#i like making art like this! but i also miss drawing my blorbos... i just miss drawing! i miss drawing for fun!! I miss breaking art rules!

[quinn-pop]

astral things…(aka orb cats)

y’know that cute thing cats do where they sleep with their paws out??? yeah

[roukabi]

Everybody loves a winner

so nobody loved me

[walnutcookie]

fandom can be awful sometimes so heres a few reminders for my beloved mutuals:

- do whatever you want forever. if its not harming anyone or yourself you are amazing and you should continue doing it if it makes you happy

- ship wars/discourse suck ass. if its not a proship its fine, if someone has a different ship than you or interprets a ship differently you dont have to fight with them.

- your ocs are the best thing on this planet and you should share them

- your oc x canon is so wonderful and lovely and you should share it

- the ocs you created to be family members of other characters are awesome and you should share them

- your headcanons and interpretations of characters are awesome and you should share them

- hit that character with the beam. you know you want to. make them trans, make them gay, make them poc, make them disabled, make them fat, whatever makes you happy

- if someone is mean to you blow them up (hit the block button)

- be nice to others. support their art, their stories, their ocs and headcanons and ships, even if you arent very interested in them. stay curious!! ask about peoples ideas, because most of the time they want to share just as much as you do

- if other people have different interpretations or ideas, you dont have to agree or disagree with them. its okay to appreciate others opinions without telling them that theyre wrong

- if anyones ships/ideas/etc make you too uncomfortable, block them.

- if someone is too annoying to see in the tags, block them.

- if anyone is mean to you, block them. especially hate anons

- write whatever you want always. draw whatever you want always. draw those girls kissing draw that enby covered in blood write about that man going to see the dentist

- draw them as furries, as dragons, as humans, as objects, whatever your heart desires

- your selfship partner loves you always

- people arent always right about characters. sometimes theyre way far from canon, and its not really your place to correct them. if it makes you too uncomfortable block them.

- some people choose to not follow canon. do what you want forever, you are always right about your blorbo. you are not limited to canon or what the fandom depicts the character as

- dont be the one to send anon hate

- its okay to be a hater and a lover. you can hatepost on your blog just as much as you lovepost. just dont main tag it (thats mean) and dont add it onto other peoples posts who like what youre hating on (thats also mean)

- if someone is hating on something you like, its best not to engage with it.

feel free to add anything i missed :] i love u mutuals you should tell me everything about your ocs and ships and headcanons forever. pls

[theposhperyton]

if you have the time could you tell me literally everything you know about isfd?

I found your blog through the one piece posts and now need to learn anything I can about this obscure fandom

An ISFD ask from someone who isn't already lost in the sauce? (<-Self call-out) O glorious day!

Gosh, there's so much, I don't really know where to start. I've been following this micro-fandom for YEARS now, and it's one of those things that just keeps on giving. The amount of lost/missing content and the frickin nuked forum (I'm a survivor, baebee!!) really does sometimes make it feel like the universe is trying to wipe us out, but hey. ISFD fans are basically cockroaches. Killable in theory, but surprisingly hearty in an actual life or death of a fandom scenario.

As for the actual content of ISFD that I engage in, I'm a rare(?) case where I kinda dabble in everything. I can confidently say I'm a member of the ** original ** gen of fans, so I've been around for the noteable eras, and have obsessed over every major character group at one time or another, as well as some niche characters (Cyan and his 2 other fans, rise up 🔥🔥)

I gotta say though, I am currently obsessed with the mafia portion of the universe (and, tbh, by extension, the Marama family. They are to me what the Kardashians are to some)

In particular, Phillip Varic has been my consistent blorbo since last September. It is not an exaggeration to say I've averaged about 40 drawings of him a month since then (my friends and I have counted. I should be on my strange addiction at this point, tbh. Or seeking other professional insight)

Here's some of the doodles in question! I am not terribly good at finishing art of him, I just sketch him loosely and rotate him rapidly in my head

I just think he's so neat. And I think his stupid, codependant, and mildly dysfunctional mafia found-family are so neat. And I think his husband (seraphine) and wife (abram) are so neat. And all his kids, both the legal kids and the ones whom he mostly just pays college tuition for, they're neat to. And the echos of Magnolia throughout his life and the larger narrative, even decades later. That's also very neat (my heart doesn't hurt at all!)

