#and I’ve wanted some kind of Watership Down art for years | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

bazypitchandsimonsnow · 6 years ago

Text

Watford Cove

Chapter 5: not so typical love song

Rating: T

Genre: Fluff/Angst

Word count: 5365

Chapter: 5/13 [All chapters]

Summary: Baz goes to Simon's house to work on the project.

Read on AO3

AN: So as some of you may know/remember, I work at an amusement park. I was supposed to work today but it's literally raining all day so the park is most certainly closed. Which means I can post early! Hooray! This is personally one of my favourite chapters. I enjoyed writing it quite a bit, though I had trouble writing Baz's emotions. The boy is a weird self destructive mess and it's difficult getting that across lol. Finally, we learn a bit more about Simon. Plus some fluff, of course. Hope you all like it!

Tagging: @wayward-son-61 @lunar-lover394

———————————————-

“Where are you going?”

I lazily turn towards Mordelia. She’s standing next to me with her arms behind her back, rocking on her heels. The picture of an adorable, unassuming child. You can hardly tell she's a brat.

“Out,” I reply.

“Mum says you go out too much.”

I do feel a bit bad about that. Daphne does legitimately care about my well being. “Well, you can tell her I’m not going out drinking. She can stop worrying.”

“Drinking what?”

I sigh. Right, she is still seven years old. “Nevermind. I’m just going to do schoolwork at someone’s house. I might be home for supper or not, I don’t know.”

“Okay. When can I ride on your motorbike?”

I smirk and buckle up my helmet. “Let's wait until you can reach the pedals. Then we’ll talk.”

Mordelia pouts pathetically. I ruffle her hair, which only makes her pout become an impressive scowl. I flip down my visor with flare and rev my engine. I give Mordelia a salute before driving off down the country road.

Simon’s house isn’t that far from mine, actually. Maybe a twenty minute ride, the way I break the speeding laws. I zip down the hill at ludicrous speeds, and keep that pace up across the country roads until they become moderately paved. Soon I’m on the sparse outskirts of Watford Cove, not the bloody fucking wilderness like mine. A much nicer place to live in my opinion.

Only a few minutes in, I arrive at the address Simon texted me. The house is actually quite posh. It’s not the terrible extravagance of the Pitch mansion of course, but it’s nice. Red brick, white shutters, some fancy curtains. There's a silver mailbox at the end of the drive with "Salisbury" painted on it in annoyingly bright green letters. The handwriting looks childish, as in a child probably wrote it. The initials "LS" are under the words like an artist's signature. Hm, interesting.

I park my bike in the driveway then make my way to the oak door. The doorbell chimes deep and loud. There’s some steps and soon it swings open. Oh. This is...not Simon. Because Simon is not an older greying-blonde woman.

This woman reminds me of portraits my own grandmother. She was also tall, straight backed, and respectful looking. But my grandmother never showed an ounce of happiness. This woman has a very kind smile on her face though, her wrinkles more from the expression rather than age.

“Hello,” she says kindly. “May I help you?”

“Um, I’m here to see Simon.”

Both her blue eyes and smile widen. “Oh right, Simon said you were coming. Simon! Your friend is here!”

There’s a crashing sound, like someone falling on the ground. Rapid steps come down the stairs until a beaming Simon jumps to the bottom.

“Hi Baz,” he says breathlessly. “Glad you found it.”

“I have Google Maps, Salisbury,” I deadpan, but with a smirk.

“Oh yeah, right, let’s go.” He motions for me to follow him inside. I nod to the woman. She looks up towards the stairs, hands on her hips.

“Simon,” she says with mock accusation, “are you not going to introduce me to your friend?”

Simon freezes halfway up the steps and whips his head around. “Oh right! Sorry, Gran. Um, Gran, this is Baz. Baz, this is my grandmother, Ruth Salisbury.”

I reach out my hand. “Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Salisbury.”

Her brows rise up in surprise. I suppose she didn’t expect politeness from a guy wearing a black Ramones shirt, leather jacket, and ear piercings. But she still takes my hand. “Pleasure to meet you as well, Baz. You two have fun.”

Simon scoffs. “It’s school, Gran. We’re not supposed to have fun.”

“School can be fun if you try, darling. Maths has made me very good at cards.”

“And you fleece Mrs. Jones every week at your games, I know. We gotta go.”

“Yes yes, go do your schoolwork. Don’t break anything.”

Simon and Ms. Salisbury smile good naturedly at each other as we go upstairs. He runs at a breakneck pace, nearly tripping over the green carpet. I follow more slowly, looking over the walls. Unlike my house, there are many personalised things. Landscape art, funny knick knacks, and some pictures. There’s one of Ms. Salisbury with an older man, who I assume to be her husband. Next to that, there’s the couple again but in their younger years. A boy and girl stand in the foreground, both as blonde as Ms. Salisbury. The last one at the top of the stairs is obviously the two kids as teenagers, grinning with arms around each other. The woman looks weirdly familiar. Her freckles, they remind me of...stars.

“Baz, c’mon!” Simon yells.

“Yes, yes, I’m coming. You’re quite bossy today, darling,” I say teasingly. I hear his gasp, then fall into a coughing fit.

“I-I just want to start working.” His voice is still a bit hoarse.

“Alright.”

I saunter down to the hall Simon went down. I step into his room, and...well, I’m not sure what else I expected. The bed and desk look old, but everything else is new. The floral blanket, the multicoloured rug, the IKEA shelf filled with comics, all quite fresh. The walls are bright blue and covered in posters. Troye Sivan, Lana del Ray, Hayley Kiyoko, and assorted pastel coloured art. Equally pastel clothes are spread out across the floor. The whole room is so...bright. It sort of hurts my eyes. I’d prefer everything a bit darker. I guess I like Simon’s colour palette in small doses, just not all in one room.

I look up. Simon’s at his desk. I finally notice that he’s wearing a new shirt. It’s like the sunflower one, but pink and with bright red rosebuds instead. It works with the copper undertones of his hair. He looks perfect in it.

“Pretty,” I whisper.

“What?” Simon asks sweetly.

Fuck, I hope my face isn’t as red as his shirt right now. “Um, nothing.”

He looks confused for only a moment then shrugs. “Okay. I woke up late and forgot breakfast, so I'm starving. Want some of this? For brain food and stuff.” He holds up a mint aero bar. My smile is instantaneous.

“Sure. Mint aeros are my favourite.”

He grins to his ears. “Mine too!

I sit in the chair next to him. He breaks off a large piece for me. We eat the chocolate at the same time, but Simon gets some around his mouth. (Of course he's a messy eater.) I want to slowly lick it off his cheek then kiss him so hard we run out of breath. I quickly look away to resist temptation. “So, you got the project up?”

“Oh yeah!” He turns back to his laptop. I see that the desk is covered in scribbly note paper, candy wrappers, and nail polish bottles. He’s got almost every colour in his preferred pastel shade. He’s actually wearing the pink one right now. It matches his shirt. I have to keep myself from making an out loud comment again.

“So I’ve started making the powerpoint,” Simon says, bringing up the application. “And I think we should start with Watership Down. The actual place. Cause it’s like, the most important setting right?”

I bite my tongue, because I...disagree. Strongly. Watership Down should be in the middle, because it is the end of their first journey and the beginning of the next. It’s important to illustrate that, I think. But he doesn’t know I would think that.

“Sure, cool,” I mutter.

“O-Okay. Then, uh, for characters, we should start with General Woundwort.”

Wrong, very wrong. He’s important, sure, but others should be discussed first. Maybe Hazel, Bigwig, or Fiver. Fuck, Bluebell should come before Woundwort.

“Yeah, that’s fine.” I hope there isn’t a strain in my voice.

“Awesome! And I thought for analysis, we could talk about the archetypes and shit.”

No! Archetypes are Jungian! We’re supposed to do Freudian! Oh, fuck it.

“Give me that,” I hiss, snatching the laptop away. Simon blinks at me confused. I type furiously, barely thinking really, just spouting out the knowledge I have onto the slides. Some of the stuff is very smart but not well put, so I redo the wording. Not good with words, just like Simon said. I don’t know how long it takes, but when I’m done, I put the laptop back on the desk with my arms crossed.

“There,” I say curtly.

Simon looks through it, jaw falling open wider and wider with every slide. I shift away. Christ, this is embarrassing.

“Holy shit,” Simon whispers. I wait for him to start laughing, or yelling because I change his work. But he just turns to me with big awe filled eyes. “You’re...really smart.”

My cheeks must be as red as tomatoes now. I scoff and look at the Hayley Kiyoko poster. “Yeah, whatever.”

“No, no, I mean it, Baz. This is bloody brilliant! You’re super smart!” His brow furrows. “Why do you never show up to class? You could be getting As in like, everything.”

I press my lips together, digging my nails into my bicep. “I don’t care about school or grades. That’s all.”

“Really? You just, don’t care?”

“No, I don’t.”

Simon sighs, and I hate how close to pity it sounds. I don’t need his pity or anyone else’s. I made my choice a long time ago, and I don’t regret it. Well, I mostly don’t regret it. Certainly don’t regret because of where I’m going when term is done. Not at all...

“So, uh,” Simon says rapidly, obviously trying to break the forming tension, “I'm also mostly done the drawings. I’ll scan them later and put them in the presentation if you like them.”

He pulls out a sketchbook from his desk and flips through the pages. He shoves it in my face once he’s found the right one, making me jolt back in my chair. I snatch it from him.

“Christ, Salisbury, let me actually look,” I chuckle.

“Oh, sorry, sorry.”

I look at the picture, and it’s my turn to be awestruck. It’s...amazing. Rough, raw, a bit messy, but amazing. He’s captured Watership Down in just pencil. Sure, it’s just a hill, but Simon has drawn it from the perspective of the rabbits, so it looks looming and majestic. There are little shapes at the top, and I realise it’s a few of the rabbits looking out into the distance. A cute and perfect addition.

“Wow, this is incredible,” I say with absolute reverence.

Simon blinks at me. He seems genuinely surprised. “R-Really?”

“Yes. You’re very talented, Simon.”

