#as shown through visual aid

[scoobydoodean]

The scene where Dean wakes up from a nightmare a little before his alarm in 6.01 is such a specific thing, and the way Lisa immediately shifts over and checks on him (along with Dean's dialogue later in the episode about persistent nightmares over the whole year) gives us these tiny little insights into their dynamic and how Dean's been managing... and despite Dean putting himself down about it later, it's clear that he's improved a lot over the course of a year.

Ever since coming back from hell in season 4, Dean has dealt with nightmares. We see Dean startle awake from a nightmare about hell in 4.03. In 4.08, it's specifically pointed out to us that Dean has been drinking more heavily to cope with his nightmares specifically.

This is further addressed in 5.11 "Sam, Interrupted", when Dean "tells" Dr. Cartwright (really talking to himself since she's a figment of his imagination) the following:

DR. CARTWRIGHT: How many drinks do you have a week? DEAN: Well, I gotta sleep sometime. So, uh, what's seven days times--somewhere in the mid fifties. 

Dean drinking large amounts of alcohol as a sleeping aid is shown to us again (visually only) in 5.16, when the episode opens on Dean asleep in a motel, with several empty beer bottles littered around his bed.

In 6.01 though, we see Dean's drinking has cut back. Dean's still having nightmares, but he's sleeping through the night, waking just a little before his alarm, and with only a nightcap—not chain-drinking beers (5.16) or drinking hard liquor straight from the bottle to rid his mind of the remnants of a nightmare (5.08). Under his bed, instead of a liquor bottle, there's a gun and a jar of holy water.

[ateez-himari]

FASHION WEEK; HIGHLIGHTS

"I can be all the things you told me not to be"

MILAN; VERSACE

• The vocalist recognized the journalist that had made tasteless and uncomfortable comments suggesting she was only in ATEEZ because of her appearance in 2021, continuing to throw sly comments into articles since then. When their manager began motioning him over for the common short interviews, she reminded him that he had been blacklisted from events for years - he was also the only one who she did not bow her head to as a greeting.

• When both ambassadors stepped out of the car together, the large crowd that had been gathered for hours flickered with bright flashes almost instantly whilst he extended a hand in order to help stabilize her.

• During the showcase of 'Ephemeral' the vocalist sat down on a white cushion to play the Koto - the national instrument of Japan - in order to accompany the music composed with different Korean instruments, representing her identity perfectly.

• To close off this impressive debut the runway welcomed the artist dressed in flowing light pink fabric adorned with golden details, displaying the very last design of her collection while she thanked the audience. Himari then bowed before the house's artistic director who in response mouthed the word 'Bellissima' and cued for attendees to toss red peonies towards her ambassador, a flower representing prosperity and good fortune in Korean culture.

• San attempted to hide that he was wiping away tears at the sight of their maknae accomplishing one of her dreams right in front of their eyes yet could not conceal his emotions when engulfing her in a tight hug.

• Once the show had concluded, Himari left her bandmates' sides to search the room for someone and hurried over to embrace the house's artistic director, who returned the hug warmly before placing a specially prepared tiara on her ambassador's head. Fans have compared their interaction to an aunt with her favorite niece due to the way Donatella seemed so attentive to her at all times, meanwhile the idol would hold her hand while being introduced to guests and the two were even seen gossiping at some point before the show began.

Afterparty;

• YouTuber Isaac M.I.K taught her how to do the South African dance move 'Tshwala Bam' over which they bonded very quickly before the vocalist in turns taught him the 'Work' challenge which was later released on the ATEEZ TikTok account. He now follows her personal Instagram account.

• In footage posted by guests, she could be seen visibly tipsy while whispering something into Mingi's ear, before pulling away biting her lip with flushed cheeks making shiny doe eyes even more noticeable as she gazed up at him. Whatever was exchanged between them made the rapper tighten his hold on her waist as he left a kiss on her neck. This clip rapidly made the rounds through social media with the unreleased song 'Come Through' by The Weeknd used as the background.

• Throughout the night, Gigi Hadid was seen dancing with her and later on posted several stories containing endless pictures of the two clearly forming some kind of friendship. The poses were different from what is usually seen from female idols but this allowed netizens a look into her more relaxed personality, dimming the cuteness shown during fan interactions to make way for natural charm.

• Madonna asked San for her Instagram handle during the Dolce & Gabbana afterparty the following day, and posted about the Ephemeral Collection with the caption; "What can't this girl do ?"

PARIS; BALMAIN

• The vocalist seemed overwhelmed with the loud sounds created by the crowd as both artists signed autographs, so Hongjoong discreetly reached over before lowering the volume on her hearing aid.

• Upon meeting his ambassador's youngest member for the first time, Olivier Rousteing let out an audible squeal and noted that both seemed to fit the other perfectly in terms of visuals. Some journalists present during the interaction even managed to catch him joking about wanting to steal Versace's Princess for his own fashion house.

• Dove Cameron cheerfully greeted the idol with a warm embrace along with seemingly endless compliments about her beauty when the show was being prepared. An entire camera roll long photoshoot ensued which was then posted on both of their social media accounts with captions conveying affection for the other, and both were seen giggling whilst sitting next to one another.

• Throughout the event the maknae seemed much calmer in the presence of their group's captain and sparked conversations with numerous high profile attendees, although this happened only when he stood at her side. Much like during their debut years, there were several pictures of her holding on to Hongjoong's sleeve while walking around.

• When came time to leave, Mingi stepped out of the car waiting for the bandmates in order to help his girlfriend inside with one hand under her own while the other guided her by the waist. Their manager could be seen standing aside smiling to himself, though trying to hide it, much like their captain.

Extra;

• While the members currently present in the city were taking a stroll, they ran into the vocalist's friend of three years, SEVENTEEN leader S.Coups, who immediately chastised her for having time to travel throughout countries yet none to stop by their studio despite having a keycard to the HYBE building.

• The Paris Saint-Germain Football Club invited their player's younger sister to the game against Rennes and despite having been apart only since Chuseok, the siblings ran up to one another as if it had been years once it was over. Since most players present had never before met her, Hanzo excitedly rambled on about nearly every accomplishment while the embarrassment flushed her cheeks with every passing moment.

[bidaubadeadieu]

Photos of Hugh Hayden's Exhibition Home Work, as seen at the Rose Art Museum (Brandeis University), 2024. Throughout this post, text present in the gallery (written by museum curators, not me) is intended in block quotes.

