#can I make this in photoshop like a collage

[pssarahwins]

Wanting to create art but not having the skill or motivation to learn how to do it. Wanting to see a piece of art, only to soon realize it doesn't exist, and you can't make it. Wanting something to exist, but not being able to make it simply appear, realizing you're going to have to work hard to see if you can make your vision come to life. And you'll probably fail, you almost definitely won't be able to recreate the idea you've cooked up in your head, but no one else is going to do it, so either you learn and you try or you just don't get the thing.

[child-of-plut0]

AI is killing creativity

[pietadean]

im convinced free programs advertising as alternatives to photoshop are actually operated by adobe to make broke fans go absolutely crazy so we snap and subscribe to the evil 700€/year adobe thing

[ridragon]

If you are capable of replacing any ai complaints with the word Photoshop and match the quote to things people actually said back when that was introduced maybe you should think about how wrong and silly we see those anti Photoshop people now. That's just my salt on the topic. Idk.

[piecesintoplaces]

As a thank you for so many new followers, here's a brand new edition of my editing resources masterposts ✨ (you can find the previous editions here). Make sure you like or reblog the posts below if they’re from other blogs to support their creators! A friendly reminder that some of these are free for personal use only, so be sure to read the information attached to each resource to verify how they can be used.

Textures & Things:

Collage Kits from @cruellesummer that I find myself using basically every single day

Taylor Swift Wax Seals from @breakbleheavens that I also use literally every day

Rookie Magazine Collage Kits (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)

Scribble Textures & Cross-Outs (1, 2, 3)

GIF Overlays (1, 2, 3)

Film Grain & Noise Textures (1, 2, 3)

Paper Textures (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

PNG Overlays (Paper, Flowers, Clouds, Stickers, Lips, Vintage Paper, Misc. Symbols)

Halftone, Scan Line, & VHS Noise Textures (1, 2, 3, 4)

VHS Tape Textures by @cellphonehippie

Misc. Texture Packs (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

Photoshop Effects (Halftone Text Effect, Chrome Effect, Glitch Effect, Ink Edge Effect, Photo Morph Effect)

Fonts:

Badass Fonts (free fonts designed by womxn 🤍)

Open Foundry Fonts

Free Faces

Uncut Free Typefaces

Some Google Fonts I Like: Instrument Serif, DM Sans, EB Garamond, Forum, Pirata One, Imbue, Amarante

Some Adobe Fonts I Like: New Spirit, Ambroise, Filmotype Yukon, Typeka, Big Caslon CC (TTPD Font!)

Some Pangram Pangram Fonts I Like: Editorial Old, Neue World Collection, Eiko, PP Playground

Fonts In The Wild (font-finding resource)

Tutorials & Resources:

Comprehensive Rotoscoping Tutorial (Photoshop + After Effects, great for beginners!) by @antoniosvivaldi

Rotoscoping & Masking Tutorial (After Effects) by @usergif

Texture Tutorial for GIFs by @antoniosvivaldi

Color Control PSD by @evansyhelp (to enhance, isolate, or lighten specific colors)

Cardigan Music Video PSD by @felicitysmoak

Picspam Tutorial by @kvtnisseverdeen

Moving GIF Overlay Tutorial by @rhaenyratargaryns

GIF Overlay Tutorial (+ downloadable overlays!) by @idsb

Icon & Header Tutorial by @breakbleheavens

GIF Blending Tutorial by @jakeperalta

Split GIF Tutorial by @mithrandirl

Guide to Coloring Yellow-Tinted Shots by @ajusnice

Slow Motion After Effects Tutorial (useful for GIFs!)

Gradient Map Tutorial by me!