I realize I kinda derailed from answering your original ask because the mafia brainrot is debilitating and chronic, but I'm not entirely sure how I'd go about answering it anyway because there is just. So, so much world and lore to glean from ISFD, and none of it in any easy or direct way. Honestly though? The mafia might not be a bad place to start? If you want, I can tell you as much as I know about the cast and dynamics of the mafia, because I feel like a lot of the mafia character's lore and backgrounds act as a good segway to other noteable aspects of the larger ISFD narratives and the in-world political climate as a whole (Especially Mask and Howard. Not to single those poor souls out, but genuinely. How are they both gonna be so afflicted by the narrative like that)

If you're still interested after I practically talked your ear off, I could totally make a larger post about the whole mafia :3 They're my special blorbos ❤️ I would not feel safe around them IRL, but trapped within the confines of fiction, they're all free for me to babygirlify with almost no consequences

[creaturing-your-faves]

(If you're comfortable with this) could you make a tutorial on how you make your creations??? It'd okay if not, thank you for making them :D

WAA i can try!! baby's first tutorial ft. this guy

🐾 first, a picture of your blorbo

i use waifu2x to up the quality, not always neccessary but it makes everything a bit easier and prettier. i use firealpaca to edit but you can use whatever you like, im not your mom

🐾 probably get a reference

yeah i dont always do this. but you should! i should! so google whatever creature you want to turn blorbo into and maybe scroll for a bit to get a feel for what they look like :3

try to find one at a similar angle to your blorbo picture and paste it/open as a layer. look this is close enough ↓

🐾 onto the actual editing! human ear surgery

in case you prefer just one pair of ears. you have to understand the style so you can imitate it.... so look at their hair, maybe theres more colors or gradients than you can see at a glance or something ! i colorpick a bunch of them and put them over their ears, then blend them together with a low opacity watercolor brush

ALSO, notice the.. lighter glowy aura thing around his ear in the og? i try to imitate details like that too, used watercolor for this again

now maybe you wanna make it look like theres something covering that spot, since theres kinda nothing there now. soo if that looks weird to you, (open a new layer and) put some hair over it. i cant tell u how to imitate Any style so just. study it and keep trying

with enstars here the lines are pretty soft, so i go over it with watercolor brush after doing the general shape. with a higher opacity you could probably just use a softer brush from the start, i just like starting with the basic pen

🐾 the lines!!!

nowww i lower the blorbos opacity to around 50%, bring the reference somewhere i can see and just kinda... start sketching. lot of redrawing and transform tooling here sometimes

TIPS 1. you can clean the lines up at the end so dont stress

2. think of your blorbos new ears as a real tangible part of their body and how they fit on their head since you dont wanna make it look too flat !

3. and for the placement i always end up at roughly one human ear length above their og ears if that makes sense. tried to visualize it

as for inner ear fluffs phew i dont know either. draw a circle and start from there? maybe there are actual animal ears in blorbo artstyle out there you could reference

🐾 coloring 🏳️‍🌈

finally some progress huh. i color the lines in a contrasting color first so i see the lines properly and dont miss anything, then fill it in with the actual color :3 OH and for gradients i just use the airbrush at the ear tips or sides

noww shading! new layer, basic pen brush and try to follow the shapes in the og art. it's best if you pick the colors from the actual picture!!! take notes mentally and just do your best i dont know how to explain this more

taking this as an example, the shading is mostly in pretty simple wider areas, so not a lot of seperate strands in there. and its again pretty soft around the edges of shades and highlights, so i'll go over it with my beloved watercolor. keep things like that in mind so the creaturing blends in well :3

if you like more detail better you can still go with that. or less detail on a complex artstyle. the world is your oyster

🐾 and the rest

what else could there be???? making the lineart more cohesive for example ★ oftentimes it's not one solid color, thicker or thinner than yours, things like that.

for things like piercings or fangs you can just draw them on top i believe in you <3 if its like an intricate earring use the lasso? magic wand? the one that lets you select an area to copy and move on top of your ear layers

+ remember details like shadows, if you put a tail on top of say blorbos leg there's gonna be a shadow under it! put a layer under the tail ones and freehand draw the shadow, OR copy the tail layer, put the copy under the og one and change color/opacity until it fits

[heymrspatel]

Weekly Tag Wednesday! Thursday! Friday!

my low energy making me not want to participate in this tag game vs the WHOLE LOT OF YOU THAT MADE ME FEEL ALL NICE AND LOVED WITH THE TAGS!!! 😭 thank you @jrooc @creepkinginc @deedala @suzy-queued @arrowflier @metalheadmickey @lingy910y @mybrainismelted @francesrose3 @dynamic-power @mmmichyyy @mickeysgaymom @transmickey @ardent-fox @milkovichrules @skylerwinchester @juliakayyy @softmick @too-schoolforcool @tanktopgallavich and @lupeloto (i hope i didn't miss anyone!)💙💙💙

🔤 Name: julissa

🎶 Last song you listened to: summer by brockhampton

🎵 Artist on Spotify giving you the feels right now: hozier and boygenius are battling each other

👯‍♂️ Fave Blorbo Moment:

🍟 Your guilty pleasure snack: flaming hot cheetos probably lmao

��� What food are you craving today: grilled cheese!!!

