#it'll just take a lot of styling and product to get it ~just right~

[chalk-homunculus]

My cosplay wig is here... I need to style it later this week but it feels like a big step towards actually finishing my cosplay for the con this time. I also got chain for the coat too, and some fabrics I already have in store. I still need some dyes and paints, some fabrics I don't have yet (mostly blue for shirt, faux leather for boots and gold-yellow for the inside of the coat), something to create all the various decorations out of (I don't have a 3D printer, so.) And of course, materials for the sword. I'm thinking everything will be mostly foam (EVA foam type), possibly some cardboard with reinforcements where needed, polymer clay (Fimo) where I need super detailed shapes, or if I can get my hands on it, worbla/similar. We've worked with many of the materials before and so it all should be pretty straightforward, I'm just mildly dreading the actual process of creating everything.

[foodandfolklore]

Tools and Ingredients to keep on hand; Kitchen Witchcraft Elevated Pt. 3

A few more items I'd like to recommend to my kitchen witches. This is going to start getting a little more specific to my own style of cooking and practicing. So if there's anything on this list that makes you go "That's dumb, why would I need that?" then it probably is not for you. Don't go out and get it! But if you think "Huh, that's a good idea" maybe try it out. You can also check out Part 1 and Part 2.

Terracotta Disk Okay let's be real; anyone who's opened brown sugar before knows the struggle of hard sugar. Brown sugar dries out and becomes rock hard. Now, there are lots of solutions that have been presented, but each of them have a new issue. Adding a piece of bread for example. Well now I gotta worry about crumbs, mold and gluten contamination (I'm very mindful of allergies, despite not having any myself). I've also heard of adding a marshmallow to your sugar. I've tried this, but I'm not sure if it's the environment I live in, but it just doesn't work well for me. Plus both feels kind of wasteful. Then I saw a Terracotta disk at the dollarama for about 2 bucks. You soak it in water then drop it in your jar. Boom. Soft brown sugar in a few hours.

Rice Vinegar I know I already suggested vinegar in general, but rice vinegar tends to be more mellow than white vinegar or balsamic vinegar. I like to make a lot of quick pickle stuff like pickled Daikon, Pickled Carrot, or pickled onion. It's also a common ingredient for many Asian sauces and dishes. So if looking up a recipe, it'll often call for Rice Vinegar in some form or fashion. It's also nice to add to plain white rice.

Tortillas Anytime I can find these for cheap in the store, I stock up and throw them in the freezer. Yeah, I can make my own for cheaper, but I've never been 100% happy with how they turn out. They can be too thick, or get a hole, or are not the right size; I dunno. Sometimes I'll make them when in the mood, but mostly I prefer to have them premade. Tortillas, whether made from wheat or corn, have strong solar energies. They also have good protection properties. When you wrap your food in a tortilla, imagine it to be like a protective blanket. It's great for tacos, burritos, fajitas, or just lunch/breakfast wraps in general. But you can also use them non conventionally. When a pizza craving hits, I'll throw some sauce and toppings on a tortilla and bake. Or I may cut the tortilla up into triangles and bake if I need something to go with a hot dip. Monosodium Glutamate Better known as MSG. There has been a lot of misinformation and hate regarding MSG. Starting when Chinese food became popular in North America, but people worried about the quality and cleanliness of food cooked by a foreigner. After all, other countries had different rules about what was considered acceptable when it came to food. So when people were experiencing headaches or stomach aches after eating Chinese take out, they were appalled to find out it was cooked with MSG. MSG was reported to be the cause of these health problems and demonized it. Except.....it was all dog whistling.

I want to be clear: There is NO causation link to MSG having a side effect of pain or stomach problems. What's more likely to have happened is people had an adverse reaction to deep fried food, combined with mass hysteria. MSG is like Salt, Sugar, or Citric Acid. It occurs naturally, and we humans found ways create the product in it's purest form. MSG can be found in all kinds of food like tomatoes, mushrooms, soy, cheese, fish, grapes, and a ton more. Now that doesn't mean you can just eat as much MSG as you want. Like Salt and Sugar, too much over a long period of time can have negative health impacts. But a pinch or two in a dish while cooking is great to help enhance the Umami or savory flavor. MSG also has way less sodium than regular salt. While I don't think it'll replace salt, it can be good to try adding first for flavor if you're trying to reduce your sodium intake.

Cane Sugar There's a lot of different kinds of sugar. Granulated sugar, brown sugar, yellow sugar, icing sugar; most people keep some kind of sugar on hand for baking or sweetening drinks. But I like to keep Cane Sugar on hand as it has a more complex flavor profile. Magically, I find while Cane Sugar sweetens demeanors just like any other sugar, Cane Sugar is able to have people be more...understanding. Instead of finding a new reason to like you or tolerate you, Cane Sugar makes it more likely people sees things your perspective. It makes people more attune to their empathy when engaging with you. If that makes any sense. Oh, and it's my go to for fermented drinks. I actually ran out experimenting with things like ginger beer. Whoops. Scrub Mommy Listen, I hate cleaning. Especially dishes. I chuck as much as I can into the dishwasher, but some things need to be done by hand. So I'm always looking for way to clean them as quickly and easily as possible. But I also don't want to use harsh chemicals or keep buying steel wool that I'll throw away. I saw the Scrub Mommy be used in a lot of videos, so I gave it a try, and holy crap. I bought one for 6 dollars a year ago. I still have it. It doesn't shrink, it doesn't mold; I can toss it in the dishwasher if it needs a clean. And it gets the food off SO easily. I still need to give stuff a soak every once in a while. But most stuff comes right off. Even jars when I'm getting labels off and I got that sticky residue, scrub mommy it with some dish soap. It's gone in like 30 seconds. I still hate doing dishes. But at lest now I can do them without putting every fiber of my being into them.

[captain-n-crunchies]

Pretty girl

Tsubaki x Black Reader ( we a girly girl now!)

F/c= Favorite Color

f/ch= favorite character

s/s= shoe size

" She's a lovely girl, I wish she would see it though."

' Tsubaki, she honestly the prettiest girl I've ever seen! I mean look at how stunning she is! She has pretty hair, cute outfits, and she has the patience of God she's like Anna Hathway! But she never sees it...'

I think this as I boredly stare at the board, Steins trying to dissect some bird again and Maka trying to stop him? I dunno I just twirl my hair and daydream when Patty taps my shoulder.

" Hm? Oh, hey patty girl" I smiled at her.

"Hiiii! Me and Liz, Tsubaki, and Maka was thinking of going to the shops after classes today and I want YOU to come!" She's like honestly like a mind reader or somethings because, I was going to go to like the thrift or the shoe store because I literally have nothing to wear!

