation:

And with this, all the illustrations are done. I'm not super happy with all of them, but I did my best to make them all unique and recognizable. And within 4 weeks. I'm happy with it.

Translation:

Physical book

Research

Binding. At first, I thought about doing a standard case-binding, a standard hardcover book. But after watching some tutorials, I realised that's quite complicated and requires supplies that I couldn't easily get. I continued searching and found crisscross-binding or secret Belgian binding. It resembles a standard hardcover book, but you barely have to glue, you need less supplies, and it's easier for beginners. It looks cool, it's sturdy, but also flexible.

Paper and size. A5 size, then I don't have to trim and printing is easy. A4 folded. A4 cream novel paper, I want it to look as professional as I can. It's not the best paper for illustrations, but it does work, I've seen it in other books.

Material. I bought everything I need at an art store in the city, except the paper. I ordered that online.

Practice. As a try-out, I made a small book of printer paper and used watercolour paper. It went well, except that i didn't sew the pages to the spine properly.

Translation:

Final product

Printing

I put my printer at home in my room. First, I tried on standard printer paper if the printer did what I wanted it to do. Which it didn't. It couldn't print double-sided. But with Acrobat, I printed booklets. First only the front, then the back. So I managed to do it.

After successfully printing one booklet on the standard paper(left), I started printing the whole book on the cream paper. Within 1,5 hours, I printed the whole book, 19 booklets. Together with the testing, it took me about 2 hours.

I pressed the pages underneath my cutting mat with two bricks. I left it there for about a day.

Translation:

Cover

I cut the front and back cover out of cardboard, then covered it with linen paper. I drew a twig on it with ink and a brush. Then I poked holes in it for the sewing.

Here, I made the spine 2cm wide, which I thought would be enough. It was not. I'll get back to that. I covered the spine in linen paper, too.

I sewed the cover together, I followed a tutorial on YouTube. Then i glued the end papers on.

Translation:

Binding & Dust jacket

I poked holes (in the booklets) for the sewing, then I started sewing the paper to the cover.

When I'd sewn 6 out of the 19 booklets onto the cover, I was already halfway along the spine and I realised this wasn't going to fit. I undid all the sewing and remade the spine. This time 3cm.

The new spine was still a bit too small, even though I thought I'd exaggerated it a bit. The book doesn't close properly. But I refused to redo everything again, so I just accepted it. It was better after pressing it for a day. I didn't trim the edges, that was very difficult with the pages already bound into the book. I quite like the untrimmed edges.

I folded the dust jacket around it and pressed it, so it'd keep it's shape. And now the book is done. The paper of it smudges very easily. A little bit of dust on it and it won't come off. That's a bit disappointing. (Now a year later, it also isn't lightfast whatsoever. It stood in a dark corner of my bookshelf nowhere near the sun and the spine turned yellow. I guess I now know why covers have protective coatings on them. Which I didn't have the option for.)

Translation:

FINAL final product

Reflection

This project was the most fun thing I did at this school. I've always wanted to do this and it's awesome I can now hold my own book in my hands. The binding was fun to learn, but also a challenge. Not everything went perfectly, like i said earlier. But now I've can learn from those mistakes. I'm quite impressed with myself that I managed to do this in this time. I wasn't sure I could do it. But i did dedicate every moment of free time I had to this.

(I did all of this in 5 weeks. All the teachers doubted me, that it was too much work, and just told me good luck. And I said "Watch me." Autistic hyperfocus activated.)

(The second paragraph isn't important, just a short description of the last discussion I'd had with my teacher about this.)

Awful picture, sorry.

This is the final presentation I had at school for this, and this is where it stops for the school projects side of this. But it continues.

After this, I didn't touch it for a few months. Then I let a friend read it (digitally) and processed her feedback into the book afterwards. Then I published it on Amazon.

This won't be the last time I do this. The whole process is really fun and fulfilling. And owning a real, published book that I wrote, illustrated and designed is awesome.

In case you're interested, click here to buy it.

[headcanonandburn]

HP headcanons i found on reddit part 2

Oliver Wood and Marcus Flint end up on the same Quidditch team, get into a fight in the locker room when they find out they're on the same team, and then kiss because they actually have a shit ton of sexual tension.

The curse on the Defense position was anchored to Ravenclaw's Diadem.