“Oh, uh, well, thanks. I’m...really glad you think so.” He fiddles with his fingers nervously. “There’s a-a couple more if you want to see them. Three pages after.”

I flip through a few more pages. There are a lot of rough, abstract sketches. They look more like feelings than specific things. Waves of smoke, angry scribbles of pencil, over and over. He must do that a lot. Eventually, I land on what I think I'm supposed to see. It's obviously Fiver, based on the photo he showed me. But it's not an exact replica. It's a gorgeous interpretation. He's emphasized Fiver's large, sad, all knowing eyes. You can almost see everything terrifying and wonderful happening in them. To say I’m impressed doesn’t really cover it.

I go to the next page, and I immediately recognise it as a scene from the animated movie. When El Ahrairah, the first rabbit, was given physical gifts to survive predators from their fictitious god Frith. This one is in colour, and somehow even more stylised than the movie. El Ahrairah himself is a deep rich brown with grey loops, the sun is swirl of orange and yellow, and the sky is ripples of vibrant blue. The same colour as his eyes.

“These,” I say, “are perfect, Simon.”

Simon chuckles nervously, fiddling with his fingers. “I’m glad you think so. Think Miss Possibelf will approve?”

“If she doesn’t, she’s completely incompetent. And I don’t think that’s true.” I absentmindedly turn to the next page. It’s the start of another unfinished drawing. It’s of someone’s face. Someone with sharp cheekbones and dark wavy hair. Wait, is that-

Simon snatches the book and quickly flips it closed. He hides half his scarlet face behind the leather cover for a long moment, until he nervously coughs and lowers it. “Okay, good,” he stutters. “Glad you think so. I, uh, guess we’re done now. Man, we really could just do most of this over text.” Mother of God, must he keep doing that hair tuck? It’s torture.

“I suppose that's true," I chuckle.

"Wanna hang out?" He asks very quickly, gripping his sketchbook with ghost white knuckles.

I shouldn't. Fuck, I really shouldn't. I should go home, avoid him, keep my toxic self far away from Simon. But fucking hell, I'm weak for this boy, and just weak in general.

"Sure." My voice stays impressively neutral. "Any ideas?"

Simon twists his lips, looking around the brightly coloured room. His eyes drift down to my hands and he smiles mischievously. “I could redo your nails.”

I look down at my hands. Well, my nails are definitely chipped. I forgot to repaint them a few days ago. I look back at him with a raised brow. “I doubt you have a bottle of my ‘Chanel Le Vernis in Gris Obscur’, Salisbury.”

“Nah, definitely no Chanel. But I got some pretty good stuff from the drugstore.” He lifts up some obviously cheap but pretty nail varnish bottles. They’re all his pastels colours though.

“Not really my style.”

He shrugs. “Maybe you’d like to try something new?”

I bite the corner of my mouth. The colours hurt my eyes a bit. But he looks so adorable with that hopeful grin and glint in his eyes. I sigh, and put my left hand out. “Very well. I want your darkest shade though.”

Simon literally bounces with excitement. “Awesome! So, uh, how about...” He messes around with the bottles, almost dropping a few. Eventually he settles on a pale blue. “This one, and,” he holds up a unused looking dark grey, “this one? We can alternate.”

“Hm, sure. That grey doesn’t really match your style, though.”

He shrugs. “Eh, came with the set. Glad it did. It, uh, matches your eyes.” He looks pointedly at the desk instead of my face. That’s good though. I don’t want him to see the blush that’s spread across my cheeks. “Now gimme your right hand.”

I do as he says, placing it on the desk. He puts down some paper towel then pick up his nail polish remover and cotton balls. I have the exact same supplies at home. He reaches towards my hand, but quickly hesitates. He’s shaking actually. I can’t blame him. Every time we’ve touched, it’s been accidental or very quickly. This is different. This isn't a shoulder pat or playful shove. This is long and sustained and purposeful. And I may not be showing it, but I’m just as nervous.

“I can take it off myself,” I say quickly, reaching for the bottle. But Simon pulls it away.

“No no, I’m good. Just sit there and look...badass, alright?”

My lip twitches up. He’s so sweet. I leave my hand where it is. “Very well.”

Slowly, shakily, he slips his finger under mine. His skin is callused but still much smoother than my rough palms. It feels weird, but very nice. Almost electric. He dabs the cotton ball on the nail, rubbing off all my high end black nail polish. Huh, they look odd. it’s been awhile since my nails have been clean. After wiping them dry, he starts on with the blue. It’s a nice colour. Not something I would pick, but I can see the appeal. Simon drags the brush against my nail slowly but surely, making sure the coat is even.

“Hm,” I say, “you’re good at this.”

“Thanks,” he chuckles. “Self taught. A lot of trial and error, y’know? Took me ages to figure out how to do my right hand.”

“I learned from YouTube videos. Those makeup gurus know their shit.”

“Huh, smart. Oh, y’know what.” He stops painting and spins in his chair. Even with his back to me, I now he’s fiddling with his phone. Suddenly, the honeyed voice of Lana Del Rey is resonating through the room. He spins back with a grin.

“Your weird music is necessary?” I raise an eyebrow for sarcastic emphasis. Simon chuckles.

“Yeah, helps me concentrate. And it’s part of my continuing effort to convert you to good music.”

“Oh, is that your grand mission?”

“Yup! Slowly pull you away from all those screamy boys with bad haircuts and towards the beauty of Troye and Lana.”

I scoff. “You keep trying that, darling.”

He gives me a shy but sort of playful look from under his long eyelashes. “I certainly will...darling.”

Oh shit. I hope my complexion hides my blush enough. I smile back and try to look calm, hiding the storm in my chest.

We switch between chatting and companionable silence. Though Simon is never truly quiet. He hums along with the song, or makes noises of contemplation and frustration while trying to get my nails right. His hands slowly get less shaky, which helps. When we’re not talking, I take the opportunity to just watch his expression. How he sticks his tongue out in concentration, and his brow pulls together, and his face adorable pinches together when he gets something wrong. He always tries his best to fix it though, even with his clumsy fingers. It’s really sweet. Just like him.

I'm so unbelievably fucked.

“And...there!” He pulls back with a flourish. “Topcoat and everything. What do you think?”

I examine my hands. Huh, the blue is actually nice on me. And he’s right, the grey matches my eyes. It’s very well done. Maybe black isn’t the only colour I should use. I look up. Simon is staring at me wide eyed, chewing on his lip, leg jittering.

“It’s wonderful,” I say. “You did a marvelous job, Salisbury. Maybe you have a future as a nail artist.”

His nervous expression breaks, thankfully. I’ve found I prefer his grin to his genuine agitation. Blushing smile? Adorable. Wide eyed leg jittering? Not so much. “T-Thanks. Maybe...you could do mine sometime?”

Our eyes meet, and there’s no deception there. He’s always so genuine. It’s amazing. “Sure," I say before thinking. "If you can learn to like black.”

She shrugs. “Well, if you can learn to like blue, I guess I can try black.”

He grins, and I grin back. There’s a stretch of silence. It builds between us, making the air thicker and thicker. I’m torn between what I want to say and what I should. That I want more from this, more than just winks and smiles and “darlings”. But I know it can’t work. Simon should know that. I should tell him, all of it. But...he'll hate me. For not telling him about Switzerland, for using him like a plaything, for being an utterly stupid reckless prick. Can I handle him truly hating me?

“Simon, love! It’s nearly supper! Are you and Baz done your work?” Ms. Salisbury’s voice carries quite well. It jolts me from my depressive pit. Simon sighs and leans out towards the door.

“Yeah! Be down in a minute, Gran.” He looks at me, and I swear I see genuine sadness. “Looks like it’s time to say goodbye.”

I try to hide my own disappointment. “Yeah, looks like it.”

He bounces out of his chair, then offers his hand. I inhale sharply. Did not expect that. But after only a second of hesitation, I take it. He pulls me to my feet with ease. I’m still disturbed by how much his strength excites me.

“C’mon, let’s get you back on your motorbike, Pitch.”

“Should get you on it one day,” I say under my breath.

“What?”

I straighten up, hands in my jacket pockets. “Nothing, Salisbury.”

We walk down the stairs quickly. Well, Simon more jumps down them. He’s a never ending ball of energy. Ms. Salisbury is at the bottom.

“How was the work, you two?” she asks sweetly.

“Wonderful!” Simon chirps. “Talked about bunnies and stuff, and Baz let me do his nails.”

My brow shoots up to my hairline. I can’t believe he’s so open about this. If I told my father or Daphne the same, they would not say anything at best and lecture me at worst. But Ms. Salisbury looks positively elated by Simon’s words. “Oh, marvellous. Finally you can practice on someone other than me, love.”

Simon rolls his eye. “Yeah, like you don’t like it.”

“Of course. But it’s good you have another guinea pig. May I see your work?”

Simon looks at me in silent question. I shrug in response, then hold out my hand for his grandmother. She flips the glasses down from her head. “Amazing job, Simon. You’ve gotten so much better. And it looks great on you, Baz.”

“Thank you, Ms. Salisbury.”

She pulls away, waving dismissively. “Please, call me Ruth. Now, Baz, will you be staying for dinner?”

“Uh.” I turn to Simon. “Am I staying for dinner, Simon?”

Simon’s face turns red. “Oh, sure, if you want.”

I shrug. “I’m certainly in no rush to get home, and if it’s no trouble.”

“Oh it’s none at all,” Ms. Salis- Ruth says, waving her hand dismissively.

“Then I guess I’ll stay for supper.”

Ruth claps her hand once loudly. “Wonderful! Let me put out another setting.”

She saunters off to the kitchen. I decide to actually take off my jacket and boots and stay awhile. Simon leans in close to my ear, making my pulse spike.

“Hope you like roast beef,” he whispers. “It’s the only thing Gran knows how to cook well. Grandpa was a chef, and she’s been on her own since he died, so she’s never had to cook anything else. But she’s been learning more since I’ve got here.”

I shrug like he does. “I think I’ll live.”

“Good to hear.”

