#I'm still working on improving my grass painting

[aurantia-ignis]

Picnic in Paldea

[pumpkinbxtch]

Hope you’re having a good day!! I haven’t requested anything in a second…so may I request an apollo x reader :3 ??? fem! I don’t have any other specifics in mind, maybe just daughter of hermes!reader ??

that’s all

tyy you’re the best mwah ❤️❤️

painting date ｡⁠*ﾟ

— apollo x daughter of hermes! reader

warnings: none

a/n: oh gods, I have never done a daughter of Hermes, I feel like I have to improve. I promise to do it but for now, I offer this to you with all my heart.Thanks for always coming, you know I got your back, girl. kisses 💙

You let out a big sigh and tossed the brush onto the grass with resignation. Apollo glanced up from his own canvas resting on his lap and gave you a gentle look.

— Finished?

— It's really bad. Not my thing — you said, puffing out your cheeks as you watched him continue working on his painting. The idea of painting each other's faces wasn't going as well as you had imagined. Half an hour had passed, and you had already given up on Apollo's portrait, while he couldn't tear himself away from the canvas, smiling satisfactorily.

You were curious about how his was going, so you stretched your neck for a glimpse, but he immediately tilted the painting to avoid it.

— I could... steal something for you. I'm good at that.

— No stealing.

— Connor has those cookies you like.

— No — Apollo said firmly, taking another brushstroke.

— A prank on Mr. D?

Apolo rolled his eyes and leaned against the tree trunk, still holding the canvas out of your view.

— As much as I'd love to see my brother covered in something gooey or something like that. No.

You pouted and admired your own painting. A total disaster, the proportions weren't good at all. You decided not to give it to him; it would be an offense to his ego. Apollo coughed, drawing your attention.

— Can I see it, darling?

You abruptly refused. You wouldn't let him see the atrocities you had done to his face for anything in the world.

— Come on — he insisted, smiling slightly.— I've finished mine.

— wasn't very smart to suggest a painting date to the god of arts — you said.

He chuckled. Your heart was racing faster than you could accept; you didn't want to know what would happen once Apollo saw the portrait you had made. He'd probably throw it in your face and stop talking to you for eternity; he could make that possible.

— Dear — he called, still looking at your own work, and with a surge of courage, you revealed it to his eyes.

Apolo smiled eagerly and sincerely. Not a hint of mockery showed on his face, and you felt envious of his self-control. It felt like those times when you showed your mother something you had done in kindergarden, yes, those same times when they praised your clearly null artistic talents.

— It's spectacular! — he exclaimed, and where his eye was supposed to be, the paint began to spill. Now it looked like his mascara had run.

— Liar! — you turned the portrait and smeared the paint to avoid more spillage. Apollo tried to stop you, but you had already spread the paint across the canvas, leaving his face stained with the tone.

— Hey, I still wanted it.

You sighed and put it aside.

— Yeah, sure.

Apollo looked at you over his lashes and reached out to take your hand.

— Do you want to see mine?

You nodded, despite your bad mood, you were curious about his. He turned it around, and as expected, it was beautiful, except it wasn't just you, but a painting of both of you doing exactly what you were doing at that moment: Both sitting face to face, canvases in your laps, and covered by the shade of the tree on a sunny spring day.

Your heart squeezed, and you bit the inside of your cheek.

— It's beautiful.

Apollo smiled and took advantage of your admiring his painting to take yours. Before you could snatch it away, he snapped his fingers, and it disappeared in a golden cloud.

— I hope you sent it to the Manhattan dumpsters.

— Now it's hanging in my palace room.

Your cheeks flushed, and you shook your head. He raised an eyebrow and conjured up a vision on his palm.

Above his bedhead was your painting, not only that. It was the first time you could see that everything you had given him was cherished in that place. The origami frog? That paper with a red lipstick kiss? Your commemorative shirt with the Hermes cabin symbol that you gave him after you won a race? Everything was there.

Your lip quivered; you were about to cry. Apollo already had teary eyes; seeing you like this gave him so much feeling.

— My love —you sobbed, and Apollo made the vision disappear, starting to raise his arms towards you.

— I love you, darling — and he drew you into him.

He was the god of the arts. He could see beauty in everything, especially if it was something you had done.

[magnoliaroad]

4 Seasons Back Yard Remodel + Crystal Yard

My 4 seasons remodels of the Petz 5 Back Yard are now available for download! And because I went on a bit of a side-quest, I’ve also made a bonus version, a fantasy, crystal back yard!

You can read my creator's notes below:

I somewhat wonder if it's fair to criticize the original Petz 5 playscenes too harshly. It's possible that the development team faced tight deadlines or budget constraints, factors that may not have been entirely within their control. However, regardless of the circumstances, the end result was a disappointingly sloppy product, and it's difficult to ignore some of the glaring flaws. While I can understand that the developers were working with dated software, there are certain flaws that can't be attributed to software limitations. Rather, they seem to reflect a clear lack of attention to detail. Here's what I mean.

The more you look at it, the harder it is to decide which flaw is the worst. The blatant MS paint spray paint "touch-up" in the upper left, that there was no effort put into blending in the skybox, or that they neglected to add textures to the roof.

Alright, enough ranting there. None of this is to say my playscenes are perfect either, but they were a labor of love and I hope that this is evident in the final results.

SPRING

I smoothed out the grass texture to give it a more velvety, manicured lawn appearance. I brightened up the dingy looking fence to a more brighter white. The original playscene had a hole in the fence, and while it might add "character", I opted to cover over it for a more polished look. I added bushes behind the fence to cover up the skybox and to conceal the bottom of the houses.

Speaking of houses. Wow these needed a big work-up. The texture work (or lack of) on these is just bad. I'm no expert in house construction, but even mostly-brick houses will have some accents like trims to break up the monotony of a fully-brick façade.

Because of how fuzzy the brick texture is in the original, I drew in the mortar lines of the bricks to enhance the texture. I added roof shingles, siding, and trim boards to the house to make it look more like a typical suburban house. Despite these edits, it's still not a "great" house - the way it looks through the windows, it looks like the house is one room lol. I wish I could put better houses in the backdrop but because Tinker doesn't allow me to edit the animated blinds, I'm constrained to keeping them the shape that they are. Oh well. We can use our imagination.

I added landscaping rocks to make the flower bed look nicer. I also added some landscaping details like bushes, garden lights, and string lights for ambiance.

