#WHY AI-GENERATE IT FFS

[vladim-3d]

Re-made the AI-generated image of PS2 Shadow that has been going around, because SCREW 'EM MACHINES!!

[crazybutgood]

so sick of chatgpt infiltrating education 🥲

[artisanalpeanutbutter]

Some of you are so fucking stupid

[bashful-berry]

Having to email an app company to get the ever present ai turned off on my "workspaces" and getting a clearly ai response is so annoying jfc

[evermoredeluxe]

I actually wonder if Taylor is at the point where she feels like nothing she does is good enough so she just does her job and goes home because she cannot be everything to everyone anymore. This is the second time since January she's been asked by others to sue someone for AI (the first time being the AI porn stuff following the Chiefs playoff game in Buffalo) and people want her to be a spokesperson for this. But it's always her who should speak up and do something. Like I get she is a billionaire (due to her musical catalogue), but I don't get why she is demanded to speak up for everything especially when she is the victim.

they want to control her so bad, it’s so weird to me. she has power and influence ofc and i get wanting/hoping for certain things, but ffs lets all look around us about how she’s treated and threatened and how it disables her to do stuff in general

[heichou-dancho]

FFVII Rebirth thoughts (Spoilers for everything)

I reemerge having finished Rebirth after four weeks and 92 hours in-game playtime. That’s an incredibly short but also massive amount of playtime for me, Yakuza 0 took me a year with pauses. I’m still reeling after finishing chapter 13, and since all my FF buddies from the old days are long gone, I’ll just vent here. I enjoy reading the reactions and thoughts of other players, so maybe someone else does too?

This post is full of spoilers and Shinra fangirling, but it’s about the whole game:

Shinra:

First, somebody on the team that wrote material for the Turks and Rufus must be some Shinra fandom veteran grown up with 20 years of fanon. Just Elena as a whole, Rude getting her that ice cream, Rufus in the Gold Saucer harassing fighting Cloud for fun, Dark Star not only obeying Rufus but also Tseng. Rufus complaining that Tseng is being overprotective… (faints) So much crack and shippy moments, I was grinning like an idiot.

(Is crack fic even a thing anymore? It feels like they’ve gotten rarer)

I expected maybe three or four scenes with the Turks, maybe less for Rufus. AND THEN SQUARE SHOVED THEM IN WHEREVER THEY COULD WITHOUT DERAILING THE PLOT. Elena was given so much room to breathe. Same for Rufus. Those little moments with Darkstar. I’m over the moon.

Okay, Rufus, so your father got stabbed, and the first thing you did after that was recording some motion-capturing and dialogue for a Turk recruitment hologram-video-thingy in an abandoned facility? It makes zero sense, but it’s my favourite protorelic mission and I’ll happily add it to my headcanon as a sign that Rufus gave Tseng his okay to recruit more Turks.

(The real answer would probably be automatically generated AI shenanigans, but that’s not very exciting.)

Viceroy Saruf. Just … Rufus, you’re such a cheeky idiot and I love you. Is there any faction in this world you’re not manipulating from the background? I can’t shake the feeling that being the man in the shadows suits you more than actually openly running the company.

Tseng and Reeve were great, I would love more little moments like that, where the Shinra folks just interact outside of action scenes and dramatic moments. The talk Tseng had with Reno and Rufus in Remake after the Sector 7 collapse hit the same note for me. I want more Reeve in part 3.

The scene between Tseng and Aerith at the temple made my eyes misty, but I wish it had been longer. Tseng keeping it short and abruptly leaving to "make a report" was perfect, and I know Cloud being so cold and cutting Aerith off fits his behaviour, but something about the timing just felt off.

I was surprised that Heidegger would take a bullet for Rufus. For President Shinra, absolutely, but Rufus? Hmm… This makes great fanfic material. I’ve read a fanfic before that tried to reimagine the Shinra executives (even Palmer) as more realistic people, and I found it to be really interesting, but then I’m a weirdo with plot bunnies in my head that involve a younger President Shinra, his wife, Veld, Vincent and the older Shinra execs.

I’ve never been a fan of Hojo but his R re-imagining is one of the few that doesn’t work at all for me. OG Hojo was far more unsettling. R!Hojo is just your typical mad scientist, I just can’t care about him, which is a shame, because him taunting Aerith in Remake with how he dissected Ifalna hit me hard.

I still haven’t quite grasped why Rufus is so obsessed with the Promised Land. It probably all comes down to wanting to be more successful than his father, right? I’m probably forgetting or mixing up details from Remake, Rebirth or the OG here, but I assumed that Rufus would outright dismiss it as a fairy tale.

