#also I’ve been working on an illustration for a few days now and I was going in circles so this helped me break out of it thank youuu skfns

[starcorvid]

They are very much still in the works, but I wanna talk abt them so bad so thank u for this!! I’ll put my ramblings under the cut cause this actually got a bit long lmao

My hatchy is called basalt! (nicknamed Salt) They’re pretty friendly with most of the village but Hal is def one of those they’re closest to. They were childhood friends raised pretty much together, because they hatched only a few days apart! (Hal is older and will not let basalt forget about it, ever)

Basalt is also really close with Esker! Growing up they were an absolute menace, and Esker was their favourite prank accomplice because they would always cover for them, and the other adults never suspected a thing. Salt also loves Esker’s stories of the beginning of outer wild ventures and the stories hearthians told about space before they could explore it. They miss them a lot, esp since Esker has become more stationery on the attlerock, but they try to communicate regularly through the signal scope and visit them often to keep them company.

They were mentored mostly by Gossan, who they immediately imprinted on upon hatching. They did idolize pretty much all of the ventures as a child, and would never be found very far from any of them, but they have a special bond with Gossan. They were the only one basalt would listen to 100% as a hatchling, so Gossan would often be solicited multiple times a week to come reign in the hatchling lmao. Gossan did their best to find ways to occupy them whenever Basalt would get too restless and things would start to blow up around the village. The thing Basalt liked the most about Gossan’s brand of discipline is that they had an open approach: when other adults usually tried to put dangerous stuff out of their hands to avoid issues, Gossan would try to teach Salt how things worked and how they might be handled safely. They put a lot of importance in safety, but they always responded to Salt’s curiosity with encouragement, which is what eventually motivated Basalt to start the owv training.

Salt is currently in an intense will they won’t they (spoilers: they absolutely will) with Gabbro!! They weren’t really acquainted with each others as hatchlings, Basalt mostly knew Gabbro as the one Feldspar took care of. They would mostly interact when Basalt was trailing Feldspar or Gabbs was bringing stuff to Gossan. Basalt has a blurry memory of being comforted by Gabbro the day they learned of Feldspar’s disappearance, but so much happened that night that it’s hard to remember it in detail. Gabbro and Basalt grew a lot closer during the loops, and they’re currently in this phase where you just wanna grab them and scream ‘just kiss already!!’ (Something Hal has dreamt of doing many times already)

Basalt’s not the best at verbal affection, they’re very sarcastic and oftentimes try to communicate affection through it, but it doesn’t always work. Sometimes their jokes miss the mark and they come across as rude or hurtful, something which they feel very guilty about. When it happens, they always make an effort to give a genuine, vulnerable apology, and it’s often the most open they are with talking about their feelings. It’s something they’re working on, with the help of Gossan and Hal, but they’re not quite there yet.

Basalt prefers to show affection through touch, they usually always keep at least one point of contact with people they like. When they feel overwhelmed or very affectionate, they have an urge to bite their loved ones- not to hurt, but as a show of affection of some sorts. They also enjoy giving handmade gifts, usually bits of fabric they embroider or weave themselves (something they picked up from Gneiss to keep them occupied as a hatchling). Hal has their head scarf, Gossan has a ribbon they wrap around their wrist, slate has one wrapped around their bicep. Hornfels has theirs hung up in the observatory and Basalt keeps a handkerchief they’d made for Feldspar in their spacesuit. They’ve also embroidered gabbro’s beanie, but they’re currently trying to learn knitting with Esker and Gneiss so they can make gabbro a new scarf. They also love taking Gabbro on dates through the universe and try to find the places with the best views for Gabs to draw inspiration from for their art.

Honestly pretty much most of my hatchling art that’s up is Basalt lmao, I just hadn’t fleshed them out as much before.

I could really go on about them so so much more but sleep is calling and I feel like this has become a bit of a word salad- but omg thank u for posting these questions, this was so fun to write and helped me flesh out a bunch of things about Salt!

Tell me about your hatchlings or fish ocs *v* I wanna know all the hearthians!!!!

who's their bestie? who's their mentor? if theyre dating anyone, who? what do they normally do when they spend time with each of them? how physically affectionate are they? how verbally affectionate are they? whats their love language? do you have any art of them? any writing? show it off :3

[art]

Creator Spotlight: @mimimar

Hi! I’m Michelle (Mimimar), an illustrator born and raised in Venezuela, currently based in Italy. I enjoy making colorful illustrations that reflect the things I love: fairy tales, fantasy, tenderness and queer (especially sapphic) stories. Occasionally, I also make paper dolls, comics and animatics. I have a lot of interest in book illustration and I’m currently developing my own stories that I hope to share as an author-illustrator someday!

Check out our interview with Michelle below!

Did you originally have a background in art? If not, how did you start?

I always enjoyed drawing when I was a kid, but it only became a hobby that I did almost every day when I was around 11. At first I only used traditional mediums, but I decided to make a serious effort to learn how to draw digitally when I was 15, and once I got the hang of it I never stopped!

I didn’t go to art school so all of my learning was done through studying the tutorials and resources that other artists generously share on the internet and lots of practice / trial and error.

How do you want to evolve as a creator?

I want to do many things but what I want to do the most right now is work on books! I want to make art for other authors’ stories and also my own stories as an author-illustrator. I want to grow as a storyteller and create art and stories that will really resonate with people emotionally. I’m always striving to improve my skills as well.

I also really love dolls, so working on doll box art or as a doll designer is something I would love to do someday. I actually have been designing paper dolls on my Patreon for the past few months, it’s been a fun project that is still ongoing right now!

What is one habit you find yourself doing a lot as an artist?

Probably using a lot of purple! It’s my favorite color so I find myself using it a lot. If I can find a way to sneak a little bit of purple into an illustration or a character design then I will.

Congratulations on finishing your Ivy Comic! Did the outcome turn out like how you expected or were there some unexpected bumps along the way?

Thank you! It’s a project that I worked on very slowly in between other art because I wanted to really take my time with every spread and make each of them a fully detailed illustration. I thumbnailed the full comic before starting but I kept changing the sketch for the final spread until the very end! Overall I’m really proud of the end result. I sprinkled a lot of hidden details in every page that I hope some of the readers will notice. For example: the meanings of the flowers in each page represent what the characters are feeling in that moment, and the colors of their wardrobe become gradually lighter as the story progresses to represent their emotions, as well as the changing of seasons.

We’ve noticed that you have created some amazing cover art for TGCF. Is there another series you would like to do something similar with? 

That was another passion project that took some time to complete. Initially, I didn’t intend for them to be specifically covers, it was just a series of illustrations based on the 5 books/main arcs of TGCF. But since they were well-received and I had people telling me they wish they could use them as covers for their books, I decided to rework them into dust jackets for the english translation of TGCF!

I haven’t thought of any other specific series but I love doing cover art so maybe I’ll do something similar again in the future!

What’s your favorite part of your style? Why?

I’ve heard from other people that there’s a delicate quality to my art, this is something that I like a lot! I like pretty things, fairytales and vibrant colors. I think all of these things probably reflect in the art I make as well.

If there is one thing you want your audience to remember about your work, what would it be?

I hope that they remember how it made them feel. Feelings and colors are the two things I give priority to in my work. Most of the time I like depicting tenderness, softness and emotional intimacy. If that could reach the viewer and stay with them it would make me very happy. 

I make a lot of art with queer (mainly sapphic) themes because they’re the kind of stories I personally like and want to see more of, so whenever people tell me that my art has helped them in their journey to discover and accept themselves, or that they see themselves and their partner in my art, it is always extremely meaningful to me. When art that I made to give myself comfort can provide comfort for others, no matter how small, it reminds me once again that despite any hardships art is genuinely worth pursuing.

Who on Tumblr inspires you and why?

So many artists! To name a few:  I love @sakizo’s amazing eye for fashion and detail,  @paneeps’ gorgeous style and striking colors,  the sweetness of @bevsi’s art,  @vickisigh’s pretty colors and concepts,  @idledee’s warm and heartfelt art,  @littlestpersimmon’s dreamy wonderful art,  and @loish has been an inspiration for as long as I can remember.

Thank you so much for stopping by and sharing, Michelle! Be sure to check out their Tumblr blog over at @mimimar.

[purpurkatart]

Hello! After having some time to get over my loss for the Pokemon TCG Illustration contest, I decided to write up a small blog entry about the process and include some WIP pictures. Feel free to look below if you want to read my ramblings on the process.

Idea Generarion-

So coming into this contest, I knew I wanted to make a mixed media piece. In terms of theming I chose something that not only reflected a “magical moment” for a Pokemon (in this case meeting a legendary Pokemon), but also a moment when playing the games myself. In fact this piece was inspired by my awe when I first encountered a box legendary in game, as before I thought my teacher was lying to me when he said you can catch the legendary on the box!

This is the concept sketch that started it all! At the time my main concern was getting ideas down and seeing how they looked. Thinking about things like how would the composition would look, how would the colours look. So on and so forth.

I didn’t want to focus too much on the sketch and wanted to start making the physical object, so out of some cheap paper I started making a set up testing out size, scale, composition. I didn’t want to get too attached to the original sketches only to realise I couldn’t make it in real life… I went though a few drafts trying to get things right, slowly adding in aspects such as background objects and higher quality drawings.

After completing the draft I bought the images back into procreate to experiment with colours. This is the point where I made the mistake of thinking I had plenty of colours to choose from, not realising I would be limited by what I could buy from various yarn shops. That or hope I could find the right colour online, but that was always a gamble. If I don’t stop talking about this now I’ll get sidetracked talking about how much I miss yarn shops…

Anyways, I cut out the individual pieces that I would make within the background and used them as a guide for crochet assets. For this part I wanted to use different stitches to create textures such as the ripple stitch, bobble stich and some cable stitches, I feel bad as I never took any work in progress photo so of them. Let’s pretend you’re looking at a photo of a half finished crochet abstract shape.

Finally onto the main event, the Pikachu (and Suicune). The decision to make Pikachu a plush was based on what I would have liked to make for the 2022 illustration contest (if I wasn’t geographically challenged!!) Despite being British I decided it would be fun to make anyways, so I could experiment. I never got around to that but decided it would be fun to try for this edition.