Through his prodigious studio practice, Hugh Hayden (b. 1983, Dallas, TX) has become one of the leading artists of his generation. His meticulously crafted sculptures, hybrid forms, and poignant installations evoke profound reflections on the human condition within a complex, volatile, and often threatening world. hayden combines a probing analysis of serious and often painful topics with humor, visual puns, and wordplay, provoking a unique blend of visceral and critical responses.

I was captivated by Hayden's work from the moment I stepped into the gallery. Really stunning stuff. Names of all pieces in this post (left to right, top to bottom), as well as excerpts from gallery text, can be found below the Read More. I highly encourage you to check it out in more detail!

American Gothic (2024)

Hayden merges two skeletal figures with agricultural and domestic tools, examining aspects pertaining to labor and the dignity of work. The artist deliberately positions himself as part of a genealogy of American artists, referencing Grant Wood's 1930 painting American Gothic and Gordon Parks's 1942 photograph, American Gothic.

Eden (2022)

Eden presents two ribcages locked together in an intimate embrace. Hanging on a clothes rack, the ribcages are meticulously crafted from cedar wood, a material often used where clothes are stored to repel moths. The fact that the skeletal lovers are closeted suggests that this embrace needs to be kept a secret. The title references the bliss associated with the biblical Garden of Eden.

Hangers (2018)

High Cotton (2015-2020)

High Cotton, emulating and arcade claw machine, is clad in lustrous, Chippendale-inspired Honduran mahogany, carved to the recall the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century furnishings of high society. Sharp-edged cotton balls (replacing the game's expected toys) force a player to "pick cotton," a task directly associated with slavery. The work highlights the raw material used to produce the fine cotton clothing found around the world--and once neatly folded inside the mahogany armoires of slave owners.

Fairy Tale (2023)

Fairy Tale features a pair of interlocking Tiffany rings, with HIV-prevention medication replacing the expected diamonds or gems. The title suggests a "happily-ever-after" gay love story for those who once lived in the shadow of AIDS. The word "fairy" in the title, sometimes used as a slur, is here reclaimed with pride.

The Kiss (2020)

In The Kiss, two football helmets are caught together like stags whose horns are locked in battle. Their interlocking forms and the title of the piece suggest a range of relationships, from homosocial camaraderie to same-sex intimacy. Many of Hayden's sports-related sculptures expose the fact that the very devices supposed to protect may also wound. The Kiss recalls the high number of brain injuries suffered by football players.

Positives (2019-2024)

Hedges (2019)

This installation features a model of an archetypal suburban home. Rather than associating the domestic with security, Hayden transforms the familiar abode into an unsettling place where menacing branches sprout from and overpower the structure's walls, window, and roof. Hedges is experienced within a mirrored chamber that situates the viewer amid an endless row of uncanny houses. Hayden often notes that home ownership is considered one of the key goals of achieving the American dream. Yet this path is hardly assured for many people, given the inequities in society and the financial precarity that so many endure. As shown here and throughout the exhibition, Hayden's visceral sculptures reveal the disquieting contradictions of the American dream.

[theoddest1]

with how the fans and even viv being VERY excited with the “visuals” of poison it’s was very clear that the intended purpose of having those scenes was for porn. Why else would viv be excited for SA scenes and make a cum joke? Not dismissing any SA survivors that felt seen or represented through Angel. I think the bar scene where Angel has a breakdown is good I just hate how they kinda swept everything he said under the rug for a musical, with the episode ending on a happy note and were told not shown that he gets better.

That’s why people kept bringing up moral Orel, silent hill 2 and tuca and Bertie as good SA rep because the abuse is NEVER shown were told or it’s heavily implied it was the aftermath that was shown, nurse bendy is hyper sexual in public but she secretly hates, is lonely and regresses into a little girl playing family with stuffed animals when she’s in her safe space. Angela is depressed/suicidal her only hope is to find her mother so things can get better but she never finds her mom and it’s implied Angela dies, Tuca and struggled with her sexuality and sexual trauma even feels ashamed about having intrusive fantasies of her abuser and thinks that after being SA’d but she is complete control of those situations and it’s her way o healing and even if she wasn’t SA’d she’d still be into those fantasies. It’s too early to say anything about Angel character it might change in season 2 and actually talk more about his trauma especially since the vees are gonna be more prominent (which I call bs because they said the exact same thing about Adam and he didn’t do shit, he only showed up in 3 episodes and he was so underwhelming plus he was the 2nd most powerful being in the show, idk what vox and Val are gonna bring to the table expect be stupid wannabe “mean girls”, plus lute is still around and she is by more powerful and interesing villain) but we have to wait and see, right now I’m indifferent to Angel he’s not a bad character but he’s not the best, sir pentious and nifty outshined him and everybody else, they were the best characters, and they were just joke characters

Viv is very, very obvious with what she seeks involving Angel Dust's character arc. She sees it as an opportunity to recreate a similar situation to Raph's animatic, a 3rd person view surrounding Angel's dilemma rather than Vox's. It's paraded around as though it's a tragic "Love Song" but there is no proper or meaningful way to convey the tragedy surrounding it all. It's an elaborate kink video for those who indulge those sorts of subjects. As you've mentioned, some other known media have handled the topic with much care and didn'tshow it, but this time around, this could have been a great time to make useful imagery to show just how awful the entire situation is. But we don't get that. All of it is glamorized in a pop song with neon lights and no subversion of one's expectations. The only time we are shown any blunt and saddening imagery is when Angel is passed around in bindage gear. The colors change and turn red, and we are faced with a strikingly blunt reality of the situation, but we then see Angel dancing in front of his situation, whiplash of the seriousness pertaining to it all. And while the pacing is better in this episode than most, it's still FAST.

So on top of everything we have a rushed pop song that's supposed to engage the audience in a mindset regarding SA to further think and discuss but it only aided in fueling kink culture and no one has had any strong meaningful discussions when it is about that entire sequence but the kinks sure are THRIVING! Imo, the fact that this side of the community got more outta this than those who love to discuss stories reflects on how unserious and sexual Viv saw it to be, and THAT is what makes Viv's shit representation bad. The remix only solidifies what I had assumed this entire song to sound like. It fails to be commentary, only fuel for a kink someone has, and NEARLY EVERYONE in the community is letting it slide cause of that.

[rising-volteccers]

Happy one year anniversary to Pokemon Horizons! I'm not even joking when I say that this series has been keeping my mental health afloat throughout the past year. I'm so happy that I'm able to have the enjoyment of looking forward to a new episode weekly, not to mention all the friends I've met and the motivation to do share my own content to the fandom!

