#but the US version is all on youtube nowadays....

[franciya]

I love people under this tweet going "I don't care about watching Fraggle Rock because it's for little kids" and that's how you know these people mean it when they say they never watched it, like

There's episodes with "Main Character Funeral" as the title, seriously

And it's far from the darkest episode.

[la-cosmonauta-extraterrestre]

How to learn physics as an adult

I'm creating this post in response to some posts @un-ionizetheradlab made the other day, but I'm creating this as a guide to anyone this is relevant for. It's going to be a long post, but pick and choose what to do from this list based on what works for you and what your goals are, whether it's just to gain basic scientific literacy or become a physicist (or something in between). Also remember that it's a journey not a sprint, so it's ok if you don't understand physics at first (and if it makes you feel better, physics was one of my worst subjects in school and now I have a master's degree in physics). Without further ado:

First Thing's First

There are some mathematical methods you need to learn to understand physics; there's no way around this:

Vectors: This is the most important thing to learn for physics, how to use vectors. It seemed every mathematics or physics class I took in my first year of my physics degree started with an introduction to vectors, and for good reason. You can learn about how vectors work on Khan Academy for free.

Matrices and Tensors: Once you've mastered vectors, learn about matrices and linear algebra, and perhaps go on to learning about tensors once you're at it. You can at least get the basics about matrices from Khan Academy, but you might want to invest in a linear algebra textbook.

Calculus: I said vectors are the most important thing to learn for physics, but it actually might be calculus. If you have absolutely no previous knowledge of calculus, you can watch the video "Calculus at a Fifth Grade Level" on YouTube; it's a little more advanced than fifth grade level but can give you a good feel for what calculus is about. Once you've done that, there are multiple calculus courses available on Khan Academy. There's also a calculus course available on Brilliant, but it might only be available through the paid version.

Ordinary Differential Equations and Boundary Value Problems: You don't need to learn these right away, but if you want to do physics at the upper undergraduate level, you'll need to learn these at some point.

2. Learning to Think Like a Scientist

Some suggestions of apps and things to watch if you don't know much about science so you can start thinking like a scientist:

SciShow: If you don't know much science at all, SciShow on YouTube is a good place to start, I used to watch it and as I recall it's more focused on life sciences but there's some physics videos there, too.

Ciencias De La Ciencia: This is sort of a Spanish version of SciShow but it's more physics-focused. At least some of the videos have subtitles if you don't know Spanish.

Cosmos: If you haven't seen Cosmos (either the old version with Carl Sagan or the new version with Neil DeGrasse Tyson), it's very good and at least some of the episodes are available for free online. It's more pop-science and history of science than actual science content, but at least they make a point of using anecdotes from the history of science to illustrate how the scientific method works.

Sabine Hossenfelder: Highly recommend her YouTube channel; she's one of the most intellectually honest scientific communicators in the world nowadays. Her videos are a good illustration of how to think like a scientist. She also has a blog and has written a few books.

Brilliant: This is an app with mathematics and science courses that places an emphasis on problem-solving. Most of the courses are only available on the paid version of the app (but you should be able to get a discount on it if you're subscribed to any mainstream science YouTubers), but even the free version gives you access to a few courses, plus a forum where people post problems. I had this app back in the day and liked solving problems on the forum (no idea if it's changed since then).

3. Books to Study

If you're committed to learning physics you should study from some textbooks:

Physics LibreTexts: This is a whole collection of university-level physics textbooks for free online. It's an invaluable resource for learning physics. Use it to learn classical mechanics, electricity and magnetism, modern physics (but don't jump into quantum mechanics straight away if you're just starting out in physics).

Landau and Lifshitz Course of Theoretical Physics: This was the physics school curriculum in the Soviet Union; it's a little dated now but if you're just learning the basics it can't be beat given the excellent pedagogy. It's easy enough to find copies of it online, especially on Russian sites. Most if not all of the textbooks in the series have been translated into English, but if you know any Russian, the original is easy to follow.

Introduction to Electrodynamics by David J. Griffiths: Once you've learned mechanics, modern physics and some electricity and magnetism get yourself a copy of this textbook; you can get used editions on Amazon for a reasonable enough price. American physics majors are obsessed with this textbook, refer to it as the Bible, and for good reason.

Every Life is on Fire by Jeremy England: This isn't a textbook, but reading it took me back to my statistical mechanics class and it's way more readable than any actual statmech textbook so if you are interested in learning statmech, this book is a good start. It's actually a general reading book about England's ideas about the origin of life, interspersed with some parallels to the Hebrew Bible because England is also a rabbi. He actually has some interesting ideas about the philosophy of science, though they can be difficult to get behind, so if you're interested go listen to a podcast where they interview him (obligatory I don't condone the Kahaneist politics he sometimes promotes).

4. Learn About Research and Experiments

Physics is an experimental science, so expose yourself to some experiments:

Look for PDFs of high school physics labs online. You can find some for free and it should be cheap enough to do the experiments at home.

Read scientific papers on topics that interest you to try and understand what's happening today. If you find them difficult to understand, try reading older papers and go from there, for example, in undergrad I did a research internship relating to neutron stars, but I found some of the recent scientific papers difficult to understand, but reading the 1938 paper "On Massive Neutron Cores" by Oppenheimer and Volkoff helped me to understand neutron stars better. (When I returned to some of those same papers during my master's degree, I was proud to have understood them well.)

5. Take University-Level Physics Courses

You can take university-level physics courses without committing to a degree:

Search online for MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). You can find MOOCs on multiple sites about many physics topics, and they're often free (sometimes you have to pay for them).

If you live in the United States, you can take physics classes at your local community college.

You can enroll in online physics courses through Open University, based in London but you can take the courses from anywhere. It's expensive, but you pay by the credit so you don't have to pay for a whole year of tuition if you're just taking one course.

If you happen to have free time in the summer and the money for it, many American universities (and elite British universities) offer summer courses that one can enroll in even if they don't attend the university. These are usually in-person classes.

6. Get a Physics Degree

Getting a physics degree is ultimately the only course of action if you've decided to become a physicist, the recommended course of action if you're ultimate goal is a PhD in the history of science or philosophy of science, and a good idea if learning physics has made you want a career in science communication of science education. There's no shame in being a non-traditional age student; in both my bachelor's and master's degree in physics I knew students who were non-traditional age. The downside of this is that it's a bad financial decision to get a degree, especially if it's a second bachelor's degree, but there are ways to lessen the financial burden of a degree:

If you attend an American university with American tuition, you can usually get an on-campus job, though that's pocket change compared to the costs of tuition.

On the bright side, if you already have a bachelor's degree you can probably get credit for general requirements at American universities, so a second bachelor's degree in physics might not take long.

You can also do a part-time degree while you work at many universities.

Just some general advice, if you go the American university route go to a university with a Society of Physics Students and get a student membership in American Physical Society; you get all kinds of benefits like access to Physics Today magazine, scholarships, internships, conferences, an honour society induction.

All that said, it's difficult to attend an American university without losing money. For that matter it's difficult to attend any university in the world without losing money, but you can lessen that burden by going to a country where university is cheaper. There the limiting factor is going to be language; although English is the international language of physics and the medium of most postgraduate physics degrees around the world, physics bachelor's degrees are usually in the local language. Some possible exceptions I found to this, for those who are not fluent in a language other than English:

Apparently there are world-class English-medium physics degree programmes in France? I figure there must be some kind of catch given the way the French are about their language, but given the high research output France has in physics, this is worth getting into.

There are English-medium physics bachelor's degrees in the Czech Republic, and tuition there is pretty affordable (for the English-language degrees; it's free for Czech-language degrees if you happen to be fluent in Czech). I don't know Czechia to have a lot of physics research output today, but back in the day Prague was a major centre of scientific research (Einstein briefly lived and worked as a physics professor in Prague), so it you're goal is to do a PhD in the history of science...I'm just gonna say that there's an English-medium physics bachelor's degree programme at Charles University and you'd have time when you're not studying to explore the city and it's history (but you should learn some Czech if you're going to live there).

University degrees in South Africa are usually English-medium, and tuition there is pretty affordable. There's also a fair amount of research output from South African universities. (Though I understand not wanting to live in South Africa.)

[breoasis]

i hate HATE so much that almost every single social media app nowadays has a tab for some kind of full-screen short-format videos (youtube shorts, instagram reels, you name it) like, all apps are the same thing now, and you have no option to disable them

i used to have my youtube modded so i could disable the stupid shorts (because i have no self control and can waste over 3 hours scrolling mindlessly), had to return to normal youtube because the modded version wasn't working properly, but i will find a way to disable those again, i refure to waste so much time because every single fucking app is just trying to mimic tiktok's success instead of doing something original, mind consumming

[saltpepperbeard]

It's the entitlement that really frustrates me. David didn't create this show to fix all problems with representation, he didn't even know what queerbaiting was, bless his heart.

People keep saying "we were promised xyz, we were baited, he betrayed us" ( I wish I was joking about the last once.

He literally promised none of that. And he ows us nothing. Whether people want want to admit it or not, OFMD is his story. This happens a lot nowadays, someone makes something, the response is "well its not what I want ,therefore it's trash".

I dunno, I'm just angry at this point

HONESTLY. And I feel like that's becoming such a large issue that spans across numerous forms of media too. Like, from tv shows to youtube to fanfiction, the audience thinks they're "owed" something. "Owed" something simply for being there and consuming the thing. And it's like??? No??? You are just there on your own volition to consume the thing that's being provided to you???

*hands you a cupcake* "i don't like this cupcake >:(" THEN DON'T EAT IT???

And yeah, as you said, this is very much David's story. This has always been his story. He was passionate to tell it even before it got such a large following. He was surprised it got such a large following!

It seems like he's had a lot of things in mind since the very beginning, and a rather clear direction in which he's wanted to steer the story. And, based on his recent interviews and also very interesting meta pieces I've seen, the whole [redacted] was probably a long time coming too.