Apparently there is a Midgar DLC for Power Wash Simulator. Square Enix, where is Hitman: Tseng and a version of Yakuza where I can play the Turks dealing with dumb crap doing missions in Midgar? Give us Shinra fans something, I'm still waiting for the EC version of Before Crisis. And I don't even like gacha mobile games. >:(

General game thoughts:

The open world is fantastic, I want to live in Gongaga or Kalm. So pretty. People online seem to hate the Gongaga map, but the soundtrack and the jungle theme made it work for me. I found the gliding parts in Cosmo Canyon far harder to navigate.

Shinra Manor is terrible with Vincent being it’s only redeeming part. The actual mansion looked great (the portrait of President Shinra was a nice touch) but the upper levels being inaccessible and turning it into another lab dungeon was boring. Same for the box throwing mini-game.

Dio the archaeologist turned body-builder is great, but Shinra knowing about the keystone and just not bothering to use it when President Shinra was looking for the Promised Land is a weird plot hole. It would have been a lot easier than trying to convince Aerith to come to them. There were some other little details like that, that bothered me but it’s a blur now.

Remake Barett made me into a Barret fan, Rebirth Nanaki into a Nanaki fan. The writers are genius when it comes to rewriting these characters from the OG. I’m not really bothered by Cid not being grumpy and swearing all the time. Him reminiscing about Ifalna was cute. Vincent using his old Turk skills (and having some lingering loyalty to the job?) was cool. Really looking forward to seeing how they’ll handle Lucrecia, the one character in FFVII I'm so conflicted about.

I’m still confused about Aerith’s death scene, especially the cuts where she’s lying in her own blood and then isn’t. I understand that she’s dead in her current reality, but is the scene without blood (and Aerith "waking up" in Cloud’s arms) Cloud’s hallucination or just a different reality? I’m also utterly confused by how many Aeriths we’re dealing with. The Aerith and Cloud we’re playing with and the sleeping Aerith (and Cloud) from the dimension where Zack lives are one and the same? It’s tying my brain into knots, and not in a good way. That’s why I usually can’t stand stories involving elaborate time travel loops or parallel universes.

(Man, why doesn't Tumblr allow spaces between paragraphs? I hope your eyes aren't bleeding)

I first played the OG as a young teen. Cloud’s mind being fractured and hallucinating was a neat bit of storytelling back then that I hadn’t encountered in video games before. Twenty years later, I’ve dealt with loved ones who are ill but refuse help, and known plenty of people who have some form of psychosis or schizophrenia. Whilst I would never seriously compare Cloud’s problems with rl mental illnesses, I found the scenes where he sees Sephiroth and no one else, or is completely out of it hard to stomach. Interacting with somebody who has hallucinations (even "harmless" ones) or paranoid thoughts is unsettling at best, nightmarish at worst. The group trying to passively bear it and keep things together rings very true (especially Tifa) but I’m surprised that even Barett or Yuffie aren’t trying to confront Cloud about his behaviour at least once.

(I tried to format in html, but it somehow looked worse. I'm old. This is how Vincent must feel like every day.)

Dyne, Myrna and Tseng talking to Aerith at the temple had me tearing up, and I lost it at Aerith’s "date" with Cloud in Ch. 14. Hoo boy, I know Aerith stalling off the inevitable just for a little time, was the game having a very direct conversation with the player about what’s going to come, death and how we deal with it. But to me personally, it was more about how one gets caught up in trauma and repeat it over and over in your head, mulling about the point of where things went wrong and what you could have done to prevent it. I know it doesn’t fit, but that’s what my weird brain made out of it. Also Dyne’s and Aerith’s (at the temple) speeches about how they deal (or didn’t) with grief and trauma hit me hard.

Damn you, silly anime action game, you really shouldn’t affect me this deeply, but then a lot of fiction hits me harder than it used to.

[itchyeye]

someone on tiktok said that ai writing sites can write ff. let me just say that i read a pretty decent jonelias oneshot, with surprisingly character-accurate description

i think ai "art" is evil. i think feeding data to ai to develop it further is evil.

when i write fanfiction i do so as a human being who is passionate about a source text and wants to create transformative works. writing fanfic is an expression of love. i love this story so much i want there to be more of it. i want to play with it and make new things with it. i want to use my limited free time to create things about and based on this story and world that i love.

for me, studying the voice of a source text and emmulating it successfully is the central point of fic. capturing that takes time, nuance, and study. i put a lot of effort into my fake little stories about fake little people.

ai can never put effort into anything. it's a robot. an algorithm.

i have no idea why you would send me this message. i have no idea why you would want to read ai generated text prompts and call them fic.

if you want to keep doing so you can do it quietly far away from me where i never have to hear about it.

[k-kizkhalifa]

okay hey everyone. hi. im still taking a break tonight but i just spoke with my niece who is fifteen (15) and... well long story short my sister told her i wrote/write ff for drarry. she wanted to read. my sister gave her my account information. (shes in the demon slayer fandom, and had been reading ff for that. they recently read hp together and after the second book she had looked at my sister [her mother] and said, "are harry and draco in a relationship?" any my sister sent her to me. to which i explained shipping to the extent us drarry's do.)

