#but i digress leave that artist alone

[merriclo]

i should tell you about the cishet aa server NDJSNSKS. the cishet aa server is a server run by this 1 mutual circle or whatever (i used to be mutuals with them but um. not anymore) and iirc the premise was that they had this joke au where everyone in ace attorney was cishet and they decided to run a server around it. i wasn't in there for long but Wow it was a uh. place. /neg. owner of the server was 18 and most of the other mods were 17 or 18 and they had a whole channel dedicated to mocking this 15 year old fanartist???? who they made the most ableist jokes about??? their anatomy (spinal specifically) tended to be odd so they'd constantly make scoliosis jokes????? there was a huge falling out and controversy in the friendgroup after the 18 year old blog runner harassed a 15 year old which turned into 2 members of the server who lived in the same country mutually cyberstalking one another and finding info like home and school addresses etc.

this wasn't the only unsavory behavior directed towards minors in the server i personally got some Weird behavior as well but WOW it was. Weird! really Weird!

∑(;°Д°) HELP AHAKSKLSLW WHAT THE FUCK where. do i even begin to react

leave the kid alone holy shit (T⌓T) that’s actually so weird to be kinda grown and still bully the hell out of a 15 year old. i know the age gap isn’t that big but the maturity difference is so insane.. like guys grow up and leave them alone??????? they’re a young artist????????? also mona lore i have scoliosis and hate most of those scoliosis jokes because it’s so hard to make people take it seriously bc it sounds so unserious. like how do i say “guys :( my bad posture.. it’s serious stop being silly” without sounding like a whiney little bitch. stop it guysss my back hurts :(((

ALSO THE MUTUAL CYBERSTALKING is that a common thing because i’ve seen that happen too in several servers. some people just get weird i swear

anyways. discord is a hellhole and cishet ace attorney au will haunt me in my nightmares

[wellthebardsdead]

Your daily reminder that no matter how much you love a voice actors work. They. Are. Not. Your. Friends.

They do not owe you Jack shit!

Where is this coming from? Another parasocial freak came out of the woodwork and began harassing Andrew Wincott. Carrying on about his social media manager and him sharing artwork on his social media of a Raphael & Jaheira ship art that was honestly beautifully done. Me personally I ship jaheira with minthara but I digress.

To the person who did this. And I know for a fact you’ll see this.

You, and other delusional fuckheads who behave like you are the reason why artists distance themselves from fandoms.

Andrew loves interacting with the fan base, as do all the other VAs. But freaks like you often frighten them away and ruin it for everybody but especially the actor themselves. They become uncomfortable, afraid, irritated and remove themselves from the space.

Leave him alone. In fact, leave any and every Va alone. He is not your friend, he will never love you romantically and no doubt your behaviours left a foul taste in his mouth.

He is a human being. Not an object of your deluded fantasies.

[edwinspaynes]

Another post pointed out yesterday that the Clave was so progressive in the 1800s and (especially) 1900s while being incredibly regressive in the 2000s-2010s. This is inarguably true. It also inarguably is true to real life when it comes to views on homosexuality. While male homosexuality was illegal in the UK during the Victorian/Edwardian eras, many (though not all) people tended to turn a blind eye to it assuming that everyone involved minded their business. (Oscar Wilde, for a relevant example, was pretty widely known as being a man who loved other men. He probably would have been able to carry on as he was if not for suing a powerful and influential public figure. But I digress).

Also, it's important to note that, yeah, the TLH kids' parents were overall loving and accepting people. The one who was not such a person blessedly died before his son came out. On the other hand, Alec's parents were in a literal hate cult. But once again, digression.

Because what I really want to talk about are Shadowhunter's shifting attitudes to technology and innovation. I would like to posit that Christopher Lightwood's death was the beginning of the downfall of innovation in Shadowhunter society.

In TID, Henry contends with mockery and side glances because of his drive to invent and create. This makes sense in what his son will later describe as an "arid warrior culture." However, while generally labeled as an eccentric, the Clave - including the Consul and Inquisitor - generally leave him alone to tinker and build. No one stops him. And when he finally invents the Portal, no one shirks it. By the time TLH rolls around, it's a widely-used, widely-respected part of Shadowhunter society. It's ingrained in the fabric of their people just as steles and seraph blades are, and we still see them widely in use in the modern day.