📖 Last fanfic tab you opened: intro to quantum dating by @spoonfulstar it is my absolute go to when i need comfort! it's a warm hug, a fuzzy blanket! my beloved 💙

🖌️ Favorite fic project you've created: i am not a writer so this doesn't apply. but, i've done some art based on fics! i loved working with @metalheadmickey on the artwork for cinematic! and i also really got a kick out of drawing these two cuties for sweetpea by @whatthebodygraspsnot 🥰🥰

👩🏼‍🎤 Next tattoo you want (or would consider if you're not a tattoo person): my number one is line art of a bouquet of flowers with my grandmother's middle name in a lil ribbon

🧐🆓 What's living in your head rent free this week: the fact that it's already november and time seems to be flying and what do you mean the holidays are around the corner it was just summer like what do you mean by that huh answer me i was just on vacation in august what do you mean i have to buy christmas presents stop lying ok enough of this no it isn't nearly 2024 fuck right the fuck off and-

i'm late so i'm skipping the tag. but, if you want to play please do and tag me so i can seeee! ily happy weekend! 💙

[sphxremint]

(man this art is really old but im usin it anyway lol)

☆ Heya heya一it's me, Mint!

I'm the guy that does the funny draws (and music (and sometimes edits)).

Some of you have definitely heard that line way too many times before. Or some of you probably just know me as the Simple Yet Stupid guy. If you haven't seen me before, congratulations! You've successfully met "that guy" (me) for the first time!

This is my tumblr. I reblog stuff I think is neat and post art/music/stuff I like once every [unspecified time frame]. I dipped (sort of) from Twitter (ah, sorry一ECKS [X] as it's called now) like a year or two ago because some guy had too much fun ruining it. Now I'm here more often!

Right, this is an intro post. lemme get on that...

☆ cool things you should know

• I'm 20 (born July 4th, on MINT day. not whatever the hell independence day is. eugh)

• I'm aroace (certain of it now! we out here)

• I'm black (there's like no way to make this funnier it just is what it is)

☆ some other neat stuff

• I draw!

I'm definitely not consistent with it at all, but I'm trying, 'cause it's fun and I like doing it. I may be into a lot of medias too, but I'm mostly an oc artist, and it's a curse I will bear until the end of time

• I make music!

I'm also not very consistent with it, but I'm a bit less open about it... I do it for fun, really; though it's more of a personal thing compared to my art.

• My timezone is CST

...which is about UTC -05:00. if you need to know that. i know we all got varied timezones

• I'm very good at being inconsistent!

(such as basic punctuation and grammar. cause thats important. sometimes i'll actually use apostrophes and sometimes ill just completely forget mid-sentence. lmao)

☆ my 5 core interests

aka. The main things I like! I switch between the 5 of these on a whim. You can inquire me about any of these. Be ready when it happens.

• Sonic The Hedgehog (he's just THAT GUY, yknow. just a guy who loves adventure. ultimate life forms and whatnot)

• Kirby (i'd forfeit everything for him. #1 blorbo living life)

• FINAL FANTASY (esPECIALLY XIII and XIV. but it's mostly XIV. two lalas ready for Dawntrail WOOO)

• Celeste (#1 game ever. i love everything about it so much, i naturally get my friends to play it. i'm also pretty good at speedrunning. smile)

• and anything osc! (though I'm not part of the fandom "like that". just on the surface layer, yknow? bfdi, ii, boto, ppt2... funny shows go brrr)

☆ cool and awesome tags

□ #mint.txt = probably some random garbled text i spat out one night

□ #mintdraws = i sure do! and you should go look at it!

□ #mint.png = funny image included (not guaranteed)

□ #mint.mp3 = rarely use this but i still want people to know i make music

□ #mint.ask = because i get those. sometimes art, sometimes stupid funny stuff

□ #simple yet stupid = yeah its for those funny objects i talk about. i put this one here just in case

□ #mint's expoboard = i'm probably talking about one of my ocs

☆ and some extra stuff i guess

□ my sonas and stuff if you need that

□ my carrd! go read it cause most of my extra links (and contacts) are already there

□ my toyhou.se Did you know I have a toyhou.se? because I never shut up about my characters, and sometimes people just need the Repository of Information. well... here it is.

Okay. I'll update this post more as time goes on, but... that's about it. That was probably like a read and a half. oops.

Remember: if you do follow me, you are (unofficially) officially consigning yourself to my presence and any stupidity and/or brainrot that follows.

...if that's cool with you. lmao =ᴗ=)b

(big shoutouts to the old pinned i had. you will forever be missed)

last updated: 08 / 27 / 2024

[chocolate-cringymuffin]

every even number in the love your fandom game!

Oh bro here we go...

1- 3 things you like about your fandom:

1.1- It has a lot of content!

1.2- You can experiment and play with many characters and concepts, there are no limits!

1.3- it has a lot of nice and talented people!

2- A headcanon you where not sure about first but fandom made you change your mind:

Mmmmm... not sure about this one. I think I used to Headcanon Amon as Asexual but thanks to some nice mutuals now I can see him bisexual.

