#i actually have a video in the works for this comic

[marblez-art-studio]

I've seen a bunch of those "I'll do this for that many notes" thing so here's my go at it

NOTE CHALLENGE TIMEEEE

CHECK MY MOST RECENT POST FOR THE 100 NOTES ANNOUNCEMENT

10 - I'll post something random today and/or answer a random ask if I even have any

20 - I'll drop another spoiler for my big project!

50 - I'll actively study for my driver's permit and actually follow up with all of the thousand jobs I've applied at

75 - I'll work on writing the next chapter of UnderInk!

100 - I'll reveal what my big project is early 👀

150 - I'll drink the daily recommended amount of water for once in my life

200 - I'll ACTUALLY work on drawing my comic!! I've continuously shoved it off to the side and the stuff I've actually made I've scrapped MULTIPLE TIMES.

250 - I'll give you one of my crusty ah recordings of my singing

300 - I'll make a new animatic that I'll put real effort into finishing

400 - I'll draw fanart of one of your OCS (I'll pick it randomly from my asks, send in a pic if you wanna be apart of it)

500 - I'll post a video of my quadrobics (which is something I've shown very few people)

Only rules are if you spam to much they won't actually count towards the score. (I'll count like 10 notes per person)

Also get pinged bozos :3

@neverniko101 @inkchoarts @cas-spirit @snowdrop-wolf @soul100 @casperzcrimescene @olivebigpaws @zaidenthealterhuman @jaydenssocool

[factual-fantasy]

27 Asks! Thank you! :}} 💞

@peaspods

I might not be understanding, but I'm imagining this as people opening up commissions so people can give them money and they can turn around and donate that money to me..

I fear that this would create the opportunity to scam people.. "I'm taking commissions on behalf of Factual Fantasy! They're very sick so please commission me!" only for them to run away with the money they make..

I've been thinking a lot about setting up some kind of commission/donation thing because I'm starting to kind'a need the money.. but idk, I'm just kind'a run down and need some time to keep thinking about it. Thank you very much though <:)))

@zecromgen5

Thank you very much! :) And I've been hanging in there.. there hasn't been much improvement to my health or my mental state. The fact that in April it will officially been over a year since my health started to decline, and the fact that I'm going to spend my birthday at home collapsed on the couch has made me feel very sad <:( But I'm doing my best to work on it.. I'm hoping this new advice from my doctor helps me feel better <:)

And something good HAS happened actually, I got my tablet/FireAlpaca to work again! :))

XDD SJKFJSH AWW! THANK YOU SO MUCH!! :DDD

I've only seen a bit of it from Markiplier. So far I'm 50/50. Somethings I like and others I don't care for 😅

@neo-metalscottic

Thank you so much! :D 'm glad you've liked my recent artwork!! :}}}}

Also for Homes eyes, that was just meant to represent its oppressive presence and the fact that its watching them in that moment.. 👁️👁️

And I don't have any plans for any of the neighbors or Wally to figure out the house is alive. My AU is more like "a day in the life of" thing. Having someone discover Home is alive would move the plot forward. Which I don't feel like doing <XDD

Now communication... Home understands the concept, but he has no way of communicating other than creaking the floorboards and slamming doors..

I've heard about the well. That could work for Cliffjumper and Breakdown maybe.. and the twins perhaps.? But wouldn't they have to have Tailgates body in order to revive him? Hmmm.. idk actually,,

I've watched the bayverse movies, most of Prime and a few other things here and there. I didn't mind the bayverse movies that much, but I can see why a lot of people don't like them <XD

I just imaging trying to consume more than one Transformers media would be a lot to take on.. and I also don't like the animation styles of most other transformers shows 😅

(That's actually how I decided to watch Prime. I took a look at all the shows and went "this one looks ugly, this one looks ugly,, this one looks REALLY ugly.. Oh, this one doesn't look half bad. TFP it is then!")

@acreaturecalledkyfa

I've watched Markipliers first video on it. So far I'm not sure how I feel about those two 😅

The way I immediately opened YouTube and went looking for it XDD

@fandomcenteral (Link in ask)

Thank you so much! :DD This will come in handy!