Now, we get to Christopher, Henry's protigee.

It's important to acknowledge that Christopher may have been left alone in part because Henry's Portal was so successful. With him primarily hanging about in the Fairchild lab, nothing could go wrong. Additionally, Charlotte was Consul, and she knew how brilliant her husband was. This probably contributed to Christopher's success greatly.

Christopher grows up shrouded in this love. He is free to create and innovate as he pleases, and he comes up with the idea for fire-messaging. We see him successfully invent fire-messages by early 1904, at which point he is tragically killed by Belial.

Fire-messages are the final piece of technology that we see invented before the TMI era. All other technologies in the modern TSC canon exist in the historical stories. Thus, we can conclude that Christopher's fire-messages are one of the last creations of Shadowhunter society.

(ADHD side ramble: I'm interested to see what Grace manages to accomplish, but I cannot think of something in the modern TMIverse that she may have created. I imagine that her status as not only a woman but a widely-disliked social pariah held her back. Hate it, but my point stands. I hope she's at least given a small amount of credit for the final touches on the fire-messages.)

Anyway, fast forward to 2012. The TSCverse now has another brilliant neurodivergent mind in Tiberius Nero Blackthorn. Of course, he is extremely different from Henry and Christopher. He is more mentally present, serious-minded, and a lot less spacey. But he also views things in a significantly different way than other Shadowhunters do, finding himself drawn to technology like computers in a way that most Nephilim would shirk.

Ty and his family are forced to keep the fact that they have computers in the Institute a secret. This is likely in part because mundanes invented them, but it also feels inconsistent with previous generations. Shadowhunters of old appreciated art; Jem and Alastair were openly musicians, for example. Matthew is an obvious aesthete with a penchant for the theatre and artistic pursuits. Even when Alastair notes that they aren't supposed to like mundane things like moving pictures, he does not seem worried about facing repercussions for seeing one. Ty and the other Blackthorns seem to think that they will see legal ramifications for having a computer, and this is in a world where Jia Penhallow is Consul.

Could the Blackthorns be wrong? Sure. But it feels to me that the Shadowhunters of old would not shirk a useful technology, and the computer has limitless capacity to assist them in their demon-fighting endeavors.

The Clave closed itself off to progress shortly after TLH, and Christopher's death feels a likely catalyst for that.

[a-writers-blurbs]

A bit of a disclaimer ig...

Hi guys,

This is going to be a long post that sounds slightly rant-y & I'm going to apologize in advance for that. I am going to make exactly ONE post (this one) about this topic, and I will not be discussing it further or posting about it again. I will also not be responding to any negative comments but deleting them instead.

These are my personal opinions and [...not *trying* to sound rude, but there's no other way to say it...] a bunch of random people online aren't going to change my opinions.

My husband is an artist. He does canvas painting & draws comic books (think anti-hero dark horse). I paint furniture (kinda mini murals) & make chibi drawings. I've also been writing fanfiction since the late 90s.

That being said, this post is about AI art.

I get the controversy, I do. But I've heard this argument before, when fanfiction became more popularized. The whole "You're just stealing someone else's work & changing it up to call it your own" is (at its core) the same argument against AI. The only difference is that instead of you yourself changing it, you're allowing a machine to do it.

But I digress...

Over the last week, I have received several messages about my use of AI art. First & foremost, my stuff is appropriately tagged as AI.

Second, I don't sell or advertise these pictures in any way. In fact, none of them have been posted anywhere but here (as of 6/1/24).

Third, and probably most important, I DONT MAKE THEM FOR YALL. Fanfiction & fanart are a HOBBY. It is something that I do because I enjoy it and it destresses me. I DO NOT do it, hoping I'll get 1000s of followers, views, likes, etc. Every story I write, I print & bind for my library. I will now be doing the same with my AI pictures.

I have a condition that has a symptom called Maladaptive Daydreaming. Because of this, my head is full of an alarming amount of excruciatingly detailed & unrealistic scenarios and images. (To the point that it affects my everyday life).

I can't necessarily recreate the images in my mind without help & the only way to get rid of the random scenarios is to write them out. So I do write them. And now I use AI to help me get a BASE image. I do still go in myself and edit/redraw parts of each generated image to fit them to the characters I want them to represent. I do thus using digital art.

