#THIS is research material

[mysteryanimator]

The Punishing Heat spot art for @ifishouldvanish in @castlevaniaszn

Go check out the zine here!

Also here's a tiny peek at my exploration/research stage! I have to give major props to Vanish for giving me a lot of the groundwork to go off. I would've been so lost on where to start without them providing a ton of resources for me!

[charcoaldustonmyfingers]

Leo skeletal anatomy! Click for better quality :)

The way most turtles actually fit into their shells is because their arms and legs are shaped to fit into the loose skin around the openings for their limbs, but on account of their human proportions, I just suspend my disbelief as to how mutant turtles could fit in their shells without the odd configuration to their organs that real turtles have. Real turtles have flat lungs that sit widely along their carapace, which is weird but cool. Turtles shed their scutes (the large flat scales on their shells and plastron) about once a year or if the scutes are damaged. The scutes have barely any skin between them and the bone, which is why turtle skeletons usually have the scutes on still, though they can pop off. The rest of the skin sheds regularly though, instead of in large patches.

For the brothers’, their respiration is much more human than turtle. Therefore, their lungs need to expand and contract with their diaphragm rather than just with their movement, so therefore they must have some flexibility to their chest. Some turtles, like box turtles, already have hinged plastrons, and softshell shells are mostly cartilage, so it’s not too far off to assume that there’s a bit of cartilage just to the upper plastral bones of the hard shelled brothers to give their humanoid lungs room to breathe.

Poor Leo. After the movie, one could assume he’s got a couple broken bones. It kind of made me morbidly curious as to how to describe injuries on a character whose skeletal structure is quite different from a human’s for my own writing!

Feel free to use as reference or disregard, these are just my own little speculations :)

[General][Raph][Donnie][Mikey][Splinter]

[starlightseraph]

friendly reminder that george took ballet classes!!

[serpentface]

how do you come up with the ways cultures in your setting stylize people/animals/the world in general in their artwork, i.e. jewlery, rock carvings, statues, etc? Each culture in your world seems to have a very unique "art style" and I love it a lot - makes them seem that much more 'real'. This is something I struggle with a lot in my own worldbuilding and I'd love to pick your brain if possible 😁

I think a starting point is to have a research process based in the material realities of the culture you're designing for. Ask yourself questions like:

Where do they live? What's the climate/ecosystem(s) they are based in? What geographic features are present/absent?

What is their main subsistence method? (hunter gatherer, seasonal pastoralist, nomadic pastoralist, settled agriculturalist, a mix, etc)

What access to broader trade networks do they have and to whom? Are there foreign materials that will be easily accessible in trade and common in use, or valuable trade materials used sparingly in limited capacities?

Etc

And then do some research based on the answers, in order to get a sense of what materials they would have routine access to (ie dyes, metal, textiles, etc) and other possible variables that would shape how the art is made and what it's used for. This is just a foundational step and won't likely play much into designing a Style.

If you narrow these questions down very specifically, (ie in the context of the Korya post- grassland based mounted nomads, pastoralist and hunter-gatherer subsistence, access to wider trade networks and metals), you can direct your research to specific real world instances that fit this general idea. This is not to lift culturally specific concepts from the real world and slap them into your own setting, but to notice commonalities this lifestyle enforces - (ie in the previous example- mounted nomadic peoples are highly mobile and need to easily carry their wealth (often on clothing and tack) therefore small, elaborate decorative artwork that can easily be carried from place to place is a very likely feature)

For the details of the art itself, I come up with loose 'style guides' (usually just in my head) and go from there.

Here's some example questions for forming a style (some are more baseline than others)

Are geometric patterns favored? Organic patterns? Representative patterns (flowers, animals, stars, etc)? Abstract patterns?

Is there favored material(s)? Beads, bone, clay, metals, stones, etc.

When depicting people/animals, is realism favored? Heavy stylization? The emotional impression of an animal? Are key features accentuated?

How perspective typically executed? Does art attempt to capture 3d depth? Does it favor showing the whole body in 2 dimensions (ie much of Ancient Egyptian art, with the body shown in a mix of profile and forward facing perspective so all key attributes are shown)? Will limbs overlap? Are bodies shown static? In motion?

Does artwork of people attempt to beautify them? Does it favor the culture's conception of the ideal body?

Are there common visual motifs? Important symbols? Key subject matters?

What is the art used for? Are its functions aesthetic, tutelary, spiritual, magical? (Will often exist in combination, or have different examples for each purpose)

Who is represented? Is there interest in everyday people? Does art focus on glorifying warriors, heroes, kings?

Are there conventions for representing important figures? (IE gods/kings/etc being depicted larger than culturally lesser subjects)

Is there visual shorthand to depict objects/concepts that are difficult to execute with clarity (the sun, moon, water), or are invisible (wind, the soul), or have no physical component (speech)?

Etc

Deciding on answers to any of these questions will at least give you a unique baseline, and you can fill in the rest of the gaps and specify a style further until it is distinct. Many of these questions are not mutually exclusive, both in the sense of elements being combined (patterns with both geometric and organic elements) or a culture having multiple visual styles (3d art objects having unique features, religious artwork having its own conventions, etc).

Also when you're getting in depth, you should have cultural syncretism in mind. Cultures that routinely interact (whether this interaction is exchange or exploitation) inevitably exchange ideas, which can be especially visible in art. Doing research on how this synthesizing of ideas works in practice is very helpful- what is adopted or left out from an external influence, what is retained from an internal influence, what is unique to this synthesis, AND WHY. (I find Greco-Buddhist art really interesting, that's one of many such examples)

Looking at real world examples that fit your parameters can be helpful (ie if I've decided on geometric patterns in my 'style guide', I'll look at actual geometric patterns). And I strongly encourage trying to actually LEARN about what you're seeing. All art exists in a context, and having an understanding of how the context shapes art, how art does and doesn't relate to broader aspects of a society, etc, can help you when synthesizing your own.

