#but I like it. also the tutorial at least the first time around was necessary to me bc the difficulty scales way up later on lol

[b4kuch1n]

Your swsh art always makes me want to replay the game because i love it and its my favorite pokemon game and every time i play another pokemon game i think of it how i miss certain elements from swsh. Then i boot up the game and im once again caught in the 1 hour 40 minutes hand held intro and im like ah- now i remember why i have been playing other pokemon games instead of this one. Happy (late?) birthday!

you don't want to listen to hop? you don't want to hear him teach you about type matchups? you don't wanna let him cheer u on...? 🥺 waa....?

[mister-qi]

Mr. Qi Friendship and Romance Mod: 4/19 Progress Update

It's a working title, I'm trying to come up with something less wordy that still will pop up in Nexus searches.

I wanted to be able to track my progress, mainly for myself, but if you're curious, this is the state of the mod right now:

Writing:

Heart Events - the 2 heart event is fully written (with blocking directions), and the 6, 8, and 10 heart events are outlined. The 4 heart cutscene currently has me a bit stumped; I have ideas, but nothing concrete yet. I definitely now understand why Sam's 4 heart cutscene is him dropping an egg. 14 hearts is on the back-burner as a little treat to myself once I get further into things.

Generic Daily Dialogues - about 1/3 done, probably the highest priority for writing. I'm leaving his vanilla casino dialogue as the two heart dialogue, and the vanilla Walnut Room dialogue as his four heart dialogue, with a few small changes. And, since it's me, I have more marriage dialogue written than anything else...

Day-Specific Dialogues - very few written, lower priority. Hoping to have a lot of these made eventually, and I have plenty of ideas, but they aren't necessary for the core of the mod so they're on the back-burner for now.

Gift Dialogues - all 5 generic gift response dialogues are written, with an additional 22 dialogue lines for specific items/groups of items. I'm also up to around item 530 in figuring out what item corresponds to which dialogue/whether or not he likes it. Certain item groups, like cooked food, still need more lines, however. This is definitely something that should be low priority, but also something I'm really enjoying working on. Some personal favorites so far are-

[if given a fish (hated)]: "Eugh, it's all slimy..."

[if given a legendary fish (disliked)]: "If you must give me one of the rarest fish in the valley, can you at least wrap it so I don't have to touch it with my bare hands?"

And I think that's pretty funny.

Art

Portraits - 3 new portraits finished: "deep frown" "glint" and "glasses-less". I'll probably be messing with "glasses-less" for a looong while; it's first shown at a dramatic moment so it needs to look good. Blushing portraits are next on the docket.

Here's "glint" btw, with a background thrown on so I can have a custom icon. You know I gotta make him do the anime glasses thing a few times.

Sprites - no progress yet. Walk cycle is up next after I finish the blushing portraits. Did you know he doesn't have a walk cycle at all? [1.6 spoilers] in the cheated Summit cutscene where he attacks(?) you, he literally just slides at you very fast. Anyways, I may also change his map sprite a bit as well, since it was drawn to match his old portrait and doesn't actually have the same color scheme as his sprites. Note to self: is it possible to make the sparkles on his outfit prismatic?

Maps - no progress yet. The 6 heart and 10 heart cutscenes both require custom maps, with the 6 heart one being a fully custom asset. 10 heart recycles some existing assets but will still need some custom stuff done as well.

Misc Sprites - in my head, there's a dream version of the 8 heart cutscene that has so, so many unique sprites. Like an incredible amount of stuff. I think it'll kick ass, but also that sequence could be done with a few lines of text. So, for now, it's low priority. But maybe in a few months I'll put out a request for help.

Implementation

Not totally sure how to split this into sections yet, as I'm very much still in the preliminary stages so far. To say that I'm feeling overwhelmed is an understatement; documentation on the wiki swings wildly between "an asset is a file in a video game" and "this is an advanced tutorial. Read these 4 other pages first before continuing."

I've started using Ms. Coriel's NPC Creator which has been good for setting up the basic file structure, but ultimately doesn't cover some of the more complex stuff I want to do. EDIT: Turns out it's completely outdated for 1.6! Had to throw out a bit of work, but I still learned from it so it's fiiine.

I think setting up his "schedule" will be a challenge, in that I don't actually want him to have a real schedule like most NPCs. Not to pull back the curtain too much here, but I want him to "exist" in both the Casino and the Walnut Room simultaneously, which is to say, he does not exist in two places at once in the narrative, just in the code. This will change after marriage, however.

My next goal is to set up placeholder cutscenes for each of the heart events, and then to implement the generic daily dialogues once those are finished.

Final Notes

God, this will be a work in progress for a while, but I'm enjoying it! Definitely enjoying the writing more than anything else, but hey, that's how it be. I've got around 70 lines of dialogue written, a bit of art done, and I've started learning how to actually get stuff in game. I've always been more of a designer than a coder, but it's getting there!

ADDITIONALLY I've decided that if I abandon this project for more than 8 months, anyone is welcome to request my work so far and use it for their own mod. If this blog hasn't posted in a long while, feel free to send me an ask or message! I may say no, however.

Ultimately, I want this mod to exist in some fashion. While there is an existing one, I have a pretty different take on the character and I want to share it with you all! Every line of dialogue, every heart event, every little detail needs to share something interesting about a character and their world. Yet, Mr. Qi is a mysterious guy, and I think some things should be left up to player interpretation. And I think it's crucial to be able to match his tone and voice to the vanilla game, while also expanding on his characterization. It's a fun challenge to write, and I hope the finished product, uh, well I hope it gets finished mostly, but I think it'll be pretty good.

Thanks for reading all this. This is largely just a stream of consciousness for myself, but I hope it's...interesting, or something?

[bitchfitch]

idk my stained glass post is going around again and a lot of people are saying it's inspiring them but they're still hesitant to start whatever craft has their fancy rn, so here's a dipshit's guide to getting from horsey to whale when you're starting out a craft

Step 1: skim a tutorial.

don't take notes, don't pay all that much attention to it, give it like. at max 10 minutes of your time. Just get the general shape of the process into your head along with any relevant safety precautions.

the point of doing this is to stop yourself from forming expectations. Expectations are the motivation killer. Strangle them to death.

Step 2: Tool time

You may want to start right in on a project, you might even have one in your head already.

Don't. Stop that, see the point above about expectations. Your first project is going to suck major nuts, it doesn't matter what you do, so you simply must plan to make your first project as nut-sucktastic as physically possible. Burry your expectations so deep in the ground that you will leap over them by simply faceplanting.

So here's what you do instead, gather the necessary tools and materials then set aside an amount of material that you are ok with just pissing away. just absolutely wasting. If you went right in and got discouraged enough to drop a project while doing it, youd be wasting the materials anyway. Might as well get the wasting over and done with Before it eats hours of your mortal life.

Ok, now pick the first tool and associated skill involved in your new craft and just practice That. Don't try to make anything, just learn the motions and teach yourself how things move or break or bend or etc etc etc. all the real basic boring parts that don't produce anything.

Then move onto the next steps associated skills and tools. Connect them back to the product you got from practicing the first step if you can, then the third and so on, so that at the end of this ordeal you too can have a horrible abomination you can pretend looks like a horse.

Step 3: nap

With that done, fuck off and do something else for a bit. like for at Least a few hours if not a full day. Take a nap. do some drugs, play a hentai gatcha game, fuck if I care man. Just don't do the craft. This is the best way to kill expectations: fuckin forgetting what you're capable of.

step 4: learn it right this time

Actually watch/read that tutorial now. like. for real. give it your full atten and take notes on where you fucked up and how you struggled back in step two. like actual written/typed notes. You're going to be focusing on those areas and having a neat list to keep thing orderly in your head can help.

at this point it's also a good idea to try to find other tutorials that explain the Thing, but have a different person explaining it. or tutorials that are more granular. like ones that talk about the skills involved in a single step instead of the whole process. having that little bit more detail can be a game changer.

step 5: visualization

Come up with the easiest and most basic project you can think of while referring to that list of areas you struggled. You want this project to primarily focus on those weak spots and give you room to practice and improve them. ok. and now scrape the top 10% off the project. Make it easier make it smaller, make it less detailed, find a pattern instead of making your own, whatever just simplify it that little bit more.