Harry is Master of Death (when it fits).

Parselmouths have an affinity toward healing magic and that's why Voldemort is never seen using Parseltonue spells because he has no inclination toward healing.

Harry is still a Parselmouth after he dies.

Astronomy is mandatory for all students until fifth year because it is intermingled in almost all other pursuits of magic. Certain potions need to be brewed during this time of the year or this phase of the moon, certain ingredients (for both potions and herbology) are supposed to be gathered during a full moon or new moon, arithmancy takes into account star positions or whatever which helps with runes and spell creation, and all of this other shit that I don't feel like typing out.

Harry has rights to both the Slytherin and Gryffindor name. Gryffindor shares a lot of characteristics with Lily (the red hair and green eyes) and Harry conquered the last heir of Slytherin, making him the new heir of Slytherin via magic.

Luna isn't actually "loony" and the Quibbler is supposed to be read upside down with those glasses she's always wearing. The Quibbler spouts nonsense most of the time to hide the fact that they're actually publishing stories that contradict the government. Not necessarily my headcanon, but something I picked up after reading a fanfiction and full-heartedly agree with.

The Potters are technically a Most Ancient and Noble House but aren't a part of the Sacred 28 because their last name is a common Muggle name. They're descended from the Peverells, who were very powerful in their own right.

The Potters and Longbottoms have been allies for years.

Neville's Mum was Alice Smith, the last heir of Hufflepuff from a straight line, making Neville the heir to Hufflepuff. Hermione is from a Squib line from Dagworth-Granger and she is the heir to Ravenclaw. Harry is the heir to Slytherin or Gryffindor (or both) via his mum or dad (or both). Or Ron is the heir to Gryffindor (because he's a true Gryffindor in personality) and his brothers aren't the heir because all of the heirs must be in the same Hogwarts year because why the hell not?

Snape's hair is super greasy because of potions fumes.

Dean and Seamus are totally fucking. Same with Sirius and Remus.

Voldemort is batshit insane because he split his would numerous times until there was only a little sliver left. Bellatrix is insane because she's done a shit ton of Dark Arts and they corrupted her.

Wizards used to celebrate the "Old Ways" or Pagan holidays, but Dumbledore voted on pro-Muggleborns and he thought that it was rude to have Muggleborns accept non-Christian holidays so he removed the celebrations from Hogwarts, instead incorporating Christian holidays to make the Muggleborns "feel welcome" and having all of the "dark" families celebrate the holidays in their own time. Dumbledore tried to get Muggleborns and Purebloods to accept each other, but since he's not a politician, he went about it the wrong way. Instead of having them all accept one another, he said that purebloods must accept Muggleborns (by incorporating Muggle Studies and removing wizarding holidays) instead of teaching Muggleborns about the wizarding world. The result is that the Ministry now believes the Old Ways are dark but the rest of Europe celebrates pagan holidays and that's why there's the traditional Yule ball (that was celebrated before Dumbledore voted to remove pagan holidays after Grindlewald or Voldemort's first reign) instead of a Christmas ball.

Harry is not completely "light" because he is very good at Dark spells. Sectumsempra is a dark spell that he mastered on the first try.

Harry joins the Auror corp for a few years to find the rest of the Death Eaters before retiring to become the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts.

[your-local-uwu-artist]

wip dump :3

evil art style! my art style has quite a lot of range but I decided to default to chibis for this. I also didn't want to like, just draw one character bust up like i see most people do for it, so I wanted to come up with a way to show multiple characters on one page in an appealing manner

sonic drawing practice! I've been procrastinating this one because the lineart I've done so far on it is almost too good. I'm not sure If i can keep up the standard set

jame-joe doodles! really wanna keep developing this concept: I think it has decent potential! i don't remember how much I've shared about him but i don't think i've talked about it much beyond the base premise. Jame-Joe is inspired by characters like Dipper and Wirt, he's clever, is serious and studious in the pursuit of his goals, can be rather emotional and is prone to cowardice and insecurity, but can be determined when push comes to shove. I set myself up for a challenge here, as I want him to be expressive but limited by his doll body. It's a fun challenge though!

more 'i should start an etsy' drawings. i've seen people make like 'gacha blind bag' keychains and thought of the idea of those with aimaina-chan designs!