Making the pattern was HARD! As I wanted Pikachu to have a unique pose, I had to work out different methods to plush i’ve made in the past which have been somewhat relaxed in their posing. I ultimately ended up making each part individually, pinning it together and then making adjustments as needed. It didn’t start out great however I ended up with this weird Pikachu shaped thing that did the job. Throughout this process I would regularly photograph it in the background to try and catch any issues early on. For example if the ground needed to be a different shape.

Photographing the final price was interesting. I felt bad for my partner as I essentially turned my dining table into a mini photography studio! I spent several days waiting for different lighting opportunities and experimenting with different light. Marking down different camera angles to ensure I have all of my bases covered. I easily took over 100 photos to get the perfect shot! In the below photo you can see washi tape being used to rest out different positions for the sculptures.

And that leads me to the peice! Even though i’m sad I didn’t make the top 300, I am pleased with the work I did for this piece (and my flygon entry too!). I’m glad I decided to experiment with ts peice and look forward to refining my methods in the near future!

[animalsalvationassociation]

[ DO NOT REPOST, ALL ART & CONCEPTS WERE MADE BY ME ]

Illustration Time: 8hrs 17min

I suppose it’s official now, the Octonauts and their friends are going to be answering questions from now on. I may pop in every now and then but hopefully I can get the ball rolling and get into their heads for once! (That sounds creepy)

Notes:

I put the ID together because I thought it would be funny if he made up a name for his military license because “Pirates don’t have last names”. With Dashi’s help, Kwazii Gilbert will never see the light of day again and Kwazii Navarro is definitely getting a new ID issued.

I had at least three people who asked me this question so I gave in. I spent literally all day on this. I am so tired, but at least I have YT. I’m so glad to have finished this because this was my final day off for work this week and I was NOT gonna have time to do anything else.

I suppose this is also a farewell post to Netflix Octonauts, I gave in and bought the dvd sets because I’m tired of dealing with Netflix. I know I’m weak I’m sorry.

A special thanks to @what-is-my-aesthetic and her new Octonauts video. Because otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to actually finish this post, I would’ve given in a few hours ago. I’ve been following AthenaP for a while now and dang does she know how to make me laugh! Go check her out and give all of her videos love, she puts so much time and effort into making her videos definitely one of my very fav creators!!!

@thekwazii

[ This is a Octonauts AU, in no way is this canon to the OG storyline. ]

[squad-724]

Oof I’ve had a couple rough weeks at uni, have padmecker artwork I’ve been slowly working on. It’s an illustration for a short fic of the two of them, a twin piece to @electrikworm ’s fic

“There.” Padmé sighed as she put down the stylus, a moment ago used to correct the few words of her next speech on the Senatorial Ball she was organizing with Bail and Riyo to warm her colleagues up to the clones. A small tactic to make them look more sentient and humanoid than what they officially were written as in the law. One step closer to the bill that would recognise them as citizens of the Republic.

She straightened up in her seat, her back cracking in a few places, making her wince. No matter how much the chair cost, five hours of no movement will make her body ache. And because of the non-stop debates in the rotunda she had no time to prepare it earlier; the ball was the next day.

Padmé took her time, finishing sipping the cold caf she got delivered back when there was still sunlight, watching the lights of the Planet That Never Slept flicker in the distance. She knew how they looked up close, both on the triple zero and in lower levels she so rarely visited; only going there for her rare dates that she still had to hide from the public. If the media learned about her relationship with a clone, the whole rights bill could be compromised.

Sometimes she didn't care, wishing to be able to take Wrecker to one of the fancy restaurants, let him taste all the amazing foods she could get him, to walk around in broad daylight, visit museums and opera. She wished she could spoil him as much as he deserved.

But it would have to wait. Padmé knew she would make sure he and his brothers could soon walk around as fully free citizens.

“You done?” The senator almost jumped out of her seat as a male voice came from the doors to her office space.

“On the moons Anakin you scared me,” Padmé let out a sigh of relief, and the jedi laughed at her reaction. “What are you still doing here, you were supposed to leave hours ago.”

“Eeeh, I think I should give Rex a little room to breathe. He almost strangled me after I threw him down that hole two days ago.”

“And you don't want to spend the night on observation with Kix.”

“And I don't want to spend the night on observation with Kix, and Rex WILL rat me out in an act of revenge.” He walked over to her balcony doors, grabbing one of the donuts she kept on her desk, her favorite one she kept for last. “I'll sleep at Snip’s new apartment, apparently she got a great deal from the landlady that had a good family history with the Order, and didn't need a down payment. I'll see you at the ball.” He waved her goodbye and jumped down the balcony. Padmé knew he called R2 to come pick him up, just as all the times he decided to have that dramatic of an exit. One day he would fall and break his neck, and that would be karma for stealing the best donuts.

There was nothing more Padmé wanted than to sleep. But she desperately needed to shower, and knew Clone Force 99 was about to enter the Coruscanti atmosphere in a few moments.

She met the squad only a few months back, the four clones called as her escort during a mission. At first she was surprised at the differences from normal troopers, but soon learned about their mutations and special enhancements that were made to them.

Each one of them was unique and interesting, but it was Wrecker who caught her eye, his eyes that kept looking at her with awe when he thought she didn't notice, but also the difference between his pure show of power in opposition of how gentle he was with her.

He had that charm and authenticity that all her previous suitors lacked, speaking his mind and not carefully picking lines of dialogue they practiced before each meeting. He was himself at all times, and who he was was a man of big heart. And Padmé couldn't deny him the beautiful musculature and tanned skin.

And now, after three weeks of a comms-out mission, he and his brothers were coming for a personal debrief with commander Cody, and to crash at her flat for a few days.

She already stocked her fridge with food, readied her three guest rooms with a fresh set of beddings and towels. Yeah maybe she was playing favorites with that, but no one deserved being pampered like these four. Especially Wrecker.

As she waited for the clones to arrive she took a quick shower and brushed her teeth, finally getting rid of the acidic aftertaste of caf on an empty stomach. Once she put on her face mask, she got a ping on her datapad reading “Be there in 5 ;)”.

Padmé got her droid to brew some tea when the doorbell rang out. All of her sleepiness evaporates in an instance when she runs to the door.

She isn't done opening them properly before a massive set of hands hauls her off the floor and into a spinning hug that ends with a keldabe kiss.

“Hi sweetheart,” Padmé breathes out, looking into Wrecker's mismatched eyes. She locks her hands around his neck, pulling him close into a proper kiss. Oh how she missed it.

“Ekhm, we're still in the doorway love doves,” a snarky voice brings them back into reality, Wrecker laughing as he moves deeper into the apartment, letting his brothers in. “Great. I'm taking the bathtub first.” A few voices of protest ring out as Crosshair bolts to the refresher.

“Sorry for the wait, there were some issues with the docking system and they didn’ want to let us down to the planet.” Wrecker finally let Padmé down, putting his bag down soon after.

“Not your fault, I just barely finished my job anyways, didn't have to wait for long.” She stood on her tiptoes to land another kiss on her boyfriend’s scarred cheek, making him blush. No matter how many times she did it, the giant clone got red after signs of any affection.

“Thanks for letting us stay,” Hunter all but collapsed on the couch, cup of freshly brewed tea in hand. He looked a little roughed up, his cheek covered in a fresh dressing, left eye sporting a bruise. “I don't think I could survive another night bunking on the ship with those three idiots.”

Padmé laughed as a choir of three voices raised up with a complaint. She sipped her herbal tea. She had missed this.

Not just Wrecker, but his whole family. How much life they brought to this otherwise empty apartment. The sound of bickering during breakfast preparation, doors opening and closing when they left for the town, repetitive whirring coming from Tech's room, muted music from Crosshair's.

“I am completely exhausted, so I'll be waiting for you in bed. I don't want to smell ANY grease or pickled feet when you join, so take a bath beforehand.” Padmé smooched Wrecker one last time, putting down her cup next to the dishwasher, before she wished the clones goodnight and retreated into her own bedroom.

As much as she complained about the costs of her sheets to Sabé, in moments like these every single credit spent on them seemed worth it. She slipped under the covers, sighing softly as the pain in her back quieted down just a little bit. She had to wake up in the morning for the last dress try on, and then get her hair done before the ball. How lucky she was that a highly experienced squad of troopers was available as her security for the event.

Padmé felt herself fall asleep just as the mattress next to her dipped significantly. Wrecker put his calloused hand on her back, sneaking it under her shirt and drawing slow circles in between her shoulder blades.

“Mmm I really need to sleep my dear, we will have the whole night to ourselves tomorrow.” she murmured into her pillow, relaxing her back under the soft pressure of his palm.

“Then sleep cyar’ika.” The trooper whispered, drawing his thumb up and down her spine, kneading the locked up muscles into relaxation. Padmé knew how firm they must have felt, and let her boyfriend smooth them out as they slowly fell into a rhythm.

“Does anything else hurt?” Padmé could feel his warm breath on her cheek. She could deny it, let him lay down next to her. But, it felt so nice to be taken care of like that.

“Right arm, think I was holding my stylus too tightly.” She didn't even open her eyes as she turned on her side, reaching out the hurting limb.

With a gentleness a man of his frame seemed incapable of, Wrecker took it, moving it to face the palm up, and began massaging it too.

He started with her finger, so delicate and small in the embrace of his giant ones. Each one was delicately pinched in between his pointer finger and thumb, joints muscles and tendons kneaded into relaxation.

Then came the palm, painfully wiry, with the muscles tensed and coiled from the long hours of no rest. Wrecker's fingers carefully massaged them, and Padmé let out a few hisses of pain before these too relaxed into comfy hums as her boyfriend helped her with the pain.

She thought it would be it, but he continued the comforting movements on her forearm, now his actions bringing her more of a relaxing effect rather than purely pain relivement.

Wrecker arms continuously moved his hands up and down her forearm, drawing circles with his thumbs, making her back shiver with pleasure. She didn't even realize how wiry her muscles got until he made them relax, his fingers digging into knots deep into her limb.

“How did you learn to do this?” She murmured, her voice partially muted by the pillow she was laying on. Wrecker’s mismatched eyes didn't leave her arm, but she definitely saw the slight smirk under his nose.