That's just the thing. I also feel like everyone just gets so caught up in their own interpretations and their own headcanons and their own versions of the story that it leads to almost inevitable disappointment and/or upset. Hell, even I'm a bit guilty of that; I looked too hard into that one article that described Stede's beach reunion dream, and thought we were going to get a makeout in the waves. And then when we didn't, I was like "oh lol 😀." Same with the little brief snippet of Stede pushing Ed against the wall that we got before episodes 6 and 7 dropped; I went in with preconceived notions which didn't end up getting met.

BUT LIKE, THE THING IS, THAT WAS ENTIRELY ON ME LMAO??? NOT THE FAULT OF ANYONE INVOLVED IN THE SHOW???? And it seems like people are disregarding that very fact! Like, oh I'm upset with how this went, so it's YOUR fault. I'm not responsible for how I'm reacting to this; it's YOU. YOU were supposed to bend exactly to MY wants.

And that's just,,,not! the case!

I'm over here piloting my safe spaceship, but what I've been seeing in my peripherals is making me sad too. Like, just the blatant disregard for everything else this show has given us, and the vitriol being slung towards the cast and crew, and all the negativity around what was supposed to be a hopeful sendoff...

People can be upset. People are absolutely allowed to be disappointed, or sad, or even angry. People can definitely dislike a narrative or character choice. Hell, I'd definitely feel some kind of way if Ed or Stede died, and I've gotten angry over narrative directions in other fandoms before. But just...the lines that have been crossed are just so so disheartening to see. You can be angry without being ugly about it, without pulling so many people down with you.

If people are that upset, I really encourage them to just step back, take a breath, and focus on other outlets. Because the entitlement and accusatory bits are certainly not it.

[rays-of-fire-and-ice]

The Music Goes On and On

Rating: K/General

Setting: in the decade before the main story.

Synopsis: Shinji is going about his daily life at his job in a music store, until he sees an old face from the past.

AN: the winner of my first poll! This was fun to write, so thank you to everyone who voted for it!

I hope I did Shinji justice here. He's a character I love, and I've always wanted to know what he and Visoreds did after escaping the the Living world and before they introduced themselves to Ichigo. I've broached the topic before in As Months Go By, As Season Change part II, but I wanted to write a specific instance of his life in the World of the Living. I had intended this to be more comedic, but well...it's me, and it ended up more angsty with one sappy moment.

In terms of research, I looked into Japanese 1990’s music and the workforce during the 1970’s. I'll briefly go over it here, but if you want to skip it and get to the fic, continue to the line break before the story begins.

For music, I mainly used information from this article about Japanese jazz bands, doing Youtube searches for 1990s Japanese music, and searching for what records stores in Japan typically look like.

The songs, albums, and bands mentioned in this fic are:

B'z: a Japanese rock duo who sold millions of albums during the 1990's. They're one of Japan's best-selling artists even to this day, having sold over 80 million albums. Sasori ni sasa reta by Kimidori Review by Glay: this was one of the best-selling albums in Japan for 1997, and sold over 2 million copies in it's first week. Casiopea: a Japanese jazz fusion band who have created over 40 albums as of the time of writing this fic. They've been active since the 1970's, and have gone through four phases with different band members; in this story, they're in their second phase. Light and Shadow by Casiopea Casiopea by Casiopea Yasuko Agawa: a Japanese jazz and blues singer. Before releasing her debut album, Love-Bird, in 1978, she starred in movies in the early 1970’s. This included the Bloodthirst Trilogy, a Japanese horror film trilogy that involves unconnected stories about vampires. Agawa starred in Chi o suu bara, which is the final film in the trilogy and it's title has been translated to Evil of Dracula in English. Love-Bird by Yasuko Agawa All Right by Me by Yasuko Agawa Scenery by Ryo Fuuki (also mentioned in As Months Go By, As Season Change part II)

In terms of the workforce research, I had to change the timeline in light of what I found. Rather than seeing a coworker Shinji knew from 30 years ago, it's now 21 years. This is because the store they worked at together, Yodobashi Camera, opened it's first store in 1975, and in this fic Shinji got a job with the company a year later. In it's early years, the stores primarily sold cameras and photography equipment, but eventually branched off into other technology and home electronics such as TVs and PCs. Nowadays it's online version is incredibly popular and one of Japan's most visited online shopping platforms. Why a camera store? I can't explain why, but I have this weird feeling that Shinji might've worked in a camera store at some point. Maybe because old camera's used to have inverted lenses, meaning they could be upside down (and we all know how Shinji feels about things that are inverted).

Finally, there's a slight joke with the name Shinji chooses to use here. From what I saw in my research, ‘Mako’ can use the same Kanji characters as ‘Shinji’, (which are ‘真子‘ and if I’m not mistaken have the same meanings of ‘truth’/’sincerity’ and ‘children’) but both names can also be spelled using other Kanji characters too (but it changes the meaning of the name). While ‘Mako’ tends to be primarily a girl's name, it seems it can also be a boy’s name too, and from what I can see, the spelling of it can be same for both boys and girls when using the same characters as ‘Shinji’. If I got any of this wrong, please let me know so I can change it. My sources for all of this were here and here.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this!

______________________________________

The bell above the music store’s entrance rings as the latest customer leaves. Shinji doesn’t glance their way, taking and unfurling a poster of B’z from his cart. After pinning it to the wall, he lifts out a box of CDs to restock the ‘New Releases’ display rack at the front.

 Karakura Beats Records Store is empty save for him and Kana, who resumes pricing the latest shipment of vinyls behind the cash register. The morning sunlight pours in through the many posters and notices stuck to the windows facing out on to the quiet street, casting blocks of shadow over the many vinyls and CDs.

From the speakers high up on the walls, a tune he’s never heard before begins to play quietly through the air. Shinji drums his fingers on the CD rack to the tune in between stacking in copies of ‘Review’ – which will no doubt be gone by the end of the week if the hype around the album and the sales figures from other music stores are to be believed.

Eventually, he’s swaying his body to the beat too. “Yo, Kana-san!”

She looks up, her bright, dyed hair falling over one shoulder. “Yeah?”

“Which track is this?” he asks, still swaying as he tops up the rack the. “It’s a good one, I might buy the album if the rest is any good.”

“ ‘Sasori ni sasa reta’ by Kimidori.” She grins. “I knew I could get you to like something I like.”

“Didn’t think you’d like hip hop.”

“Not much of it, but I heard this one when I was in my last year of high school.”

Done with the CDs, Shinji returns to his cart and rolls it behind the cash register. “Ya done with those?” he says, pointing at the vinyls.

Sticking a price on the top one, Kana picks up the pile and drops them into the cardboard box that just had 'Review' in it. “Done now.”

He goes to pick it up, but blinks down at the cover. There’s three shadows on a white surface, and above them with is a de-saturated sky, and running along the middle is a dark lake and the silhouettes of hills and houses. The album’s title is in English, as is the band name. Even so, he recognises the name without having to read the blue slip on the vinyl’s side with a translation. “Huh, when did this come out?”

“In September. The old drummer came back, apparently.”

“Ya mean Jimbo Akira?”

“Yeah, but it’s got a guest drummer too.” Kana cocks an eyebrow at him. “I’m surprised you don’t know. You like Casiopea, right?”

Shinji shrugs. “Some of their stuff, sure. I can take ‘em or leave them, just surprised I didn’t know about this one.”

“They release something every year, right?” Kana says, moving on to the next stacks of vinyls and CDs to price. “Shouldn’t be too surprising.”

No, it shouldn’t. He’d been listening to their music since their self-titled debut album in 1979, and even though he’d lost some interest in their music by the late 1980’s, he still kept tabs on them. But then, even after being in the world for as long as he has, the passage of time is so different it sometimes escapes him.

Resisting the urge to shake his head, Shinji puts two other boxes of CDs and vinyls Kana had prepared into his cart, and rolls it down the right-side aisle.

Hecomes to a stop at his favorite section. Written above the display racks and cupboards is ‘Jazz’. When he’d started here three months ago, while he'd been impressed the store's collection was better than others he'd come across, the section had been smaller and in desperate need to of a wider range of artists. After showing his extensive knowledge about jazz and blues music had been one of the reason’s he’d been hired by he and Kana’s manager.

Aside from the usual roles in customer services, he’d been tasked with refurbished the store a little, putting up posters for bands and music artists on the walls and redoing the titles over each genre section. While doing the latter task, he had to withhold the temptation to write every genre name upside down – he’d tried to argue it would make them stand out from other stores, but backed down when Kana protested against the idea, saying ti would confuse customers.

The jazz section was his unofficial space in the whole store, the one where he got to arrange it as he wanted. The entire row against the wall has a wide variety of artists, from the famous to the up and coming to local talent. He goes to the where the rest of Casiopea’s discography is and clears a space for the vinyls.

The bell rings again. Kana greets their new customer from the counter and offers assistance. Judging from the voice that thanks her, the person is elderly.

Shinji doesn’t listen to the rest, but as he makes his way down the middle aisle to stack some vinyls and CDs in the ‘Rock’ section, the older man remains in his peripheral. He takes out the box, balancing it on the rack with his arm over the top, and unloads the vinyls two at a time into an empty space with the others. He frowns at the sensation in the back of his mind; something nags in the back of his mind, begging him to look at the man.

The bell rings again. This time by the sounds of it, it’s one of their regulars, a young woman who’s name doesn’t remember. She and Kana chatter away, discussing the weather and family. It’s so ordinary, so far away from all of the worlds he’s ever known. He hasn’t been in the Soul Society for decades, and yet there are times like now when it feels like only yesterday he was a captain.

With all the vinyls stacked in, he begins to lift the almost empty box back into the cart. However, his arm bumps into someone, clattering the records inside. Shinji turns to apologize, but his throat closes up involuntarily when he sees it’s the older man from before.

“Oh, sorry, please excuse…” The old man trails off.

Shinji frowns, that nagging sensation getting stronger now that he has a closer look at the man. He’s not as old as he thought. His hair is greying, but there’s still some dark hair on the top of his head and in his thick eyebrows. Wrinkles ring around his eyes and the ends of his mouth, but they aren’t deep, only just beginning to show more prominently. Behind his glasses, the man’s eyes are dark brown, and widened with probably the same strange feeling of familiarity as Shinji is experiencing.

Then, when the man tries to speak again, and his brows furrow into a frown, it hits Shinji.