Simon leads me to the small dining room table. When I go to the left side, Simon grabs my hand and drags me to the right. I jolt slightly. Wow, that’s bold for him. Not that I’m complaining. I sit next to him as Ruth brings out a platter of delicious smelling meat and mash potatoes. Simon immediately shovels the food on his plate, licking his lips like a starving animal. I on the other hand take only a few slices delicately just like my mother taught me. But Ruth gives me an odd look.

“Are you not hungry, Baz?” she asks.

“Um, no, I am,” I reply slowly.

“Then please, take as much as you like. I always make a lot because of Simon’s endless appetite.”

Simon rolls his eyes, speaking with a mouth full of roast beef. “I’m a growing boy!”

“Growing monster more like it,” Ruth chuckles.

Huh, okay. I decide to be polite and take some more. Dinner proper starts, and it's...weird. My family is never this talkative at supper. We’re mostly silent and sullen. But the Salisburies are the exact opposite. Ruth and Simon chat, though Simon has trouble responding through all the the food in his mouth. (The boy has zero manners. It’s adorable.)

“So, Baz,” Ruth asks, facing me, “how’s school for you? I’ve only ever heard about it from Simon and Miss Penelope.”

No one’s ever asked my opinion of school either. I shrug. “It’s alright. Not my favourite place to be, of course. I think English is my favourite subject.” I tap Simon’s foot under the table. His breath hitches slightly, and he flashes me only a small smile. But it’s enough.

“Glad to hear so. Simon loves English too. He’s always eager to get to first period for Miss Possibelf’s class every morning.”

I flick my eyes over to Simon. His cheeks are flushed as he bites into his roast beef.

“Hm, glad to hear I’m not the only one who loves literature.” I let my voice drawl a bit, hopefully enough for Simon to notice but not Ruth. He doesn’t look up from his food, but I feel his toe tap my foot. And once again, it’s enough. Everything Simon does seems to be enough for me.

“I’m just glad Simon’s adjusting to Watford,” Ruth sighs. “It’s not easy moving schools most of the way through the year.”

Simon sighs in return. They sound almost exactly alike. Though Simon is more exasperated. “I told you, Gran, I’m fine. My grades are much better than last term.”

“There’s a good reason for that.” Ruth aggressively stabs her beef, and Simon looks sad as he nods slightly. This is the only crack in Ruth's kind demeanour I’ve seen all day. It’s strange, and the curious brainiac in me wants to know more. But the sensible part knows to just keep eating my food.

“Hey,” Simon chirps, “did I tell you about the kid who gave himself a wedgie in gum class yet?”

Ruth’s playful smile immediately returns. “No, I don’t believe you have.”

“Oh man, it was hilarious! Baz you’ll love this too.”

I lean my cheek into my palm. “I’m sure I will.”

Simon launches into the rambling anecdote, using mostly weird noises and illustrative hand gestures instead of words. Ruth and I both laugh along genuinely. This is the first time I’ve enjoyed a family meal in ages. It may be unusual, but it’s certainly not unenjoyable.

Soon enough, dinner is over, and Ruth brings out dessert. They’re sour cherry scones from Pritchard Bakery. Simon takes three immediately and starts slathering butter all over them.

“You like scones?” I ask mockingly.

Simon nods, scone crumbs all around his mouth. “Uh-huh. Gran got me some my first day here. They’re absolutely incredible.”

“My cousin owns the bakery, you know.”

His eyes go impossibly wide. “Really?! Could you get me some free samples?”

I shrug, a playful smile on my face. “Maybe.”

“Simon, you eat enough, you don’t need any more,” Ruth kindly berates. Simon frowns.

“There’s never enough scones, Gran.”

Ruth and I exchange an understanding look. Maybe I will bring him to see Cousin Pritchard before I go though. Something to make him happy before I’m gone.

Soon enough, Simon’s eaten all the scones, the dishes are done, and it’s my time to go. I’m a gentleman, I know when to take my leave. Simon and Ruth walk me out of the house.

“It was lovely having you, Baz,” Ruth says. And I have to admit, I’m a bit taken aback. Most parents and/or guardians aren’t this friendly to me. Dev and Niall’s parents barely acknowledge my existence nowadays, and they’ve known me since I was a baby. It’s a warm feeling I never thought I’d miss.

“Thank you for having me, Ruth,” I reply, smiling graciously.

“Anytime. Simon, feel free to invite him over again.”

Simon smiles sweetly at me, cheeks unabashedly scarlet. “Yeah, okay. Maybe we should meet up before the presentation on Wednesday?”

I nod, hoping my cheeks aren’t as bright. “I think I’d like that.”

Because I would. I regretfully very much would.

“Awesome! See you later!”

My lip twitches up without thinking. “See you.”

I get my helmet on. I don’t rev my engine as loud as usual to be respectful. Simon waves with his entire arm, while Ruth’s looks more like the queen. I salute in return. (That seems to be my thing now. I’ve embraced it.)

As I drive back towards my home, my mind stays with the Salisburies. With nail polish, roast beef, and a sense of peaceful happiness that lingers in me long after the house is in the distance.

I get to the Pitch hill and just sit there, looking up at the looming little bastard. I know what I’m supposed to do. Go back to all the misery there. But fuck that. I turn to the left, not back towards Simon’s, but at least somewhere my father isn’t. Somewhere I can keep this feeling for a little longer. And maybe get really pissed.

———————————————-

“Basilton! Where have you been?!”

If I didn’t already have a migraine, I’d assume my father’s voice had just given me one. Going on a two day bender will do that to you. I stop walking but don’t turn around. Honestly, I look like a wreck right now, and I don’t want him to see it.

“Away,” I say curtly.

“Away where?! We haven’t seen you in days! No calls, no mail. We’ve been worried sick!”

I groan and turn on my heels finally. To my utter surprise, he looks genuinely concerned. His eyes are wide and his hair is disheveled, like he’s been running his hands through it. Huh. Actually worried about where I’ve been. That’s a first.

“Well, I’m home now,” I sigh. “Happy?”

“Certainly not.” He puts his hands on his hips like a pissed off school teacher. “I’ve been getting calls from your school. You’ve missed almost all of your classes, including tests and projects. I thought we had an agreement.”

I whip around, scowling with as much menace as I can muster with a hangover. “No, you gave me an ultimatum. And I refuse to be threatened into doing what you want, Father dearest.”

I start stomping away again, but we Grimms refuse to not have the last word. “Are you sure you haven’t just been...distracted, Basilton?”

I stop halfway up the stairs. The tone of his voice could imply many things, but I have a sinking feeling I know what he means. I chuckle, shaking my head. “Daphne told you about Tuesday, I suppose.”

“That you brought a boy over to our house without our knowledge? Yes. And I find it a bit disrespectful that-”

“That I what?!” I yell, probably louder than I should, considering it’s late at night and I have four younger siblings. “Dare to be gay?! Sorry it’s harder to ignore my sexuality when I’m actually acting on it.”

My father takes a deep breath, something he always does when he’s trying to keep his slipping composure. “Basilton, that is not what I meant.”

“Oh really? So you’re actually okay with me bringing guys around? Maybe I’ll start having big gay nightclub parties in the receiving room.”

I can see my father losing his cool. Bit by bit, his perfect British man composure is slipping. It’s the effect I certainly have these days. “That would not be appropriate, Basil. And I merely meant that maybe this ‘Simon’ is distracting you from your studies and causing your poor grades.”

For a second, I don’t know whether to laugh or be furious. Fire bubbles in my gut, my fingers curling on the bannister. Yup, let’s go with righteous fury. I stomp down the stairs and push my face into his.

“No,” I growl, “Simon is not at fault. You are. You are the catalyst for all the things I’m doing now, Your bullheadedness, your pride, your prejudi-”

“Oh for God’s sake, Basil!” He roars. “For once in your life take some goddamn responsibility for your own actions!”

I step back a bit. I haven’t seen him this outwardly angry in a year, but he’s practically seething. If he was the kind of man to throw a punch, he would have just clocked me. But instead he just stares me down in an attempt to intimidate. That won’t work.

“Fuck you,” I mutter, turning on my heels and stomping towards the door.

“Where are you going?” he calls after me.

“Out!” I turn to glare at him. “And I’ll be back when I feel like it!”

I make sure to slam the door very loudly, hoping my message is clear. I know exactly where I want to go. And who I want to see.

———————————————-

AN: Is Baz being a total brat here? Yes. Is his bratiness sorta justified? Also yes. Things are complicated. And finally we meet Ruth! I loved reading everyone's comments speculating about Simon's home life cause this was planned from the start lol. But why is Simon living with Ruth? Well, that will be explained shortly. Tune in next time for answers :)

Chapter title is from "Alfie's Song" by Bleachers.

#carry on #snowbaz #simon snow #baz pitch #ruth salisbury #fluff #angst #punk/pastel #mysnowbazfanfic

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magic-can · 7 years ago

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Okay I tried to pick just some questions but they are all so good so like,, can you answer all of them?? (Unless you don't want to answer some jsjdksldk)