@mason-gaylord

Aw! Thank you so much!! 🥰🥰

@im-nice-but-i-dont-like-you

Jangles would be a helicopter probably, Gerald would be a tank, Cici would be a Miata and Bibi would be a slightly raised up Miata XDD

Aw, I'm honored that you miss them <:}} Though I don't know if I'll draw them anytime soon.. I'm really not into inserted OCs anymore <:(

I'm waiting on Markiplier to release more videos on it <XD

@fadlingartisanfreakwinner

I like to imagine that Pokémon can learn dozens of moves. But 4 is the limit for official Pokémon battles. So any wild Pokémon in my comics can use/learn as many as they want :0

And yeah, they had that chat eventually. I just never got around to drawing it 😅

@wolfie-777

Nah nah its just iced tea XDDD

@whereismycupofcoffee

:DDD Thank you so much!! :}}}}

AAAA THANKYOU SO MCUHH!! :DDDD

@nuggybee

Yeahh,, Sky has its ups and downs. I'm currently in one of its downs. It seems like I'm let down by everything they're releasing 😓

@smithanonsworld

I feel like I've never seen a rabbit that color... its so cute 😭💞💞💞

@heaventhehedgi3

That sounds like me! Though I don't draw Octonauts anymore 😅

I'll keep it in mind! :0

🥹🥹🥹Aw... that's so sweet! Thank you so much!! 😭💞💞

@captain-skyler1987

You made an account just to follow me? :DD Aw that's so sweet! :) Thank you!

Also I'm sorry to hear you got the flu :(( I hope you're better by now!

I also have not played Dandy's world 😅

@stargirldrawsx3

The first thing that came to mind was very anxious all the time 😅

@network-warrior-01

Ah, that was an April fools post. <XD There is no drawing

[sailorspazz]

10 Dance - chapter 43, part 2 summary

Following a day of text conversations, the Shinyas finally get the chance to go out together as a couple. Their conversation reveals that they have some differing ideas about how their relationship should progress from here.

Full summary and highlight images under the cut.

Chapter 43, part 2: I Could Have Danced All Night

Published online on February 7th, 2025. Available to purchase on Comic Days, or rent for 10 days on Yanmaga.

Norman holds up the tablet as Suzuki greets Nino through the ongoing video call, while Aki freaks out a bit that the famous Nino Zolche is actually talking to them. Nino says that he'll be joining their training team soon, and will be in Japan within the week.

After handing over the tablet to Suzuki and stepping aside, Norman is approached by Saichi. Saichi sees him watching Suzuki talking to Nino, and says (in English) that Norman is actually a meddling yet kind man. Norman tells him not to address him with such poor pronunciation. He asks what his first name is, and Saichi answers that it's Takashi. He wonders whether he should call him Takashi or Saichi, and just as Saichi starts to answer with his last name, Norman starts calling him by his first name. Norman says that he heard Saichi tried to quit, but Max laughed and threw out his resignation letter. He then asks how Shun is doing, and Saichi replies that he's been hanging around his place, and also started going to the gym to blow off steam. Norman says that's probably because Saichi suggested that to him, and says that they both seem to be meddlers.

As time passes and the next day comes around, we see a series of what the Shinyas have been texting each other while apart. Suzuki asks questions like "What are you up to?" and "Did you make it home?", and the responses he gets in return are mostly one-word or other short answers. Suzuki sends a selfie with the message "Love you too", to which Sugiki thinks that he didn't say "Love you" in the first place. He texts back suggesting they should get something to eat together, which gets Suzuki excited.

They meet up at the same restaurant they visited in volume 1's special chapter "Samba de Men's Love" (it did not have a name back then, but is now called The Yanmaga Grill & Wine Bar, referencing the current publisher). Sugiki comments that it's hard to believe they're here together again, but interrupts himself as he's distracted by Suzuki, who has his arm around him and is repeatedly kissing his cheek.

He cautions that they shouldn't act so cozy in front of other people. Suzuki calls him "mi bebito" (my baby) and wonders why he's worried about that now. Sugiki grabs his hair and pushes him back, calling him "darling" and says he shouldn't be showing such an alluring and indecent looking face to anyone else. Suzuki questions if he's in any position to talk, since it seems like he's been trying to provoke him. Suzuki then flirtatiously utilizes his sexy accented English, and Sugiki runs his thumb down to his lips, grabs his face, and kisses him.

Suzuki suggests that they get out of there, but Sugiki refuses, saying that he won't have sex with him until after the 10 Dance competition is over. Suzuki tells him not to tease him like that, but Sugiki insists that he means it. Suzuki internally spirals into negative thoughts, wondering about things such as how the selfies Sugiki sends all look the same, and it's possible that he can't be bothered to even take new pics for him and is just changing the backgrounds. He worries whether Sugiki actually loves him back, but Sugiki seems to sense what he's thinking about, and threatens that if he says anything stupid he'll have his way with him right then and there. Sugiki says that they have an important goal to work toward in the 10 Dance, but Suzuki argues that it'll be hard to focus on the competition like this. He warns Sugiki not to make light of him, and wonders if Sugiki thinks he's so caught up in love that it'll cause him to mess up. Sugiki replies that they're both caught up in it, making Suzuki blush.