Granted, there's a whole other group of people that think digital art isn't real art... but that's a discussion for another day. Anyway...

TLDR:

I use AI art & will continue to despite some people's dislike. I will continue to delete any and all comments left publicly that are malicious, rude, or condescending. My stories & are are for me. If others enjoy it, great, that's freaking awesome. If not, there are literally thousands of other fanfic authors you can follow instead of me.

Again, I apologize, I know this sounds rude. But I need to be 100% transparent on this one. I am extremely grateful for every folllower & reader I have. I won't lie & say comments/positive interaction isn't a serotonin boost because it is. Yall also give me more motivation to actually complete a story vs. moving on to the next idea. But I'm not going to change the way I do things to appease someone I don't even know.

This is one of the few things I enjoy doing in my free time & have been doing it for 25 years now, and in the last 5 or so years ALL fandoms have gotten so toxic its hard to enjoy anything anymore. Last time it got like this, I simply stopped posting. I'd rather not do that again, but if people (who aren't even following me) don't leave me alone, I'll probably have to do it again, sadly.

But for now, hopefully this post will give people with different opinions to go ahead and block me from their feed. We're not going to agree so instead of wasting energy arguing, let's keep the peace & agree to stay off if each others feeds.

I won't judge you on your idea that you feel it's your duty to harass people over their choices & you won't judge me for enjoying something. 😉

Thank you for listening. Love yall & and I hope your day is blessed!

[the-outer-topic]

Are you a fan of the Conan movies with Arnold?

Hello Anon, thanks for the question! I like to talk (or write) about the things I love. The fist film is a good movie in its own right, but it's Millius story and vision of the character and, not Howard's. I dislike the infatuation with Asian things of the 70s-80s, you know when Conan is taught swordmanship by some Asian and he strikes poses with the sword to show off his muscles, but the more I know about Western swordmanship and see videos of reenactors reliving ancient swordplay, the more I dislike all that stuff that was cool in the 80s, ninjas , samurais, kung fu, and all that, and the more I lament that in Hollywood we don't get proper and realistic sword fights. It's either effete fencing with foils or exaggerated coreography with somersaults. The film is good but not great, the best part is the soundtrack is so good I recalled it and now playing it . Comics are much more faithful to the original movies. I don't really like Arnold, now that I think of it perhaps Dolph Lundgren with dark hair would have been a better Conan. I don't like Arnold much, I don't care about the German accent, as I watch movies dubbed into Spanish, I hardly can understand spoken English as it is. Arnold physique is magnificent, but he's an awful actor, even Stallone with his facial paralysis is better, and has improved with age.

I think the movie was a bad influence on artists like Royo. All his girls have the same face, all his guys look like Arnold. I also dislike the stereotype of Conan as a hulking brute who talks in grunts. Too much muscle, I think. Conan as depicted in the novels would have the body of a olympic gymnast and feline grace. Also I dislike the stereotype of mountain of muscles and no brain. Conan is no intellectual but he's very smart, cunning and articulate. Above all things, Conan is a leader of men, and in a world before the printing press, culture was oral. Story telling, verses , songs. Conan perhaps does not talk much, after all, his stories are action adventures, but Conan does not become king on the strength of his sword arm alone, he does know to talk. After all, the stories of Conan are supposed to be reminiscences in his old age, as he tells his drinking buddies his adventures as he recalls them as the mood suits him., Conan is not only a warlord that knows how to harangue his men, but he also knows how to haggle, cajole and persuade.

There's something of Howard the writer in the character of Conan.

Due to the constraints of media, both in comics and film Conan is always scowling, a tight lipped stoical, which is sad because it deprives him of his humanity. Conan is a sensualist, glutton, drunkard, lascivious, and emotional to both extremes of mirth and melancholy. What sets it apart from a mere hedonist is his ambition and thirst for power. It's not just that he wants power to have riches and enjoy the nice things in life, he resembles the Nietzschean superman in the "will for power". Conan wants to rule, to be obeyed, to conquer. In the end quite by chance he achieves his lifelong dream when he picks the crown of Aquilonia from the gutter, and finally settles down to have a wife and children, but then gets a whole new set of challenges and troubles. One wonders if Conan was a good ruler at all, considering his track record, of being ousted, overthrown, or giving up and leaving in all his positions of power he attains, course being a pirate captain or a bandit chief is more unstable than being king, but Conan t having taken the throne at spear point finds you can't sit on it.