ANYWAY she called me and said, "hey *kiz! okay do you have a second?" and guys she is fkn just bawling her eyes out. so, of course i am like, "yeah whats up baby?" and she is just crying and then she is like, "i just read 'the fear in your eyes' and i hate you!" and i am like "baby, chill. it happens. i told your mother i don't write happy/fluffy fics. i am sorry." and she goes, "i went to ChatGPT and gave it instruction to write me a drarry fic that was happy." AND Y'ALL I AM BAFFLED. I was like "Name* that is ridiculous! I will get you fic names and authors this weekend and send them to you! Don't use something like that." (I know, I know their generation man.) And she's laughing and she goes, "its not great *kiz but i want to give it more prompts bc i am lauhging at it. this is not what i was expecting." and I was like, "okay lemme see it. send it to me."

and well i read it. it wasn't great, it wasn't horrible. it honestly seems like a great prompt for a fic, if i am honest. but i can see where her laughter came from. it's not like how a person typically writes words together in a sentence. if that makes sense? it was just really forced, the word use was different, and so on. (i know it's AI. I am just explaining i understand why she was laughing at it.)

okay, so you made it this far? great. i just really wanted to share the story with someone, else, because when i explained why i was laughing so hard to my offspring about the whole situation they could care less.

you all could probably care less. anyway, if youre desperate give ChatGPT some very specific diameters and hope for the best? (LMFAO??)

[fairyniceyeah]

🔪🦷🦴- @darl-ingfics 🩵🩵🩵

Hey @darl-ingfics! 🩷🩷🩷

… you just had to pick the hard questions, didn’t you? 😉

🔪 ⇢ what's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

What qualifies as weird? I don’t know 🤣

I mostly research medical things and dorm arrangement at specific times so honestly that probably ain’t that weird considering what I do. I did end up on a website for a French hospital once though since I was using real places for a fanfic, so yeah, that was weird.

I send this message to a friend once though:

When you are writing a ff in English that plays in France so you look up what medication are used in France but whenever you google in english you only find stuff for America. So you use Wikipedia, click the link you want and choose French only to have it automatically translate to German because french-english somehow doesn't work… My brain hurts

🦷 ⇢ share some personal wisdom or a life hack you swear on

Why are you asking this of somebody who has been wanting to write this answer and got distracted by her phone for an hour straight? 🤣

This may seem pretty basic but here we go. I have a pretty small handbag that doesn’t fit my bottle but I use everyday. So I have this plastic ring/cord combination that I can hook up to a carabiner and clip to my bag. I still can use this small bag that fits everywhere and take my bottle anyhow. It’s not much but it’s great for me and a lot of people commented on how smart that is!

🦴 ⇢ is there a piece of media that inspires your writing? 

Before I say this I want you to remember the WOOZI/BBC situation…

I do casually use ChatGPT for fanfic generating. Not fanfics that I post, of course, just things I wanna see and have not been written and I am too lazy to write. I promise that all my fics are written by me and not AI!!!

But it does inspire me at times to explore new concepts and gives me ideas how to approach situations I struggle with. I find it interesting to test the limits of what AI can do and cannot do. Sometimes it struggles with the easiest concepts and prompts. What really fascinated me was that I once, just for fun, asked it to have a character confess their feelings and struggles to another character by playing “She’s in the Rain” by The Rose. It worked! It’s fascinating and scary at the same time.

Well, that got off topic quickly, but yeah, I do use ChatGPT at times to give me prompts and ideas or approach topics differently than I would. I find I often struggle to write something I would personally not do or think (remember my issues with writing fights!). It helps me with other perspectives.

So yeah. Do with that information what you will and again, I promise I do only use my own brain for what you find on this blog!

Lots of love,

🧚🏻‍♀️

[cornus27florida]

General Thoughts on Ship Wars (discord)

Before, I wanna to tell that : I am a very passionate shipper but I don't wish for any hurt to anyone especially to the ones that shipping characters that not my taste or my NOTP. I will simply avoiding those NOTP ships in any way of fanworks, because if I am stumbled upon those NOTP fanworks - I am afraid that I might unleash beast inside me that could hurt even by words - or for myself getting hurt to see character that I feel a nice, romantic couple to be with other character else. I've learned that fanworks world (fanfic: ff, ao3, etc)(fanart: twitter, devianart,etc)(shipping analysis: tumblr, reddit) should be a safe world for anyone to be happy - shipping characters of the series they'll like while letting others in part of the fandom to know the reasons to liking a ship. In short, I am respecting anyone to ships any characters to other BUT please don't push that ship especially by bashing other character by learning how the characters doing and how the relationships progress in the story.