Misc:

How to Make Your Own Textures by @sweettasteofbitter

How to Report Tumblr Reposts of Your Work by @fatenumberfor

Tips for Accessible Typography

[feyspeaker]

Hi!! I’m not sure if you have already answered this, I tried to scroll through as much as I could to check lol But how clean are your sketches before you paint them? I know some people leave them as loose can be and some clean them up and even outline. So I was just wondering! :)

Hi there! Usually rather hideous so I do not share much. I use a mixed media approach to my painting, so to "sketch" I will sometimes use a mixture of 3D (I like to use Blender but I probably use it like a gorilla lol) and photobashed elements. I will build scenes kind of like a collage instead of traditional sketching first, then I will color correct them to fit together- usually I use 3D to build lighting reference. Then I run everything through a lot of filters to bring everything together better (I like to gaussian blur, then the posterize and palette knife filters in Photoshop, I've been using the oil paint filter for my vintage BG3 portraits haha) then I sketch over it more traditionally. Either I go straight into painting or I do this in black and white more recently, if I do that I add color later. The B&W process is a lot less chaotic so I've been enjoying that a lot more recently. both ways allow me to tweak character's likenesses and more importantly add in details like clothing/hair/elements like that so I'm not painting blind.

I have a lot of background in Photoshop like, for editing photography so I take a non-traditional approach to digital art. (if there even is one) It's a lot more akin to the way concept artists put together pieces, however I take them a few steps further to, hopefully, obfuscate the beginning a bit more. I love concept art but I do think a lot of it looks stiff or clearly photobashed, which I don't love the look of. A few years ago I started messing with this process as it felt like a lot of my beefy Photoshop knowledge was being wasted while I was focusing on more stylized works using Rebelle 5.

Honestly, my sketching process is the ugliest thing known to mankind and I am very self conscious about it, so I don't share a lot. It's not aesthetically pleasing, it just looks like I have no idea what I'm doing lol. I might share some about my Frankenstein process on Patreon at some point.

I believe very strongly in using the tools you have available as an artist, especially in this hellscape where AI abominations are at every corner and the pressure to create as fast as you can looms over you constantly as an artist. There are so many cool and weird ways to make art, ESPECIALLY with your computer, that there's really no excuse to use AI slop. I'd take my weirdo collage approach any day over asking some machine to poop out "art" for me.

[mostrovskaa]

Just out of curiosity, you make the mockups for your faux sticker set by yourself from scratch? or maybe mofidy existing ones?? I Think they look very good and add so much to the comms and you even theme them to suit the characters instead of using the same one over and over, like wow that takes some effort!! Your art is amazin! Do you reccomend some tutorials/tips and tricks/sites for mockups like these?

Hi! Thank you so much, I am so glad you like these! To do these I most often use stock images and public domain images alongside textures and scans of objects (notes, paper, scribbles, book spreads etc.) I made myself and mofidy them into digital collages. I also sometimes use preexisting mock-ups for graphic designers and just edit the hell out of them to make them suit my patchy aesthetic, but I prefer to just use the previous method of putting images together, because it gives me more of a field to work with. It does take a bit of effort, yes, that's why I don't make them for every commission post but I like to create them anyway as much as I can, to visualize a digital product in a semi-realistic way :-)

If I want to create a specific effect, I often just search up some photoshop tutorials or just experiment with filters untill i find something exciting or nice graphically. There are a lot of places that offer free textures to use, for example sites with materials for 3d modelling that offer these things - which I love to use in my work. But they are super easy to create on your own as well traditionally. I often take pictures of scraps, dirt and the like to later put into these types of images. You can also find that many museums and art institutions offer public domain images (of artwork, documents and the like) from their collections!

All in all, the process of making these comes from my need to explore how all the effects, filters etc. from digital programs can be used to achieve interesting visuals. I am by no means any authority on the topic though, I mostly just explore and if I like something - explore it more.

Sorry for the long anwser, but i think this is something other people would also enjoy to know!

Thank you again!

[petersolarz]

greetings! i love your photography — how you can elevate even the simplest of subjects through creative use of color, make the mundane feel magical! my wife is a hobbyist photographer, and she says she's never seen anything like what you do. if you don't mind, could you share some advice on how to achieve such vivid, unreal colors as in this post, for example? https://www.tumblr.com/petersolarz/775746566994690048 your wisdom would be much appreciated <3

Thanks for reaching out. Without giving away too much of the magic, everything I do gets tweaked in Photoshop. I’m old so I started with the first version of Photoshop 1.0, which had no layer options so I had to use a program called Collage to work with layers. I generally spend no more than a few minutes on each photo and use multiple versions of the original image and various layer functions to find the magic accidents that push me in a certain color direction. I use color gradients to enhance the overall effect.