“All of us got some pains a massage helps with. I was the first to need them, my growing pains making my whole body ache until I couldn't move. That's when Tech found some texts on holonet to teach me so I could do them before sleep. Then it turned out that Hunter's migraines can be lessened if you relieve the pressure on the neck,” Wrecker's pressure on Padmé's arm became weaker and weaker, his body slowly sumping to the side. “Tech tends to fall asleep on the pilot seat and next to his workbench, and I deal with his back afterwards.”

The senator gently pulled her boyfriend to lay down, his heavy body hitting the mattress. He didn't say anything, but let out a hum of comfort, wriggling closer to her, wrapping his arms around her much smaller waist. He was very warm, making Padmé shiver.

“Mmm, I'm glad you're here.” she settled her forehead just above his heart, taking comfort in the sound of the beat. Strong, just like him.

“Wish I could stay,” one of his arms moved to the base of her skull, gently scratching her hair bulbs, often sore from the extravagant hairstyles she wore on a daily basis. The hair and dresses, what she was most known for. A beauty of Naboo, queen and senator Amidala whose spirit never yielded. Just like her looks she never did anything halfway, giving her everything into how she presented herself as how she protected the innocents of the Republic.

But there she was, her hair in disarray, wearing an old t-shirt and underwear that has been for sweet release of the trash bin for months, and Wrecker was here, calling her beautiful in the pure darkness, his arms a comforting weight. Here, she was Padmé Naberrie, spending one of her rare moments with a man that found her beauty not in the make-up, dresses or jewelry, but her genuine laugh, lacking cooking skills, and the ability to stand her ground to help him and his brothers become people in the eyes of law.

He would protect her planet, while she secured his future.

Thank you Manhattan for edits and beta reading!

[cottoncandyclown123]

Hello everyone! I know it has been a very VERY long while since I’ve posted 😅 I’ve just been busy with my personal life and my motivation declined a lot for the past months.. but it has come back! And I missed posting here!

While I was away I made a few illustration of the main characters (and one villain)! I redesign a few of them and i am much more happier with there new designs! I hope you love them as much as I do!

First is my jttw oc, Tao Huwang! I changed is hairstyle to make it more accurate to Chinese culture (his previous hair didn’t make any sense idk what I was thinking) and made his clothes more fighting style but still classy! I saturated his colours a bit more to make him less grayish and made his face/expression more fox like. It’s not a HUGE redesign but still a much better one

Next is, Sun Wukong! I completely redesign his outfit because his old one was ugly as shit. I was mainly inspired by the Reborn version of Sun Wukong from the movie: Monkey King Reborn, but I guess if you know that movie it’s pretty obvious that I was inspired by him (I love that movie). I changed his eye color to a orange red to indicate more the furnace he was trapped in the beginning of story and made him have some battle scars! So yeah, big redesign from him!

Next is, Tripitaka! For Tripitaka I didn’t change anything major, just a few different details but not a very noticeable (ex: His hat, his staff, slightly colour change). But I did make his face lean more on the softer side to make him more friendly! So, no big difference.

Next is, Sandy! Just like Tao, I didn’t change anything major except his hairstyle. I made it longer and more curly, I also change his eyes to be more round than pointy. So yeah, just a few changes nothing to major!

Next is, Pigsy! For Pigsy, I changed nothing! Except, I changed his eyebrows a bit and put a tiny scar on one of them. But other than that, there is nothing to change!

Next is, Ao Lie! Again, like Tao and Sandy, I changed his hairstyle! I made it into a two ponytails because I think it would be funny to see a horse with two ponytails (plus it fits him), and I made his tail shorter to make him more horse like but still dragon-y. As for the rest, nothing as changed!

And finally, last one, Macaque! This one is actually not a redesign. I decided since I was redesign the others, that I should probably design one of the villains, and who could it be better to make a design than the fan favorite! I absolutely LOVE how I did him and tried to make his designs the opposite of Wukong, by making his colour the opposite (white for black, purple for red, grayish white fur for bright brown), making his “hair” longer, his outfit looser instead of tighter, his eyes more orange than red and giving him a hat (because I think it works on him)!

So yeah, that’s all of them (for now)! Thank you so much for being patient and I hope I can post more drawings soon! If you have any questions for the characters or any requests for the next character, than feel free to ask! Have a amazing day!

[raymantogether]

Rayman Together Community Spotlight #3 - Clairiphi

Rayman Together Community Spotlight #3 - Clairiphi

Introduction:

Have you ever made your own Rayman comic book series? Growing up, I spent thousands of hours outside of playing the Rayman series creating comics and drawings, making my own adventures for Rayman and his friends. However, I never could create something as captivating and truly unique as the Rayman Nightmarish Series. Rayman Nightmarish stole my heart and is something that I have followed since 2020. Every few weeks to months, I eagerly anticipate the next chapter. There is something so personal about the art style and original characters, which I fell in love with. Every strip is full of personality and charm. I had the pleasure of meeting Clairiphi, AKA Chiara, during my visit to Ubisoft Milan. In person, Chiara is just as amazing as her series. So when I decided to make this Community Spotlight Series, I just had to make a segment on Chiara and her Rayman Nightmarish series.

1. Please introduce yourself.

"My name is Chiara; I go by Clairiphi on the web, and I'm a storyteller from Sardinia (Italy) who dabbles into drawing to accompany her stories. I hope one day, not too far from now, to become a professional comic writer if the comic industry in Europe gives me the chance. For now, I sadly remain an enthusiastic hobbyist."

2. What are you currently working on in the Rayman Community? 

"I’ve been publishing my fan comic Rayman Nightmarish for a few years with the frequent help of my partner Francesco (@thepinna on Instagram and Cara), who is a professional illustrator and studied as a comic artist as well. Without his teaching, I would be nowhere near where I am with my skill level. He taught me how to storyboard, how to efficiently use a drawing tablet, and helped me train my writing skills. He also offers his direct artistic input from time to time, when work hours permit him (for example, while I did the storyboards and pencil sketches for chapter 11, he did inks and colors)."

3. What is your inspiration behind Rayman Nightmarish?

"One December evening I was particularly bored and haven’t been writing since the beginning of high school, but that evening I was coming from a long period of frustration regarding the school path I chose, and coincidentally, I was also back on my Rayman obsession because I was playing Legends and Origins. I had this fairy character (Waaty) and a horrific, almost lovecraftian villain (The Lighteater) in mind for a while, and all of a sudden I said, “You know what? Let’s stop daydreaming and write an actual story!” I took a huge empty notebook from my desk drawer, and a bunch of years later, here we are!"

4. For any newcomers, what is the story of Rayman Nightmarish about?

"With Rayman Nightmarish, I aimed to narrate a classic Rayman adventure, with the humor, the combats, the voyage across fantastical places... And zombies! Yeah, I love horror, and of course there was going to be a twist. But no worries! This is still a story for all ages, like Rayman always was after all.  An ancient evil called The Lighteater is rising from the depths of the sea and is going to bring a dark plague that will soon turn The Glade of Dreams into The Glade of Nightmares. Of course it is Rayman's job to save the day once again, with the help of Globox and a few unexpected friends, like Waaty, the livid dead fairy with strange clairvoyant abilities...and many others along the way! Will he be able to do it this time? Very likely knowing his records, but this could actually be more challenging than he thought."

5. Is there anything new or unreleased you can share?

"I’ve actually been working on a new original fantasy series for a while. The story is already all planned, I'm in love with the characters and every process I came across during the planning of the plot. I hope with all my heart that I'll be able to bring it to life, not as a webcomic but as a fool-blown series for comic stores’ shelves."

6. What made you fall in love with the Rayman series?

"When I was a little girl, I didn’t have much social skills, and my first ever playmate, before my brother was born, was my dear cousin, who one day came to me with a copy of Rayman 3; his parents got him somewhere during a trip. That game changed my brain chemistry because as soon as I saw the fairy council level, I was hypnotized, and I wasn’t even the one playing! The music, the scenery, the jokes—I don’t know, but every time we played it, I came home wishing I was still in that world. Then a few years later, my cousin got a PS3 and gave me and my brother his PS2, Rayman Raving Rabbids, and Rayman 3. I was so happy! My first ever “comic” was a very cringy Rayman fanfiction I wrote in middle school, kind of an ancestor of Rayman Nightmarish in a way, haha! I thank my cousin every day for showing me that game that evening, and if he were still here today, I bet he would think Rayman Nightmarish looks pretty sick (especially in comparison to his middle school predecessor)."

7. What is your favorite Rayman game?

"I think it’s pretty clear by now that it’s Rayman 3 since it comes with so many dear memories, but I really liked playing both Origins and Legends in co-op with my brother when they came out. They were really fun to play with others! While I’ve always considered Rayman 3 like an intimate journey to take alone in a fantasy world, as silly as it sounds. Haha!"

8. Who is your favorite Rayman character?

"I’m going to be very unoriginal and say it’s Rayman because it’s true."

9. Tell us about your time at Ubisoft Milan.

"It was better than Disneyland! I felt like a kid again being able to hang out with a team of professionals behind a whole videogame. Not only was I happy, I felt seen, like, “Woah! These guys know I exist and even asked me to come here, hello???” Pretty surreal experience!"

10. Other than playing Rayman, what are your favorite things to do?

"I’m going to be completely honest; I haven’t been playing a Rayman game since the dawn of time. Haha! Back when I was a little girl, I wasn't much of a gamer and only played Rayman games because I didn’t care for the others. Now I love my switch, and I found many more games I love to spend time with. Rayman still has a special place in my heart, because it’s thanks to it that I found out I was actually meant for writing stories. Two of my other favorite things to do (besides writing and drawing, which are obvious) are reading books and watching movies, and in both cases, my favorite genre is horror. I also like to play fantasy TTRPG games like D&D or Pathfinder from time to time; they are very stimulating for the imagination."

11. Tell us something interesting or funny about yourself that we might not already know. 

"I’ve actually graduated (both bachelor’s and master’s degree) from a music conservatory in classical piano and never taken a single class in any art school. Sometimes I feel stupid about my past choices, and sometimes I’m glad because learning to play an instrument on a professional level has helped me build discipline and time management skills that helped me greatly in the writing process."