Step 6: just do it

actually do that project while referring to your tutorials and notes.

Let yourself fuck up. Let yourself waste shit. And then move on. Don't get tangled in expectations, or let your perfectionism strangle you. Look it in the eye and strangle it back, make your shit uglier just to spite it.

Skills take time to develop. Give yourself that time and don't let your brain issues take the joy of creation from you. It's fuckin hard, but you've Got to do it if you want a modicum of happiness in this hell world. the vibe is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy but done with pure violence and vitriolic hatred of what your own neurosis are trying to take from you.

step 7: aw shit it's a never ending cycle

repeat step 5, but go for something a bit harder, then step six until you find a new muse to start over at step 1 with.

[translifetips]

Are you transgender and scared of the future of America? Here is how you can keep yourself safe.

The results of this election are not at all what we expected or wanted them to be. While this is incredibly unfair and there is a strong likely hood that Trump cheated, we must move on. The government, and our country has failed us. The next four years are looking to be very dark for people of color, women, immigrants, queer and transgender people. These times are very frightening, but we still have time before things change. Trump will not be in office until inauguration day, which is Monday, the 20th of January 2025. While we do not know exactly what will happen to transgender people after Trump is in office, project 2025 is stated to remove protections of LGBTQ+ individuals.

So, what can transgender people in America do to stay safe in Trump's America? First, know the safety of where you live. Many states, even states that were red in this election, have laws that protect transgender individuals in hate crime laws, and how they regulate gender. Lgbtmaps is a wonderful resource to figure out if your state is safe. If you live in a state that is generally not safe for transgender people and moving somewhere safer (such as states in New England, New York, California etc.) is an option, you should do so now. For those that live in unsafe areas and cannot leave, you still have options.

If you are on HRT, consider stockpiling your hormones. Testosterone and estrogen can be purchased online. This site can show you how to get hormones online. IF you purchase hormones online, be cautious and do your research on the website you are purchasing from. If you can, use a prepaid visa card instead of a credit or debit card. Producing your own hormones is an option, but this should be a LAST RESORT option. Passing, though unnecessary in trans places, will become extremely important as aggression against transgender people becomes more rampant under Trump's reign.

For transgender men, consider binding using trans-tape or KT tape (around $5 at Walmart for the generic brand) instead of using a binder. Using tape is generally safer, you can wear it 24/7 without having to take binding breaks. If you decide to wear tape instead of a binder, watch a tutorial before using. Packing may also be necessary, using something as simple as a folded pair of socks can give the illusion of being male. Do not fear using the men's bathroom, most cisgender men are stupid don't know transgender men exist, let alone use their bathrooms. Using a 'stand to pee' device may be helpful, but most men do not think anything of a man peeing sitting down (if you are questioned, you have diarrhea).

For transgender women, you can wear a face mask in public if you have traces of facial hair, this can also help to disguise your voice. Tucking generally will make or break your passing, but you can wear loose clothing such as skirts and dresses as an alternative. Since I am not a transgender woman, I don't have all of the tips and tricks that transgender women might have, if you have specific questions for passing in female spaces there are resources such as the mtf subreddit where you can get advice from people who are in the same place you are.

This is also the time to change your name, and if possible, your sex, on your id and birth certificate. Changing your name is a relatively easy process in most states, and most states do not require publication of name change statements. Your state's government website should have information about how you can change your name. In 2022 and living in Massachusetts, it took me just a few days for my name change to be finalized, though this will differ based on where you live.

If you live in one of the twenty-five states that allows it, you can even amend your birth certificate to show your preferred sex without even having sex reassignment surgery! This process, at least for me, was somewhat of a lengthy process but the result is your future employers never needing to know that you are transgender. Most cisgender people do not even know that this is an option. This will be easiest for people who have a diagnosis of gender dysphoria from a doctor, but if you are on HRT, you already have that. Specific states have different laws and processes, so be sure to check your state's government website for what you need and how to go about it. I underwent this process in Massachusetts, so if you have any questions about how this looks in Massachusetts, send me a message.

Most states allow gender markers on IDs to be changed, some even allow an 'X' to be marked instead of 'M' or 'F'.

Overall, be safe and careful. These are just tips on what you can do now while things are still safe. There is no telling what the future will hold, but we can control the present. To all of my trans siblings, we will get through this. The world is a better place with you in it. Do not let them take away your identity. Be there for your friends. If anyone needs help or just someone to talk to, my inbox is open.

If you are struggling crisis lines are available: Call 988- Suicide and crisis lifeline

Text 'TALK' to 741-741- Crisis text line

Call 1-866-488-7386- Trevor Project lifeline

Text START to 678-678- Trevor Project text line

Call 1-877-360-LGBT (5428)- LGBT crisis lifeline

Call 1-877-565-8860- Trans lifeline

[love-medusanon]

One more post from my recent Hornet cosplay, this time the wip/progress pics when sewing Hornet's cloak!

This was a bit daunting as I had never tackled anything so large before - my prior sewing experience was more accessories, belts, bows, stuffed tails, that sort of thing, and not full outfits! I had a couple ideas in mind for her cloak, (boning, petticoat, ballgown panels, etc) but ultimately ended up going for a double circle skirt with horsehair as it seemed like the easiest option for my sewing skill, while giving the perfect flowy look!

I decided on using duchess satin because obviously Hornet is a princess and deserves nice fabric ♥️ it was quite heavy but I think it ended working out well as the weight gave it some solid structure! I used a crimson satin for the outside, and chose to line it with black satin - that step maaay not have been necessary, but I think it made the overall cosplay look much sleeker and cohesive 😅

I drafted my pattern with the help of La Modéliste's YouTube tutorial and an online calculator, and got to work! I first cut out my pattern, sewed the pieces together as needed and then attached the horsehair first to the wrong side, and then folded and ironed underneath to give a clean finish. I then spent a solid amount of time hand stitching a catch stitch to keep the horsehair in place... this did take awhile.. orz Then it was time to attach the black lining underneath, for which I hand sewed a ladder stitch ALL the way around, 10/10 do not recommend, took me probably three days straight, but it meant there was NO ugly seam showing on the front!!

Last, but not least, I took some scraps from my crimson satin and attempted few different collar/cone shapes until I found one I was happy with; then used thick interfacing on one side to keep it stiff before sewing at the neck hole and attaching some snaps to keep it closed. I am still terrible at getting crisp corners, so that's something to improve on next time 🥲

I also accidentally forgot one poor lonely pin and entombed it inside the lining, and had to stage a rescue operation so that it wouldn't stab me at the convention 🫠

[zaptap]

cleared 15 more floors of side order last night and left the last 5 for tonight (i remembered that i beat octo expansion like a day or 2 before the first splatfest after it--the orange juice one--so i decided i should try to be done in time for this one too)

and i beat it! (some spoilers ahead)

first 2 phases of the final boss weren't so bad, but in the third i died once (from the stingray... i remembered stingers are the number one thing i die from in salmon run so after that whenever i heard it i just RAN. reefsliders also broke my armor once so i learned to be careful of those too)

and since i only have 2 lives i had to play it super safe the rest of the fight. after dying, it literally took me almost 20 minutes for just that one phase (i recorded my playthrough so i know exactly how long it took).

i'd swapped my special for killer wail at a vending machine early on (using dualies btw) so my strategy was just to continue swimming + inking around the perimeter of the stage and then point the wail at it and go back to running. i also had a swim speed up chip and that certainly helped. slowly i wore each of the targets down bit by bit until they were gone (and sometimes ofc if i felt safe enough i'd hurl a splat bomb--i also got those--or go in and shoot at it)

wave 4 was super fun but i let all that power (and the music) go to my head and almost got killed by stingray again (if i didn't have armor i wouldve been dead)

was a little surprised that you only have to clear 30 floors (i guess 40 including the tutorial) considering how quick a lot of them go, i guess the expectation is you'll lose at least one run? (and i guess i did come close to doing that)

it's gonna get harder from here though probably. generally i chose based on which color chips seemed best, so i ended up doing a lot of easier floors (and i quickly learned my dislike of splat zones extends to this version of them too, i barely made it through a couple of normal/hard ones and decided to avoid them for the rest of the run) (tbh they're still better than defending an orb. at least you don't die if they take the zone)

