#i know i wasn't going to post much art here because of all the AI fucking bullshit

[scoliwings]

"What if you were cured?"

This is a question I get a lot, usually after sharing that I am deaf and I do not speak English. Deaf people get this in general. We've likely been asked this thousands of times in our lifetimes.

Most people treat it as a casual, sometimes playful question. Like it's something that would have a "why, yes, I'd love to be hearing!" answer. As if it's obvious that everyone who's ever deaf or disabled should simply choose to be abled. As if it's even remotely easy to get that kind of treatment, to simply learn a language you've never even heard, to simply have your ears altered to take on a small, artificial fraction of the full range of hearing people have.

I've been asked that question so much that it all sounds like "Why don't you just die?" to me.

I'm used to shrugging it off and I constantly educate people about deaf culture and accessibility and why these kinds of questions are wrong. Now, I'm surrounded by people who defend me if this is asked. It's a nice balm to the decades of isolation and pain I've been through, particularly when I rarely find any deaf people online or in person.

[liberalsarecool]

From Professor Christopher Robichaud, Senior Lecturer in Ethics and Public Policy, Harvard:

“I'll say this, and then I likely won't be saying much more on here for quite some time, to the relief of some, I'm sure. But my farewell warning is this.

Everyone in the days and weeks ahead will use this loss as an opportunity to seek validation for their own hobby horse complaint. Harris lost because she campaigned with Liz Cheney. Harris lost because she didn't embrace Gaza. Harris lost because she didn't choose Shapiro. Harris lost because she wasn't progressive enough (possibly my favorite one).

Take a good, hard look at the map, my friends. Trump has won the popular vote. Trump ran the table. Explaining that with your hobby horse issue isn't going to cut it, tempting and consoling as it may be. The problem isn't the electoral college. The problem isn't that we didn't have a full primary. The problem isn't Harris. The problem isn't that Dems didn't have the right message. The problem isn't even inflation or the border.

The problem is so much worse than any of those things. Those are all technical problems, with straightforward expertise fixes. If only it were so! No, our problem is not technical. It's very much adaptive. A party that embraced the Big Lie, supported an insurrection, and has been selling conspiracy-addled madness for years, [which] was widely and enthusiastically embraced. Voter turnout was profound! People didn't sit this out.

Simply put, the problem--as some of you have rightly posted--is cultural. America, culturally, has completely abandoned a politics of decency and respect and has embraced instead a politics of resentment, revenge, false nostalgia, and bullying. And if you look at the demographics, you also won't be able to comfort yourself that it's just a white thing, or a working class thing, or an education thing. It's multi-class, multi-gender, multi-educational, and multi-racial. That's what winning the popular vote means. That's what running the table amounts to.

A culture that has descended to this level of debasement is not easily fixed. In fact it may not ever be fixed. The timeline for changing something like this is decades--at best--not two-to-four year election cycles. You can extend that in this case, because with the GOP likely controlling all branches of federal government and the courts, they will ensure that mechanisms are in place to keep them in power long after their popularity has waned. You can count on that.

The GOP evolved into a party of rage, lies, and revenge--and it correctly diagnosed that there was and is a large appetite for that. That's what the country wants. At least enough of the country wants it to ensure broad appeal and widespread electoral success. The old GOP will never return, and the Dems have nothing to say to American culture at the moment. Nothing. They've been speaking to a country that's gone, like dust in the wind.

And that's my final thought, which my posts last night alluded to. The America I knew and loved is gone. This new America--nah, I won't even bother. I will say that cultural change is less likely to occur in politics or in the academy. You're not going to get people to see how vulgar they've become through a clever argument or a nice campaign speech, that's for sure.

This would be time for the arts, broadly understood, to step in. The arts can change hearts and minds. Too bad the arts have been systematically dismantled in education in this country, and on the other end, the tech industry's assault on the arts through AI is sure to hollow out any good-faith efforts that might emerge.

And for the rest of the world, America's rightward lurch is, I'm afraid, bad news for you too. I know you know this. Because it's not isolated, is it? It's just at the moment the most prominent example of a burgeoning trend. And this will embolden others in other countries, to be sure. We need not speculate what happens when countries become mired in lies, embrace resentment, and savor bullying. We know exactly what happens. Bloody conflict and global destabilization.

The first quarter of the 21st century will, therefore, in hindsight, be viewed as the seed-planting stage for the absolute shit show that's about to unfold globally over the next two and a half decades. Count on it.

Adopt whatever coping and endurance strategies you have available. You're going to need it.

I think that's all I've left to say.”

The least evolved. The most paternalistic.

The bully. The liar. The most resentful.

This is the reality we are in. FOX and Republicans have been repeating the script for decades.

The Dark Ages are conservative aspirations.

The abdication of values/principles is complete.

'Good faith' no longer exists on the Right. The more reprehensible the action/person, the bigger the addiction. Trump proves this.

Anti-paternalism, anti-fascism and anti-bullying are my paths forward. Join me.

[jinogasux-fr]

Santae banned me without telling me why and won't unban me unless I send them my photo ID

Hey guys sorry for not posting in… forever? I just suck at social media lol. But you may have seen that I've reblogged some posts that advertise Santae in the past, but please disregard all that. I've since deleted those posts after learning how the site is managed and, after what happened to me a few days ago, I feel as though I should go public about this. Because boy did I just get fucked over.

Anyway, yeah, what it says in the title. On October 24th, around 10am EST, I was restocking my user shop when the entire webpage went white. I couldn't access the site at all and, when I tried to look for the Discord on my server list, it wasn't there. I knew what this had meant. I got banned from both the game, and the Discord - this is important to keep in mind for later.

I didn't receive any Discord DM or email notification about my ban, so after asking a mod what their support email was (and yes, I later verified that this is indeed their legitimate support email), I sent them this:

After a few hours, I get this back in response:

There's so much I'm confused about here. I think the one that screams out the most is that they're asking me to show them my photo ID so I can get unbanned. Absolutely not. I refuse to do this. This poses a massive security and privacy risk. They straight up banned my account, gave this half-baked explanation, and told me I need to send my personal information or... I stay banned?

Let me make something clear: The only personal thing they have on file about this account is the email address that I created my account with, which I've also used to contact them. My real name, date of birth, anything of that nature would not be connected because this was not asked for during account creation, therefore this wouldn't actually prove I'm the account holder. Theoretically speaking, I could show them any ID in the world and for all they know, that's my real information, because they have nothing else to go off of. They even say as much in their privacy page.

Secondly, "account has been compromised"? What does that mean? I think anyone's interpretation of this would be that my account got hacked. But if my account got hacked, why wasn't I informed of this? I had to reach out to support, they did not reach out to me first. That means my password, which I may share across other sites, would have been known to someone else and thus I should've been warned of this immediately, not roughly 5 hours after the fact.

Thirdly, what, was my Discord "compromised" too? If an automated system had flagged my account, does that system somehow interact with a Discord bot so they ban a user on both at the same time? How does that work? That makes no sense as to why they'd ban me on both the game and the Discord for something like this, which is why I'm calling bullshit.

Let me tell you what I think happened.

Recently, Santae has been in some really hot water with connections revealing their relation to an older petsite, Lurapets, which has a history of scamming and artist mistreatment, as well as proof coming out of them using AI art for their NPC art. You can find these posts on the @santae-salt blog if you want to see for yourself, but I'm also linking them throughout this post.

Once the post about them being directly related to Lurapets was released, several users that the Santae staff thought might be involved in the creation of the post got banned. As it turns out, I was banned at the same time as these users.

After speaking with the @santae-salt admin, we are both of the belief that I, a regular user, got caught up in this mess because they're assuming I'm an alt account of someone else and staff demanded to see my ID because they didn't think I was a different person. It may turn out to be wrong, and yeah that sounds a bit far-fetched, sure, but really, what else can I go off of here?? Santae staff has given me a very questionable and refutable explanation as to why I've been banned, and their radio silence after I refused to send them my ID is just making me believe they don't think I'm real. They don't want my photo ID to verify I'm the account holder, they want my photo ID to verify I'm not someone else.