(I’m not gonna answer ones I don’t have an answer to if that’s okay dndjdjjd)1. If you got the chance to hang out with any famous person for a day, who would it be?Tbh? Probably Sean McCloughin (or jacksepticeye for anyone that doesn’t know also I hope I spelled his last name right hhhh) because he just seems so,,,down to earth??? Like I’m not saying other ppl I’m a fan of are egotistical or anything it’s just that?? He’s always interacting with fans, he knows he’s not a perfect person, and he’s super non-judgmental and optimistic and accepting and he just seems so approachable. (I’m gonna make a post about why I have a lotta respect and appreciation for this dude actually, bc I’ve been binge watching his videos and I’m being reminded of why he’s my favorite YouTuber, such an awesome dude.) Not only that but he has a lotta the same interests as me and stuff and he actually has a really thoughtful mind when it comes to a lot of things and I’d feel a lot less nervous around him than any other famous person.2. If there were 4 things you could get rid of, what would they be?* Mistranslated religious scriptures bc hooh boy they’ve created a lot of misunderstanding and controversy * pedophiles* TERFS* nazis 3. If you could uncancel any cancelled video game, what would it be?Silent Hills,,,so much potential, Thrown out the window by a greedy company. It’s such a shame the game got cancelled, I was super pumped for it.4. Is there any celebrity you used to be a fan of but now aren’t?Pewdiepie, he gives me a really bad feeling now.6. Time travel: cool or a horrible idea?HORRIBLE IDEA 7. Are you a creationist or evolutionist?Definitely creationist, but I do believe there are quite a few animals that have common ancestors and stuff like that.8. Worst song(s) you’ve ever heard?Can’t think of the absolute worst one I’ve ever heard in my life, but recently? Despacito and Shape Of You hhhh.9. Have you ever astral projected?Nope. I can’t even imagine what that would be like.10. Have you ever had any experiences with the paranormal?I think maybe...I’m not sure though. Even though I 100% believe in the paranormal I don’t assume something odd is automatically of the nature, evidence is important.11. What’s the last song you listened to?Papua New Guinea- The Future Sound Of London 12. Would you rather take 3 pills that would each make you forget an embarrassing memory, or take 3 pills that would each get rid of a bad habit?3 pills that get rid of a bad habit, yeah I’ve done a lot of cringey stuff but I think those would help me more in the long run.13. What is the worst fandom in your opinion?I used to think it was the Skeleton Clique, but nah, the KPop fandom looks like hell on earth (and I’m going nowhere near it, especially after hearing about the abuse and torment the KPop stars face. I will NEVER support KPop even if there was a gun to my head. Those people don’t deserve this hell.) 14. Do you still have stuffed animals?Buddy I’ll still have stuffed animals when I’m 50.15. Do you have any fears that other people might find weird? Is fear of time weird? 16. Which of your parents are you closer to?Probably my dad.18. Thoughts on roleplaying?There’s nothing wrong with it if it ain’t hurting anyone!19. Does the world scare you?Yeah, but it doesn’t discourage me, we CAN make it less scary.20. Any good advice you have?A priest that used to work at my church (he moved tho and I miss him bc he was the sweetest guy) once told me that people tend to view the world in black and white, when in reality it’s multiple shades of gray (not 50 shades of gray this is a church goodness.) That’s something that’s always stuck with me. I think that’s a mindset more people should have.21. Thoughts on this site? What’s good about it? What’s bad about it? What can be fixed?The good things about this site is that it can give people opportunities to share their art, interests, views, and build communities. It’s a shame that instead people use it for hate speech, hypocrisy, this gross hive mind, extremism, etc. Oh, and a staff that ignores all the crap.22. Ever gotten anon hate?Not directly.23. What’s the weirdest dream you’ve ever had?All of my dreams are freakin bizarre, I can’t choose the weirdest of them all. Like last night I had a dream that a rat turned into a worm and that’s one of the more “tame” dreams.24. What do you think heaven and hell look like/would look like?I don’t believe in the fiery hell a lot of people believe in. I believe in Sheol tho, you know, the depths, a v v cold lonely sucky place. Heaven...idk exactly what heaven would look like, but I know it’s beautiful and otherworldly in the bed way possible.25. If you had to have an encounter with any famous horror movie character (examples: Jason Voorhees, Freddy Krueger, Mike Myers, a Xenomorph, etc.) who would it be?Okay I haven’t seen any of these kinds of movies, but wasn’t there a movie where this girl ended up kinda-befriending Xenomorphs?? Bc in that case I’d go with a Xenomorph.26. Do you think science is flawed?To an extent. I’m gonna make an entire post about this subject, because I my views are different based on different situations.27. The age old question: what came first, the chicken or the egg?I mean,,,chickens are the closest relatives to dinosaurs, and dinosaurs laid eggs, so obviously the egg.28. Any book recommendations?The Plague Dogs by Richard Adams (the same man that wrote Watership Down!) It’s my favorite book, I will warn that it has gore, both human and animal death, animal abuse, and even mental illness?? (There’s a character that experiences delusions and hallucinations and stuff like that but he’s not demonized at all. There are outdated terms to describe him at times though, the book was written in the 1970s so there’s another warning.)29. Ever go through an “embarrassing” fandom phase? (You know the ones.)Anime and Vocaloid (even though I will always low-key love Vocaloid with my entire being.)30. Favorite superhero?Used to be Batman, but now it’s Black Panther. One movie was more powerful than years of attachment and nostalgia regarding another character. I really hope I get buy a lot of the comics soon, I need money.31. If there was any outdated meme you could bring back, what would it be?Any memes from the past that were focused on just having good fun. Stuff like the “Just Do It” and John Cena prank call, you know those kinda memes. Less “cringe compilations” and more of those please. 32. If there was one holiday you could get rid of, what would it be?Columbus Day, I don’t even have to think twice about that. Replace it with Indigenous People’s Day. Genocide should never be celebrated, I can’t believe we live in a world where that’s a controversial statement.33. Thoughts on the education system where you live?It’s a flaming heap of garbage.34. What would you do for a Klondike bar?Buy one at the store or something if I want one, duh.35. What’s a question you hate being asked?“How can you be ____ if you’re Christian?” Ugh.36. What’s the worst nightmare you’ve ever had?I don’t feel comfortable talking about it openly, because a lot of them are REALLY bad ones and I only feel comfortable talking about a few with friends though personal messaging.37. Worst villain you can think of? They can be from anything.Scourge from Warrior Cats HOLY FRICK HHH38. A reverse of the last question, the worst hero you can think of?There’s definitely a worse hero that’s not coming to mind but the worst one I can think of is Beck from Mighty No. 9.39. Look left to you. The first thing you see is what you use to fight the devil. What is it?A gigantic blanket. Welp.40. Does rainy weather make you happy or sad?Happy, probably bc rain is fairly common where I live and I associate it with home.Whew! That took a while but it was fun. Thank you so much love 💜💙💜💙💜💙 I hope you’re doing well!

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rahlala · 7 years ago

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Post-inktober debrief

I wanted to do a bit of a post-inktober debrief, seeing as this year’s one meant a whole lot to me. Duncton Wood was a book given to me by my Nanny Mollie when I was in my early teens. She knew I liked Watership Down and everything animal, and I believe she found it in a charity shop and thought of me. She was a top nan. I’d read the book many times before starting this, and it’s actually one of a trilogy (although I’ve only read the rest of the trilogy once, as the books stand very well on their own) and there is another trilogy set in the same world which I actually haven’t read yet, so that’s on the menu (I’ve owned them for a while!) Anyway, onto the retrospective comments.

I tried a variety of tools for the project, starting with my preferred fine liners (a very thin permanent ink pen) with watered down Indian Ink painted on with a brush, moving on to a brush pen (thicker lines, but wonderful to draw with) and ending by trying out some copic markers (about £4 per pen, they are like drawing with highlighter pens but in many different colours, and they have a thick tip as well as a thin tip)

As to style, I found it constantly changed throughout the process. Crosshatching, stippling, ink washes of varying intensity and contrast, fine detail, total minimalism, weird borders, filling up the entire page, realism, anthropomorphism, caricature. This was on purpose, as it was interesting to me to not be confined to any particular style during the process. These were never intended to be any kind of final rendering book illustrations, but an exploration into finding a style that I /may/ choose if I were to illustrate the book for real. One thing that did stay pretty constant was the tiny white eyes, which I decided on after day 2. While moles aren’t entirely blind, their eyesight is pretty bad, but eyes are such a part of how I draw that I didn’t want to remove them entirely!

What I did find from the project was that I didn’t really have a defined way of drawing each character, having not started with any sort of character design or reference sheet (which is what I usually do before beginning any sort of character illustration) - to be honest, this is what has always stopped me from starting this project in the past, as it seemed quite a daunting feat! Working this way has actually given me an idea of how to differentiate the moles and I think I’d find it far easier now to work with the character design process. (Mandrake was my favourite design, although I loved Mekkins’ eyebrows and Rose’s roundness)

I definitely preferred the results of drawing in a mixture of fineliner with a slowly built up wash of inks (such as in “deep”, “run”, “crooked” and “squeak”), although I loved using that brush pen and really enjoyed the results of “mysterious”, “filthy” and “united”. “Fall” had a nice mix of the two ink pens with a very faint wash of ink that I really enjoyed. I think I still need more practice with the copic markers, as well as a lot more colours. Moles look so much nicer in a warm brownish grey, like the dirt around them!

The images took between 1-4 hours to complete. During the first half of the month when I was posting one every day, I was working very detailed and they were taking far too long. It got to a point where I got overwhelmed and fell behind. Thankfully my friend Megan’s idea of putting our Drink and Draw groups’ images into a gallery showing gave me enough of a deadline that I was able to spend a weekend getting back on track. I love a good midpoint deadline! (This is probably why I didn’t do so great at uni - being told to go off and do a 6-month project without any sort of midpoint deadlines really messed me up). After that, I didn’t let them take too long and stopped worrying about posting every day. I let myself catch up and even get ahead on the weekends so I could focus on work during the week.

The comments I received helped push me to complete these. I adore when people say anything to indicate they’re enjoying my work, and although I was doing this for me, sometimes I don’t care about myself enough to finish things. But I care again when I see other people care. So thank you to each and every one of you that said anything to me about these, it truly meant the world to me.

I have learned a heck of a lot participating in this years inktober, and I intend to do it again next year. I’m already buying more supplies to try out based on what I’ve seen from other inktober artists. I wonder if I dare tackle Watership Down? I kind of feel it’s had enough art dedicated to it! I’d love to do His Dark Materials, although my people drawing skills aren’t so great. Maybe that’s the time to improve them. We’ll see :)

#inktober #inktober2017 #in retrospect

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minimoll7 · 8 years ago

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Aaaayyyy so I found a post where someone shared their top 20 favorites and I decided I wanted to make my own to xD I made this template myself and I have a blank one (tho without text at all, I can input the “Top 20 Favorite Shows” if anyone wants me to). If you wanna do your own with my template, just shoot me an ask or PM!

Hit the read more if you really want to know my opinions on each. I suck at summarizing so it is a bit of a read, sorry about that heh

20) American Dragon: Jake Long - I thought this was the coolest show when I was a kid and I would always try to watch it whenever possible. Tho, while its not as cool now to me as it was back then, I still love this show and its characters

19) Milo Murphy’s Law - As soon as I saw the first ep, I just knew I was going to love this show. I’m a bit behind as of now but I cannot wait for new episodes! This show has a lot of charm and great characters, not to mention catchy songs!