" Omg! I legit love you, I'll go! When we leaving" I open my phone and try to set alarm because Death knows I can't keep up with the time when I'm going somewhere. Patty sends me the time and where to me and we talk about random things like does Lord Death know how to do cartwheels, can aliens turn into objects, do animals try to put on clothes? Ok Soul looked at us weird when he heard me say I thought animal testing was animals rating products...

*After Classes, around 2:45 and We in our room in a choas*

" I SWEAR I HATE FASHION SOMETIMES!"

I scream into my pillows, like nothings ever goes right!? I have a denim skirt that I thrifted, and I wanted to pair that with this white halter top but, it dirty and I can't wear it again because I stupidly spilled like red sauce on it! Which is confusing because it's not ketchup so what is it? I dunno so, I try a pink long sleeve but nooo its hotter than ever and I have nothing else to pair it with!

As I flip through the piles and piles of clothes I get a knock on my door, my meister/weapon is out for a family trip, so I answered and there goes pretty girl.

" Hey reader! wanted to come over before our hangout to see you."

Tsubaki tender smile graced her lips, and I smiled back subconsciously. I let her in and I sigh sadly.

" Tsubaki help me pleaseeee, which shirt pink halter with dark denim or yellow thank top and light blue jeans?" I switch the shirts put and down so she can see, and she takes a moment to pick.

" Pink top, it matches the jewelry you have"

" You're a genius!" I squeal and run to change clothes, thank Death I had just my locs in two ponytails (or whatever style you wanna wear). A spritz of perfume or 50 spritz and a twirl in the mirror and I walk out with a strut.

" I look fabulous, I look like coquette icon who Lana Del Ray? I see only Reader Del Slay!" I cockily strut around the room while Tsubaki chuckles and acts like a fan girl.

" Omg! Its reader!? Omg sign my shirt!" We both giggle at that and I grab my keys and we walk out my dorm, its 10 minutes before we supposed to meet up Patty and them so we just walk around campus talking about what we've been up too.

" So, your saying BlackStar had to go to the school nurse because he...fell off a building trying what now?"

" It's honestly still confusing to me" Tsubaki sighs pitifully, and I giggle at that. We walk to the entrance of the DWMA and we see Patty, Liz, and Maka waving at us. We walked down and we headed to our first store; 'Deathly Good Looks' it's like a thrift store but, no granny clothes a lot of vintage items and a bunch of items from the late 80's to mid 2000's. We walk around trying on sunglasses, hats, and purses and I move onto the back of the store looking for anything pink or f/c and fav/ch, as I looked around, I see Tsubaki looking at this dress with wonder..

" Ouu! Thats so pretty, your gonna try it on?"

" Hm, you think I should? I don't know if it'll be as cute on me"

I don't know but when she said that I almost tackled her, WHAT DOES SHE MEAN!? She could pull off a garbage bag and I'll want to wear it!

" What do you mean!? You'll look like a 90's baddie with this! especially if you wear some brown sandals, shades, and have a cute hair style you'll look better than the girl who first owned it!"

Tsubaki blushes at that and I wished I paid more attention to that though; I push her towards the dressing room and tell her to try it on; she takes a few minutes and when she comes out, I couldn't help myself.

" GOOD GOOGGLY MOOGLY WHATS ALLAT BACK THERE!"

I didn't even to say it! But the dress said her body was teaaa and the way she just walked out like she ain't all of us up?? Who does she think is?

" So, it is pretty? I like it" She asks looking in the mirror.

" I'll bite you" I say intense, and she laughed, the girls came over and complemented the dress on her and she changed back; we paid for our items and headed to the shoe store, since the kishin was released we've all had no late-night curfews unless you had a mission or a kishin was around, so we headed to the shoe store quick.

At the store I think I was in heaven honestly from platforms, pumps, flats this store would be bankrupt without me like I'm single handily an unofficial official owner! We look around and I show Maka some sandals that would match this dress she wore to the death anniversary, I saw some Bebe slippers and I went to see what size they we're a perfect s/s! I put them in a mini basket they have and look for more shoes today wasn't that good a lot of sneakers which I should've got if the sandals weren't telling me to buy them! Liz and Patty had like 50 carts of shoes and Tsubaki had a few items, we paid for those items after telling the twins when are they going to wear 'stripper heels'? And we headed to a nice diner close to the school.

We ordered our food I got a tiny burger and fries (if tiny means a sonic burger with a side of large fries and a triple Oreo fudge milkshake then yea girl...tiny) and we sat down and talked and gossiped about the boys, what drama was around, and stuff we've been doing. As we talked and ate, I kept staring at Tsubaki...omg that's sounds so creepy I gotta fid away with words, or is it thoughts since I'm not speaking? I don't know point still stands! But she's so pretty it's hard not too! She caught me a few times and blushed this time I saw and it's so cute I wanna bite her but, that'll be weird.

When we were done, we headed back to the dorms and said our byes, me and Tsubaki headed to her dorm since we were only one level down.

" Hey.. so, a saw you staring at me at the diner, I just wanted to see if you was ok?" ...' I'm not a spy, I'm not smooth, how could she see me I thought my side-eye was perfect! Omg she probably thinks I'm creepy and is gonna hate me!' The thoughts ran quick through my head as I awkwardly smiled and chuckled.

"Oh that! oh it was um..."

" Was what you said at the shop earlier true? Am I pretty?"

I was confused until I thought back to my she's so pretty rant...If I said it out loud then she heard which means she think I like her and I do and she's like me back now we-

" Your speaking out loud again reader"

oH...That's amazing thank youu!

" Oh..act like you've never heard that I'm sorry if it made you uncomfortable! bUT-"

" I like you too reader...a lot actually

" You saying i'm bad? Ok girl thank you!" I say now giggling and twirling my hair, see I knew I gotta all the girls like I'm Nick Cannon with this!

Tsubaki goes on to tell me she didn't think she was as pretty as I made her to but, it broke my poor heart because she so gorgues!

" Tsubaki girl, I can't lie good, nor I can't say if someone is ugly or beautiful because I have my flaws but you! Your like so pretty it hurts! I look at you and your aura and the way you act entranced me, the way you care for your friends all the time you're so tender it makes me blush anytime you have a concern over me! If you don't feel beautiful then I don't know what I am!"

Tsubaki stares at e during my rant with wide eyes and when I was done a tear fell down as she hugged me tight..

" Thank you..Thank you so thinking that reader..."

I hold her and tell it it's all true, we walk to her dorm and she stops.

' So, are we a thing now? It's fine if-"

" So we married now?" we said at the same time, we both laughed at that.

" So..we girlfriends?

" Yea! I guess so!" I said all giggly now, Tsubaki smiled at me and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek as a bye.