fdanfsdjk I almost feel bad for spoiling this one because I'm so excited to share it!!!! But i guess the sorta person to read through this post probably don't mind spoilers lol. I realized 'Timmy's a 2000s kid' and decided to go ALL IN on that. I dug deep into my memories and decided this kids going to need rainbow looms, slap-wraps, silly bandz, and those rubbery braclets where theres one white segment and one black segment and i have no clue if this is true but when i was a kid everyone always said the white segment was snow from mount everest and the black one was like sand from the bottom of the ocean. anyway! I had so much trouble wiht finding the right shade of pink that if i go trhough making a youtube video on these designs you guys will definitely here my color theory rant.

my main goal i can only describe as 'arcade carpet'

he thinks he's cool but knows he's lame. I gave him a fnaf shirt also, i dived deep into my brain as asked myself 'what graphic t-shirt from hot-topic would timmy turner wear' and i decided on fnaf because i think it's funny. so far these extra outfits have been going up in the amount of projection I'm doing. It started with spongebob's sweater vests, continued with Dannys stereotypical-transmasc fits, and now I'm lowkey just drawing stuff I've worn (actually danny's fit with the flannel I've def worn before but like, i assigned timmy a sanrio character(i gave him keropi because it's an easy way to incorporate green accents into his design lol)) anyway!!!

i had 'i want it that way' stuck in my head again and turned to queeries he proceded to give me the solution of chipi-chipi-chapa-chapa. this was not a solution obviously but whatever. i decided to use my new problem to animate myself dancing. sure. why not. if I upload this to youtube i think i should title it 'me at the function' of course i don't actually go to any functions so perhaps 'me when i' would be more fitting

Haku with his starter! the shy kid to eccentric adult pipeline

more of baby Haku! weird part-mimikyu child wandering alola before discovering ghost-type communities and being like 'finally! someone that doesn't look at me weird when i mention demonic possesion!'

with the timeline I'm going with Haku's younger than Acerola so she's like a big sister to them :3

He stares at you with his big ol eyes awkwardly lowkey steals your malasada and gives you a flower in return

rf4 art!!! I love rune factory enough that I own a throw pillow with vishnal on it >:3

frey my fucking beloved!!!!!! lest is here too also. btw frey is a demigirl and lest is a demiboy this is true you can trust me

sketch design for one of those cd keychains with alvin and the chipmunks!

I plan to caption this '1k notes and I voice+animate my yumehoshi beam' as a bit, not because i want 1k notes, but because 99% chance it won't get 1k notes, but if it does then it'd be a really funny way to break my shyness with sharing my voice to the internet

smurtsune miku smurf my BELOVED

need more character for this btw!

[evilmagician430]

concept art/character design for an acachalla centric horror story i've been brainstorming since last school year ^_^ still havent finalized any of these designs, i feel like they need a little more tweaking...

WARNING: blood, body horror, the mangled corpse of a dead animal, guns, crowbars, medical equipment and general medical imagery, and all around just weird and gross stuff

ADDITIONAL WARNING: really fucking long

story and images under the cut:

i imagine the premise is that sue, at the police station, gets a call from the acachallas like in canon. she decides to go to their house to help, alone because her coworkers are all busy/hate her (theyve been in the force long enough to go corrupt while sue still tries to do whats right)

when she goes in she discovers that the acachallas have been dead for like 10 years and their bodies are barely even intact. she also notices that their house is trashed, not only does it seem completely reclaimed by nature, covered in fungus and insects and blood, but a lot of their furniture and appliances are missing. their rooms look like theyre missing all that wouldve signaled the character of whomever inhabited it, and she thinks, well, maybe the house was looted after they died, but that doesn't explain who called...

then she accidentally steps in a pile of fungus. which wasnt there before. she turns around and a man, fully formed, has sprouted out of the ground. he is made almost entirely out of mushrooms and he has 2 shotguns for arms. he tells her to leave his house. she starts to run but then another figure stops her. a very tall woman who speaks in the same voice that called the police department. her form is indiscernible in the dark, but soon sue comes to realize this woman is not human.

she's not even alive.

sue meets the others and, sure enough, they all seem to be amalgamations of various household objects, both inorganic and organic matter, forming crude fascimiles of who they once were. there are 5 bodies and 5 of them, so they must be possessed by the immortal spirits of the acachallas...!