[deepdreamnights]

From this post, a conversation between Mrs. Nice and Dr. Underfang, about how there's more than one way to make a comic.

While the linked post goes into the process in much more detail, the short version is that making a comic with AI involves all the steps of making a photocomic or a Wondermark-esq collage comic.

Here, each panel is a combination of one or more gens through direct compositing and inpainting ('gumby Underfang' is a basic crop-job but the others are multi-image composites, inpainted edits, or both), with graphic design and non-AI composited elements. `

I like to use AI art to achieve forms of 'fauxstalgia', weaving concepts into the aesthetics of artifacts of the past. I consider myself a nostalgia artist (not a nostalgic artist, tho I can sometimes be that), but you can get as experimental with it as you want.

And people are already doing it, they just don't call them comics.

Those sequences of AI-generated photos that tell a horror story that pop up on Tumblr? Those are comics.

We are very much in the "plastic wrap and lens flare" phase of AI art, where the newest and (often literally) shiniest effects take center stage because like an early 2000s kid with a cracked copy of photoshop, it's the new toy.

(I have a feeling Colin Kaepernick is going to give us, at most, a few adventures of a D-rate Borgorroth of Coolswordoorroth before absconding with the bag.)

Feel free to reblog with folks that are doing innovative stuff.

I will start by recommending @reachartwork, where you're going to find all kinds of interesting new stuff, and a fun illustrated prose super-verse under the CHUM title.

[jasper-pagan-witch]

Do you have a favorite and least favorite deck that you own? Or multiple in each category. Or any decks you disliked enough you regifted them?

Ohhh boy, do I ever. Firstly, I would like it to be known that I do, in fact, have spreadsheets for this. I have so many spreadsheets overall tbh. Therefore, I have spreadsheets for this! Regifted decks do not count towards my total of 60 decks, but the shame corner decks do.

Regifted Decks

Cosmic Tarot - I didn't really vibe with it, so I gave it to my mother.

Crystals: The Stones Deck - Not actually a tarot or oracle deck, but I gave it to my grandmother.

Dark Goddess Oracle Cards - There was just. So much wrong with the "lore" in this deck. The artwork also reminded me of those low-quality game ads you get on...adult content sites. I gave this one to my mother too.

Disney Villains Tarot Deck - I just didn't vibe with it, despite the pretty artwork. It really felt like they just made it a tarot deck because tarot decks are more popular than oracle decks. I gave it to a friend.

Kawaii Tarot - It was simple and clean...and I genuinely couldn't fucking read the deck. I gave this one to my mother as well.

Tarot of Sexual Magic - Most of this deck was cishet white folks and the only black man who appeared was about to get murdered on the Tower card because he was sleeping with a white woman and her boyfriend was swinging an axe to stop it. Did not enjoy. My mother actually took this one as well.

Shame Corner

Aleister Crowley's Thoth Tarot - I got this one on purpose and I think I gave it anxiety. I actually used its cards for bookmarks for a while but almost lost a good half of the deck.

Gems Oracles Cards - I knew that there was appropriation in this deck because I actually bought it off of a friend who was complaining about it, but it's part of something akin to a personal art project.

Decks I Actually Like - Tarot

The Antique Anatomy Tarot (Claire Goodchild) - This has the same overall vibe as those old-timey doctor's illustrations and it makes me feral in a good way. I want to eat this deck.

The Crow Tarot (MJ Cullinane) and the Guardian of the Night Tarot (MJ Cullinane) - Beautiful photoshopped collage-style decks. I even named my Crow Tarot "Uldren" (shoutout to the Destiny players and lore nerds who catch that reference).

The Dragon Tarot (Nigel Suckling, Roger Garland, Linda Garland) - My first ever tarot deck, lovingly named Abbot. This deck taught me a lot of hard lessons real quick about divination. Could use more dragons, but I love it. I've used it so much that it's falling apart.

Gay Tarot (Lee Bursten, Antonella Platano) - One of the first queer decks I bought, and it makes me happy because I'm masc-leaning when I must present as a gender.

In-Between Tarot (Janine Worthington, Franco Rivolli) - A really cool deck that explores the spaces between the cards rather than focusing solely on their classic depictions and interpretations. Cernunnos called dibs on this one.