" Bye Sweets see you in class"

" Bye bye Prety girl!" I said walking away with a wave.

Pretty girl, My pretty girl

A.N: (I finished! OMG THIS THE CUTEST THING I'VE EVER THOUGHT OF! Like y'all don't know how Patty and her was my soul eater crushes before anyyyy one! But let me know if you like this and I can write more for her because she so bad!

[abandonambition]

Who drew these Capricorns? It's me! I did it. S...Sorry.

HI TUMBLAR. I'm Dana. I draw animals and mythical creatures (mostly capricorns and dragons). I like to reflect on lesser-known or dark aspects of nature, feelings of distress and despair, or creating designs that just look cool for the sake of looking cool. I have a sort of positive nihilist outlook on life, in that I'm rather upset with the general state of things but I still feel compelled to find or create beauty and interest anyway, even if my darker feelings sometimes come out through my work.

"Abandon Ambition" is both grimly serious and darkly humorous. I was raised in both a household and country that emphasized setting lofty goals of acquiring high earnings and impressive assets, but the timing of my pursuit of these things has laughably aligned with global financial crises, global pandemics and lockdowns, and now global heatwaves and global conflicts. Abandon ambition, and instead embrace what you want to say and do and create and build now; Tomorrow is not yours, and your goals may not be waiting for you there.

Be responsible, and be kind. But hope and wait for nothing.

So uh, yeah, I draw a lot of stuff and explore a lot of things that I think I've been holding back on for years for one reason or another. I want to draw dark goats, glowing bats, tempest capricorns, skinny dragons, snarling wolves. So here they are.

Check out what I made!

A lot of my designs find themselves on fun and/or practical merch! I like to create things that are high quality and have a long shelf life: I don't want to make something thinking it'll go in a landfill in a year, I want you wearing and enjoying my work for a very long time.

Here's a hat that glows in the dark!

Wow! Here's another hat that doesn't glow in the dark, but still looks really nice.

Pretty! If keeping your skull cozy isn't your thing, I've printed my art on fabric, too. I like this idea because if you move house a lot and/or can't afford custom frames, art printed on fabric can be displayed anywhere, and folds up nicely when packing up for your next move, without any breaking glass or anything.

A big part of my thinking when I'm designing products is also what do I myself use in my day-to-day life, and lately I've been desperately trying to cut my phone addiction by going back to pen-and-paper planners and books and things instead of using screens. And to keep track of where I am in my planners and books, I've made bookmarks!

I had so much fun designing these. You have something enjoyable to look at on both sides of the page it's clipped on. How fun is that?

Okay lastly, I make a TON of stickers. A lot of my designs translate really well into small, self-contained things like stickers, and I only ever print vinyl stickers, so they live a long time on your laptop or phone case or wherever you wanna put them.

So that's a small collection of the things I've done and made. Do you like them? I hope you like them. I liked designing them.

A COOOUPON JUST FOR YOUUUU

If you'd like one o' these things for yourself, you're in luck!

You, lucky Tumblar user, can visit my shop and take 20% off with code TUMBLR20. This coupon expires 1st April 2024 (or does it...? That's April Fools' Day after all... Okay yeah it does actually expire then. Sorry).

Oh, commissions?

Hey! Sometimes people like my art style and want a custom commission. That's great, and I'm so glad you're interested!

If you'd like a custom ink mailed to you on a postcard that also features my art on the back (so it's like... you get two pieces of art on one postcard), these are exclusive to my Patreon right here. I have limited slots per every month, so check back often in case I'm sold out.

I also offer what I call "instant order" commissions via my Ko-Fi. You pick out one of the offerings I have, send me your ref sheet, pay, and I just...get it done. It's as close to instant as commissions can get.

Besides those, I also do more bespoke work, so you can send me a message to discuss your idea and we'll work something out. :corporatethumbsupemoji:

Honestly? Thanks!

The internet has become a pretty weird and honestly rather hostile place. I'm a solo act that's as indie as they get. So, it really does mean a lot to me when your eyeballs land on my stuff and you click that little heart or reblog icon, or even better when you add it to your cart and click check out. Your eyeballs land on thousands of stuff every day, so the fact that my stuff brought you joy or interest or something deep that you resonated with means a lot to me. I think in a sense it makes me feel like my brush strokes are going somewhere far beyond whatever canvas I've otherwise confined them to.

This is a pinned post to share who I am and help me get some coins to fund my life and art projects, but yeah you can reblog it and share it around planet earth, I don't mind. It's nice.

So yeah, that's me! Feel free to comment if you have questions or want to know whatever else, I'll uh... reply and like answer them and stuff.

[amaiguri]

The WIP Questionaire

Thanks so so much from @verba-writing for the tag! I had such a fun time reading your answers too and I'm very excited for paranormal romance 😍

I feel like I wanna flag that a lot of my answers are very anime/gaming-sphere oriented and I hope I'm not totally alienating my mutuals by revealing just HOW MUCH I'm not a book person lololol But this is with what we're working:

The Questions are:

1. What was the first part of your wip that you created?

The very first thing I made was the high premise: It was synthesized from the Overly Sarcastic Productions question "What if all the Kings Under the Mountain came back...?" and then I added the context "...in a Nuclear Crisis to discuss piece?" And in my head, it was this HBO-style modern fantasy Game of Thrones meets West Wing type deal. But then... I didn't want to write the modern piece. (The modern piece should be written by people in countries from all over Europe about what it means to be a hero in various cultures.)

So I set it in 1800s fantasy world instead!

2. If your story was a TV show, what would the theme song/intro be?

The first arc would be Dance in the Game by Zaq

The second arc would be Lacrimosa by Kalafina

The Gods' Arc would be Paper Boquet by Mili

3. Who are your favourite characters you've made? Why?

Is it to cliché to be like "my current self-insert protagonist is my favorite character I've ever made"? Her and my antagonist are just THE BEST and I love them.

4. What other pieces of media do you think would share a fan base for your story?

Mmm, I think Untitled Yssaia Game's story would appeal to queer Game of Thrones fans who could FEEL the straightness in GoT, especially if they also like anime. I would hope I could get general anime fans as well as Arcane and Genshin Impact fans, but I feel like those are too mainstream and Yssaia is not. Realistically, I think I'm gonna get the Wadanohara people and the Ib people and, if I get really lucky, the To the Moon people.

5. What has been your biggest struggle with your wip?

Marketing lol -- explaining what it is to people in a way that they realize they want it.

6. Are there any animals in your story? Talk about them!

Fuafua 🥺🥺🥺

Look at her! She is a six-legged, six-eyed slug cat called a Maret. Marets fill the same role as ocelots in Yssaia, except they're more semi-aquatic like otters and their skin has a stressball-like texture.