But I digress, as I am wont to do, but hey, you asked!

As for the sequel, "Conan the destroyer" just a B grade adventure movie, without the epic and symbolism of the first one. Best that can be said about the movie was how hot Olivia d'Abo was.

No, I am not a fan of the Conan movie. It's good, but it's not Conan. I suspect that for most of those that hail from the 20th century before the internet, the only Conan was that of the Savage Sword comic. Of course the stories became derivative and repetitive after a dozen tomes, and it depends of the quality of the artist.

As for the original source, the novels.. I think I prefer the comic. Howard was a good storyteller, but the stories are pulp, and the Hyborian age as a fantasy universe is quite lacking and sketchy. They are readable, enjoyable, but not memorable. I think Howard was more suitable for historical novels , but the pulps demanded sword and sorcery so he had to shoehorn in supernatural elements and magic to make them enough of a "weird tale". Like Lovecraft, Howard lived at the wrong time. Decades later, instead of Conan, he would have been a best selling author of a series of novels of a Pictish warrior adventures in the Roman empire.

Probably you are sorry you asked. I wonder if anybody will read this...

[etherealascend]

hii it's unorcadox ^_^ how does your editing process work!!! like how do you choose what images to use, how to combine them, how to get the right "feel" etc. 👀 very curious abt ur answer

Damn, great question! Also, love your edits, Orca! (also a bit jelous abt your productivity, wish i had so many great ideas) So i present to you: a wall of text! (cw really long!)

So, many people see a great base image and then immideately get an idea of what they wanna do w/ it. I'm not like that, i ususally have an idea of an edit in mind, and then search for sometimes a few hours for a base image that may work. I have a whole tutorial-worthy process of how i always find what i need, but i digress… Most of the times, tho, i get something better than what i had in mind. I love this process, cause it's like tresure hunting for me. (ofc it's not always like that, just most of the time. Since i have a giant collection of base images i may sometimes use them). I choose my images based on the mood i wanna portray. It's always supposed to be looking kinda dreamlike and unreal, but it can also be creepy, dark, bright, etc.

When editing my favourite style of edits - fake dreamlike places - I try to make them look as real as possible, regarding color, lighting, etc, while still making them look blatantly fake regarding the composition, subject matter, etc. Ofc i don't try to perfect my lighting, since it can take away the feeling i strive for, so it's kinda based on my own feelings idk. I get really inspired by the surrealists' painting. Artists like Brent Wong, for example. Liminal spaces are already weird, so why not make them even weirder, by making the geometry non-Euclidean and subject matter impossible in the real world. Also unlike surrealist painters, i have a luxiry of making the scene like "more real" by combining actual photos in photoshop. Ofc people have been making surreal art w/ 3d programs forever now, but it still doesn't give off the same feeling real picture does, yk.

Uhh... what was i talking about... Ah, yes! I firstly make a collage, that i have in mind by this point, and sometimes it just... doesn't work out! i had discarded so many great ideas, cause they weren't turning out good. But if it works, i add shadows and highlights. I look at real liminal space photos and try to really analyze them. Like, what makes them work? the color, the quality, the blurriness? Then i add effects that works to my edit. Every edit needs it's own level of compression, sharpness, blurriness... You just gotta feel it.

Really important step. I leave my edit for a few hours, so i forget how it looks, and then return later. All the imperfections, things that don't work, etc pop out immediately. I read somewhere that the process of creating and the process of analyzing are two completely different things, and i couldn't agree more. It's annoying when you have a finished edit, and you really wanna show it to the world, but you have to wait... But it's better, than being embarrassed later that you posted something unfinished and you can't fix it now.

Ofc i make text edits as well, but they basically serve the same purpose and not that interesting to describe, cause process is the same just with a few steps skipped.