[thatneoncrisis]

the ethical or ecological debate about ai isnt even my thing thats not why im not using it:

i

dont

want

to

thats it. i want to have a thought for myself. I want to read and summarize information for myself. I want to look up information without having it reduced to a bite sized paragraph. I want to write a 200 word response or a 20000 word essay by myself. i want to do things by myself, because i am capable of doing it by myself.

if someone else has difficulty writing or drawing or coming up with an idea or what the fuck ever else, this should not mean an entire curriculum is shifted to the point that i cannot be taught to do something without ai being involved, when they were perfectly capable of giving effective feedback not three years prior before this whole thing reached the public. i do not want ai assisted browers, or ai powered this, or ai supported that, for the simple fact that i didnt ask. and now they will not let me turn it off. THAT is my big issue

[wildstar25]

WolShtola Week 2025 - Day Five - Intimacy

Everybody has an off day once and a while, even these two. What's important is that make sure to take care of each other when they do 😌

[reality-detective]

Hemp could work as another material to build houses and make them cool in Summer and warm in Winter! Hemp fiber wall, stayed for 4 hours under heat of 360° and barely burned.

Hemp walls are soundproof and act as an insulating layer. Many years ago it was banned for no good reason. 🤔

[distantkairi]

"Canon Link would never 🙄 He wants to just roam!1!"

Canon Link: I hope my sweet princess graces me with her beautiful voice today. How I wish to see her smile. I need to live up to her feelings

What's that, princess? You need research materials? gives an excess amount of what she asked for

You want my hairtie? Sure! Everything I own is yours

[whimperingwizard]

arcane x cowboy bebop au I

fellas is it gay to give up your career and become wanted criminals to save your lab partner?

[dragonwysper]

No I need to make a fucking post about this because I just stumbled on this paper, and this is insane.

Going to be talking about and sharing images of various insects. You have been notified.

So y'all know fleas. The little parasitic insects.

Yeah. Those guys.

Well. This study did genetic analysis on fleas (and several other insects) to find out what these guys derive from. Because up to this point, fleas have been just these weird little things in their own order that are... somewhere??? in the Antliophora clade. Previous scientists have thought maybe they're some weird offshoot of Diptera (true flies), because they do actually have vestigial little wing casings.

But this study, and the genetic analysis they did, revealed that fleas are not especially similar to Diptera. They're actually most similar to Mecoptera. Scorpionflies.

That's right. These guys.

Which is completely and utterly insane to me. You're telling me these big, super unique and specialized, weird-ass bugs, somewhere down the line, created an offshoot of these tiny little insects that lose their wings in favor of hopping around, that parasitize vertebrates and feed on blood? Scorpionflies did that??

Idk this is just. So so interesting to me. The Big wide beautiful world of entomology.

Here's that study. I think you'll have to make an account on the site in order to read it (though I can also just send any interested folks the file I downloaded, since I successfully made an account), but it is SO fascinating.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

You should be a childrens' book illustrator! Your style would be so perfect for that I think! Really unique :D

While I don’t know any children’s literature writers, I *was* commissioned to do illustrations for a medical journal article!

[imaveryevilenby]

The fun part about biology is explaining to people how field work is done because a lot of it is like as close as we can get to hurting the animals without hurting the animals

like mist netting is a way to catch birds and bats and flying stuff, it's basically very loose, very thin netting that gently catches flying things and tangles them up. Does not hurt them at all but like if you look at a bird in a most net you're gonna really think you're hurting it

there's methods for catching birds of prey that involves basically dragging a live bird on a wire until they swoop in and grab the bird, at which point the biologist trips a net and catches the hawk. Talked to a person who's been doing this for literally 10+ years, and in all of that she's had like 5 birds actually hurt and none lost cause they're wearing these cute little leather vests that protect them from everything. They switch out the birds after each hawk catch too cause the poor guys literally faced death but not actually

And that's not even mentioning the small lizard nooses! Some herpatologists use basically a slipknot (noose) attached to a long stick that they loop around the neck of small lizards. Does not hurt them at all apparently cause they literally don't have enough body mass for the noose to actually constrict much! Controls the head and you can just bend down and grab em

I put mice in plastic bags before (open for air), they try to hide in the corners it's cute

some people put birds upside down in pvc tubes to weigh them

What people need to understand about biology and studying animals is catching them is a difficult and complicated task and we're fucking professionals who know how to do that shit without hurting them, but sometimes the best methods sound horrifying

[salvadorbonaparte]

By now I have developed the audacity to email professors of interesting courses I can't take with Hey can you send me the syllabus? I can't take your course but it's relevant to my research pretty please and hope for the best

[eliounora]

my pet peeve is those "historians thought they were very good friends" jokes, like obviously for sure there are homophobic historians, but the study of same-sex desire and relationships of the past is also quite complex and you can't often go and simply label people's relationships or identities of time gone by, and sometimes it's more complicated and elusive than "they were a couple" or even "they were in love"

[demonslayedher]

The end of this season kinda had good timing so that I can have my brain back while doing a much of research trips. I won't be very responsive, but I'll still be chilling out on Tumblr here or there with randomness and updating the GiyuShino fic when I have nights back at home (and I'll go put up Chapter 5 soon if my brain doesn't give out). Sword Fic will have to wait another month or so.

[falcondoingdoodles]

Where did Sebastian get that frilly shirt. He’s not human sized. Did he make it? Does Sebastian like frilly shirts? Did someone make it for him? What nut job researcher would go "you know what our fish man experiment needs? A cravat." Seriously. Where did it come from