....but i expect i'll probably want to clear all of the floors at least once in the end, just like how i've cleared every octo expansion/rotm stage with every weapon even though that isn't really necessary. so im going to have to go through splat zone hell later. maybe that'll make me better at splat zones though (also i guess the hacks should make that significantly easier. all i had was one extra life and slight damage reduction)

i did do one rigorous floor, acrobatic_triangular.floor, and it was fine. as with a lot of things in this game the trick was to just keep moving

and now that i've finally unlocked inkopolis square i can work on clothing store badges again (having unlocked the gold one in splatsville recently). i added up the amount needed to get everything i didn't have from 1 star to 2 stars and it was well over a million (this was before fresh season added more, too) so i didn't have to worry about potentially not being able to put money towards the jelfonzo badges. but at least now i'll get them sooner

i do still need gold hat/shoe badges from splatsville (i have all the inkopolis plaza ones) so i guess i'll be running back and forth until i have all of those and can focus my purchases entirely on inkopolis square shops

anyway splatfest for the next couple days so i guess i won't be doing anything in side order until at least after that. i do have several days off in a row though. also i gotta do my taxes. also i gotta get up for work in like 3 hours goodnight

[demonicintegrity]

Painting and sewing are probably like the cheapest of the two to learn, provided you start with cheaper/upcycled materials.

Target has a good brand of paint which is cheaper than anything student or artist grade. Blick has sales often and a clearance so if you hunt you can find good deals. (Also sign up for their membership thingy, takes anywhere from a few cents to a dollar or two off almost anything I buy from there it’s great)

You can also paint anything. Super fun. Target has a brand of sketchbooks called Sketch that actually handles mix media very impressively. Blick has some cheaper but still good sketchbooks/paints/materials hiding in the kids or crafts section. Canvases can be expensive or bought in a cheap pack. Alternatively I love painting random stuff around including old pins, bottle caps, index cards, pieces of wood, etc. If you’re painting smth found at least sand it down first so the paint has smth to hold onto. (For small stuff I just use my nail file) you don’t always need to have a base coat of gesso/white paint, it just helps the paint itself be a bit more vibrant. So play with doing and not doing that, or even priming with different colors.

For clothes obvs shopping around for things to alter and fabric are the most expensive parts. I picked up a Jean jacket from a second hand store and started there. Embroidery thread is actually quite cheap, and a basic rainbow pack is a great starting place. I got mine at Blick. Make sure you specifically get embroidery needles. And there are million tutorials on YouTube to learn from. I know punks also use dental floss to sew on patches. Old jeans/shirts are great for making patches. You can also paint acrylic right on clothes or mix acrylic with a fabric medium to make it a bit more flexible and durable and nice to wear. (That’s what I do instead of buying fabric paint.)

Obvs a machine speeds up a lot of it and let’s you do more things, but for learning it’s not necessary. With normal thread and needle you can still learn how to attach a button, mend clothes, etc etc. Just be prepared to stick your finger a million times it’s part of the process lol.

The only downside to me having these hobbies: I hoard every scrap of paper, fabric, lace, and junk known to man I’m running out of cabinets save me.

I need a new hobby.. I either wanna start sewing, painting, interior decoration, or learning to build cool shit (like furniture for example)

[hickeygender]

You’re (Probably) Drawing Archers Wrong

Hello, my name is Len and I’ve shot archery as a hobby for as long as I can remember. I have a problem: fanart depicting archery is oftentimes Very Wrong! I feel like most of this stems from not using good reference pictures, and from a general lack of knowledge. So, I wanted to create a post for anyone interested in accurately drawing an archer! Disclaimer: this is not a comprehensive post or a tutorial on how to shoot, and is intended for artists. That said, if you’re interested in archery, you may still find value in this post, though I recommend doing your own research. I’m certain there will be errors here considering I do this as a hobby not a profession, and I welcome corrections. Finally, archery can be dangerous, and even if you don’t read any more of this post, PLEASE read the safety section.

Safety

This part is going to be a PSA, because the thought of someone reading my post, getting into archery themselves, and doing these things? It terrifies me. So, rules number one, two, and three are: never aim at another person (duh), never use a damaged bow or arrows, and never, NEVER dry fire a bow. Dry firing means drawing back and releasing the string without an arrow. This can make your bow EXPLODE. It can hurt you, and even if your bow doesn’t explode, it’s fucked it up so bad that you should never shoot that bow again. Don’t do it, and don’t draw art of people doing it. Okay, PSA done, now onto the rest of the post.

There’s a TL;DR at the bottom!

First thing’s fist: the equipment! Archery requires four things: a bow, a quiver, arrows, and protective equipment (which is usually what I see most posts lacking). The first thing you should do before you draw your archer is decide what type of bow to give them. I’m not covering crossbows because I’ve only shot one once and I also Hate Them. There are three main types of bows: longbows, recurves, and compounds.

Bows

There are two different types of bows that are commonly called a longbow: English longbows, and flatbows (yes I’m considering flatbows a type of longbow to simplify things). English longbows are very large and have a very high draw weight (which means it’s hard to pull the sting back). These were used mainly by the English in the Middle Ages. Flatbows are typically smaller and have a lower draw weight as well as a slightly different profile. These were mainly used by Native American tribes such as the Hupa, the Karuk, and the Wampanoag, as well as prehistoric Europeans and the Finnish, among others. It is often seen in historical fiction and fantasy, and the English longbow is usually depicted as Robin Hood’s preferred bow type. I believe Katniss uses a flatbow in the beginning of Hunger Games, but don’t quote me on that.

Recurves have limbs that curve outwards and are smaller than longbows. Many, many cultures have used these, including but not limited to certain West-coast Native American tribes, the Mongols, the Scythians, the Greeks, the Turks, the Koreans, and the Chinese. Recurves can be made of either wood or of a combination of wood, horn, and glue, making them either composite or non-composite. These are the bows you typically see mounted archers using, and are often used in competitions today. It’s commonly seen in fantasy, and is the bow type used by Legolas, Tauriel, Katniss Everdeen in Mockingjay, Merida, Green Arrow has a lever action, and Hawkeye uses a silly collapsible one.

Compound bows are the most commonly used bow among hunters, are almost always made of fiberglass and either carbon fiber or aluminum, are Technical Looking, and pack the biggest punch for the least amount of effort. It’s a modern invention used worldwide. I don’t know where else to put this, but almost everyone who I know that shoots a compound uses something called a trigger release (pictured below) to draw back the string because it means your release is cleaner.

So, those are the main types of bow! Google which bow would be appropriat for the era and region your character is from, or if they’re from space or an alternate dimension, pick whichever you think fits the character the best.

Quivers

There are two types of quiver: back quivers, like Legolas wears, and hip quivers, like those used in the Olympics. Which quiver you should use varies from culture to culture and time period to time period. If it’s fantasy, set in modern day, or set in the future, you can chose whichever you prefer.

Arrows

Arrows can have shafts of wood or fiberglass, can have real feathers or synthetic for fletching, and can have countless different types of heads. The main two that are in use today are called field points and broadheads, and most commercial arrow shafts allow you to freely switch them out.

The arrow on the top is a field point, used only for target practice, and the arrow on the bottom is a broadhead, used only for hunting or war. You never hunt with a field point, and never practice with a broadhead. Basically every fictional character out there is shooting to kill, so they’ll all use either a broadhead, or a culturally appropriate variation of deadly arrowhead (bodkin, scythian, flint, etc). Do your research! A Native American wouldn’t use a bodkin, and a Scythian wouldn’t use a flint arrowhead!

Protective Equipment

The one really necessary piece of protective equipment is hand protection. If your character uses a three fingered draw or a pinch draw (we’ll speak on draws later), they need either an archery tab, or an archery glove. If your character is using a thumb draw, they need a thumb ring. These three pieces of equipment keep archers from getting blisters and damaged skin.

This is a tab.

This is the type of glove that I use. All an archery glove needs to do is protect your three draw fingers, but it can be more traditionally glove-like than this one. I’ve even seen ones that are a combination leather bracer and archery glove that give big Fantasy Vibes.

This is a ring. Some historical ones can get REAL ornate and pretty.

Another piece of protective equipment that is commonly used is an arm guard or a bracer. Not everyone uses one, because if your form is good the string should not be hitting your arm, so you can get away with not giving your character one. They can vary in style from something like the more minimal one below up to a full leather bracer.