He nearly has to bite his tongue from saying the man’s name aloud. “No harm done,” he somehow manages to say without any of the spiking nerves thrumming through him.

He tries to remain calm as he continues stacking the vinyls in, but he can feel the man’s – Keiji Mimura’s -- lingering gaze on him, even as he turns and pretends to browse the albums in front of him.

He has to get out of this fast. He can hear the cash register going; Kana must be ringing up the regular, which means she’ll be free any second now. He hoists the box back into the cart, planning to head back to the counter, then offer to take over the register for Kana. She’d go out on to floor, probably keep Keiji distracted and try to sell him some obscure rock album she likes. If he ends up buying the album, Kana will likely keep the conversation going all the way to register, get Shinji to move aside so she can ring Keiji up, and then he’ll be gone from the store, and Shinji’s life again.

Shinji doesn’t even make it three steps when Keiji speaks up behind him. “…Hirako-san?”

Shinji has no choice but to stop and turn around. In the face of the man’s shocked expression, Shinji somehow manages a smile. “Excuse me? Did you say something.” It sounds lame even to his own ears.

The man shakes his head. “Forgive me, it’s just…you look and sound like someone I used to know.”

It takes everything in Shinji to not drop the smile, but even then, the corners of his mouth twitch. How to get out of this?

He and the other Visoreds had managed to keeps their identities a secret up until now, switching jobs every few years, never getting close to any coworkers and never revealing anything about their personal lives. They mostly find work outside of Karakura Town in the major cities, countryside towns, and to a smaller extent the towns that surrounded Karakura. The commutes were a pain, but they needed to make a living and not expose themselves as being ‘ageless’ to local residents. This was his first job in Karakura Town, and it had partly been out of desperation when he couldn’t get another anywhere else.

He can dismiss Keiji, just treat this as an awkward encounter with an elderly man who had a case of mistaken identity. It happens, more often than he realized before being forced into the World of the Living.

It’s what he should do.

Later, as he's walking back to the warehouse and then while being lectured by the other Visoreds after telling them about his day, he will reflect on this moment where he chose to do something far more troublesome for himself.

Shinji’s widens his eyes, pretending to come to a realisation. “Ah! Wait. I think I understand your confusion.” He chuckles and shakes his head to himself for effect, leaving the older man bewildered. “I’m terribly sorry, sir,” Shinji continues. “Did you used to work with Hirako Shinji?”

“Y-Yes!” Keiji stammers out.

“Ah, ya see, he’s my father. I’m his son.”

The older man blinks, briefly scanning Shinji from head to toe. “He never said anything about children,” he murmurs under his breath.

Shinji pretends he didn’t hear it, remaining rooted in place, grin plastered wide over his face and a fisted hand on his hip. Seeing the man’s unfaltering skepticism, he bows slightly and holds his hand out to him. “I’m Hirako…Mako.”

Of all the names! He purses his lips and continues to stare at the ground, hard, as he inwardly begs, Please don’t think too much on it, please don’t think to much on it, Keiji-san, don’t think --

After a beat, the older man bows and shakes Shinji’s hand. “I’m Mimura Keiji. Forgive me for before, it’s just that you look so much like Hirako Shinji – your father, I meant.”

“That’s fine. I’ve gotten that quite a bit, actually. Everyone’s always saying I look like my old man.”

That gets a huff of a chuckle out Keiji; Shinji can’t tell whether it’s due to the comment, how informally he’d spoken, or how the way he spoke was identical to his 'father'. It's probably the latter.

Keiji lets go of Shinji’s hand and they both straighten back up. The store bell rings, briefly drawing Shinji’s attention to Kana. To his chagrin she doesn’t look his way, instead continuing her chat with their regular as she makes her purchases.

“I worked with your father a long time ago.” Keiji explains. “We were coworkers”

Shinji keeps his grin small as he returns his focus back to his old coworker. “Where did you work with him? The old man’s had a lot of jobs across his life.”

Keiji smiles. “So he said. We used to work at Yodobashi Camera together.”

“Ah yeah! He was a sales clerk there. He barely knew a thing about camera’s when he started, huh?”

Another huff of a chuckle broadens the old man's smile. “He learned on the job. I was no expert at the time by any means, but he even had to learn which button to press to take a picture.”

Shinji chortles, both from the memory and the embarrassment of those years. He’d been the World of the Living for several decades by that point. He’d known about cameras but was so concerned with training to control his Visored abilities and stay afloat money-wise he hadn’t ever learned about some of the most basic things for humans.

“He was all right with the other technology of course,” Keiji continues. “We often had shifts together. Every now and then we went for drinks at ‘The Golden Cup’ with everyone else.”

Despite himself, Shinji can’t help but grin wider as nostalgia flutters in his chest. He and the other Visoreds tried to maintain a certain distance between themselves and the cowrokers in whatever job they worked in. Regardless, on rare occasions, he’d indulge himself and go drinking with his coworkers. He did it more often with the employees of Yodobashi Camera than in any other job, and he’d never had a bad night out with them. They were a good bunch of hard workers who knew how to party even harder afterwards -- or at least as much as they could given that they all needed to wake up and go to work the next day.

“I -- He mentioned that too,” Shinji eventually says. “He always came home in a good mood after those nights, tripping over his feet."

Keiji gives a nervous snort. "I must admit, I did worry about how much he drank sometimes."

Shinji did too. He recalls the concerned pinch of Keiji's brows when he was about to leave, wobbling on his feet. He rarely got drunk, and he didn't always understand why he chose to get drunk with those guys.

"Nah, he was always sharp," Shinji says, "even when drunk. Heck, he could even play mahjong while drunk and still win." He let's Keiji's chuckle fill in the air for a pause. "He used to play that game with his coworkers too, right?”

“Ah, yes! I used to enjoy our games.” Keiji sighs. “It’s been a long time since then, and Yodobashi Camera has certainly grown bigger and bigger over the years.”

“Ya can’t escape them these days, huh? Feels like they’re at every railway station in the major cities.” Shinji leans back against the vinyls racks, trying to appear casual. “So, do you live in Karakura Town now?”

“Oh, no. My wife and I are visiting our daughter. I assume you live here?”

“Yeah, I moved here about a year ago.” A lie, so natural sounding from years of saying many more like it before.

He can sense the next question coming – something to effect of ‘Do your parents live here as well?’ – so he quickly continues, “It’s a small town, but there’s a few places I can recommend for visitors if your daughter hasn’t taken you to them already.”

“We only arrived two days ago. We visited one of the shrines with her yesterday. My wife and daughter are having breakfast at a cafe nearby. We’re planning to walk around the shopping district this afternoon.”

“All good ideas. There’s also Tsubakidai Park, it’s always nice to walk around there. There’s also a music performance happening there two days from now, local bands mostly.”

“Is there now?”

Shinji points to the most recent poster taped up next to the store’s entrance. He briefly glances at Kana, who had gone back to pricing the vinyls, but she’d stopped at some point, staring at their exchange. She eyes him with a raised brow. Her expression is asking him ‘Is everything okay?’

“See that there?” Shinji says, keeping Keiji distracted long enough to wink at Kana in reassurance. “It’s got the details for it if you’re interested.”

With a shrug and a good-natured roll of her eyes, she returns to her task.

Keiji nods. “I’ll be sure to look at it on my way out.” Turning back, he looks over Shinji shoulder. “Speaking of, I came here to get an album I was told would be here. I believe it will be under jazz.”

“Yeah? Which one?” Shinji asks as he leads Keiji to the ‘Jazz’ section.

“It’s often hard to find, but Umei -- oh, she's my daughter -- thought I should try my luck here. She said this store often sells music from older artists. ‘Retro’, she calls it.”

“She ain’t wrong.”

Keiji frowns thoughtfully when they stop in front of the rows of CDs and vinyls. He let’s out a sudden, ironic laugh. “Actually, now that I think about it, it’s from a singer your father introduced me to.”

Shinji already knew, and his heart squeezed for a moment. “Oh, yeah? Which one?”

“Agawa Yasuko.”

The memory comes to him. He’d gone drinking with Keiji and his coworkers, and they ended up discussing films they love. When the topic of The Bloodthirsty Trilogy came up, Shinji brought up how Yasuko Agawa had gone on to make music since then. Only Keiji was interested, and took up Shinji’s suggestion to go buy her debut album. He hadn’t seen someone as smitten with a jazz album as Keiji (and apparently his wife) was. They discussed her singing the next day during lulls at work, and for the first time in a while, Shinji felt relaxed, briefly forgetting the troubles that always weigh on his mind.

“Well, her albums are just here,” Shinji says, gesturing to the left-side display racks. “Were you after CD or vinyl?”

“CD,” Keiji says while steps around him. He bends over the CDs and thumbs through them. “You have most of her albums here.”

“It’s like your daughter said, we’re retro here.”

He takes out a copy of ‘All Right With Me’ with a grin. “This is the one! I listened to it last year, but haven’t been able to find a copy of it until today.”

“It’s a good one, she’s always had a great voice. I can recommend any of her albums, they're all good.”

“Ah, are you a fan of jazz music too? Just like your father?”

“Yeah, like my old man, jazz is one of my favourite genres. It never gets old.”

“He said the same thing.”

Then, because one of half of him is now stuck in the past, Shinji says, “My father mentioned you had a wife, a daughter, and a son. They doing okay?”

Keiji hums in ascent. “Yes, very well. I’m not sure if your father told you, but my wife, Kyoko, works in a bakery. She has worked in the same place for over twenty years now, and got promoted to manager five years in.”

“That’s incredible!”

Keiji nods firmly and returns to flicking through the albums. “She’s always been determined. Umei is a newspaper reporter for the local news here, and my son, Naoya, is an accountant in Tokyo.” He grins. “He’ll be having our first grandchild soon. My wife is eager to be there in the weeks before the baby is born, she already has gifts planned for him. He’s a lot like his mother, determined and hard-working. I have no doubt he’ll be a good father.”

Shinji has the sudden urge to reminisce with this man. To talk about their days in the store, where Shinji learned how to use a camera, and about their regular customers. To show he remembered the little details Keiji had told him about his life outside of work – how Kyoko would come to visit them with baked goods when she knew her husband hadn’t packed a lunch, or how happy he was about Umei’s first day of school, or when he was pleasantly surprised by Naoya’s sudden obsession with the new ‘Astro Boy’ anime. To talk about the music from that time, and see if he’d taken on other jazz and blues recommendations he’d made.