[ Enlarged picture of the garden light I made ]

I also worked to improve the skyboxes in all 4 seasons of the of the Back Yard playscenes. It would be lengthy to get into the details of all that but here's a before and after of the night skybox. You got to love them high-quality MS paint stars in the original.

SUMMER

I had a hard time with the summer one because it was hard to come up with ways to make it look different from the spring version. I did make the grass, bushes, and tree leaves slightly more vibrant. Originally I had some flowers by the bushes but I just wasn't really happy with them. At the last minute, I made the decision to remove them entirely. This makes the playscene a little more "plain" but I think some people may want a more "plain", undecorated version so that they can dress it up how they want with toyz.

FALL

Fall is my favorite season, so this was a joy to make. I toned down the color of the grass and added fall landscaping motifs. Recoloring the tree's leaves was done by using Photoshop's gradient map feature. If time permits, I may do a tutorial on this in the future.

Gradient mapping is a powerful tool for recoloring almost anything. It can give way better results than methods such as hue/saturation, replace color, etc. And thanks to photoshop actions, applying this recolor to all the animation frames took just a couple of minutes.

Unfortunately, the fall leaves look "bright" in the nighttime version of the playscene. There does not seem to be a way to implement a darker version of these leaves for the nighttime playscene. If you look at the sprites in Tinker, you'll see that there are two sets of animations for Leaves A, B, and C and they're labeled "PropsAd" and "PropsAn", which would lead you to think that the developers originally intended for there to be a set of leaves for the day time, and a darker set for the night time. I guess the developers scrapped this idea because this does not work in the actual gameplay. When I experimented with this, the game appears to randomly display the nighttime sprite even during the day time, effectively ruining the intended affect. I'm not sure why the developers scrapped this. Either they had issues coding this properly or were just didn't want to put in the effort to make two sets of leaves.

WINTER

Instead of doing recolored leaves for this scene, I made all the leaves transparent and added holiday lighting to the tree. I know the lights aren't perfect - it was kind of hard to make out which direction a branch was going, so it has hard to maintain 'perfect' perspective.

CRYSTAL YARD

This is a bonus playscene that I made because I got a little side-tracked as I was working on the 4 seasons back yards. This is inspired by the Suramar zone from World of Warcraft, so it has a bit of that fantasy, night-elf feel and color scheme. It's been years since I've played WoW but I still appreciate the enchanting aesthetic of the elven zones.

I used gradient mapping again to recolor the leaves to give it this lavender, shimmery, iridescent look. I did a little bit of gaussian blurring and layer effects to make them look a little more "glowy" than the originals.

As before, Tinker won't let me edit the blinds, so it limited what edits I could do to the houses. I would love it if I could have done curtains instead or something. I did my best to make these houses look a little less suburban and more elven. It's not perfect but it was rough working with what I had.

KNOWN ISSUES / THINGS I COULDN'T EDIT

As far as I'm aware, there is no way to turn off the snow effect for seasons like summer where it wouldn't make sense. This probably involves some code-editing that is beyond my technical skillset.

The winter playscene still has the green grass footprint when your petz walk. The sprites for these are not housed within the .env itself but in the Petz 5 Rez.dll file. It would probably involve a bit of tweaking in the code to switch the sprites to something else.

The fall leaves are "bright" in the night time version because there is no way to implement a second, darker set of leaves.

I cannot edit the blinds animation. Tinker gives you an error when you try to edit this sprite. This unfortunately limits what edits I can make to the house and the fence because of where the sprite is positioned.

If anyone does know of solutions to these, do let me know as I'd love to enhance these scenes further!

ICONS

Making the icons for these was also a fun little project. For some odd reason though, the game puts a stray pixel over them when I import them through LnzPro. I did my best to disguise them but there does not seem to be a way to fix that.

BEFORE / AFTER

With all that rambling out of the way, visit my main page over at Magnolia Road > Resources > Playscenes to download the goodies!

[akwolfgrl]

Fireworks

Day 1 first meeting/ first kiss Reiju x Okiku

@oprarepairweek

Reiju still couldn't believe what had happened. Her and her brothers were now free. Big mom had killed their father, setting them free. Thire was still working to be done, but she was confdtint between Dr. Trafalgar and Dr. Chopper that her brothers would be fine. They had already shown vast improvements since being here.

The streets were filled with people celebrating and rebuilding after Stawhat Luffy had taken down Kadio. Reiju stepped to the side to avoid being run into as children ran past giggling. She bumped into a warm body.

“Sorry,” Reuji apologized looking behind her and the up twords a gorgeous women with dark hair that hung down her back, dark blue eyes in a yellow kimono with chrysanthemum floral patterns, a pink cream and lavender obi, white tabi, and black-soled. Her face was round and skin smoth a prefect, dhe a gorgeous red lip and a slight brush of blush on beautiful face. Reuji stepped to the side of the women off the busstiling street.

“It's quite all right,” She smiled down at her with prefectly painted red lips. “The streets are rather packed today. It's so wonderful to see everyone so happy,”

“Yes I suppose it must be nice,” Reuji had seen her around but hadn't had the chance to meet the tall women before. “I'm Reuji,”

“Okiku, your Sangorous older sister,”

“Yes, it's quite easy to tell who I'm related to,” Reuji admitted with a small chuckle. “If you don't, would you care to show me around? It's simple, beautiful hear, very different from my own home,” She always did enjoy beautiful and deadly things, and she could tell the women next to was such.

“Oh I would love to, you cuaght me at the perfect time,”

Reuji was looking forward to it, she had always known she preferred the company of women, she had keep that sceart close to her chest, she had a role to play and one she did very well. Even if she was found to screatly break the rules. But now that she was free, it didn't matter anymore. there was no need to hide.

“Then shall we?”

<>

Okiku led the stunning women who had bumped into her around her home. She couldn't stop stealing looks at Reiju from the corner of her eye. With her vibrant pink hair and curly eyebrows, the other women certainly stood out. Even with the soft pink kimono with the different colored roses and lilys on the sleeves and hem, her yellow obi did little to hide to her figure.

Her blue eyes seemed deep and full of mystery, and her smile promised pain and pleasure if only one was bold enough to take it.

“Oh thire shuld be fireworks starting soon, I know a wonderful spot to them from,” Okiku decided to be bold and took the other women's hand in her own and led her up the hill.

She was unsure why she was acting this way. They had only just met and yet. Okiku couldn't stop herself from wanting to know more. She had heard that her and Sangorous brothers were receiving treatment to bring back all of their emotions to undo what had been done to them by their own father. She didn't know the details, but it must be hard to have to learn how to handle and regulate your emotions as an adult. Okiku chased thouse thoughts from her head as they neared the spot.