3- A character that fandom made you appreciate:

Asami and Katara. Before I get in here I was neutral about all the characters (of course my three main blorbos are the exceptions), but with the right fics and art I could connect with them a little bit better.

4- Say something nice about a ship you don't ship;

Not into Korrasami really, but if there's one thing I can't deny is that the ship has good artists, (haven't read fics but I guess there are good writers too).

5- A thing you see often in fics:

We collectively refuse to accept when a character we love is dead in canon. (canon is clay and we can shape it into whatever we want).

6- A thing you see often in fan arts:

When we make Korra strong and pretty. Also Yue art, she is so pretty and I heard that if you are a cool artist you have drawn her at least once! (Please don't mind if you haven't drawn her, I am sure your art is great).

7- Tropes you enjoy to read/write/draw:

To draw- arranged marriage, basically any amorralok au where Tarrlok and Amon live, for Azulaang any modern, cute or funny comfort au, (tea or coffee shop, school au, flowershop), and love drawing dirty mechanic/prince Irosami.

I guess any cute, comfort au actually.

To read- Arranged marriage, castaway Amon, equalists plot continuation, GIMEEE.

Also love coffee shop aus and spirit traveling au's for Azulaang.

Irosami is interesting with equalist or spy Asami au's but love some good cute domestic aus.

Basically anything related with spirit travels, equalists continuation, action and fluff included.

8- Something you would like the fandom to love aittle bit more:

Any ship and character that doesn't get as much appreciation as it deserves around the fandom.

9- A ship that it's not your Otp but you ship:

Yuetara, have neglected it WAY too long but whenever I see it I appreciate it.

10- A blog or mutual that has made your experience in fandom better:

Can't name all the people that have made my experience better, fortunately, there have been too many nice mutuals. Some are no longer active but to name a few I would dare to say @flameo-trashman @crookedmouth-mountainbones @lotus-ashi @orangepanic @moreamorra @amorra-tlok @writebecauseyoucannotbreathe and @mokonahapuuuuuu

Thank you all for your kindness and your presence in this chaotic site!

11- An artwork/fic you are proud about:

12- Say something nice to a mutual!

Orange, Lotus, Crooked, Neffy, Write, Mokonahapuuuu and Moreamorra: Never stop being awesome and having cool art and fics.

And for everyone else reading this: you are great too and your presence enriches this fandom.

13- Favorite fandom event?

Ship week! (loved the avatarsunkenshipweek by the way).

14- A ship that makes you smile:

Mostly Amorra but Korrlok, Irohsami and Azulaang hold an apecial place in my heart. 💜💙🤎❤🧡💛❤️‍🔥

15- A character that makes you smile:

Baby Korra, she is too precious. Baby Noatak and Tarrlok too, must protect.

16- A thing in canon you would like to get noticed by the fandom?

THE PARALELISMS BETWEEN AMON AND KORRA, THEY ARE INSANE.

17- A thing in canon everyone likes, including you:

Seeing Iroh and Aang back in tlok and Jinora getting her tattoos.

18- A tag you follow?

Just Tlok

19- Current fandoms:

Again just Tlok haha.

20- Your first fandom:

Can't recall the first one I got interested in.

21- A fandom you miss:

Undertale.

22- Mutual you have known the longest?

Mokonahapuu, it's been a lot since we knew through this lil place.

23- A fandom you are curious about thabks to a mutual:

The dragon Prince.

24- How has fandom positively impacted in you?

Mutuals helped me to work in my art and storytelling skills. 💛

25- Advice to take care of you in fandom spaces:

Do not get too invested in any fandom, it can be overwhelming to deal with too many opinions so it's better to try to be nice and not worry about what the rest could say.

Get 2-5 psychos, (affectionate), and stick together, it will probably help you a lot.

Also, you don't have to like what everyone else does or agree to everything, not everything is made for you or a single person. Keep in mind you will have to learn to cope with the things you dislike.

Finally, look for other activities to entertain yourself, focusing too much in fandom can be bad in the long term.

[wasyago]

hi! this is the bunch-a-questions anon. this wont be an ask ask. thank you for answering! it really gives me so much insight about tools and processes, i really enjoy seeing/reading how different artists have different ways in approaching creation of art. it’s all so interesting to me

and oooh i know what you mean about looking at a lot of different artists! it’s inspiration!! i find those things to be amazing too, it’s so cool. it’s like “this spot is inspired by an artist” “this artist draws this like this, so i wanted to try” “i think the way an artist drew this was neat and i wanted to try an implement it” it reminds me of that one post how we, as people, are a mosiac of other people and i believe it to be the same for how artists are too with their art

i feel inspired by the way you draw….. everything!!! it gets me pumped to try and replicate the way you do some things. like the shapes you create, the colors you choose, the way your lineart seems to be so flowy, how dynamic everything feels and how different each drawing you create is from one another (i saw you reblog that meme of like “why shouldnt i draw characters from the waist up and that is SO me, but it’s shoulders up” because drawing full bodies makes mh drawings feel so stiff, i need to practice more!!), the poses of the characters. just.. every aspect of your art is so, so, so nice!!