7. How do your characters get around? (ex: trains, horses, cars, dragons, etc.)

They walk or ride Rumateurs (which are alpaca-like beings with ossicones) or take ships or airships or trains. I don't like writing about travel that much though so it is a background element.

8. What part of your wip are you working on rn?

I am pre-editing the first arc for my alpha readers and the third arc has another 50k to 100k words to draft. We're at like 250k words total right now and it is so unwieldy 😭😭😭

9. What aspects (tropes, maybe?) of your wip do you think will draw people in?

Oh, I have a convenient graphic for this. Hang on...

10. What are your hopes for your wip?

I was just diatribing about this earlier but the DREAM is to turn it into an RPGmaker adventure game and have it go viral and make a million bucks off it. I'd love to be the next Undertale but it'll never happen because I am not positioned to be the next Undertale, you know?

So yeah, that's what's what! Thanks again for the ask! This was so fun! I'm gonna pass this to @maiemorrae, @moonfeatherblue, @zebee-nyx, @winterandwords, @modernwritercraft, @words-after-midnight, @spideronthesun, @theprissythumbelina, @thepanplate, @thetruearchmagos, @maskedemerald, @moondust-bard, @pluttskutt and @emelkae 😍😍😍 I actually internalized Verba's WIP so well from this tag and I wanna make sure I'm updated on what all you cool people are working on! Open tag to any of my other moots too! 🥳

IMPORTANTTTTT⚠️

I will edit this to have a blank easily copy-and-pasteable question section when I get back to my computer. If I forget, @ me!

[ghostinthegallery]

Nearly all of my writing projects require a fight/battle scene right now...

I am not in the mood to write a fight/battle scene...

I know! I'll write about fight/battle scenes instead!! That's productive, right?

Truth be told, in general I do love writing action. One-on-one, small scale fights, huge battles. I love it! The movement, the drama, the tension and release of it all. But I do hear some people struggle with it, so here is my approach. Maybe it'll be helpful.

Golden rule: writing a fight scene is just like writing a sex scene. It is physical and emotional. The action should build on and be based around the characters. And it is very important to keep track of how many limbs everyone has and what they are doing.

I am lucky to have experience as a fencer, some martial arts, I've shot firearms, and I am a general history nerd. It is very helpful to have a baseline understanding of how weapons are used and how they feel. But with the internet this information is easily acquired! Go to youtube, search for the weapons your characters are using (or the closest equivalent for magic/scifi weaponry) and watch people fight. SCA and historical fencing tournaments are great for this. Trust me, weapon nerds love explaining how their stuff works.

Now, the main thing to remember when writing action is that you are balancing believability with entertainment. Note I say believability and not realism. Because in reality, most fights are short, brutal, and not fun to watch. This is not our goal as writers. However, you want your audience to believe the action on some level, so I like to go in vaguely knowing the most grounded version of how a fight would go, and then building off of that to make it actually fun.

Okay, that's all the background but what about the actual writing? At its core, an action scene is no different from any other type of scene. Your character has a goal and they are taking steps to achieve it. So in the fight, what is your character's goal? Don't just pick "survival". Get more specific. How are they going to survive? Escape? Kill their opponent? Disable them? Or is their goal something different, like holding an enemy back or reaching a destination? Protecting someone or something? Once you know that, it is much easier to come up with the beats of a fight because that goal will determine the actions your characters take.

This also works for large scale battle scenes. In fact, I would say a clearly defined goal is even more important in that context! Otherwise the audience will get lost in all the moving parts. Star Wars, great example: the final battle against the Death Star gives everyone the explicit goal of firing torpedoes into the vent before the DS blows up the rebel base. Simple, easy to to follow, orients the audience so we know what they heck is going on.

Make the stakes clear. What will happen if your protags win the fight? What will happen if they lose? Usually this is easier in smaller encounters (life or death, losing mcguffins). But battles have stakes too. Will a lot of people die if the enemy takes a city (Lord of the Rings, Helms Deep great example). Will your character be shamed if they lose? Do they have something to gain in victory? Or are they a soldier on the front lines just trying to find a way to stay alive? If the goal and stakes are clear, it is much easier to make your audience care about the outcome of whatever you have set up.

As for the actions your characters will take and how to write them? That is where you draw on your research plus your knowledge of the characters. Are they bold and reckless? Cautious? Write their fighting style accordingly.

When I write, I try to vary up action with reaction. A character lunges with their sword, describe the physicality of that. Describe how they feel when their sword is parried or their opponent leaps out of range. Describe the counterattack, then how your character reacts. Use these moments of outward action and internal reaction to set the pace of the fight.

Short sentences mean faster pacing. More frenetic. Faster, desperate. They build tension. Whereas longer sentences will slow things down and give the reader a chance to breathe and absorb what has just happened. You will use both, but use them deliberately.

Mastering the pacing of an action scene takes practice, like everything else, but you will start to get a feel for things after a while!

Battles can be harder because most of us are not generals schooled in military tactics, so they seem quite intimidating. However, most battles come down to two things:

do not get flanked

do not break formation

If the enemy surrounds you? Bad. If the enemy messes up the formation of your army? Bad. All battles pretty much come down to that. The rest is just flavor based on your setting and what people have access to in order to inflict violence on people they do not like.

(One trick I enjoy is to find major historical battles and just...copy them. Trust me, nobody will know ;))

Do not forget the environment in which the battle or fight is taking place! It is vitally important (and will give you things to write about besides just punches/blows or whatever). Watch the John Wick movies for super good examples of this for fight scenes. And remember, clever use of terrain has changed the course of history (*cough* Agincourt *cough*) so do not neglect it!

That is pretty much it! Feel free to ask me questions, I love talking about this (and procrastinating. what? who said that?).

[merelymatt]

To get my upcoming audio drama I Need A Miracle off the page and into the airwaves, I decided against the indie production scramble where everyone donates their time, and against crowdfunding – and instead I basically sent the scripts to @wirelesstheatre and said "What'll it cost to make this happen?", then compared that number to my savings and said "Ok, let's do this".

(It was obviously more businesslike than that, but that was the basic maths of it on my side.)

Here's why I didn't do it those other ways this time:

Why not the indie production scramble?

Scraping it together on a shoestring. Buttonholing friends to perform, using whatever recording equipment I already have to hand, doing as much of the production as possible myself and begging favours for the parts I can't.

In some ways this would have been the easiest option. It doesn't rely on anyone else's approval, or involve putting any new infrastructure together.

But! For me, for I Need A Miracle specifically, this was the option of absolute last resort, for various reasons.

First and foremost, I already have one podcast (@merelyroleplayers) that I run on this basis. I already ask a lot of my friends to perform on that show for nothing, on the promise it'll be fun and I'll buy everyone a pint afterwards. I think you only get one of those, or you should only get one. If you run every project like this, especially if you're calling on the same people each time, it starts getting exploitative.