It was almost completely dark as the sun had dipped below the horizon. Okiku took a seat on the ground and patted the grass next to her. Reuji joined her after a moment. They sat in silence listening to the world around them, the wind ruslting therw the trees, the animals moving around, the fireflies had just come out to play.

“Oh!” Reuji examlies next to her. “What are these?”

“Thire fireflies you've never seen one before?”

“No never, I grew up in a floating castle, never spent time outside after drak that didn't involve training, thire was simple no time to just sit and enjoy the world around me,”

“Well now you do, now you have time,”

Reiju smiled at her, softer this time. She leaned closet, her kimono sleeve brushing against her own. They sat and watched the night sky light up with colors, celebrating their freedom.

[forsakenwitchery]

I think I've been MIA on my public profiles everywhere long enough so ummm just dropping by to say that I'm… alive? And that's as far as it goes, because I'm not particularly well physically or mentally. My cat has been sick for almost a month now and I'm one of those weird people who sees pets as kids, so Rowena is quite literally my furry baby. And there're times she's better for a day and then there're times when her condition isn't improving or gets worse in some ways so it's just… Um… It's been a month. Sometimes I sleep 3 or 4 hours a day 'cause she constantly wakes me up and I'm trying to get her to eat or drink at least something. Sometimes I can't force myself to eat if she's not eating. I had a full on mental breakdown the other day for a handful of reasons. I also freaked out when I actually saw myself in the mirror. The whole things is just… A lot. There are times when I just look at her and I see that she's mostly her usual self but something is still off and I just break down crying and she looks at me like I'm insane. I hope she mproves this week, but if not, I just don't know what else to do or think or whatever. I don't want to take her to the clinic for full days under the IV again, but I might not have a choice. I've had a fair share of bad weeks and months in my life with eating disorders, but this September has sure been… something else entirely. I don't have a great support system either and I'm also fighting my family to not make her condition worse 'cause they think that eating grass and vomiting is somehow better for her as if we're in the 19th century.

I am sometimes working on some creative things just to keep a semblance of sanity but I've got no idea when or if they're coming 'cause… you get the picture I’m not particularly keen on painting.

And if someone could send some good vibes Rowena’s way, please do.

[leo--len]

Hi guys!

After reading a large amount of fanfic, and realizing I have an unhealthy amount of ideas in my brain that can't all be expressed through DnD, i've decided I want to try my hand at writing Fanfic. I'm posting it here just so I can get some feedback from real humans while I'm waiting on an Ao3 invitation.

This fanfic takes place in a Minecraft Origins inspired world. This is my first time, so if you have any criticisms or ways I could improve, PLEASE tell me.

Bright Stars in the black void

By: leolen

All was quiet in the town of Bracken Hearth. The children were already asleep, most of the adults were silent and ready to follow them into darkness. Even the sounds of the surrounding forests and valley seemed muted, like even the valley itself had fallen into a deep slumber. And with the moon having been darkened, the only light provided came from the stars, twinking away with their dim light. With not a cloud in sight, it was perfect conditions for a bit of star gazing.

But in the end, that night only two had their eyes on the stars.

CRACK! Gratin winced as a branch snapped under the weight of body, weighed down as it was from the heavy equipment slung around his back. It must have weighed at least sixty pounds, and they had been hiking for well over an hour up the side of the valley. At the sound, Milo jumped, startled until he realized what it was.

“Stars above Gratin!” Milo exclaimed, “Can you at least try to be a little quieter, you scared the crap out of me!”

Gratin gave him a baleful look and shot back, “I’m only here because you needed help carrying this thing up the trail. Next time, I won’t come, and you can do it yourself.”

At that Milo gave a little huff and continued climbing up the trail. Gratin hoped they were almost there, he was running on an empty stomach, and the nap he took this afternoon wasn’t enough to fully dissuade his exhaustion.

At last, the trees around the two cleared, to reveal a large grassy area. A few minutes of walking later and…

“Whoa…” Gratin whispers. No matter how many times he comes up here, the view from this bluff never fails to impress. This was surprising, as he had been to places much more expansive, and seen the world from angles few ever had. But even still, this bluff managed to take his breath away each and every time he stepped up to that ridge.

“Let's set up over there,” Milo said, pointing to a patch of grass a good distance away from the ledge, “The ground looks stable enough to set up the scope.”

“On it,” Gratin replied. And after a few minutes of Milo and Gratin fiddling around with the heavy equipment, a large brass telescope finally stood in place. With the telescope fully assembled, Milo began his work, mapping the stars and the constellations they formed onto large scrolls of paper. This was Gratin’s favorite part of the routine. Gratin carefully settled himself down into the grass—careful not to pinch his cloak in the wrong way—and looked back up at the sky and the stars that danced across it. As Milo hummed to themself while copying down the patterns he saw in the sky, Gratin felt himself drifting off into a deep, and restful sleep.

— • —

Milo loved the stars.

He loved how they painted the sky with light, even in the darkest part of the day. He loved how they wove together stories through the constellations they formed. And he loved how even though they would shift and change throughout the year, he loved how they would always come back together. And so, for the past year and a half, he'd been coming up to Cedarhead Bluff each week to see how they've shifted across the sky. To witness their beauty up close, and personal.

Hours after Gratin fell asleep, Milo noticed something unusual in the sky. It started as looking like a brand new star in the sky, appearing right between Glatoris and Minos Ursa. But the longer Milo looked at it, the brighter it seemed to get. This continued until the other stars seemed to pale in comparison to its sheer luminosity, and by the time Milo had shaken Gratin out of his slumber, it was brighter than the full moon.

“Gratin! LOOK!” Milo shouted, shaking Gratin back and forth. The light grew brighter and brighter, now revealing the sun in its intensity. Birds began to chirp, the forest startled into wakefulness by the violet light spilling across the entire valley. Even the inhabitants of Brakenhearth, still slumbering away in their beds, began to stir, their bodies still knowing its night, but confused by the seeming presence of the sun. It grew brighter, and brighter until,

It vanished, and the night was dark once more.

“What was that,” Gratin grumbled, still a bit annoyed from being woken up so suddenly, “It almost looked like a shooting star.”

“Not even meteorites are that bright,” Milo excitedly replied, shooting a glance back at a now awake Gratin, “This is something new! Something previously unknown! Something…” He trailed off, now looking in the telescope pointed towards the source of the unknown light. A look of confusion was painted across his face.