the way you draw, in all your styles, it’s definitely one of the ones that is such a good scratch to my brain. it gets me all giddy and happy! i’m not sure if i’ll get into jwri, mostly because my attention span will not let me be able sit and focus on listening before i get distracted and miss context on parts, BUT i still go to your blog almost every day just so i can see your art, no matter what it is, no matter who the characters are because it’s always so so good and i love taking it in. (will eat your art if i could, i am so serious)

this was a long one but yeah! i just wanted to let you know how awesome i see your art is! and how i also think youre a cool person, you seem like such a good peep to hang out it! might be weird to say but if you were a blorbo, you would be one of the most blorbiest blorbos to blorbo ever

hope youre having a good day!!

OH THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL THE KIND WORDS THIS IS SOOOOO

your explanation of taking inspiration from other artists was so poetic and beautiful! truly inspiring in itself

its okay if you can't get into jrwi, i get it! i didn't think i would get into it as well and after binging all the episodes i honestly forgot why i even started listening in the first place. remembered recently tho! it was because i was going a little crazy while making the picrew and needed some actual talking in the background instead of just music. so, if you ever decide to give it a try, or listen to something else equally as lengthy, try to busy your hands with something that doesn't require a lot of thinking! it helps me at least! worked both with jrwi and tma. it's like, doing something monotonous (knitting, sorting files, cleaning the house, etc) can be incredibly boring if i sit in silence and let my mind wonder. alternatively, listening to something long or watching a long movie can be incredibly boring as well because i struggle to pay attention to the same thing for two hours. but combining these is really good, because it keeps both my mind and hands busy, but not overwhelmingly so!

and ough ough ough thank you again for such heartwarming message! im so happy to hear that you feel inspired by my art, and i wish you good luck in your own art journey!!!!!!! remember to have fun and listen to yourself and do things that you find interesting and that you enjoy! don't force yourself to draw stuff you don't like! all art is personal and individual, so don't be afraid to make things "you"! you don't have to do clean line, you don't have to do lines at all, you don't have to do coloring or shading, if you don't like it! and if you do like it or are excited to try, you should go for it! don't be afraid to change and grow but don't force yourself into it!

also don't foget to stretch before drawing its very important!!!!!!!!!!!!

[yotsubaclover]

p3 of blorbo association explanation woohoo and this time it's fugo!!! my beloved!!! who i can still draw quite cutely after all this time aww love my lil guy

song: I HAVE A WHOLE FUGO PLAYLIST it's really OLD but it's so important to me. i always thought the pain and aimlessness and self-loathing of turn off the lights was perfectly post-gw (and early phf) fugo. another very fugo song? lassassymphonie from mozart opera rock.

color: deep red! maroon? i like red fugo the most :3c silver and red on top

animal: genuinely ive never kin assigned him any animal hes just always been a teen boy to me but i said hare bc ... i recently saw bunny!fugo fanart but he is not a cute rabbit he is something a little more square than that. and a hare seemed right. i think they're also a bit shy lol which is also very fugo to me, actually quite timid

food: berry fugo lover says strawberries are him who is surprised

object: diy holes in jeans cos i just think he should do arts and crafts. but also because i saw these pants with heart holes in them in some runway show a few years back and thought "wow i could hypothetically make those jeans on my own actually..." LMAO as for the earrings, i too have strawberry earrings, and anything similar i will call fugo earrings :D

aesthetic: i just like him in more alternative fashion and specifically 90s era stuff too so i just merged both. i think him in 90s casual is also good. i like to draw him in that i think thats why lol

other: smog cos purple haze baby. both kills. one just slower than the other. regret cos i like angst and pain and phf. tomes cos boy is a nerd at heart forever and ever and of course the mysterious killing which changed his life. but like genuinely i think he would hang around the library and pick up a random bigass book and binge it within ... less than a week probably. like. he READS. and he is INTERESTED. i'm not sure if he'd be a philosophy guy or a humanities guy at all but i am optimistic and projecting he is. i think his family would've wanted him to be a lawyer idk. to me he loves some kind of humanities or social science okay

i loved fugo so much i made an incredibly elaborate debate au starring HIM ft a bunch of other jojo characters pls and i did that so i could also love the sport... when i burned out i stopped building the au im so sad i miss passione debate society :")

[olderthannetfic]

Having more fandom friends around my age/mindset (context: late 30s, rare fandoms, reads some nsfw but not the type to post about it a lot in my main account) might be nice. I ignored the fandom part of myself a long time due to my RL friends being shitty about it (I dumped the worst of them) and I'm trying to enjoy it more.

But I keep leaving comments on fic and art and don't get any reply, let alone a conversation or follow. When I do get a response, the person stops posting fic in that fandom shortly afterwards. In an earlier more active fandom, I would send requests to people (clearly open for requests!) and 99% of the time I'd be ignored, or they'd draw the request at a level clearly before their usual stuff then delete it because they didn't like it (their words).