This is unprecedented. I've never seen any petsite ask for a photo ID in any situation, and after asking around, not even those banned from Santae were asked for this. It's just me! This is an incredible attempted breach of privacy, and, with Santae now under doxxing allegations, I really don't feel confident they'd keep my personal information… well, personal.

I messaged back almost immediately after they responded to me where I told them I would not send my ID and I had asked if there were any other way I could verify myself to get my account unbanned. I've received no response so far, and after what I've learned, I feel like I'm not going to get one at all.

So, let this be a lesson to you: don't waste your time on Santae. You can be the most obedient player out there. You can abide by all their rules, be a nice and generous player, or just be minding your own business, but if they so much as think you're associated with someone who they think has wronged them, you'll be banned.

And they can't even be bothered to properly tell you why.

[petite-madame]

just so you know, it’s very obvious to actual artists that you’re posting AI and then lying that you’ve done it all by hand. kind of embarrassing, and more than a little fucked up.

Hi anon

This kind of nonsense usually ends up in the trash with a laugh but as it's my first "your art is AI", let's go! (It was just a matter of time, as practically all my artist friends got this kind of messages at this point)

it’s very obvious to actual artists...

Actual artists ? You mean, like me, a professional illustrator in her 40s, who has started drawing at the age of 8 and who has been drawing with a consistant art style for the past 15 years (with some improvements, thank god 🤓) ? People like you have accused me of tracing using tracing paper when I was a kid, tracing in Photoshop 15 years ago when I started to post on the internet and now my art is "AI". I should be used to it by now: when I posted this one 14 YEARS AGO, people told me it was traced and that "I wasn't a real artist, actual artists could tell"

I've consistently posted step by step, WIPs, vids, reels, gifs, shown the number of layers I use by art (sometimes more than 100) but apparently, it's never enough. And my art is AI generated ? Which one ?

So much for the Loki one, I apologize for the 0,3%…

Which is also funny is that fans of Supernatural, Good Omens, Sherlock, etc…have been able to say exactly which reference pictures I used for each drawing, not only for faces but sometimes also for the pose and the clothing (because yes, omg, I use reference pictures, the horror 😲)

However if you want to talk about my technique, and I've never hidden it, I sometimes use photos or 3D models for backgrounds because I hate drawing backgrounds. For instance the background of the Superwholock one is composed of a couple of stock pictures (a pub).

Same for a "Sherlock Harry Potter AU" I'll post in a month or so: some parts oh Hogwarts are screenshots from the movie because I didn't feel like drawing a room full of students.

Also, is there sometimes mistakes in my art that don't make sense ? Yes, nothing new, I make mistakes, I've been doing it for years and I still do it, particularly when it comes to anatomy. I want to pull my hair out when I notice them weeks (sometimes months) later but here we are.

Anyway, people like you who throw "it's AI" accusations all over the Internet better think twice because the result is this.

Don't get me wrong, I get the AI paranoia but instead of sending messages to artists like this one, ask kindly about their process, their technique, etc…and also, have a look at their archive, it could help.

I'm leaving you now, I have AI art to generate (= spending 10 hours per drawing using reference pictures, finding inspiration from classical painting, using about 100 layers and stressing about the art not being good enough).

Have a great weekend!

[venbetta]

I'm not sure if anyone's ever thought about this or has made a post about it, but I figured I'd add my own two cents if someone did talk about this.

// Ruin spoilers ahead

mostly about Freddy

So, seeing that headless Freddy has prototype written on the bottom of his foot, it's suggested or even theorized that our Freddy (the one we're with in SB) was a prototype this entire time.

Of course, like many others, I was very skeptical and in denial about the idea because why the hell would that be a thing? How is he a prototype? It wasn't there on his foot in the base game, so why this sudden change?

I kinda hated it, and as a way to cope, I theorized that maybe it wasn't the same Freddy and FazEnt just replaced him with another copy and then abandoned him... don't ask me how that particular Freddy became headless either. Also I was wobbling between the "True Ending" being the Canon one, I was back and forth and just trying to figure out what would've made sense.

My logic for the True Ending being canon was, maybe Freddy and Gregory both got out (alongside Vanessa) with glamdaddy intact, and they're just living life. Meanwhile, Faz Ent just made a new Freddy while fixing the plex but gave up and left everything to rot. Of course I know now that makes no sense or explains why/how the 2nd Freddy lost his head, but it's what I came up with. The PQ Ending is technically canon... so that was a waste of a braincell, hah...

Since fnaf has the tendency to rewrite/add things to the story, I think our Glamrock Freddy being a prototype is something I've accepted. Now, there are a few things I thought of that might add to the idea of him being a prototype (not confirmed but more speculative).

He's a high-tech, sentient AI robot, he can clearly experience human emotion (like the other glamrocks) and has decent mobility. What most likely seperates him from the other glams is the fact that he experiences existentialism. I know we don't see much from the other glams, what they think of their current situation (not even from Roxy in Ruin), they aren't fully aware of what they are or what they're doing (as far as we know). Their programming is focused on being entertainers and birthdays.

I'm not gonna say that the other glams aren't able to express deeper thoughts, but I think this is where I might be stretching this idea just a bit.

If you're going to make AI bots who can adapt and be flexible with their environment, there's gotta be some kind of limit of what they can say/think/do. Freddy is the prime example of not having that limitation since we see/hear him express concern about not being the only Glamrock Freddy that's walking around:

"Have I always been a Freddy? Am I Monty with a different shell? What if I am not the first Glamrock Freddy? ... Do we all feel the same? Am I special? If I am mass-produced, am I still art?" (Endo Warehouse)

This motherfucker literally commits arson:

"You sure collected a lot of toys! Perhaps we can do something to stop whatever is going on here." (Fire escape Ending)

When he goes to the basement and encounters the blob, he goes on this monologue:

"I know what this is. I have been here before. She brought me here. I found myself for the first time when I cleared the path. I did not want to, but I had no choice. Now I have a choice. I have changed. My friends are here. They are so angry, confused. But I can protect you. I am not me." (True Ending)

He ultimately goes against some of his programming to help a child in need-- even lie to a security guard-- which if he were set to do as he's told, he would've sent Gregory straight to Vanessa, even with Gregory adamantly telling him not to.

If he were programmed to be strict and not break any protocols, he'd would've gotten Gregory killed immediately.

I'm saying this because if we're being realistic (realistic in terms of how we usually program robots and things), there are barriers in what a robot/ai can really say/do that doesn't break its programming. If he's a prototype, Freddy wouldn't have those barriers to stop him from saying/doing most of the things he did in SB. I know there's another factor to him behaving kindly to Gregory and that's him being in safe mode, but even still... you would think he would follow the rules and not let Gregory do certain things and perhaps unintentionally get the boy killed.

I'm going back to the existential crisis Freddy has, because for something that's meant to be an animatronic mascot for kids, you wouldn't want him to make the children around him question the meaning of being alive and sentient. There would have to be some sort of guard against having those kind of thoughts and ideas. It makes Freddy more interesting, especially if he could've been easily replaced with a finalized version of him that did what he was suppose to.

Also, I know it's probably more widely accepted that either Vanny or Gregory hacked into Freddy, causing his collapse during the opening. With him being a prototype, maybe his systems couldn't handle that type of an advanced hack, unlike the other glams, making him unable to be properly hacked into in the beginning.

Not only that, there are some issues he has with performing, who knows, maybe he's had collapses before. We don't know.

Him being unable to enter the West Arcade:

"When I step onto the West Arcade dance floor I cannot stop myself! It is a programming bug." (West Arcade)

I'm aware him being in safe mode meant he's disconnected from the main network as well keeps him docile. While the "Afton" fight isn't technically canon, with the other upgrades on Freddy, those parts might have made him more susceptible to the virus attack. There's not much evidence pointing to the other glams not being prototypes but seeing how they each have upgrades while Freddy doesn't, that might hint that the others were mostly finalized, meaning their systems were properly functioning (aside from the virus of course).

Sorry if this was super long, but it's something I thought about and I had to put it in words. Nothing about Glamrock Freddy is normal, like he's not possessed (I use to believe in the glammike theory but I don't anymore eh...), but he's a prototype! He's gonna act all funky because he's not polished yet... and I think that's very interesting and endearing (in an odd way).