“Gratin,” Milo said, with a note of apprehension and fear audible in his voice, “Could you tell me where Dywyll is. I've seen to have misplaced it.

Dywyll? What was Milo talking about? Being in the Ursa cluster, it was one of the easier stars to find, even with Dywyll being one of the dimmer stars of the night. First find Sylaphus, then one down and two to the right…

No

Wait

That's not

Again, first find Alarch, then three up, and one the the left…

No!

Again! Find Rhewlif! Then two down, and one to the right…

Nothing

Gratin stared, a look of utter disbelief on his face, as he finally understood the look of almost terror that was now present on Milo’s face. No matter how many times he looked, no matter how many times he searched the sky using maps that had been long since ingrained into his brain, he would always come to the same conclusion. That in the sky, one of the dancers have misstepped in a way that shouldn’t be possible. Because Dywyll, well…

Dywyll was missing.

And once again, all was quiet in the forest.

[deliciousnightcomputer]

my brothers death, my parents, my friends 2.

3. Httyd, Pitch perfect, the Duff 4. Once my mom went out with my uncle and my aunt and after she came back, she was kind of drunk and just took of her glasses to go to sleep but she set them on the bed so she slept on them that night and it kind of got crooked and now every time we go out we always tell her don't drink too much or you'll sleep on your glasses again. 5. i heard a lot about Tumblr and that u could find almost any ship here so i was curious and came to check it out. 6. the number of notifications is the best and worst cause i like reading the comments and seeing how much i got but it also makes a lot of noise and if your gone for more than 2 days you'll have a million waiting for you and u have to read through them and answer back 7. Insects and the middle of the ocean. i don't really know why I'm scared of insects but i just am like anytime they come remotely close to me i start to freak out. Oceans because you never know what's happening around you when you're on a boat you'll never know if there's a gigantic thing under you or when you're under water you won't be able to see if somethings under you or above you unless you look up and it's not like you can hear them either. 8. not really i rarely have dreams as is. 9. once when i was little my brother, my cousin and i we started our own business selling cherries and lemonade and the business was actually going pretty well (btw we were only 6 and 7 at the time and this is in another country) until i cut the back of my leg on something at school it was this long piece of metal and the cut was long i don't know how my tiny self-did not cry after seeing this, but after that we had to shut down our business. 10. yes i would 11. when you and whoever you're with can stay in the same room together not saying a single word yet you guys can understand each other, when you're in your moment of weakness and you guys don't even have to say anything but you know what they need and when even though you guys are mad at each other you guys would still take care of each other, when the person likes you but doesn't think they're good enough so they improve on themselves for you when something happens to one of you and the other one waits instead of moving on and leaving you behind. 12. never take anything for granted you never know what can happen in the future, especially to the people you love. 13. supposed to be doing homework but am reading, talking and writing on Tumblr instead. 14. I've always wanted to have a sleepover with a friend or go hang out with a friend outside of school but i can't do that because of my parents so that's never happening. 15. my house, family and my best friend 16. my inability to do work early I procrastinate too much. 17. God, My best friend, and My books 18. i don't believe in ghosts but i do believe in Aliens 19. the feeling of the sun of your face, and the trees and grass looking so green under the sunlight, the air blowing and making the trees sway, being able to have natural light. 20. the solitude, not needing to do anything, knowing there isn't anybody else awake in the house, the stars, the way its so dark but it looks like a painting, and the minimum of sounds, it's just so peaceful at night (also being able to sleep in the darkness).

questions I think would be fun to be asked

what are 3 things you’d say shaped you into who you are?

show us a picture of your handwriting?

3 films you could watch for the rest of your life and not get bored of?

what’s an inside joke you have with your family or friends?

what made you start your blog?

what’s the best and worst part of being online/a creator?

what scares you the most and why?

any reacquiring dreams?

tell a story about your childhood

would you say you’re an emotional person?

what do you consider to be romance?

what’s some good advice you want to share?

what are you doing right now?

what’s something you’ve always wanted to do but maybe been to scared to do?

what do you think of when you hear the word “home”?

if you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

name 3 things that make you happy

do you believe in ghosts and/or aliens?

favourite thing about the day?

favourite things about the night?

are you a spiritual person?

say 3 things about someone you love

say 3 things about someone you hate

what’s one thing you’re proud of yourself for?

fave season and why?

fave colour and why?

any nicknames?

do you collect anything?

what do you do when you’re sad?

what’s one thing that never fails to make you happy/happier?

are you messy or organised?

how many tabs do you have open right now?

any hobbies?

any pet peeves?

do you trust easily?

are you an open book or do you have walls up?

share a secret

fave song at the moment?

youtuber you’ve been obsessed with and why?

any bad habits?

(this post was stolen from @teenage-mutant-ninja-freak, since it couldn't be reblogged anymore)

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

Real pleased with the progress in the yard so far, and fine-tuning the next steps as I go

Projects I noticed while working on the reseeding today:

Need to build and hang some bee boxes and then scrub down the deck with a citronella seal to hopefully convince the carpenter bees to relocate - also need to redo the deck frankly but that's a long-term thing and I'd really like to have access to a woodlot first and plane our own boards rather than buying them. Even in bulk from a lumbermill that's more money than I'd like to spend for proper hardwoods like oak and cherry

Need to buy a sythe/machete for the tall invasives by the creek - once the ground is cleared, going to turn our old olive oil tins into lizard houses, and reseed with strawberry corn, sunflowers, cardoons, witch hazel, and ground cherries

Need to call the city and find out who is legally allowed to bring down the willow across the creek that got uprooted during Helene and has been threatening to fall onto our fence ever since. Happy to do it myself if I'm allowed, but would rather the other land owner handle it, unfortunately it's not a person, it's a company so I have no idea how to talk to them about this except through the city.

Need to smash a pumpkin and throw some budding sweet potatoes into the compost and really hill up the hay on top so I can have a pumpkin and sweet potato patch for my leetle ladies tasty treat times

I need to sprout the red plum seeds and prep the temporary pots for when they're ready to transplant outdoors, might consider planting them directly in their own loosened hale bales, esp if I can let the chickens have at the bales over winter first.