of course, it turns out they never needed help. it was merely a trap to lure sue home.

they accept her and care for her far more than her biological family or "friends" at work ever did. but being with them takes a toll on sue's body. eventually she dies and they build a new body for her. she wakes up as a beautiful monster. she wakes up as herself.

you're going to notice none of these drawings are of sue- that's because she's still just a regular human in this. by the end she might become a horrifying monster like the rest of them, but i havent designed her.

i took inspiration from a variety of sources, but i can only remember some of them off the top of my head:

undertale (lorewise the whole thing about monsters dust being spread on their favorite object so they can live in it, also photoshop flowey designwise was a huge inspiration)

deltarune (largely just the enemy designs)

dont hug me i'm scared (the teacher's designs, general vibes, also lamp's explanation of what happens when someone dies in episode 2 of the tv show)

tipping point (literally just stylistically. i need to learn digital collage to properly portray these designs)

tokusatsu (the costumes for the gorma in gosei sentai dairanger are like. really good. i enjoy their designs severely)

communications era ghost and pals mvs (the collage stuff speaks to my soul)

and thats all i can remember rn. now heres the first pictures i drew of each member of the family (on my world history notes) and the most recent draft of their designs (in mspaint) this is basically all of the drawings of them.

beginning with spencer, he's the smallest of the family at only 4 feet tall. he is made out of his computer and manga collection basically. on each of these i left a lot of notes in the pictures breaking down what each part of the body is made out of. i wanted to incorporate figurines and action figures into his design too but i decided to keep it more focused. but all these designs are still subject to change. a teacher walked by as i was drawing him and said she liked how it was "very industrial but feminine" or something like that.

sally! im not entirely sure what that first sketch is but as you can tell i wanted her to be wearing a doll mask from the start. i gave her this big poofy princess dress to conceal where godzilla connects to the shelves that act as her legs because it looked very strange and did not look like the shelves were her legs. the dress turns into curtains which are draped over her shelves. she was very hard to design but very fun. also i just chose random dolls and stuff i know g3 draculaura and kylie and pnp sasha are like recent dolls that wouldnt exist yet. its a mockup ok

next we got billy who is built out of his own medical supplies. i wanted to make his body one of those IV drip stands, although that means both him and spencer have very similar lower halves, with the wheels. hes the only one who doesnt really wear any clothes because billy doesnt really have an iconic outfit; the only thing i remember he wears is obviously his medic outfit but thats like. a whole outfit. i dont understand the layers of it so i can just put part of it on this thing. maybe i shouldve just given him scrubs. or what i think billy would wear that represents him

gertrude having a dead cat as her hair is a reference to a really specific one-off joke i read about on the wiki but dont actually remember from any of the videos. i think hair is a very important part of self expression so they would want to recreate their hairstyles with whatever they could find. it was hard as hell getting that cat into a shape that made literally any sense but i think i figured it out. her outfit is a combination of what she normally wore and her old costume as the crowbar, which i was inspired to design my version of as well (will post that drawing later). i think its very interesting how gertrude seems to exist to trap and keep safe or detain/kill various dangerous beings. shes like a shepherd but also an executioner.

papa acachalla doesnt have a draft cause this was literally the first time i tried drawing him in this story because i was stuck on trying to imagine what hed be made out of and how he would look like. then i remembered fungus comes in all shapes and forms and also works as a metaphor for his connection with his family and his roots. also his arms are guns LOL! i wanted to make him more catholic but i couldnt come up with how while still having him look like papa acachalla. maybe adding that priest collar cause i think father grigori has it anyways but its hard to draw stuff around his neck area.

[pagingdoctorbedlam]

Do u have any headcanons of ebenholz? Please i need even more content

(Ebenholz Headcanons)

Do I?! Absolutely! Here's some of what I've cooked up:

As I've written in at least one fic now, Ebenholz gets into rock music and this has a huge effect on him, from his fashion sense to his music. I like the idea of him learning to play guitar so he can say he's mastered an instrument under his own power (while continuing to spite the Witch King!)