Second, I'm trying not to exploit myself either, by which I mean, I've put work into writing this series (admittedly on spec), I think it's worthwhile, and I'd like to see if I can make some money in return for that work. And if one person involved in a project is getting paid, everyone should be getting paid.

Why not crowdfund?

There are sub-options within this option: subscriptions and patronage-style funding (like Patreon, Ko-Fi or Gumroad) and up-front project-based funding (like Kickstarter, Indiegogo or Seed & Spark).

I actually have been weighing up the idea of a Patreon or Ko-Fi for a while, not for I Need A Miracle specifically, but for @foggyoutline in general. At the beginning it would effectively be a Merely Roleplayers subscription, because that's currently the only Foggy Outline show. But if enough people pay a bit a month for bonuses like uncut episodes, that could help fund new projects like I Need A Miracle, which could bring in more listeners and more patrons, whose contributions could help fund the next thing, and so on.

But the problem I would have with any kind of crowdfunding model is, right now I'm only pulling a small crowd! I'm an unknown writer, Foggy Outline is an unknown player at least in audio drama. And it seems like to succeed with a crowdfunding campaign, you really need your audience already built and poised to give you money.

If I Need A Miracle takes off and finds its audience, the kudos off that might make crowdfunding an option for the next thing. But I just wasn't confident it would succeed for this show, at least without a load of spend on a consultant and advertising (which then eats into the campaign proceeds).

So go on then, where is the money actually coming from

Me! Supplemented by my Foggy Outline business partners, who are also my Mum and Dad. But the majority of the production costs for I Need A Miracle are coming out of my savings.

This is one of the reasons I prioritised I Need A Miracle over other audio drama projects I'm working on: because it's simple enough that I felt confident I could cover the costs myself if I needed to. There's no dialogue (only monologues), so it's not a complex edit. Most of the episodes take place in one location, with little action beyond the character speaking, so it doesn't call for elaborate sound design. All the episodes are under 20 minutes. For a more complicated production, I would have had to bring in some funding from somewhere, or convinced a producer to take on the production costs themselves. This one was, to some extent, designed (by me) to be more affordable.

It's worth saying that getting started wasn't just a case of getting a quote from Wireless and agreeing to pay it. Producer Sarah Golding read the scripts and wouldn't have taken on the project if she didn't think it was worthwhile. So it's not pure pay-for-play.

So the plan now is:

Sell ads and subscriptions and see how much of the production cost I can get back that way after the fact (I expect not all of it, but that's ok, because...)

Also think of that money I've spent as an investment in both this and future projects – by spending money on an amazing production company that's making the show brilliant, I'm getting something that's hopefully going to make this whole process easier next time. Because next time I can point to Wireless' confidence in my writing, and the quality of I Need A Miracle, (and hopefully its success and acclaim and awards and all its fans), to get someone else to put their hand in their pocket instead, whether that's listeners, producers or sponsors.

[fourseasonsfigs]

Building Block Figs - Catching Light

Continuing on from the last Building Block Figs - Basking in the Sun and Building Block Figs - Beautiful Fight Scene in the Middle of the Lake, Part 1 and Part 2, we have this wonderful set.

These figs make me laugh - I love them so much! I don't know why, I just find them ridiculously charming.

This building block set is 1,544 pieces, measures 8.4 x 17.6 x 15.6 cm, and is rated 10 hours. I did indeed take all 10 hours to build this, if not a little bit more.

Here is the sales pic of what the finished product is supposed to look like:

Cute, isn't it? As usual, sellers do a much better job of setting the scene than I do. I will say, though, that I did make two little tweaks to the set to make it a bit more canon compliant. Can you spot them?

It'll be easier to tell as we get better pictures, so I'll get into it!

First, here's the box of doom bricks. Like the others, this came in a generic sales box, with a super handy little unsnapping tool, and a sticker with a black and white image of the set and QR code instructions.

Once again, you'll notice my line up of extra bricks from the previous sets hanging out in quasi-neat little rows. Originally I figured I'll leave them all out in case I ran short of any, but in reality, this set maker gives me extras of each color every time. Which is handy, as you will see for later posts, when I make some adjustments to the fig sets to make them a bit more canon compliant.

As you can see, there's a LOT of extra bricks left over. To be honest, there shouldn't be so many white bricks - those are from another set that I made a major change to. I'll post about that one tomorrow.

Here's the different order of assembly - I went ahead and started with the base and tree, as they suggest.

As you can see, this is a very beautiful terrain here. I did not remember this area being so green and flowery from the show - in fact, I remember it being kind of sandy and desolate, but my memory is pretty lousy, there might be a scattered flower or so. Let's check.

HUH. There is not a flower in sight, is there. Hmmm. Well, this is kind of gonna bother me. Maybe I should have looked up the inspiration before putting together the entire 10 hour plus set, huh! Well, the little flowers are easy enough to lever off.

Hmm, anyway, moving on (for now).

So a couple things here. First, as you can see, there are only two green colors. I mean, one normal color really - the light green here is actually a neon green. It's brighter than it looks here. It looks great here, don't get me wrong, but now all I can see is the very sandy terrain of that screenshot.

Second, I tried something a little different here. It actually takes a long time to sort all the individual bricks, so in an attempt to shave off some time, I decided to experiment with this set. As you can see, I dumped the entire bag out to the right and am just picking out individual pieces as I go.

You'll note it's now evening. This tree took a LONG time to build. I actually timed myself up to this point, and to get to this mostly-done state took 2 hours and 58 minutes. I was pushing hard, too, because I really, really wanted to get the whole tree done that evening before I went to bed. But there was no way. I was too tired and was hitting the point where it was less fun and more work. So, despite really not wanting to, I summoned my inner adult and called it a day here.

Fast forward through time to the next day, and I'm all bright eyed and ready to bust this tree out. And it's done! I like this tree a whole lot...I think they did a beautiful job modeling it. Imagine if they had the full Lego suite of colors and special pieces! It would be really something. I kind of like it this way though (although I would take more colors, I can't lie). It really has an old-school style charm.

You can see the grey rock there where Lao Wen will be propped up against. And of course, the cheerful greenery and pink and yellow flowers.

Feeling VERY accomplished, I put the tree aside, and moved on to A-Xu.

Yep, looks pretty good. I was a little surprised they picked the medium blue color instead of the dark blue color, considering how bright the dark blue color actually is. But this looks fine too.

I am going to proudly say that I did, in fact, knock this fig out in record time. I've put together two and a half A-Xu figs by now (the half is going to be explained tomorrow, I promise!), so this third one went like a breeze.