Speaking of which, we need more hay. I need to call my hay guy and ask how much another 50 bales of clover hay will cost me

Need to bury the logs under hay and compost to start byilding raised beds and improving the topsoil quality, ideally I'll seed the swales with wetland/riparian plants so that as the swales smother the lingering invasives, the plants can sprout up on top with all that yummy organic matter

Need to buy/make root veggie sacks to bury in the compost and new topsoil so I can grow even while I'm still making new topsoil

I need to make sure to include wildflowerd in the spring compost and reseed, because we're starting to get some volunteering which means the soil is recovered enough to play good host and I want to speed that up

Gotta make some starter plots around the chicken run and the dog run to regularly re-establish groundcover in them given how much the chickens and dogs tear up the grass

Need to build a chicken tractor to use in future years to control overgrowth and compost growing beds after harvest

Need to build a water table for lettuces and greens, ideally linked up to the rainbarrel water storage system

Need to keep expanding the chicken run now they're all enjoying it so Elvira is less of an asshole, and reinforce under the coop so no one gets stuck under the foundation

Reinforcing the creek bank (witch hazel and red plum tree and creeping thyme) behind the dog run so we don't lose integrity of the fence.

Paint the house some goddamn colors holy FUCK

Keep making braids for cat and chicken toys

Maybe enclose the upper deck for a four season cat porch

Set up some 7-10 gallon pots on the deck for growing ginger and lemongrass and other culinary/medicinal plants we need to keep out of the topsoil

Make a plant ID booklet for use during harvesting

Make a recipe book to guide cut and come again use

Set out a shaded table at the top of the drive with places to set out eggs, produce, preserves, etc that we're not going to be able to use up for give away - should make sure to put a sign up to officially let folks know they can take what they like.

Start passionflower vines by the creek and back fence

Fill the front yard with flax

Plant a broomsedge, scouring rush, water cress, plaintain, American Trout Lily, alumroot, phlox, chickweed, creeping blueberries,culinary sumac, and primrose propogation bed by the creek to crowd out the last invasive ground covers (apparently the native ground covers have done a GREAT job smothering most of the invasives in the yard, and there are only a few invasive vines and crabgrass left actually. Everything else is native wetland grasses and galax. Just....so much galax lmao

I might look into canebrrak bamboo as well, that would be extremely useful for fiber production holy shit

I definitely want a stand of Indigo for dyes and inks

I still want my pawpaws and wild olive and wild black rum cherry trees so they'll probably go in the front where the crabapples are now. I could probably make a lil lumber out of the bigger crabapple and a nice cat toy out of the smaller one.

It would be great to get a Broom Hickory or a chinquapin, too, but I'm prioritizing the pecans

A sugar berry would be lovely, they're kind of nothing on their own, but if you use them in preserves of other fruits, they come out AMAZING

Coreopsis my beloved <3

I need to flesh out my medicinal garden too, and I'm thinking about waterleaf. It would be AMAZING for my skin condition, particularly for my feet, but I'm not sure I can harvest and use it fast enough given its growth habit the leaves and shoots are ostensibly edible, so maybe if we a consistent about cutting them back for the greens that will keep the rhizomes focused on growing rather than spreading.

Bayberry would be extremely useful for making plant waxes and butters, but I'm in the same position as the waterleaf, esp since they're even less readily edible lol

I think that's everything so far, which is good because it's already a year's worth of work lmao

[artsymeadowblog]

Evaluation

I made this creative artwork of a key. It was tough to work with clay polyester while moulding the shape, and painting it was also tricky. I had to make a digital drawing of my initial idea, but I ended up changing my approach and removing some colours. The final result isn't exactly what I had in mind compared to my drawing, but I still like how it turned out. I was comparing my key to the ones in Locke & Key, and I noticed that his keys only have the design on the head, while mine is way more colourful and unique. I even added dragonfly wings, which his keys don't have.

Making my trading cards was super fun and awesome! I got to create new characters and used sea animals as inspiration for the back covers. Each card has its own special trait or personality, and I even named them after the sea creatures they're based on. So, I made this island stack and plaster sculpture by reverse casting. It wasn't too hard, but I did make a few mistakes. It was still fun to make, and I added a lot of detail and texture to the clay using paint and other materials. The final product came out pretty much how I expected, but the bird stain is a little too dramatic. If I did it again, I'd use less vibrant green so it would look more like grass.

I did some research at the beginning of the project on artists who do realism, shapes, and cute cartoony stuff. Amanda Visell, Norman Saunders, and Junko Mizuno are some of the artists I looked at. Honestly, though, their work didn't really influence me or my ideas when I was creating my own stuff throughout the lessons. For the eight pieces, I decided to do a pirate theme. I thought it would be different to do something with sea creatures since pirates are always out at sea. I also used a different theme for one of the pieces, which was clowns being pirates. 

My best work so far was definitely the trading cards and key. The designs came out sick, and even though the key didn't turn out exactly how I pictured it, it still looked dope in the end. I'm gonna try to be better about managing my time with posts and creating artwork in the future. I'll plan ahead, do some research, and take progress photos to include in the posts. I also want to check out other artists' work to see how I can improve or compare my own stuff. And of course, I'll use the internet to help me make and design things.

[valcuda]

- Jasmin cloud gazing with her little siblings.

This is a scene from a short story I'm working on, "Jasmin: A Little Day Out". In this painting, they're just laying in the grass, enjoying the sun, and the wind, and the sounds of nature.

Anyways, I imagine Jasmin viewing Quinton and Elizabeth as siblings, instead of pets, or just family members, a view which I think Quinton and Elizabeth share, especially since they were shrunken as part of the same test, they have a bit of kinship there.

Oh yeah! You can also see Jasmin's thigh high's in this! Something which I rarely think about. The only reason she has them, is cause I made her in Sims once, and her legs too bare, so I gave her thigh highs, and they looked good, so I stuck with them. She's not showing her thighs in her base artwork tho, so I can't show them! This makes Jasmin the only character to have a detail not included in her base art! Assuming you don't count the seams on Junk-Watt's thighs, legs, ankles, and stomach, as separate details from her other seams.

Anyway, because I suck with perspective, I actually used Blender to pose digital wood drawing mannequins in the right poses, with the right sizes, rendered that, and essentially used that as my pose draft. I feel a bit guilty about doing that, but Jasmin's neck paid the price. An when I say wood drawing mannequins, I mean actually hunted down a 3D model of a typical wooden drawing mannequin, since that's what I base my pose drafts off anyway. Here's a link to it if you want it. It's honestly quite nice, and the stand was easy to remove thankfully!