I see a couple viable paths for Ebenholz's approach to music going forward. One is that, since he's gifted with so many instruments, I'd love to see him get into composing and conducting. On the other hand, pivoting hard into rock music but incorporating some orchestral stylings would be hella rad? Things like incorporating his flute into rock songs like Jethro Tull, or occasionally pulling Czerny for a piano accompaniment to a song (specifically along the lines of Blue Oyster Cult's Joan Crawford. Just listen to this and imagine.)

As he continues to open up, Ebenholz actually befriends quite a few operators. There's the book club gang, of course, and I also think he becomes a pal of Beeswax as they talk records and stuff during horn care sessions. Connected to the music headcanons above, Ebenholz being besties with Vigna is one of my faves. But also, I feel like his particular backstory lends well to him befriending fellow operators with prickly and traumatic backstories. Like Rosmontis. Let them be "child experiments put some literal fucked-up shit in my head" pals.

Once he comes out of his grief-stricken shell, Ebenholz is so damn excited to explore this world he's only ever dreamed of. He can be convinced to explore anywhere and try just about anything at least once. And with how sheltered he was in the Spire, there's a lot to catch up on! Between missions, music, and adventures with his growing circle of friends, he's always busy. (And is able to drag along friends with more hermit-like tendencies as well, to everyone's benefit. *coughCzernycough*)

One line Ebenholz does refuse to cross is alcohol and other intoxicants. Overhearing the noble's plans to turn him into a useless alcoholic has thoroughly shut down his desire to touch the stuff. Not knowing how the Witch King will affect him when he's under the influence is another factor.

Since he was a sheltered noble for so long, Ebenholz has been trying to educate himself but still makes the occasional insensitive comment. Old habits die hard, so he can still be a little defensive when called out, but...he's working on it.

My personal queer headcanon for Ebenholz is that he's gay and demisexual, but thinks he's ace because...well, he's never actually gotten close enough to anyone to build that emotional connection that leads to attraction. (I have a fic on this in the works right now, actually!)

I can also see Ebenholz experimenting with gender and presentation a bit. I'm not sure if he'd actually be nonbinary or just "cis but comfortable enough to present more femme/androgynous/etc when he feels like it", but I wouldn't be surprised to see him experiment once he learns about genders beyond the binary.

Goat boy has goat habits. He likes to climb random shit, and will do so without thinking if he needs to get away with a migraine. Folks have found him in the strangest places...

Also, because goat and because he's open to new experiences, Ebenholz will try to eat just about anything. Though you'll definitely get a snarky remark if he doesn't like it...(and no Hibiscus, this isn't an excuse to give him more health food, put the kale smoothie down...!)

On the subject of migraines, Ebenholz acquires some assistive tech and help with his migraines. Though they're mostly fueled by arts (and the Witch King), I can see him with some light-sensitive shades and learning other migraine management techniques to help some of the symptoms. Also maybe a camera or recorder to help handle his occasional hallucinations by recording something and playing it back to tell what's real?

Alright, that was...a lot of headcanons. I've had many thoughts about this boy. But I hope you enjoy this offering of Good Goat Boy content!

[spookyheaad]

More art goodies!!

I got some KenUno stuff, and some Tesoro art for his birthday ☺️

@p-riama @girlwiththepapatattoo @goldenshowman

I’ll do Tesoro first because it’s his day 😤 (by the time I post this it’ll already be the 25th but I don’t care; hbd Tesoro babes)

I was actually making this to submit for my One Piece Music zine application, I ended up only using the middle image (purple background) because it looked the best to me. I wanted to push myself in terms of playing with color, so I made a bunch of scenes where Tesoro is performing. I love drawing him perform, it’s good anatomy/gesture practice.

I was also going to add stuff to the background but it became tedious, and I was on a time crunch to submit the app. Maybe I’ll revisit this…

Something for fun! I always use Tesoro for practice, whether it be facial expression, gestures, hands (I will NOT forget how the animators focused on his hands in the movie, there were so many shots of his hands like holy fuck. I ain’t complaining tho), etc. I love drawing him enraged tho, because it’s such a fun emotion to portray! And with Tesoro it kinda fits, with all he’s been through.

Ok ok, so Have A Nice Life (one of my favorite bands) released a demo of one of their songs, Sisyphus, and I listened to it for hours. I was inspired to sketch an idea for the Tesoro/Stella fic. Another hallucination; Tesoro sees himself all grotesque (possibly bloodied and mutilated) in the mirror. Chose to incorporate some of the lyrics with it as well. Love how this one came out too!!