This is a small request but I'd love to hear your thoughts on why you like / love / enjoy Pokemon Horizons!

I love this series because as an adult, it was super refreshing to see a cast of competent adults aiding the young protagonists of this series! Seeing Liko, Roy and Dot grow as Trainers really made me happy because they have people in their lives that looked out for them as they navigate through the pains and joys of growing up. They're able to just simply be kids exploring the world of Pokemon.

They've certainly been ups and downs when it comes to the episodes, and I do have my fair share of gripes with the series but the positives far outweigh the negatives. The visuals during big episodes are gorgeous, the score perfectly matches the scenes shown and this series resparked the wonder I have for the Pokemon franchise. While I'll always be a fan of the games, I haven't really watched the anime in years until Horizons. I feel like a kid again, tuning in weekly to watch the new episode of Pokemon. That kind of excitement and joy is such a bright spot in my life at this moment, and for that I'm grateful for this series.

Also thankful for Horizons by introducing me to the love of my life Mr Friede Rising Volt Tacklers you are so handsome and smart and my undiagnosed ADHD bisexual king I have spent so much money on you

[theweeklydiscourse]

The Darkling, Villain coding and Shadow and Bone’s abuse narrative

The abuse narrative is Shadow and Bone is actually a pretty reassuring one. It imagines a world where the “evil” people are easily identifiable and possess visual indicators of their wickedness. The narrative doesn’t feel the need to recreate any true-to-life instance of covert manipulation because it already conveys that by way of coding Aleksander as villainous.

While Leigh Bardugo has spoken about the way Aleksander’s good looks aid him in his evil pursuits, we are never actually shown significant evidence of that idea in the text. Although Alina is certainly affected by his good looks in terms of her physical attraction to him, we seldom see this in other characters throughout the trilogy. That being said, even when Alina IS very much attracted to him, that attraction is still swayed by her underlying prejudice and suspicions of him due to his role as the Darkling. Aleksander’s beauty is used superficially if we are to understand that it helps him covertly manipulate people, because how does it give him any tangible power?

It certainly doesn’t seem to help him convince the King to care about Grisha and it doesn’t seem to have much influence over the Grisha of the little palace as well (considering that a portion of them defect to Alina’s side after S&B). So my question is, what purpose does his beauty serve in the story? How does it build up the trilogy as an abuse narrative?

My answer to those questions would be that Leigh Bardugo relied too heavily on superficial indicators of villainy to create a more surprising twist and in the process, conveyed a shallow view of a supposedly abusive character. To supplement this, she claimed that it was Aleksander’s beauty that allowed him to manipulate and abuse others but also fails at communicating that through the actions of her characters. At best, the abuse narrative is perfunctory.

Any reader could gather upon first reading Shadow and Bone that Aleksander was a sketchy dude. Hot, but sketchy nonetheless because of how obvious it was that he was a villain. A dark cloak? Black hair? Shadow powers? Next you’ll tell me that his name has the word “dark” in it! But the story constantly tries to convince the readers that they have “cracked the case” and found the wolf in sheep’s clothing. Except this time, the wolf was just a wolf that the writer pretended was more disguised than he actually was. It’s more reassuring that way.

[talonabraxas]

“The shaman is the figure at the beginning of human history that unites the doctor, the scientist and the artist into a single notion of care-giving and creativity.” — Terence McKenna

Ayahuasca Shaman Talon Abraxas

A Shamanic View of How Ayahuasca & Nature Communicate With Us

In a shaman’s world view, everything is energy, and for them the word spirit and energy have the exact same meaning. Indigenous knowledge often includes a great deal of practical insight about everything material, for instance, how to use plants for medicine, food or craftsmanship. Their ways of understanding the material universe mix with spiritual and highly meaningful beliefs. Naturally, the way plants and animals communicate with us and with each other is also understood through this mind-body mix.

On the level of smell, plants call out to us from a distance by their varied aromas that form the basis for many scents and perfumes that are attractive to humans, often to the point of stimulating a resonance between lovers. Additionally they are used as powerful tools in aromatherapies to induce recall, reinforce powerful emotion, or simply for the calming quality of their fragrances.

When they affect us in these profound ways, it is because we resonate with them.

On a visual level we are often attracted to them by their stunning beauty, and we display them in our homes and businesses to “brighten things up”. It is a long held tradition to bring roses to a romantic partner to show love and as a traditional courting strategy, and we send flowers to commemorate special land mark human occasions like birth, marriage, and death.

These visual and olfactory cues combine to attract pollinators and other synergistic interactions to spread seeds and enhance other survival strategies aided by other species, and this is only what we see in the frequency spectrums that we normally perceive. Who knows what might be happening in the spectrums that other species can perceive that we cannot?

Similarly, in the vegetable kingdom, as shown in the complex interaction of the olfactory and taste receptors, these characteristics combine to help us identify what is healthy to ingest and aid us.

On vision quests and in visionary states, particularly those encountered on strict shamanic plant diets centered around the ayahuasca brew, people imbibe any number and combination of specialized plants to learn from the spirits of the plants by passing through physical, mental, and spiritual ordeals to prove that they are worthy of the gift of knowledge that the plant spirits have to give them.

Each plant and animal has its own spirit, essence, or energy which can be characterized as its own unique personality in the same way that ayahuasca is universally referred to as “The Mother”. It is also the reason why North American Indians don’t refer to animals as the bear or the coyote. They say Bear or Coyote as they consider them all to be manifesting the entire essence of their spirit in a grouped manner, similar to bees, ants, and other cooperative colonies, and each one has its own unique energy signature that is treated with equal respect, such as the well-known personality of Coyote the Trickster.

When you ingest a particular plant or plants, especially in a specific environment while on a strict cleansing diet, their effects are strongly felt and enhanced, even more so the longer the diet is continued. During that time participants are subject to the energy field of that plant or plants, which all interact with each other and our bodies and minds in different ways.

The combination of the diet, environment, the plants and other elements affect our brain wave activities and physiologies in a myriad of mysterious ways. This includes on physical, psychological, and spiritual levels that we can scarcely comprehend, much less study in any traditional, objective scientific way. The best way to study them is through the subjective perceptions they produce in experiences that often transpire on deep non-rational levels of resonance and synchronization. In this way, the plants act as transmitters in the position of orchestra conductors, and the people as receivers, communicating in ways that defy logic and articulation.

An ayahuasca ceremony is characterized as an individual healing experience in a group setting with much anecdotal evidence supporting sporadic telepathic experiences among participants. The healing circle is referred to as a container to safely hold the energy it generates and attracts so that the participants can be protected while in the vulnerable state necessary for healing.