Now then, something that annoys me is how little resolution I had for Quinton and Elizabeth. I originally planned to do this in Medibang, at 5600x4200 (my usual, just landscape), but it didn't give me enough resolution to do those two in my usual style, so I decided to try digitally painting it, and Penup has an even lower max resolution. Jasmin was drawn on 10 layers (Something I kinda regret), while Quin and Liz were done on 1 layer each. Honestly, if I wasn't so hellbent on making Quinton and Elizabeth their accurate sizes (which I still messed up by making them a tad bit too small) this would've looked far different, as I planned to include a tree stump, and some flowers (Like "Dreams by the Creek"), but I had to zoom in quite close just to make Quin and Elizabeth more than mere specs. This whole drawing was a disaster and a half. I still love it though, and I'm sure I'll end up making an improved version sometime, likely in Medibang. (Which ironically, was what I made "Dreams by the Creek" in, cause I didn't have Penup at the time, or even know it existed!)

Well then, that's all for now!

[ambivartence]

sorry in advance if you've already answered a question like this but i just wanted to ask, how do you improve on drawing?? i think especially for things like coloring, shading, and lighting , its been difficult for me to be happy with how it looks because compared to the sketch (that i think already looks nice) the colors just seem sort of flat and muddy and i feel like i dont have a good grip on what colors to put where and how to make it look unflatt if that makes sense! just curious on maybe what kinds of practices and studying you do for this(if any))<33 obv you dont have to answer if you dont want to, and thank you for being one of my inspirations, love youu<33333

hihi!! for simply shading/lighting, i would suggest you only work in black and white until you're totally comfortable with developing values. why? marco bucci explains it really nicely in this video but basically if you have good values u can have absolutely garbage nonsense colors and it will still make sense aka when i did this lol:

i'm guessing you're more interested in colored artwork though since black and white drawings can't be "flat and muddy" bc theyre in grayscale lol. for coloring, this is so tough for me too so i thought about this for a day or so and i came up with 3 tips that might help^^ 1) getting colors directly from photo reference or color reference, 2) manually adding filters/color harmony, and 3) studying color theory

i always work from photo reference so it informs a lot of my coloring/shading/lighting and often when i don't understand what color I'm looking at i directly just eye drop it and realize that what i thought was purple was actually just a gray-red. working from an actual picture helps make sure my colors don't look strange and while i used to think eye-dropping felt like "cheating" when i worked digitally honestly i've learned a lot from it and honestly if i stare at a color long enough i can get it pretty accurately now but i'm just too lazy so eye-dropping just speeds up my workflow (plus i hate digital color pickers anyways they r not built for artists and i wrote an entire paper on it in college once lmao) anyways here's an example of a color study i did by directly eye-dropping from a gif with @quokki's incredible coloring (love u ale <3)

if you're not working from a picture directly, you can still use other pictures or artwork as a "color reference" which I used to do a lot. i like to look at art from other ppl with pretty colors and create a color palette to use in my own drawings. for example, the color palette for this felix painting came from a piece (idr which) by Simón Prades on instagram but this palette is really easy to use since it's linear values it's like working in black and white but comes out looking cooler LOL

Recently for my lee know kiki's delivery service drawing i felt that the colors seemed a little flat n muddy to me because it was in an animated flat coloring style (lol) so I added a filter layer (just a flat apricot color set to overlay at 25% on photoshop) that livened up the whole thing and made it feel more cohesive. It's a pretty subtle difference to other people but made a world of difference to me :) it helped take the muddiness out of the shadows of his face and the glass reflection and took the painting from gloomy rainy day with stale bread to warm sunny day with fresh bread :]

and finally if u are interested in actually studying colors and lighting and shading and stuff these r some of the youtube videos and channels that i think do a great job explaining these very cool concepts:

pre-realism vs post-realism is a cool video about the difference between the mentality of how beginners draw vs how experts draw and kinda blew my mind tbh i think the big color takeaway from this video is that something that kids would color (like green grass) might actually be a totally different color to an artist's eye (dark yellow, red gray, even a super desaturated purple) depending on a realistic lighting situation

nathan fowkes did a 3-part guest talk series on understanding color temperature and relationships: (1) (2) (3) also not coloring but i love his video on value massing

this lecture on what charles bernard calls "the mother color principle" takes the "filtering" tip that i mentioned earlier to a much more developed level (it's an hour long so just skip through it.. u get the gist of what he's saying in a few min but the whole demo is also cool too)

i mentioned him earlier but marco bucci has many 10 min digestable videos about color on his channel that i like :) (also this lighting/value video is great too)

sorry i don't really know exactly how basic or advanced i should cater my advice but i hope this helps some anon^^ lmk if u have questions or if u ever want feedback my inbox and dms r always open

[drybrushdriftwood]

This is the result of my first attempt at making a diorama.

I started with a LED tea light in a 11x8cm cardboard base, carved up some glue gun sticks to act as crystals and rinsed them in hot water to get a glossy finish.

After that, I modelled the terrain with air-drying clay and set the stone circle.

Everything was covered in a mixture of mod podge and black paint to make it more stable. I then painted the ground in different shades of green.

The dry brushing of the stone circle did not work out as well as I had hoped. I guess I still had too much paint on the brush, when touching up those stones with a light grey.

I chopped up an old sponge into small pieces, mixed it with pva glue and paint to make small bushes and undergrowth. The grass was made from a mixture of sawdust, paint and pva glue. After gluing in a bit of sand for the path, I secured everything with watered down pva glue.

So—this is it.

A Mystic Crystal Shrine.

I'm pretty happy with the result, though there is still a lot of room for improvement.

Fortunately, these LED candles came in a pack of four.

Let's see what I can do with the others.

—

This build was greatly inspired by a tutorial from tabletop witchcraft.

Tips on home-made flocking can be found over at dioramabox.

[wasteofart]

I feel like the biggest problem today is that nothing is made to be enjoyed anymore. Everything is hyper optimized to gain influence, cater a certain audience and just make money.

I get it, money is important and needed for living since everything has a cost. But that still doesn't justify the need for everything revolving around it. No one enjoys simply having a hobby anymore, you always gotta be the best, broadcast everything for validation and make money from it or otherwise it's not worth the time. What happened to people just enjoying stuff? Because I feel like no one is actually having fun and joyful anymore. I don't remember the last time I saw someone genuinely be happy and content just doing something they enjoy, whether it be painting, gaming, any sort of craftsmenship, reading, dressing up, doing make up or whatever. Why do we let society and capitalizm take away the only good things we have in life? If it isn't for those things, what else is there?

