#but sure! you know better! totally!

[running-in-the-dark]

oh - when my nephew was here he also told me that my mother said medication doesn't have any effect on hunger.

hahaha that's so fucking funny, I'm gonna scream :)

(was just reminded of this because I feel like I'm starving. because of my new meds. when without them... I don't really feel hungry until many hours after I should have eaten.)

[thesmokinpossum]

If My Body Could Speak, Blythe Baird | The Godfather, Mario Puzo | My Father's House, Sylvia Fraser | To The Daughter Who Secretly Longs For Her Mother’s Affection, Lynne Shako | Storms from Jupiter, Wanda Deglane | DO NOT REPLY, @filmnoirsbian

[egophiliac]

I was wanting to try doing an art piece in the style of the signature spell poster art pieces you create. But I’m not really the best at coming up with a composition for such a thing.

Do you have a process for how you come up with the compositions for them?

oh, awesome! it is an INCREDIBLY enjoyable style to work in; I hope you have fun with it! :D

I'm not great at putting my thought/art process into words, so my apologies if this doesn't make a lot of sense, but I'll try! my first step is always to do a LOT of thumbnails to figure out both the idea and how I want to show it; not trying to do a real sketch or anything, just little doodles to figure out what exactly I'm trying to portray. (I also call these "garbage passes" because they're not meant to be any good, they're just there to throw things out. aha. ha. ...anyway.) I think it's important during that first stage to really focus on the idea and the layout and not to get too bogged down in the actual drawing yet!

I tend to save my final thumbnails, so I'll use 'em as examples (I posted the ones up through episode 5 here if you're interested!) (and, uhhh, spoilers through episode 5 also in this post, hopefully that won't be an issue!)

the main thing I try to think about in composition is balance -- not necessarily in terms of symmetry, but in where each element is placed and how much space it's taking up. remember, empty space is still space! it's also really important to think about the parts that don't have anything in them, as much as the parts that do!

personally, I like to divide things up roughly by both halves and by thirds -- there's a lot more in-depth info out there on why the "rule of thirds" in particular works well visually, but in short, our brains tend to focus on things that are placed closer to imaginary division lines, instead of in the exact center of an image. so even when I'm doing something that is very centered and symmetrical, I try to keep that in mind and generally aim around those for landmarks like faces/eyes (or...where they would be, anyway) and other focal points.

it's not a formula of "the character's face should be in this division of this grid" or anything, more like "our minds like to focus on these areas, let's think about how to use that", if that makes sense! and of course rules are made to be broken, art is lawless anarchy, and so on. but it can be a good starting place for deciding where you want to put things!

(blue - thirds, red - half)

and against the finished versions, because they do usually end up changing a lot (including the empty space of the border):

(...these actually lined up a lot better than I thought they would. :') it makes me look like I do things way more intentionally than I do.)

other stuff I just try to keep in mind is that our eyes like following arcs and paths, which can be a good way to guide the eye:

and frame and control the focus:

honestly, composition is one of those things I feel like I struggle with a lot, so I'm not sure how much of this is helpful or actually makes sense outside of my head. but hopefully it helps a little! it's all just stuff to think about while drawing and not anything hard-and-fast, so don't, like, stress out about making sure things are lining up exactly on the thirds or anything. again, it's more "our brains think these are the dopest parts of the rectangle" than anything else! take advantage of the cool parts of the rectangle!

NOW GO HAVE FUN DRAWING seriously though, it is always super cool that other people like this idea and style enough to want to do it themselves and for other/their own characters! thank you! ❤️❤️❤️

[gothsuguru]

Th....thinking about domestic!suguru who always makes his plates of food look good for his bb <3 whether it be breakfast, dinner or a snack, he always makes it look good in case his bb wants to take a pic 😊

this is making me feel so warm & soft bc you’re so right anon… i think one of his biggest love languages is acts of services and that includes making meals for his beloved! i think if you two live together then he’s absolutely perfected his recipes for your favorite meals, and if you don’t live together then TRUST that he’s toiled away in the kitchen with a stained apron, hair pulled back with wild pieces covering his face, and a small smile after he’s tasted his meal cooked with love (he can’t wait to cook your meal and casually bring it over one day — a small smirk on his face as he says “it was nothing!”)