Manga Tarot (Riccardo Minetti, Anna Dorzhieva) - A very fun little deck that genderbent every card and focuses on overall color to help carry the meanings. It is not, as far as I can tell, based on any particular existing manga.

Star Spinner Tarot (Trungles/Trung Le Nguyen) - This deck comes with four different Lovers cards, so I just keep them all in the deck. The author apparently has a graphic novel called The Magic Fish that I intend to read one of these days. I actually came across the novel through a YouTube video and didn't catch the author/artist's name at first, but I saw the artwork and immediately clocked it as Trungles.

Tarot of the Divine (Yoshi Yoshitani) - Alongside its companion book Beneath the Moon, this is an adorable little tarot deck whose art style makes me squee.

Tiny Universal Waite Tarot aka Tiny Tarot (no listed artist/author) - This is not a deck I use for divination, it's just so smol and cute that I wanted it.

Decks I Actually Like - Oracle

The Arcana of Astrology (Claire Goodchild) - Another Claire Goodchild deck, and I want to eat this one too. This deck doesn't just stop at zodiac signs and planets, there are also cards for the houses and the "comets", too.

The Seed & Sickle Oracle Deck (Fez Inkwright) - THIS DECK'S CARDS MAKE A GRADIENT. This is one of the most beautifully illustrated decks that I have ever seen in my life. It comes with two guidebooks - one for internal meanings, one for external meanings.

Spirit Allies (Jill Pyle, Cidney Bachert, Jay Kay) - I don't care much for the "goddess" portion of this deck, but Cannabis is a card in here and that made me cackle. Worth an honorary mention.

Woodland Wardens (Jessica Roux) - Another beautiful deck, this one features animals paired with plants. The composition of these are absolutely top-tier and I love them very much.

Thanks for sending this ask! I love to talk about decks I own and ramble about them and brag about my spreadsheets!

~Jasper

[frokenkeke]

Making of Ashes to Ashley

Recently I posted my comic Ashes to Ashley, and got such a tremendously kind and loving response that I felt like sharing a little bit more about where it came from.

The story is about a transgender awakening, where the quiet and somber Ash explodes out of the closet as the loud and colorful Ashley. This was always the plan, however the details changed along the way. Quite quickly I realized that I was writing about myself and my own trans journey. I never played in a band and I don't imagine I'll ever grow bunny ears (sadly), but still Ashley is undoubtedly a reflection of myself. I just allowed life to become a stage and gender performance a rock concert.

Above are the first idea doodles I drew late at night in early April. I quite enjoyed giving Ashley lipstick and prominent eye shadow, since I hadn't ever done a character like that before. The idea was a bit of exaggerated femininity that accidentally becomes raw punk expression. One or two people have pointed out the Um Jammer Lammy similarities, and they are absolutely not coincidental. Initially I imagined Ashley would've been more reluctant about her transformation, which is why she looks a bit more annoyed in some of my sketches, but the story became more bright and funny if it was made immediately clear that this all happens off of her own volition.

Some method and color tests. My girlfriend suggested I instead go a lot more raw with it, which is why I ended up adamantly using an ugly sponge brush built into Photoshop. Sapphic Disaster are some form of punk-shoegaze band, so combining rough pencil linework with crunchy texture coloring felt like a fitting visual representation of them. This also side-stepped the biggest problems I've always had with drawing comics – dealing with inking is a boring waste of time, and working digitally always makes me fixate on perfection. By just using pencil on paper I had to stick with whatever errors couldn't be saved by a regular eraser, in fact I dedicated myself to only using an old worn down Bic mechanical pencil and embraced the idea that the comic would consistently look a bit off and amateurish. Of course I allowed myself the luxury of cleaning up my drawings digitally before coloring, but that can only take you so far. This way of working helped me make fast progress and kept each step engaging, I've never had as much fun drawing a comic as I had with Ashes to Ashley.

Here's a before and after from initial scan to finished panel. I often only tidy up around focal points like faces or hands, and allow the rest to remain as it is, usually parts like the legs or Ashley's ears.

Character references and my initial color picks, they went through small changes as I went along. I liked giving all the band members different sorts of rabbit ears to make them all look distinct from each other.

Here's some ideas for the Sapphic Disaster band logo and the comic's color palette, notice how Ashley is more vibrant than Ash.