If a group of people all sat around with their own radios, each tuned to the same station listening to the same song, all of the radios would be playing the same music as one, in sync.

If all of the participants in the healing circle tuned in and resonated at the same frequency or frequencies, there is no reason why they would not have similar shared telepathic events. This learned ability to subject themselves to these diverse natural energies to surrender and discover what mysteries they may reveal puts shamans in the humbling position of being subject to their plant teachers as the conductor transmitters, in spite of the physical or psychological discomfort they may have in the process.

In the Amazon, ayahuasca is often referred to as la purga, because it purges the body and rigorously clears it out through every orifice, including vomiting, defecation, profuse sweating, tear ducts, and the lungs as well as energetically at deep psychological and spiritual levels. Often it is used in conjunction with other intensely purgative plants along with the restricted diet referred to as the dieta consisting of boiled rice, oatmeal, or quinoa, baked or boiled unripe bananas, and chicken or fish once a day or less combined with a pitcher a day of a helper plant or plants. There is no salt, no soap, shampoo, toothpaste, scents or additions of any kind, and no sex. In addition to the deep inner purification, other plants are used for daily plant baths to physically and energetically wash away the toxins and energies that are released in the process.

All of these restrictions enhance the cleansing process over the extended time of the dieta, which dates back to prehistory. As time passes people lose their telltale human scents, particularly pheromones, hormones, and other secretions that jaguars and other animals with a highly refined sense of smell can detect, making the hunters virtually invisible to them and their primary sensory modalities. The constant refined ingestions and plant baths result in the subject not only smelling like the jungle, but they become the jungle, giving them a distinct hunting advantage.

These intense practices fine tune the individual’s own senses bringing great clarity and a highly refined perception of their immediate reality, further adding to their hunting advantage. Aside from the intensified state of awareness that comes from this extreme purification which historically prepared them for hunts, battles, or other challenges, their conscious awareness of their field of perception expands at inner and outer levels making them psychologically and mentally clear for the task at hand.

These hard won physical and perceptual enhancements bring deep inner shifts from the resonance that comes from being sympathetic to and in sync with the plant spirits and the energies they manifest. One of the intriguing results of this immersion into what shamans characterize as the spirit world is the encompassing energetic field that it opens up. This field brings an ability to not only commune with the plants and the distinctive energies of their unique spirits and personalities, but also to the distinctive energies and personalities of the animal kingdom.

This phenomenon is reinforced by widespread reports from ayahuasca drinkers of directly experiencing and communing with or being “possessed” by specific animal energies that are common to the ayahuasca experience, regardless of whether they are in the jungle or in a major North American city.

Among the numerous totems claimed by participants, or which they say actually choose them, the most common are condors, jaguars, and snakes which have a deeper meaning going all the way back to prehistoric cultures. Those experiencing these energies or spirits often roar and growl through no volition of their own like jaguars, flap their legs like wings, or feel their bodies swaying seemingly of its own accord to distinctive serpentine movements. Other animals and insects like hummingbirds, butterflies, dragonflies, dolphins, and other aquatic totems can play big parts as well.

This phenomenon with its roars, “wing flapping” and other animal indicators forms the core of shape shifting mythologies where shamans reportedly have the ability to change their form into that of their familiar animal totems.

In this way shamans share the distinct, intimate resonant vibration of these entities in the same energetic way they do with the morphogenetic field of plants, becoming one with them by sharing the same frequency. In the same way they have to surrender to the plant teachers to discover what mysteries may be revealed, shamans must humble themselves to their animal familiars as the conductor transmitters of their experience.

In the lore of the jungle, by sharing in the vibratory field of the animal’s spirit energy, in a state of surrender on that entity’s terms, that animal learns from the human by seeing things through human eyes while the human learns other modes of perception from seeing things through the animal’s eyes.

There is an invisibility that comes from physical purifications that makes hunters virtually invisible to the primary sensory modalities of their prey. In this manner, by mutual agreement and the understanding that comes from sympathetically sharing the same energetic field and perception of specific animals, the shaman hunts the animals in spirit first, then follows through what has happened in the spirit world in the physical world in the actual physical hunt, aided by his cultivated invisibility.

This learned ability of shamans to tune in to and commune with these diverse plant and animal energies that we all share the world with allows them to experience them in a direct, definitive, and subjective manner that helps them understand other perspectives. This cultivates empathy which is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another, and opens them up in ways that only direct experience can, while aiding them in developing the critical skills necessary for what is defined as soul retrieval.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Thank you for answering my question about Leona and his gloves!

There I meant if guys can cast spells without their pens? Or it’s just dangerous without them?

[Referencing this post!]

I’m pretty certain it’s possible to cast magic without specifically magical pens; it’s just risky to do without some kind of magical item or something embedded with a magestone to act as a magic conduit. Without that, one accumulates blot much more quickly and it can be difficult to gauge how much blot you’ve already collected without a visual (like the color of one’s magestone).

This is topic addressed in the Vargas Camp event, when the students’ magical pens are confiscated. They realize that this will make using magic (to help with camping) very difficult for them. However, they were later able to use raw magestones they mined and that Ruggie pilfered to help them overcome certain obstacles. So… it’s not so much the magical pen that’s important, but the magestone in it. Trey also clearly states that they can use magic “without their pens”, but that they’re at a greater risk for blot without the pens.

If you look across the various cards, there are numerous examples of characters or even whole lines where other magical objects or items with magestones are used to help the boys channel their magic. In the Dorm Uniform series, Vil uses a grimoire, Leona/Azul/Riddle/Kalim/Malleus use staves, Idia’s magestone is inside of a floating skull device. Presumably, this occurs because they have a magestone embedded in these alternative use items (for example, when Idia OBs, the blot is shown pooling in the magestone inside of his skull device).

Magestones can come in many different forms, so it’s not limited to just magical pens. RSA has magestones in brooch form, and Lilia explains to Trey (in Lilia’s School Uniform vignette) that though magical pens are what is chic now, they have gone through many different size iterations through the years and describes the changes like trends. Popular fan speculation is that the NRC staff wear their magestones in alternate forms as well, such as Trein’s cravat and Vargas’s bracelet.