Well, in the fanworks you could do anything you want like making character c looking bad especially highlighting the things they're did in certain aspect of the story, which to make character a and character b (or more if this a polyamory relationship) to be together. But honestly, could that cliché be avoided? For creative thinking that filled with honesty - kindness - and the forgiveness, so even the character c won't be together with either of character a or b - everyone involved are happy. Being happy doesn't always means for union of characters. being listened-understood-respected it's also part of happy spectrum too even if by making that happen means to letting go someone they love. That's not only limits to characters let go the one they'll love (because the love status is uncertain as it's platonically? becomes familiar love? etc) BUT also when the characters they're love are gone - be it for moving on to another part or phase of life, or for going to the afterlife. Because love could turns ugly like obsession if the 'letting go' part not been used healhtly. Cue to inserting this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9H1-33qQ554

So, people in discord said a really good paragraph exclaim :

It's (refers to the ship wars) definitely not limited to coai (conan/ai), it happened in almost every fandom. But I think it basically boil down to a perfect storm of popular characters with a semi-canon ship status. Shinran (shinichi/ran) fans doesn't need to argue their ship into canon bcs they're already canon. Slash pairing (e.g. kaito/shinichi, heiji/shinichi) also doesn't tend to argue their ship bcs they know it won't happen. Meanwhile coai is very much a possibility (even if it is one-sided) so the fans gets loud in their support in hopes that Gosho (or other party related like Mai kuraki the singer for most of Detective Conan songs) will change the status-quo if coai (a pairing that have lots of ship teases - or the characters are so interesting together with their personalization) becomes more "popular".

I hate it when readers try to force their ideas on the author/creator - let them do their ideas and experiment and see if it works or not (which should be on fanworks world). Although in Gosho's case, I don't think there is reason to fear that but many webtoon creators are young and new to this all and inexperienced so they may bow to the immense pressure of the fans. -> there's many examples in the webtoons already as many unsatisfied readers have the webtoon ending with the ship that 'majority' didn't want like My Deepest Secret, Nice To Meet You!, Edith et cetera

Those webtoons also the example of the ones that didn't have any author note episode at the ending, in fear possibly if explaining why the character a not means to be with c, or technically there's no pairing become canon

Gosho is experienced indeed, BUT in the manga world making - editor is holding the key as basically try to make popular series going as long as possible ~ and if doing so fuelling ship wars by adding teases scenes especially towards triangle love, so be it. It sucks for both the author and readers actually, but it happens anyway. For the creator or author to can't write what they're actually want. For the reader of the intended pairing shipper as they are seeing the characters they're ships getting 'flirty' with other character that likely their NOTP. Or for the reader of the unintended ship as they're been fed by false hopes that their ships are means to be 'as canon'. I am also talking about constant ship wars at Oshi no Ko with Kana vs Akane btw, I love Kana more so I am mad if she's getting mocked espc by the Akane/Aqua shipper - but I also know that Akane - Aqua relationship is special in their own way even thou not that healthly.

I stopped reading Marionetta because the ship war too (the Sahed fans attacked the Tonny fans really hard) -> this the result of ship wars, this make fans to decides to stop enjoying the series for entirety which is very sad.. It's technically not the author's fault but as the fandom becomes toxic. Of how toxic and poisonous a fandom could be it's another nother to talk about and I won't talk it here.

The (ship, be it intended as well unintended) teasings happen in a lot of things: media, series, books, manga…to fuel the readers to become interested longer (thought only for the ship). It is a common thing nowadays and I don't like it at all.

-> A good story should telling what their own story properly, and shippings should be the spices not the main ingredients. So, a story should be a story based not ships based.

I disliking the ship wars as the pain, hurt, tiringness which could resulting to the fandom become toxic in intense war as pointing out why 'their ship is superior, and other ship is doomed'. This totally unhealthly, both for other part of the fandom espc your NOTP shippers AND YOURSELF as being constantly on edge to proving your ship. Why not taking steps back, letting out a long breath - and enjoys the ship that you like without hurting others happily? You, as the reader (or if the medium of series isn't visual, then watcher or anything else), is always part of the fandom that making up popularity of a certain series. If you are gone as getting tired or getting swept up by the toxicity of ship wars, didn't it hurt to the creator of your favorite series - or your friends at the fandom that you used to be like before ~ as realizing too late that you're gone?

P.S if curious:

As a shipper on multifandom, here characters that I ship on different series - which are heterosexual pairings, and well personally no hate towards LGBTQ+ just if them making NOTP I am simply disliking and avoiding the following pairings. No amount of others' arguments telling me about 'reasons your ship sucks' will ever change my opinions regarding my OTP, and I hope it's understable without seen as too hard headed - I won't bashing any characters that become part of my NOTP. I always respect anyone opinion, but I also hope that respect is a dual-interaction too so it'll become "I respect you, and please respect me too".