While working I filled up numerous papers with doodles trying to workshop panels and layouts. It's too much to show all of them here, so I composed a few collages of my favorites.

It was pivotal for me that Ash would always look painfully cute. The sketch of the table scene with Floyd shows a rare out-of-character confident and laid-back Ash. In the presence of Floyd?! Never!

I was very concerned about the reader recognizing the old Ash when first seeing Ashley. She may be all excited about being a girl, but her nervous cluelessness remains. I ended up going back and redrawing two panels in Ashley's introduction to strengthen this impression.

For those not in the know, shoegaze is a rock subgenre that centers around noisey guitar textures, typically achieved through heavy use of effect pedals at the musicians feet; hence the name. When Ashley plays her guitar she produces a cacophony of strange sounds, the reader will have to imagine what they actually sound like, but I always imagined their opening number "I Wanna Be a Girl" to sound like a couple of amateurs trying to recreate Lush's Blackout.

The page where the band go around looking for Ashley while she's receiving her makeover was shoehorned in at a later stage for pacing purposes. That's why Gabriel is suddenly back to pulling cords after previously claiming they're all set, oops!

One of the core rules to this story is that everyone is always overly supportive of Ashley's transition no matter what. This is what makes the otherwise stern and serious Floyd especially funny, my girlfriend was pivotal in sprucing up his dialogue, adding bits like "have you seen the health care waiting lists?, "I know an endocrinologist who owes me a favor or two" and "give me 35% more danger"

Towards the end I discovered that Ashley and Debbie dancing was apparently the most important panel in the entire comic, judging by how much I tried to perfect it. (For the record, my favorite panel is when Ashley screams into the microphone that she wants to be a girl.) Maybe Ashley and Debbie dancing should've replaced the final full-page panel? Well, we got a lot of cute doodles out of it regardless. Just kiss already!

Initially I imagined Ashley to be standing alone in the "could this be the real me" final panel, but I realized her odd family of friends was equally a part of the real her. She was always right where she needed to be, she just needed to find herself within that place. (I ended up giving Ashley a cigarette because otherwise it looked like she was praying.)

Here are some ideas for the cover illustration, of course in 1:1 format to look like an album cover. Up until last minute I planned for the comic to have You Made Me Realize as its subtitle to distinguish it from eventual follow-ups, which is why the You Made Me Realize EP cover art is paraphrased in the top-middle. I ended up just going with Ashes to Ashley to keep it clean and simple. The title Ashes to Ashley was blurted out immediately by my girlfriend when I first showed her my concepts for the story. It's perfect, she's perfect.

I drew two Ashes and two Ashleys for the cover art and let my fingers smudge all over the latter. While most obviously riffing on the cover for My Bloody Valentine's Loveless, it's equally taking from the Ecstasy of Saint Theresa's Pigment.

And there you have it.

However I never intended this to be the full extent of Ashley's story, just a satisfying and complete end of a chapter. I've already finished writing the next story, Today Forever, and I hope I can get it out to you all soon enough. Your love for Ashley keeps me going.

/Kiki

[artbyifer]

Gonna edit this cause I got some booing in the comments.

Yes, this is AI. Artbreeder, in particular. Everything that I have done that contains AI is under the tag #artbreeder. If it does not have that tag, it is not AI.

My rebuttal to the booing is as follows:

A) I made & queued LONG before AI was controversial on here or we knew the disastrous effects on the environment

B) I'm not selling it and would not have hired an artist anyway, since my original intent was simply to help increase my facial diversity by making these mockups before doing my actual art. Because

C) I'm a pretty good artist who can draw just fine on my own but

D) I'm faceblind and have aphantasia. I used AI here to get a mockup of a character that looks right to me when I can't do that very well usually

E) This even helped me identify faces a bit better since

F) I put actual work into these and they take 5h+ of staring at every so slightly different faces. I know that a lot of AI stuff, and artbreeder in particular is samey and has no effort. It’s really easy to do that! You just put in a prompt or a set of faces and go! But if you’ve got actual artistic vision and are trying to guide it in a certain direction, it’s more like using an unpredictable or limited medium. Like collage or paint marbling or cracking glaze. Which matters because

G) Other than the environmental impact, the obvious misuses that corporations like Disney could put it to to cut out artists, and the poor sourcing and payment on the dataset, AI is just a tool like any other. And if we could deal with those three problems (artists need credit and money [ubi?], corporations need fewer ways to be jerks, environmental impact needs to go WAY down) it would be just another tool in any artist's toolset like photography, colouring books, knitting, or photoshop.