Various events also utilize different items, enchanted or not, to aid the boys in combat. For example, the flower bouquets in Ghost Marriage are already enchanted with the power to dispel ghosts. Many other items the boys use for combat don’t inherently have magical properties (fishing poles, cooking utensils, pies, peashooters, instruments, etc; the Diasomnia boys just do martial arts for their Halloween costumes). There are also cases where people cast their UMs without explicit use of the magical pen (such as Jade on Kalim in episode 4; if Jade had his magical pen out, it would instantly give away he intended to do something). Given what we know from Vargas Camp, I believe the implication is that as long as a character has a magestone ON them, they can safely use magic (ie the magestone helps them use everyday objects to channel their spells, and/or they can cast their UMs without necessarily whipping out the magical pens to wave for the spell). It’s also possible for someone to use magic without a magestone, but there is a greater risk associated with that.

The only notable exception I can think of is that Malleus uses magic on the regular by just waving his hands around rather than by utilizing his magical pen like most of the other students do (see the School Uniforms for an exemplar). This could just be another case of "a character uses magic with a magestone on him", but I think if there are any characters that can easily use magic without a magestone, it's probably him (because of how overpowered the Draconia line seems to be)? Like I said before though, my general impression based on the current lore is that it's the magestone, not the pen, that allows for magic to be safely conducted. Again, safety is an emphasis here; it’s possible for any mage to use magic without a magestone, but blot is a much greater concern.

[anonymousgayrobot]

A not fact checked FIXATION RANT:: FALLOUT 4

GOD does anybody else feel like fallout 4’s self insert mc was a wasted opportunity?? LIKE WHY DO WE GET TO PLAY A LITERAL VETERAN FROM THE ANNEXATION OF CANADA, THE THING YOU ONLY GET TO HEAR ABOUT IN PAST GAMES

AND ITS NEVER BROUGHT UP AGAIN

like why give the self insert character lore if you’re never going to mention it again or feel any repercussions or sentiments from the past? the sole survivor never mourns, is never the one opening up to other characters (which makes the romances appear very one-sided)— like can’t we get any flashbacks?? anything??? in this weird mixture of having a self insert and a protagonist, you wind up with this very bland character that breaks any kind of immersion. and why make a self insert character if there’s always going to be a set background? that defeats the purpose.

really bad examples for context? comparison?? ((AND I KNOW ITS KINDA FUCKED COMPARING A 2015 GAME TO SHIT THAT CAME OUT IN THE 20’S, BUT IT SHOULD BE BASIC KNOWLEDGE KNOW-HOW ON HOW TO DEVELOP AN IMMERSIVE SELF INSERTED PROTAGONIST EVEN WITH TECHNOLOGICAL SETBACKS??))

anyways, so in Cyberpunk2077, you are given past options THAT AFFECT LATER DETAILS OF THE GAME; do they alter the PATH that the game goes? no, but it creates a sense of immersion because you are now a person with past experience and knowledge with a uniquely spoken narrative and perspective.

in BG3, particularly the Durge route I found to be the most immersive, you begin with amnesia and the nautliod with the other protagonists. right there’s a reasonable excuse for not having a concrete lore, and it haunts you throughout the game with sparse hints until the big reveal of your history— which isn’t even explicitly + visually shown, but it’s spoken through other characters and makes it feel more like a solid, 3 dimensional character outside of being a self insert mc.

And to make Nora ‘just a lawyer’ just seems so unfair lorewise because her husband IS A WARCRIMINAL. godddd, but even still bethesda could’ve compensated for that with flashbacks from her civilian perspective, perhaps with dealing with Nate while raising Shawn, that stress, discovering his crimes, whatever. Same goes for Nate. FUCK YOU BETHESDA. oh my goddhf.

‘oh yeah i served :T’

SERVED FUCKING WHAT? SERVED CUNT?SAY FUCKINN CANADA YOU SUBURBAN LOSER. BUT THATS ALL WE FUCKING GOTTT AND ALL WE’RE EVER GETTING AAAAAAAAAGGHHHHH

one detail however I really like, is one of Sole’s sarcastic comments in the Nuka World dlc. They reminisce ABOUT GOD FUCKIGN GINGER..,:; TO PUT IN TEA. but continuing this, they mention adding a lot of brandy. who the fuck does that. WHO FUCKING ENJOYS SPICED HOT TODDYS??? (name of the drink described by sole;; psa: it nasty((to me.) and the ginger tea is typically to aid in sickness, colds, ‘soothing’. Stressed out lawyer and mother, PTSD-riddled veteran and father, makes sense, adds up. but the addition of ‘a lot of brandy’ can add more personality to such an otherwise one dimensional character. but they don’t describe enjoying a spiced hot toddy in particular,, they merely describe adding brandy to their otherwise normal-recipe-d tea. That’s it. Soothing aid with the addition of ‘a lot’ of alcohol; what does that say about a character? a better and more used example, is when a character is shown pouring alcohol into their coffee, often to demonstrate how stressed they are and how they are forced to cope, using alcohol. THIS IS THE ONLYY GLIMPSE OF INSIGHT WE GET ON THE SOLE SURVIVOR. FUCK. LIKE SURE THE SURVIVOR HAS THEIR ANGRY MOMENTS WHEN THE GAME FIRST BEGINS IN THE CRYO CHAMBER,, ADDRESSING KELLOGG, SOME MOMENTS WITH THE FATHER— BUT ITS ALL ANGER. ANGER WITH NO OTHERWISE MEANS OF EXPRESSION THAT POP UP AND ARE EASILY MISSABLE. THERE’S NO IDLE COMMENTS THAT CAN RESPOND TO COMPANIONS, NO SENSE OF CHARACTER COMPLEXITY, CAMARADERIE WITH TRAVELING COMPANIONS OR INTENTIONALLY-WRITTEN INTERNAL DILEMMA.