Form

Form can vary greatly and I’m not about to diss other archery disciplines especially ones I’m ignorant on, so just know that not every culture has the same form. I’m just going to cover a few cultures’ variations, and what I’ve been taught by 21st century Midwest archers. There are several aspects to form, as form is just another term for “everything pertaining to how you shoot”. I’m going to break it down into stance, posture, draw, elbow discipline, holding the bow, and anchor. These are not the only aspects of form (there’s aiming, release, and breath control), but these are the only relevant aspects to drawing archers. I will not be covering mounted archery because I’m sadly ignorant on the topic. I recommend doing your own research and looking into Mongolian mounted archery.

Stance

The thing all stances have in common is that you should put your feet a shoulder-length apart, balance your weight equally between both feet, keep your knees slightly bent, and stand facing approximately 90 degrees away from your target. There are three stances that are common that I’m aware of: squared, open, and closed.

Squared stance means keeping both feet squared up to an imaginary line. Open means that you’re facing slightly towards the target. Closed means you’re facing slightly away. I vary between square and open, and to be honest I’ve never noticed a difference. So long as you draw your character standing with a stable stance, facing away from the target, you should be good.

Posture

Your posture should be with your back straight, your hips squared, and should never have you leaning. Below is one of my favorite archery pictures, not only because I love Marilyn, but because it is a great illustration of what not to do posture wise.

See how she’s leaning back? Yeah, don’t draw your character like that, it looks foolish.

Draw

There are four different types of draw that I’m aware of, I’m educated on three, and I have experience with one (though I’m itching to learn to thumb draw). The types of draw are three fingered draw, otherwise known as Mediterranean draw, pinch draw, thumb draw aka Mongolian draw, and Japanese draw, or torikake. I know fuck all about Japanese draws, so I’m not going to speak out of my ass on topics I don’t understand (if anyone reading practices traditional Japanese archery I would love if you chimed in!). I highly recommend doing your own research on which civilization your character comes from and which draw they use, especially if it’s Japanese because I’m not covering that here.

First up is three-fingered. This is the draw I use, and it’s the most common draw in my limited experience in the Midwestern archery community. It is common in Europe and the Middle East. It requires you to use three fingers, partially wrapped around the string. You do not pinch the arrow. Most people place their index finger above the arrow and their middle and ring finger below, though I’ve seen all different variations. If your character is right handed and uses this draw, draw the arrow on the left side of the bow. Lefties do the inverse, and make sure and draw a left handed bow while you’re at it.

Next is the pinch draw. I’ve never shot with this, nor seen it used. It was common in the Americas and for a time in Ancient Greece. You’re supposed to physically pinch the arrow between your thumb and index finger. Your character would need a full archery glove if you draw them with this grip. The release is supposed to be smooth because there’s only one point of contact, rather than three. I believe you would place the arrow on the right side of the bow when using this technique, but I cannot speak with certainty as I’ve never seen it done (again, lefties would do the opposite).

Last but not least is the thumb or Mongolian draw, though it is/was also widespread in Korea, China, Russia, Persia, Turkey, and the Roman and Byzantine Empires. In this draw you wrap your thumb completely around the string and tuck it behind your other fingers. You do not grab the arrow. This draw utilizes your strongest digit, and so it may be less strenuous than other draws. This draw is commonly used with mounted archery. If your character is right handed and using this draw, put the arrow on the right side of the bow (lefties, do the inverse).

Elbows

Another aspect of your draw that is important is elbow discipline. The elbow of your character’s string hand should not point up into the air. It should point straight back, like the picture below.

Now, the other elbow is important, too. Don’t draw them with a locked elbow, instead keep it slightly bent and rotated inwards, like the picture below.

Holding the Bow

Your character shouldn’t have a death grip on the bow. Instead, show it resting in the curve between the thumb and index finger. Here’s a wikihow article that describes the different ways to hold different types of bows that is more succinct than I could ever be. Ignore the crossbow (derogatory).

Anchor 

Everyone needs an anchor. What’s an anchor, you ask? An anchor is a fixed spot that you draw your string back to whenever you’re going to shoot. It’s necessary in order to ensure consistency, which is accuracy’s best friend. Your anchor spot can vary. I anchor at the corner of my lip. Some people anchor underneath their chin. Some anchor to their ear. I’ve even seen some people in Asian disciplines anchor behind the ear or almost above the head, which is incredibly impressive. Bottom line, unless your character’s archery discipline has them draw behind the ear or above the head, you need to have them touching their head somewhere. The only wrong anchor is a short anchor. If you can’t draw the string back far enough to touch your face, that means you’re either trying to draw back a bow with too high a poundage, or the draw length is too short for you. The picture above of the person with the compound trigger release has a good anchor point on their face. The picture of the person with the arm guard has a good anchor point under their chin.

This person, on the other hand? Their anchor is out in space, that is to say they don’t have one (also their elbow discipline, posture, and stance are atrocious). I see this in fanart ALL THE TIME. It’s a pet peeve of mine. Don’t do this, have them anchor to their head or behind it somewhere.

Carrying The Bow

The best way is to just carry it in your hand by the bow (not the string). You can give your character a bow sling, or a back mount like Legolas has as well. You can slip the string over your shoulder and wear it across your back in a pinch, though this may damage the string. The only really wrong way to carry a bow is by the string, though you can damage your bow carrying it on your back if you’re stupid, and I’ve never tried to do so with a compound. Too pokey.

TL;DR

If you’re drawing a fantasy character, go buck wild. Still make sure to give them the right type of arrowhead, hand protection of some sort, a strong stance (no kneeling or sitting), good posture, a sensible draw, elbow discipline, an anchor point (don’t be like the person above!), and a good way to carry their bow, but you can have fun with the rest. If you’re drawing a character from history, research the archery discipline they would most likely use, and draw them with the appropriate bow type, quiver, arrows, protective equipment, stance, posture, draw, elbow discipline, anchor, and bow carry.

[ashbelero]

AKA a tutorial on color theory and skin tone that you shouldn’t have had to hear from a pasty white guy.

I’m not here to talk about what brought me to do this tutorial. I’m just giving my thoughts on color theory, basically, because most of these examples, WHILE TOTALLY VALID, use other pictures as reference points to pick out color. That’s not even necessary all the time, so I’m showing how I choose skin color from the wheel itself.

We’ll be using this sneak preview of Mammon from Obey Me! with piercings, which will be appearing on my Patreon soon. I am literally willing to give you guys exclusive preview content to make this point.

For simplicity’s sake, I went ahead and gave Mammon a base coloring just to give us an area to paint in. Look at that sad, gray skin. He’s so sad. Why would you do this?

I’ll start with what I think the biggest problem is. Here’s a selection of skin tones I use for white or asian-coded characters. Some of these are color-picks from Belphie and Beel, as they’re in my palette currently, along with the tones I use for Matteo. We can see that those colors tend to be clustered towards the white corner and the top of the color scale.

I theorize that when people want to make a skin tone darker, what they’re doing is either using black and gray as their shaders, or simply dragging the color selection down towards the bottom, the black side of the color picker. But that side is also where colors are their least saturated.

Skin tone is determined by melanin concentration. Melanin isn’t a different color for different people - it’s simply more concentrated in some tones than in others. So when we’re choosing a darker skin tone, what we have to do is move down into more concentrated and saturated colors.

Here I’ve selected a few shades of “pale” skin and concentrated them to show a variety of shades and colors that can appear in normal skin tone. You may want to compare shades with the ethnicity you’re portraying before you select your midtone for that character.

The purple tones I’ve selected at the bottom are uncommon, but can often appear in the skin tones of people with extremely dark coloration, which can sometimes suggest an almost violet hue. I think that’s awesome and I implore people to explore reference pictures and models of all backgrounds to literally broaden your spectrum.

As an aside, I personally don’t even like the tones that are often used in official art of Mammon because he does still appear de-saturated in some, so I knew from the start I was going to be selecting my own color.

First point to consider: Never choose your highlight or lightest color as the base for your midtone!

What we want to do is play around with the base color for our model, and then select our highlight and lowlight tones from there. Once you’ve selected your midtone, it’s okay to slide a little vertically to get your highs and lows, but make sure you don’t lose the concentration of your pigment or you’ll end up shading your model with an entirely different color.