12. Do you have any hidden talents?

"I don’t know much about "talent,” but I do love to sing in my car, and I can memorize the entire script of a movie if I like it a lot. Haha! I remember when I was in elementary school, I used to recite Madagascar to myself when it was past bedtime, but I didn’t want to sleep."

13. What is one thing you can’t live without?

"Besides my air conditioner, I think I would go insane if something happened to any of my writing devices. I keep all my notes scattered between my computer, my iPad, and many physical journals. While clouds are essential, sometimes I just need an actual piece of paper and a pencil to figure out a scene or a plot point."

Want to discover more about the Rayman Nightmarish series? This is my link tree where new readers can find the best social media platforms to either catch up with the story or stay tuned for any exciting news:

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is:  WabiSabiPapi! @arimakes has 16 fics posted to AO3 in the Stranger Things fandom and 12 of them are in the Steddie tag.

Our anonymous nominator recommends the following works by WabiSabiPapi:

Fill My Lungs With Sweetness

Peach Boy

Dog Days of Summer

March Madness

"They're multitalented-- not only do they write beautifully but they're an amazing illustrator, too. Ari puts so much heart into everything they create." -- anonymous

Below the cut, @arimakes answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

I’m starting to think I’m possessed? It all began because I really wanted to read one specific thing and nobody had done it yet, so I figured, why not try writing it myself? I haven’t been able to stop since. Turns out, it’s my favourite thing in the world to do, and I think about it all the time. Art has been my source of creative expression since I was a kid, I really never expected to love telling stories this much, too.

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

Hands down idiot4idiot, mutual bi-discovery! I’m pretty sure Steddie’s natural state is clueless and confused! Big shout out to @bilbosmom-belladonna’s Exactly What It Looks Like!

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

Hmm, so I love writing an Alternate Universe. I love canon, but I really enjoy plopping them in a variety of situations and discovering how a change in circumstance might impact them. Looking at my tags on AO3, I tend towards Friends to Lovers as well! 

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

Oh goshhhh! This is so tough because I have so many that I think about often, but the very top would have to be Is Your Light On? By Vio. The boys are imperfect in such a human way. Their motivations make sense even when their decisions have you screaming at your phone. Vio is also a master in subtlety. There is a treasure trove of subtext to parse through so reading any of their work is truly a remarkable experience. I also credit Vio entirely for my involvement in the Steddie fandom. My first piece of fanart was for IYLO. It’s the reason why I ended up connecting and making friends with other creators!

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

There would be so much to explore through a Came Back Wrong fic! Either POV, really! The gnawing suspicion of someone you know who is acting strangely or maybe losing grasp of yourself after a tragedy. It’s a great opportunity to utilize an unreliable narrator, plus I really enjoy misleading readers or hiding things (either from the reader or from a character) until a big reveal.

What is your writing process like?

I always write a bullet point outline with the overarching plot and then pass through it over and over and over again, adding more details every time. Sometimes, I’ll be on a walk or cooking and an idea for a scene or piece of dialogue or interiority will pop in my head, so I pick up my phone and add a bullet point in the proper spot. I am always considering interiority, action, dialogue, and scenography as I plan and write. If the scene is hinging on a conversation, I’ll write that part first and then weave in the rest of it to make sure all my bases are covered! By the time I’m actually writing prose, I’ve got pretty well every scene figured out beat by beat.

Do you have any writing quirks?

At the beginning of the writing process, I often have the intention to keep a fic short… like in my current fic The Carnivorous Lamb, I literally told a few of my friends that I was just gonna write a quick n dirty one-shot and now I have no clue how long it’s going to be. For some reason, I can’t make em hook up without an in-depth character study!!

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

I have no patience! As soon as I’m done writing a chapter and it’s been beta’d (shout out to Amy), I am raring to post.

Which fic are you most proud of?

Right Where You Belong will always be the one I’m most proud of, I think. It’s the first thing I ever wrote and even though I’ve learned a lot since that one, I am still so so proud of it. The timeline was complex (it’s a time travel au) so I had to thread things throughout it all and make sure the dates all made sense!

How did you get the idea for Dog Days of Summer?

Dog Days of Summer is actually the final installment of a series! The first part was a Tommy POV called A Piece of Something (You Think Is Gonna Last) which came from a list of prompts from a Valentine’s Exchange on a server I’m a part of. I wrote the first part over the course of a few days, and I couldn’t stop thinking of the little lake town and the silly characters living within it. A bigger story webbed out from that first part so I decided I’d write a different one for the exchange and explore the backstory more thoroughly through an Eddie POV (Peach Boy) and then a Steve POV (Dog Days of Summer) to then catch up to the events in the Tommy POV. So, I have CheshireDog to thank for the entire Boys of Summer series! More specifically, though, in Dog Days of Summer, Steve is finding his place in the world in a big way. It follows him over a span of six years while he falls in love with this town his family summers in and surprise surprise! He falls in love with Eddie, too! It was my first time doing a deep dive into Steve as a character. I partially wrote it as a challenge to myself to understand him more thoroughly and discover his voice!

When writing Dog Days of Summer, what was something you didn’t expect?

I honestly wasn’t expecting it to resonate with people as much as it did. Out of all of my fics, it was the one I got the most engagement on Tumblr with folks sending asks just to tell me how excited they were for the next chapter.

What inspired March Madness?

March Madness was written as part of Sub Eddie Week last year. I love Steddie in any combination: top, bottom, vers, sub, dom, switch! Let the boys have fun! I’ll read and write it all. But something about Sub!Eddie just clicks with me. From the beginning of this ship, Dom!Eddie fics have DOMINATED (is it tacky to wink here?). Currently, searching the tags on AO3, Dom!Eddie has 1,511 works whereas Sub!Eddie has 658. That event from last year added 118 to the pool! To think that one event is responsible for nearly one-fifth of that tag is pretty incredible. Don’t get me wrong, March Madness is a very silly fic. I love to bring humour into kink, because in my personal experience, I prefer it when there is an edge of humour and playfulness. That’s all to say that I don’t take myself too seriously in regards to this fic, but in the second chapter, I did want to represent submissive tops. I won’t make any grand statements here, but I think some folks equate domming with topping, which again, in my real-life experience just isn’t the case. If it were, then femdoms who receive wouldn’t exist. 

What was your favorite part to write from Peach Boy?

There’s a scene in Peach Boy—actually, it’s the scene that everything was building towards… Eddie is thirteen so his emotions and imagination are big and wild. He’s been driving himself mad over something so small and innocuous (finding peach pits lying around town in strange places) and he reaches a breaking point. I love writing Eddie’s interiority. He’s got such an over-dramatic, colourful, and unique voice, so finding ways to express that with odd turns of phrases and jaunty language is a blast. And when he’s thirteen, that just amps it all up ten-fold! In that particular scene, he loses control and his interiority bubbles up and bursts out of him in a very physical and silly way. It was fun to play with his awareness of his actions and to orchestrate how a moment stretches on or freezes or slips away from oneself.

How do/did you feel writing Fill My Lungs With Sweetness?

Super inspired! It’s a twist on Hanahaki and I did a bunch of research on the ancient Greek/Roman medicine system of humorism in which the human body is made up of four humors: blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. If anything is out of balance in a person’s life, a build-up or stagnation of any of these four things occurs in the body, and that’s how people get sick. I loved the marriage of humorism with Hanahaki—a physical manifestation of not expressing one’s love.  In this fic, rather than flowers invading a person’s lungs, it’s vines and sap. The illness first presents as an upper respiratory infection (lots of sticky, sappy, phlegm) and if you wait too long, you eventually lose the ability to speak because of it! Sorry if I’m nerding out too much here, but I’m a sucker for symbolism so I also tied the seasons in with it, and the phlegmatic humor is associated with winter! 

What was the most difficult part of writing Fill My Lungs With Sweetness?

I had finished writing one of the chapters of Fill My Lungs With Sweetness and sent it off to be beta’d, but something just wasn’t sitting right with me. Initially, I wrote a conflict culminating in a certain way, but when I started writing the next chapter it felt like I was trying to write myself out of a corner. So after chatting with Amy, I decided to rewrite a big chunk of it and switch up how everything shook out so I could approach things from a totally different angle that made so much more sense for the characters and story. I’ve encountered the same issue before while co-writing Late Bloomers with Amy. I just couldn’t get through writing a scene and we determined that it was just the wrong thing for the character to go through. In the planning phase, a scene or a decision might make sense, but as the story shakes out while writing the actual prose, things can definitely change. Sometimes you gotta scrap entire scenes and approach things from a different perspective!

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

It’s a toss-up between the final scene of Right Where You Belong and the final three paragraphs of Dog Days of Summer. My favourite parts of writing a story are always the beginning and the end. Tying everything together into a satisfying conclusion is thrilling! I get a lil rush of serotonin from it I think.

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

Right now, I’m working on The Carnivorous Lamb. It’s ongoing and it’s the first fic I’ve really allowed myself to settle into the middle of the story rather than barreling toward the finish line. If you like age gaps, power dynamics, and kink exploration with a big helping of religious quandary, this may be the fic for you!

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

Mainly, I want to express my gratitude for the friendships I’ve formed through this fandom. It’s so inspiring and such a special thing to be a part of. And I’m honoured folks read my work at all, let alone get excited about updates. Having not found this hobby until my thirties, it really is a testament to never knowing what you might discover about yourself as the years go on! There are things you have NO CLUE you will love waiting for you in your future!

Thank you to our author, @arimakes, and our nominator! See more of WabiSabiPapi's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[thestarlightforge]

TBOSAS Meta

This started as a couple-paragraphs-long Everlark & Coryo x Lucy Gray rant. It turned into an essay on the politics of systemic oppression and how we illustrate it in fiction, with The Hunger Games and Ballad as case studies. Regardless, I hope others enjoy, lol. This is where my brain lives, now, as I expect it will the rest of 2023. Cheers!

***

It’s been interesting, the last few days, some of the discourse that’s popped up around TBOSAS. FASCINATING political discussions, as I’ve come to expect for a Suzanne Collins release. (#1 in my heart.)

Personally, I always separate books vs. movie canon with her franchise. With the OG Hunger Games, sometimes I felt the films were better—like she got another pass at it and REALLY took advantage, and utilized the hell out of taking it out of Katniss’s first-person POV to develop other characters and the world (still without detracting from her narrative)—while for some details, I preferred the books.