18) Code Lyoko - I absolutely adored this show as a kid and it still holds up as a big fav now. The whole idea of going into a virtual world really fascinated me as a kid. I mean yeah sure Digimon had that to, but I was never really lucky in catching it on TV. Plus, the idea of the virtual world being animated in 3D while the real world was in 2D? Sign me up!

17) Xiaolin Showdown - Another show that I adored as kid and still do now. The characters and animations really made this show for me. I love how they all react with each other and some of the expressions it had to offer are top notch. And let me tell ya, this show has probably one of the funniest villains out there, Jack Spicer. He cracked me as a kid and no matter how times I rewatch the series, he still cracks me up

16) SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron - I never grew up with this show but I had just recently finished watching it for the first time. The animation for this show, especially at the time, feels amazing and it really does have this nice 90s feel to it. The show itself is really fun to watch and I am a suckers for cats and cool aircrafts. The SWAT Kats’s Turbokat is almost just as cool as an Arwing! I find the characters to be really likable and while I do question some of the designs for the female characters, I overall just really enjoyed them all

15) The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius - Jimmy himself was a huge part of my childhood and it still saddens me that his show doesn’t air on TV anymore. The characters are incredibly memorable to me, especially Sheen. The humor in this show never fails to get me to laugh and I always loved the interactions between a good chunk of the characters

14) Wander Over Yonder - I fell in love with this show after just watching a few episodes. The characters are well-written and the art is jaw-dropping, well, to me at least heh. The show itself is generally very sweet and the humor is great as well! I also adore the fact that Wander himself is always willing to help and its always kind to others. He’s a protagonist that we all need in our lives. Hopefully, we’ll get a season 3 someday

13) Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja - Love puns? Love action? Love ninjas? Well, this show is definitely for you (maybe). This show has a lot of cheesy jokes and puns, which is something I can appreciate. Puns are always an easy win for me haha The characters themselves to I find to be really likable, especially the main protagonists, Randy and Howard. The villains to are really entertaining as well. The animation for the show can be pretty awesome at times and its a shame that nobody talks about it

12) Fullmetal Alchemist (Brotherhood) - Despite my distaste for blood and guts kind of violence, I couldn’t help myself from watching this anime. The story was amazing in every sense of the word. I’ve never watched anything before that has played with every single emotion I have (and I’m emotional to so that’s saying a lot I suppose haha). The characters and their development was well done as well. I highly recommend this show to anyone who hasn’t seen it (and can stomach the violence)

11) Avatar: The Last Airbender (and by extension, Legend of Korra) - I’m a complete sucker for elemental stuff, which is probably my favorite aspect of this show. Watching the characters fight each other with an element is pure entertainment for me. And speaking of entertainment, the humor. My goodness, this show wasn’t just action-packed, but also hilarious. The character development to is astounding and I’m sure we know just how well-written Zuko’s arc was (like damn son, it felt like a real experience almost). Another show I highly recommend to anyone, along with its sequel series

10) My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic - I remember just how shocked I was when I watched the first episode and found myself loving it. I was never expecting a girly show like this to be as good as it is (and don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with a cartoon being girly, I just expected to be aimed for little little kids). I adore the animation, the characters, the story (when its present) and the lessons that each episode teaches. This show will never stop being entertaining to me, no matter what anyone else has to say

9) Animaniacs - I would’ve rated this show higher but I had to consider every segment the show has, not just personal favorites. Despite that, tho, I absolutely adore this cartoon. I didn’t grow up with it, but I first found it about 5 years ago and have loved it since then. While there are some segments that I strongly dislike, the ones I do love are completely worth it. Buttons & Mindy, Rita & Runt, Slappy Squirrel and the Warners made this show for me and I love them all (especially the brothers ha). The humor is some of the best I’ve seen in cartoons to

8) Over the Garden Wall - This miniseries captured my heart almost instantly. The animation, the story, the characters, I just can’t really hate anything from this show. I love how scary and unsettling the characters can be but yet there’s always a simple reason behind them (well, not always lol). And Greg, like come on, how can you hate this kid. True, he was annoying every now and then, but his innocence and his “words of wisdom” just makes him really likable, to me at least. I can rewatch this show over and over and I can never be tired of it

7) Ed, Edd ‘n Eddy - Whenever I think of cartoons, this one is usually the first to come to mind. This was one of my big favorites as a kid and its still one now. The humor in this show is great and its a gift whenever Ed speaks. And there’s just something special about how the entire show was animated and I can never truly put it into words on just how much I love it. Ed, Edd ‘n Eddy is just one of those where I can’t really explain why I enjoy it so much, but trust me, if you haven’t seen it, its well worth your time (and it also has a really catchy theme song)

6) Pokemon - And by Pokemon, I mean the entire series, not just a specific arc or two. Before I was even into the games or just the Pokemon themselves, I enjoyed watching the anime even as a little kid. The anime is really the only reason why I got into the games in the first place. I know the series can be repetitive, some arcs more than others, but I just can’t stay away. I love Ash, Brock, Misty, Dawn, Serena, Clement, Team Rocket and etc. The slapstick humor in the original season is probably the best of this show’s humor but as the years went on, the battles have become better and better and I just love that. I just love Pokemon and no matter what people say about the anime, I still enjoy it to this day!

5) Watership Down - I would have never imagined liking this show as much I do. I mean true, I’m a sucker for rabbits, but I wasn’t sure if this show was truly great or not, but hey its at number 5, its obviously great! Yeah, the animation and some of the voice acting is quite lacking and the design and voice change in season 3 was hard to adjust to, but the story and characters are well worth it. Its definitely one those gems that don’t get a lot of attention, I highly recommend this show!

4) Generator Rex - Similar to Watership Down, I went in not expecting to love it as much as I do now. I knew the show was going to be great, but boy do I love it or what. Like dudes, this show is incredibly underrated. The whole concept with the nanites and E.V.O.s are just insanely cool. It also had a crossover episode with Ben 10 which was an awesome episode to say the least (also Ben merged with Rex in his Upgrade form and it was freaking sick). Like seriously, if I were to try to explain why I love this show so much, we’d be here for a while. Just please, watch this show if it interests you

3) The Amazing World of Gumball - I fell in love with this show upon seeing the first episode and by that I mean I became obsessed. I love everything about this show. The characters, animation, humor, the references, designs, just everything! And seriously, if there’s any kind of animation I had favored the most from a cartoon, its this one. I adore this show so much and I literally cannot wait for the next episode. It sucks that more story related shows, like Steven Universe and Star vs the Forces of Evil (both of which are still great, don’t get me wrong), takes all the attention away from this one. Its sort of underrated in that sense but seriously trust me, everything about this show is completely worth it. I highly, HIGHLY, recommend this one

2) Teen Titans - Aaahh Teen Titans, was obsessed with it as a kid and I still am now (to bad its hard to find stuff to reblog bleh). This is just one of those shows were I can’t explain why I love it as much as I do. I mean, I know I’ve repeatedly said this (because I’m actually bad explaining why I like things and tend to reuse the same sentences over and over oops) but like, I simply adore the characters and the stories. While Starfire lacked some good character development, the rest of the characters really grows and it never gets boring watching their arcs over and over. Like, I don’t know why I can never bored of this show, but I can’t. I just love it to much (and it also has one of the best theme songs ever)

1) Fairly OddParents - No no no, not the newer seasons. The older seasons! This show was my jam back as a kid and surprise surprise, its still my jam now. Excluding shows meant for toddlers, this was the first cartoon I ever got into (probably, it could’ve been SpongeBob or Looney Tunes but I kind of doubt it). This show means more to me than I could ever say. This show sparked an interest for animation and helped really get me into drawing. I was always interesting in drawing, but this show was what pushed me to keep going. It was also the first show I ever drew fan art for. I remember drawing Timmy and Cosmo almost nonstop for a year there, back when I was 2nd grade and finally taught myself how to draw them. I remember making comics with these characters, sharing and reenacting jokes with friends, never shutting up about it aahhh and come on, well all remember the Jimmy Timmy Power Hours, that crossover was legit the coolest one for me. This show is incredibly important to me and despite the direction the show has gone now, it’ll forever remain as my favorite show <3

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owsalfa · 7 years ago

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Saw you answering some questions so I figured I'd join in. Please let me know if I'm asking too many (first time doing an ask). First off, I just wanna thank you for running this blog. I got into Watership Down fairly recently and it's kinda hard to find that much content related to it, which leads to my question(s): 1) Do you have any recommendations of artists or writers to follow (or any specific works to read)? 2) Have you taken David "Loganberry" Buttery's course on Lapine? Just curious

^0^ no worries!!! asks are welcome anytime. I know what you mean about not finding a lot of content...that’s why I started. I couldn’t find the kind of content I wanted so I decided to make it! It’s one of the only things I’ve truly put dedication and thought into. I should apply that to other parts of my life BUT :/ *shrug*

You can take a good look at my fanart tags http://owsalfa.tumblr.com/tagged/fanart, if you see a reoccuring artist you can check out their blog and see if they have other stuff!! @peemu-art, @woolenhoofbeast, @fiszi are 3 i can think of right now! I honestly don’t read a lot of fanfiction but I did write one myself. It’s on fanfiction.net called “Nightwatch” I have been wanting to write another for about..4 years now? but I can’t string my ideas together.

And I haven’t! I took a quick glance at it and it seems pretty cool though!!