OTP stands for 'one true pairing' while NOTP stands for 'not one true pairing' which usually if the character a and character b that making up a pair (or more if polyamory) is paired up with other character else. So I am only limiting a pairing on each work series, but doesn't mean I didn't have more characters that I like to ship. The list of my OTP are the following with consist on various media indeed :

Jodie Starling (Saintemillion) and Shuuichi Akai | Okiya Subaru [Detective Conan | Case Closed]

Princess Gwendolyn of the Pastel Kingdom, and Prince Frederick of the Plaid Kingdom [Cursed Princess Club - webtoon]

Kaneki Ken | Haise Sasaki and Touka Kirishima [Tokyo Ghoul]

Severus Snape and Lily nee Evans [Harry Potter series]

Jellal Fernandez | Siegrain Hart and Erza Scarlet [Fairy Tail]

Nagisa Shiota and Kayano Kaede [Assasination Classroom]

Gojo Wakana and Marin Kitagawa [My Dress Up Darling!!!]

Kana Arima and Aqua(marine) Hoshino [Oshi no Ko]

Remi and Blyke [UnOrdinary - webtoon]

Adashino Benio and Rokuro Enmadou [Twin Star Exorcist]

Kinomoto Sakura (or Princess Sakura) and Syaoran (Li) [Cardcaptor Sakura : Clear Card Arc + Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle]

Suchan Jang and Huijin Park [Jungle Juice - Webtoon]

Chrome and Ruri [Dr. Stone]

Mai and Prince Zuko [Avatar the Last Airbender]

Sena Kobayakawa and Suzuna Taki [Eyeshield 21]

Naruto Uzumaki and Hinata Hyuuga [NARUTO]

Saguru Hakuba and Akako Koizumi [Magic Kaito]

[tmntkiseki]

TMNT Art Diary 2: The Importance of Art Goals and Focusing Your Attention

Happy March, everyone! How are we doing? It's been almost a month and a half since my last turtle art diary, so I figured it was about time to type up yet another set of ramblings talking about my experiences learning how to draw the 2003 TMNT.

Before we get started, I feel it's worth mentioning that the future of this blog is kinda up in the air at this point? From the beginning, I've been against AI generated images because of the ethics involved and like many in the Tumblr art community, recent going-ons with the site have me concerned for where things might be headed. I'm not planning to jump ship just yet, but there is a pretty good chance that I'll be posting less and less original drawings here and start utilizing my newly created Pillowfort instead, as the staff has taken a very firm anti-AI stance to the point of completely banning both AI generated images and writing on the site (the official Tumblr post regarding their decision). If you're a fellow artist, TMNT or otherwise, they might be worth checking out as a potential alternative to Tumblr.

With that out of the way, let's begin!

Okay, so let's talk about something that applies to most anything when you're learning how to do art; the importance of art goals and taking things one step at a time. Whether you're a beginner artist or someone who already has years of experience under your belt, it's important to not only have goals in mind of what you want to learn, but also to try and not do everything all at once. There is a lot that goes into successfully drawing the turtles; their anatomy, applying their less human features like their shells and three-fingered hands, their expressions, their colors, etc. HOWEVER, if you're trying to learn to draw too many aspects of their designs all at once, you are going to become overwhelmed very fast and you will not see improvement as quickly, which inevitably results in frustration and loss of motivation. Ergo, you need to take things bit by bit, breaking down the turtles designs into bite-sized pieces and focusing on specific areas that you are having trouble on.

For instance, early on, I realized pretty quickly that one of the areas I was struggling in was the turtles heads; I love their shape, but damn are they hard to draw. Subsequently, there was a point where I was largely drawing turtle heads and ONLY turtle heads so I could learn what shapes went into them, what they looked like from different angles, etc. Within even a few days, I already saw massive improvements just because I wasn't trying to draw EVERYTHING all at once; just one very specific aspect of their designs. Compare the very first Donny I drew on the 5th of January to a quick doodle of Mikey I did a couple of weeks later on the 25th and you can see how much I learned in such a short timespan.

Speaking of shapes, you wanna know the biggest hack I've discovered for learning how to draw the 2003 turtles? Studying the Fast Forward art style. Yeah, you heard me.

At first glance, this seems kind of stupid. I'm pretty sure most people aiming to draw fanart of the 2003 turtles are planning to draw them in a similar style to the first five seasons, so it makes more sense to study screencaps and model sheets from those seasons rather than FF. However, the reason why Fast Forward is so useful for TMNT 2003 fanartists is because, at its core, Fast Forward is 2003's art style simplified. Anyone who has ever taken a professional art class or looked up tutorials online knows that basic shapes are incredibly important when drawing, as they are the building blocks of literally whatever illustration you're trying to make. Now, I absolutely love how detailed the designs from the first five seasons are, but because they are so detailed, a lot of the basic shapes do get lost under everything as a result, which can make it hard to figure out what actually goes into the turtles designs at a fundamental level.