With TBOSAS, though, the book and movie feel almost entirely different to me.

There are MANY shared elements, of course, and I feel either version gels quite nicely with the OG franchise. It’s not even that there’s that many continuity differences—some things cut or altered for time, sure, but the bones of the plot are the same. Both illustrate astute political commentary, Coriolanus’s descent into madness, Tigris’s shift in position on him (foreshadowing her full turn by Mockingjay), and Lucy Gray’s role in his life in both his initial downfall and his defeat by Katniss. The actors and creative team all did BEAUTIFUL work bringing it to life, and I honestly love both versions.

But fans who mainly like the book may be frustrated by the sympathy Coryo garners in the film.

Normally, I’d say this is because the book reveals more internal monologue—and it does. But honestly, one of the things I was most impressed by in this film was how legible the actors’ internal monologues were. It was clear, the amount of work they all did to that end. So I don’t know that it is just more. I think it’s also different.

Book Coriolanus devolves much earlier and more obviously. He starts from the same pressed circumstances and has moments of goodness, but he becomes the villain we know him eventually to be pretty damn fast.

Film-Coriolanus has a much slower descent. Ironic, honestly, given the film has far less time than the book does.

I think as a result of this, I’ve seen discourse comparing beats in his relationship with Lucy Gray to Katniss and Peeta. For example, that beautifully shot/choreographed/performed scene in TBOSAS with him and Lucy Gray on either side of the fence after the bombings that night, where they almost kiss and he asks her, “Is this real? If I’m going to risk everything?” being compared to Peeta’s long game of “real or not real” throughout Mockingjay. Everlark folks (rightfully) pointing out that for Peeta, the refrain is about shared trauma, especially between him and Katniss, and both of them grounding their relationship in mutual trust—while asserting that for Coryo, the same refrain comes from a place of selfishness.

I get where this opinion comes from: President Snow is probably one of the most violent, sadistic, genocidal dictators in modern popular fiction. His relationship with Lucy Gray started as transactional—even more acutely in the book. Nearly everything Book-Coryo does is for his or his family’s personal gain.

But to me, half the beauty and tragedy of the film is this delicious possibility—the hope—they showed us.

THG has always had a strong anti-war philosophy in general, with through-line commentary on showmanship, propaganda, surveillance and performance: The recurrent themes of cameras always bring on them, the arenas and entirety of Panem being a stage/game—and how those things impact authentic human relationships. Everlark hit for so many because of the ways authenticity bloomed out of that hellish, contrived pit. Coriolanus and Lucy Gray’s relationship started out similarly contrived: Thrown together by the politics of the Academy, the uprising, the districts, the Capitol and the Games—helping one another survive. Largely unlike Katniss and Peeta, they both played the game intentionally, to varying degrees. (Personality wise, these four really have almost nothing in common, lol.) Lucy Gray is a good person, both in the end and from her start (unlike the terrorist Coriolanus becomes). But she is a performer. He’s right about that.

So honestly, I don’t see much purpose in reading Peeta’s question as valid while Coryo’s wasn’t. I think that judgment is colored by dramatic irony—us knowing who they each become. But in theatre, we talk about living honestly in imagined circumstances. It’s used in a lot of acting techniques, but particularly for people playing villains. To stay grounded in the truth of it, you have to believe honestly in the imagined moment, not the gestalt; Leslie Odom Jr. was a great Aaron Burr because every performance, he believed in the whole journey, from hope to ruin. Tom Blythe was a great Coryo because he invested in the earnest reality of Snow as a young man, not the devil we know he becomes. And at that point in the story, at the cages that night with Lucy Gray, Coriolanus was honestly grounded in similar struggles as our OG heroes: Trying to provide for and protect his starving family. His family (and the Capitol at large) reeks of privilege, and his prejudices were obviously flawed. But in his developing love for her, he was steeped in starvation, the same political forces as lashed all citizens of Panem, and was clawing his way from beneath just as much Capitol propaganda as people from the Districts—perhaps even more so, given his Grandma’am and how his father died. Because of their given circumstances, politics bled into everything—but eventually, so did feeling, and they had several moments of genuine bonding, trust and connection which the actors invested in beyond their political need for each other. There’s a constant push and pull: Holding hands at the zoo for the cameras was political; her reaching for his hand in the arena visit was less so. The first “Stop treating me like I’ve already lost” in front of everyone was wit-soaked survival, while “Please don’t let me die in that arena tomorrow,” near-whispered and with hands held between them where the camera would struggle to see, bled into real vulnerability. Saving him from the other tributes in the cage-ride to the zoo was about survival; risking her life to go back for him when the arena was bombed was at least a mix. Her motivations for singing in her interview are complex—perhaps guilt that a “rebel” attack nearly killed Coriolanus, his advice she’d get the most money that way—but I feel strongly that a non-zero amount of her was motivated by wanting to demonstrate that she trusts him, which for her is even higher-prized than love. And I also feel that, after the hospital and her “final performance”—leading up to their near-kiss at the zoo—Coriolanus scoped out the arena (and ultimately took all those risks to help her cheat the Games) both because he wanted the Plinth prize, in theory, and because he increasingly desperately wanted her to live.

The waters between them were thoroughly, legitimately muddied—which I believe was intentional, that constant tension between authenticity and politics. And as much as he was falling for her, Coriolanus saw that Lucy Gray was just as clever and good at crowd-work as he was—maybe better.

So to circle all the way back to this Everlark comparison: Given the absurdly multilayered situation, is it really that selfish or unreasonable he would check in with her during that moment through the fence? That this child—wrapped in oppressive patriarchy, violence, starvation and propaganda—would ask for reassurance before he was willing to be vulnerable, or to potentially risk his family’s lives?

Some artists are hesitant to engage with the humanity of “villains,” their origins, because they feel humanizing them excuses them. In real life, I get this: Second chances aren’t always the answer, and people need to be held accountable. But isn’t it more powerful storytelling to demonstrate the corrosive nature of all systems of oppression in our fiction, to show how they can corrupt even those who try, than to condemn people before they’ve even had a chance? Isn’t the beauty of Lucy Gray’s whole thing that everyone starts out good, and it’s our job to choose to stay on the right side of that line?

And when President Coriolanus Snow finally chokes on his last rose, wouldn’t it be a more satisfying victory if we imagined him as a real-feeling person—full owner of sixty years of horrifying choices—rather than a cartoonishly evil cardboard cutout?

Book-Coryo has a more obviously manipulative/evil streak, much earlier on. To make it plain: He’s an ass, and his “love” for her reads more like obsession. But my favorite aspect of the film (and I feel one of the most compelling) was how it illustrated that these systems of oppression can make tragedies of almost anyone: All but those at the very, very top. Suzanne’s anti-capitalist politicking—how classism turns everyone below the 1% against each other, where the “upper middle class” (doctors/lawyers/actors) is vilified to the poor as a red herring while a handful of robber-baron CEOs amass almost all wealth on the planet—strikes again. She, Francis Lawrence, the film’s creative team and these actors came together to put tragically human faces on that struggle—how hard it is to stay a good person amidst intense, violent, systemic oppression.

But none of that sings quite as true if you go into it having decided that Coriolanus was evil in his bones. The stakes are so much higher, richer, otherwise. If his love—for Tigris, for his family, for Sejanus, and yes, for Lucy Gray—was, or became, authentic.

It’s not a descent into madness if he’s already mad. Or, as he put it in the original Hunger Games film: “Hope. It is the only thing stronger than fear.”

[utdr-fractured]

College really crushed my spirit when it came to art (a very common occurrence, unfortunately) and it caused me to stop doing art in any form for years. It’s well known that art school is very harsh on people who do not do anything other than traditional art. They look down on people who do digital illustrations, anime, cartoons, comics, and etc. It embedded deep embarrassment and shame into me that I couldn’t escape.

The anxiety I felt when I posted here for the first time was insane. A certain event after posting caused me to reconsider creating this comic but the wave of support pushed me through. The whole thing was a misunderstanding though and it has since been cleared up! While it did have a slight impact on my confidence, I do see this as a blessing because it caused so many people to encourage me to continue when I was already on the fence about doing this.

Since I started posting here, I’ve drawn more just in these past two months than I have in the past 5 to 6 years. I’m happier than ever when it comes to drawing but I’m also very disappointed that I wasted so much time being afraid. If I never let my fear and anxiety get the better of me my art would have improved so much by now, but no used dwelling in the past! I’m working towards improving now and that’s all that matters.

This whole comic started because one day I want to create my own original webcomic. That’s something that I still am planning on doing but I wanted to create a “practice” comic so to speak. I wanted to get used to laying out panels, making things flow smoothly, practicing anatomy, and more. A few months ago I made my husband play Undertale for the first time and recently made him play Deltarune, so I got back into the fandom. I also have a list of songs that I listen to on repeat that I felt resonated with the characters of my AU which helped create the story and, boom, UTDR Fractured was born.

If you bothered reading all of this, thank you so much! I just wanted to share this so that you all know when I say thank you, I genuinely mean it. I have a sketchbook and there’s a page dedicated to all the kind comments I receive. When I feel defeated I reread them to give me motivation to power through. By sharing this, I hope that other people who have experienced similar situations, or are feeling disconnected when it comes to art, know that they are not alone. I hope that you persevere and accomplish all that you want to in your life as an artist.

-Lavender

[art]

Creator Spotlight: @chaaistheanswer

Hi everyone! I am Clara, but you can also call me chaa! I am a digital artist based in Auckland, New Zealand, with a bachelor’s degree in Creative Media Production. After graduating from uni, I moved out to pursue my art career and I’ve been a freelance digital artist ever since. I love concept art, especially character design! Creating characters influenced by my love for fantasy is what I live for. Thank you for stopping by, and I hope you enjoyed my art! And thank you, Tumblr, for this opportunity!

Check out our interview with Clara below!

Did you originally have a background in art? If not, how did you start?

I specialized in art in high school and have a bachelor’s degree in Creative Media Production from Massey University with an animation pathway. For our thesis film, which I worked on with several of my classmates, I took on the role of producer, art director, and concept artist. Our short film was featured in the Wellington Film Festival Terror-Fi in 2020. After graduating, I went on to become a freelance artist, but my goal is to work for the gaming industry as a character concept artist. Ever since I first picked up a pencil, I knew I wanted to become an artist!