AND THIS IS ALL WE WILL EVER FUCKIN GET. FUCK

i know this uh ‘turmoil’ is kinda my own fault for falling in love with analyzing classic literature books starting in highschool which it then set my standard for writing, and now everything is Not Fun anymore. IT FUCKING SUCKS BRO😭😭 BUT AT WHAT COSTTTTTT WHAT COSSSSTTTTTTTTTTT

[mettywiththenotes]

Talking about an au

This is one that has been on my mind since 419 and tbh I thought for sure it could happen

Remember when Tomura shed his skin during the Floating UA battle? Well I wondered if a similar thing would happen again in Mount Fuji

Picture it. In the void, AFO eats Tomura. He's dying as he's told everything about AFO's involvement in his life. AFO takes over his body, hand formed over mouth and all. It looks pretty bad. All the stuff happens with Izuku getting his arms back, the heroes coming to his aid etc. Izuku punches AFO (end of 422, beginning of 423). Here's where it diverges from canon:

Izuku punches AFO and he starts crumbling slowly, from his gut (where the impact was) to the rest of him. Except before it even reaches his chest, his face starts to crack open. Visually we can see this crack isn't the same as the crumbling of his body. It's one we've seen before, across his face in the middle of a battle. A parallel back to this

Except within the crack is Tomura's face. Tomura inside Tomura's body. Tomuraception

What happened? Well, the power of Izuku's will to stop AFO (the punch) allowed the vestiges that got thrown into the body to reawaken and bring Tomura's soul back. At the same time, minutes before, Tomura, slowly dying in the void, began to think. About everything AFO told him, how he was doomed before he was even born. How much that angered him, the rage coursing through his soul. He already had a strong will before, but now he really can't accept what has happened and he can't accept AFO getting away with it. Even if AFO's fate is to die, he'd rather be the one on the other end of it, alive and watching him. Better yet, being the hand that ultimately brings about his end

As a visual representation, it's like Tomura reaches out, desperate to climb out of the abyss he is slowly dying in, and he is met with several hands reaching back, taking his hand and pulling him out and back to the world. The vestiges, who have been reawakened by Izuku

Before, Tomura has not been able to die or stay dead. So why should this not be the same? With the power of rage, spite, his hero and some ghostly relatives, he lives on. He twists his own fate by accepting the hands that reach out and climbing out of the hole AFO threw him in

AFO's Tomura face cracks open. Tomura forces AFO's vessel apart from the head, almost like a butterfly climbing out of its cocoon, almost like he is actively prying his own cage open and escaping for good

AFO had been crumbling and was ripped open, but in a desperate attempt to stay together and stay alive (also fueled by anger at being pushed to the edge like this + Tomura somehow coming back from the dead), he uses his quirks (mostly drills) to keep his body intact for now (this is already shown in 423)

Also, I guess it depends on what you would like to believe, but the way I see it, Tomura could come back either with just his decay OR with the vestiges choosing another vessel for what little power they can give left and so backing Tomura up with the last of OFA. Aka 10th user Tomura. It's not as powerful as it was with Izuku but it still adds a lot, just enough to pack a real punch. Personally I think if we're already throwing away "what is realistic" then I might as well go big or go home and go with 10th user Tomura my beloved

It's from this point that he and Izuku begin to work together to kill the old body. As you can imagine, it's probably not an immediate bonding of friendship or whatever, but it's more or less teamwork formed with the general statement of "we still have things to work out, hero, but I don't care about that right now. I hate him more than anyone else on this damn mountain and I can't stand the thought of letting anyone else kill him but me" etc but then progresses as they fight

[rustedbread]

A huge portion of my problems would be solved if I was a member of the literature club Oh yeah, back when the rot was REAL bad [I'm talking the ultra-fixation rot, not the other kind, I'm well versed on the other kinds, but I wasn't doing that in this instance at least] yeah back when the rot was real bad, I was playing through sidestories..? I think? and I stopped playing midway through Natsuki and Yuri both arguing about whether or not manga should be considered literature to just rant, and I went on for like ten whole minutes describing why Yuri was partially wrong I know my main argument was that you can still appreciate and have good writing if it doesn't require you to visualize the scenes yourself, and that the difference between visual novels and traditional [?] novels is mainly just that the authors vision is more clear, with art being able to show exactly what the storytellers WANT to be shown, which can lead to some subtle details that can't quite be perfectly replicated in traditional novels. I don't think that visual novels are lesser than traditional novels in any way, because they both serve slightly separate purposes, and just because one might be a bit easier to digest doesn't mean it isn't literature because like, then I'd have to explain that [to my knowledge] the idea of literature itself mostly extends to media as a whole if it has good writing and merit to it if it serves its purpose well, truly it doesn't matter if the medium it's contained in has a higher wordcount in it or not, because it's still media, in a way it is literature [?] but the main point is that it still has substance even if you don't have to directly involve yourself with creating the world you wish to observe the main reason written works might be seen as more sophisticated is that it may take more effort to actively immerse and vision the world you're reading about, which personally to me a very forgetful and distracted person, is fairly hard to do and I do see why it'd be more preferable for someone to like novels to be compared with media that uses visual aid in storytelling so fairly I can get why Yuri would think that, but honestly, the main thing I feel she's REALLY arguing about when she was saying manga is lesser than regular novels and that manga can't have substance or usually doesn't have substance which entirely is up to the novel itself, and it's a shallow view to have about stuff, to be honest! just because something might be easier to digest doesn't mean it DOESN'T have substance, and if something is so out of grasp for most people, if it still has good themes, but is much harder to access for ordinary people because of confusing writing, it defeats the purpose of writing it in the first place, yknow? that's a bit out of my main point, so let me try to get onto some sort of actual point here, I guess one moment yeah literature and media as a whole shouldn't be about what is the best type of media there is, no, it shouldn't be about if comics are immature or that they won't ever have substance everything has lows, the medium you get in doesn't matter, what matters is the substance itself, and if it's easier for someone to get into something that requires less mental work, good on them! it shouldn't be about what's the most mature way to read a book, all that really matters is if the story you're going to be enjoying itself is good or not [also I feel like literature can be replaced by media as a whole, because like, all media IS literature, but I also know literature is mostly defined as just novels usually, but that's not really what I'm using it as? be assured I feel the definition of literature should be more broadened, but that's what media is for, I'd say] .... no I didn't intend to write this much

[martialartslover7]

Oh, you're in for a treat.

I have been really irked by this fact that, someone like Sakura got a fair shot at defeating an Akatsuki member, but someone like Hinata did not? Come on, now, the Konoha 12 couldn't have just been twiddling their thumbs, just waiting for Naruto to come back, especially Hinata. If she wants to reform her clan, through motivation from Naruto alone, then she had to train extra hard.

Plus, you will get to see, the Byakugan upgrade that I have been longing to show off in writing. Shoutout to Aleister Brown from Quora, he actually came up with this. Give this guy some love there, for coming up with something so ingenious.

For visual aid, his is how Hinata's eyes look, the moment she taps into that evolution of the Byakugan, by the way.

And for further visual aid, this is how that chakra armor looks that the new Byakugan allows her to gain. Only, it's colored differently.

Plus, this story is connected to "Love Deterrence" (I will upload it here too, don't worry, NaruHina fams, you know, you know), as a Shippuden-follow-up, if you will. It further builds upon what I have shown back there, so stick with me. This arc will have one HELL of a happy ending.