As you can see in the back, I couldn't help myself, I was starting to make a few little piles of the colors I was working on. The big messy pile of bricks was kind of a pain, and I had to keep resisting the urge to sort them out.

And here he is! All done. He has a very solemn no-expression on his little brick face, which is appropriate. Can you see how there's a little bit of a neck (nothing too saucy or anything), the thin white layer of his under-robe, and then the lighter blue layer? I love it. Very charming. We also have his black belt with a bit of the tails.

It was yet another evening by this time, but since I did manage to finish him before I went to bed, I did indeed sleep the sleep of the righteous.

I woke up even brighter eyed and with pep in my step, ready to rock this last fig out. 10 hour assembly time? I don't think so!

I had now made three Wen Kexing brick figures, so the fourth one was gonna be just as quick as A-Xu was, no doubt. I pulled up the instructions on my phone, and got ready to go. 95 steps for our battle-weary Valley Master, huh? Huh. That's kind of a lot. But considering A-Xu was 85, not too bad. The tree was 119, by the way.

As I looked at the picture, however, I noticed that they had Lao Wen's (virtually) omnipresent hair wispies here. Given that this red wedding costume is the one outfit where his hair is pulled back all the way, it kind of bugged me. Which is funny because I've never liked how he doesn't have the wispies with this hair style on the show. It's my least favorite look on him, which is too bad, because I did like how they at least mixed his hairstyles up some. In my defense, I feel like I'm right (so right!) about how much better he looks with the wispies with this hair style, because you could see it at the concert. And he looked spectacular.

Anyway. Warring between my extreme desire for him to have the wispies and the simple fact of it not being canon, I started to build.

I got the first big chunk done very quickly indeed. Many of these figs are done where you do a big piece, and then set it aside while you work separately on the next piece. This is where I was.

And that's where I stayed, for a long time. I built this piece three times. I had to completely disassemble the entire thing the first time I built it, because I was off on my brick count, and the second time I had to disassemble it down to the first third.

Part of the problem was the way the directions were. As you can see, they still have the first "set it aside" part showing up on the directions directly under the new piece. Unfortunately, all that red blended into each other when I rotated the image around, and it was very easy to accidentally think I needed more or less pieces than I actually did.

I went ahead and built it with the wispies, as directed...and then just couldn't do it. I disassembled half the head and re-built it again without them. I also think that this fig, just like Lao Wen, does not look as good without them, but canon is canon.

Unfortunately, it was so late and I was so tired by the time I finished him (and yet also pretty jubilant), that I forgot to take a pic of the finished fig! Yes, I literally finished this set late last night, despite my best intentions of finishing it up and then triumphantly posting about it on the same day. It did, in fact, take longer than the 10 hours build time.

It took a long time, in general. My finger tips have actually toughened up a bit, so they don't feel sore from snapping the bricks in place, but my neck isn't all that pleased with me from hunching over these various sets for so long. So, I've been taking a few more breaks to stretch and do other things.

But, I woke up early today, and very happily took this set's beauty pics in the clear light of the morning. I love it!

I love how this set all fits together. We have the tree growing over the edge of the base, and Lao Wen there leaning up against the rock. A-Xu is standing with his elegant posture, and their little brick hands are reaching out to each other. Cute cute cute!

Wow, this light is great. I clearly should get up early to take fig pics more often.

The tree looks great, I think (and not just because I spent hours building it!).

This is a good view of the rocks behind Lao Wen here, and his big ponytail (I do like this part of his hairstyle).

The green doesn't look so bad on the ground, I think. I'll pull off the yellow and pink flowers, and maybe make a brown patch on the corner closest to A-Xu. That'll keep it colorful but make it a bit more like the show.

A-Xu's hair looks great, as usual. You can also see how I removed the wispies on Lao Wen's hair. I'll get a close up later so you can see it better.

Shoot, not my best pic - can't really see any of the detail on A-Xu's glorious night-black hair.

There we go, now you can. Oops, I see I knocked a tiny piece out of kilter on the bottom of his hair, I'll have to fix that. But! Here you can see both changes I made from the instructions - the lack of wispies of course, and then I made Lao Wen's guan gold instead of white. This took a while too, because I didn't have enough yellow pieces. The only yellow I had from any of the sets was literally from the yellow flowers here and the few extra they gave me of it. I actually pulled a few yellow flowers off the base there and replaced them with green or pink, just because I needed them for his guan. I then also carefully checked to see what internal yellow bricks were covered up by the black of his hair, and replaced them with black so I could save the yellow ones for the parts that did show. I'm very happy with how it turned out! It looks just like the white one, except, you know, yellow.

I don't know why they didn't originally design it with yellow, given that it is gold on the show, and they had already included yellow bricks with this kit. Maybe they felt the white stood out more or something. Anyway, it was bothering me it was white, so I'm glad I was able to figure out a way to make it work.

Alright, we're back around! And a bit of a different angle here, so you can see the poses a little bit more clearly.

Alright, a true top-down pic here. May I just say one more time how much I like this tree! The detail in A-Xu's guan is really nice too.

The bottoms-up pics are always tough here with the bases. Not a flattering picture, sorry A-Xu!

A close up of our noble shixiong with his little hand outstretched...

...and our weary shidi. What a great set, I love it! I'm so delighted by it, I can't even tell you.

Alright! come back tomorrow, for the much hinted at next set. And the last one, for a while - I have to wait for the remaining sets to be sent to me.

(Come back tomorrow, she says, as she still has some assembly on the last fig to do! I'll wake up bright and early tomorrow, and hopefully finish up).

Material: Plastic bricks

Fig Count: 506

Scene Count: 35

Rating: They're actually both reaching for their light

[link to the Master Post Index]

[froguemorgue]

[phases through your screen]

i want to pick your brain about hamilton and religion because like everything about this man it kept changing, but maybe that's just the human condition.

we know he met a dr knox but that was an entirely educational occupation. we know the storm absolutely shook him to the core but that's mortal to the core. i feel like as all men, as all people, the moment he needn't have to depend on the faith for a divine and merciful father he just let it push back. and it seems?? sort of?? that society itself was still holding onto the enlightenment era aye? which is funny because there also seems to be some sort of religious upheaval through different denominations (of protestantism) in America. and then we have the constitution which didn't even bother thinking about Christianity in explicit terms. it seems to be a gotcha but back then i feel like it was more of an obviously it'll be this, how could it possibly change thing benjamin franklin DID try to have a prayer to guide them towards a more harmonious and productive convention only to be rejected because they couldn't afford a chaplain. which, i didn't know protestantism had fun stuff like chaplains, we just have Brother (in Christ) and Sister (in Christ) and then if you're good and of binary genrder you graduate to Pastor (and ascend onwards to Chief Pastor, i believe) and Mother (and Senior Sister, and then ur seniority depends on the seniority of your faith home) ANYWAYS again we know after philip's death he was a lot more religious, he at least read the sermons even if he didn't attend church regularly ish? and he begged to be buried in trinity church (i thought he would get into the dutch reformation church? after marrying eliza?) and yeah so that's just

this is just how a man would deal with religion i guess. but faith seems different. and its funny/sad how hamilton who never could depend on others never has much speaking about his faith either. and i have to consider all this when he has someone he's close with like oc who's a faithful man. who's self-styled to be a sort of man of god, with divinely granted foreknowledge. primarily, i feel like hamilton would have been a lot tenser about getting entangled with laurens, if we assume that they had a steady, fairly sweet relationship