((IT WAS ABSOLUTELY SOMETHING… satoru had to calm him down on the phone when he spiraled about if you would like the food or not)) (((satoru offered to be a taste tester and finished all the food -> suguru PROMPTLY bonked him on the head w a frying pan)))

BUT YOU’RE SO RIGHT!!!!! i think he feels especially honored and excited when you take a picture of the food he made because he PRIDES himself on plating! i’m talking abt he can do cute animal shapes one day and then elegant michelin style plating the next — my man has RANGE! <333 i think suguru ALSO has a notes app of your favorite food/snacks/beverages and ALSO an album of food he’s made for you/food you’ve made for him :’)

i think food is one of his biggest love languages :’) he wants you to eat well and bonus points if he can feed you with all the love too :’) if he fusses over you please let him, he just loves you so much & you’re too adorable 🙂‍↕️ and if you want to learn how to cook/already know, then suguru’s favorite activity/pastime is cooking with you :’) it’s very intimate and sweet, love belongs in the kitchen!

[ssaalexblake]

it’s also baffling to me that tumblr, home of the ‘why are white men Still being cast as the doctor’ for So many years now (For you know, like over a decade.) is somehow not appalled that they hired a white dude to be the next Doctor because look okay it’s okay if it’s This white man. 

I mean, I do not consent to acknowledge that they’ve shoved him in there under any circumstance, but my Only need for the casting of the next person was that it was Not a white man, otherwise i didn’t care who it was, so when they “announced” Gatwa I was satisfied (i am hesitant to say they announced it bc it was more like a tiny footnote than an announcement, oh the disrespect) and it took a whole seven days (it was literally seven days. Yes i counted. it was easy since it was only seven days) it was ‘actually sorry no it’s this white dude we’ve already had before did we forget to mention that???’ and it’s steadily gotten worse and worse. 

That This site of all places is not up in arms about both the situation and how it specifically played out is depressing, but also massively and darkly hilarious.  

Especially since i Also remember nobody on this site thought casting Whittaker was good enough but literally going backward to a previous white man is?? This is not even a metaphor about diversity getting worse, they literally looked backwards. 

But, yeah,  tenn/ant with the ‘what the future looks like’ headline is uh... Good???? Not super worrying and ominous? 

I feel like i’ve been dumped in some weird parallel universe by reactions to all of this on here like??? the whole way this was done was appalling, the situation is appalling, but i guess the bbc/disney should get a rousing round of applause for accurately judging that nobody would care about their poor actions if the specific white guy they cast was popular enough that next to nobody would care. 

( and to the ‘it’s an anniversary ep’ thing, they legit could have just set a couple of eps in the past. i don’t mean they travel to the past. i mean just say ‘hey this ep is set during s4!’ and nobody would care. this show does weirder stuff than this every second episode. and it would still be bad, but how they did it is so much Worse.)

[hotasfahrenheit]

I'm worried about you, First.

[Twins, episode 5]

[edenfire]

🌸💗 Day 3- Small Gestures 💗🌸

when you're in a hot, backstage love affair, it's good to keep things subtle😌💞

[longagoitwastuesday]

I just saw a Gojo-like guy in a store. He was eyeing those purple shampoos for white dyed hair, I think. He had the height and the round glasses and all. It was uncanny, truly like out of the anime. Never had seen someone pull a character's look as well as this guy. I was this 👌 close to approach him and ask him to read Georg Cantor, like a cultist stalker, but fortunately (for him) I was with my mother so I behaved

[monards]

everytime i find out someone has assumed i had a crush on them because i treat them with (normal) platonic affection i die a little inside. i fear people have unnormalized just being decent and kind a little *too* much

[vampyroteuthid]

just learned that one of the two people who i could call friends here fucking got married a couple weeks ago and the one other person (the one i lived on the same property with for 15 months) was there and even though i have seen her since it happened neither of them told me about this. and they have also regularly been hanging out without ever inviting me. obviously i don't need to be involved in everything but you never asked if i wanted to hang out even once even though i said multiple times hey we should all hang out sometime. ok 👍🏻

[shallowseeker]

ngl i love my girl anna but the reason cas was more compelling is that he was arcing into doubt

there is a better post somewhere but cas is confused about his loyalties, lending intense tension that fed the pre-existing themes

EDIT: all i'm saying is there is more natural tension in a person coiled/standing on the precipice than there is in the one already splayed on the ground

[manic-pixie-dick-girl]

Girl help a reply I wrote on twitter about TERF ideology got more than 10 likes and now my notifications tab is full of essays on how biological essentialism is feminist actually.