[acertainmoshke]

Okay now that I've gotten to do the surprise book review bit, 7 Days for Fae questions

What was the process of getting the cover like/where did the cover come from?

This is such a dumb question, but font size. Do I just read books with tiny fonts or did you make your font bigger than normal. If so, was that intended as an accessibility thing?

Where did the idea from this book come start? Like, there are a lot of moving pieces (Brownie, Aunt Lana, the school stuff) and I'm curious if you started with one of them and expanded outward or something different.

Did you ever behind-the-scenes decide which Zelda game Brownie was playing? Totally cool if not, but as someone who played a lot of Zelda on her 3DS, I was curious

I'm curious where fairy theming with Fae came from? It's such a cool part of her identity and personality and stuff and I'm curious where that idea came from. If that makes sense as a question.

Oh wow, Heartshaven, thank you!! These questions are so great! I don't get to talk about this story much because I was almost done drafting it when I started this blog, so this is my chance!

One: The cover. I use getcovers.com, which sounds shady af but is in fact not. Their covers are cheap because these use cheaply (or free?) licensed images and put them together in kind of a...collage thing? None of that is how to say it right, but they basically photoshop a cover you can legally make money off of, which is cool. You go in with an idea in mind and pay differing amounts based on if you need a back cover for physical books and how many images it uses. I've done this for almost all my books, actually, even the ones that won't need them for years. I like visuals.

Two: The font was definitely bigger than normal, which was 90% because that was what the formatting pages suggested for kids books and 10% because I was fighting with formatting and kept having blank pages because the page break itself took up a line so I may have made it one size bigger to stop that.

Three: This book's story is...different. Usually I have an idea floating around for ages as daydreams, like I'm playing with dolls, and eventually plan it into something coherent. This one wasn't even an idea. It just happened. But you have to understand a few things: it was 2020 (self explanatory), I had just moved out of my parents' house for the first time (...don't do the math on how old that made me, I've always been a little behind), I was a senior in college (overwhelmed constantly so that I was barely learning anything, just trying to pass), and despite knowing for almost a decade had just decided to get an autism diagnosis.

Suddenly I was writing this story to deal with how I was never accommodated as a little autistic kid, and the way my parents treated me, and it was a wish fulfillment. And then I needed a b-plot and hadn't made Fae trans because that felt like too many things, so I made her parent trans. I was actually homeschooled until high school so the story isn't at all about me, but the vibes are what could my life have been like? I don't usually relate to books about autistic kids so I wanted one that was like me, and I never see my full disabled experience represented.

(Fun fact: in the first several drafts, Aunt Lana's name was my mom's middle name as a placeholder, which I think says a lot about how much stuff I had to work out)

I did change two major things when I projected onto Fae. First, I do have ataxia and based her symptoms on mine, but mine is episodic, ranging from a baseline of general clumsiness and poor balance to really bad spells of being barely able to walk, but often with spells in between, at the level I describe for Fae. But that is complicated for a short book, and I wanted it to be clear and understandable for kids, so I made hers consistent. I stretched reality here a little: episodic ataxia is one of the very few genetic kinds that is not progressive. But it's a story, so.

And second, I aged her down. I based her off of what I was like around 13. This is partly because an elementary school story is easier to tell than a middle school one, but also I know that despite being precocious I was emotionally young and on paper this story makes more sense for a slightly younger kid.

Four: I am so sorry, I know nothing about Zelda. I wanted a 3DS but never had one. We got a PS3 when I was like 16 and I played Batman on that and Diablo on the computer, but before that it was mostly PC games like Oregon Trail. Feel free to project whichever game you like.

Five: That was actually me. Mostly. As a kid who never felt like I belonged in the world I was in, I had a bit of a Fae obsession myself. Even more so when I learned about the changeling-autism connection. Cold Iron, my Fae book, has had some version in my head since I was like 14. It's just kind of my thing, between the beauty and terror and isolation and...well, and ice magic because I'm also overheating all the time.