Even spending time with friends is a competition. Who went out with who, what 'cool' things did you do together. It's all plastered over social media for others to see and be jealous of.

And at the end of the day? Everyone is miserable. We're burnt out and depressed from constaintly fighting to stay relevant while trying to one up everyone else. And I'm sick of it. I'm sick of spending hours on my phone, looking at 30 second clips of people doing shit to promote themselves in a world where nothing of this matters. I'm sick of having to spend my whole day working a job that I hate that brings me nothing but dread and exhaustion only so I can pay rent. I'm sick of worrying that my whole life will be this joyless and sad, living from one day to the other. But what can I do? I can't quit my job because the next one will be exactly the same. I can't delete all my social media because at this point my brain is demanding to be entertained, I can barely focus on only one thing at a time without getting not just bored but plain under stimulated. This whole life we're living has caused us to spiral down into an endless cycle of wanting to escape the stress but in order to do that we need to work even harder. And that is exhausting. I am tired, I can't change my whole life in a day just to not be tired anymore. I can't work to become not tired. There is literally no way out of this.

There are so many things that I want to change, that I feel need to be changed or otherwise I will not be happy. But then again, I feel like nothing I could do would actually make me happy. It would only change the circumstances under which I am unhappy. And to be honest, I feel like everyone around me has the same issues. My friends struggle with their jobs, with their relationships, with their health. And do I feel like anything is going to get better? No. I honestly feel like we fucked up so badly, let this society become what it is today, in a way where we passed the point of no return. Everything is just getting worse and even the beautiful things seem completely meaningless compared to everything else. I mean, yes, I sat down on the grass and picked flowers today. Was I happy doing that? No. Will that cure my mental illnesses? Also no. Will that improve anything in my life, my job or the overall problems we have in this world? Absolutely no.

Everything is just adding to the weight we're all carrying around with us and I don't know if that is the mental issues speaking out of me or my mid-twenty year old brain that is overwhelmed by the way adulting works. Either way, it seemed like these problems today are so much more severe than the problems people had back in the days. Yes, there were wars and plagues and economic crashes before in the history, but those usually lead to the collapse of a society. If someone asked me what time period we lived in, I would say the already declining high before the total fall. The digital age is coming to an end and we're all going down with it if we don't make rapid changes. I don't want to sound pessimistic or depressing but that is honestly the feeling that I'm having about the times we lived in. There are barely any new technological innovations or groundbreaking discoveries that bring us forward as a society. Everything is only about money. Companies want to make sales by optimizing the shit out of everything even if it only lasts a short amount of time. The best example for that are NFTs. Was there potential? Sure. Did it make any fucking sense? Nope. So there's no wonder that shit is going down as fast as it came to a peak. The cycles in which things go 'out of style' nowadays are alarmingly short. Back then everything lasted longer. The quality and appreciation were so much more valuable characteristics of just anything starting from products over employment to our hobbies. When did we stop appreciating things just for the sake of it, because it is dear to us and not because it involves a lot of money?

I see a lot of great things out there. People trying to live sustainable, trifting, taking care of nature, making art. But nowadays there's always someone trying to make money from it and ruining it for everyone else. Why does everything have to be monetizable do be of worth. Why is a video or a movie only good if it reaches millions of people and makes millions of dollars? Why am I only a real artist if I make sales? Why does my fashion have to be popular and admired by my followers in order for it to be enjoyable?

We're ruining it for ourselves. We're taking the joy out of the things we love. No wonder everyon is depressed nowadays when even the things that are meant to make us happy cause us distress and distress only. And peole give you shit for trying to break the cycle.

[nightroo]

Finally finished painting my bookcase! It ended up looking more... whimsical than I planned (I think it's because of the bright colors), but I quite like it

So the bottom three shelves are the moss and mushroom layer, the middle shelf is grass and flowers, and the top three are branches and flowers. Its split like that because the number of shelves I have does'nt divide neatly into 3's...

I just put the varnish on it so it's still shiny, when it dries out it will be matt like the vines on the sides...

Overall this was way more work than I initially thought it would be, but I'm happy with the result, and I feel like my ability to freehand stuff with a brush really improved, so I'm glad I did this.

Now, for my next project, I'm debating if I should go do the comic chapter first, or rush into emroidery since today I bought supplies for that and I really wanna try them out...

Knowing myself, I'm probably gonna do the emroidery first lol. Well, as long as it's something creative it's gonna be useful to do (from my perspective)

Speaking of the comic, I finished the thumbnails yesterday, and I feel like it's gonna be a good chapter, story-wise and art-wise

[blackleopardgirl]

a little robbie update (if anyone cares) 

therapy: i really do hate going to therapy these days. i haven't been in over a month maybe, and it's because i realized that only talking to someone for an hour and then never having anything change for me isn't helping anything. i don't want to keep telling my therapist that i haven't seen any positive contributions and improvements to my life and i hate that lol. there's NOTHING i can do about it. so id rather not talk about it.

my life: i am incredibly grateful that I've had these opportunities with jobs! and the results from the kids and the parents, so i am happy to work. i don't get sad as much because i bought three books: Palestine, Iran, and Cuba. i don't see him as much anymore, but more on that later. I'm really not on my OWN Instagram anymore, but i am on my private account. which makes me happier.

school: im excited to graduate and still do well in school. it is what it is right now. I've had great grades recently. so that makes me excited to still be on this path. im not focused on making friends in school anymore, i am just going to let life happen the way that it happens. but all my enegry and time will be spent being in the libaray studying, and focusing on all my school work. which excites me! because then it means i wont be sad and depressed at home wondering why people didn't call me back.

him: i just don't feel as into him as i once did, i don't know what happened recently. but I've given up on the *idea* of him, which is good. because he is who he is, and i am who i am. it did take a whole year to fully break my heart and go through the stages, but i am here. and tomorrow will be another day. i really don't tell him about my personal life anymore, because it feels pointless. i do love him, but i know that i have to stay away from him because the love just isn't reciprocated, and that's ok. he doesn't have to love me, or want me the way that i want him does. and he doesn't. and for whatever reason right now, i am ok with that. ive found solise once again in just being myself, and leaving.

grief: i still do have these daydreams and just plain dreams of what my life was like about 10 years ago and I can't do anything but cry, (i still cry writing this). it won't ever be what it once was, and that breaks me every time i start talking about it again, but I'll be here and still move on.

anxious-ness: I am starting to read from my books, and highlighting sentences, and paragraphs that i think are worthy. i play this relaxing sims family that i love. their a couple with 4 small kids and its caotic, but its what i wish my life was. no one grows up or changes, we all just stay the same and the little kids stay loving me as their sim mom. i also want to buy more white paint (like a full thing of it) to maybe start painting random little pictures on the weekends. i also need to get back into poetry, and violent bent backwards over the grass, just ebcause it impacted me on such a deep level 2 years ago. (wow time is flying)

moving forward: hopefully, my parents have talked about me moving out, and that makes me happy but also not really. because this happened last year and we all remember that. regardless, i did remain calm and ok when i didn't receive something BIG that i wanted. the same thing happened when he didn't want anything with me, and my changes over this summer dispute them being negative to my life.