A lot of what I'm about to reply totally echoes what you've already stated, but I'm gonna yap anyway. tl;dr, hamilton's religion may have been comforting to him but I don't think they were rigid moral lessons that he practiced, even later in life, except as performance or to further comfort himself. sad, little faith in him as a person? maybe, idk. sorry

If I'm being so honest, I think Hamilton's religiousness later in life was due in part to environment + age (his wife and her family, the slowing of youthful ambition and perceived hubris associated with questioning social standards, religion, life as one tries to find themselves in their teens and 20s) but also performance. Maybe it's his upbringing, but I just don't see him as a religious man so much as a man surrounded by religion. (My reply to this submission has taken sooo long because I'm having trouble organizing my thoughts on it, which are certainly not objective, I'm not citing any sources here so take anything I write with a grain of salt, and my opinion on the characterization of Hamilton's later-life religion is definitely influenced by my own experience with Protestant Christianity in the U.S.).

Okay, so everyone's religious. Not everyone, but most everyone, even prominent men who subscribed to science and philosophy and would consider themselves a different sect of Christian, even if that veered into the territory of agnosticism. Colonials and the countries from which they came accepted at this time that there is a Creator and the big question during Hamilton's young life was whether the Creator had given kings and queens the right to rule over everyone else. Politics, always politics. So even if Hamilton was more agnostic as many youths are as they struggle to learn more about the world, their opinions, and to find their place within society, he's not going to go around being Godless. I think his religiousness later in his life was impacted by the fact that it was the philosophy most (colonizers) people subscribed to in some way or another, from England to France to Spain. (I'd like to add also that even if his mother ((or his mother's ex-husband Johann Lavien)) was potentially Jewish which is potentially the reason he'd have a Jewish tutor and know how to cite the Torah in Hebrew, any learning in Judaism, Hebrew, or the Torah does not necessitate him being Jewish because Christianity is rooted in Judaism. That's a whole other thing and I imagine learning about Judaism would make him a better-rounded individual and more knowledgeable in religion and it's interesting to portray him/take liberties with this information in fiction).

So Hamilton's getting older and more sure of his beliefs, performing also for his political agenda, and he is now a part of a Christian family with a reputation, so of course he's going to value religion in public. He has a moral responsibility to raise his children that way, to attend services himself. History, science, philosophy, politics, economics, literature, math, it was all taught through the lens of religion.

I also think there is a degree of tranquility and comfort he was finding in religion, in going to church like a meditation, in quiet, and in his final moments, hoping his life meant something, afraid to die and hoping everything he believed in his faith was true, that there isn't just nothing, that in a way, he'd live on. It's frightening to know for hours that you are going to die, to have a child who died just a few years prior, and to have that time to reflect on your life? No wonder he sought the comfort of religion. He was still a young guy, he had kids, his wife, I'm sure he wasn't nearly ready. But you know how he's characterized most often... a frightened and ambitious man running on a timer for his whole life, unsatisfied and feeling nothing was ever enough. Maybe that's another reason he sought religion. It might have felt peaceful and good.

As for his relationship with Laurens... this is conjecture until I shovel some true sources to back this statement, but I think he didn't care. I think, especially when he was young, he did feel that he had the impunity to love who he loved or have intimate physical relationships outside of marriage and that that couldn't be wrong. His teenage poetry (objection, your honor, my client was just a celibate horndog) and his reputation indicated he might have been having physical relations before ever marrying, which was improper but not as entirely inappropriate for a man as it was a woman (people didn't like this anyway). If his letters to Laurens were any indication, he didn't write anything that would give a negative connotation to their relationship, meanwhile he chided Laurens for apparently thinking a "cure" was necessary (say the word "cure" and the historical lams/amrev tumblrstorians go bonkers. that sentence was crazy. both exciting as a piece of evidence and... completely heart-breaking). I think John had a great deal of guilt and shame, I mean, he just seemed to be full of that at least starting in his late teens... probably around the time he realized the attraction to men vs. how completely unacceptable that was in most contexts. then his many mistakes in his early 20s before joining the war, i mean. poor guy.

Hamilton? I do NOT think he was like that at all. I think he could understand it, but he probably didn't feel it in the same capacity and for that reason. Hating yourself because you feel like you'll never be good enough? He and Laurens had that in common. Hating same-sex attraction, sex, and romance? No way. He seemed to know that part of himself well and besides marrying for the long list of reasons he had to do so, I don't think he would ever let religion get in the way of how deeply he felt and desired love. Love of God would bring him closer to Elizabeth and their children. Love of God would not negate his relationship with Laurens. Also to tack on, it was not for a lack of God or religion that he told Laurens that straight marriage ≠ cure. I would imagine that his relationships with men, emotional and physical and anything else, were separate from what he considered to be his marital duties.

[mr-butt-youtube]

AI will be a slave to capitalism just like everyone else

People in software talk a lot about AI "alignment." The idea is that, when creating an algorithm that self-learns, you need some kind of test so that the algorithm can know what behavior is desirable and what behavior is undesirable. The whole point of alignment is to make sure that these algorithms have a good test in place that "aligns" with our values.

A classic example is The Stamp Collecting Device. Imagine an algorithm that can send any kind of data over the internet, that optimizes itself and changes the data that it sends in order to collect stamps. The test is simple: more stamps = better. This could start off benign, sending in bids for stamps on eBay or something. But before long, the algorithm might start sending emails to other human stamp collectors, and gets them to mail it their stamps. Maybe it hacks people's computers, encrypts their data, and refuses to unencrypt it until it receives stamps in the mail. Maybe it hacks the nuclear codes, and threatens to blow up the entire world unless the president sends it all the stamps that the USPS can produce!

The problem with this example is that it misses the fact that all of the useful AI models today are created by massive corporations, or at least by non-profits connected to massive corporations. Either way, AI will be created and used for one reason and one reason only: to make a profit. And collecting all the stamps in the world would not be profitable.