A voice calls out saying it's been a while, addressing them as "amigos". Suzuki recognizes the man as Marcelo, the one who played guitar and sang while the Shinyas danced back in the "Samba de Men's Love" chapter. He says that thanks to them, the restaurant lets him play gigs there now. He asks if they want to do another number together, and simultaneously Sugiki thinks and Suzuki says aloud that they'd like to do a cha-cha. Marcelo starts to play, and before the Shinyas begin, Suzuki wonders what their connection will convey to each other now. When their hands join, both look stricken by the intensity. While the other patrons clap and cheer them on, Suzuki and Sugiki smile at each other as they finally reunite in dance.

Previous chapter: #43 part 1

Next chapter: there is currently no information on the next release date.

[tblsomedoodles]

The Preferable Alternative - part 14

Start - previous - next

rare 6 pg update! b/c the pacing was better if i stopped the scene there.

Leo: That was weird.......ANYWAYS!

: )

[blackkatdraws2]

There are more things in the Parable than Stanley knows about. [Blank Scripts AU]

[personishfive]

in which his life is like a video game

[ferronickel]

Hail, flatter! This one, who is a layperson of the arts and comixcraft, has a query for you:

So like, what is flatting?

I've seen your flats in Wifwulf, and I've read about the flats in Looking Glasses, and generally get that it results in an image with similarly coloured areas sharing the same false-colour.

But like, how is it then used? The final images seem to contain more colours and shading, so why not just go straight to this? Why do false colours get used instead of the real ones? How do you pick the colours and how many get used?

How come this is a thing that a whole other person can do separately? I guess that's because it's time consuming - so it saves time somehow?

Thank you! I come in the spirit of humility wishing to relieve my ignorance of your noble craft!

OHOHOHO!!! You've activated my trap card and now I get to ramble about comics craft! And in my area of professional expertise, too! Be prepared for a long post

I'm going to start with the last part of your question:

How come this is a thing that a whole other person can do separately? I guess that's because it's time consuming - so it saves time somehow?

So the thing about comics is that it is one of the most intensely time consuming mediums to create. One person can make comics on their own fairly easily, but it takes forever to produce. Consider that I've been working on Looking Glasses for 18-19 months and have drawn about 87 pages. Now, the western comics industry expects issues to be produced monthly, generally 24 pages in length. It's very difficult for a single person to work at this rate, so the labor of producing comics has been divided. Generally these jobs become:

Writer (writes the script)

Editor (edits the script)

Artist (draws the lineart)

Colorist (colors and renders the art)

Letterer (adds balloons, dialog, and sfx)

Flatter (sometimes 'color assistant' they take the art and prepare it for coloring)

This isn't comprehensive though, there are a bunch of other jobs, like designers and layout artists. Occasionally the artist job gets broken into Pencilers (who sketch the art) and Inkers (who ink the sketch). Basically, by splitting the work amongst a number of people you can produce comics much faster. Not all of these jobs are required, and creator-owed books might have artists do their own coloring and lettering, while big work-for-hire books might have twice as many people working so they can pump out a spider-man book every other week.

Okay, so why Flatters?

Flatting at it's most basic level is just coloring inside the lines. You take a black and white page of art, and you have to fill in every part of the page that will eventually be colored. It's a pretty time consuming task depending on how involved your lineart is.

Flatting a page of Looking Glasses doesn't take me all that long, usually less than a half hour, which is pretty quick. Looking Glasses pages tend to be... optimized for flatting though. There are only ever a few characters and there aren't a ton of background details.

You mentioned Wifwulf (created by my longtime friend and collaborator Dailen Ogden), here's one of it's pages:

Basically everything that's a different base color, (every tree, plant, bit of moss, character, etc.) needed to be picked out separately. Each page of Wifwulf took me a few hours to flat. If Dailen had been doing that themself, those hours would have really added up, but instead they could spend that time drawing and coloring. Now, that said, these pages have a lot of texture, so it's hard to see exactly what I did.

Here's an example from a comic I worked on early in my career. (Lineart by Patrick Custodio)

The writer for this comic loved to put in these incredibly complex crowd scenes, which is something the artist excelled at drawing. I was coloring and flatting at this point on the book, and before I could even start coloring properly, I would need to flat for like eight hours. (I have a much more efficient method these days) It was frustrating because I just wanted to work on the actually creative part, but the majority of my time was spent on something monotonous. As soon as I got the writer to hire a flatter for me, coloring a page would take me only one or two hours, not nine or ten.