#ask #maty12wasalreadytaken #i should go wipe my keyboard i dropped crumbs everywhere

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1400762-personal-showcase · 8 years ago

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Weekly Journal

Week 1 (September 26th -30th)

Over the summer holidays I got a headstard on my idea. I want to do a story about a little Prince trapped in a tower who gets rescued by a female knight. I was thinking how sad it must be for princesses that are trapped in towers and how alone and depressed they must be, and I thought that their struggles must be as tough as the struggles that the knight endures to find her, but no-one ever thinks about how the princess feels. The gender reversal happened just because I thought 'why not? What's stopping it from being a prince instead?' then I thought it would be a sad twist that the reason why he doesn't get rescued is because he is not a princess. All the strong knights want pretty princesses that they can marry and flaunt, not a little boy to save. So I stated to make an animatic for it very early on in the summer, because I knew that this would be a big project. I really want to do an animation which tests my storytelling skills and the point of that is having enough time to create a story and tell it. I don't just want to rush everything and tell the story, I want to learn the best ways to tell it, concerning visuals, sound, timing, 'show don't tell', all of that. From the briefing it seems as though I wont have enough time to do the full animation but I will see what I can do, I really want to create something that can test my narrative skills, not just the animating skills.

Week 2 (October 3rd – 7th )

I went to see Peter to show him my animatic and see what he thought about it. I don't think I will be able to animate the whole thing for the deadline. I didn't realise that only half of the year was dedicated to our personal showcase so I'm a little disappointed that I don't have the whole year to focus on it. Peter really liked the animatic I had so far and really liked the story, but he felt that something emotional was missing. The basics were there, showing the princes lonliness but I wanted it to be more sad, darker, I really want my audience to sympathise with this prince. He advised I go see Helen Schroeder as she has a lot of knowledge on storyboarding and is working on the storyboards for Watership Down. Helen mainly had questions, which is a good thing because if I'm to learn how to tell a story to an audience, I don't want the questioning things they don't need to. The first thing she thought was 'where is his food coming from?' I'd thought about this but didn't bother to think about it because I hoped people wont notice, but I suppose that if I noticed then anyone could. If I figure out a way to show how he gets food then it will likely make the character and the story feel a lot more real. She also said I should come up with a backstory about why he's there and where he's from. The audience doesn't need to know this but it will help me understand my own character better. Nice advice, I will have to think about it and improve my story.

Week 3 (October 10th – 14th )

While thinking about my animatic I've also been working on a walk cycle of my prince. I'd also like to do one for my knight but I will have to see if I have enough time. I like it so far, I love animating a characters sketch work, I have so much fun and I can really feel the movement. But I struggle so much with the clean up and colouring, something about my animation syule feels inconsistent. I don't know if it's me being sloppy or it's normal but I want to work on it because every animation that I've done, I've loved until I've gotten to the colouring, and then I just feel as though I mess it up because I'm an incompetent colourist. It's strange through because I love colouring still images and comics, I'm actually quite proud of my line art and colouring when it comes to comics, I don't know why I struggle so much with animation. I went to see Lynsey to talk about my dissertation thoughts and look at the kind of chapters I want to write. She said I should get down what I want my chapters to be and then start writing the first one just so that I have some words down. My essay is about cartoons and other pieces of media sending bad messages to an audience so I'll look at what things I want to discuss specifically and see if I can put them into relevant chapters.

Week 4 (October 17th – 21st )

I showed Helen my walk cycle and she also agreed that I need to work on the consistency of my animation. She said that things like the legs were thicker in other frames and thinners in others. She also said that his head is bobbing up and down too much. She said that it was good, though, which is why she is 'nitpicking', so that's reassuring. I went in to see Phil Archer in the sound room also and asked him for some advice on music. I have never touched music writing in my life, I once tried to play guitar in year seven but never kept up and I have no idea how to make music, I don't know what chords are, I don't understand how people put notes together in a way that sounds appealing, but apparently I thought it would be a good idea to write my own song for my animatic. I think knowing the basics of making music is a really good skill to have, especially in animation where sound can go a long way, and I feel as though one of the things that could hold me back from making more films is the fact that I can't make backing music. So the idea of making my own music for this animatic is really exciting to me and I hope will give me some good skills. I went in to see Phil and he was kind enough to give me a lesson on the beginning of the basics, he explained chords and notes to me and I really enjoyed myself learning something completely new to me. I went back home and now I'm actually trying to write my own song on FL Studio. So far it's very basic but it has the kind of 'happy' Disney tune to it that I want and considering I've never made a song before, I'm proud of myself. I will go back to Phil again for another lesson and hopefully he can take a look at what I have so far.

We had our briefing for the Collaborative project and have decided our group. I worked with Tia and Adzie last year for the final project and we had so much fun and really loved what we created, so we agreed to working together again, but we have included Jordan and Catherine. Tia, Adzie and myself are all 2D artists, Catherin is stopmotion and Jordan is 3D, so we were thinking about creating something with mixed media similar to 'The Amazing World of Gumball” style. We are hoping to meed up often so tat we can discuss our idea and our job roles.

Week 5 (October 24th – 28th )

I changed up my animatic. It focuses a lot more on the Prince growing up in the tower and trying to cope than the knight finding him. I realised that the majority of the last animatic was time spent having the knight take the prince away, when more focus and time needs to be on the prince himself. I've resolved the issue of food and created an outside presence that sends him food under a hatch in his wall which he gets daily. I showed this update to Peter and he felt this was a lot better, he felt he connected better with the character in this animatic and that it shows his struggle, isolation and loneliness in more detail. I'm so much happier with this version, I still have yet to finish the new ending but so far I find myself also being more attached to this character than I was before. I haven't shown Helen yet, but I hope to soon, when I went to see her she suggested that I start work on an animation test. I've decided to animate the clip where the prince picks up the opened lock and looks at it in shock. I've chosen this clip because I feel as though something simple means that I can pay closer attention to the character acting and expression. I went to see Phil again to get advice on my song and so far he thinks it's a good start. I told him I wanted it to derail into something sad, so that as the animation goes along and gets darker the music goes with it, but I was struggling to understand how to put chords and noted together to make it sound sad. He helped a lot and I've managed to find a musical rift to go to the sad moments of the animatic.

We went in to see John about our collaborative idea. At the moment we had this idea about creating a world that leads to different dimensions, which would mean we can add different types of media easily. I thought the idea of a hotel would be good, in the kind of style like 'Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends'. Sort of wacky, funny, quirky and strange. Adzie would like to do the character design but overall we like the ides of this character being a small monster who is on vacation, he gets given his room for the hotel and then goes to explore the other rooms. We have yet to decide on an idea or a reason for him to look around the hotel, but we are piecing the world together.

Week 6 (October 31st – November 4th)

I've updated my new animatic and went to shot Helen, she much preferred it but there are still some things she picked up on. She felt that the introduction could be shortened if I needed to save time, I could cut out the part where he pulls the lantern under the sheets, the scene where the books are piling up doesn't make much sense. I said that it meant he was leaving them untidy and abandoned but I suppose it still shows his depression with the plates piling up. And then there were a lot of things concerning the screen direction and film language that need to be tweaked which I have written about on my blog. She said that the general story comes across well, but there are areas of detail that could make it a lot better is fixed. I feel really greatful and honoured to have Helen's advice, she has taught me so much and I am so willing to change anything in the storyboard to make it perfect. I really want to learn how to execute a visual story successfully, I knew from the beginning that I would be changing a lot of my storyboard so I had no worries about being given criticism. (That's why I wanted to get the basic storyboard done before I came back to the first term, so that I had time to change it). This project to me is more about progressing my narrative skills as well as my animation skills, so the majority of my focus in based on all of the development I'm putting into my storyboarding rather than focusing so much on one animated clip. Having Helen around to criticise my storyboarding is so beneficial to me, I feel like I am learning so much from showing her what I have, receiving her comments, and then changing it. I can see it in my work that from the first animatic, I have improved the feeling of the story so much more with her help and perspective. I'm starting to figure out what I want to specialise in in animation, I think I want to specialise in storyboarding and character animation. Helen also recommended that I start working on my animation test, and as I've started to do so, I realise how much I also love to do character animation. Story and character is where I want to go. I also went to see Helen Piercy later this week to show her both animatics and see what she thought. She felt more emotional towards the second animatic but she preferred the ending to the first animatic. I then sat with her and showed a classmate, Lila, to get her thoughts also. Lila felt a lot more connected to the second one and also preferred the ending.

There was a Narrative and Character workshop for the Collaborative project. I wanted to go in but overslept and so I turned up later to meet with Adzie and Catherine during the second half. They were doing a character design activity, and weren't focused much on the collaborative project, just on creating their own characters. I said that I would meed them next week for the Narrative workshop, then we could discuss the story for the project more in detail.

Week 7 (November 7th – 11th )

I finished the sketchlines of my animation test and went to receive feedback from Helen and Robin.

Firstly they felt it was a well made animation with great expressions. Robin really liked the way the eyebrows were drawn and said they moved well as a unit with the eyes and face, which pleases me because expression is really important to me and one of my favourite things to draw. Helen felt that I needed to look more on my overlapping and secondary action, and a lot of it moved at the same time and it would look better for it to almost go in a wave, the whole general motion moving in an arch. I'm pleased with this advice but she also said I need to watch my time and that I should try to get it finished. I want to hopefully finish this test soon then get straight onto animating my showcase. As the animatic is far too long to make into a full animation, me and Helen discussed the idea of taking just a segment of the animation to animate. Most likely a part that has a basic beginning, middle, end to it. I wanted to make a trailer possibly but I think I would be able to show my still better if I took a scene from the animatic and animated that. I can't decide which part though, because I don't want the scene to look out of place without a story to it. I might do the end scene or a part where he's growing up.

We spoke more about our Collaborative idea and we are still trying to give the character a reason for leaving his room. We're unsure of the ending as we feel that it's too simple, or is not the right moral for the character to go back to his comfort zone. We are planning to go into the Narrative Workshop next week so we can get some advice from Helen on it.

Week 8 ( November 14th – 18th )

For my animatic Helen felt that I needed some scenes of the prince trying to escape, which makes a lot of sense. It's so clear to me now that after he realises he's not being rescued, he'd try to escape the tower himself, anyone would. So I'm going to add two scene, I've got one where he tries to bang on the door and get whoever is there to let him out, but then food just comes in and he is ignored. Them I'm going to do one where he escapes the window. I couldn't decide what to do with him, because he needs to not actually get out of the castle so I'm thinking that either he is too scared or it's too high for him to get down safely, or there's some kind of spell keeping him trapped in, like an invisible wall or something. I'd like to do the invisible wall but when I suggested it to a few people who had seen my animation, they felt it might be difficult to portray, including Helen. I'm going to go with a magical chain that suddenly appears on his arm when he tries to escape, so that his efforts to muster up his courage proves to be pointless. I finished colouring my animation test but I'm not sure I like it. I really struggled with colouring. I managed to find a tutorial to draw clean lines with the polyline tool and then use the paint bucket tool to fill but the animation looks too jumpy at the same time. The shape of his face is inconsistent and seems to change in every frame, making it look quite jarring and jumpy. I think what I'll do in my actual animation is have more layers and leave unmoving parts still, but hopefully I can still animate the whole thing overall to not look too still.