I'm not writing anything inappropriate or critical? I try to make my comments more interesting than 'i love this write more thx', maybe they get too confusing and off-putting to read? It certainly isn't because my ship is too weird because even non-shippers ship my current OTP lmao

I am trying to be realistic about it, maybe they aren't replying because they don't have the energy, or they have a life and they can't reply to the comment immediately and forget to, or they moved on, or they think I'm a tit which is totally fine?

The issue is it keeps happening, it's depressing, and the follows I do get are people in the same fandom who only like the parts I'm not invested in at all, have really tired takes and are significantly younger to the point I'm concerned about looking like a creep if I interact with them at 100% of my full power. It feels very much like I'm wishing on a monkey paw.

I have a very small number of friends I can talk to about fandom stuff I will cling onto with both hands. I just wish there were more. This is mainly me venting but if anyone has any suggestions feel free.

--

Hmm... Well, I share your suspicion that if you're the common factor, you're at least somewhat contributing to this situation. It may not be that you're offputting but that you inherently like things most other fans don't like—not just rare ships but also rarer tropes.

Or it may not be rarity exactly but prompt style: while tons of people love found family and slice of life, a lot of prompts for those are so generic and boring that they inspire exactly zero new plotbunnies. Meanwhile filthy kink is not for everyone but often has the seeds of a specific fic in a prompt, so if you do like it, those prompts are super inspiring.

A lot of people are pretty terrible at responding to comments. I'm extremely hit or miss on AO3 myself. I'll respond to a zillion things on tumblr before I remember to actually answer comments on AO3. Partly, it's that I get said comments in my email inbox, not on AO3 itself, so I read them and appreciate them but am not in the space where I'd respond right at that moment.

Sadly, people making one fanwork and moving on just comes with the territory when you're in rare fandoms. It's much easier to make friends who like to vid Asian dramas or who are learning a language for fandomy reasons or who are doing fandom historical preservation than friends who share your exact current taste in blorbos and who will continue to do so.

In my case, I love rare things, but I also love to move from fandom to fandom rapidly, and I find it really stressful to have friends who end up resenting that.

I tend to befriend fans whose overall vibe I find compatible more than people I share ships with: people who will probably be in fandom for life, people who are loud and proud about it, people who are interested in fandom history and pan-fandom meta. I also tend to be drawn to accounts that are not only horny on main but horny for kinky shit that draws haters. It does a wonderful job of weeding out the whiny children and finding me fans with a spine. Hilariously, one of my closest offline fandom friends with whom I share the most character opinions doesn't even like sex scenes. But that's not somebody I'd have gotten to know online.

It's going to vary for the people you're approaching, but that may be one reason they're not as enticed by the sight of another fan of their current rare fandom: they may have totally different types of criteria for fandom friends.

It's hard to know how much of the problem is you without examining your internet presence more, but I get why going "here's my account, plz critique" is not attractive. This ask seems fine. No particular writing style red flags jump out at me.

I've definitely known people who were dicks about my tumblr popularity and wanted to know why I didn't reblog them... but it turns out they interacted with me only once every six months so I don't remember them or their tumblr is entirely shitposts or their writing style is incoherent or they sound angry all the time.

One problem you may be running into is that findable fans in their 30s and 40s are self-selected for Fandom For Life types who already have a bunch of close fandom friends. They're likely doing a lot of socializing in private with people they've known for ages. I like to think of it as people with very full dance cards. They tend to be the most attractive because they're living happy, fulfilling lives, but that same quality makes them too busy. Meanwhile, people who are sad and alone and desperate for friends are often less visible and less compelling. If someone figured out how to connect with them, they'd be a great friend, but fewer people are trying.

It's not that every compatible late 30s fan is too busy for new friends. It's that the fans who are visible enough that you know they exist and know their approximate age are a very specific slice of overall fandom.

As fans age, some of their fandom friends leave fandom or die, so there can be periods where people are going "Shit, I need new friends!" later on, not just in college and such. But I'd say late 30s is a tough-ish period. A lot of people are busy with young kids and/or haven't lost their inner circles from younger years yet.

In general, a lot of my closer fandom friends aren't actually looking for new friends and haven't been in quite a while. Some don't even post publicly anymore. I'm something of an exception because I'm both extremely friendly and always on the lookout for minions to convince to go to Escapade con or take up the banner of fandom preservation yadda yadda. I have a vested interest in remaining open to new people.

Thoughts, everyone? Have you gone through friend-seeking and full dance card phases?