Ok, KenUno time 😏

This is all Modern/Actor AU stuff; this shit is helping me with the stress of packing my shit and moving; it’s so fun to come up ideas and imagine the two of them being silly and happy!! This larger sketch is the both of them winding down for the night; Unohana is admiring Kenny, who for all we know, is fucking talking abt Star Wars (nerd).

The smaller sketch is Kenny now admiring Unohana, who is disheveled and wearing his shirt; she just woke up. Pre-coffee Unohana. Of course no matter how she looks, he still adores his wife ☺️

Messing with his hair again, also just an excuse to practice drawing his back muscles. Still trying to figure out placements for his tattoos…

They keep making each other laugh during the filming of the Muken fight. Also Kenny calling Unohana “Uno”. Need it to happen. Top right is self explanatory :)

More kisses!!!! The top kiss, you bet he’s carrying Unohana. And the bottom one was, once more, back anatomy practice. It turned into an intimate little kiss.

And a bonus Kenny in a Muppets shirt & dad hat?? Why not! (He’s either just arrived on set, or is done for the day & going home)

[tommybowefuneralattendee]

Hey there

any advice for someone who's writing their first fan fic (me)

totally! lemme give you some quick tippies and if you have any specific problem you want my perspective on, let me know! i decided that five was a good round number, but i'm sure i have more to say if you need me to scare something up~

remember that you are doing this for fun. if it sucks, hit the bricks. leaving a wip half done and saving it for a you that actually loves the story can sometimes help a lot. there are times when you need to push through the difficulties of writing, but if it is genuinely causing you distress, maybe we should consider taking a lil break with another project.

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remember that you are doing this for free. you do not owe a certain quality or quantity or consistency of posting to anyone, and if someone makes you feel like you do, that's a them problem and not a you problem. publish whatever word count, or number of chapters, or fragments of plot that you want to upload. fanfiction is, for the most part, free. do whatever the fuck you want forever.

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if there is a scene that you are writing an entire fic for, try writing the scene first. oftentimes i find i build things up and up and up in my head and so i have to write these 10k words of build up, i have to have more scene exposition, when sincerely, you might find if you get right into it that the scene is capable of standing alone, and even if such is not the case, now you have a scene written here that illustrates the point of the piece, if that makes sense.

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if something you desperately want to write feels out of character, try changing the language around the action. like say- maybe it seems like this character wouldn't lie to their spouse about something important- what's their reasoning for it? how would they rationalize that action to themself? if you have actions you want to be completed, assume that the character is already doing what you want. you just have to let the reader know why.

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the voice is never quite going to sound right. the perspective is always going to feel a little off. that's not a bug of your writing, that is a feature. that is the little bit of you that you are putting in your story, turns of phrase that people only use in your area, potential perspective that the pov might not have but you do, incorporating that is part of the art of fanfiction. we are all creating something new from a previously completed tapestry. all of the pieces are going to be different. this is a feature. this is your contribution to the culture of fandom. don't make it any less than yourself

[twisted-tales-told]

hi, hi, um, 20, 24, 50, 68, 71!!!!

HIII

This ask game

20. Do you prefer writing AU’s or in canon

Depends on the fandom! Supernatural is definitely an AU, and it’s definitely the same in the marauders fandom. BUT in the marauders case I love fucking WITH canon. And that is an entirely different catagory

24. How do you choose which pov to write

I don’t. I pick one and start writing and if it feels wrong I start over with someone else. If there’s a better method I haven’t found one yet

50. How would you describe your writing style

Feeling your flesh decay in the woods, and also finding the most beautiful little critter in the wild. Maybe a. Fox.

I love nature imagery which makes my poetry professor real mad because I am supposed to be writing about cities.

68. Are there any fics that influenced the way you write.

YEA THERE ARE.