Have you ever had an art block? If so, how did you overcome it?

Art block is quite common among artists, and unfortunately, I too have fallen prey to the affliction. I have several ways of overcoming art block: watching movies, playing games, reading, or going out for a drive with my sister. These are just a few things I love to do to help keep my creative juices flowing!

What is one habit you find yourself doing a lot as an artist?

I tend to obsessively research about completely unrelated topics while I draw. I find learning new things helps improve my concept designs, especially in creating backgrounds for my characters.

Over the years as an artist, what were your biggest inspirations behind your creativity?

Video games and anime were my biggest inspirations! Anything with a captivating story that’ll send me to the edge of my seat, and loveable characters. I’m particularly drawn to high and dark fantasy.

How has technology changed the way you approach your work?

Technology has made a huge impact on us artists over the last few years. I used to draw a lot on paper, but since getting a tablet, I find myself searching for the undo and redo buttons and even trying to zoom constantly while I draw on paper. I used to only draw for myself as well, but after posting my art online, I now have an audience to whom I can share my art. Because of this, I am able to earn a living doing what I love by creating illustrations for clients.

What is a recent creative project that you are proud of?

I am very proud of this recent commission I’ve done for a client! Fortunately, the piece turned out exactly how I wanted it to look, and my client was very happy with the result. I am also in the process of working on a Webtoon, which is going as smoothly as I hoped it would be before its re-release!

What advice would you give to younger you about making art that's personal or truthful to your own experiences?

The best advice I would give my younger self is to never hold back! Try not to think about the negatives of creating and sharing art that you believe in. Embrace vulnerability, and don’t be afraid to dig deep into your own emotions and experiences. Always explore, and don’t limit yourself to your own bubble. And most important of all, stay true to yourself! Stay true to your values and beliefs, and never compromise your own authenticity for the sake of pleasing others. Your art is a reflection of you as a person.

Who on Tumblr inspires you and why?

@yuumei-art has been an inspiration to me since my early Deviantart days. I admire how she uses her skills to focus on environmentalism and cyber activism. @nipuni is another inspiration of mine. I found her when I was in the process of recovering from Dragon Age Solavellan hell. I admire how she manages to capture faces well while also sticking to her style. Her paintings are so beautiful and very pleasing to my eyes!

Thanks for stopping by, Clara! If you haven't seen her Meet the Artist piece, be sure to check it out here. For more of Clara's work, follow her Tumblr, @chaaistheanswer!

[coolbeesbro]

Despite my best wishes and going 5 years strong, I got Covid. So now I find myself with more free time on my hands to do personal stuff, and not feel guilty for laying around in bed/in my room for the next few days.

Between bouts of writing, naps, being buried under my cats, and finishing my final for my illustration class, I’ve been working with the clothing design I want to go with for Narinder in my fic. I’m a fan of this, but for the life of me I don’t know how to describe the kind of pants he’s wearing? I also took some time to practice drawing his face, since drawing full anthropomorphic characters in a consistent way is a bit of a challenge for me.

[cyrilau]

Pentagram Ritual Experiment:

At the heart of the crossroads, the spirit blooms into matter, on its tongue an alphabet pronounced in silence.

Over the past few weeks I’ve been working my version of the Greater Invoking Pentagram Ritual in the morning, and the Greater Banishing in the evening.

My intention was to strengthen my relationship with the cardinal directions and elemental energies of my local environment. The Earth element/Malkuth/Horizontal level is absolutely foundational to all practical and transcendental operations (in my experience). The upper and lower worlds are linked here. The Tree of Life diagram illustrates how every sphere focuses into Malkuth. What is right around you, here and now, is the beginning and end of the Work.

I used the classic Golden Dawn/Crowley elements and 5 pointed star correspondence; including the God-names, grade signs, and angels. This evolved and changed as the month and practice progressed which I’ll get into in a second.

At first the invocations were a lot. Throughout the first part of the day I was spacey, and felt disconnected. There was a lot of energy coming through. On one level it brought habits and behavioral patterns that were crossing me up to the forefront. This felt like the first layer of elemental purification/strengthening, it put the desire of fire, cognition and thought patterns of air, actions and behaviors in earth, and the emotion in the waters all under a microscope.

Middle Pillar and sitting style meditations after the invocations really helped ground the influx of energy and it helped me integrate the influences better. As the weeks progressed I felt way more evened out, like the core aspects of my being were rounding out.

I frame the “banishing” ritual as a refinement process. I like to use it as a way to purify, stabilize, and bind/ground the energies of the element(s). This ritual felt like a good way to close up and seal the experiences and insight gained throughout the day. The time after the banishing is where I found the time to develop and specify my own elemental correspondences as they appeared throughout the days and weeks. Sort of like I was digesting everything.

The practice noticeably shifted after the Full Moon. I have a general skeleton of a full moon rite adapted from the Azoëtia, and when circle casting at the beginning of the Ingress rite I incorporated the greater invoking ritual. I subtracted the grade sign and God-names, instead I used the Azoëtia’s directional invocations in conjunction with the drawing of the pentagrams. The experience was intense but exceptionally rewarding. I tried returning to the golden dawn/crowley method after the ritual and it didn’t have the same effect at all. It felt like the signs and formula were half-dead.

A couple things I’ve been doing since the full moon is developing my own “signs”, functioning as signals and postures sigilizing and encoding my combined experiences/gnosis of the elemental and directional spirits and energies. I’ve also adapted part of the Dragon Book’s method of projecting the upright and averse pentagrams to charge the directions. I found this section in the DBoE so fascinating and it definitely resonated with my experience:

(The Fifth Arcana of the Hendecarch, Dragon Book of Essence)

One of the most nourishing outcomes of this operation is the feeling of the spirit anchoring into the physical. Sort of like the vertical line of the spirit moving down and extending horizontally in 4 directions. The 4 elements/directions allow the spirit to find form and function. I’m not exactly sure how to articulate this part of my experience, but the “subtle essence”, or quintessence, feels more tangible.

The daily repetition and consistent meditation practices have also had a huge impact on my overall mood and rootedness.

Lastly, during a few of my meditations after the invocation part of the ritual (around week 3) Christ symbolism kept surfacing. This got me thinking about the central egress rite; the sacrifice of the 4 elemental vessels and the 5th vessel of the quintessence: the death and resurrection of the self. In the center of the crossroads, the body becomes the gate.

[yeoroot]

9 Fandom Peeps to Get to Know Better

Thank you for the tag @soup-du-silence !!

3 ships I like: JamiKali/KaliJami (TWST), LouWill (Metaphor Re:Fantazio), AtsuKita (Haikyuu!!)

First Ship: I can’t remember…? It may have been Sonic related like Sonic/Amy or Sonic/Tails or Phineas/Isabella from Phineas and Ferb-; now that I think about it I may have shipped Shadow with Rouge or Silver (ironically i know nothing about sonic now other than through a friend or if my brother wants to watch the movies)

Last Song: Get Him Back by Fiona Apple (I’m cycling through the album rn; I’ve been listening to 4 of her albums + the ost for Metaphor on repeat for weeks-)

Favorite Childhood Book: Hibi Chouchou (or Like a Butterfly); I used to read a lot of shoujo manga and I just found out while searching for it that it was made by the same mangaka as A Sign of Affection what-

Currently Reading: Metaphor Re:Fantazio fics! I’m specifically looking for LouWill; I’ve been watching the amount of fics for the game update for the past few days, and I just read a Chinese fic thats currently at 97k words via my phone translator. Read another Chinese fic for LouWill and was surprised by the dynamic, I’m cheering so loudly- (I also felt like writing for the ship, so I have two Google docs, one for stray ideas and another I’m working on slowly, but I forgot that it then stirs my want to make a fanbook and illustrate all of it, this isn’t good-)

Currently watching: Brooklyn Nine-Nine on repeat; sometimes I like to put myself in a type of purgatory where I become not that bored but not that entertained from the repetitiveness that I’m stirred into action. I also recently finished watching House M.D.

Currently consuming: a bright yellow soup with fish in it. My mom made it for me but because she told me the name of it in Vietnamese, I do Not know what I consumed. It was pretty good though!

Currently craving: x2 Buldak noodles. I’m stressed by a bunch of tasks, things I want to do, and the concept of time. Plus my tolerance grew from the frequency I’ve been eating them due to stress this is not a good combo who told me spice was good for stress-

Tagging: @pointy-spiral, @kobanzme, plus anyone who wants to do this! (No pressure if you don’t want to btw)

[fkinkindagauche]

Watch While I Show You the Ropes

Full fic on AO3. I've been wanting to continue The Unbearable Horniness of Steve for a while, and I was inspired by the @strangerthingswritersguild Kinktober day 7 prompts "Bondage / Traffic Light System".

This can totally be read as a standalone without reading that fic as it is just porn, all you need to know is that Eddie and Steve are in a relationship, it's an Omegaverse no Upside Down Modern Setting AU with them as the ages they were in Season 4, with Eddie working his way through his super super senior year.

Rating: Explicit | WC: 7,037 | CW: Steve gets overwhelmed at one point and starts to panic, but he's able to verbalize this and Eddie stops as soon as he asks him to. Also mentions of Eddie working toward getting a neuropsych eval for ADHD. | Tags: Omega Verse, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Upside Down, Established Relationship, Smut, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Bondage, Shibari, Light BDSM, Kink Exploration, Kink Negotiation, Anal Sex, Knotting, Oral Sex, Anal Fingering, Omega Steve Harrington, Alpha Eddie Munson, Top Eddie Munson, Bottom Steve Harrington, Dom Eddie Munson, Sub Steve Harrington

“What is that ?” Eddie asked as he walked into Steve’s apartment, voice suspicious. 

“Hello to you too, Mr. Munson,” Steve said from where he was sitting on the floor near his futon, untangling a pile of rope. “It’s just some supplies.” Eddie raised his eyebrows, but didn’t question Steve further, walking into the room to slump down on the futon next to the pile.

“How was your day?” Steve asked, getting up to sit in Eddie’s lap, straddling his legs.

“It sucked,” Eddie said, frowning and reaching out to put his hands on Steve’s waist.