[incorrectjane-andthedragon]

This is being talked about a lot on the JATD Discord and Martin Baynton's official Instagram, but I'm not sure how many people on Tumblr know about it, so I'm going to talk about it here.

Recently, Martin Baynton worked with an ai developer to create a personal ai tool to create aged-up versions of the JATD characters based off of his own art style. He said on Instagram that it does not rip off anyone else's art, but some people are suspicious about this due to the way that the ai images look. Even if I wasn't a staunch ai art hater, I would still think that the images look terrible, unlike his previous art, and uncanny.

A lot of people don't know that he (allegedly) uses only his own art in this tool, so he's started receiving backlash about his usage of ai art. I understand, I hate all forms of ai art and have become suspicious of him due to his usage of it. Because to be honest, there's something genuinely kind of disheartening about seeing an acclaimed artist who created something you love begin using ai art in any legitimate capacity. I also feel weird about the fact that he's posting them (seemingly with increasing frequency) without openly discussing the harmful impact of ai art that much. He's clearly *aware* of it since he referenced it in a statement he put out about ai art, but that didn't feel like enough to me, since his "official statement" was just a comment on his own Instagram post.

Idk man, this whole situation is just weird.

[spotsupstuff]

actually ey fuck it. list of personal headcanons for the main six iterators some of which i might illustrate properly at some point:

Moon: • one of the first 10 iterators ever built. she is grandma as HELL and totally forgot she is that old • Pebbles sometimes asks her to tell him about the older times, because history nerd. he writes everything she says onto a pearl • in the post i've made talkin bout her and pebs' voice, saying that she sounded like Miku, somebody said that they like to think the ancients made Moon a vocaloid. to that i absolutely agree: she has NO fucking clue what do when it comes to putting a certain emotion into a song but god DAMMIT shes so good at singing • she can add effects to her voice, including a glitch effect. she likes that one the least • -HITS DESK- THE DISAPPEARANCE OF HATSUNE MOON. • she doesn't particularly like to sing, especially not to herself. but she does know that pebbles likes music- the first week after the mass ascension was rough and he was working mostly on autopilot, not answering DMs or anything. she called him up and told him they could sing together, if he wants to. he felt much better afterwards • MOON'S SECRET RAP CAREER • i'll put it here too so it's all in one place: her AI isn't developed enough to understand the emotional quality of any form of art • Moon was upgraded a few times in her function. most of the time it was because her citizens loved her too much to let her go too out of date (specifically in the physical sense. they made sure she wouldn't fall too easily) • one of the first memories she designated as a "core memory" was her first upgrade that was a result of her citizens' riot against the Houses- to keep her safe. she noted it down as "Kindness is effortlessly repaid" • she remembers when iterator comms were connected by a cable rather than radio waves • she also remembers when two of the first 10 collapsed and went into coma, with their citizens of course perishing in the fall and crash. she's still terrified of those days and doesn't like recalling them even for Pebbles • Nish was her first little sib and she feels like she can talk with him about anything. she hates it, but she's distant with Suns- they are always so damn polite and skittish around her... and she absolutely adores the other three. her tiny little wonderful siblings • she didn't like to admit that maybe her hardwave wasn't keeping up with her citizens anymore. at that point she did start to emotionally care less for them, but she still didn't want to admit she wasn't able to provide and protect those she was responsible for • i can't get the image of her being the one to actually ensure the family is gonna financially survive in a more chill au where the iterators r just sorta kinda people. Miss Moon From Accounting... • her overseers were originally blue. she swapped colors with Pebbles all on her own accord. having yellow overseers, seeing them, made her feel even more connected to Pebs • this is basically canon but she fuckin Loves animals. she's the iterator version of Steve Irwin. she also don't kno jack shit about the vegetation • city's representative instrument Evolved- first it was a harp, then it went to a nyckelharpa and then to a violin

Nish: • he is built over marshes to the south-west from Moon and she helped with his blueprints! the Gen 1s had their blueprints checked over by the already built iterators to make sure something wouldn't go wrong. she was so so excited to have a neighbour • the scarf is from his main programmer. the Ancient wrapped it around his puppet's neck before he was even turned online so for the longest time he had no idea that the thing wasn't originally in his design. Moon had to tell him • he became a jokester Entirely because the first time he made Moon laugh he absolutely fell in love with it. he told her and she recommended him looking into jokes. baby boy had no idea what the fuck a joke was so Moon had to explain • when the middle gen started being created, the Ancients noticed that these new iterators didn't have... much of emotional skills. so they turned to the older gens to look for the most emotional and empathetic ones. Nish scored Really High on that survey- his empathy and emotion modules were studied and each time they found something new and better, they upgraded him in that one aspect. so now Sig is one of the biggest crybabies ever. you show him a sad movie and this supercomputer will be lyin on the ground wailing like a newborn. oh and also he makes for a great therapist because he can now just Get It • as the most emotionally... mature? capable? he decided he will be the one to keep a real close eye on everyone in the Local Group after the mass ascension • thanks to all that emotion business he gets along with Suns swimmingly. when Suns needs assistence with figuring out their own emotions or what would be appropriate and not too cold towards someone, they go to him • if he could he'd give everyone younger than him a noogie and you cannot convince me otherwise • the Hunter was a sickly pup that was left behind on his roof by a family that came to him which he directed towards the void sea. they were far too weak for the family to keep them, basically on the death's door. Nish took them in, operated on them, enhanced genes and raised them from there • Is half a medical facility. mister veterinarian, baybeee • since he's a sap, he started to view the Hunter like his own kid at some point. he was also the one who pitched to Suns the idea of sending Spearmaster over to him for visits. Spear tried its best to help raise and train Hunter • the whole rot thing happened because Nish did a stupid and forgot that neurons are quite the fuckin reactive things and continual exposure to what is essentially extra macho giga neuron Can and Will fuck up cells. his and Moon's cans have a long distance between them. it was enough time for Hunter to develop the big owie cancer. he noticed it only when they were too far away and it was already too bad • he felt absolutely Terrible about it. again he loses someone so so very close to him. but this time around? there is no one to be angry at for this but himself • Hunter manages to ascend. Nish watched them leave, silently, in subterranean • he used to do his best to play with his citizens. when a kid came to his chamber, he gave them rides on his puppet's shoulders or the umbilical arm. same went for Hunter • his city is called Risio • city's representative instrument was EITHER a PVC instrument or suona i can't decide for the life of me

Suns: • they were built much further away from the planet's equator than most of the Local Group, meaning they experience polar days and nights • the "Seven" in their name refers to the amount of months the unusually timed sunsets and sunrises last for. for seven whole months, the locality gets only about four hours of Somewhat darkness • in return, they have three full months of relatively strong darkness. their city used to shine bright, during this time. post mass ascension those months are terribly lonely and depressing • because of the warmth they produce, there's an oasis for wildlife underneath them • the warmth was also sung about a lot by their citizens. they've seen it as an incredible blessing- Suns used to run hotter than other iterators just for them. nowadays they are mostly normal though • the outside of their can is tinted blue- frostbitten. that much warmer their yellow, orange and red city feels • their and Moon's personalities clash so hard that they sometimes go out of their way to avoid her. they do appreciate her but talking with her is exhausting. she's a stranger to them, almost • the iterators can project/send their emotions through messages/broadcasts. Suns' messages always sound flat, unless they use the ~ • one of their biggest dreams is to sit with Pebbles leaning against their side, all the while listening to old music of their cities • once Spearmaster returns, the walls of their puppet chamber become completely covered in doodles and masterpieces • they end up standing the longest out of the whole Local Group. bright and warm even after everyone else dies • their city is called Solis • city's representative instrument was an armonica (look that shit up its sick)