[the-ark-awaits]

i wish i had stuck with art tbh. i had a pretty severe breakdown about my art a few years ago now bc i hadnt seen much improvement from 6th grade to like, the end of highschool, so i quit bc drawing started to become so emotionally draining and awful feeling that it wasnt worth the strife, but also like, not for those same reasons it feels impossible to pick it back up. i know it isnt, but its still a deeply awful experience mentally for me, however i still love making little guys and no one gives 2 shits about your your blorbos unless you can draw them, as is made very apparent by artfight season, general posting trends, and ask blogs with no art.

but also, i just kinda miss it, i miss being younger and being able to draw shittily and have fun, now i draw a guy with the face a little crooked and i start spiraling and have to put the pen down and walk away. it also doesnt really help that i couldnt ever get into the digital art scene bc i couldnt get a hold of a tablet, drawing or otherwise.

it sucks because i enjoy making guys, it takes me a while and i dont tend to make stories out of them for a variety of reasons but i like having ocs and its a lot harder to design a guy when im limited to picrews and dollmakers.

this is kinda random i guess, i just kinda miss being able to enjoy things without thinking too hard about it

[vile-wizard]

Kay!!!! Dashes into here!!!! Does Kay have any original characters that he loves dearly I would LOVE to hear about them ✨💫💫 Or any current blorbos!! That would also be lovely hehe <33

This is a very difficult ask to answer because there's years of information to tell. I used to play a lot of TTRPGs and on top of making my player character I'd make their friends and enemies and parents and coworkers etc etc etc. I've got some old art of my old OCs floating around in my drawing posting tag. I've also mentioned Jethro here. I also have Tumblr blogs for a lot of them just sitting around gathering dust...

It's a little hard for me to think about Jethro now bc the campaign he was in fell apart but he's still my special little guy. Here are some drawings I did of him from HS, College and current (He's 27 but he acts like a grandpa. It doesn't help that he starts greying VERY early.) As you can see he liked horror films and theatre. Also he is Transgender. Just thought I should mention that.

His whole deal was that he's a Private Investigator looking for his Dad who went missing several years ago. His dad was a PI who did a bunch of dangerous magical cases (did I mention this is a magical world) and Jethro is trying desperately to follow in his footsteps. Jethro has questionable social skills but he watched a ton of movies growing up so he's molded himself after those old timey noire detectives.

At the start of the campaign Jethro is living in his dad's old office (don't worry there's a bathroom attachment). He's making some money taking financial and insurance fraud cases on a freelance basis and..... Well....here are my notes actually:

(His dad and mom were tragically separated before his birth and then his mom got sick but 12 year old Jethro used his burgeoning detective skills and the power of library internet access to find his dad and take a Greyhound bus him)

Anyway. In the campaign the town of Portage (and most of the world) is overrun by Magical Mutated Monsters called Slashers. No one knows how they form or what causes the mutations. There's a science research team looking into it but they keep going missing. Jethro's first task was to find out what happened to one of the missing researchers.

The game was kind of separated into arcs where Jethro and his ragtag team of misfit friends would fight a slasher all while trying to figure out the Truth behind what's going on. Jethro's character build (this game is Urban Shadows btw) is called The Sworn and it basically means he's a fighter for a kind of God. Because this is a horror game the God type thing that Jethro is affiliated with is called The Chorus the Angel of War, Justice, Revenge and Protection. It talks to him sparingly through other things. Fortunately I wrote a disco elysium style thing about Jethro's first interaction with it after his first fight with a Slasher:

Anyway, he starts hearing Voices and despite his Catholic upbringing he's still more than a little freaked by it especially since they're telling him to avenge the dead and stuff. There are more gods in the same and I made a Pinterest for them here. Jethro questions his sanity, humanity and has general existential dread about the whole thing. It's kinda an issue for him because he ALSO experiences hallucinations due to his poor life choices. He self medicates with a variety of sleeping pills throughout the game, something that his friends can't really do anything about because they've all got their own traumas (horror game).

Sorry there's a lot of stuff here and I'm getting ahead of myself. Uhhh personality wise Jethro is very altruistic and sometimes stupidly kind but he also has a deep rooted hero complex. He keeps things to himself and wants to handle matters on his own, which causes a lot of issues.

TLDR; I have so so so so many original characters and there's too much to say. I'm also running out of time to write this because I have a stupid timer on to limit my Tumblr usage lmao BUT YEAH. There's so much thanks for asking

[kirbles]

i have a very complicated relationship/history with cosplay and cons, but i'll spare you those details and just talk abt how much i've enjoyed this weekend.

idk what it is abt cosplaying gale but i felt rly good abt myself. it's silly cuz i'm a very femme cis woman but there is something abt putting on a beard and drawing on wrinkles for a day or two that is so fun to me. i'm itching to cosplay more characters like that. i've only ever wore qt girls before this.

even tho it could've looked better i still got tons of compliments for the makeup and the cosplay itself. it's got me thinking of ways to improve this cosplay for the next con (may? september?)

i want to properly style the wig to look more like his short wavy vanilla hairstyle. i want to fix the shirt a bit better, fix the belt, and make a necromancy of thay prop. it would also be cool to make other outfits for him, like robes and a staff, but that won't be anytime in the near future.

i talked to some lovely ppl and i really did miss cons and the social aspect of it. running on pure adrenaline and looking goofy so it makes me feel confident enough to try and befriend ppl.

con wise it was fun enough! the artist alley was fucking fantastic i got SO much bloodweave merch it's unreal. my shrine looks amazing. i wanna post it tomorrow but i'll have to sit down and look through all the business cards i took so i can properly credit <3

i feel silly being so happy abt that but with the recent years of brexit and awful import tax and not attending cons til now i've not been able to buy any merch without it being extortionate so i'm just SO excited to own a bunch of cute art of my blorbos ;; i want MORE!!!!