Bonus fact no one asked for: The original story was called Fae and Brownie because I thought it might turn into a series where future books would be like Fae and Brownie Do Things. But several beta readers pointed out that he's one of several aspects in her life so it needed to be named something just centered around her.

Bonus fact again: One person thought it seemed like she was developing a crush when she commented on his hair but since the rest of the book didn't go there I should change that. I thought about it and decided not to because noticing sensory things and wanted to touch them isn't related to sexuality or romance for me, and since that's how I think that's how Fae gets to think.

Thank you, this was awesome!! I hope it isn't too long.

[dollys-perfect-world]

🔍👣One step behind👣🔎

Zach Chen has gone missing while pip is at collage, and no one knows how to find him as well as she would've. Upon that, pip isn't answering anyone when they try to contact her. So who's better to take on the case than her 11 year old little brother, Josh Amobi?

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

It started with Ravi. Even after the breakup, Ravi and Josh remained close. Josh would've been heartbroken if he lost Pip and Ravi both; his two role models.

Ravi had come over to play video games, but something was off. Well, something bad been off for almost a year; ever since Pip went off to college and they'd broken up. But something different was off. Maybe 30 minutes into them playing, Josh had won everytime, which only ever happened when Ravi was too distracted to try.

"You're acting weird," Josh said, turning his gaze from the TV screen to Ravi.

"I am? Didn't notice. Guess I'm just tired," Ravi replied keeping his eyes on the screen, pressing the 'New Game?' button.

Josh hated that response. He was doing exactly what Pip used to do! He was 'too young' to hear about their worries, and they didn't want to make him worry. So what if he was still a kid, he deserved to know stuff, right?

"Liar," Josh mumbled, looking back at the TV as the next round started. Ravi pretended not to hear him, but Josh knew he heard.

Dinner was quieter without Pip. Maybe it was because Pip always kept the conversations going, maybe things just weren't the same without her, so no one saw a need to talk. A need to pretend it was the same. At least they kept the TV on for background noise, without it Josh would go insane.

Zach Chen was fairly popular around fairveiw; all of Pips friends were, since they had been mentioned in her podcast; AGGGTM.

Josh wasn't supposed to listen to her podcast. Pip had told him not to, but without his sister there, who was gonna tell him no? So with a pair of Pips old earbuds and his worn out computer, Josh listened to every episode until he could recite the entire podcast by heart.

Everyone kept their eyes on their food while the news played from the TV in the living room. Josh wasn't paying much attention until he heard Pips name.

"The friend of our local celebrity, Pippa Fitz-Amobi, Zach Chen has gone missing. We would like anyone who knows about where he could be, or has any information about the situation, to step forward."

Josh had run into the living room the moment he heard Pips name. "Oh. Well that's what Ravi was worrying about, then," Josh thought. He heard some faint, 'oh, that's horrible.' comments from his parents, but it was hard to hear through the ringing in his ears.

It was a impulsive and stupid idea, but that's all that Pips ideas started out as, right?

'I can prove that he's innocent."

'It'll help Connor.'

'Just one more, then It'll all be fixed.'

Josh could make Pip proud. He could be just like his sister; his hero. He could find Zach.

And it started by trying to figure out how to fine the name of Pips printer, (and trying to figure out how to use it,) becuase hes only 11 and why would he know how to use a printer?

After about an eternity of googling things and waiting for his parents to fall asleep, Josh snuck into Pips room, which didn't even feel like a real place with her gone, and immediately walked over to her printer. He had his own laptop tucked under his arm. Josh opened his laptop and set it on the desk next to the printer. He opened photoshop and pulled out a folded up piece of paper; Jamie Reynolds' missing poster.

It took at least 2 hours, but he worked and almost exactly replicated Jamie's old poster. Josh made up a fake email, ChenProject226@gmail.com, and put it in the contact information. Printed out a couple, praying that the screaming poster wouldn't wake up his parents, and then snuck back to his room.

The next day, Josh convinced his parents to let him walk to school. He stuffed the papers and some tape in his bag right before he left. Every couple poles and light posts that he walked past, if no one was looking and no cameras were in view, he hung up a poster.

