#awesome advice

[spiritualseeker777]

[balleater]

despite being more often than not a "rules as written" fan over "rule of cool", i really do love me a good "rules be damned, i'll give you this awesome moment" call. like matt giving fcg the otohan kill despite what her hp was at or brennan giving cerrit an extra mage slayer reaction attack at the end of calamity. honestly, if anything, i think the fact they mostly play by the book makes these moments even better because it really has that extra weight towards those decisions to put the rules aside.

[jadenvargen]

nobody asked but the how to draw manga books that raised me cause i didnt have the blue one raise your hands up

[csquare]

Needed a serotonin boost so I commissioned @heeeygracie for a bit of Red Daughter fun. As usual, Gracie knocked it out of the park — look at her ☺️

[cartoonsinthemorning]

Today it's Jan the 4th, my Birthday! This is my present. Let me tell you why I decided to draw it. I know MTMTE fans think of Rung letting lose and dancing like a dork- during that party chapter in LL- as a simple gag. And I mean YEAH it was hilarious, but. You see. Rung also happen to be, canonically, an anti-fascist icon. A symbol of Liberation, freedom of expression and identity! GUYS HE'S SO DISCO. HE'S A DISCO QUEEN. I strongly associate that dancing Rung bit with the unifying force of Disco, of Queer Joy. It makes me so happy, you have no idea. Or maybe you do, because I went off with this drawing AHAH! GAY BIRTHDAY TO MEEEEEEEE~

[libelelle]

I love how you draw silver so so much do you have any tips

THANK YOUUUUU thats so nice of you 🥺

drawing silver was a lot of trial and error for me ill be honest, im still kind of figuring out how to do it. HOWEVER i do have tips : ) it will be under the cut because im allergic to being concise.

1.most important. dont skimp on the fluff. i know his 06 model looks a bit like he glued on yarn to his neck but its important that he is fluffy. to me

2. and more seriously, the toughest part to figure out is is stupid fan weed forehead quills. theyre stupid, they block half his head, theyre a defining characteristic and they make drawing his eyes a nightmare. for most other characters you can draw the eyes easy, but the way silvers quills work make fitting them and the eyes together really weird.

anyways my though process drawing them is. try not to think about them as separate things. its easy to think of it like being the eyes and then somewhere above there are the quills, but its eaier to get them to fit together if you imagine the eyes are following the shape of his quills

like this ^

they intersect. so the shape of the eye is influenced by the way his quills lay, but you can also use his eyes as guidelines for the quills too. they start where his eyeline ends, and they follow the shape of his brow on the top as well. you can start from the brow or the corner of his eyes, either way works, just pick the one that makes dinding the position and size easiest

from there you care use his eyebrow quills to reference the rest of them. i usually jump to the middle on next and use its position to judge where the last ones lay, cause those ones are kinda awkward

then of course you can add his little ears in. you dont HAVE to if the angle is awkward. his ears are itty bitty and easily hidden

all his quills slope back a bit, so they have a cute bend to them.

3. uhhh those 2 big fucking quills on the back of his head. they are weird to position because they are SO. LONG. luckily theres only 2 of them. theyre spaced out pretty evenly from each other, and there is a gap in between them. we've all seen his bald spot

anyways the quills have a gradual curve downward and outward. you can see it pretty well in that first picture, with all the silvers lined up. you can see it pretty well on the silver figure. from the front you can see them falling to either side of him

his quills kinda look like a starburst from the front : )

anyways i think thats the best advice i can give. dont ask me about drawing his cuffs or boots. they scare me

i am also figuring it out still but hopefully this helps a little : ) this also by no means a rule book, ive seen people draw him a million different ways and they all look awesome so experiment with this. have fun drawing him!!!

[lunarharp]

shirahama-sensei reminded me she has a thing for the teacher from pokemon s/v so i randomly went off on an au where qifrey is the professor. etc

[morporkian-cryptid]

Sometimes you get put down for being autistic and weird...

And sometimes your neighbours ask you questions about Japan because they're going there on vacation, and you write them a 14 pages long list of things to visit and cultural tips and vocabulary and a pronunciation guide (while knowing full well this is not a normal thing to do); and they read the entire thing and invite you to their place for dinner to ask you follow up questions, let you infodump about kabuki history and Shinto culture and sound genuinely interested in it, and they learn the Japanese phrases you gave them and ask you to correct their pronunciation.

Sometimes you find people who are genuinely interested in you and happy for you to share your knowledge. Sometimes being neurodivergent is a fucking gift.

[softpine]

This might be juvenile, but do you have any tips on not comparing yourself to others? (Especially when it comes to note count or popularity.) I’ve been posting a story for over a year and it hardly gets any traction. It’s tough for me to see new creators post and get hundreds or even thousands of notes. I hate that I’m doing this but don’t know how to quit it!

this is not juvenile!! i struggle with this myself, especially knowing that i hit my peak years ago and i've been on the decline ever since – but only by numbers alone! i'm more proud of my story than i've ever been, i'm more attached to my characters, i'm putting more love and thought into everything, but i had to be realistic with myself and understand that i'll never pull even half the notes i did in 2020. gone are the days when i would wake up to 3 new anons about my story and dms from people every day (i can't believe i used to get overwhelmed by it...) and i would be lying if i said it didn't make me sad sometimes, because we're humans and our brains are practically wired to crave the hit of happy chemicals you get from seeing the stupid number go up 😭 it does feel demotivating. it makes me feel less urgency to post quicker if i convince myself that no one is waiting for me anyway, which means i post less, which means even less people stick around, which makes me post less, and on and on. it's a tough thing for me to come to terms with in all honesty.