At Shinji’s silence, Keiji’s grin transforms into a bashful smile. “You’ll have to forgive me. I must seem like an old man rambling about my family and reminiscing about the past.”

“Nah, it’s fine. I get it. My old man worked at Yodobashi Camera over twenty years ago, and if I saw an old coworker, even if it was their kid, I’d want to talk about it.”

"Well, thank you then," Keiji says, “How is your father these days? I probably should've asked that first.”

Shinji knew it was coming, hovering over them from the moment Keiji recognised him without realising. Even so, the pit of his stomach plummets along with his grin. He’s at another crossroads.

He takes in the man’s features again. How the wrinkles gather deeper around his eyes and around his mouth as he speaks. The fact he wears glasses now, resting over the faint scar on his nose he got when he broke it during a high school baseball game – he’d tumbled after getting homebase and cracked it on the ground, Shinji recalls; it'd been a drunken confession made on one of the night he'd gone out with the coworkers.

He thought noticing age couldn’t affect him anymore. But seeing someone from his past, someone who he got along well with and truly wished the best for, it strikes something in him. He’d been a Shinigami for centuries, ferrying hundreds of Souls like him to the Soul Society. One day, Keiji will be met by a Shinigami when he passes on, and forget the life he’d lived by the time he gets to the Soul Society.

It’s then SHinji realises he's been living in this world for too long. That detachment, that knowledge that he was not like humans, has eroded over time, crumbling bit by bit, leaving only a thin slab behind. Hiyori was right; he should’ve left his job at Yodobashi Camera sooner. It's been one of the longer jobs he'd had, and he recalls trying to stuff down the bitterness of leaving it behind when he left on his last day.

It hadn't been right to drag Keiji along like this, for his own selfish whims of wanting to relieve the past. So he does the right thing this time.

Shinji looks off to the side. “He’s gone. So is my mother.”

In the pause, Keiji remains frozen in place, lost for words. “Oh, I…I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to bring up…I had no idea.”

“It was three years ago. He and my mother were involved in a car accident.” Like all his lies, it comes out smooth and natural, like he is the son reflecting on grief he's only just overcome. He hates it.

Keiji shakes his head in disbelief. “That's awful, truly. I really am sorry.”

“Thank you, but you don’t have to be. I’m sorry you found out this way.”

Keiji is silent again, staring at the ground for a long moment before raising his head. There’s a faint mist across his eyes. “Your father and I only knew each other at work, and on the occasions he came to drink with the rest of us. Even so, I could always tell he was a good man. He worked hard, but he always had time to help others around the store too. Not just his coworkers, but also the customers.” His smile faintly returns. “I always wondered what happened to him after he left the store. I always thought, though, that wherever he went, he’d do good work.”

Keiji always saw the good in others, and in a time where Shinji still hadn’t fully processed Aizen’s betrayal, he’d been wary of the man at first. He'd reminded him of his seated officer Genji Isawa: a hard worker who could bring a smile and laugh to anyone who met him. Maybe this is why he'd eventually came around to being a little less guarded with him.

In his last year with the store, it was only then he’d begun to take an interest in his personal life and the lives of his coworkers, whether it was the rowdy Takahiro, or the quiet but hard working Kaneshiro. In some ways, now that he thought about it, Keiji might’ve been the closest thing he’d had to a friend in many years. Still kept at a distance, still lied to, but still an echo of a friend, one he probably would've had in another life.

He can't tell him any of this, not without it sounding like he truly knew him rather than a son telling a father's old coworker what his old man thought of him.

He'd put what little detachment he still had between him and his past, but now it came bleeding through like a bruise. If only he knew he was speaking these words directly to him and not to the son he thought he was.

“Thank you,” Shinji says quietly, still unable to meet Keiji’s eyes completely. “He’d have appreciated your words a lot.”

A sombre awkwardness settles over them, only broken when the store bell rings. A young couple come in, with the woman goig straight to the ‘New Releases’ rack. Shinji looks to Kana, who now unabashedly just stared at the scene unfolding in the corner of the shop. She’s only distracted away when the man who just entered asks for assistance.

Keiji bows. “Thank you for your assistance and for listening to my ramblings today, Hirako-san. I’ll go purchase this now.” He rises, but doesn’t move to the counter. He hesitates to say something else, lips parting and closing. "And I'm truly sorry for your loss. You have my condolences."

Shinji can only nod. This will be the last time he ever sees Keiji. It’s just as well, given the emotions and reactions he’d undergone today. Who knew how he’d react to meeting some of his other old coworkers from his other jobs. If nothing, this has reiterated why he shouldn’t get close to any of the humans, not even asking them about or taking an interest in their personal lives.

But some part of him, a wistful part that he’d thought was buried under the cynicism and hurt of Aizen’s betrayal, urges him to do one last thing. His detachment tries to block it, but it shine through, clutching at his heart.

“Did my father ever tell you what his favorite record was?” Shinji asks.

Keiji frowns slightly and shakes his head. “He might have, but I’m sorry, I can’t remember.”

“Well, to be more accurate, it’s one of his favorite records.” Shinji takes a step backwards and scans the lines of CDs until he finds the one he needs. He fishes it out of the rack and presents it to Keiji. A copy of ‘Scenery’. “He loved it from the moment he heard it. I still have his vinyl copy of it.”

Keiji is slow to take the CD. “I’ve always been more into pop music, really. Agawa Yasuko is the only jazz singer I liked.”

“It came out in 1976, the same year he started working for Yodobashi Camera. He said that while listening to it, it’d remind of his life at the time, including his work and his coworkers. He always associated it with good memories.”

Keiji nods, and his smile returns, albeit with a sadder edge to it. “I’m glad, then.” As Shinji holds his hand out, planning to take the album and put it back, Keiji raises his gaze back to him. “In that case, I’ll be buying this too.”

Shinji let out a chocked chuckle. “Whoa, hey, I wasn’t trying to make a sale –”

“I know, but I want to buy this now.”

Keiji had to be guided by his sentimentality right now, this isn’t fair. Did he feel the need to listen to this to honor him? “Hey, look, it’s really not –”

“If you recommend it, and if your father would’ve recommend it to me, then I have no doubt I will enjoy it. I’m sure my wife would too. She also likes Agawa-san’s music, and a few of the other recommendations your father made.”

Somehow, that lightens the load on his heart. He even manages a grin. “Then in that case, it’s on me.”

“What? Oh, no, please, there’s no need –”

Shinji holds up a hand to silence him. “It’s no trouble. Think of it as a gift.”

Even as they walked to the counter, Keiji fretted about the idea. Kana is ringing up the couple, but as the woman counts out the money, she eyes Shinji and Keiji as they approach.

After serving the couple, Keiji comes up the counter and Shinji digs his wallet out of his pants pocket.

“He’s buying the Agawa album, the Fuuki Ryo one is on me.”

“Really, you don’t have to do this,” Keiji insists.

Kana only shrugs as she takes Shinji’s money. “If you’re sure.” She turns to Keiji with a smile. “Good choices by the way.”

Keiji hands her the albums and his money. While waiting for Kana to count up his change, Keiji reads the poster for the upcoming music festival. “I’ll tell Kyoko and Umei about this. I have a feeling they’ll be interested.”

“It’s looking to be a good line up this year,” Kana says while handing him his change and bagging his purchases. “They have a lot more local acts. It’s always good to support them.”

“Yes, it is.” He bows to her after taking the bag from her. “Thank you very much.”

She bows in return. “Have a good day, sir.”

Keiji then bows to Shinji. “And thank you so much, Hirako-san. I’m glad I got to meet you. Please, pay my respects when you next see your father and mother.”

Shinji bows in return. “Likewise, Mimura-san. I’m sure my old man would’ve been happy to see you today.”

Both rising, Keiji smiles broadly, before turning and leaving the store. There’s a still silence after the bell above the door rings. A few heartbeats later, Kana finally speaks. “What was that about?”

“One of my dad’s old coworkers,” Shinji says, ungluing himself from his spot and going back to get his cart. From across the store, he says. “My old man and I look a lot alike, so he thought I was him.”

“Huh,” Kana huffs. “That sounds like it’s be awkward.”

“It was, but…I’m glad I got to see him.”

Kana’s brows frown slightly, but she doesn’t say anything about him ‘seeing’ rather than ‘meeting’ him. “So long as you’re feeling okay about it.”

“Yeah, I am.”

The rest of the day continues as usual until closing time. The sky has turned to amber, with the last of the sun peaking out over the horizon, by the time Shinji and Kana steps out of the store.

After locking the front door, Kana spins to him and hitches her bag over her shoulder. She jerks a thumb in the direction of Karakura’s main shopping districts. “You want to go for a drink?”

She always offers, and just like every other time, Shinji shakes his head. “Nah, gotta get home.”

Kana shrugs. “Suit yourself.” Unlike other times, concern flickers across her expression. He’d tried to hide the sombreness that’d settled into him after Keiji left, but maybe he hadn't been convincing. Maybe he's losing his tough.

Kana bows. “Thanks for your hard work today. See you tomorrow.”

Shinji does the same in return. “See you tomorrow.”

They part ways, going in opposite directions.

Autumn is in the air, crispy in the wind that brushes against him as he walks the quiet streets of Karakura Town. The streetlight pop on, beaming down over him and the those either returning home or heading for a night on the town in the shopping district. He can blend in with everyone, dressed like them and walking like them, but never be one of them.

He never wanted to be, still doesn't, but like them, he'd let that small part of him, that sentimental part of him, get the better of him.

As he comes to the quieter part of town, getting closer to the warehouse, he contemplates quitting his current job. It's only a passing thought, one that he dismisses when he considers his and the Visoreds financial situation. Kisuke had been generous over the years for someone struggling almost just as much as them, but they can't rely on him.

They needed to make their own path back to the Soul Society. Back to Aizen, to take him down once and for all. The old fire returns in Shinji's, a determination he'd used to fuel his detachment form humans.