So that's why flatters exist, mainly to ease the workload on colorists.

But like, how is it then used? The final images seem to contain more colours and shading, so why not just go straight to this?

Flatting serves a couple of purposes. It's main function, like I said above, is just coloring in the lines. After finishing your lineart it has to get colored in, so in a layer below the lines, you add colors.

The secondary function is preservation. I like to work in a way that is non-destructive, basically, at any point in the process I can restore an earlier version of the drawing if I make a mistake or don't like something. Flats are integral to this.

In digital art, there's this thing called anti-aliasing, where the edges of a line or shape have a drop off of pixel color or opacity. It makes the edges look smoother or blurrier. The three dots on the left are Anti-Aliased, while the one on the right is Aliased, there's no drop off, just hard pixels.

Anti-aliasing is fine until you need to change the color using the paint bucket, or select using the magic wand...

See how the anti-aliased art doesn't play well with these tools, but the aliased art does? So with something like Wifwulf, the final art is going to be full of texture that makes it impossible to select anything again once it's painted. By having a dedicated aliased flats layer under the rest of the artwork, you can always re-select any part of the image you want.

I always leave my flats layer alone, and do any detail work in layers above. For example when I was painting this, it really helped to be able to select just the titan so I could work on those paints without worrying about brushstrokes overlapping the rest of the characters.

One of the other things you can do with flats is quickly selecting certain elements. On most pages, I flat my panels, figures, and background elements separately. Later, with a single button press, I can select just the characters in the scene, or entire panels at a time, which makes things like shading a whole lot easier.

Why do false colours get used instead of the real ones?

If you're flatting for other people you often don't know what the final colors are going to be, so you just pick random ones. Garish colors can be helpful because it makes it obvious that they're not the final colors. Why don't I use the correct colors on my own pages when I'm flatting? Habit, mostly. It's also faster to grab random colors than to track down the correct ones. Sometimes two different things will have the same final color but I like to flat them with different colors so I can select them individually if I need to.

You can see the process a bit here. In my flats, Lancer's spade (eye? eyes? thing) is a different color from his tongue, even if they end up being the same white in the final image. This would help if I ever needed to select just his eyes for some reason. You can also see how I select his body fur color and then add details on top, like his colored fingers and the grey on his arm. Those elements have blurry anti-aliased edges, and it would be impossible to re-select them without flats.

How do you pick the colours and how many get used?

I use the default "additional color set" palette in clip studio and just work my way through it. I pick row and work my way down (for a change of pace I vary which row I start with). How many is mostly dependent on the artwork. You just keep going until you run out of individual objects to color. I have worked on pages where I've run out of colors on this palette and had to start making up more. Typically a page of Looking Glasses only needs around 20-30, though.

So! That's flatting! It's a little known job, and it's how I got started with my comics career, so I have a lot of thoughts on it. I was trying to be concise (lol), so I hope this all makes sense, but I'd be happy to clarify or answer any other questions about this process. I know I didn't really go into how I flat my work, so I can make that post if anyone is interested.

[syrupyyyart]

one of the first and only teasers for motley: the cartoon

[unfriendlyamazon]

the thing about azula is she's also a victim of abuse she bought into her father's ideology because she was rewarded for doing so (and she has some funny thoughts about divine right to rule) and explicitly gains power both in the context of her society and mentally by torturing her brother ("you can't treat me like this you can't treat me like zuko")

which is to say the show depicts azula and zuko has fundamentally different from a young age (and zuko's inherent goodness is his main source of conflict for most of the show) and i appreciate that the show doesn't go out of its way to show sympathy or explain its abusers, even when azula is given her moments, it's not to make her more sympathetic, and i think the show is aware that azula has benefited from being a natural prodigy who aligns herself with fire nation ideology, but it's clear by the end that ozai treats her as no less a tool or extension of himself than he does zuko

which is also to say her final battle between katara and zuko is my favorite part of the show hands down i find it beautiful and the music makes me tear up and when she is defeated and sobbing and completely undone, it's my favorite part of the show. azula has spent so much of her time and energy into currying favor with her abusive father, putting herself into a position of power, and to be undone by her brother who she views as inferior to her in every way and some waterbending peasant i think it must just break her worldview. everything she's done up to that moment, it was the wrong move, and zuko is now the one on top

anyway i think the show has a lot of interesting things to say about power and those who wield it, and i think azula's relationship with power, both under it and exerting it herself, is a really interesting one, and as a foil to zuko, she works really well in showing that even aligning oneself with power despite or because of circumstances is ultimately a fruitless task, and those in power will keep moving the goal posts as you try to get ahead

[pixlokita]

Why don't you allow them to do dubbing for you?