All characters belong to Masashi Kishimoto Images belong to Aleister Brown

[ibrithir-was-here]

Phantom of the Opera Remake Dream

So I have no idea why I dreamed this. I haven't listened to Phantom lately at all, but-- last night, I dreamed that there had been a remake of the Phantom of the Opera musical as a big screen film attempt again.

In the dream reality this had come out a few years back and had done well overall, though there were controversies.

It was incredibly visually beautiful film. I remember feeling like it felt like a Guillermo del Toro fantasy sort of thing with a touch of Tarsem Sighn, really honing in on POTO as a modern-day fairytale horror movie and more focused on making an immersive dream like world than really being accurate periodwise.

The costumes were beautiful, especially in the Masquerade scene, where Christine and Raoul were actually wearing masks too for once. Think Labyrinth meets Eiko Ishioka. And there was a whole motif of White,Red, and Black going on through the three main characters where it symbolized how innocent or corrupt they were becoming as the horror of the Phantom's haunting went on. Christine starts out pure white for example and gradually gains other colors and the Phantom's only white was his mask, which was a literal false face.

The controveries had come in that several of seemingly set points of the musical had been reworked. From least to most controversial:

Christine in the movie was now book accurate blonde (I remember thinking she looked a little like Florence Pugh but not exactly).

Several scenes were added in to give Christine and Raoul more instances to bond and really create a deeper relationship, and Raoul was a much more active character now, he and Christine acting more as a team eventually

The Phantom's ghostly/otherworldiness was kept ambiguous much longer, so much so that the audience starts to wonder if maybe he really is some sort of vengeful spirit, not an angel but something unhuman, possibly even demonic. We know we should know he's just a man doing conjuring tricks but we're suddenly unsure.

Also his mask was now a full mask instead of a half one, sometimes even covering his mouth entirely, such as in the Masquerade scene were he's all in red except for a full black skull mask.

Also his face is never actually fully shown. We see people react to it, and glimpse warped reflections of it in water and cracked mirrors but never see the full thing (how they would have pulled off the final confrontation scene I have no idea)

And finally, most controversial amoung dream film critics though I'm sure it woupd have done numbers on Tumblr xD ---they made it a proper Love Triangle where the Phantom despite his jealousy and hatred of Raoul starts to be charmed by his devotion and innocence and Raoul despite his desire to protect Christine from this admittedly dangerous presence finds himself being drawn in just as she was.

The entire Past the Point of No Return song was reworked/restaged so now Raoul at one point sneaks on stage to aid Christine and he and the Phantom end up dueling and singing parts together, sometimes so close they're literally cheek to cheek.

I woke up at 5 to that image and frantically wrote it all down and made a pinterest mood board 😅 So definitely expect some art for this!

[crotchety-old-emu]

OLITDP chapter 24 references

as i mentioned in my author's notes of the chapter, there's a few references that i would like to share with those who are interested in them. you don't need to know about them to understand what's going on in the story, obviously, but perhaps it's nice to have some visual aids to go with some of the things that are happening.

if you haven't read the latest chapter yet, and you want to remain spoiler free, it's best to skip this post (or perhaps come back to it later). you can find chapter 24 of our love is these days' piano here!

so here's a short list of things that might be interesting - but definitely not necessary - to know about chapter 24:

penelope's dress at the trowbridge ball is a silvery sea green. the one i had in mind was kind of like this one, from the season three behind the scenes pics. nicola looks stunning in green, especially with the red hair. i found beatrice knight's regency color compendium, a stunning overview of all the fashionable colours of fabric in the regency era, with some fantastic descriptions of how they were made and when they were worn. the willow/sea green colour shown on this page is exactly the hue i was picturing while writing.

lady trowbridge's decorations: i spent days and days researching how lady trowbridge might showcase her wealth and peculiar tastes during this ball, but honestly, i didn't find much info about ballroom decorations and i didn't want to make up things that definitely could not have happened. so i settled on things that i was already fairly certain of were pretty decadent for the era: pineapples and ice cream. after reading up on ice cream in regency times through several sources, i came across the website of ivan day, who is a food historian and has worked on some bbc regency costume dramas. he had a very insightful youtube video on how ice cream was made in those days. in it, he makes one of the ice cream pineapples i mention in the story. ivan day's actual website is under construction, but i found a photo of moulded ice groups, as they were presented in regency times, on another page which was taken from his. it includes ice cream shaped like a swan (which may have been parmesan flavoured, which apparently was a popular ice cream flavour back then).

another food decoration that both eloise and penelope mention is a flummery solomon's temple. i found out about these through watching the bbc documentary pride and prejudice - having a ball, which talks about accurate representation of balls during regency times on television. the part of the doc i'm linking to is the part where ivan day reveals a solomon's temple and explains that this would be a staple on all upper-class tables in those days. the white bits, if i'm not mistaken, are milk-flavoured, the brown is chocolate and/or coffee, the pink is coloured with cochineal.

he also has a page on solomon's temples on his blog, which has a very amusing short clip of how exactly these jellies moved. if you watch it (highly recommend), i'm sure you'll understand why eloise would think it was a good thing to comment on. ivan day himself describes it as:

Because it is made of flummery, which is a kind of opaque milk jelly, the central obelisk wobbles and cavorts in a most entertaining manner, while the four little cones shake, rattle and roll in a very naughty way.

the dance: i must have watched at least fifty different dances that were popular at the time - shoutout to regencydances.org, which not only has a very extensive list of dances, but also a youtube channel and animations showing what the dances would have looked like. i based penelope and anthony's dance on the northdown waltz - which granted, only became a thing from 1820 onwards, so it's technically an anachronism for them to be dancing it. it simply was the only dance that best fit with how i wanted the scene to go. you can find an instruction video on the northdown waltz here. anthony, in this case, would be the red rectangle, penelope the green ellipsis. here's a clip of actual people performing the dance, so you can kind of imagine what it would have looked like. i always knew anthony's confession would happen during a dance, my main inspiration for that was this scene from becoming jane. if you've seen the film, you undoubtedly know exactly which scene i'm talking about without even clicking the link. i remember that when i first saw this part of the film, i stopped breathing for a minute, because it was just such an intense moment, which was exactly what i wanted for anthony's big moment.

there you go, some insight into the tiny things mentioned in the latest chapter that you might perhaps enjoy knowing more about. hope at least some of you found it interesting!

also, i want to mention: i am not a historian, i don't claim that my fic is historically accurate, not in the very least. i try to stick to period-appropriate things, which i do as much research for as i can. but some mistakes will have slipped in there, i am very much aware. so if this is a particular pet peeve for some of the history buffs among you, i apologise.