Below I played around with gold and copper tones for Mammon to determine the best complement to the color of his hair, eyes, and piercings. As he’s a fallen angel and technically has no ethnicity, I had the freedom to do that, but I’ve been trying to lean more towards latinx/hispanic for his overall aesthetic. (I am relying HEAVILY on other tutorials and friends who know better than me to get THAT part right. Once again, this is only about color theory.)

As a side note, #2 is probably the closest to Mammon’s canon coloration among these.

I personally use linear/color burn and color/glow dodge with concentrated colors to achieve my high and low tones. I used mainly a marigold color for this round, but I usually only end up saving the midtone color and using my background to determine the color cast of my highs and lows, so the highlights and shadows might look totally different if Mammon were standing in, say, a dark blue room with a pale light source... but that would not change his base hue.

Here’s the color palette I ended up getting after toying around a bunch. Just from a color perspective, I think this makes his hair and the gold jewelry pop a bit more while also making sure that they don’t drown out his color.

I hope this tutorial was useful, and if my BIPOC followers and friends have issue with anything I’ve said above, please feel free to correct me and add to this post as you see fit! Once again, this is only from the perspective of someone using color theory to determine these factors, and I am not an ethnic or racial minority in any way, shape or form. My opinions and views on this matter are probably flawed and subject to guidance. I suggested doing this tutorial as a passing thing and someone said that I should, so I did.

Look out for the upcoming “Demon Boys with Piercings” post available publicly on my Patreon for patrons AND non-patrons!

[southcodes]

Hi!! i hope you're having a wonderful day <3

for the ask game, 13- any advice for beginners? ty!

hello you too!! here goes some tips ive gathered over the years

be organized from the get go, otherwise you'll find yourself cleaning code before releasing something that you can't even understand yourself. some examples of what i do is: write the css in the same order you wrote the html, use comments as much as you can, name classes something easy to understand (ex. if you have an element thats the block of text in an about, name it something like #about-text)

you can always look at other's peoples code to figure out how to do something. there might be a grey line between getting inspiration from and stealing code, and the best course of action is to ask the original maker about it

back up as often as you can, if what im coding is complex/has a lot of code in general i usually back up codes every couple of hours, and most importantly: right after youve solved a problem

kind of obvious but google will be your best friend, even when you're good with code you'll always need help and google will give you a solution around 99.9% of the time

always add credit for outside resources cannot stress how important this is

make your codes resposive, might be a hassle at first but this is crucial. your codes should be usable across all browers and screen sizes to the best of your ability

foolproof your codes, have in mind once you release something, people are going to do whatever they want to do with it, for example: if there's an element that has a lot of text, make sure it still works and looks good whether the user is writing one word or a full block of text. it can be hard but you need to make sure that, when people customize the code, whatever they decide to add/modify wont break the code

write instructions to your code if necessary i suck at this one but it's still good pratice to explain how to do something in your code, or at least link to a tutorial that explains it

gather resources! bookmark everything and anything that you might want to use in the future

have a working base code if youre using your own base code, make sure its up to date. you can also have different base codes depending on what you need (ex. have a base code exclusively for when you'll use isotope filter, etc)

thats all i can think of right now but hope that helps!

[jeremy-ken-anderson]

The Executioner

Something in Bloodborne worth examining closely if you’re into game design is an optional enemy hidden away in an alley fairly near where you start. It doesn’t have some excellent drop, as far as I know, and being as I’ve killed it once it certainly doesn’t have an excellent guaranteed drop.

It’s also unreasonably strong. It has one grab that will straight-up one-shot you if it’s an early encounter. Most of its other moves will take half your health or more.

So why is it there? As a troll? Well, no (at least, not exclusively. There’s enough troll content in Bloodborne - lookin’ at you, jumpscare villager #57 - that we can’t say that wasn’t a factor, but there’s an obvious better purpose). It’s there as an opt-in tutorial, and it’s one of the best out there. Once you have the ladder nearby there are functionally no consequences to fighting this thing. You can just die, slide down the ladder, run past or kill one crazed villager, and hop into the rematch as many times as it takes. If you decide you don’t like it, you can walk out of the alley and it won’t chase you. Conversely once you’re in there you won’t have to deal with extra villagers wandering in - without the fancy boss mist it is very much set up as a duel. Furthermore if you decide you don’t want to mess with it...that’s fine. It is not strictly necessary to anything. But if someone responded to complaints about the difficulty of the game with “git gud” and you felt that was horrible advice because it doesn’t say how? The executioner is how. This is your training partner to get a handle on weapon range, attack timing, dodge timing, and the practice of learning enemy movesets. The executioner is unreasonably strong but not unreasonably fast, and as you dodge around it you start to internalize the tells and work out which of its attacks are followed by big openings for your own counterattacks. It’s in a fairly claustrophobic space, big enough for dodging but not for kiting, and it’s got some clevely placed coffins and carriages to make cheesing the monster by attacking it from beyond its aggro range difficult if not impossible. It also blocks, and unlike the “shield and torch” villagers, it’s a real threat all by itself if you attack into its block and get thrown off-balance.

The full package is pretty amazing. In one tucked-away alley is a tutorial that

Teaches you how to learn enemy movesets and figure out timing

Sets the grim tone for the game

Clarifies the importance of dodging over attempting to bull through and take hits

Lets you know the game is dangerous and includes challenges that have no reward besides the enjoyment of overcoming them

Teaches that some deadly enemies may just be worth leaving alone

If you’re on your first playthrough, beat this creature. Beat it before your first boss fight. I know I just said it’s not strictly necessary. But like many action games the amount your character levels up is nowhere near as valuable as the amount you level up. The items you find around Yarnham are how your character levels up. Fighting the executioner is how you level up.

[warwickroyals]

EDITING BOOTCAMP: WARWICKROYALS EDITING PROCESS

So, about five hundred years ago (or somewhere in that ballpark), an anon kindly asked me to share my editing process. It's been a long time coming because I've recently stopped using Pixlr (a free online photo editing program) and have moved on to 2020 Photoshop. I really recommend using Photoshop, it might be confusing or overwhelming at first, but I think it's worth it and ultimately it cuts your editing time in half once you get the hang of things. However, you can still use this tutorial if you're using GIMP, PIXLR, or whatever else. So, let's get into it (YUH)!

STEP 1 | ASPECT RATIO & SIZING

Alrighty, so what we have here is what I call a "raw screenshot." After playing around with multiple versions of ReShade and countless presets, I have come to the conclusion that I hate it. It makes my game slower, switching between filters is a pain and they just get in the way. But this is just my opinion, there are some very pretty ReShade filters out there, I just don't think they're necessary for a pretty screenshot.

When I load up my screenshots they are almost totally vanilla. I do use Luumia's NoGlo and NoBlu mods, but that's about it. I do not resize my screenshots at all, they are 1600x900 by default. However, one of the first things I do is add an aspect ratio (those two black bars you see at the top and bottom of the image) to give it a more "cinematic" feel.

I do this by adding a background layer and resizing the width from 900 to 1020. With the untouched screenshot in the centre, there should be two bars above and beneath it that are 60 px wide. I then colour the background layer black with the paint bucket tool. BOOM. Aspect ratio. Technically my edited posts are 1600x1020 when edited, but the screenshot remains 1600x900.

STEP 2 | PSD/PHOTOSHOP ACTIONS

The next step is for me to add my PSD. Think of it as your own personalized filter that changes how your screenshots will look. What your PSD does to your images is really just based on personal taste. For me, I love a rich screenshot with lots of contrast and strong blacks and more dramatic shadows. So, that's what my PSD does!

Your own PSD might look totally different for you. Maybe you what a lot of brightness, with warmer undertones, and lots of bloom. It's totally up to you! I recommend you play around with Photoshop's setting until you find an aesthetic that suits your own taste.

You can also download some Sims 4 PSDs and Photoshop actions from other creators. I really recommend those from @/intravertt here on Tumblr. They make ReShade presets, PSDs, and have a variety of other resources that are stunning.

Here's what my PSD looks like.