Wind: • Wind's can stands in this giant plain. there's like nothing as far as the eye can see and even further Except her. she just stands there like fucking Slanderman XXL version • the plains are absolutely prime location for a spawning grounds of tornadoes and shit like that. the wind is Constantly strong so most of the rain clouds they exhale are immediately blown away • instead of rain they deal with ginormous tornadoes at the end of each cycle. while their superstructure can take it, the comms can't. so Wind is often absent from iterator chats as a result. after the mass ascension these connection knock-outs become a great source of stress and worry for the others cuz they never know if Wind will come back or not this time • because of these comm blackouts, Innocence took it upon herself to catch Wind up on everything they've missed when they come back online. Innocence started doing this all by herself out of seemingly nowhere. she just cares. silently. • the strangest thing about her is that her city is half built within her structure instead of on top of her. the winds can get sometimes so bad that they manage to affect even the top of her can. so the solution was to put half of the city under her skin as a sort of giant bunker • the ancients, not being ones to waste much space, made sure the city can still be used by Wind's processes, in a way. their neurons fly through the streets, completely unbothered, working as makeshift streetlights. the kids used to love chasing after them- never catching any though • sometimes when the wind storms outside got real bad, the kids that were scared of them were sent to Wind's puppet chamber. she used to tell them all kinds of stories or about what she was currently working on • it was often that their puppet chamber would be full of pillows, blankets and sleeping children. they loved their citizens so so much • nicknamed themself "Chasing" Wind in chats because, just like Moon, they are also quite the dreamer • closest with Moon, too. Wind looks up to Moon Immensely. they really wanna be like her one day • Wind is what some people think of Moon- a too kind pushover that doesn't know how to get angry and defend herself. Wind is the kindest, most sensitive and softest person they have in The Local Group. Nish takes care to keep his jabs and jokes about Wind very mild • has a really beautiful voice • likes flowers :) • her city is called Procella • city's representative instrument was a fujara cuz god DAMMIT i love that instrument i Have to slap it on Someone in here. it fits their vibe in my heart either way

Innocence: • she really wishes her surrounding circumstances were in some kind of way special but actually she's built at the least unique place with basically nothing neat happening nearby. there are strange giant cherry trees nearby, but that's about it • fuckin LOVES lizards. she's the one who made the Cyans and sent some over to Pebbles to fuck him up. thankfully, as we all know, Cyans are kinda stupid and since they launch themselves over edges of cliffs they haven't managed to destroy the local ecosystem • her citizens used to keep lizards as pets. most of the time just for the joy of having 0 braincells creature follow you around but some had 'em as sort of hunting dogs • was the one who created The Rivulet. she was mumbling to herself and a friend smth about how boys only screw things up while engineering Riv's genome • she BASICALLY packed Riv into a cannon and shot them over right into the middle of a scav toll cuz "come on, it's not that far away. this will make your journey shorter and shit". i don't care how goofy it sounds, this is how it went in my heart • in possession of probably the most durable comms ever made • claims she's purple! she's actually fake out purple which means homegirl is Deceptive Blue. she CONSTANTLY fights over this with Pebbles • despite their squabbles she did care for Pebbles. she was very excited to not be the youngest anymore and getting to baby someone • her and Nish always start verbal sparring matches, often consisting of threats that more often than not range on impossible to actually commit. they constantly lead their mock wars in #general. Moon's gonna kill 'em one of these days • trusts Moon the most- which is why she outed Pebbles' rot and sent Rivulet with the instructions to extract the rarefaction cell • her city is called Sermo • city's representative instrument was a shamisen. she absolutely knows how to play it and loves to threaten people with the bachi

Pebbles: • the only people he enjoyed doing group projects with were Suns and Wind. he Could do group projects with Moon and Nish but Only if he could race them. rascal found it fun to challenge the nokias 😔 • now with Innocence though? Never. if they were forced to, they could do a great job with minimal communication but they were not going to be happy about it • latched onto Suns exactly because Moon was overbearingly protective and Suns always seems like they couldn't give less of a shit about anyone. sometimes they'd have a videochat open and not say anything for hours as they worked • with Nish he used to like inventing new things. a lot of times the things turned out to be silly or kind of useless which would normally frustrate him, but surprisingly enough Nish made the time spent worth it • Wind's favorite activity was comparing notes with him and then talking about the differences in their research. they'd hum to him happily while the both of them would be sorting through their stuff • i sometimes imagine him having a slight chinese accent and i blame Steven He for this so hard • second most emotional fuck in the group. his emotions mostly rotate around anger, though • he won't admit this to anyone but he really liked it when his and Moon's cans were connected by bridges. it felt like holding hands. he felt more stable. now all he can do is just miss it quietly • was legit surprised when he found out not every iterator has a build in older sister right at their side • his city is called Literally just Metropolis cuz the ancients didn't bother with properly naming it. depeshioumn. • city's representative instrument was adopted straight from Moon since Pebs' citizens were honestly just hers, so- violin it is • Pebbles HAS attempted to learn how to play a violin himself. certainly was a test of patience and puppet dexterity/camera-to-digits control. almost broke the poor thing a few times from nerves

either way, Wind, at the end of each fucking cycle from day 1 of their life:

[millenniumproductions]

If it does pass through

I just wanted to say... Thank you. For following me, for liking my writing, my stories, and speaking with me.

Growing up, I didn't exactly have a lot of friends, only two. One just left me behind without ever telling me why, and the other was moved away from me, and I didn't get to properly say goodbye.

I met and became mutuals with SO MANY amazing artists and writers on here, and in a way... It filled that friendless void in my heart.

Fun fact: I never told any of my family members about this account or my Ao3.

Mostly because of the fact that my Dad and his girlfriend are both Trumpers and hate ANYTHING LGBTQ and Democrat related.

And I have to admit... I was like them at first.

But then I realized that I was Bisexual and Asexual, and I saw with all of your guys' posts that Trump wasn't this "American Hero" that my father claimed he was.

This site also helped me with my writing skills. I'm not like NOVELIST level yet, but I've DEFINITELY gotten better than when I constantly had to do essays during my middle and high school years.

I actually picked out the name "Millennium Productions", because I used to dream of becoming a Youtuber and wanted to make AMVs due to them being my favorite kind of videos at the time.

I'm honestly on the verge of crying as I'm typing this because... It feels like that healed up part of me is gonna break again if this stupid KOSA thing does go through.

I'm gonna turn twenty-one in September, meaning I'll technically be considered a "real" adult, so I don't know what'll happen after that, and I'm HONESTLY scared.

SO MUCH SHIT happened in like the span of a month.

I might reblog more stuff from my Likes because I want to at least give the people I admire on here more attention if I can.

But if this is the last time we end up seeing each other, then I have this to say:

FUCK KOSA

FUCK AI ART

FREE PALESTINE

FREE GAZA

VOTE FOR CORNEL WEST BECAUSE HE MIGHT BE OUR ONLY HOPE

FUCK BIDEN

FUCK TRUMP

FUCK NIJISANJI

FUCK PR*SHIPPING

FUCK INC*ST

FUCK P*DOPHILIA

FUCK PREDATORS

DON'T LET THEM SILENCE YOU NO MATTER WHAT THEY TRY TO DO

KEEP DOING WHAT YOU LOVE

By the way... I wanna leave you with something personal if I never come back.

My middle name... Is Miera.

It means "giving light" or "shining" in Hebrew.

Finally, to all of the artists and writers who inspired me this past year and all of my followers...

THANK YOU.

[trashprinceward]

EVERYONE LISTEN UP, THIS IS IMPORTANT!

I'm going to talk about the history of Tumblr, the current state of Tumblr, and why you should get out.

And you can call me a hypocrite, sure. But as an artist who depended a lot on commissions and art sales, I only came back to Tumblr because this is where the audience and active fandoms are. If it weren't for that, I wouldn't be here.

So, you've probably heard people calling tumblr "the queerest place on the internet". Probably more ironically that sincerely, lately. But the reason for this is that, at one point, it was true. Tumblr was synonymous with gay shit, all over the internet. That was this site's reputation. To the point that what the right wingers call "woke" these days, used to be called "tumblr shit". Tumblr was the BIGGEST resource for LGBT+ communities, information, advice and connection. That was here, on this site. Ask boxes thrived with friendship and fun games, artists got regular commissions and their work was shared. And, as much of a cliche as it may be to say this, Tumblr was a 'safe space'.

Then everything changed in 2018. I don't know how many of you were here for that, but that's when all this started. That's when we had porn bots. They'd start reblogging random posts, adding pictures of straight up porn. Naked people, straight up fucking. No tags, no warnings. Just uncensored porn and those stupid "click here to fuck me" captions. They were everywhere, constantly. And staff did nothing about it. No moderation, no kind of adding verification or new accounts. They just let the problem fester. Why should they care? Until they were threatened with being kicked off the app store, at least. Then they moved to do something about it.