First of all, all of @sophsicle and @otrtbs stories have influenced me as a writer!! These 2 humans are very dear 2 my lil heart and also extremely talented artists. I love what they do with words and I always strive to be like them when I grow up writer wise. They’re so confident in what they want to write and just bulldoze ahead in their stories in a way that I think is really unique. I always appreciate the flow of their works and have definitely learned a thing or two from them about what specifically I want to see in my own style. More importantly & not to pun but they’re very good at killing their darlings and have taught me how to COMMIT to the BIT as a writer and do what’s best for the story & not exactly what I want. It’s a hard lesson to learn but it’s for this reason that their stories stick with me so I know they’re doing something right!

There was also a fic called Taste that is now deleted that had an immense impact on what I write. The worldbuilding was so strange and eerie that I just absorbed it like a lil plant. The IMAGERY of this Vampire-post-apocalyptic-world was INSANE. Like it was cities and countryside but all overgrown because earth had fought back and reclaimed the earth?? Like it opened a door to creativity in my mind and I’m so grateful for that.

OH OH AND En Avant by bluerosebouquet on ao3 REALLY influenced me because it was written with a lot of images, but instead of visualizing it like an art piece I was visualizing it like a movie which was NEW to me!! And I really liked that about it!! So I’ve tried to incorporate some of those skills as well & picking out why it feels different.

70. Do you spend more time reading or writing

Well I am a cultural studies major so definitely reading. I wish I could spend more time writing. Unfortunately I need the pressure of school work to literally do anything at all with my life.

[taptroupe]

before I sleep and disappear from social media because of work I would like to share this most wonderful piece of evergrace fanart I found the other day

https://web.archive.org/web/20051120124543/http://www012.upp.so-net.ne.jp/gte/gift3.htm

it was so good that I wrote a 500 word essay about it. here you go

okay so i was freaking about this to cookie earlier so my heart is prepared to make a 500 word essay to this right here right now. the kindness, the sweetness, and the extremely important dynamic of "darius and sharline sitting on a rock together" is the world's most wonderful treasure, a callback to the official evergrace art…. but that one had sharline sitting on the grass beside the rock, so this is infinitely better, plus sharline cutely leaning much more against darius. this is already very lovely and shows her charm of being a pushy and caring big sister.

and of course who can forget little baby darius in the front. i love the addition of him being here, as someone who's always like "hmm… how can i incorporate the Scrunkly into group drawings" there he was. my heart…. the glow and translucency of his appearance leads me to think, is this perhaps like demon darius, a temporary reincarnation that is simply happy to know that they will have a happy ending after all? or maybe it's a reflection of darius's inner emotions = bursting with happiness? awwwww. either way, thank you for including the little baby scrunkly

and also how he sits right in front of where you'd see darius and sharline's hands :) clever composition, allusion to fromsoftware's way of making lore just vague enough out of reach but enough to help you form some conclusions.. or is it? either way it makes you want more. and that's sure what the game did to me. the ambiguity…. the mystery…. oh but they're holding hands for sure. btw. or else why would darius be looking away trying to hide his red face with his hand…. his moe ass i need to squeeze him like a stress toy…. for this once i give it the benefit of the doubt okay. let this man experience human affection

lastly, i think this is so charming, but the composition and background of the image… the always incredible sunset orange world of evergrace is very much present in this piece. the grassy fields, the rocks, the autumn scenery. 100% i have zero complaints and it's perfection. i would like to draw special attention to the lovely touch of darius's scarf fluttering in the wind… it's long huh. that reminds me of this one chapter in Maiko-san chi no Makanai-san/kiyo in kyoto where a red scarf literally connected the three childhood friends together… okayyy maybe there was a love triangle intermixed with platonic love so maybe not that. but you know what i'm talking about. fated meetings. bros for life. that kind of thing. at the very least, having darius's scarf cross over to sharline's side of the composition makes a very nice completeness to the piece. perfect triangular composition with the nosey cute imbalance of sharline, the "oh god he's so moe i have to bite this bitch" darius, the happiness of the little baby darius…. peace in the heart. you understand why i slapped my fucking bed with such a lovely piece. thank you OP. thank you so much

[fishboneart]

Fishbone #003

does stylejacking real? and does it matter?

38 layers, 37 source images. This Creature sees without recognising, reads without understanding. It likely wouldn't be able to see this image properly because of all the transparencies I used, it would read a lot of artifacts that are not readily apparent to the human eye. One asshole abusing transparencies isn't actually enough to fuck up a model and individualist action won't change anything, I just think it's a neat concept for this piece to incorporate. I also squeezed in a few comments about how it doesn't know what things are so it bleeds them together.