STEP 3 | SHADOWS AND HIGHLIGHTS, BRIGHTNESS, AND SHARPNESS

After adding my PSD I do some further edits to change how my screenshot looks. Because the shadows are so overwhelming, I add some highlights and might tweak with the exposure just to make sure nothing is too dark/under-exposed. I sometimes draw in some light shadows, but this is quite time-consuming so I don't most of the time. I also add a bit of sharpness to make certain details stick out some more. If the screenshot is taken outside, I will add some vibrance just to regain some warmth and make it look like my characters are in the sun.

Like PSD what you chose to edit, and how, it 100% up to you and what you what to achieve from your screenshots. I again recommend playing around with different settings to find something that works for you.

STEP 4 | ADDING TEXT

I recommend a text size of at least 35 pt. My texts are also bolded, outlined, and have a drop shadow, just so that it's easier to read for some people. Text tends to blend into the background and it's super annoying, so those elements help a lot. I also recommend using a sans serif font (ironic, I know, but I'm using a serif font exclusively for this arc for a reason, I swear). Also, make sure that the spacing is all good so the text isn't jumbled or crammed together. If your posts are word-y like mine (lol) you might feel the need to lower the spacing, just don't go crazy with it.

My text is centre justified. I write the name of the character who is speaking only once before their first line [LIKE THIS]. I start a new paragraph each time a new character starts speaking. To tell characters apart I assign different colours to each character, based on the order they are speaking in. The first character to speak is white, the second is yellow, the third is blue, etc. I recommend having some colour variation between characters' dialogue. Even if you have the name of who is speaking before each line, text of the same colour blends together easily.

Fun fact, I also often don't close off my paragraphs with a period or any punctuation (unless it's an exclamation point). Screw grammar, I just prefer it that way.

Here are some of the fonts I recommend, both serif and sans-serif:

Arial

Garamond

Century gothic

Book Antiqua

Josefin Sans

Perpetua Titling MT (this is the font I use in my banner)

Alte Haas Grotesk (My main sans serif font)

Can you tell I'm a author?

My loser ass legit has a list of favourite fonts

STEP 5 | BLUR/OVERLAYS/FINISHING TOUCHES

Adding blur to my posts is something I've just started doing at I don't know why. It's a great way to focus on certain objects/people and put things into perspective! It doesn't have to be a lot, but it does wonders. I just use a brush tool to go over the areas I want blurred. However, there are other faster ways to do this for sure such as cutting out and blurring the area you want out of focus separately.

If there are any clipping issues, like skin poking through clothing, I will go in with a tiny brush tool and paint over the skin with the same colour as the clothing's fabric. Sim's joints always look strange and jagged when bent (like the skin clips around a sim's bent elbow or leg, so annoying) so I'll often go in with the smudge tool with very little strength/hardness in order to remove that

Sometimes my posts have lens flares or little dust particles. These are just simple overlays I add with a layer mask + reduced opacity. You can find overlays like that easily online and maybe I'll make a post about how exactly I use them but we're DONE 'N' DUSTED for now. I hope this tutorial is useful for someone. This was fun! I'm totally down to do more in the future.

[rainbowgazes-archive]

I wanna start making music but I have no idea where to even start. I've never fully learned an instrument before or used like any kind of audio software really. Do you have any tips for getting started??

Here are some tips and hopefully I don't get too long winded with this lol

Playing an instrument is not necessary to make music, though I would highly recommend learning how to play one as it can usually be a great reference point if you're ever working with other instruments. For instance, I started out playing guitar, and was able to translate that skill to bass and to a lesser extent keyboard. Sweetwater is a good site that has listings for some pretty cheap starter instruments. Reverb is another that sells used stuff.

If you get an instrument, make sure you buy something cheap. Not because you shouldn't expect yourself to keep going with it, but because sinking a bunch of money into something is just going to put extra pressure on you to learn it, and the last thing you need when learning to make music is pressure.

If you can't afford an instrument you can still make music with a digital audio workstation, commonly referred to as DAW. Ableton is one of the biggest ones out there. it's very user friendly, has lots of documentation and plenty of tutorials on youtube. Reaper is rather barebones DAW and has a somewhat steep learning curve but it's got a really long trial and a really cheap license and it's highly modular. It also has tons of tutorials and documentation. Couple others I can think of are FL Studio, Cubase. You'll want to look around and see what looks appealing to use.

If you do end up learning an instrument, there are plenty of places online and on youtube that can give you scales and whatnot to practice.

You're probably gonna start out making stuff that sounds kinda wonky. It will sound really off and it'll take a while to pick up on why. You need to be comfortable with this because literally everyone goes through this.

Don't compare your progress of learning and making stuff with other people. Music is not a race nor a competition.

The last tip I have might be kind of a ramble, but I've been teaching myself to play and write music for the past 16 years and the most important thing anyone should know when they start learning music is that there is no wrong way to learn.

A lot of people start out learning chords/scales, and things about theory, but I always hated the idea of learning that way. The way I kept myself going was to really hone in on what kind of music I liked the most, and how can I imitate it. And I don't mean perfectly imitate either, I mean at least just match the notes I'm playing/writing to the notes of the music I like the most.

When I first picked up a guitar I was obsessed with Green Day, so what I started doing to learn guitar was match the notes on my guitar to whatever I heard in the song. For the first 3-4 months I only played on one string, just sliding one finger up and down. And most of the time I'd just be playing the bass line or something, but through that I eventually figured out what a bar chord is, what it sounds like, how to do it, and just kept moving up from there. Not only was I learning, I was also kept entertained by getting to listen to my favorite music.

Years later, I still do that (on more than one string and finger now) and I'm able to play and write for multiple instruments. And that's not me trying to flex, that's just saying that you can start literally anywhere doing anything. Don't worry about efficiency, don't worry about being perfect, don't worry about getting something out there for everyone to hear as soon as possible. It's cliche as fuck but really, you just gotta enjoy yourself with it. Hope this helps <3

[goldrogerstits]

How to edit and color manga-caps

This is a tutorial on how I personally color and edit manga caps in photoshop. I’ve done my best to explain my editing and coloring process but English isn’t my native language so please excuse any grammatical errors! Anyway, let’s get started💛

Clean-up

First of all you need a clean manga cap to work with. Start by erasing the parts of the image that you don’t want to keep and redraw parts if necessary. In this case I erased the speech bubble and redrew parts of the sparkles surrounding Komurasaki. Try to stay consistent with the artists original style If you redraw parts of the image as it will be very noticeable if you’ve strayed too far from the original style. I recommend that you study the line width especially and try to emulate that! 

Then level the image as seen in this tutorial by @aldiwali​, by leveling the image you erase some of those grainy dots surrounding the line-art. I’ve also found that it helps darken the line art! When you are done with clean-up separate the line art from the background. I’ve already made an in-depth tutorial how to do that (and erase more of those grainy dots) so I’ll link that here: X. 

Once you’ve cleaned your manga cap and separated the line art from the background you can start putting down your base colors and flats!

Coloring process 

Start with a simple base color for the skin, I usually go for #9e7e7d as that will give the skin a nice warm tone once your done! Then make a copy of your base layer. Go to your copy of your base layer, right click and create clipping mask and color it with something more akin to an actual skin tone. Combine the clipping mask and the copy of your base layer, then lower the opacity to your liking, I usually go for around 85% opacity. 

This step is very unnecessary and you don’t need to actually do this (just a normal skin-tone as a base) but I do it out of habit. If you look at some of my older stuff it’s way more noticeable (see example down below). 

If you use this method please be aware of that it does tend to lighten colors so I don’t recommend that you use this method for when you’re using darker colors. 

BONUS TIP for when you’re coloring: Make a color palette! I try to keep track of what colors I use for different characters but it’s easy to get a bit lost so I actually made a little color palette as a reference for myself. That way I can easily keep track of what colors I like to use for a base and for shading. 

Anyways.... back to the actual tutorial! Time to color the rest of the image! Try to get some good reference pictures of the character/characters (preferably something that was colored by the actual artist) if you’re going for canon colors. I usually play around with hues for a bit before I’m happy with results! For example I gave Komurasakis red dress more of a purple/pink undertone to make it work better with her fan and the flowers in her hair. 

Try to divide your colors into different layers to make the shading process easier but don’t make to many separate layers as that can get a bit confusing! I try to divide my layer based on color and placement! 