[raemanzu]

So... I've been basically off tumblr for probably the longest I ever have since I joined in 2011.. lol...

Which is to say, 2-3 months, I think?

Long enough to realize that most of what I missed about tumblr was just a handful of people. So I came back and unfollowed most of the blogs I follow, keeping only my favs. Started working backwards through one of them and it felt really nice.

Life as a working person who's also doing an accelerated online masters program is making it very important for me to manage my time better and also my mental/emotional bandwidth. When I'm not at work wrangling little feral humans or slogging through special education textbooks I'm exercising (weights) 3 times a week and trying to get a garden going with my partner, and the rest of my time goes to RPing blorbos, for morale.

But this week I made bread, twice.

I used to post a lot more random art and personal updates on here, once upon a time, and my favorite blogs/tumblr friends are the ones that still do that, so I think maybe I should try to do simple stuff on here more, not just reblogging stuff... maybe it would help me feel more like a person while using this online space. I'm missing a feeling of community lately.

If you tagged or messaged me anything between now and March I probably missed it, I am lost in the homework anxiety vortex. I know I was tagged in at least one WIP game but I haven't done any creative writing lately, alas! Only a little drawing, and I'm torn on whether to upload it anywhere because of the AI "art" problem.

anyway shout out to @astriiformes, @tearlessrain, @squireofgeekdom, and @neil-gaiman, the main reasons I got back on tumblr tonight xD

[megatraven]

tagged by @retiredficwriter thank you!!! :3

1 . How did you get into writing fanfiction?

i've always thought up little scenarios in my head for whstever blorbos i was obsessed with, but actually writing it down didn't happen until i was in college! i joined a new fandom at the time (miraculous ladybug) and was so inspired by all the art and fic other people were making that i started writing fanfic (and drawing fanart!) in earnest :>

2. How many fandoms have you written in?

according to ao3, 12. but i have a lot of unfinished or unposted works from other fandoms, so the number is even higher than that though i'm not sure by how much

3. How many years have you been writing fanfiction?

since the tail-end of 2015! so almost 9 years!

4. Do you read or write more fanfiction?

i write more than i read these days, but i'd love to get into reading more fanfic again sometime

5. What is one way you’ve improved as a writer?

[finger guns] i dont know! B)

6. What’s the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

i don't usually research things for my fanfics i just wing it

7. What’s your favorite type of comment to receive on your work?

comments where the reader says that they come back to reread the fic every now and again 🥺🥺 i've only received a couple of comments that are like that in my time writing, but they're the ones i love the most. just so sweet ooogh

8. What’s the most fringe trope/topic you write about

well i havent done it in years. i don't know if it still exists somewhere here on the internet, but there was a donkey x shrek fic, once upon a time......... other than that, my fucles fic from like 2016/2017 whenever that was. so i guess you could say i love taking a Weird Ship(tm) and writing deeply unserious fic about it

9. What is the hardest type of story for you to write?

smut for me too! i have so many wips that include smut scenes that are all stuck right at the smut parts because i can't write it for the life of me. it feels so stiff and choppy and unnatural and too-detailed. but im working on it! :3

10. What is the easiest type?

i love expanding on canon. for example in astoria there's a throw-away comment about mc having what's implied to be a sex dream! so a fic i'm working on is The Dream(tm). i love filling in the missing peices! that, or i love love LOVE writing what-if fics. what if sydney was strigoi and adrian chased after her. what if alya was ladybug and in love with marinette. what if mc replaced a goddess against her will. i like exploring every potentiality and possibility!

11. Where do you do your writing? What platform? When?

in my bed if i'm at home, otherwise wherever i am on my phone. i write in tumblr drafts. terrible habit, i know, but alas. whenever i have the time and motivation lol.

12. What is something you’ve been too nervous/intimidated to write, but would love to write one day?

smut :( it makes me so nervous to write, that's why it's also the hardest one for me 😭 even if i do write a scene out i get too embarrassed to share it or even ask for a friend to read it over.

13. What made you choose your username?

had a few nicknames on deviantart back in the day, among them "megatron" and "raven". at the time i was searching for a new url and one of my friends mashed the two nicknames together to create "megatraven" and that's been my Brand(tm) ever since!

tagging: anyone that wants to do it! :3c