“Wanna talk about it?” Steve reached forward to rub his wrist on Eddie’s neck, scenting him. 

Eddie sighed, leaning into Steve’s hand and closing his eyes. “Not really,” he said.

Steve hummed thoughtfully. “Wanna tie me up and fuck me?” 

Eddie’s eyes flew open, glancing at the pile of rope. “I knew it was too much to hope that you’d just decided to take up rock climbing.” 

Steve rolled his eyes. “I can feel your cock getting hard right now, don’t act like you’re not into the idea.” Steve rolled his hips down onto Eddie’s cock to punctuate his argument.

“Fine, I can admit the idea is appealing. But why do you suddenly want to be tied up?” Eddie asked.

Steve shrugged. “It’s not really sudden, I’ve always kind of wanted to try. Then I went down this Reddit rabbit hole a few nights ago and ordered some rope and a book on shibari.” 

“Are you just constantly horny? Isn’t that uncomfortable?” Eddie asked. He still liked to pretend he wasn’t just as horny as Steve, and Steve let him get away with it. 

“No, I’m very comfortable ,” Steve said suggestively, grinding down onto Eddie’s lap again.

Eddie shook his head, but leaned forward to kiss Steve’s neck, biting down a little and sucking at the junction where his neck met his shoulder. Steve moaned at the sharp sting of pain, tilting his head to give Eddie better access, hands curling into fists in Eddie’s shirt as he squirmed in his lap. 

“So you gonna show me the ropes?” Eddie asked, looking way too proud of his pun. But he’d had a bad day, so Steve let it slide.

Steve pushed himself out of Eddie’s lap to stand, walking over toward the rope. A book was sitting beside the rope, open to a page illustrating multiple different knots. “When you learned to camp and do other invigorating outdoor activities, did you also learn how to tie knots?” Steve asked. “Because none of these make much sense to me.”

Eddie laughed, pulling the book toward himself. “Yes, I can tie knots. Though I didn’t learn it there,” Eddie said, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

Steve felt a bolt of jealousy rush through his body and tried to tamp it down, knowing it was ridiculous to be jealous of things Eddie had done before they were together, but it must have shown on his face. Eddie smiled, pulling Steve in for a kiss. “Don’t worry,” Eddie said, “they were nowhere near as pretty as you.” 

Steve shoved him away. “I wasn’t jealous!” Steve protested, blushing.

“Sure, baby,” Eddie said, condescendingly.

“Okay, maybe I won’t let you tie me up,” Steve snapped, crossing his arms over his chest.

Eddie laughed, but it wasn’t malicious. Steve had already started to pick up on the fact that Eddie loved it when he was a bit of a brat. “You’re the one that wanted to be tied up, Steve,” Eddie pointed out. 

“Well, I don’t anymore,” Steve said, huffing over to the couch and sitting down again, crossing his legs bitchily.

Eddie kneeled down in front of him, putting his head on his legs and staring up at Steve with his big baby cow eyes. “Pleeeeeeeease, Stevie? I’m sorry, you’re right, now that you put the idea in my head I do really want to.” 

Steve couldn’t say no to anything Eddie wanted when he looked at him like that. Especially not when it was something he wanted, too. “Alright, fine,” he said, acting like he was now doing Eddie a favor by agreeing to do what Steve wanted in the first place. 

He pulled the book over toward them, flipping to the pages detailing how to do a cross-chest box tie. “What do you think of this one to start with?” Steve asked, feeling himself get slightly hard just from thinking about it.

Eddie scanned through the instructions, flipping through the images. “I can do that,” he said, nodding, going into what Steve thought of as his “focus mode”. Eddie often seemed like his attention was being pulled in a million different directions all at the same time, but sometimes he latched onto one thing and focused intently on just that. Steve loved when that one thing was him.

“It will be easiest to do while you’re standing,” Eddie said, reaching for the rope. Steve had gone with the suggested starter rope from the company he’d bought the book from, and it was a natural light brown color, he thought maybe it was hemp? He really hadn’t paid that much attention.

Steve stood in front of the couch and Eddie studied him, tilting his head to the side. “Shirt off,” he said, and Steve immediately complied, hearing the hint of command in Eddie’s voice. Eddie had never actually been bossy during sex, that was Steve’s role, but Steve shivered, finding he liked it. 

Steve pulled his shirt off, baring his hairy chest for Eddie, who stepped forward with the book in one hand and the rope in the other. He walked around to Steve’s back and set the rope down, using one hand to move Steve’s arms into position behind his body, stacking them on top of each other so they were parallel, like an equal sign. There were frequent pauses and readjustments, during which Steve assumed Eddie was consulting the book.

“Okay, I think that’s good,” Eddie said after a few minutes of these pauses and readjustments.

“Eddie, there’s not even any rope on me yet,” Steve complained, and Eddie walked back around in front of him.

“Well excuse me if I’m trying to avoid giving you permanent nerve damage,” Eddie said, rolling his eyes. He picked up the rope and started to drape it over Steve’s body, making an X over the top of the front and back of his chest, then wrapping a loop around his chest beneath his nipples. 

Steve loved the way the rope felt as it dragged over his skin, Eddie needing to pull quite a bit through each time he made a loop. The hemp was a little rough, but mostly slid smoothly over his skin, making a soft rasping noise each time Eddie pulled. 

Eddie stepped back after he was finished with the initial chest component, not having started on the arms yet, and looked at his work. “That makes your tits look fantastic,” Eddie said, reaching out to brush a thumb over each of Steve’s nipples. 

Steve shivered at the rough feeling of Eddie’s calloused thumbs, cock filling out in his shorts as his nipples hardened. Eddie glanced down and smirked at Steve. “Enjoying this?” he asked.

Steve huffed. “Yes, I’m enjoying it. But I can still move my arms,” he said, punctuating the statement by flailing his arms around a little.

“Stop moving!” Eddie said, walking around to Steve’s back and putting a hand on his arms to keep them still. “I had those where I wanted them.” 

Steve grumbled a little but stopped moving, letting Eddie reposition his arms how he wanted. “Alright, how does that feel? Is it pulling on your shoulders at all?” Eddie asked.

Steve shook his head. “No, feels fine,” he said. Eddie pressed himself against Steve’s back, reaching for the trailing end of the rope. Steve could feel Eddie’s cock, hard against one of his ass cheeks, as Eddie leaned in to kiss his neck. 

“You ready for me to tie your arms?” Eddie asked, a whisper against Steve’s ear. Steve was fully erect now, much more turned on by the process of being tied up than he thought he would be.

“Yes,” he said. “I’ve been ready for a while now.” He injected a little of his trademark bitchiness into the last statement, a little unmoored by how affected he was by the process. 

Eddie bit down on Steve’s neck and sucked hard enough to leave a bruise, choosing not to respond to his bitchiness with words. Steve moaned, tilting his head back and thrusting his hips forward into nothing. 

Eddie stepped back and began the process of completing the arm portion of the box tie. Steve hadn’t looked that hard at the instructions, so wasn’t totally sure what he was doing, but he felt his arms being gradually enveloped and held by loops of rope. Every time the rope dragged over the skin of his back he got a little more aroused, slick pooling in his boxers, the sweet scent of it filling the room.

He could smell the arousal building in Eddie’s scent as well as the process went on, the scent of cardamom thick in the air, and Steve was glad he wasn’t the only one affected by this. Eventually, Eddie’s movements paused, and he stepped back further.

“Perfect,” he said, voice lower than it had been when they began. He tugged at something in the back, and Steve felt pressure through the ropes on his chest and arms, but no pain. “Does that feel okay?” 

“Yeah,” Steve said, voice breathy. 

Eddie came back around to stand in front of Steve, and Steve was struck with how turned on he felt, being restrained in front of Eddie, who was fully free. Eddie, whose pupils were blown wide with arousal, and who was looking at Steve like he wanted to eat him. 

“This is fucking fantastic,” Eddie said, eyes running up and down Steve’s body, pausing as he caught sight of the slick that had already leaked through his tiny shorts onto the tops of his inner thighs. “Still want me to fuck you?” 

Steve nodded. “Yes. Please,” he said. 

Eddie’s eyebrows shot up into his bangs. “I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a ‘please’ from you before. We might have to do this more often.” 

Steve scowled at him. “Just fuck me already, will you?” 

“Oh, okay, there’s the Steve I know,” Eddie said, laughing and pulling off his shirt. He stepped up to Steve, pressing his bare chest against the ropes crossing Steve’s chest, and kissed him, tongue diving into Steve’s mouth. Kissing Eddie without being able to touch him at all was odd, and made Steve feel uncomfortable at first, until Eddie deepened the kiss further, fucking his tongue in and out of Steve’s mouth, and all thoughts of discomfort fled his mind.

Steve moaned into Eddie’s mouth as Eddie moved him toward the futon. Steve was unsure what to do when they got there. He couldn’t lay on his back with his arms like this, but also couldn’t prop himself up on hands and knees. 

Eddie had plans, though. He pulled Steve’s shorts and boxers down, steadying Steve so he could step out of them one foot at a time. Once he had them off, Eddie started to kiss him again, hand coming between them to stroke Steve’s cock several times before moving further down. He trailed a finger over Steve’s balls and perineum, back to Steve’s hole, already covered in slick and gaping open. Steve whimpered, needing more, as Eddie pushed two fingers in and started to fuck him.

Steve felt off balance, unable to brace himself on anything as the pleasure started to build in his body. It would have been frightening if he’d been with anyone other than Eddie, who he trusted implicitly with his body at this point. Eddie steadied him with one hand firmly gripping his hip as he used the other to open Steve up further. 

Just as Steve felt an orgasm starting to build, Eddie pulled away his hand. “Wait, what are you doing? I was close,” Steve complained, but Eddie just shook his head, smiling. He put a pillow against one of the arms of the futon, still in its couch form, and gently moved Steve to kneel on the futon and rest his head on the pillow.

“How does that feel?” Eddie asked. “Is it comfortable?”

“Yes,” Steve replied, shifting his legs a little. His face was pressed into the soft pillow, turned to the side so he could see out into the room, but he couldn’t turn himself enough to see Eddie behind him.

“Alright,” Eddie said, and Steve could hear him undoing his own pants and pulling them off. He felt the futon dip behind him as Eddie climbed on, a hand on each of Steve’s hips. “Tell me to stop if your arms start to hurt at all, or if it gets too intense.”