Because the designs in Fast Forward are less detailed compared to what was seen in the first five seasons, many of the basic shapes that go into the turtles designs are much easier to spot. If you've been following me long enough, you know that I was absolutely LIVID to discover that one of the things I genuinely don't like about the Fast Forward style--the pentagon shaped heads--makes drawing the 03 turtle heads so much easier. To explain it in detail; a pentagon basically maps out the five "points" of a turtle's head. What these points represent can change depending on the angle from which you're drawing your chosen turtle, but if you're doing a turtle head from a front/three quarter view, the five points denotes the top of the head, the cheeks, and the chin. It requires some practice to get right, but by building off this initial pentagon shape, you can easily draw a turtle head in the style of the first five seasons. A hexagon works just as well and is especially useful if you're going for a rounder/softer head shape.

Beyond that, I think making to deliberate choice to draw in the Fast Forward style rather than the OG style is helpful for other reasons. When a turtle's head is only a pentagon, you don't have to worry as much about details and can focus on other areas you might be neglecting, such as figuring out the positioning of the eyes/mask, or developing the way you draw the turtles' expressions. (Seriously, the white pupil-less eyes are cool, but they do make conveying emotions a hassle, especially when the turtles are lacking for proper eyebrows.)

It's been about two months since I drew my very first 2003 turtle and while I'm still very far off from where I want to be, I've already made some leaps and bounds in terms of overall progress. I do sometimes feel annoying yelling about my turtle art learnings and struggles (especially when I know there is stuff that potentially comes off as Captain Obvious territory to others) but I personally find it helpful to write down everything I've learned and experienced in case I forget something and need to look back on it. And hey, maybe someone will see these disjointed ramblings as helpful. You never know.

Anyway, here's a lil Donny doodle from today to finish this entry off. See ya later!

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

Which member would be most interested in trying many different sex positions?

Men don't think about sex in terms of how many positions or what positions they're doing. They're just... doing it (keke). So, it's hard to say who would be the most interested, because I don't think any of them have a running list of positions to hit up. They just, ya know, have sex however it ends up working out at the time. XD

Most East Asian cultures (including South Korea) are quite sexually repressed despite sex often being used as marketing tactic. The social attitude houses a lot of deep-rooted negativity when it comes to sex. For example, pornography is largely illegal in South Korea. (The emergence of AI is, in short, not good. If "regular" porn is illegal, then... Yeah. You understand.) There's also very strong opinions to how men and women should act. This is the environment BTS grew up in. I am not insinuating that they subscribe to any idea or that their families have influenced them in any particular way. However, it is very difficult for them to ignore the general social environment as they are the most famous public figures in the nation (and the world). I'm sure they're all very careful about who they choose to have sex with. There's a reason why HYBE / Big Hit are so adamant about shutting down what they can, yet this is the age of the internet. If something is out there, it's out there. Forever.

If exploring sex is largely restricted and condemned, this means exposure, safe spaces, and knowledge are scarce. Of course, if you're insistent then maybe it doesn't matter, but then being able to find someone as sexually open as you is difficult. Could be dangerous in some cases. Many have personal mental hurdles (shame, humiliation, aversion, etc) to overcome before developing the courage for sexual exploration.

Yes, BTS are global superstars with access to a lot of different perspectives but largely their identity is rooted in Korea. I am not implying that they are all vanilla. But, considering their schedules and the obstacles of their social position, they probably need sexually stimulating partners to develop sexual creativity / curiosity beyond the "basic" positions.

tl;dr: rather than trying many different positions to nut, bros are just tryin' to find the time to nut in the first place LMAO Seokjin already dragged Hobi to work on his first day back ffs

[fictionaldeity]

Been forced to use an AI tool at work (don’t even want to type out the name and give the google the idea that I want anything to do with it outside of work) (as it is I already got one ad for one the other day). Anyway, even ignoring everything but the practical side of it, there are many things good and bad to speak of the tool all right. But my current main issue with it is the fucking lack of consistency.

Like, I’m making the exact same query over and over again applied to different brands. And the thing just keeps answering in different formats instead of following a same pattern for all answers. I’m literally copy-pasting my queries ffs! It cannot possibly be that my wording randomly but subtly changes the answer. Like, why? No, seriously, why? It’s not even a complicated query TT_TT

Another pet peeve is the thing’s apparent inability to give a short and brief negative answer. I assume it goes hand in hand with its need to be cute and Helpful (TM). Because the word “no” is apparently forbidden. So instead I have to be subjected to a paragraphs-long answer that amounts to literally nothing relevant.

(or really, it sucks at short answers in general. And I supposedly set it up to give me concise answers. I dread to think what longer answers would be like. An endless string of semi-intelligent meaningless paragraphs that should not be evaluated under any real scrutiny not to unveil the blatant mediocrity).

Like, man, more words don’t make you smarter. Sincerely, an incurable over-writer

[skaruresonic]

"Real human beings draw that?" yes they do. People draw anything and everything in a variety of styles. Come on, man. You can't pick and choose. Either we all have your respect or none of us have your respect.