But he's been here for so long, more than a century now. He's been alive for too long, and been around humans for too long.

Their lives are so short; one moment they're here, and the next, they're meeting a Shinigami or another agent of death. Yet, he'd come to like some of the human's he'd interacted with over the decades. Keiji is clearly one of them, and for all of the grief today had caused him, he still can't deny he'd been glad to see him. But now he'd another person in his past, one he'll never see again.

And one day Kana will have to be one of those people too. He could still visit the store for next few years and get away with it, but there will come a time where he’ll have to stop visiting. And even then, he’ll have to watch himself more in public; Karakura is a big place, but there’s still a decent chance he’d run into her on the streets in the years to come.

When that time comes, she might wonder where he went, what he’s up to, or maybe she won’t. Maybe she’ll unintentionally spare him and move away, going back further north to be closer to her family and finally confess to that one highschool friend she sometimes calls on her breaks and still lives in her hometown. Maybe she’ll use the money she’s saved over the year for singing and guitar lessons, then start that rock band she’s always dreamed of and leave Karakura to go touring.

And maybe none of that happens, and she stays here until the end.

It’ll be a shame when it happens. Despite how small the store’s original jazz section had been, he always loved the store’s collection. He hadn’t found another like it in all his time in the World of the Living.

[usernamesuggestionsarefunny]

Wish spoilers ahead.

The start of Wish is exactly like that of Encanto but without all the heart. It is literally the meme of "Can I copy your homework?" "Yeah but change a few things so it is not too obvious."

Also Asha deserved a pretty dress in the end like wth are you going to sell to little girls Disney you are all about money and you failed miserably even at that.

And it is for real soooo unfair how the queen did get a pretty dress the whole movie and Asha only got some lazy ass sparkles added to her boring ass dress.

Asha... not bad, ok, but she is copy paste Anna, Mirabel, and Rapunzel. Youtuber ModernGurlz is right about Disney's "adorkable" problem. All their main girls since Rapunzel have the same "quirky" personality save a few details. I have liked them all but it is getting boring. Give me a princess with a monotone, sad personality, give me a shy princess who only smiles and talks around close friends, give me back the classic super girly personality Aurora and Snow White style, give me an angry girl with a brutal sense of humor like Merida. Be creative, please!!!

I love the queen's design, super gorgeous. Too bad her character added nothing. Her help was barely needed since Asha's friend had already sneaked them into the castle and it was her who deciphered the king's magic. A super villain couple would have been way more fun.

Oh, yeah, Asha's friends. There were so-damn-many of them and only like 3 were rememberable or needed for the story.

The villain is a complicated issue. I appreciated Disney's attempt at another fully evil character, I liked how he wasn't yet another badly set up "twist villain" revealed only at the end. But I didn't like the end result that much.

His backstory was super underdeveloped and to "get" his motives better, if they really wanted to make him evil-yet-complex, they should have shown us a flashback of him losing his family Encanto style (They copy pasted the start might as well do the same with the antagonist backstory.

What the hell was the missing piece of tapestry for if it wasn't going to have any significance later on? Did the writers just forget or what even?

Worst part for me: The stakes were low as fuck. Disney doesn't respect its target audience, nowadays it thinks that children can't handle anything worse than a main character getting disappointed. The worst this "super evil" villain does is make people sad temporarily, for like two minutes (Kid you not), like one character stays sad for longer but MOST people in the kingdom seem happy and normal after giving up their wishes, he legit just makes people sad a few minutes (Again, I kid you not, no one dies, the wishes he "eats" to make himself stronger come back, nothing he does has a permanent, devastating effect, he is not even revealed to have killed Asha's father in a dramatic way or something). Yeah he makes people forget their wishes which is pretty sketchy but up to that point he seemed to have complex reasons for that, reasons that seem to disappear or have never even been there the second half of the movie when he magically becomes more evil due to a forbidden green spooky magic he uses, and then suddenly he becomes Maleficent (The cool, perfect villain version, not the woobie one) style evil in a very, very rushed and over the top way. I feel like he should have started up as fully evil with no backstory (Just a simple, Gaston or original Maleficent style, self centered guy, who wants more and more power and adoration), and simply gotten worse and stronger OR given more complexity as to why he became that way, but instead we got this weird thing in between where it is clear he just wants power and love from the people for the sake of it and yet he has this half-made sob story on how his family died.

There was a great lack of originality in this movie at the climax as well. Anyone watched "The little mermaid II"? That was pretty much it. Villain gets power boner, says he will enslave everyone (Worst thing he does in whole movie and yet no one trying to defy him dies at least off screen or gets hurt in any meaningful way). Then heroine saves the day.

The funniest part of this movie is that the villain's fate is worse than anything he ever did in the movie I swear. He gets trapped in a freaking mirror and then locked up in a cell (Similar to the Little mermaid II villain's end too lol). That is straight up torture till death, it is so fucked up. And his wife who literally sees how the green spooky magic is the main thing responsible for his bad day (If we are being honest that is all it was, other than the taking wishes part he seemed to be a good king) leaves him to rot and becomes queen Catherine II style, it is hilarious. Like girl, you turned against your husband like five minutes ago because apparently through decades of seemingly loving marriage, you never knew he was evil but now somehow you are ok with him rotting in solitary confinement till the end of time? So dorky and silly. So bad, so bad.

Lastly, that goat was annoying as hell.

[lyinginbedmon]

B-banned Minecraft mod??

Okay I can probably explain it here, so:

During Minecraft version 1.12.2 there was a mod called Kidnap.

It mainly dealt in adding ways to hinder other players (as one might expect from the name) in terms of how they could move around, what they could interact with, and to an extent even how they were able to use ingame chat. But for game balance, and in a stroke of genius game design, everything you could do to someone else, they could oppose, even without specialised tools. They could struggle out of being tied up, they could pick the locks on their manacles, so on and so forth. This meant that despite the mod giving you ample ways to debilitate your fellow Steve, they always had some way to respond to it.

Additionally, you could counter-act their escape efforts by checking up on their restraints regularly, which created a kind of emergent mind-game mechanic as abductees tried to outwit their captors and escape (or just wait for them to log off). The captor in turn had to stick around to ensure their prey didn't disappear from under their nose. The restraints were also very rarely absolute, even gagged you could type gibberish into chat.

If you haven't yet spotted the problem here, well... Kidnap was a BDSM fetish mod, and it did NOTHING to hide that fact. The basic rope binding was straight-up fetish knots, there was a variety of ball gags to use, there was even blatant slave/domme mechanics you could enact on your captives.

Mojang quite swiftly caught wind of this, and in a move unheard of before or since they stepped in and forced the one-man mod team for Kidnap to pull it offline in very short order. Almost overnight the mod became vaporware, nowadays even the wiki is barely visible on Archive.org, and it took me a good while even to identify the screen name of the author. From what I gather, Mojang were so intimidating that they deleted the source and basically quit modding altogether after that.

There's basically nowhere to find Kidnap in a downloadable form, though there are copies floating around outside the anglosphere and foreign language mod showcases for it still pop up on YouTube occasionally. As they say, nothing ever quite leaves the Internet.

At time of writing Minecraft is marching towards version 1.21, and in the intervening time absolutely no mod has ever come close to replicating the game design elegance that Kidnap did. For a lot of projects, it continues to be a tough question of how to impede players without utterly spoiling their play experience. Most of the time it's either done with status effects that can't be meaningfully opposed or by keeping the stats low or just giving up all pretense and hosing the unfortunate recipient.

But in a kind of Streisand Effect, Mojang stepping in to squash one brilliant mod with a proud and upfront adult thematic did more for it than the author likely ever could: It created a legend.

[alatabouleau]

You know, I was always theoretically aware that whitewashing was a problem, but it never occured to me to how many examples i'm completely oblivious.

So, I just learned through a YouTube video by a Romani person ( https://youtube.com/shorts/A-kF9BBVfu8?feature=share ) that Romani people were just as much part of the target for the "final solution" in World War II by the Nazi government. Which, first of all, came as a complete shock to me, because in school, we would learn all about antisemitism and how Nazi Germany executed Jews brutally and factory-like, but we rarely, if ever, talked about Roma meeting the same fate. Honestly, even most people around me growing up didn't talk all that positive about Romani people, usually reducing them to systemic beggars.

And this all plays into the fact that I never saw how Magda, you know Magneto's late wife, one of the few people in his life he actually loved, was not Jewish but actually Romani. So, Wanda and Pietro Maximoff are actually half Jewish, half Romani (because I REFUSE to accept the 2014 retcon it makes no narrative sense, I hate it)! And even their original adoptive parents were Romani as well.

So, why is it, that in the X-Men-movies, as well as in the MCU, their Romani side is COMPLETELY eradicated and their maybe-Jewish-background never touched upon?! Why are their parents in the MCU, real or not, white?! And yes, I feel like I'm late to the party, but my goodness! It's probably just that I now realise that I have been due to my ignorance, participated in white-washing, because in my Cherik fanfictions, I always use the movie version of Magda who is, maybe a Jew? But rather, just a Polish woman and IS ALSO WHITE, WHY?!?!?

I mean, not to start an oppression olympics, really not, but you know Jews have at least ~some~ examples of positive representation in the media nowadays. The only one in mainstream media for Romani people is probably Esmeralda in Disney's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" (https://youtube.com/shorts/zXHctFGKM1M?feature=share ) and even she falls into the trope of "Disney overse*ualising Disney princesses of colour". The other one is in the Paramount+ prpduction 1883 (https://youtube.com/shorts/j1DiLR27LyI?feature=share)

Man. This is bad.

I really don't want to make this into a white saviour complex thing, it's just something I realised I was unaware of before I found the Youtube-channel of florida.florian which has been really informative and made me see how little I actually knew about Romani culture and how much this demographic still faces severe discrimination to this day. Also in my country, Germany, which is probably why this hits so hard to me, personally.

If you now excuse me, I need to rewrite Magda's character in this one Cherik-fanfic I've been working on

[bluehairlaunch]

Top 7 BEST Dragon Ball Transformations

Honorable mention: Yung King Piccolo

Does this count as a transformation?

Mecha Tao

Yup, the best villain in all of Dragon Ball also did this first.

Eat your heart out, Frieza.