If you’re not using a reference for what colors you’re going to use I recommend that you at least follow a color scheme. Try to find colors that work with each other but still contrast each other. A lot of people will be looking at your graphics trough their phone and a lot of details will be lost so by making your colors contrast each other you keep some of clarity! I’m not saying that you shouldn’t use colors that are very similar but you should keep the format which your graphics will be looked at in mind. 

Anyways now that we’ve colored everything we need to add color to the parts of the line-art that aren’t supposed be black, in this case we need to add color to the hair, lips, fan and dress. Go to your line-art layer, right click, make a clipping mask and then you can color the line-art. Your layers should look similar to this:

Make a base which you can work off later as seen below.

I usually color everything first and then I refine the outlines with the help of the eraser. Try to keep the width of the outline consistent with the rest of the line-art, otherwise it won’t be as seamless. (I did’t outline her hairline as it’s very “feathered” and I wanted to keep that feeling, but I usually outline the hairline too)

You don’t have to separate each color into its own clipping mask as that isn’t going to make any difference when you shade everything later. Now time to add the line-art to the hair! 

Line-art

I do recommend using some sort of drawing tablet to make your new line-art. It’s not that isn’t possible to do it without one but it’s a bit tedious to it with a mouse or touchpad.

If you use a drawing tablet use a brush that allows you to control the stroke weight of the brush. I usually go for one of the default brushes but I’m sure that there are a tons of fun brushes out there to play with!

Create another layer just above your manga-cap, this is where we’ll draw the new line-art! Try to follow the “flow” of the original line-art. In this case it’s fairly easy for me to see where line-art would fit naturally thanks to the way Oda choose to illustrate the “shine” on Komurasakis hair! 

Look at the area that I’ve encircled, it’s easy to imagine that that’s where Oda would have chosen to add the line-art if he hadn’t colored the hair black. If you can’t find any of these spots try to find a few references for how the original artist does the line-art when it’s in full color. For example I used the cover of volume 92 to get a feeling of how I wanted my line-art to look. 

Basically try to find what makes the original artists line-art distinct and copy that for your own line-art! 

After I’m done with my line-art I go back to the black base and fill in some of the empty spaces that were left by the artist for clarity. Like the gap between the line-art and the deep purple parts of the her fan. When your happy with your base and line-art you can start shading! 

Shading

(Before I start shading I generally color in all the stuff I left out like her eyes, makeup and the shine on her hair. I also decided to outline her eyebrows.)

Let’s start with shading the flats! Add a clipping mask to your layer and set the layer style to multiply. The amount of layers I use differ from color to color but I tend to stick between two our four layers of shading. When you’re shading use a color that is soft but with enough contrast to your base so it doesn’t blend into it. I generally use a color with a warmer tone to shade but the you can play around with colors and tones to add different effects. 

Create a clipping mask and set the layer style to overlay or soft light to highlight certain areas with a lighter color. I tend to play around a bit with the opacity before I’m happy the results. When you’re finished with shading the flats you can start shading the base! 

It’s basically the same thought process as before, just add a clipping mask your base layer and set to multiply! Your layers should look like this: 

And that’s it! We’ve shaded everything and we’re basically done! There’s just a few more minor things to do. 

Details / Coloring the line-art 

I like coloring the line-art as it gives the graphic some extra color. To add color to your line-art just do as we did before. Make a clipping mask and color the lines, simple as that! Try to use colors that are dark enough that the line-art isn’t lost. 

I did some finale clean-up, colored the sparkles surrounding Komurasaki, added som motion filters to that, fixed the background and that’s that! We’re done! That’s how I edit and color manga-caps! I hope this helps! I might have gotten lost on a few tangents so please feel free to ask questions if you need clarification on anything💛

[love-takes-work]

Very Cool Potluck

Did you know that some people are so dedicated to reproducing Steven Universe recipes that they’ll both put cheese puffs in their sushi AND willingly bring durian into their homes?

I will teach you the basics of how to prepare the Cool Kids’ Potluck and also tell you the story of how I got food poisoning.

(Sorry, Lars’ ube roll is not included, because it didn’t make it to the potluck. It is available as a separate recipe, of course.)

See more SU food tutorials!

I decided it was time to do the Cool Kids' POTLUCK!

STEVEN: (holds up Snack Sushi) "Who's feelin' lucky?"

SOUR CREAM: "I brought the soda."

JENNY: "I brought the pizza."

BUCK: "I brought the assorted fruit."

And Sadie brought paper plates to complete the set. Too bad Lars's Ube Roll couldn't join them! 

Okay, so we have a four-part meal. Most complicated of course is the sushi! We can assume it is Snack Sushi, which I have made before but didn't really give instructions. Steven explains pretty well but doesn't give you a sushi rice recipe. How about I just tackle this here and show you how?

Recipe 1: SNACK SUSHI

Ingredients:

11 1/2 ounces sushi rice

1 1/2 cups cold water

4 tablespoons rice vinegar

3 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 package nori (seaweed sheets)

1 avocado

1 bag cheese puffs

Mayonnaise

Hot sauce

First, sushi rice is made a special way. I am no expert, but the way I do it has worked fine for sushi in the past. First you measure out your 11.5 ounces of rice and put it in a sieve, then wash thoroughly with tap water.

Put it in the pan you will cook it in, pour the 1.5 cups of cold water on, and let sit WITHOUT COOKING for 30 minutes.

When the soak time is up, turn on high and boil. As soon as it hits boil, turn to low, cover, and cook 15 minutes. Then turn off the heat and let steam in the pan for 10 more minutes. You now have fluffable, tasty, sticky steamed rice!

Next, make your vinegar concoction. Combine the vinegar, the sugar, and the salt in a small dish. Microwave it to dissolve the sugar. I did this in a few 20-second bursts. It smells strongly but I love that smell. Make sure when you stir it, there's no sugar on the bottom! It must be dissolved.

Pour the concoction over the hot rice and stir it in. You are ready to work with it!

From there, it is as Steven shows us in "Cooking With Lion."

• Put nori on a rolling mat, rough side up

• Spread sushi rice on the nori thinly

• Halve the avocado, remove pit, cut in slices and rub a spoon around the avocado flesh to dislodge it

• Place the avocado slices in a line on the rice

• Place a line of cheese puffs in a line next to the avocado

• Roll compactly, tucking as necessary to get it into roll shape

• Cut!

You'll also need to make "spicy mayo" for the garnish. Steven uses hot sauce and mayonnaise. Mix together and squirt neatly onto the top of each roll.

"Who's feelin' lucky?!"

And that's the recipe!

Tip:

Use rice shortly after cooking. Refrigerate it if you will not be eating it soon after. Guess who got food poisoning from eating old rice because of this? CAN YOU GUESS?? 🤢

Recipe 2: PIZZA

So I've made pizza from scratch half a dozen times already for this show. I'm not gonna do it again. (Here's my personal Fish Stew Pizza recipe.)

Jenny simply brings pizza from work! So I decided to go the easy route and purchase a commercial pizza this time.

We never actually see the pizza eaten. I will assume it's the default pepperoni pizza and add veggie pepperoni to mine.

Baking in the oven per box directions as I figure out pizza boxes!!

Jenny's got four dang boxes of pizza on that table. I'm sorry, but I will not be preparing four pizzas. I live by myself and am not actually having a real potluck here. I will use comic book boxes to provide the illusion of many pizzas even though I am only cooking one. Shhhhh.

I actually used paper cutouts and markers to design my own Fish Stew Pizza box!!

Done! Next!

Recipe 3: SODA

Another recipe where I don't really make anything. I am just dressing up a bottle of Diet Coke.

But at least I made it look like the soda Sour Cream brought (termed "So-Duh").

Recipe 4: ASSORTED FRUIT

Oh god.

Buck, you clown. 🤡🤡 You went and bought various pokey-skinned fruits and forced me to BRING A DURIAN INTO MY HOME.

Folks, do you have any idea what durian is?

Let's just say it's known as the King of Fruits and it is SMELLY. You can't look up anything about durian online without related news stories discussing areas where durian is BANNED, neighbors complaining if you bring durian home, and tips on getting the smell off your hands and out of your breath.

I've bought frozen durian before to make Durian Juice Boxes. It was bad enough frozen. But then I had to go buy a FRESH STANK MACHINE at the Asian Market.