[cozylittleartblog]

Do you have any tips on drawing the Swatchlings?

frankly i am happy that i have gotten good enough at drawing these bird boys (gender neutral) that someone wants my opinions. anyway

i see a lot of fun ways to draw swatchlings tbh and i don't really know what you want tips on Specifically so i will just make notes on a few of the main things i think about when i draw them, most importantly: just make them bitches broad and fluffy, man. they're all canonically Ripped, but an important thing to remember is that they are likely completely covered in feathers! that's going to smooth out those muscular details, so you wont be able to see them, just the broadness of them.

my style is all based in gesture and shapes, so i use a lot of blocks so they look nice 'n sturdy. it's okay if you don't nail the anatomy on the sketch, i am constantly nudging things around all the way into the coloring phase trying to get the shapes right. frankly i would probably bulk out even this Example Bird if i were drawing them all the way. i usually add more fluff or muscle or chub or whatever when i detail them but the absolute bare bones of them is dedicated to blockie

i give mine these sort of vestigial wings on their arms to make them look softer, and i think about how feathers move and stick out on real birds to help inform how they'll sit on these birds, too. and i carry the soft, pointed feather shapes into the fingers so they also look soft.

tip for drawing Soft: don't get caught up making too many individual strands or feathers, soft things tend to come together in big tufts. you want big gentle shapes, not a bunch of little ones. unless you want your bird to look wet or scared in which case you're doing a great job and you've probably just drawn spamton instead

their faces are really tricky so i think of them as these kinda... non-euclidean semi-hollow pentagonal cones. there's five "planes" with the top two dedicated to eyes and the bottom three dedicated to mouth placement. sometimes you can see the far eye even though, in real life, you would not be able to see that "plane" of their face. you don't always have to understand things sometimes they just look cool, especially when characters are cybernetic birds made out of Magical Darkness. there is no rule about when to draw one or two eyes. it's just whatever looks better.

biggest and bestest tip of all about drawing swatchlings! very important! write this one down in your most favorite gel pen and Really Big! give them either tails, or tail coats. i don't care that canon has neither, canon is wrong. you can switch it out, even - my birds have tail coats as part of their standard uniforms but they can wear their real tails out on special occasions.

lastly, if you want to stick closer to a canon interpretation, i would not try to make the birds too unique, when they're on the job anyway - they like being coordinated! tasque manager is very particular about keeping them coordinated as well. but if you just want to have fun then you can make your birds as fun and unique as you want :) even though i draw them all about the same i personally love love love seeing super funky swatchling designs, making them different colors and species and such.

course summary:

make them Large. make them Fluffy. use really broad, blocky shapes and draw big, thick tufts of feathers instead of trying to detail them too much.

their heads are silly magic nonsense. draw a triangle and get funky with it. no rules, only vibes. if it vibes it stays

they always need some kind of tail or tail equivalent and i don't care what Anybody else says

if you want to follow canon, draw all the birds except swatch just about the same. if you're just here for a good time, throw that out completely and have fun with it.

[oozeandgoo-art]

everyone is sooo in love with vakori on account of le is so cool and smart and deeply pragmatic and is also completely batshit insane

[yuridovewing]

if i may say something a little contradictory to what i posted tho…. where the hell was leafpool during squilfs labour? shes not mentioned at all in that passage i posted. did the writers forget that she was also there? was she off running an errand or something?

[hella1975]

my mum: you've been doing really good lately. every part of your life is really stable and you seem genuinely happy, it's great to see :)

me, who's felt like ive been going actually crazy bananas insane for months now: yeah haha