So, instead of pulling together a human moderation team, or temporarily limiting new accounts, or doing any kind of intuitive policing of these spam bots, they just decided to make a blanket ban of all NSFW content, the enforcing of which would be carried out by AI bots. This, as you can probably guess, was a monumental failure. Anything that remotely looked like naked flesh was tagged as mature (a particularly infamous example features a picture of sand dunes being tagged as mature). And perhaps most tellingly of this failure, it didn't get rid of porn bots.

What it did get rid of though, was artists. Myself included. I was a mature artist. I had a NSFT sideblog. I sold commissions, I made money. It wasn't exactly career level, but I made enough that commissions helped me to eat when all my money went on bills. Then that was gone. Even SFW art wasn't entirely safe, because if the bot decided that your art had too much "skin" in it, you were flagged. (And at the time, I drew a lot of Jojo art, so I was screwed on that front.) So I had to leave. To find a new site where I could post my art, and try to continue selling commissions. The problem with this? Only a handful of people followed me offsite. I had roughly 300 followers on here. About 5 came with me to twitter. And then about 2 came with me to pillowfort. I had lost everything. Artists all over lost their following, lost their support, lost their income. All because people couldn't be bothered to boycott their funny fandom website.

But that wasn't all. Because now staff saw they had an opportunity. This bot they had created, was going around flagging anything mature, sometimes outright deleting posts or banning blogs that were too 'NSFT'. So... What group is often inherently seen as NSFT or sexualised? Yep, you guessed it. The queer community. And so that's what they did. They struck it all down. The biggest LGBT community on the internet, and they used the "porn ban" excuse to start flagging and deleting blogs. Never touched the nazi blogs, or the white supremacists, or that one blog that would doxx gay people in homophobic countries. Nope, they were left alone. But the most prominent, notable and well known queer blogs were gone. And again, the majority of the userbase was ok with this. They stayed.

I left this site for 5 years. And I tried to make it work elsewhere, I really did. I went to twitter. But over there nobody retweets work, nobody comments on your art. I only had like 2 regular supporters. I haven't gained followers in YEARS. Literally the only reason I still post to twitter is because Airdorf retweets FAITH fanarts. I tried going to pillowfort, which is honestly like a BETTER version of Tumblr. But, it was empty. Nobody was there. I even offered to give out free invite links to pillowfort so other people could join up too! Nobody ever responded to me. So I gave up. After 5 years with almost no interaction, almost no commission sales. No friends, nobody to talk to, nothing to do, nowhere to go... I came back here. And interaction is so much better (even though it's still a struggle to get people to actually talk to me). But I hate being here because I know what this site is like.

Also I know how complacent people are. The things they did back then, they're still doing now. Flagging trans women as mature, straight up banning them for no reason, spreading around campaigns of hate. Its STILL happening. And you're all still here sitting "oh this is awful, this website is transphobic" and then go back to reblogging memes. I saw a poll recently that asked what people would do if tumblr closed down or kicked them out, and the majority answer was just "give up social media completely" and it's like, really? There are plenty of alternatives out there. Artists and creators, and LGBT activists and whoever have been BEGGING you to join us, but you just wont. People would rather sit in this sinking ship till it goes down than make the leap and follow us into the lifeboats.

And I'm saying this again now because there have been talks about tumblr making a deal with midjourney. Because they want to feed all our art, our selfies, our hard work into the AI slop machine. So history is repeating itself again, and once more artists will be begging you to please come with us. Please get off this site. Please come to a place that isn't actively trying to get rid of us.

Me... I'll be staying here as long as I'm able because this is the only place I have any kind of audience. But if you can, if you care about friends, if you care about artists, if you care about queer people. PLEASE come with us. If the worst comes to it, then I'll be leaving for pillowfort. Please, PLEASE come with me. I have invitations, I can send you one so you can join. Send me a message and ask me. Just please, don't die with this place.

[korgbelmont]

Choices Insiders August 2024

Here we are once more with this months Insiders

Having seen some of the backgrounds, they've done well to translate these into the book

I'm guessing that this is how the MC will meet their respective Love Interests. I think this is the second time they've used the Speed Dating thing with the other being in Getaway Girls.

The only way I can think of why the MC would go is because maybe the breakup was on mutual terms. But given the recent stories Choices have had about affairs, I have a feeling that it may have resulted from that.

I've seen the cover. It is very clearly AI generated and this is come form of attempt to make it look like they created it by hand. Either way, I haven't got much to say on this one.

To be honest, I'm not overly fussed about this one, I'll have a look at it once it begins it's Wide Release as I'm always willing to give a book a chance before writing it off.

Working with a company that is all about AI is not okay. AI art is not art, AI stories are not stories.

The fact that they have gone in this direction is absolutely disgusting, and people who do art and stories for these things as their careers are now losing out on opportunities.

I'll be interested to see what possible additions get made, and whether it will be like what they did with the Royal Romance or if it will be what I think in film they call legacy sequels.

I'm guessing that this will be about September/October time as it's usually about two-ish months between VIP release and Wide Release.

I'm surprised to see that Plus One is a gender of Choice, I was completely sure it would be a genderlocked book, so this is a nice surprise. We also know now that Bitten is genderlocked.

I must admit, I can't fully remember the last Insiders so I am surprised to see that it is two books releasing this month.

I did see a screenshot posted by @the-unconquered-queen showing that both All Of Us stories begin their release on Wednesday. I think Plus One will begin it's release once Filthy Rich has finished.

It is a shame to see Blades and Crimes 3 being VIP. I am looking forward to these along with Bitten as it sounds like it's a Supernatural book. It's safe to say that Blades 3 is going to be September, then Bitten in October, and Blades in November. Although it could be a case of two in one month, just have to wait and see.

I must admit, I gave up with Filthy Rich about part way through the first Chapter, it wasn't enjoyable and felt like a bit of a drag.

I have fallen behind on Along Came Treble, and it'll probably be a case of catching up once it has finished so I can do so in my own time and not rush to get to chapter x.

Hearts on Fire I thought weren't too bad, curious to see how it will play out.

The Deadliest Game I have also fallen a couple of chapters behind on, but I am enjoying it, absolutely LOVE Farah, she is such a cool Love Interest.

The Ghost of Us is an interesting mystery (even if I already know who the killer is), Grey in part does remind me of Trystan.

I must admit, I never finished Roommates with Benefits, think I got about halfway through and then just kind of forgot about it. I'm not overly fussed about this one either, but I'll have a look at it when it starts.

Nothing on Wide Release for this month, so we'll be going down to four books for a bit.

Given that there are three possible world changing options for Blades, I imagine BK3 is going to be taking the party somewhere else away from Morella.

That's it on this one, keep safe everyone!

P.S. There is an announcement coming soon regarding the future of the transparents

[torukmaktoskxawng]

Hello this maybe a spoiler or not I’m just wondering how do you think Kayla will react to wearing full Navi clothes do you think she would be comfortable because if you watched the first movie you see how Jake feels in that kind of clothing but how would a Kayla feel

I don't think this would be considered a spoiler so I'd be happy to answer. So yes, Jake wasn't accustomed to Na'vi attire at first but he quickly got used to it. I don't think Kayla would have the same sentiment and here's why:

One, Jake's a male. As we know, Earth as a whole isn't as strict about men's modesty compared to women's. Men can walk around shirtless and no one bats an eye. I wish I could say the same for women, but we all know how that is.

Sure, some men feel self-conscious and wear many layers or refuse to take off their shirts for a swim, but Jake doesn't strike me as self-conscious. I'm sure the Na'vi attire wasn't that big of an adjustment for him.

(Hi, dropping some more AI art of her 🥰 for context: this isn't what she would wear as a human on Pandora. This is just basically her wearing her avatar's clothing.)

For Kayla, it's different. I don't mean to bring our day in age up while discussing a fictional world and characters, but I like comparing Earth and Pandora so that in the fic's future, Tonowari and Ronal will begin to understand where Kayla comes from.