(HIHIHI COMMENT IF U WANT MORE TO THIS CAUSE I DONT WANNA WRITE TOO MUCH IN ONE POST!! IF UR READING THIS ILY!! ALSO I MADE THE EMAIL JOSH IS USING A REAL EMAIL IF U WANNA HAVE EMAILING IT AS IF ITS REALLY JOSH/PIP!!!)

[izzyandcrew]

Q&A

What is the Izzy and Crew Event?

It's an effort to foster positive energy and to revitalize and uplift our community through a group art project. (A bit like Izzy's prosthesis)

What's the theme of the event?

The theme is to explore the fellowship that exists or could exist between Izzy and various crew members. You're welcome to post content of just Izzy or just the crew member of the week, but ideally, entries should focus on the bond between them.

What kind of art are we talking about?

Anything at all! Draw, paint, write, photoshop, make memes and moodboards, sew, cosplay, take photos of your crochet dolls and puppets, collage, post headcanons. Whatever you can make will brighten someone's day.

Do we need to post something every day?

Do as much or as little as you want.

Do you have prompt lists?

Here's the Day of the Week Prompts.

Here’s the Big List of Prompts.

Use whatever sparks joy.

Are the prompt lists mandatory?

No, they’re totally optional. They're there for the folks who do best with a jumping-off point.

Can I post ship content? What about angst? Is there a rating limit?

Although shipping is not the focus, it is welcome. Angst is welcome, too, just keep the spirit of the event in mind. As for rating, post your content on the appropriate sites with the appropriate tags and we're all good.

What if I want to make content about the whole crew?

Sounds awesome! You can share ensemble crew content any time during the event.

What about Ed and Stede?

The event is already three months long, and there's a lot of existing content with Izzy and Ed and Stede, so the captains were ruled out. You're welcome to use Free Week, though.

What is Free Week?

Free Week is the last week of the event. Feel free to post about Izzy with any characters on the show or to revisit your favorite crew members if you like. (Izzy & OC or Y/N content also welcome during this week if that’s your jam)

I have a question you didn't cover.

Feel free to message me here or on my personal blog @deskgirl. If it's information that might help other folks, I'll add it here, too.

[damnfandomproblems]

5168

That One Anon: Get the fuck out of fandom then if you are That against "theft". Your blorbos aren't yours, then, they belong to the original creators. Go pick up a pen and write your own characters, thief. Never make a creative aspect without citing every single possible subconscious influence you took for it. That head tilt you drew? The concept of a sad backstory? Proper credit only, you thief.

Oh, what's that? You don't count?

I read books daily. I write and draw from pure imagination, and study artists on youtube to get better at drawing.

I also think AI is a tool that can be used for good or ill, and it's how people use it that matters. Much like how a keyboard doesn't stop a human from sending anon hate.

I'd commission artists if I could! I've done so in the past. But guess what, I don't feel safe asking for commissions now on the off chance a artist realizes I think AI is a tool like any other and harasses me when I never would have brought it up. Despite the fact many artists both fandom and original have tons of influences both credited and not. I've seen human artists and writers get accused of AI for STYLISTIC CHOICES that anyone with half a thought should be able to tell was artist intent and inline with previous works.

I can count on one hand the amount of collage art/blackout poetry/drawn over photographs I've seen in public museums that were properly credited beyond the editor. I can't count the amount of media I've seen that nudges at other pre-existing works that was either hyped up for it or was said to justify that aspect.

Ko-fi tipping, Patron subscriptions, sales of generically labled charms and prints and fanart to get around what's Actually being sold. Art style memes, art referenced from canonical works as intentional homage uncredited. Uncredited style inspiration. The entire existence of unsourced, constantly remixed memes.

You gonna claim that's all fine, but anons should expect to be accused of being "techbros" and linked to foreign words meaning "masturbating and crying" for just asking what an artstyle from a artist is called? That it's actually FINE to drive off people wanting to be creative no matter the medium because that particular one 'isn't art' and so no one can want to be a artist and use it?

I swear I've gone back to the 2010s and 'is digital art REAL art though? the computer draws the line for you? You aren't a REAL artist, you just use photoshop to edit things.'

"That's still done by a human person though-"

Hypocrite. Get the fuck out of fandom.

Posting as a response to a previous problem.