[subparatbestcomics]

Artist’s Commentary

Rather than a new page this week, I will instead be reviewing and providing commentary for the previous 10 pages published. For the most part I will be going over my own mistakes, as well as explaining some of the choices made, and whether or not they worked. Before we start however, I would like to note these pages are not complete, but more of a rough draft. There are several reasons for this. One major reason, is that it has been several years since I have drawn with any regularity. Producing a page each week will, I hope, shake off the rust. Additionally, neither my or my brother's hardware is up to the task of rendering RFO. One day, RFO may see an updated version that better fits our mutual vision of this project. And so, the commentary begins. RFO 1 -Jude Anderson lives in a poor neighborhood; identical row houses with unkempt lawns and no decoration outside. -My first mistake was leaving the sky blank. Its meant to be near midnight, but the bright sky and lack of shading imply otherwise. -Jude's front door and the paneling on it will change in scale just about every panel. Partly, this is because there was no consistent model. -Jude's house -interior and exterior- were modeled in Lego Digital Designer. -Jude's house number is 616, a less popular interpretation of the number of the beast. -My original attempt at this was painted in photoshop. The foreshortened fences were an absolute nightmare. I'm still not too happy about them as drawn now, but its still better than it was. -I forgot to shade the first floor window shutters. Oops. RFO 2 -Jude is whistling the ever popular 'Happy Birthday'. I’m not totally certain about the notation here, because I haven't had to read music since middle school. (side note: This song recently entered the public domain) -Jude's outfit was inspired by Back to the Future's Marty McFly. -I forgot to put a candle in the birthday apple pie. -You may notice Jude has no visible fridge in his kitchen. Jude cant afford a full fridge, or fit it in his kitchen. Instead, anything he needs cold is kept in a basement mini-fridge. -Jude’s facial features and hair take inspiration from Norville 'Shaggy' Rogers of Scooby Doo. -You may notice the quality of characters hands changing. Hands are still difficult for me, but I'm hoping to improve. -My brother pointed out that the carpet in Jude's living room looks like grass. I'm not really certain how one draws carpet. -The leftmost painting depicts two figures with an arm around the others shoulder. A third figure appears later, but there is no story significance, I just forgot what it was supposed to be. RFO 3 -The overly enthusiastic individual at Jude's door is meant to be androgynous. I feel I made them a little too masculine -The design on the handbag clearly denotes a christian denomination, although not any specific one. I wanted it to be generic, but evocative of several things. (a cross, a sword, an angel, a shooting star, etc) -While it was done primarily to help them stand out, the white outline around the stranger nicely implies a holy glow. -I'm most proud of this page, and how uncomfortable and annoyed Jude is by this stranger interrupting his birthday and asking about religion at midnight. -Several of these pages were first sketched in faint colored pencil. Its not meant to show up when scanned, but clearly that didn't work quite as advertised. -You may notice proportions are inconsistent, especially regarding head size. Like most of my mistakes, I did not notice until it was already too late to fix without starting the whole page over. -The handbag is unshaded in the last panel. RFO 4 -I'm not sure how I feel about these sound effects in retrospect. I'm still toying with how they work. -One habit I need to break is placing speech bubbles too close to the papers edge. The scanner sometimes cuts them! -As Jude gets more confused and frustrated by strangers popping up at or in his house, his hair gets wilder. -Jude's house layout is similar to several I personally have been in. RFO 5 -I'm not happy at all with the posing of the officer; they're so stiff and lifeless. While I could try to pass it off as part of the stranger's idea of how a police officer asks, the truth is that even when my skills weren't rusty; posing was never my strong suit. -Some panels have blank backgrounds partly due to laziness on my part, and partly so the paper could be held without smearing -The officer's nametag reads 'GATES'.This, along with his unusual badge and emblems, indicate that this is still the same person who was at Jude's door only a minute before. RFO 6 -I don't have much to say about this page, except that the officers uniform is visibly becoming simpler by the panel. This is because drawing those details was hurting my wrist. In the future I will try to be more economical with character design. RFO 7 -If the past ten weeks have taught me anything, its that I should plan out what I'm going to do more thoroughly. Jude's speech balloon was drawn first, and ended up over the other man's crotch. Now it looks stupid. -The officer (stranger) tends to be to Jude left, while the other man tends to the right. -The middle left panel is another I'm proud of, not for any major thing, but because tilting the head is difficult for me to do on purpose; especially when the part of the head where the jaw meets the neck is visible, but I think I did okay here. -The hard angles and edges of the final speech balloon show the officer is stern and serious. It is also shaped like a stop sign. RFO 8 -While the officer is still left of Jude (to the viewer), he is now right of the other man. Left positioning in RFO signifies benevolence, right signifies malice. It could have been the opposite just as easily, but sometimes you have to make an arbitrary choice for theming purposes. -The other man's hair forms horns on the sides and a tail in the back whereas the officer's (stranger's) hair is more flowing and wing-like. -Jude only owns one other jacket, as seen in his barren closet. -The officer's proportions in the bottom left are so off, I'm not sure why I thought it looked okay. -The other man's outfit and personality are meant to evoke a stereotypical used car salesman. Also Rodney Dangerfield! RFO 9 -Not much to say here. I will continue to simplify the style until an equilibrium is met between making things look good versus not destroying my wrist. -Also, the other man's sleeve in the first panel is missing its vertical stripes. RFO 10 -Jude's face in the last panel seems off to me. I don't quite know why, and I'm the one who drew it. -When I originally planned this page out, there was too much vertical space. It would have left me either having to draw their legs (which would been difficult with the furniture in the scene at leg height) or leaving a terrible amount of dead air above their heads. Instead, I tried to do something more visually interesting with that negative space, by making the last two panels more diagonal than horizontal.                                                                                                                                       Jacob Birmingham