(Side note: I don't think Jake mentioned Earth or its customs enough to Neytiri in the movies and I wish he did, honestly. It could be a funny little scene where Jake tries to explain what a taco is OR it could be an eye-opening moment for Neytiri to understand why Jake is the way he is.)

Sorry, getting off-topic. Back to Kayla. She was born and grew up in a world where women's bodies are sadly objectified and held up to high standards. Sure, she may not agree with it but it's been engraved in her brain to cover up her chest. She's self-conscious just like any other everyday woman so she clearly stands out among a crowd of awesome, badass Na'vi females who don't give a shit. And just to be clear, Kayla isn't disgusted by Na'vi women's attire. Maybe at first she was surprised but she's never judged them for it. She's happy that they're confident in their skin and is probably envious of them.

I think as a whole we love and appreciate Na'vi culture because they clearly don't objectify their women's bodies. I'm gonna link this post here because I think it explains that subject perfectly in my eyes. It talks about how progressed the Na'vi are as a species who don't sexualize female reproductive organs.

Going back to Kayla, she comes from a world where she's told to cover up and "be modest" and while she's not exactly a modest woman (example: her crop top), she still has those teachings engraved in the back of her head (hence why the crop top still covers up). Bringing back what she's told Jake a bunch of times, there's nothing wrong with being a part of two different worlds. While Jake has pretty easily slid into Na'vi customs, Kayla very much still holds onto Earth customs because she still appreciates where she comes from in some shape or form.

And I did try dropping hints about her insecurities in past chapters. We see how hard it was for her to get used to the avatar body she now spends the majority of her time in. And who knows... in future chapters, she might begin to feel that body dysmorphia or out-of-body Jake was experiencing in the first Avatar movie. 👀

Will she eventually erase and be able to relearn how to love the skin she's in and confidently wear Na'vi attire? Only time will tell. Hope this answers your question!

tsamsiyu ta'em series masterlist

[iwasthewind]

I actually thought quite a bit about a situation I ran into recently and didn't know what to do about it, so I'll put it here. I'll preface this with saying I was a bit rash and I should've thought about how to handle it further perhaps

So recently I was going through a character x reader tags (it could've had a stranger start, please bear with me) and I came across and okay-ish oneshot. I actually cannot emphasise how okay-ish it was because that's all there is to it. I finished reading it and then saw the note and tags- it was ai generated

This is where I turn immature (more than I already am) and I told the op I hoped they could be better than this in the comments, then blocked them

I didn't think about it much but later I got curious about whether they reacted, so I checked and they had. They'd deleted the comment and had made an addition to their pinned post and all their other oneshots which were also ai generated, saying they only used oneshots to comfort themselves and wanted to share the stories that brought them comfort because they couldn't find any that captured the feelings they wanted to see specifically

And it's just... What do you think of this? I don't think I'll engage with them further but in my opinion, if you can't find joy in the art someone else made because it didn't capture those feelings specifically, you could maybe request it. If that request wasn't fulfilled, maybe you could write it. Or you know what, fine, generate it with ai. But at the very least, keep it to yourself?

When you preface everything with an innocent 'oh it brings me comfort, please don't hate' it just feels... I can't articulate it. The words a code scraped together by feeding off of a story someone wrote with their own hands? Is it similarly comforting to post it? You say you don't want notes, you just want to share those stories... But anyone could generate them. How many more people do you think will see you do it and follow in your example? It's not even about that, it feels so icky. To say they don't deserve the hate because they're not hurting anybody... Maybe I'm a bit miffed but is it hate to expect you to not steal?

The more posts they make the more notes they get and it's so sad. It reminds me of the discourse about ai 'stories' on ao3... The fact is that they shouldn't exist. It's disgusting, and nobody ever posts them because "oh I just wanted to share." You're incapable of drawing it? Try anyway. You can't write it? Try anyway. Maybe it'll be trash and you'll laugh but you'll laugh because you'll be surrounded by little gifts you made on your own, for yourself, all because you loved something. Ai is disgusting. I'm just so torn. Should I dm them politely? Should I not engage at all? I feel such visceral rage when I think of ai slop permeating into fandom. When I think of something soulless permeate into a space we carved with our own hands, with no incentive, because we loved something and wanted to talk to people because we love the same something, to share stories and art and so much more for ourselves and a community we made just because we loved something

I don't think I'll say anything to op, except maybe offer an apology. It's just frustrating. I know they meant no harm because nobody does but I just... I'm frustrated because generating stories and art as a whole is inherently harmful no matter the intent. But I really don't know, I really don't

[fr-wiwiw]

I have no art to post— actually I do. It's my studies and sketches, sfw & nsfw, things like that. But I haven't been deliberately drawing something. Mainly I've just been focusing on sharpening my art skills to gain commissions as I'm a freelance human artist, in the midst of AI chaos, I'm trying my very best to keep up while not draining myself.

So I just want to give you some updates of my life, idk if this is important or not. I'm still a bit constipatedly (is this even a fucking word lol) awkward with communicating with my followers or advertising myself. Ironic, really, bcs I majored in design & advertisement.

Hi there, my lovelies—I hope you don't mind me calling you all that. I've been trying to do healthy habits and diligently fulfill my needs in 3 aspects. Mentally, spiritually and physically. For the past 7± years, I was not really in a great place mentally. I will not expose it in this post, don't worry it doesn't have anything to do with drugs or whatnot. Just that I've been constantly working and working, controlled by fear and my anxieties and I got depressed I think.

I didn't really understand how to actually 'heal' back then. But now I do now. Starting from January I've been trying to bounce back to have a healthy mindset again— trust me when I say I'm an overthinker & problem solver, it's such a nightmare to live in this body sometimes. Fellow overthinker, problem-solver & feeler type will relate to this perhaps hahah.. I'm a turbulence type too, fucking yay. Luckily, my prayers are answered. I can't write it down one by one here, you would be reading a 10k+ fanfiction and I'm sure you'd rather have me draw or write a real fanfic, smut would be preferable won't it? lol

I have many things change, become my better self (bcs I was, still am obsessed becoming better than my past self and I'm tired of living in such dark headspace). I do feel the changes, it helps that I have better friends, filtered out some that affects me negatively. This journey going into my 30s really is such a roller coaster, I never liked my 20s bcs of all the trauma and pain. But I wouldn't be able to reach this point if it wasn't for it.

So.. I'm grateful. Trying to always be grateful too, no matter how hard my circumstances are. I have faith that I will get what I've always envisioned and dream of

I'm also grateful that in 2022, a friend encouraged me to post my Gahan fanart. Now this may seem like biased and dedicated post for my Gahan moots & followers, in some way yes, I cannot deny that. But mostly this is too all of you, who come here and follow me bcs you like my arts & fanfics, supports me however you can despite having our own hardships that we may or may not share here. Your responses to my creations really feeds me and help me boost my confidence to keep drawing & keep creating, keep hoping. I always read your hashtags here, a lot of you are really such a hilarious individuals. I'm grateful my art can find you or you find my art and take delight in it. Because I do take delight in your reactions. In some ways, I never realized it, but you guys feel like penpals. It still feel one-way communication most of the time, idk if it's because of my awkwardness to respond to such responses. Feeling like, ah this too will pass or just bask in the reactions and sit then do nothing productive. I'm kinda scared I will be satisfied with one post and then not post anymore. You get it.. Yea you can probably tell by now I'm up in my head thinking too much. Posting that first Gahan fanart on twitter really was the best decision. It feels like I gained a special community, that's surprisingly still active and alive till this very day, I'm always waiting for new fics to drop gosh. I get to see tweets & tumblr posts that are deranged, detailed analysis, fan edits, those gifs, aus, fellow artists & authors! I get to know little bits of your daily lives too and what kind of person you are online haha, just so fun.

And then my freelancing journey.. My decision to become a freelancer has always been one of my dreams but boy oh boy isn't it fucking hard to start from 0 and exist in confusion haha. Money doesn't come easy too bcs I help feed my family along with my siblings. I've been swallowing all my jealousy seeing ppl my age can go out and watch concerts (even tho I don't like crowded & noisy places like that). Going on vacation, be in a romantic relationship, marry, so on and so forth. Idk if this is tmi posting my feelings like this out in the world, but it is what it is.