The things I do for this friggin show

So we have pineapple.

We have dragonfruit.

And we have &%#!%@ durian.

Durian! People! Do you have any idea what my house smells like!!! And they put it in a bag like that because you can't pick it up without GETTING STABBED! god what am i doing

Anyway.

There, you happy?

Here is my beautiful POTLUCK.

Add paper plates because Sadie brought them and now Sour Cream is thrilled he doesn't have to do the dishes.

Also, I'm sure it wouldn't be all that much fun if you didn't get a quick lesson on how to eat the weird fruits, even though the Cool Kids did not cut into them. Right?

So after I recovered from food poisoning from that rice, I put down a plastic tablecloth on my outdoor porch table, gathered an assortment of knives and plates, grabbed some gloves, and prepared these fruits for eating.

Dragonfruit:

Cut in half. Cut further in quarters and eighths. Peel the fruit out of the husk and store.

Verdict: I don't like dragonfruit. It tasted like weird, hurty watery kiwi. Maybe you should know I'm allergic to kiwi. This is probably related. I shouldn't eat this.

Pineapple:

Cut the top and bottom off and discard (including the bush at the top). Slice the remainder completely in half. Cut the core out--you shouldn't eat it. Then slice each half and slice again into manageable strips. Cut lines in the fruit and cut them off into a storage container.

Verdict: I am allergic to pineapple so I didn't try it, but it smelled amazing. I saved it for my friend.

Durian:

All right, stank fruit, here we go.

Cut the stem off and flip the durian to stand on the top where you cut the stem off. Use pot holders to manipulate because otherwise IT WILL CUT YOU. Examine the durian's shape and see if you can figure out based on its bulges where the huge scary pods are inside. Make a cut through the very tough husk and pull it apart with your hands.

Pods will emerge. They are soft and delicate, so if you hold them too hard they'll break. Each contains HUGE seeds. Take the seeds out before eating. Go around the rest of the durian and get all the pods out. It's a scavenger hunt! Store.

Verdict: The smell is literally not any worse when you open it. It is a very thick, pervasive smell but to me it didn't smell like a rotting corpse or poop or anything.

But then I ate a little bit and the aftertaste was really dark and musty. Dip a butt in tropical fruit syrup. It was pretty vile. I swallowed it though, and my mouth was Very Unhappy. I do not like durian.

I guess I'm 0 for 3. My sushi made me sick because I left the rice out for hours, I can't eat any of my fruit, and I reused the pizza to make a damn Pizza Steve.

But at least my life is interesting while it's being a disaster, huh?

At least I can still drink my So-Duh.

See more SU food tutorials!

[franeridart]

Anon said: Would you draw SukuFushi? (Sukuna x Fushiguro)

maybe? *thinking face* if I ever got an idea for it, why not. I find sukuna’s obsession with fushiguro entertaining so I don’t count fanarts for it as impossible haha

Anon said: I looked and I couldn't find if you've answered this already, so apologies if you did, but how do you draw your faces? I always struggle with face shape and yours are always super good with really expressive features! Anyway, thanks so much I love your art <3

HMMMMMMMM how do I do that indeed, the basics are honestly what you’d find on any basic tutorial about drawing a face (circle, cross in the middle of it, build the face around that - I really still can’t avoid that step and probably never will). As for the expressions, to be honest with you my way of going about them is thinking them up in emoji/kaomoji form first and then go from there. Emojis and kaomojis have to simplify expressions to the max since it’s such a simple format, right? But they’re still super expressive and convey exactly what they’re trying to say with one single glance, so using them as some kind of reference sheet has helped me a lot in figuring out what’s essential to express what I’m trying to say - still working on it though! I’m rarely satisfied with my expressions, they really do make or break a drawing don’t they............ you never stop learning, I guess!

Anon said:  Ahhhhhhh I just spent like hrs scrolling thru ur oc tag and they’re all amazing I love them so much but I keep confusing the everloving SHIT out of myself cuz I too have a child who is Leo and he’s literally so different from ur Leo lol. Anyway tho ur art is amazing and it honestly just makes me so happy so ty and hope have a good day!!

OHHHHHHHHHHHH MY LEO! It’d been forever since I’ve last drawn him, I kind of miss him............... glad you like my stuff, by the way! Especially about you liking my ocs, that means the world to me!

Anon said: hi there !!! i was wondering if i had ur permission to ur ur itafushi art in one of my edits ! i wanted to be sure before using it <3 total respect if its a no !! thankyouuuu

Sorry but I’d prefer if you didn’t do that!

Anon said:THERES A OCTOPATH TRAVELER LIGHT NOVEL AND ITS SO COOL BUT ITS ONLY IN JAPANEESE ! ;^;There's four stories with centered around pairs of characters and alfion is one of them !Idk if itll be transleted but i hope itll be cuz it sound awesome

OH I KNOW!!!!!!! I saw the art for the alfion one a while back, it looks so soft!!!! ;;;;; 8path is kinda niche as a game though, so who knows.............. let’s cross our fingers!!

Anon said:  hello, i am here to recc Skeletons by New Years Day because i think it might fit a few of your ships<3

Thanks anon now I’m emo ;;;;;

Anon said: bakubro gives the best hugs. kirishima is the only one who knows this. everyone is absolutely incredulous when the question "who gives the best hugs" goes around and kirishima answers bakugo. (bakugo thinks kirishima is the best but he benefits from kirishima bodily hugging him and he's biased)

Definitely!! He’s strong and warm after all, bet hugging him would feel the best.... the only one who shall ever know is kiri though, as I bet his hugs are only that nice when he really likes the person he’s hugging hahaha

Anon said: Hi! Just wanted to say that I absolutely love your JJK art! The colors and style are absolutely stunning.

Thank you so much!!!!!!! I feel like I’m mostly drawing for myself lately ngl hahaha so knowing you like it means a lot!!

Anon said: Hi!! This isn't a request I just really like your art! I found you from Pinterest on a kiribaku thing you drew! Your art is so cool! I wish I could draw like that!!! I'll keep looking for new art you've made :D

Aw pinterest.......................... glad you could find your way back here though!! And thank you!!

Anon said: This happened a while ago, but i wanted to say it anyway. I remember when I started watching jujutsu kaisen and I was looking for content arter finishing the first 10 episodes in less than a day and I found your first jujutsu kaisen post (it was posted that dame day) and i was like ???? One of my favorite artists got into jk at the same time than me!!! I just thought it was a neat coincedence to share! I really love your art too, you're amazing!! Happy New Year!!

It’s!!!!!!!!!!!! a pretty dang neat coincidence for me too, since it’s always nice to know at least some of my followers are still into the stuff I make hahahaha

Anon said: i think a lot abt ur art and how ive been seeing u since middle school and now im graduating highschool and we're still in the same fandoms, i hope this doesnt make u feel old but rather VERY cherished qwq

No anon this makes me feel amazing you’ve been around so long!!!!!!! I can’t believe you’re still here with my thank you so much for that!!!!!! I think I’m gonna cry a little here.......... ;;;

Anon said: Hi! I love your art so much!! 🥰 Have you read a KiriBaku fic called The Pit??

Probably not, haven’t been reading krbk fics in a while by now! I’ll add it to my for-later list, thank you so much for the rec!!

Anon said: can u believe that (sans sero) the entire bakusquad can be put into some form of punk/goth fashion? the realization was a galaxy brain moment for me. also realizing that tokoyami, kirishima, and tamaki are all varying levels of goth/emo (some more concerning than others)

Sero’s the hippie friend every punk friend group needs, he balances things out and that’s why he’s very cherished and necessary!!!!

Anon said: your bakugo drawings convinced me to finally start stretching my ears and tbh i'm extremely excited (i've had off and on thoughts of stretching my ears (again) before this so it's not as impulsive as it sounds haha)

Anon that’s so cool!!!!!!! I love gauges so much.....................glad I could give you the last push for it!!

Anon said: uhhhh, i love the style of that top left goge drawing dude!!

THANK YOU I LOVE DRAWING IN THAT STYLE THIS ASK MEANS THE UNIVERSE TO ME

Anon said: i sent the dragon!kiri and bakugo tug-of-waring over a piece of meat and honestly your response is exactly what i thought

Great minds!!!!!!! hahaha