Steve nodded. “Sure,” he said, not really understanding why Eddie thought it would be intense. They were just fucking. They fucked a lot.

Eddie ran his fingers through the slick around Steve’s ass, presumably using it to slick up his cock, which Steve then felt pressing at his entrance. Eddie slid into him slowly, giving Steve a few moments to adjust to his size. His hands were gripping Steve’s hips hard, holding him up since Steve couldn’t use any of his upper body strength to do it.

Eddie felt amazing inside of him, filling him just the right open. Steve closed his eyes, letting the sound of Eddie’s breathing and the smell of their combined arousal permeate his thoughts. As Eddie started to move, Steve began to understand why Eddie thought it might get too intense. It was a very different sensation, being fucked when he was restrained this much. He felt completely at Eddie’s mercy in a way he had never been before, unable to even hold himself up as Eddie thrust into him.

Eddie’s cock in his ass felt amazing, hitting his prostate with every stroke, but Steve started to feel a bubble of panic rising up in his chest, jarring him from the sensations of pleasure. He couldn’t move. He felt off balance. He hadn’t been expecting this. He tried to hold out for a little longer, but as his chest tightened with anxiety he found himself yelling, “ST-STOP!” 

Eddie stopped automatically, pulling out of Steve and maneuvering him so he was able to sit up, facing him. 

“Steve, are you okay?” Eddie asked, reaching a hand up to his face, the rough ridges of his callouses helping to ground Steve.

Steve nodded, trying to catch his breath. He felt much better now that he was sitting up, but he still felt off balance and exposed. 

 “What do you need?” Eddie asked.

“Can you untie my arms?” Steve replied, voice soft. 

“Oh, fuck, yeah, of course, I should have done that immediately,” Eddie said, scrambling to undo the knots behind Steve’s back. He looked mad at himself. 

“Eddie, it’s okay. I’m okay,” Steve said as Eddie loosened the knots, giving Steve back the use of his arms. Steve immediately felt better, panic dying down and breathing slowing. As Eddie went to continue taking off the chest harness, Steve stopped him. “Leave that,” he said. 

“Are you sure?” Eddie asked, looking scared.

Steve nodded. “Yeah. I just wasn’t expecting how intense it was going to feel, with my arms so restrained. I really like the rope, though. I want to keep going, just with my arms free, facing you.” 

Eddie looked into Steve’s eyes like he was searching for something buried deep. “We really don’t need to keep going, Stevie.”

“Are you okay to keep going?” Steve asked. Eddie looked a little shaken. 

Eddie thought about it for a second. “Only if you keep your eyes open. So I can be sure you’re okay the whole time.” 

Steve nodded. “Alright. Deal.” He lay back on the futon, reaching out for Eddie and pulling him down on top of him, kissing him and running his arms down Eddie’s back. Eddie’s chest pressed the ropes into Steve’s chest, and he loved the roughness of the sensation. They kissed for a few minutes, both growing hard again, and Steve reached down to guide Eddie’s cock back inside of him. 

He sighed in bliss as he felt Eddie slide inside, tilting his hips up to meet Eddie’s and scratching his nails lightly down Eddie’s back. Eddie moaned, pushing himself up on his hands so he was looking down at Steve. 

“You still okay?” Eddie asked, panting as he thrust into Steve.

“More than okay,” Steve replied, reaching down for his own cock and starting to stroke. Eddie bent to kiss him, panting into Steve’s mouth as he tangled their tongues together. Sweat started to pool between them, and Eddie’s breaths started to come faster as he pushed himself up to look at Steve again.

Steve clenched around Eddie’s cock whenever it hit his prostate, letting out little puffs of air. He felt the ropes pressing into his back every time Eddie fucked into him. Steve sped up the motions of his hand on his cock as he felt his orgasm rapidly build, spilling over his hand as he came.

Eddie fucked him through his orgasm, his own following a few moments later as Steve felt warmth spilling into him. Eddie groaned, burying himself deep inside of Steve and pressing his face into Steve’s neck. 

Once he was done, Eddie pushed himself back up, capturing Steve’s lips in a kiss. “Was that alright?” Eddie asked. “No more weird feelings?” 

“It was great,” Steve said. 

Eddie smiled and pulled out, sitting back. “We do need to take the ropes off now, though. Don’t want them to hurt you.” 

Steve let Eddie finish taking off the rope, still enjoying the sensation of it dragging against his skin. He sighed once it was all off, curling himself up into Eddie’s side and burrowing his face into his neck. Eddie grabbed a blanket to wrap around them, then put his arms around Steve, running his hands up and down his sides.

“So what did you think of shibari?” Eddie asked after a few minutes of comfortable silence. “Not for you?”

Steve hummed in thought, trying to find the right words. “No, I think it was for me, I just… wasn’t expecting how intense it was going to be. It surprised me, and I panicked. But I liked the way the rope felt on me, a lot, and I really did like the feeling of being restrained. I think I’d want to try it again sometime, just maybe facing you, at first.”

“I’m sorry,” Eddie said. 

Steve popped his head up from where it was resting in Eddie’s neck to look at him. “Why are you sorry?” Steve asked. “This was my idea. And you stopped when I told you to stop.”

Eddie shrugged, still looking guilty. “I dunno. I just feel like -” he paused, blowing at his bangs in frustration. “Like you were totally in my power, and I fucked it up for you. That’s not good.”

Steve took Eddie’s face between his hands. “Eddie. You did exactly what I asked you to, the whole way through. You did absolutely nothing wrong.”

Eddie nodded but still looked miserable, so Steve climbed into his lap, pressing his chest against Eddie’s and kissing him. Soft, sweet kisses, just lightly running his tongue along Eddie’s lips as he ran a thumb over Eddie’s cheek. He started to purr as they kissed, and felt an answering vibration from Eddie’s chest a few moments later.

“I’m gonna keep kissing you until you believe me,” Steve said after a few minutes. 

Eddie laughed. He looked a lot less miserable now. “Well then I’m never going to tell you I believe you.” 

Steve rolled his eyes, but started to kiss Eddie again. Eddie laughed against his mouth and pushed him away gently. “Alright, alright, I believe you.” 

Read the rest on AO3.

Divider by @steddiecameraroll-graphics.

[hlupdate]

W​​hat’s the secret to a great portrait? At 86 years old, David Hockney has a few ideas. A lifetime of looking has taught him to always start with the face. “I begin with the head first,” he says, matter-of-factly, from his home in France. “From there, I place everything else.”

That was his approach when, late last May, Harry Styles traveled to his light-filled studio in Normandy and stationed himself on a cane chair, ready to become the esteemed artist’s latest subject. Over two days, Hockney worked to capture the exact hues of red and yellow in Styles’s striped cardigan, the indigo of his jeans, the string of pearls at his neck—not to mention the unmistakable tousled fringe of one of the world’s biggest pop stars. For the artist, though, the goal was merely to capture the essence of the person in front of him. “I wasn’t really aware of his celebrity then,” Hockney says, with a shrug. “He was just another person who came to the studio.”

The pair struck up an instant rapport that was likely helped by Styles being a full-on fanboy. For his Vogue cover shoot in 2020, Styles wore a pair of hand-painted Bode cords that featured a talismanic illustration of Hockney by artist Aayushia Khowala. It’s also hard to imagine the wide-eyed wonder of a flamboyant Brit discovering the sunny thrills and spills of California—a theme, and sound, that has permeated the former One Direction singer’s solo albums—without Hockney as a precedent. “David Hockney has been reinventing the way we look at the world for decades,” says Styles. “It was a complete privilege to be painted by him.”

The unveiling of the portrait kicks off the second iteration of the National Portrait Gallery’s Hockney exhibition “Drawing From Life,” which first opened in February 2020, only to close weeks later due to the pandemic. With the addition of a new room of pictures charting Hockney’s creative impulses throughout lockdown, the show returns on November 2—a few months after a refurbishment of the entire museum—with Styles’s portrait as its crown jewel. “The whole world shut down, and the exhibition was still sitting there, in the dark,” recalls Sarah Howgate, the gallery’s senior curator of contemporary collections, who oversaw the exhibition in both phases. “So it’s nice to know it will have another life.”

The Styles painting may bring star wattage, but the unassuming genius of Hockney’s portraiture is still the main exhibition draw. What makes his images tick, you quickly learn, is their honesty: whether in the tension bubbling beneath the surface of his famed double portrait of Ossie Clark and Celia Birtwell, painted between 1970 and ’71, or the seated figures that populated his 2016 Royal Academy of Arts exhibition, which included the likes of his own sister, Margaret, and the late comedian Barry Humphries. Hockney’s eye for the human figure may be playful, often kaleidoscopic, sometimes fantastical—but it’s always, most importantly, frank.

Styles’s portrait will hang alongside those of writer Gregory Evans, Hockney’s printer Maurice Payne, the mayor of his local town Dozulé, his gardener, and even his chiropodist, or in Hockney’s words, “the dandy who cuts my toenails.”

One of his more recent subjects was the eminent music producer Clive Davis, who first suggested inviting Styles to swing by. “Clive told me about Harry’s new album, and JP [Hockney’s studio assistant] sent Harry a note and asked him if he’d like to come to my studio and sit for his portrait,” Hockney remembers. “He replied straight away and said, yes, he’d love to.” From there, Hockney’s process of painting Styles was instinctive. “Everybody just came to sit,” he says, breezily, before admitting: “Now I know Harry’s a celebrity, though: I’ve seen all his music videos.”

“He’s not a traditional portrait painter,” says Howgate. Hockney’s interest is not in what people do, but rather in who they are. “He’s not interested in fame. He’s interested in depicting people and their relationships.” It’s why his eye is primarily trained on his inner circle these days—but it also pays testament to his enduring curiosity that he’s still willing to open that up to a newcomer every so often. Styles seems to know how lucky he is, adding, with a tinge of disbelief: “I’m in awe of the man with enough one-liners for a lifetime.” As to what those one-liners might be? Styles and Hockney’s mutual silence on that question suggests that what happens in the studio, stays in the studio.

“David Hockney: Drawing From Life” will be at the National Portrait Gallery from November 2 to January 21, 2024.