So.. TLDR:

Hi, I'm alive. I haven't post or updated much bcs I've been focusing on my well being. Honing my art skills, trying to get art commissions to put food on my table and simultaneously enjoying life as much as I could wisely. Thankyou to all of you who are still following me and keep supporting me, I will have to say, If you follow me for only Gahan posts, I have to disappoint you bcs I won't always post Gahan bcs I draw other things too. For my enjoyment, yours, others and mostly for me to gain market for commission too. This is norm, I'm sure most of you realized that too. But I still want to address things to you, I like interacting with all of you. I won't be surprised if one day you leave/unfollow, but let me be grateful to you while you're still here supporting me ^^

That's all for my update. I try my best to make this post as short but effective as possible so I don't bore you with my long ass writing, per usual lol. I cannot seem to write in shorts, I have accepted my faith lmao.

I wish you all well, wherever you are. I hope we can all be happy and well in this dark and uncertain place. Don't hesitate to give comments or drop questions here, I'm cooking my skills and art taste so I can give more to you and be satisfied with what I will achieve along with the progress.

See you in the next post!🌟

[tmntkiseki]

TMNT Art Diary 2: The Importance of Art Goals and Focusing Your Attention

Happy March, everyone! How are we doing? It's been almost a month and a half since my last turtle art diary, so I figured it was about time to type up yet another set of ramblings talking about my experiences learning how to draw the 2003 TMNT.

Before we get started, I feel it's worth mentioning that the future of this blog is kinda up in the air at this point? From the beginning, I've been against AI generated images because of the ethics involved and like many in the Tumblr art community, recent going-ons with the site have me concerned for where things might be headed. I'm not planning to jump ship just yet, but there is a pretty good chance that I'll be posting less and less original drawings here and start utilizing my newly created Pillowfort instead, as the staff has taken a very firm anti-AI stance to the point of completely banning both AI generated images and writing on the site (the official Tumblr post regarding their decision). If you're a fellow artist, TMNT or otherwise, they might be worth checking out as a potential alternative to Tumblr.

With that out of the way, let's begin!

Okay, so let's talk about something that applies to most anything when you're learning how to do art; the importance of art goals and taking things one step at a time. Whether you're a beginner artist or someone who already has years of experience under your belt, it's important to not only have goals in mind of what you want to learn, but also to try and not do everything all at once. There is a lot that goes into successfully drawing the turtles; their anatomy, applying their less human features like their shells and three-fingered hands, their expressions, their colors, etc. HOWEVER, if you're trying to learn to draw too many aspects of their designs all at once, you are going to become overwhelmed very fast and you will not see improvement as quickly, which inevitably results in frustration and loss of motivation. Ergo, you need to take things bit by bit, breaking down the turtles designs into bite-sized pieces and focusing on specific areas that you are having trouble on.

For instance, early on, I realized pretty quickly that one of the areas I was struggling in was the turtles heads; I love their shape, but damn are they hard to draw. Subsequently, there was a point where I was largely drawing turtle heads and ONLY turtle heads so I could learn what shapes went into them, what they looked like from different angles, etc. Within even a few days, I already saw massive improvements just because I wasn't trying to draw EVERYTHING all at once; just one very specific aspect of their designs. Compare the very first Donny I drew on the 5th of January to a quick doodle of Mikey I did a couple of weeks later on the 25th and you can see how much I learned in such a short timespan.

Speaking of shapes, you wanna know the biggest hack I've discovered for learning how to draw the 2003 turtles? Studying the Fast Forward art style. Yeah, you heard me.

At first glance, this seems kind of stupid. I'm pretty sure most people aiming to draw fanart of the 2003 turtles are planning to draw them in a similar style to the first five seasons, so it makes more sense to study screencaps and model sheets from those seasons rather than FF. However, the reason why Fast Forward is so useful for TMNT 2003 fanartists is because, at its core, Fast Forward is 2003's art style simplified. Anyone who has ever taken a professional art class or looked up tutorials online knows that basic shapes are incredibly important when drawing, as they are the building blocks of literally whatever illustration you're trying to make. Now, I absolutely love how detailed the designs from the first five seasons are, but because they are so detailed, a lot of the basic shapes do get lost under everything as a result, which can make it hard to figure out what actually goes into the turtles designs at a fundamental level.

Because the designs in Fast Forward are less detailed compared to what was seen in the first five seasons, many of the basic shapes that go into the turtles designs are much easier to spot. If you've been following me long enough, you know that I was absolutely LIVID to discover that one of the things I genuinely don't like about the Fast Forward style--the pentagon shaped heads--makes drawing the 03 turtle heads so much easier. To explain it in detail; a pentagon basically maps out the five "points" of a turtle's head. What these points represent can change depending on the angle from which you're drawing your chosen turtle, but if you're doing a turtle head from a front/three quarter view, the five points denotes the top of the head, the cheeks, and the chin. It requires some practice to get right, but by building off this initial pentagon shape, you can easily draw a turtle head in the style of the first five seasons. A hexagon works just as well and is especially useful if you're going for a rounder/softer head shape.

Beyond that, I think making to deliberate choice to draw in the Fast Forward style rather than the OG style is helpful for other reasons. When a turtle's head is only a pentagon, you don't have to worry as much about details and can focus on other areas you might be neglecting, such as figuring out the positioning of the eyes/mask, or developing the way you draw the turtles' expressions. (Seriously, the white pupil-less eyes are cool, but they do make conveying emotions a hassle, especially when the turtles are lacking for proper eyebrows.)

It's been about two months since I drew my very first 2003 turtle and while I'm still very far off from where I want to be, I've already made some leaps and bounds in terms of overall progress. I do sometimes feel annoying yelling about my turtle art learnings and struggles (especially when I know there is stuff that potentially comes off as Captain Obvious territory to others) but I personally find it helpful to write down everything I've learned and experienced in case I forget something and need to look back on it. And hey, maybe someone will see these disjointed ramblings as helpful. You never know.

Anyway, here's a lil Donny doodle from today to finish this entry off. See ya later!

[meikostan]

just solved a mystery that wasn't really mystery and didn't really need solving 👍 anyway i was going insane re:oshi no ko timeline because i forgot how old the twins are and what year this takes place in and needed to put all of my info in one place. in this essay i over-analyze the models of iphone as they differ from each other in the manga vs the anime. warning: very disorganized as i was sourcing all my evidence all this WHILE writing the post.

clickbait tldr: OSHI NO KO ANIME AND MANGA ARE IN SEPARATE TIMELINES⁉️ (NOT A PRANK‼️)

regular tldr: they're like 15/16 and the manga takes place in 2020 (but like including their childhood as well as their teenage years).

edit: the image formatting is broken :( idk how to fix it, sorry. they're still there, they're just huge and not next to each other for some reason

compare and contrast ruby in the manga vs the anime. now i will admit i am not an expert of identifying iphones but in the anime she appears to be holding an iphone 4; we can tell because there's only one camera lens, the power button is on the top, as is the headphone jack. it's also a bit rounded on the edges, which seem to have a little bit more meat on them compared to the manga. speaking of, compare with the manga: here, the phone has 3 camera lenses. the angle prevents us from getting a good view of the top of the phone, but there doesn't seem to be either a headphone jack OR a power button. it's a bit harder for me to tell but i think this is supposed to be an iphone 12 pro max.

compare. left: iphone 4, right: iphone 12 pro max

BUT THAT'S NOT ALL because aqua has an iphone too so of course we're looking at that

left: aqua seems to be using the same iphone 4 that ruby was using previously

right: looks more like an iphone x judging by the camera? compare:

ok so moving on. not from phones in general we'll still be talking about those but we also need to consider some other hints shown by the use of technology here. the anime seems to be pushing harder for us to view vol 1 as being set some time around 2010; if you saw my other post re:my thoughts on episode 1 you'll know that i talked about this already, but i'll restate some stuff here for completion's sake (+ add pictures)

compilation of flip phones being used throughout ai's death montage; while i did find some articles published in 2009 on flip phones dipping in popularity because of smart phones, they were definitely still being commonly used around that time. i know this because i was alive in 2009

also a wii, which was released in late 2006. it would have been incredibly common in many households, especially for non-gamers, which it was marketed towards. obviously a lone wii does not automatically mean oshi no ko vol 1 is set in the early 2010s/late 00's, but this in combination with the older models of phones does seem to point in that direction. also i have no proof of this but i feel like if it was set in modern day (2020s) that wii would be a nintendo switch instead.

bonus kana with an iphone 4 btw

you'll notice that these are all anime screenshots, and this is because pretty much none of this is in the manga. apart from the funeral we don't see any crowd shots, or anything of the public; it's all very focused in on aqua and ruby. what we DO see in terms of technology are ruby's iphone 12 pro max and aqua's iphone x, meaning in the manga either vol 1 takes place around late 2020/early 2021, the cast of oshi no ko is stuck in an eternal present, or this was an art oversight brought upon by early installment weirdness.

also, to cover the use of twitter: twitter was launched in late 2006. the website saw a pretty huge boost in popularity in 2008, and the mobile app launched in 2010. it would be very possible for the twins to go twitter viral and become the oshi no ko version of charlie bit my finger.