There wasn't such question, but i still wanna talk about it, cause it kinda answers "how do you get the right feel". Well, why do i make edits? Well, the world sucks ass (i don't agree w/ this statement for the most part, like friends are great, nature is buitifull, but then there are parts that just... yk...) and for me weirdcore is a sort of an escapism. I can't traverse dreamworlds mindlessly, alone or come across magical events in real world, sadly. But I can make them however i would like them to look and feel, with my characters (like deer), and my own thoughts about them, that no one except me knows. It's kinda like i actually've been there, and i took a picture. Or hell, maybe i've never been here myself, but those deer were, or invisible creatures, that are not in the shot. And i know them personally, cause i made them, they are a part of myself! And it really helps, and i'm so glad these pictures resonate with so many more people here too! I had been making these pictures without realising why for a year. I had some thoughts and heard dozens of opinins of other pople, but i hadn't had a full picture. And then a video by SuperEyePatchWolf about liminal spaces comes out, and i get it now, it was really eye opening, for me at least. It explains really well why we love unreality so much.

[paladin-of-nerd-fandom65]

Wow that as fast lol love the answers!

1: is there any modern comics that is canon in your universe? Like the recent action comics with the blue earth moment? Can see Chris having a problem with them for not being from earth.

2: would chris be the last Zod alive in your universe? Or would he be able to extend the bloodline with thara? Orrrr for drama/sadness, he ends up sacrificing himself to save his “real” family the Els.

3: don’t know if I ask this earlier, (except the duo didn’t exist question) what would it take to retire the duo?

4: maybe a nsfw question, skip it if it is, was there a plan to ship them together like a couple? Like how some ppl ship the super-sons together?

5: in their phones, what’s their family/friends contact names? Like just regular mom or mama Lois 👩🏻 for Chris

6: when taking a picture/selfie what silly face would they do?

1) Well as of recently because of the positive buzz about Beast World I got from a mutual or two, I might incorporate that with Chris and Jake no doubt being caught up trying to prevent Garro spores from entering into people in Bludhaven let alone themselves. Mar’i and Jake I can definitely see being wowed when Kory freed their Dad via luring the spore out but then crushing it with her teeth, preventing her from transforming while Dick was cured. I can definitely see Chris and Jake being there for their friend Jasper as not only is there the obvious with his Dad but also he’ll need their aid in preventing his mother Rae from being possessed by her dark self.

I haven’t been able to check out what’s going on in Action Comics so far (mainly I’ll pick it back up once Jon is restored to his proper age but I digress) but from what I can look up, the Blue Earth Movement are most definitely gonna be adapted as regular adversies for both Chris’ family and Jake’s too given their whole Human Supremacy shtick. Especially since in my own canon, Bludhaven has a sizable population of Tamaranean immigrants

2) In the future of this world…I can see Chris and Thara finally being wedded together and having a child or two together so neither Dru nor Chris would be the last of the House of Zod biologically speaking.

Though Chris might be identify as a Zod by birthright, he still proudly accepts his adoption into the House of El by Clark and Lois

3) I can only see them permanently retire once in their older ages when maybe their powers are beginning to dampen, they leave behind successors they trained for the ways of super hero work if they feel like stepping up, and the have fulfilling lives with their respective true loves

As for temporary retirements like you’d see if they’re kids and the like, likely if an internally traumatic and painful event in their lives happens with their inability to stop it or even moreso if it’s their fault somehow. Of course these retirements only last so long before the call of duty comes for them in form or another and don their costumes once again.

4) Oh No NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

No

I have seen how naughty (and in my complete honesty Perverted) fan artists and writers take that sort of ship and it makes me queasy, especially if they don’t even have the tact or foresight to age up the characters involved.

So yeah, no way I’m ever shipping Chris and Jake romantically. At the very most platonically as very close best friends but that’s the line I’m gonna have to draw

I don’t wanna invite those certain people to my little silly stupid fanon thingy, thank you very much.