Muscle Bottom Trunks

This is where Super Saiyan and its myriad iterations (including "SS2" and whatever you nerds call the version Goku and Gohan have when they emerge from the Room of Spirit and Time) would go, but I decided to choose just my favorite one instead.

I think this transformation has over half a dozen names: Super Saiyan Third Grade, Super Saiyan 1.5, Super Super Saiyan, Ultra Super Saiyan, lmao jesus christ, Power-weighted Super Saiyan, Power stressed Super Saiyan Bitch Super Saiyan, and somehow the list just keeps going on. But what I like most about it is that everyone can do it.

Well not the Super Saiyan part, you have to have a little bit of Saiyan in your brainpan to do that, but the getting big. Doing so makes you stronger, but also so much slower that the difference just doesn't matter (for those of you that just watch youtube videos, and don't read the fucking comic). Frieza is such a useless he/they thembo that he also mistook it for a legitimate transformation against Goku on Namek. Y'know, his 100% (this time for real guyz).

Golden Fuuureeeza

I railed against lazy recolors in my worst transformations list, but Frieza is the physical embodiment of sloth and affluenza. He was the strongest being in the universe by far barring an ancient alien prophecy for fucking decades. And what does he do with all that power? Well, ride around on a rascal scooter, of course, while sending endless swathes of Appule's to do his dirty work. Instead of lifting a finger for an hour and then being immortal FOREVER.

And that's why it works for me in all the ways Resurrection F didn't. He's supposed to be stupid and ostentatious. Dragon Ball Super writers, you're NOT.

Janemba

Frankly, this is the biggest glow up in Dragon Ball history. From lazy Buu clone to, well, admittedly a lazy clone of another great character. But he has a sword! And that moveset. And it's an actually good filler movie in which Hitler dies (again).

Just look at him

Legendary Super Saiyan

Why is greenish Super Saiyan soooooo coooool??? Well, I'll tell you why.

It's because it just is. Super Saiyan? Actually so cool. Green? Such a good color Victorian aristocrats were willing to kill themselves using a shade of it that contained arsenic. It was basically their version of Oceangate, but they all did it! We could only be so lucky nowadays. And the lore implications? Mmm, yeah. Yeah!

You see, in canon Goku did a little prophecy, but Toriyama can't help but be a great writer, so instead of just being the generic Chosen One a la every bad shonen we all know and love, he's not. He's just not. Goku, Gohan, Vegeta, Trunks, baby Trunks, baby Goku, they all do it too. Turns out, Super Saiyan is something each and every Saiyan can do. And then filler happens, Broly shows up, and everyone sees that this is because he's the real Chosen Boy.

And he's green! And we all loved it so hard we got a quality version a century later in the form of Super Broly The Movie

Nice. That's history for you.

Great Ape

The OG. Look at this trendsetter. If this isn't the second best, what is? You're wrong.

Perfect Cell

It's perfect

[kittyprincessofcats]

Okay, let's talk about Germany

because seriously, wtf is happening to my country?

So, a few weeks ago Germany outlawed Hamas and Samidoun. And with that, our interior minister Nancy Faeser also explicitly outlawed the phrase "From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free", with the reasoning that it's linked to Hamas / implies genocide against Jewish Israelis. You can now be fined or go to jail for using this phrase.

I was at a demonstration a few weeks ago that was an absolute nightmare. So, usually at the beginning, the rules for the demonstration (what is or isn't allowed to do/say) get layed out. At pro-Palestine demonstrations, there's always A LOT of police and they sometimes check protest signs in advance, too.

At this demonstation (which was organised by several Jewish organisations btw), one of the things we were chanting was "Stop the Genocide" - also a lot of other chants involving the word genocide in some way. At first, this was allowed. Then, halfway through the demonstration, the police suddenly decided that using the word "genocide" is forbidden now. Halfway through, after they were okay with it at first!

Then they arrested a Jewish Israeli woman (who they'd already wrongfully arrested once before) because her protest sign said "Stop the genocide in Gaza". Then they also arrested another person because their sign said "From the River to the Sea, we demand equality". THAT LITERALLY ISN'T EVEN THE PHRASE YOU BANNED! If you're going to ban FtRttS because it "could imply genocide against Jewish Israelis", then this changed version which makes explicitly clear what's actually meant should be fine! But nah, doesn't make a difference to them. If it starts with "From the River", you're gonna get arrested.

What shocks me the most is the arbitariness of it all. How can you just randomly decide in the middle of a demonstration, that something that was fine at first is now forbidden and then arrest people for it? I've been to demonstrations later where the word "genocide" was used again and it was fine. They literally just made up random reasons to arrest people. There's no logic behind any of it.

I've heard from other demonstrations in Germany that they apparently also arrested people for signs like "From the River we do see, nothing like equality" and "Bombing children is not self-defense" (what?). Also apparently they arrested one person for drawing the famous raised fist icon onto their poster because it "implies violence".

I don't want to live in this country anymore. What is going on? When has Germany become... this? I mean, I never thought we were super great, but I didn't think we were this.

And before anyone says that it's overcompensation for Holocaust guilt: That might play into it, but I don't think it's the real or only reason. Because the thing is, Germany didn't use to be like this. Israel-Palestine isn't exactly a new conflict and I remember that when I was younger, people from both sides were allowed to talk in talkshows etc. There's a clip on Youtube of a talkshow from 14 years ago where a CDU(!!! - big conservative/center-right party) politician talks about his trip to Palestine and the humiliations the Palestinians suffer every day and how no people would just let themselves be treated like this - nowadays you'll only hear something like this from the very left of the political spectrum and never on TV because anyone who speaks up for Palestine won't even get invited to the talkshow.

So like... what happened? Germany didn't USE to be like this. Why is EVERY party, even the Greens, suddenly talking like a copy of the AfD (extreme right-wing party, basically Nazis) and trying to paint Mulims as evil? And why are we at a point where anyone who speaks up for Palestine gets arrested and charged with "antisemitism" while actual Nazis are allowed to protest and get protected? We Germans are always so quick to call out other countries for lack of freedom of speech, so what is... THIS? WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?

[the-jnadf-man]

So. I've been making the thumbnails for a series me and some friends have been doing for a few months at this point. We're doing some (Halfway accurate) dubs of Ace Attorney! It's called The Defense Rests, and you can find it on the Totallyjazzed channel on Youtube. please watch us I need the validation

I am the voice of, among others, Winston Payne, Manfred von Karma, Matt Engarde, and Luke Atmey. There's plenty of others, but those are my favorites.

So anyway, I'm gonna put the thumbnails below the cut here and hope those convince you to at least give us a shot.

1-1! I was really out of practice when I made this. I could've made the ghost Phoenix look SO much better, and actually make the Sahwit work with the bit in the actual video. See, we make jokes about how his head does not move despite his whole body constantly swaying, and compared him to the gyroscopic chicken. I couldn't do what I was going for with his neck at the time, and had to settle for rotating him 180°, but I think I could do it nowadays.

Okay how the Hell do I explain 1-3. Okay so to start with the only thumbnail I didn't make was the 1-2 one. And uh. Here you can see us disliking Sal on every possible level and deciding he should go to Hell?? I dunno, I made this mid-video, and. Have you looked at it. Oldbag taking fully clothed pictures in the bathtub standing up was just. A thing that happened in this case because of us. For some reason. And now it's everyone's problem.

Okay, with 1-4 we're starting to pick up speed in terms of the thumbnails, as we get to the first one I genuinely feel pretty proud of. 1-1 was somewhat basic and 1-3 was. Just plain weird. But then we got to 1-4 and I made TDR: DL of 6. It's directly based on Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, though Von Karma's location is more based on Dracula from the original Castlevania. Don't mind that most of them are see-through, it's because almost everyone in TDR is a ghost. We get carried away at times. Fun fact: This wasn't gonna be the thumbnail! I made it before we started recording for fun, but we ended up going with it anyway.

1-5! Another one that doesn't make much sense, but this time I really like it. In clockwise order, Winston Payne keeps dying and was the Ghost³ of Winston Payne by this point in the series, Von Karma, Damon Gant, and Redd White were on Boys Night which involves drugs, and Jake Marshall's joke evolved from MAH INFINITE BEARD to MAH INFINITE TEXAS to MAH INFINITE [blank]. It's not terribly complicated, but it worked amazingly with the TDR version of the case.

Please make fun of Winston Payne for looking like he's Animorphing if you want to, we encourage it.

2-1: WELCOME TO PAYNE THEORY! Definitely one of my favorites to make, but it doesn't have as much basis in the jokes we make during the case as I'd like, aside from the Custom Made Glove and the Lobster. I generally think 2-1 was just okay, so I didn't have any other ideas for what to do for it.

2-2 IS MY FAVORITE END RESULT OF ANY OF THESE THUMBNAILS. Practically everything in it references a joke made in the video to some extent, from Payne's kazoo, Hotti wanting to steal every organ, The Bloodlement, and the part where we played tic-tac-toe on Pearl... It's all here. And it coheres amazingly. I'm incredibly happy with it.

I think we all know what 2-3 is like. Moe the Clown throwing hands with J. Udge carried it for us. They should fight onscreen. It is written that Moe's back was about to shatter and create a whole new case from how hard he was carrying the case.

HERE WE GO HERE WE GO HERE WE GO. 2-4 started my little personal tradition of taking every final thumbnail in a game seriously, though that was already starting to form in 1-4. This had my favorite development phase of any of the thumbnails, and I don't regret a second of it. I also finally learned how to use a new tool or two in my editing software because of it! Wonderful! It's not all serious, though. Wendy Oldbag is still very much the Blue Eyes White Woman.

...I didn't have any ideas for 3-1. We settled on making it a discord flashback for all the characters involved (And Redd White) ((And The Poison Genie)) during a session of Buck Bumble.

I love Luke Atmey with all my heart. He's really funny, and some of the most fun I've had in The Defense Rests. I made his superpower identity theft and had him boast about how he could "Steal your place in the thumbnail of this video!", which resulted in this. Don't mind that the bag looks like that, I had very little to work with.

I ran out of my 10 permitted images, so. I guess I'll do 3-3 through 3-5 and the scrapped thumbnails in a reblog after I finish tagging this.