[ask-afoxesshadow]

you know what an ask blog is, why else are you here.

I wont be starting with character fluff, ill put that at the end, so read it if you want a visual understanding of who your talking to and how they will talking.

Warnings

I am an adult [by definition], and since i have little knowledge on who is on the other side of the screen, this space will be treated as an adult area. Posts are subject to include the following:

Suggestive descriptions and intimate innuendos

Descriptions of violent acts or bloodshed

Blunt and brutal honesty, because patience and kindness is a resource i spend at my discretion

Scariest of all, many posts will contain the horror that is "roleplay"

Excessive sarcasm

"Rules"

Asks that are directly sexual in any form will be ignored, so don't even bother

Generally speaking, if you are blatantly disrespectful to any particular group of people, you will be ignored at best, blocked at worst. 2.5: This does mean this blog is a safe place for any and all of the lgbtq community no don't make me type the whole acronym, i don't know what it is.

There is a negative chance you will be successful in shipping the shadow with someone, please take your attempts somewhere else

"Rules" will be added and changed at mod discretion, if and when i see fit.

Notes

The person who runs this blog, me, has almost no idea how to properly format tumblr posts, neither do i care to learn, so everything will be done on a whim

Additionally I have a total of 0 (zero) art skills, so the only picture that will be shown, unless someone else with free time and an interest in this character and decides to make art [which would be awesome], is the picture used as the blogs icon, the mask seen in which is from here.

All of this is done for fun and to entertain the person behind the screen, do note take anything here too seriously, because i sure am not

I have decided to go by "Tome" as how you talk to the mod directly. Why? Because like a tome, I have an ungodly amount of knowledge regarding what is happening in this group of ask blogs, so it felt fitting

Character/roleplay information

The shadow will speak with basic text, while occasionally having changes to their text to show things such as emphasis, or acts such as whispering/speaking under their breath, and to indirectly refer to another person through the use of color and emboldening.

-The shadows actions are depicted through use of text surrounded by hyphens, shown here-

[Mod talk, from I, Tome, is contained within square brackets]

(Context, narration, and important notices are contained within parenthesis)

{Rarely, the curly brackets will be used if mod to character interactions happen}

Reoccurring characters will eventually be listed within this post, when i feel like being less of a side character, please treat their mods with respect.

The "residence" of the shadow is a royal mess of enchantments, letting them have easy access to any part of the lands of the old faith, alternate reality or not.

Character description

The shadow is a creature who's form is crafted from a pitch black substance that seems to hover around the sublimation point, often times acting more akin to a gas than a solid, seemingly at the will of the shadow itself.

Standing around 6'1", they have no obvious gender, with all features being vague and hard to identify, or exceptionally androgynous, additionally having a pair of pointed canid ears sprouting from the top of their head, and several large fox tails trailing out behind them. [For visual aid, think any media depiction of a nine tailed kitsune.]

Their attire is made mostly of muted colors and dark tones, similarly to their shadowed form. Covering their face, they don a handcrafted mask made to resemble a red fox, despite their other canid features suggesting them to be one. Their upper body is covered by a large and baggy grey shirt with torn hems, a deep blue cloak further covering their form, with a light grey scruff, held in place by a broach depicting a red flower with five petals, white semi circles between the petals of the flower, all encircled by a ring of gold. their arms seem to have a bright red string wrapped around them, looking very out of place among the rest of their muted clothes. The attire for their lower body is rough and simple, consisting of a pair of baggy red pants, with several roughly sewn patches made from fabrics of various materials and colors, and a simple pair of black boots.

Final notes

This character exists for the soul purpose of interacting with ask blogs revolving around the game "cult of the lamb" [but if your here you probably already knew that], so while some of the statements of the character might break the fourth wall in the context of the game, that wall has already been removed by the other blogs, so i care not about its existence

The flower depicted on the brooch is not a Camellia, neither is the character a follower of any of the bishops.

The tag "Pages turn" will be used when an ask is responded too by the mod alone, if you wish to see what I, and I alone, have to say, use that tag.

[cadybear420]

Hi, how were you able to create the full body of Sakura from High School Story?

Ohohoh I'm glad you asked! It's a long and tricky process, but I'll explain it as best I can. With visual aid.

(Including the edit for reference)

Originally I'd just grab a random bare body asset, adjust it to her skintone, assemble the face sprite assets onto it, and then edit new outfits accordingly.

Since the original sprite was posed with a hand on her hip, I went with the "fem junior" bodytype (used for f!Dakota from WEH and f!Drew from RWB). But it didn't feel quite right to how her original sprite looked... so I decided to do it a different way.

First I'd piece together the original sprite. Then I'd go through the files to pick a full-body sprite that suited her– I went with that of Kamilah from Bloodbound instead. I made color adjustments as necessary to match Sakura's skintone.

Then I'd use the liquify filter tool (I use Photoshop/Photopea) to adjust the body to fit onto the pose that the original sprite gave us. Including making the left hand more like the hand on the original sprite.

Then, I'd need to merge the parts from her original sprite that were bare, to the body sprite. The original sprite shows a bare arm and one full hand, so I cropped it out from the original sprite, and (as shown in the above photos) erased the parts from the body asset that were going to be replaced.

I'd use the spot repair tool to make up for small gaps from the cropped arms and shoulders (where the straps of her dress were)

Then using air brush, air eraser, smudge tool, spot repair tool, and liquify tool, I'd merge the two pieces together.

And of course, I needed to adjust the thumb nail on the left hand

And we got our Sakura sprite! Ready to dress up in various outfits! :DDD

As for the outfit... I always make sure to keep the outfit leftovers when I cropped out the bare skin and arm.

So now I just need to add the bottom part. How exactly I add the bottom part depends on the top outfit piece itself, but for this one, I cropped out the lower white part, and added new skirt and leggings, to make the outfit fairly similar to her outfit from the original Prime game.

The skirt is recolored from f!Hayden's harajuku outfit from PM, and the leggings come from the thigh high stockings accessory from QB MC, adjusted accordingly with the godsend that is the liquify tool. Shading was added with the burn tool.

And that's how I made full-body Choices Sakura!

The process can vary, but I use these basic techniques to make full-body sprites of other half-body characters in HSS. The other ones I've shared so far are Myra and Mia, and I also have a couple for other characters such as Julian, Payton, Sydney, and Koh, as well as new outfits for the characters I have completed, that I haven't shared yet/am still working on.