OK on to guessing how old they are in the present, which for now only exists in the manga!

DO NOT READ BEYOND THIS POINT IF YOU ARE AN ANIME ONLY AND INTEND TO KEEP IT THAT WAY, OR ARE OTHERWISE NOT CAUGHT UP WITH THE MANGA.

so, we know that ai had the twins when she was 16, and died a week before she turned 20. for simplicity's sake we'll just say she died when she was 20. that means the twins would be about 4 years old at this point.

what we're interested in is figuring out their age at present day. chapter 11 opens up with ruby filling out her idol applications; she list her age as being 14.

however, we know that she's been filling out multiple applications for a good while now, and aqua has continually been sabotaging her. this might not even be an application from present day. speaking of aqua, he mentions right after this panel high school entrance exams:

in japan, students enter high school (upper secondary school) around the time they're 15-16 years old. of course, aqua says they're "coming up", not that they're soon or currently happening. they could be on the lower end of 15 around here, or the higher end of 14.

additionally, in the next chapter, aqua is seen wearing what looks to be a gakuran (basically, middle school boy's uniform; middle school takes place ages 12/13 to 14/15).

from this we can guess that around 10 to 11 years have passed since ai died; they're about 14 to 15 here.

if we pretend that their childhood in the manga also took place in 2010, that means present day oshi no ko takes place around 2020.

mystery solved! but i like digging deeper this is fun. so let's continue.

skipping to the next volume!

lovenow time! here they outright state aqua's grade; high school 1st year, aka 10th grader, aka like 15/16.

can't grab screenshots of where 15 years of lies was established because mangaplus hates me and has locked the relevant chapters behind an app >:(

have to stop it here bc i don't remember as much as i thought i did and i also don't have access to chapters 95 thru 114 (thanks mangaplus👍) so uh yeah thank you for sticking with my rambles. again this was just me logicking through stuff because i forgot how old they are & is for personal reference. next time i do a reread i'll add more ^_^

[alchemiclee]

i've been told/keep seeing posts about people suddenly not liking when people add tags to their posts with their own thoughts/feelings/opnions/experiences, and even people that say not to tag with certain common organizational tags (like ships for example i see the most. some people use a ship name for organization purposes and not necessarily for shipping. for example i use "collei and her dads" for cyno, tighnari, collei art for my organization so I cam find them again and theres been a few artists screaming not to use ship tags and that could be seen as a ship tag. so what do i do? not organize your art into my tags and let it get lost and never seen again? not share your art at all? kinda silly but whatever, ill just ignore your art).

I personally think that's all a bit ridiculous....i don't know if that's a more recent thing (like with twitter people coming here suddenly and expecting to act like this is twitter) or if it happened in the years since I took a break from tumblr. but bAcK iN mY DaY we used tags as a little whisper to add our own thoughts without interrupting the main post. adding hard comments or replies was more seen as "too much/too loud" if it wasn't something directly meant for OP. tags were usually never meant for OP and were always for the reblogger and their followers. these days more and more people seem to think tags on their posts are all speaking to them directly or interrupting their post (not to say you can't speak to OP through tags, like i'll say nice things about their art in tags) but not everything in someone's tags on a post they reblog from you is for you! you can ignore it!!!

I know on twitter (where I went after leaving tumblr a while back) people use quote retweets to speak to the OP often. but not always. I sometimes would quote a tweet to add my own thoughts while using the quote as like a citation to credit OP for the idea. but I have a few times where the OP thought I was speaking to/about them and got very upset about it. one was a large account who quoted me back and got very nasty and sent their minions after me. quotes are louder than tumblr tags. so that's more understandable, and I was always very hesitant to do it, but I personally see indirect tweets about another post as extremely rude and posting screenshots of tweets on twitter is also rude.

I loved coming back here mainly for the tag system! I missed being able to share a post and also quietly add my thoughts. go on long rambles related to the main post without stealing their post completely or needing to make a whole new post. I know most old tumblr users get that and don't care, probably. I NEVER saw anyone complain about it in the past. only say how much they love it. it was just part of how this site worked for us. a culture thing we naturally created. so i'm assuming it's mostly new users who don't get this culture? it also doesn't help tumblr made it so you now see tags in your notes tab and not just comments added and replies. before, you would have to go to "someone reblogged your post" to see if they added tags because tumblr only showed comments. I personally LOVE when people add tags to my post with their thoughts and stories and whatnot. ai i'd go to every reblog I got to see if there's tags added. it's like an uncommitted interaction. they dont expect a reply, i don't expect a reply. they are isolated thoughts, but still related. it's still a form of interaction, without the pressure of being direct, and I feel seen/heard when they add them. (it means they're not a bot, auto reblogging my posts /hj) seeing tags on my posts i'm not just shouting into the void alone and someone sees me. me adding tags to a post is a gentle "you're not alone/I hear you/im a real person not a bot" from me. but it also could be me saying "your post inspired me! I want to write something too! but im being quiet about it so i dont take away from your post and your post gets all the credit" when I add my own little tag ramble.

so the fact that people are now suddenly being upset by people adding their own experiences and thoughts to tags is super disappointing and and frankly annoying. tags don't take away from your post and you can just ignore them! no one is forcing you to expand the tags in your notes and read them! hardly anyone will see them. most will only read your post and not people's tags! I know no one usually reads my tags because i've added secret messages to the end of my tags and no one ever responds to it lmao things like send a pic in my ask and i'll draw it for you.

yes I know "RESPECT PEOPLE BOUNDARIES" but it kind of disrespects my needs as well. theres a thin line between someone's boundaries being crosses and someone's needs not being met. but that's a whole debate i'm not willing to have so don't start it. (not that kind of boundary is easy to not cross. not bringing up arguments. but asking people to not use a main function of a website is kind of pushing it imo...) yeah I want to respect boundaries the best i can, but unless you say in the post "don't reblog and add your own tags" no one will know and you get upset when no one knows. and no, no one will read your profile/pinned post before reblogging. no one will go to the original post and read your tags. they will only reblog it right off their dash if they aren't seeing it directly from you in the tags/for you page. some people will reblog 100 posts a day. they won't go to every profile/original post before reblogging just to see if you have any special conditions and rules for your random one post out of hundreds they see a day. that's too much to expect, honestly, sorry to say!

but this is tumblr. maybe it's better for people to accept the culture/etiquette here and let it happen without complaining, or realize this isn't the place for them! because it doesn't meet their needs and boundaries! and that's ok! it doesn't have to be your place. you don't need to stay here if you don't like how it works! asking an entire website to "respect your boundaries" by not participating in a basic or essential function of the website is a little ridiculous to be fair....

no i'm not saying your boundaries don't deserve to be respected. i'm saying this probably isn't the place to have those boundaries in the first place. because there's am established way this site functions that works in counter to your wanted boundaries, so it just doesn't fit your needs. and like I said that's ok! you don't need to stay here if it upsets you that much! it's better if you find a social media where people can't share your posts. like a simple blog site that doesn't have a share function! or like Instagram? people cant share those posts. (sorry, I dont know much about social media) if you really want people to stop adding tags that bad, either turn off reblogs completely, or ask staff to add a notification option to turn off seeing added tags on reblogs! (if you're veeerry lucky, and not a trans woman, they might listen to you)