While a few people have been polite enough to ask and properly credit there’s a quite a few dubs that didn’t get permission, didn’t credit properly if at all… even credited the wrong person on purpose. And don’t get me started on people using AI voices to “dub” comics (also without crediting the source) . At least put in the effort. That’s just reposting art at this point :’> anyway it gets depressing when people say they’ve seen your art but couldn’t even find you because of that. I love the dubs that people were nice about tho 💖 it means a lot that they’d go out of their way to do that sincerely because they just liked the comics or contributed to the ideas somehow but yeah it got pretty overwhelming and bad after a while.

[papaiyatree]

marvel rivals have got me thinkin about what if dc had a similar game out >_>

[flickering-nightfall]

[astranauticus]

not sure if this counts as an AU but.. thinking about the Per Aspera crew as horror game bosses like.. you are wandering through a forested mountain range and you know somethings wrong because the forest shouldn't be this eerily silent, this devoid of life, and then you hear the crash of falling trees and there is a hand that is half your size glowing golden in the night and it is grabbing you and its claws are digging into your flesh and you see the spines running down the golden arm that is far too long as it lifts you over a crater in mountain, over a coiled, serpentine thing with a visage that is not of this world, and if you look closely you can see the shape of a child curled at the centre of the thing, golden hair reflecting the glow of the creature and if you listen closely you can hear her sobbing, 'Don't hurt me, I don't want to do this'. you are sailing through the astral sea when you see an ephemeral, resplendent spelljammer cutting through the starry waters and you rejoice because you have been lost on the seas for so so long, so you board the ship looking for help, supplies, anything, and you are greeted by a blue fire genasi (you wonder, do those even exist? but you can't get off the ship now because where else will you go?) and she tells you she is the captain of this ship but as far as you can tell there is no crew on board, and if she is not appearing right behind you from a trapdoor you've never noticed she is always in the engine room 'fixing the ship' even though the ship seems to be sailing perfectly fine ('Where are we going?' you ask her once and she doesn't even turn to look at you, 'Don't worry about it') and if you are ever so unlucky as to damage the ship in any way, you begin to catch flashes of red and orange out of the corner of your eye, a fire genasi wearing the woman's face who whispers at you with hollow, angry eyes 'Don't you fucking dare hurt my ship'. you are sailing through the astral sea when you see a rotting, decaying spelljammer, so badly damaged it's barely moving although you have to wonder how it's even staying afloat at all, and out of some morbid curiosity you climb on board and the deck of the ship is in no better shape than the hull, the marks of hard-fought battle - scars in the wood from sharp blades and arcane energies, stains of blood and oil splattered about - still fresh but you know time doesn't pass on the astral sea so who knows how long ago this all took place, and as you climb below decks you start to notice the writings on the walls, pieces of parchment nailed to every surface and connected with fraying, rotting threads, or words etched directly into the wood, the deep gouges barely readable, and you start to hear the creaking and clanking of rusted machinery slowly moving about and you turn a corner to see a figure standing in a room facing the wall, slowly scratching yet more of that unintelligible writing into the bones of the ship, and it turns as the rusted dented mechanite stares at you with eyes ablaze and he asks 'Who are you? Where is my crew?' as sparks of arcane lightning begins to arc through the room. you are running through a feywild forest and you know, even without the figure chasing you, that you have made a horrible mistake, you should have known better, should have been more careful, should have kept your impulses in check, and now you are being chased through an unfamiliar forest and the figure, the Hunter pursuing you knows this realm like the back of his hand, knows every tree and shrub and vine that is slithering up to grasp at your ankles, and you glance back desperately to catch any glimpse of your pursuer but there is no pursuer, he has hidden himself with some arcane trick or some innate power or just the knowledge that this realm is his home, and you hear his voice even though you cannot see him as he cries out 'You should not have hurt my family. Prepare to face the Hunter of Hundkiln'

sorry no Vhas yet maybe I'll update with one for him once we get more of his whole deal

[silverselfshippingchaos]

j.oongi is so fun because he gets introduced as this cold cool assassin type but really he's just a dork that has the goofiest chats

[journal420]

what if i shilled gravity falls and pokemon crossover thoughts. what then

[oldrockformations]

I’ve been reading superhero comics lately and I just,, want to force these bitches to drink some water. How are these people not passing out from dehydration every fight

Nobody with abs that defined has a healthy daily fluid intake. Get this man some goddamn gatorade