We attended the Narrative Workshop this week to discuss our ideas and learn some things. We answered some questions about our project, and found answers for what the character does and his motives for doing it. We did have the idea of him being bored with the 2D room he was given so he goes to look at the other rooms, then he becomes so creeped out by what he doesn't understand that he goes back to being happy with his comfort zone. When we spoke to Helen she suggested that that might not be a very good moral to a story and we should think up something more. We started thinking that maybe he takes something back with him from one of the rooms, so that he's happy with his comfort zone but is not opposed to exploring and the unknown. One of us suggested that he should be a kleptomaniac and steal things from the hotel, it would start with mini shampoo's and a shower cap and a dressing gown, then he would explore the other rooms and leave the hotel with his back full of weird objects. I like this idea, because I find it funny in the context of being a hotel guest and how we all take the mini shampoos and stuff, but I'm not sure about it completely because I really liked the innocence of the little monster character.

Week 9 (November 21st – 25th )

I've had to change some other parts of my animatic and decide on what I'm animating. I've decided I'm going to do the scene where he gets caught by the magic chain while trying to escape. Firstly Helen felt as though I need a better angle to establish the hight with he's on the window ledge. I changed the angle so that the camera is from outside of the tower, below the prince and pointed up at him while he looks down. I also went to see Sarah Harris earlier where she suggested that the character needed a closer acting scene. He needed to show his disbelief that the chain appeared, so I added a scene where he inspects his hand where the chain appeared. I changed a few other bits in my animatic where Helen felt the camera direction could have been improved, such as the scene where the scene where the plates pile up, I've combined that scene with the scene of him in his bed. Now the plates pile up and the camera cuts to show him in his bed, clearly ignoring the food, suggesting time has gone by. This is to cut some time short. I've started working on my animation. I've been taking some video references for myself, one of my tying something around my waist, one of my pulling something tied to a post and one of me stepping up onto something as if onto a window ledge. All of these references have been so helpful to my animation and have made my first scenes look so realistic. It's made me realise how important taking reference is, I know that I would have been very frustrated if I was to animate that all from my head.

We mainly focused on our personal work this week but we did meet up to do wome collaborative work together. I created a style frame, Adzie created the character sheet, Catherine worked on the PDF and Jordan began work on the appearance of the hotel. We had a good day that day and got a lot of work done.

Week 10 ( November 28th – December 2nd )

I've done more for my animation, including the first scenes and the scene where he's out on the window ledge with his clothes and hair blowing in the wind, then he cowers in fear at the side of the wall. So far I'm really pleased with, I love doing the under-sketch work for the animation. I feel a lot more free when I'm sketching and I feel that comes across in the character movement. Helen had some suggestions for changing my animation to make it a bit better. We discussed some different camera angles and felt that when he puts his hand out of the window, there should be an outside profile view. I kind of wanted to keep the camera inside the tower to keep the audience 'trapped' with the prince also, which she understood, but I think this is a much more dynamic camera angle than what I had before, so I'll go with it. She also suggested I add a last frame of him from inside of the tower, showing him collapse on his bed in defeat, framed in the centre of it. I think this is a good idea to end on, I can try to make it quite dynamic, which is good because she felt that I did not have enough wider shots in my animation, which I agree with. I went back to see Phil Archer in the sound room, this time for help in my sound design for my animated scene. I said I really wanted a nice sound to go with the chain appearing so that it could sound all sparkly and mystical, basically to make the point that it's a magical chain caused by a spell. He put together some cool sounds. He reversed the sound of a chain clinking, so that it sounded unnatural and a bit mystical, then he added a kind of reverb and 'sparkling' effect to it to make it sound shiny and magical. I'm really pleased with that he helped me come up with. He also helped me get together some basic sounds like the wood creaking on the bed post and the wind blowing.

Me and Catherine went in to speak to Jon this week about our updated idea. I explained that I liked the kleptomaniac idea but I was also unsure as I wanted the character to remain fairly innocent, and not as though he had a mental disorder, I wanted the animation to be about the wacky hotel, not the monsters mental disorder. We started thinking from a different angle and came up with the idea of the Hotel actually being a simulation that the monster can go into to experience a holiday. It would be a twist that the weird and wonderful hotel didn't actually exist and almost be a statement on our entertainment. The Monster takes the VR helmet off when the experience gets too weird for him, he goes home to his boring room and wonders whether his reality is better or not. At first we were going to make it a human, who uses the monster as an avatar in the VR but we realised that would include finding an actor, filming, sets and props, which we wont have time for.

Week 11 ( December 5th – 9th )

I've changed my animation, adding shots of Helen's suggestions, not the animatic shows him leaning out of the window from a profile view and there is a last shot of him in his room. I've also updated my animation. I've essentially finished the first half of the sketch work, getting up to the shot where he jumps out of the window. I've also painted some backgrounds for all of these scenes. I'm really pleased with my backgrounds. Last year I did a lot of colouring practise for comics and backgrounds and I've really been trying to improve my paintings so that I can create better colours and perspective. From doing the animation test, I'd found the best way to make backgrounds so that they still look good but don't take too long. These backgrounds aren't as detailed as the one in the animation test but I feel that I have been able to produce more in less time by painting them this way and they still look acceptable to me. Aside from the lines and colouring, the first half is done.

The rest of the group seems okay with the idea me and Catherine had for the ending. We've decided Job roles. Catherine is the producer, I will be storyboarding and creating the animatic, Adzie will continue with the character designs and expressions, Jordan will create his 3D room and Tia will create her room. Catherine is also making a model puppet for the stop motion scene. I'm excited to keep working on this, although I also have a lot to do. This idea and concept excites me and I really hope that we can pull it off with quality. I started the storyboard during our meet up on some post-it notes, I will digitally re-draw them later.

Week 12 ( December 12th – 16th )

I've updated my sketched animation to him leaning out, all of the movements of the body are completed but I have yet to include his clothes, hair and face. The final frame is just his tiny body collapsing onto the bed so I only have a few frames there to show that, that won't be a difficult scene to complete. I also added a bit to a previous scenen. Helen said that when he's is about to jump, that would be the point where she would check the tie again to make sure it is still sturdy. I think she make a good point, so I added a action where he does that and suddenly he seems so much more real. I've been working on the background for when he falls back onto his bed, camera from out side of the window. Previously I'd made some floor plans so that while doing the storybaord I'd be able to know where everything is positioned in every frame. For this shot, with the camera being from the outside looking in, taking reference from the floor plans I made was a really big help for painting this background. Once I get the animation sketches done, which shouldn't be long, I'm going to start thinking about colours.

I began to digitally draw over my storyboard but I'm worrying about finishing both my dissertation and personal animation, so I am currently focusing on that. Catherine has offered to do some storyboarding but I assured her that I would be fine to continue after Christmas. I feel as though I know exactly how to storyboard this, the shots and everything, as I've spent a lot of time on my personal project storyboarding, I can see this in my head so well. I'm excited to start.

Christmas Break ( December 19th �� January 9th )

Over the Christman break I focused mainly on my dissertation but did also get much animation done. I was able to finish a background where he leans out of the window to look at the chain appear and I started working on my colouring. In Toon Boom I discovered that you are able to make more than one palettes so that if you use a specific colour, then change that colour from your palette, it will also change it in the animation. This is good because it means that if colours need to be changed then I don't need to refill every frame with the bucket too, I can just change the colour from the palette. I realised that it would be cool to have a slightly different chade of colours for when he is outside of the tower and for when he is inside, just to give a bit more atmosphere to his environment. I updated the colouring to where he is when he is standing on the ledge.

We mainly focused on our personal projects over Christmas, as we all had a lot to do, we agreed to leave the collaborative work for when we were back in Norwich.

Week 13 (January 9th – 13th )

I've continued to colour but also have been focusing a lot on my dissertation and trying to get that done. Lynsey has been a big help and has been able to review my work when I've needed her to. As for the animation, I've really just been trying to get colouring done as soon as I can, I don't know how much time I'll have left to get it all done but I still need to finish my blog and complete my Research Report. I'm not sure what else to update on, really, I can just feel myself clicking into overdrive and I feel very determined to get all of this done.

This week I completely finished the animatic for our collaborative project. I had more fun doing it than I thought I would and I realise that after doing this storyboard, I really would like to specialise in storyboarding, as well as character animation. I'm really pleased with what I've created, I feel as though I can present it as something professional. Keeping the title safe zone for each frame was very helpful also, I was able to see it all in perspective and I think I've created something that reads very well. The responses I got from the group were good also. I really wanted it to come across as quirky, even a little funny, and the group felt I'd achieved that. Mt plan was to create the beginning and end of the storyboard so that we could fit in the sections where we have individually made our rooms, but I needed some more transition shots of the character walking through the hallways and looking into doors. Catherine was a big help with this and she offered to make some of these connecting shots, we also discussed the best angles to shot it. Me and Jordan put the animatic together with everyone's work and we're very pleased with it.