Now…NOW if someone does ship them romantically in an age appropriate, family friendly, childhood crush with completely averting any to all intensely naughty and lewd acts, then I can respect them. Just not it for me personally

5) Chris;

Mom Lois

Dad Clark

Big Bro Kon

Lil Bro Jonno

Auntie Kara

Cousin Kenan

Jakey Best Buddy

Mar’i Big Sis of Best Buddy

Mrs Kory

Mr Grayson

Tim Best Robin

Cass Best Batgirl

Mr Bruce Wayne

Jake;

Momma

Daddy

Big Sis

Uncle Timmy Best Uncle and Best Robin

Uncle Jay

Auntie Cass

Grandpa Bruce

Chris Best Buddy

Jonno Lil Bro of Best Buddy

Konner

Mr Clark

Mrs Lois

Uncle Gar

Auntie Rae

Jasper , 2nd Best Buddy

Uncle Vic

Uncle Roy

Uncle Wally

Irey Sis of Jai-Jai

Jai-Jai

Auntie Donna Best Auntie

6) Hmmmm Maybe Either Goggly Eyes with their mouths wide open all crazily OR the Grumpy Cat look

Your asks are always appreciated here @pin-crusher2000

[chidoroki]

182 Days of TPN - Day 91

Chapter 91: “All We’ve Got”

Leuvis has a nice little quote at the start of this chapter, being “Humans seek happiness and hope. But it’s ironic that despair is what cultivates them.” Like.. he didn’t have to go that deep, but I guess that’s sorta the idea behind most sad character arcs. That aside, I questioned this panel at first, knowing that Yuugo survives this encounter with Leuvis by eventually running away, but it wouldn’t seem right of Yuugo to just ditch Lucas and leave him on his own against this demon. They’re best bros after all. But then I looked back at ch70 and it’s Lucas who literally tells Yuugo to run, so there’s that. Of course Yuugo looks far more determined while doing so in that chapter and not like he was just grieving over Dinah’s death, but I digress.

It fills me with great joy that it’s Emma who notices the disadvantage the demons have with their regeneration. She’s typically seen as the heart of the story but damn, do I love when her smarts are put on display.

I’m so glad that Ray realizes what she’s talking about too with the amount of energy such a process uses up. Leuvis may have a bunch of experience and knowledge thanks to his 1,000+ years of life, but that old age is gonna cost him during this fight.

If Ray can kick down a door down at Grace Field, then I have no problem believing he can kick a whole table like this.

Many movies and shows where guns are involved have endless amounts of bullets being fired off that you start to wonder if they every run out of ammo, which is why I appreciate that this arc actually addresses that concern by showing the kids pick up new guns & ammo (as Nigel does both in this chapter) and reloading magazines (demonstrated by Ray next chapter).

I know I joked about both these points before, but it’s still hilarious how far down Leuvis has to bend down inside the house and how we’re seeing far more bullets in these panels alone than during all of season two.

The more the kids learn about the demon’s weakness, the more impressed and excited Leuvis becomes. He’s almost like a proud parent, only completely insane and dangerous. I suddenly have the urge to see this dude as a human..? He’d be terrifying but sly and probably fancy as fuck all at once.

Palvus is such a good boy for acting as Leuvis’ eyes while his vision is still blurry. Not good for us but whatever. Also just noticed how that shot of Yuugo’s damaged the border of that last panel. I love when artists do things like that.

Player five has now entered the fray.

Favorite panel/moment:

I just really love that one panel of Emma. She’s so determined and confident with her strategy that it allows her to act fearlessly even with a demon charging right at her.

With ch91 finished, I’ve now reached the halfway point of this.. countdown? Challenge? That’s probably not the right word I’m looking for (since I clearly have no trouble rambling on about TPN), but whatever. Sorry these turned into full on chapter reviews rather than me just pointing out a couple random things to chat about, but this is me here, so it can’t be that surprising I suppose.

[master-jarrus]

We are back at our home church and there is a girl who thinks it's okay to flirt with my husband and does so in front of me

I thought I was being jealous and possessive and asked my brother in law about it and he confirmed that yeah she is and she actually does everything with the intention of "getting back" at him for "leaving her"

So I talked to my husband about it. He had no idea (not surprised I had to directly tell him I want to date him with the intention of seeing if we are compatible for marriage to make sure he didn't over think and think it was somehow just as friends)

But yeah I told him I trust him but I do not like that she is okay with doing that and considering I am pregnant and she all of sudden claiming that she was pregnant but lost the baby I do not want to be alone with her and I would be more comfortable of they weren't alone together and he feels that's reasonable

She also had a black eye that she is lying about how she got. I don't know how she actually got it but she is trying to claim she got it from falling and she has no other injuries or bruises (it also looks like an experience sfx artist took a crack at making it but I digress)