I've also a slight chip on my shoulder about this particular mindset that fanfic doesn't get enough attention on social media because it requires more engagement from the audience than a drawing. While I understand your frustrations, you need to think about what you're implying. Low engagement affects all creative endeavors; it's no reason to disparage artists. Your problem lies with social media and its push for quick, "consumable" content. Which also hurts us because it treats our efforts as disposable as well. From where I'm standing, it's absolutely not true that people will pay attention to your art simply because it's art. If my Sonic art gets a couple of notes because A.) the people reblogging it don't hate my guts and B.) it's Sonic, then the attention my original work gets will be severely diminished because it's lacking criteria B: familiarity.

That's why I appreciate every like my work receives, because honestly, it's incredibly hard to come by.

The overlap between people who like your art and are willing to give it proper attention without stealing it, which is yet another risk is actually quite small, and hence why those artists who strike it big make "mass-produced" art that appeals to the widest possible audience, like the jelly art style. But even they shouldn't be disparaged on the basis that they too work at their craft.

Not to mention the cream-of-the-crop artists who do receive those hundreds of notes per piece get treated like content machines. Grass is always greener on the other side until you actually get there. Besides, it's precisely those snap judgments that make folks literally not pay you. I'd rather take low kudos than sink weeks' worth of work into an art piece I was promised payment for only to get paid nothing because the client didn't like one (1) detail, thus rendering the entire piece worthless. And the fannish culture surrounding fic is such that I can reasonably expect people to refrain from offering unsolicited critique without having to ask them "can you not be a dick to me on this piece I lost sleep over pls." At least with fic, people are compelled to say something nice sometimes, instead of rattling off every mistake you made on a piece you can do nothing about because it's finished. Folks will say the meanest shit to your face or straight-up dismiss you and think it's justified because you're an artist and you're meant to take it as a matter of course; if you were a Real Artist(tm), criticism would ~help you improve~ no matter how unnecessary, meanspirited, or unsolicited. An issue that gets compounded when the person in question has a complex about not being as "talented" as artists who practice their craft. Not only do you have to deal with imposter syndrome, you have to take the brunt of others' insecurities too.

Like, becoming an artist is not an easy get-rich-(or popular)-quick scheme. You'd really have to love what you do, because the process of becoming one is grueling, thankless, and sometimes traumatizing depending on your environment.

No one becomes an artist for the accolades. AI bros think typing keywords into a generator prompt makes them professional artists because they can't be bothered to sit down and learn how to draw a circle.

My old university used to have an art professor who'd whip out a cigarette lighter and set your painting on fire during critique if he didn't like it, FFS. They expected artists to be chained to the studio eight hours a day or more, subsisting on vending machine food, even sleeping there.

Compared to that, regular classes were a relief 😵‍💫

[abra-ka-dammit]

re: the AI art debacle i kinda accidentally-on-purpose started with a customer at work (i was doing my normal printshop work of resizing shit to print on banners and when i sent the proofs to the customer to tell him it looks bad thanks to whoever generated the imagery for his book promo art doing it at such a low resolution, he replied it's not AI but hand painted and my Actual Artist instincts to defend my craft kicked in so i broke down the most egregious of the images for him and he was like. oh fuck. ur right.)

He had asked for a breakdown of why I thought the other images were AI so me and a couple other artists i sent the images along to analyzed and pointed out several things in every single one

he was. well. infuriated. not at me, but his liar-ass "artist". he sent our notes to the person in question and they sent back a retort where they essentially chalked up everything to "i forgot to fix that" (?), "that was just a mistake" (pretty wild mistakes for someone who supposedly paints so well), "that's actually correct/on purpose/an artistic decision" (my ass), and basically nuh-uh'd through only about. a third of my notes. also added a few teeny tiny screenshots of "drafts" that look like other iterations they got with the same prompt, claiming things were artifacts of the repainting (in ways that don't add up)

basically they offered no convincing explanations, did not provide any source files showing work layers of any sort, and whats more, they had never sent initial sketches/drafts/WIPs to him during the process for approval (just those fully rendered "drafts". you know. like any artist ever would do. fully paint an entire finished image then run it by the client. mhmm.)

told him what i thought abt the retort and he agreed with me that it was a lot of evasion and little to no actual answers

its a weird combo of a good and bad feeling. like on one hand i feel that smug satisfaction of outing a scam "artist" (who had even signed agreements saying they would NOT be using AI for the pieces). on the other hand now this dude knows he got conned and has to deal with not only trying to get compensation for breach of contract but replacing all of the artwork because HE signed things with venues and promoters that his imagery did not contain AI artwork too. so this otherwise seemingly nice guy whose other ventures are an escape room and a dog walking service ffs is in all this distress due to me sticking my nose into other peoples business uninvited

like sure, he thanked me a lot for this but its not like. great feeling to be the bearer of bad news.

[kolbisneat]

MONTHLY MEDIA: March 2023

It’s getting nicer out but I’m still spending plenty of time indoors watching and reading things, don’t you worry.