Extension ( January 16th – 27th )

I've requested an extension due to some struggles and depression over Christmas. I'd spoken to Peter about it and after having been open to him about my feeling and situations throughout the years he agreed to an extension. I am using this extension to really push what quality I can under the pressure I'm feeling. I was able to finish my Research Report and I'm quite pleased with it. If I have time to go back I would like to add a section about Bojack Horseman but it already took a lot of cutting to achieve the wordcount and not go over, so I think it would be difficult to add extra information. I really don't know the best way to colour. I'm not sure whether it's just better to draw the whole frames on one layer and use the bucket tool to fill, or whether I should do a layer for the body, layer over the body for the clothes, layer for the face, layer for hair (etc) so that I can look at the overlapping and secondary actions separately. I'm doing it with the separate layers to be safe but I feel as though it's coming out a bit messy. I think the movement itself looks fine and I think that I've fixed the problem with it looking too jumpy by having the different aspects on different layers (the problem I had with the animation test) but the painting feels a bit messy in some places. Such as when he is standing on the window ledge his clothes wave in the wind but the colouring looks messy. Whenever I try to clean it up on the layers, there always seems to be a problem. I think I've made the right choice in having each aspect on separate layers but I think that I may have created too many layers and now I've confused myself. With the extension I've been able to finish the animation. I've done the colours so that when he is outside of the tower the colours are brighter and when he is inside they are darker. I want this to create more of a subtle sad reality to his situation, he can't even get to the light. I had some problem with the chain. Firstly I discovered that in Toon Boom I'm able to create a glow affect, which is fantastic because it's exactly the effect I want. I was able to do this with the first chain I drew but then I wasn't able to recreate it with the rest of them. It seemed as though the drawing of the chain wouldn't show and instead there was just a transparent glow in the shape of the chain. I was frustrated at this to begin with but I'd resolved it by learning that I had to duplicate the layer and keep one of the layers normal and the other with the glow, this is what I'd done with the previous chain. It proves my point that I had created far too many layers in this file for me to keep track of. I've finished my entire animation now and all that's left to do it put the sound together. I'm really pleased with what I have created. I'm mainly pleased with the undersketch animation but that is what I prefer to do and is in my comfort zone. The colouring came out better than I thought it would, and better than it did in the animation test in my opinion but I felt that it could be cleaned up in some places. I will probably clean this up after submission. My plan after submission is to continue with my full animatic story and create a short film of a few minutes that is partly finished and partly WIP. I would like to come away with a piece that shows my skills in character animation and storyboarding, so I really like the idea of keeping the majority of it as professional storyboarding and sketched character animation, with only a few parts looking completely finished.

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hareofhrair · 8 years ago

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Tagged by @hellraisertrolls RULES: answer the questions in a new post and tag some blogs you would like to get to know better.

nickname: i have a lot of nicknames and basically answer to anything. star sign: Libra height: 5′7″ time right now: 6:10pm last thing googled: Routes up Mount Saint Elias favorite music artists: Radiohead, The Fleet Foxes, Modest Mouse song stuck in your head: The Shins - Australia

last movie watched: 1408 but last I saw in theaters was Rogue One

last tv show watched: The Magicians

what are you wearing right now: A black sweater dress with a lace skirt I got online. It’s too short to cover my bits so I’m wearing a fluffy gold ren faire skirt under it and green and black fuzzy Grinch pajama bottoms under that cause it’s cold, with some socks that look like Van Gogh’s Starry Night. when did you create your blog: November of last year what kind of stuff do you post: mostly art and aesthetic since it’s hard to start rps and harder to keep them going. do you have any other blogs: A bunch. My most popular is my robot Signless Ironoverwine, which has 500+ followers. I also have a writing blog and witch resource blog. why did you choose your URL: Seemed appropriate. I love Watership Down. The author just died recently, one of the last victims of 2016. gender: kind of a vague shrugging motion. I’ve identified as female most of my life cause I didn’t know there were options. Now there’s too many options and I don’t know how to tell what’s what. I know I hate my body, but is that gender dysphoria or just cause I’m fat and not conventionally pretty? I don’t feel entirely comfortable being referred to or thought of as female, but I don’t know if I want to be a guy either. Its confusing and I feel like commiting to any label before I’m sure is asking for trouble. Gender is a nightmare. hogwarts house: Hufflepuff pokemon team: Right now I’m playing pokemon moon so this is just my team for this game. I have two Primarina, one’s my starter and her name is Noni and Eggnog is her shiny little sister. I also have a shiny Inciniroar named Peppermint. I got them both from a giveaway. Looker, my shiny Gumshoos, was wild caught and the only wild shiny I’ve ever encountered. I wasn’t even shiny hunting! He’s very special to me. Almost as special as my Gengar, Casper. He’s a gentle soul. I also have a Lurantis named Dahlia, and my powerhouse Mudsdale Asbar. I won my first Battle Royale with Asbar! I also have an Alolan raichu named Popcorn but he doesn’t get to battle much this late in the game. I’m also training up a Hakamo-o named Percy but I’m not sure if they’ll be a regular team member yet. moral alignment: Neutral Good favorite color: Yellow average hours of sleep: 6 to 8 lucky number: 10 favorite character(s): That is an impossible question and you know it. Susan Pevensie from the Chronicles of Narnia and Inigo Montoya from the Princess Bride how many blankets do you sleep with: 4 comforters and a fleece throw. We don’t have central heating. dream job: Author, which I’m already doing so, Slightly More Successful Author who can Work on Their Own Projects Rather Than Ghostwriting Romance following: 494

I tag: @proxytrolls @schemetrolls

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velvetcat34 · 7 years ago

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Bit of a gothy questionnaire

What is your favorite candle scent?

That’s a good question. I don’t actually like scented candles very often. It’s usually too weak smelling. I like to scent my home with automatic sprayers and the like though. I favor Glade’s Cashmere Woods.

Do you have a favorite book?

Watership Down. Every time I read it, I get something new out of it.

And the Black Jewels trilogy. I read it at least once a year.

Are you a tea or coffee person?

Both! Coffee in the morning and tea in the evening (and wine before bed ;)

What is your favorite brand and color of lipstick?

Morpho Cosmetics Snapdragon. It’s a perfect red stain.

What is your favorite perfume/cologne?

Lancôme’s La Vie Est Belle

Do you have a celebrity crush?

Not really...Tom Hiddleston as Loki maybe?

If you had to give up the color black, what color would you choose instead?

Hmmm, that’s a tough one. Depending on what it is, I’d go with gray, or muted greens, blues, and purples.

If you could change your name to a stereotypical 90s/2000s gothy name, what would it be?

I represent that remark! I started going by Velvet Cat in 1999.

I think I’d go with Arilyn Llewellyn or Deadra Addams (pronounced dee-ā-dra).

What are your top three tips for surviving hot weather while black clad?

(1) Stay inside where there is air conditioning. (2) Wear a hat or carry a sunbrella. (3) Be aware of your material choices - velvet and leather will be awfully hot, cotton and gauze will breathe better.

Bonus: drink lots of water, hide in the shade when you find it, and avoid going out at all between 10 am and 2 pm if you can help it.

What song will always make you happy (doesn’t have to be a goth band)?

I have a happy list! But my favorite thing to whistle when I’m happy is Disney’s Robinhood - Whistle Stop

Are you active in the arts (ex. Play an instrument, paint, write, etc)?

Active, no, but I can play a violin, viola, pick out a tune on a guitar and piano, and like to doodle.

If you had a teacup or mug made inscribed just for you, what would you have it say?

GOTH (in some nice letters)

What is your number one non-gothy hobby?

Uhhh...couldn’t tell you? Not sure what will fall under goth or not since it usually bleeds (black) into everything.

Thought Provokers:

If you could be a supernatural creature, what would it be and why?

Immortal - love forever without those pesky vampire problems

What horror monster-based super power would you have?

Breathe under water

Do you feel confident or comfortable interacting with other Goths or gothy people (online or irl)? Why or why not?

Online - yes, though it takes me a minute to figure out how to say hello and not sound like a creeper

In real life - I’m a bit shy at first and am likely to just smile a lot the first couple times until I get to know them and find something I have in common to talk about.

Which is more important for a look: Great hair or great makeup?

Neither - be thin and great skin cover a multitude of beauty sin. I’ve seen really bad hair or awful makeup and the look still works because the person is slender and has nice skin. That said, don’t hate; I’m a big woman myself and think big people are just lovely! But we have to be more meticulous in our appearance or risk looking sloppy instead of cutely casual (so lame).

Is there something you wish there was more of in your subculture?

More willingness to get together and do stuff that isn’t clubs or drinking. I’m not sure what we’d do, maybe listen to music and make stuff?

Care to share an embarrassing story related to your “darkliness“?

Hmm, don’t know that I have one. I have plenty of embarrassing stories, just none related to being goth.

How are you at DIY?

Pretty decent. I make a lot of things I like to use or wear

Confessional (aka True or False):

I love watching cheesy romance films.

False. They make me uncomfortable.

I ALWAYS remember to wash off my makeup at night.

True. I don’t care to age early.

I sleep with plushies.

False, unless you count Allgamer, in which case, true ;)

I wear non-black pajamas most nights.

False

I don’t like vampires.

False. I took a whole class on them because I love them so much

I don’t like clubs.

True and false. I like going out every once in a while but it’s not often my thing

I don’t enjoy graveyards.

False. I love their tranquil beauty and wish ours was more attractive

Blood makes me queasy.

False

I’d sooner faint than pet a spider.

False, I think I might be able to, as long as it’s not crawling on me

I don’t like haunted houses.

True. I like the kinds at Halloween, but I lived over a year in a real haunted house. No thank you! I never want to repeat that.

I’ve never read Dracula.

False - see above about vampire class.

#gothgoth #allgamer1 #goth questionnaire

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1400762-collaborative-project · 8 years ago

Text

Weekly Journal

Week 1 (September 26th -30th)

Week 2 (October 3rd – 7th )

Week 3 (October 10th – 14th )

Week 4 (October 17th – 21st )

Week 5 (October 24th – 28th )

Week 6 (October 31st – November 4th)

Week 7 (November 7th – 11th )

I finished the sketchlines of my animation test and went to receive feedback from Helen and Robin.

Week 8 ( November 14th – 18th )

Week 9 (November 21st – 25th )

Week 10 ( November 28th – December 2nd )

Week 11 ( December 5th – 9th )

Week 12 ( December 12th – 16th )

Christmas Break ( December 19th – January 9th )

We mainly focused on our personal projects over Christmas, as we all had a lot to do, we agreed to leave the collaborative work for when we were back in Norwich.

Week 13 (January 9th – 13th )

Extension ( January 16th – 27th )

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