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2024: #16

16. PORTUGAL Iolanda - "Grito" 10th place

Decade Ranking: 56/153 [Above Circus Mircus, below Alika]

OH NOES THE FINGERNAILS!! SO BLATANTLY POLITICAL!! I legit had to zoom and enhance to even NOTICE, jesus christ EBU.

For an entry that I have ranked relatively high, Iolanda is such a pain to write about? I feel like the appeal and placement are both obvious? There are also no real fun things about it? It's all fairly cut and dry (hence why I skipped yesterday to give myself extra think time for the write-up).

I find it hard to believe that anyone can muster up feelings beyond 'yah this is good, next one please' for a song of Grito's calibre. Especially over the more immediate (read: better) "Pelas Costuras"?

That said, I must soldier on and write a few more words. "Grito" is actually a pretty competent Growth Ballad. It starts slowly but then gradually builds up the tension. It handles the overcoming of inner demons with a beautiful touch of melancholy (it IS Portugal after all), and never stays too long in its phases.

In other words: it dodges the main pitfall of many other cerebral ballads: Despite what Joel and Myff were insinuating (Aus NQ'd, in your FACE) Grito is not boring.

But it's also not that engaging of a composition. My gripe with it is that it banged the hardest in studio for me, and studio cuts just... don't matter to me? At last not post-show. I get all of my listens from Youtube, not Spotify. In the studio version, "Grito" goes from zero to hero IMMEDIATELY at the first chorus, and doesn't back down. It goes quite hard. Live, the transition is more gradual and subdued, which pulls me into the immersion at a later point. Almost too late? "Grito" is a slow burner, and I'm not a patient man. You need to make me care about you immediately, not until you're halfway through the song.

It makes sense that Iolanda was sort of the Alika of the year resultswise (getting a good amount of jury votes into a negative televote) but she had the opposite problem for me. Alika came across like she was aimlessly screaming at a mic without any sophistication. Iolanda came across as frosty introvert who deliberately held back on purpose to sound frail before the big note. BELT WOMAN, YOUR SONG DEMANDS IT.

Eventually, she did. And it was pretty good.

That was a really good climax. Grito succeeds where Ramonda and Before the Party's Over (and in a sense Veronika which I'll address in a few days) struggled with or even outright failed to do.

So going into the contest from FdC, I always expected Portugal to be a qualifier (why were SO many people sleeping on it? I know a lot of eurofans are dumb (sadly, not of the mute variety), but also hard of hearing?) but I was hoping for Iolanda to inject more life into her song. This was why I had difficulty getting into her at FdC.

and she... sorta did?

Like, if I'm honest, the performance wasn't enough to fully win me over. It went from a 7 to a 7.5, it's not the LEAP forward I had hoped.

However, Portugal managed to elevate the act from its FdC counterpart, and respected the song's strengths. Befitting the lyrics, Iolanda ~transformed into a better verison of herself~, serving personality.

The staging in Sweden was also better - the use of the cubes to create a confined space for an intimate performance, the interactive choreography and the camerawork that framed it beautifully were great. In FdC, it felt like Iolanda had too many ideas for her staging, and they were poorly implemented. In Sweden, it clicked together smoothly. Her styling was great (die Joel!). She got the message across, while staying classy and sophisticated, which I suppose is Portugal's entire spiel at Eurovision nowadays.

In terms of my personal preferences though, it doesn't set my soul on fire, or makes me raise roofs tonight. Iolanda was good across the board, so she makes perfect sense as a high jury carry, but at the same time she also makes perfect sense as a televote bottomfeeder. It cuts both ways - "Grito" is good on all accounts, and outstanding at none, nor particularly is it particularly high on Fun Factor. It's too polished and competent for that. Like, "Grito" is not Eurovision. it is a well-executed live of a well-written song that found it's way there by winning the NF. It's highbrow. And I can appreciate that, but ultimately, others this year have delivered entires that were more to in line with the vibes I like to receive from my Eurovision entries.

AND NOW WE'RE MOVING UP A TIER. Here are whoever's left:

Which one is #YOUR favourite?

THE RANKING

[the-larxist-manifesto]

GameGirl36 ~ Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins (1992)

Can we just admire this box art for a second? Mario games have a knack for the whimsical, but there are few that spark the imagination as bright as this. The fish eye lens gives you the feeling that you're peeping into the world inside your GameBoy; so small that it all fits in this one vortex of action, but so vast that every inch is covered in details to admire and wonder about. Older Mario games in particular tapped into that sense of wonder so effectively because, well... what IS any of this stuff? I've never seen that particular boxing shark before! Why is there another island-sized Mario in the background? The moon is out during the daytime?

We do take for granted how strange the Mario world is to begin with; walking mushroom people probably shouldn't feel so normal to us. But due to how standardized Mario's brand is nowadays, it throws you for a loop to see him jumping off of a bomb turtle in front of his own castle. These details just don't line up with who he's been in the latest games. No, these older Mario games showcase a cartoony, plastic version of Mario that is stretched and squashed to fit whatever mood Nintendo was in that year.

Today, we're talking about one of the masterpieces of the GameBoy. I have played it before, so this entry will be less raw and reaction-based than usual. My goal is to explain what sets this one apart from the other millions of Marios that you could be playing right now.

Take a shot every time I say "Mario" for a fun and moderate drinking game! /j

~Guided tour of Mario Land~

This game feels like playing a Saturday morning cartoon many ways, including the plot. Since the developers were forced to come up with a reason for Mario to be scuttling around in the rafters of your home wearing rabbit ears, they settled on creating a brand new world and villain for this game only. After the events of the first Super Mario Land, Mario returns home(?) to "Mario land." Here, he presumably lives in peace with the giant birds and turtles and toy robot clone of himself in his castle at the center of the island. Just... when did Mario get so bougie? His own island? His own CASTLE? Always thought of him as a more modest guy, myself.

Either way, Mario is met with a nasty surprise when everyone in Mario land turns against him upon his return. Everything he loves is taken away and twisted into a flipped-around funhouse mirror of what he remembers by his arch-rival... Wario. (Yes, this is Wario's introduction to the Mario series as a whole!)

World map included with the game manual!

Okay, so now we have our reasoning as to why everything is so weird, and we have to set it back to normal. I like the larger plot subtext that this game implies about Mario villains—while Bowser often employs brute force with merciless fiery obstacle courses and an organized army, this escapade has Wario written all over it. The enemies feel like scrounged-together mercenaries he purchased on the cheap, and each world is some bizarre head trip; like the whole adventure is a giant prank on Mario. Wario is a truly disturbed little goblin man.

To win the day, Mario must journey to all six zones, defeat their corrupted bosses, and collect the titular six golden coins. Once they are all collected, he can once again enter his castle and beat up the man child that wrecked everything.

UGH, as goofy as it is, I genuinely love cartoony space aesthetics in old games .-~*

YouTube comments, everyone. They're not wrong, though

~Weird to watch, weirder to play~

This adventure does technically follow the typical formula for a Mario platformer, but with some... strange twists. Much like Mario land itself, the controls introduce and remove a lot of staples willy-nilly, in such a way that I never quite felt comfortable controlling it. To be perfectly clear, I like this disorienting and unique effect. It's one of those things that sets classic Mario games apart most from the modern entries. I'm gonna lightning-round the weird changes I'm talking about, exclusive to this one game:

Defeating 100 enemies awards an item, shown by a counter on the HUD

Press select on the file screen for easy mode

The player loses ALL golden coins upon game over

High jump by holding up on the d-pad and jumping

Spin jump by holding down on the d-pad while jumping

Spin jump can open ? blocks from above

Jump continuously by holding the jump button (only with Bunny Mario, though, for some reason)

Neither koopa shell kicks nor continuous enemy jumps award 1-ups (but stars still do!)

Not all of its uniqueness is completely random, however. As you might expect, this game does share some DNA with its direct prequel, Super Mario Land. For example, the game does not freeze when collecting a powerup, instead allowing the player to move while Mario's body stretches or squashes into its new form. The end-of-level goals split into an upper and lower part, with the upper being a skill check that awards the player a powerup minigame. Though most of the soundtrack is original, it borrows some ideas from its predecessor: the invincibility theme similarly differs from The Famous One, and SML2 recycles the unique underground theme from Super Mario Land for the haunted house level! I thought that was a very subtle but neat reference; it's an ambient theme catchy enough to deserve at least two games.

The entire soundtrack sets the golden standard for GB music; pop on this 30 minutes of merry melodies for your next walk

~Lil guys~

Next, I just want to show off some highlights from this game's art style by lining up my favorite lil guys I ran across. SML2 definitely has an all-around Hannah-Barbara type feel, with lots of down-to-earth concepts stylized to look more alive and dynamic. The moon gets moody, the distant islands frown at you, and the tiling of Mario's castle halls have teeny goomba likenesses trapped inside of them.

I'm seriously in love with the stylistic choice of "add tiny eyeballs to otherwise unremarkable background object"

Little witchy tongue~! :P

~Conclusion~

Now, I acknowledge that not every Mario platformer is a remarkable game. I will not be the first or last person to tell you that many entries in the series feel like rehashes of the same ol', same ol'. With all the hundreds of Mario games out there, it can be difficult to sift through and find the most unique and worthwhile ones. Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins is the game you are looking for. (And if I had to provide a short list, also write down SMB3, SMWorld, NewSMB, and SMBWonder)

Do I recommend it? Yesss please play it!

100% completion of this game only took me 5 hours, so even if it is a waste of your time, at least it's a small amount of your time! ^^; (For completion, by the way, you just have to reach every level exit. There are 38 in total, including secret exits and the bonus levels that you unlock through these secrets)

I fw with the NSO gameboy color and LCD filters

Alright, we're cooking through this row of GB games! Only two games to go... and the next one promises to be unique on a whole different level...

Thank you very much for reading.

~Lark Lyke

[elle1her]

How to be confident ?

Hey lovlyzz💕 Hope y’all are pretty well! Today I wanna talk about some of the tips that can help you to reach ‘confidence is the key’ mindset. Enjoy!

(Before I start I want y’all to know that what I’m gonna say is what I experienced in the past, so I wanted to share this tips with you all and try to help everyone who’s trying to be a better version).