……….FILM……….

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) It’s been years since I’ve gone back to this and it really is one of the best superhero movies ever made, right? I hope the next one succeeds and it leads to more animated features. It just...you can do so much more. Sure the live-action superhero movies have a lot of animation but they’re bound by our physics and the uncanny valley and it’s just not the same.

……….TELEVISION……….

Ted Lasso (Episode 3.01 to 3.03) Glad to be back. It’s been interesting seeing the online rise, then fall, then rise again of support for this show but honestly, who cares? Do you like watching it? Great. Do I like watching it? Absolutely. It’s a project that was planned from season 1 and it shows and I wish more media was approached in this way.

Spy x Family (Episode 1.08 to 1.25) Okay needed to shift my expectations with this one. I really thought we’d get more of Yor and her assassin life. She’s kinda just a background character to Loid and Anya and that feels like a missed opportunity.

The Great (Episode 2.09 to 2.10) Great cap to the season. Full arcs for characters, a satisfying resolution and yet still enough of a hook to get me excited for the third season. Just some gorgeous, funny, dramatic television. Big fan.

……….YOUTUBE……….

Why everything you buy is worse now and How America’s richest donate their money by Vox Okay the first one really helped explain why stuff seems to be lower quality and it’s not just “better back in my day” sorta stuff. It’s just chasing that elusive profit, you know? And seeing the stats on how the wealthy donate was eye-opening. Taxes seem good. VIDEO (Worse Now) VIDEO (Richest Donations)

AI and Image Generation (Everything is a Remix Part 4) by Kirby Ferguson I’ve always appreciated the Everything is a Remix series and this only reinforces that. A measured response to AI image generation and what that means, why it’s flawed, and what happens next. VIDEO THE FULL PROJECT

What Does Glass Onion Have to Do with US? by Vivian Strange Okay a lengthy one but worth it. A new perspective on Glass Onion, a refresher on why I really liked US, and a really great connection between the two. Also a really great breakdown of the murder mystery as a genre as well and why it’s having a resurgence. All around great stuff. VIDEO

……….READING……….

Arabian Nights (Companion Library Edition) (Page 124 of 244) Thrifted this and for some reason never knew it was a collection of short stories? Which seems obvious now. Anyway I’m sooooo slow at really short story collections but they’ve been interesting to read. Something about the translation feels like a slog to actually read but the stories included are a lot of fun. 

Wonderland Revisited and the Games Alice Played There by Keith Sheppard (Complete) I’m super picky when it comes to adaptations of Carroll’s works. Many take Wonderland and make it dark, twisted, and mature (meh) but I find the more interesting take is one that continues with the same momentum. This one doesn’t quite work in capturing the spirit of the original books for me but there’s a lot of really great ideas in here.

Superman for all Seasons by Jeph Loeb & Tim Sale (Complete) Having loved their Batman books I picked this up and, being younger and dumber, didn’t like it at the time. Where was the action? Where were the villains? I was naive. Going back to this I really appreciate the study of Superman, the narrative through the supporting cast, and the struggles that can’t be resolved through punching. Man Loeb & Sale were a team.

Fantastic Four: Full Circle by Alex Ross (Complete) As an one-off story, this delivers everything I’d want out of an FF adventure: group banter, weird worlds, and lots of mumbo jumbo science. Plus I mean the artwork is truly humbling. I had to read it twice and I still only 80% understand it all but that’s not a complaint. Totally worth picking up if you have even a passing interest in the Fantastic Four.

Ultimate Spider-Man Volume 5 & 6 by by Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley, and more  (Complete) Decided to pick up with my reread of the Ultimate Spider-Man series again and woof I forgot how much I didn’t like volume 5. The first half is an Ultimates story that I STILL find too wordy, and the movie tie-in of the second half never quite clicked. I dunno maybe there are too many losses and not enough wins for Parker in this one? Volume 6, however, is great. It has one of the most frustrating deaths in the series but it really explores the aftermath and impact. And introducing Johnny Storm and using him as the reason Spider-Man gets back into the hero stuff is really great. Spider-Man doesn’t need to solve all problems with punches and this book gets that.

……….AUDIO……….

Wild Planet by The B-52s (1980) After listening to a greatest hits album on repeat as a kid, I’m going back to the early stuff. Can’t get Private Idaho out of my head.

FREE I.H.: This Is Not the One You've Been Waiting For by Illuminati Hotties (2020) They always pop up in lists when I search for “more stuff like Sleigh Bells” but it finally clicked for me after listening to content//bedtime. Love this album.

……….GAMING……….

Neverland: A Fantasy Role-Playing Setting (Andrews McMeel Publishing) Whoa okay so my weekly group just fled the land of the Fairies after some drama with the Queen of the realm (you can read about it here) and then my Mof1 game ALSO had some Fairy drama involving the Queen. Apparently she’s a dramatic lady.

And that’s it. See you in April!