I put all the little pictures on the screens but I'm not going to make a big fuss about it.

It turns out the reasons I'm not scared of machine learning jacking my style need multiple posts and this one relates the most to the art I just posted so it's going first.

The thing about style is, you know the thing that you hate about your art--not the technical stuff, the thing that makes it look like it was made by you no matter how good it is? That's your style, dummy. You don't need to protect it, you just need to stop trying to overcome it.

"Manga" and "photorealism" and whatever else people call styles around here are eminently replicable, millions of people replicate them every day. They're "styles" but they're not your style. They're more like genres.

It feels important to note at the top that I absolutely understand that people who make their living in highly replicable styles (genres) are scared and angry about the economic threat ML poses them, and they have every right to be. I'm with them, the parasitic owning class will take any opportunity to fuck a worker and artists are workers. None of what I'm about to say solves artist precarity, and it's not a dismissal of it. It's an important issue and I will come back to it another day.

But for now I want to talk about the more ephemeral and personal artistic notion of style. Some people call it hand, rather than style. Maybe we should use that more.

However, I'm still going to say stylejacking because handjacking sounds like something very different.

So this is not about robots stealing your job (or beating your meat), this is about robots stealing your mojo, and why I think it's the wrong thing to be scared of.

If you take the average of a million manga girls, you theoretically get an ideal manga girl. And again, if you've worked hard to be a manga artist it sucks a lot that any jackoff with enough GPU power can make a hundred ideal manga girls now, I'm not saying don't be upset.

I'm saying the aspects of your art that can be easily replicated have already been replicated in large enough volume to generate that ideal average. Any jackoff with enough discipline can do it.

Yet there are relatively few human jackoffs who can mimic individual artists' hands convincingly enough to actually make a trade of counterfeiting, and even fewer who can mimic multiple artists to that level, so it's never really been this kind of huge existential threat before. Well it turns out, based on my observations in the wild, machine learning doesn't seem to be all that great at it either. I'm starting to suspect it's overhyped, like everything else about machine learning.

If you go on ai art sharing sites and search for Junji Ito, you will find Ideal Manga Girl But Black & White, you will find Photorealism With Spirals And Goo, and you will find very little that even passingly looks like an effort to emulate Juni Ito's mixed lines, unsettling compositions, uncanny faces, or impeccably fucked up vibes.

Essentially when you tell a machine learning model to produce an image of a manga girl in the style of Junji Ito, the model identifies what traits [manga girl] refers to, and what traits [Junji Ito] applies to, and cooks them together. The underlying architecture of the image is effectively a manga girl averaged from thousands, maybe millions of different images, with averaged composition and averaged line weights and averaged features and averaged vibes. Applying traits of a few hundred Junji Ito images to it (black & white, dense hatching, severe shading, spirals) doesn't result in a Junji Ito girl.

You can add weight to push more of the Junji Ito traits into the output, but even then you don't get something that looks convincingly like Junji Ito drew it, not even when you recreate famous Junji Ito panels.

Talking about this in terms of averages is actually also incorrect and misleading but in spite of that I think (hope) this is a better description than "collage machine" or "smooshing images together."

I know that right now this technology is the worst it will ever be, but I genuinely think this limitation might be intrinsic to how it functions. Machine learning models don't have the capacity to understand what they "see" so the best interpretation of any artist's hand they can ever return is cliches.

I'm not saying stylejacking isn't possible at all, fuck if I know, I saw some pretty good Beksiński-style pieces a while back. But that's the thing, when you look at them you don't go hey cool pic, you go oh yeah that's pretty good Beksiński style. Because Beksiński is so fucking Beksiński.

Even after all the tweaking and weighting you can do, once you've finally output a competent mimicry of Beksiński or Junji Ito or Mike Mignola or HR Giger, then what? That's all you've done. People will look at it and think of that artist. You haven't replaced them, you've advertised them.

The novelty of "What if Junji Ito drew Will Smith eating spaghetti" has a limited shelf life and no major commercial value. It certainly doesn't help advance the argument that machine learning is a legitimate art tool (not touching that, maybe another post another day). I think it will largely die off in a few horrible horrible years, assuming climate change doesn't wreck us first.