.Find your style

Nowadays I see a lot of people copying influencers, celebrities styles, even tho it makes them uncomfortable they keep copying them which is wrong! If you wanna be confident and attractive at the same time wear what makes you comfortable..these influencers are wearing what please them so why you’re copying them? Unless if their style match yours or you take it as an inspo, because by imitating them you’re to be them, but they’re already someone.

If you find it hard to find your style go to Pinterest look for the style that you like the most and buy some pieces that match the style you want, you don’t have to go to store you can go thrifting instead if you don’t have enough money just wear what makes you super comfortable, by that you’ll gain more confidence.

Also for makeup try to find the makeup that suits you the best! For me I used to wear heavy makeup but it wasn’t fitting my features but after I watched some videos on YouTube I realized that soft makeup match me so well.

.Compliment yourself

Believe me or not since I start complimenting myself I felt like someone new!

Whenever you wake up tell yourself how pretty you are how gourous you are, look at the mirror and keep complimenting your look.

By doing that your subconscious mind will believe this idea so you’re gonna start to feel more confident certainly.

.Fake it

When I used to be very insecure and unsure of my self, I was always faking my confidence..for example if someone tries to bring about my insecurities I act like I don’t have any of these insecurities they’re talking about like (my curly hair, my bunny teeth..ect) until I made them believe that I really don’t care what they’re saying and it made me believe it too! Until I became confident.

.Heal your trauma

I know this might be weird to hear but you should heal your trauma (your inner child) so you’re gonna be able to trust yourself which means ‘confident’.

you can’t be confident and weak at the same time you have to heal every part of you, start meditation, go see a therapist, try to change your bad habits, work on your personality until you’re satisfied with who you are. You’re gonna feel assertive and stronger immediately!

Hope this tips will help all of you! I didn’t want to add too much details since these tips are the main ones who helped me to reach this mindset..I’ll share more next time thank you sm for reading my blog may god bless y’all 🩷

[uo6ep]

god i hate searching for shit nowadays. looking something up. whole first page of results is like. clickbait. “hmm i wonder what kinds of transparent fabrics there are”. page title: 11 transparent fabrics. page preview doesnt say anything useful. its like an intro. id love if they just started listing the fabrics right away but whatever. opening the website. 3/4 of the article is basic info i didnt ask for just to make me scroll and look at ads. its all in a random order too. just watery empty text. the chart i wanted to see is in the very end. and like. i feel like this is largely what the experience is like

also google lens is shit

on a similar note. youtube search function. worse and worse and worse every day. yeah they have been adding random shit in search results for a while. but WHY does it have to be 3 vaguely relevant videos 3 random videos 3 more relevant then like 6 random ones etc. like…. it kind of helps to search by upload date but not always

the recommendations under videos.. like.. is it just me or is it always the same shit. like. for example i like asmr. im watching a new video that came out yesterday. in the “for you” under it is all videos i have already seen. like. doesnt that defeat the purpose. or have i broken the algorithm and youtube is confused with me. like if youre gonna show me stuff at least make educated suggestions?? what are you doing

tumblr search by blog just doesnt show you 90% of the relevant posts that youre Sure exist on the blog like wow thanks. i feel like it only functions on the html blog version

idk i just dont get it. is the internet too big cant search engines handle it

[apparently-artless]

I love all your edits!

Do you have any favorite psds that you are willing to share? Or tips on how to make gif colorings looks as nice as yours? 🥹

Hi, anon! Thank you so much! I am really happy that you love my edits. I really appreciate it! (°◡°♡)

To answer your question, I only use one PSD file nowadays for all the edits I make so sharing this one PSD I got for myself would be a bit uncomfortable. I hope you understand. Hehe. (￣▽￣*)ゞ

But no worries, because I thought of sharing LUT files that you can use as a basis for your color grading. I will only share one LUT file for this post but I might try sharing other LUT files as well in the future. In that way, you can achieve coloring with your own style. I will also be sharing which adjustment layers I use and what are the typical settings I apply.

SOME REMINDERS THOUGH:

I use PS 2021 but all adjustment layers are also available on older versions.

I AM NOT A PS EXPERT. I learned to use PS by reading/watching tutorials. All the things I will include in this post are just my preferences for my coloring. Take anything I said with a grain of salt.

I applied and tested my coloring on anime edits only. You may use it for real-life GIFs/photos but you may want to reduce the opacity or use a different blending mode to make it work.

My coloring deviates a lot from the original coloring most of the time. Some people may find my coloring weird so always keep in mind that this is not the best coloring practice.

ALSO WARNING: BAD ENGLISH AND LENGTHY EXPLANATIONS XD

To start, you may download the LUT file HERE.

This file is basically a compilation of adjustment layers that you may want to apply to other images. So when you use it again on another project, you can simply load this single file instead of the multiple adjustment layers. The disadvantage of using LUT file is that there's no room for further adjustments of the colorings within that file. In my case, I used it as an advantage. You may call it my secret recipe for my coloring. LOL. You can use it but there's a limit to the modifications. Anyways, this LUT file contains multiple layers which is a product of my trials and errors for the past few years since I started editing again.

You may consider using this LUT file as your training wheels. Once you understand further the complexities of the adjustment layers, you may no longer rely on this coloring file. I also did this when I started wanting to develop my own coloring style. And once I understood the basics of the adjustment layers and how to replicate the colors that I had in mind, I got rid of the LUT files and started making my own.

Now, let's use this image for coloring sample:

You can also download the image so you can follow my steps easily. This version is already sharpened.

So when I apply the LUT file for this image, this is how it's going to appear.

This color grading has the teal & orange effect. Of course, this is not the final output. This will be the backbone of our coloring as we add more adjustment layers. In my case, I always start with cyan and orange and then make the necessary changes depending on the series and the atmosphere of the image used.

But before we proceed with the adjustment layers, I want to emphasize two things you can explore when it comes to adding adjustment layers. Being aware of these two features of PS actually expands your coloring options exponentially [don't get fooled, I may sound like an expert but this is just really based on my personal experience. XD] Anyways, below are the two:

Opacity - It doesn't have to be black and white when it comes to coloring. You may choose the grey side. If you think the adjustment layer you are trying to add is causing an unpleasant effect on your image, maybe try to lower the opacity first and see if that will help.

Blend Modes - you may want to explore blend modes other than the Normal mode. If you are not used to changing the blend modes, you can check videos posted by Unmesh Dinda on his YouTube Channel. He explains really well when it comes to Photoshop features. I learned a lot from his tutorials and I am now applying these learnings to my current coloring style. You may check this video for starters. He has other videos about blending modes, too.

ADDING ADJUSTMENT LAYERS:

Levels Adjustment Layer - this is always my first adjustment layer but I also modify this in the last part. There are presets available but I am not utilizing those. Instead, I go to Auto Options. This feature is very helpful in heavily dark or bright scenes. Depending on what color correction you used, you may have extremely varying results.

Once you click Auto Options, another dialogue box will appear:

The default option is Enhance Brightness and Contrast. We will choose that option for now then click OK. [We will go back to this layer once we are done with the other layers.]

Color Lookup Adjustment Layer - this is where the LUT file comes in. Once you add the layer, click Load 3D LUT then click Load 3D LUT again on top.

Select the LUT file I shared.

Selective Color Adjustment Layer - for this layer, I always separate my adjustments for different colors and don't do the adjustments for all colors in one layer.

First Selective Color - I will rename the layer as RED and set the following values: CYAN: -100, MAGENTA: -11, YELLOW: -32, BLACK: 15

You can explore the levels of Magenta and Yellow but ultimately, I always set Cyan to -100 and Black is +15. Of course, you are free to change these two but these are my preferred coloring for shades of red. Setting -100 for Cyan gives this warm coloring.

Second Selective Color - I will rename the layer as YELLOW and set the following values: CYAN: -100, MAGENTA: +40, YELLOW: +30, BLACK: 40

Cyan is also set to -100. This adds more warmth to the tone of the image. Then you may change the remaining sliders to your preferred values.

Third Selective Color - I will rename the layer as CYAN and set the following values: CYAN: -60, MAGENTA: +20, YELLOW: +100, BLACK: +40

I don't have a rule for CYAN. This really depends on the color I want to achieve for the shades of blue. Depending on the values, you can make your color look blue/cyan/purple. In this case, I wanted to tone down the brightness of the cyan.

Fourth Selective Color - I will rename the layer as Black and White and set the following values: BLACK: +5

This is just to slightly darken the black shades of the image. I label it Black and White because I sometimes change the value of Black for White but in this case, adjusting the white doesn't help so no changes were made.

Gradient Map Adjustment Layer - I do not use this layer all the time. It really depends on the image. When I wanted to add another shade of colors to the image, that's the time I would use this. And I use a maximum of 2 gradients only.

The image looks okay now to me but let me add some gradient just to show how I use this layer. I use Gray_10 which is one of the preset gradients available in PS. Then I check the Reverse option to emphasize the contrasts of the colors. Then I set Blend Mode to Soft Light, Opacity at 100%.

Then I add another Gradient Map Layer. I use Purple_17. In this case, I didn't check the Reverse option.

Then I set Blend Mode to Soft Light, Opacity at 35%.

Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer - this one is optional. I use this on my gifs to increase the warm tones of the image.

I only change the values of Red for additional warm tones.

At this point, I also wanted to make the cool colors lose saturation, so I added another Hue/Saturation layer. To have a grayish effect on cool colors and make the reds stand out even more.

Brightness/Contrast Adjustment Layer - you can use the Auto function and then just make the adjustments you want.

In my case, I set the Contrast to -50 most of the time, then the Brightness varies. For this example, I set Brightness to +8.

Then last but not least, I made some slight changes to the Levels Adjustment Layer and then adjusted Brightness to -3.

To compare, I will post the original GIF, with LUT file only, and the final GIF coloring respectively:

I hope this helps, anon!

I might create a specific tag for this kind of post and just include it on my master list pinned post so it's easy to find. Also, if you ever use this coloring style or the LUT file as part of your coloring, there is no need to credit but if possible, please tag me in your creations (#userartless) so I can see how you personalized the file and made it your own. ^^