but it helps to remember that i would be writing even if no one is reading. and i know that, because i have! i've written entire novel-length fics that i've never published, i've written countless short stories in the frozen pines universe that i'll never post, i've created alternate universes that will never be shown, etc. i do it because the idea is in my head and it needs to Get Out and i'm kinda just a conduit for that. that might not apply to you, and that's okay! everyone is different. the important thing is to really sit down and think about WHY you write and what you get out of it. which part of the process makes you happiest? what makes you feel a sense of fulfillment / satisfaction? play to your strengths. try not to spend your time doing things you think other people will enjoy and instead, spend more time on the things that make you happy. for me, i haaaaate editing and i always have, so lately i've been trying to speed through it a little bit quicker even if it means the final product won't be as appealing to others. (this is still a work in progress for me...) i have more fun when i experiment with different writing styles, which might not appeal to others because it takes longer and i don't really have a recognizable style, but i don't care anymore because i'm having fun! ask yourself what YOU want from your story, and then write for yourself and only yourself.

essentially what i'm saying is: there will ALWAYS be people more popular than you, and there's no guarantee that when you find the popularity you seek, you'll be able to keep it. so you need to find some sort of intrinsic motivation to continue or you'll just keep comparing yourself to others forever and you'll deny yourself the joy of creation! "comparison is the thief of joy" could not be more true!!

[spiritualseeker777]

[boxheadpaint]

how do i start coming up w more interesting character designs like urs. they are sooooo cool and i try to make a character like that but it always comes out stinky

if it stinks thats great

[highlordofkrypton]

Love the writing advice of posting everything you write I need to do that more often! May I ask for advice on how to get everything onto the paper? Sometimes I get stuck on the writing phase and the perfectionist in me won’t write it until it’s perfect in my head first.

Of course! I love talking about writing with other writers, it’s how we learn and refine our own processes 😊 How else will we know what works for each and every one of us?

My #1 advice is:

JUST DO IT.

Easier said than done, I know 😂

Until you put writing on a page, there is nothing to perfect. It’s just thoughts that you’re ruminating on. I like to compare it to having anxiety—for me, anxiety came from always trying to plan ahead for every single outcome to the point that it overwhelmed me.

The moment I realized that I was capable of handling any problem if it comes down to it, I was freed. I just have to get out and do whatever I needed to do. If something bad happens, we adapt. If it’s good, well, fuck, that’s the best outcome!

So, I started applying it to writing. Just start, we can go back and edit later. That’s the whole beauty of it. No one knows what your first draft looks like nor do they have to; you can rework it later, but first you need something to work with in the first place.

Just start, and write until you get to the end.

Other tips:

Even if you ‘perfect’ something in your head, it might not translate well on paper. Reading out loud helps a lot for flow, not just dialogue.

Get HYPE PERSON/cheerleader to help you push through! I never wrote a story from start to end before last October. I hated everything I wrote, but I hand-picked one friend to drag my ass to the finish line solely on encouragement.

Once you’ve practiced ‘getting it down’ often enough, it becomes easier and easier and your first drafts become more polished because you understand your style and flow better.

Try just doing. Often, when I write, I kind of go into a trance/mode where I don’t think, I just word vomit onto a page. Anything that comes to mind, just put it down. No editing. Keep going.

If your perfectionism is still blocking you, make a draft called ‘DUMP’ where you just throw all your ideas onto a page. Turns out, whenever I do this, an outline manifests and it’s a lot easier to get a really solid first draft.

GET EXCITED ABOUT YOUR WORK. Don’t worry about the quality, hype yourself up about your IDEA. HEY WORLD, I’VE GOT A STORY TO TELL AND IT’S REALLY COOL!

Most readers are not necessarily writers themselves, and if you’re writing fanfiction, the expectations are at zero for quality. Nobody is paying for this, and I’ve seen people who are more than happy with bullet points outlining a fic and the key events. Things that you consider imperfect will go completely unnoticed by people most people.

Imperfection is where the charm lives. Some thing that you might have forgotten or worded in a way that was interpreted differently might actually open up doors to headcanons, speculation and other beloved things. In my fic that I’m just posting without planning or editing, I got these awesome intricate comments about parallels and theories—none of which was planned, but heck, let’s go with whatever they said! It’s better than anything I would come up with!

Perfection isn’t real anyway; there are too many standards, each of them different for different people. Write what makes you happy.

A couple of the biggest observations I’ve noticed by just dropping chapters without a plan is that I’m a lot harder on myself than anyone else is, and if I’m having fun writing something, that comes through 100% to the readers. It’s actually what matters most. Your passion and your investment shows, and it’s contagious. So, go for it! Do the thing! Live your best life.

I hope this helps and encourages you! There is no right answer, only what’s right for you and gets you going 😁

[luck-of-the-drawings]

when i was in highschool one o my biggest coping mechanisms was drawing all the kids i hated getting killed and eaten and killed. and well. time is a slowly ascending spiral. you will find patterns.(i work as a blackjack dealer. gamblers are FASCINATING

[claratyler]

Dan: don't go for the hot blonde, go for the nerdy girl with the glasses phil

Phil: yeah, you share similar interests