So while incel software engineers worry about their bots taking over the world terminator style, actual scammers *right now* use AI to mimic people's voices over the phone, generate fake product reviews, or send out massive numbers of spam emails. While Joe Schmoe worries about AI taking his job, marketing teams are already trying to figure out how they can AI-generate personalized advertisements that will perfectly target every individual who sees them, and optimize (exclusively) for click-through rate.

I have no idea what kinds of impacts AI will have on the world, if I had to guess I'd say it'll be a bit of a mixed bag. But I can say for certain that whatever problems AI does create will just be normal capitalism/society problems, like the ones we already have, not anything massively ground-breaking or society destroying.

[glasshalftrue]

as both an artist and a programmer (though not one working in machine learning so i won't claim anything close to expertise), the anti-ai takes i see from artists are really frustrating to me. the two most common criticisms i see about it are that it's 1. stealing 2. not art regarding the first point, it's clear that most artists don't understand the general technology behind it at all. they constantly claim that it does stuff like just collage different parts of images together, when that's very much not what it's doing! the process that neural nets use is incredibly complex and it's much more about pattern matching than storing and replicating exact sets of pixels. i definitely don't like it when ai artists specifically target an artist who voices their discomfort with having their art being used that way, if only because it's simply mean and rude, but unfortunately, i can't say that i'd consider it plagiarism. and for the people who want stronger copyright laws to protect artists' rights: believe me, it will not at all be helpful to "the little guy" like you think it will. regarding the second point, it seems like there's a couple things going on. one part of the critique seems to come from the quality of the art itself, which is an obviously losing battle. remember a year ago, when people were making fun of how bad ai was at generating hands? they seem to have pretty much solved that now, and whatever little nitpick you might be able to point out next, it's almost certain they'll eventually figure out that one too. i see a lot of tips floating around about how to tell if a piece of art is ai-generated, and while the tips usually do work well, the fact that the people need to use these increasingly specialized perceptive skills makes it pretty clear that it's becoming more and more indistinguishable. i've seen plenty of cases at this point of real artists having their work being accused of being ai-generated, which to me seems like the logical conclusion of people's assumptions that they can always tell when something is real or not, and i think it's only going to get worse and worse. the other part of the critique is about the artist's intent, an appeal to some illusory idea of "the soul", which seem like transparently bad arguments to me, and are clearly motivated from an emotional-driven place. because it seems so obvious to me that prompters do, in fact, have an intent when they're generating ai art, some sort of vision of what they want to create. it doesn't matter that their idea is vaguely defined rather than fully-formed in their head; plenty of existing art forms involve a creation process that is similarly stochastic, from Jackson Pollock-style drip paintings to experimental generative digital music. hell, even when i draw i often don't know exactly what i want to the end product to look like and figure it out as i go along! now, the incredibly low-barrier to entry and the general motivations and sensibilities of a lot of typical ai art enthusiasts mean that, in practice, a lot of (maybe most) ai art is indeed dumb garbage. but just like how the reality that most mainstream superhero movies these days are boring and soulless doesn't mean that the superhero genre is inherently without merit, the existence of bad ai art isn't good evidence of the medium itself being creatively bankrupt.

ultimately, i do agree and sympathize with a lot of artists' concerns and criticisms about ai art and what its possible effects on the world will be. like i said, in practice a lot of ai art really is soulless trash, but the ease of creation means that i can very easily see a world where most of the art we see today in our everyday lives is replaced with bland, insipid ai generated shit that is just good enough for the general public, and i really don't want to live in that world. and for that same reason, it'll also likely have a very bad impact on the art industry and people's abilities to do art as a career, and while the disruption of industries due to technological innovation is a tale as old as time, the potentially rapid pace of this disruption will certainly lead to a lot of suffering along the way. i just wish that artists had a better idea of what they're actually fighting against.

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

2D Purists, Cut It Out

Once again, I'm seeing people get all ornery over the latest look at WISH, the new feature from Walt Disney Animation Studios that marries their post-TANGLED house style and aesthetic to a more watercolor-based look. Once again, people are grousing that it doesn't look as good as the 2012 short PAPERMAN, and others are grousing that it just isn't 2D, period. I feel like the artists and film crew behind WISH are getting a lot of flack, especially on the heels of the recent Writer's Strike coming to an end. Not a good look, if you ask me.

I've gone over it many times before, I'm farggin' exhausted. Walt Disney Animation Studios, as they stand, are likely lucky to even be making films, let alone make it to 100 years of existence. It's the bedrock of the entire company: No Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, no Walt Disney Company. It seems as if it's alive by virtue of that alone... They were on the chopping block multiple times in the post-Walt span of 67 years, as recent as 2006, believe it or not! Each movie has to do well in some way in order to justify to the heads that they're a building worth investing hundreds of millions of $$$ into. When reliable hitmaker Pixar is right next door, too. Remember, Disney purged a long list of animation studios/partners: Blue Sky Studios, Disneytoon Studios, several arms of the animation studio, Skellington Productions, etc. etc. So, I'm just going to take what I can get. I'm sure I'll find something of merit, both visually and storytelling-wise, in WISH. The recent trailer, I thought, was a bit of alright. Nothing too fancy to me, but it looks like it'll be a fun time nonetheless. I haven't been wowed upside-and-down by a WDAS feature in ages, but that's a me thing. WDAS is doing THEIR thing, and I guess it's not entirely for me. That's OK! Clearly it's working on someone else... Note ENCANTO, RAYA, and even STRANGE WORLD's sheer success as streaming titles, ditto slightly older movies like the FROZENs and MOANA.

But I think some people should understand that in animation, on one half of the playing field, it's not about the art unfortunately. It's called the animation INDUSTRY for a reason.

I get it. We miss the halcyon days of Disney making a new, gorgeous, splendorifously animated feature using pencil and paper, and post-1989, a lot of digital aid. I get that. I'm a 1992 baby, that era was my era, my jam. THE LION KING alone is one of my **formative** films. It's why I write stories and make comics and would LOOOOVE to turn them into animated movies. I was a preteen during the BROTHER BEAR/HOME ON THE RANGE days when it was all fading away, and I watched - as a late teen/young adult - the studio try to make it a thing again, only to blow it.

It's because it was never about the method, the technique, or anything.

To the artists and filmmakers, it absolutely was! No denying that.

To the bean counters? NO. It's product to them, builds the bottom line, fills the pockets, etc.

That's how it's been in the post-Walt age, post-Golden Age, whatever. Steve Hulett, who worked at Disney Animation circa 1976-86, summed it up once: "These are studios. Not Renaissance art factories."

It makes me think of how a lot of classical art was commissioned by merchants, it was largely glorified fanart of Biblical scenes, but the artists who made those works put their ALL into them. Much in the same way the filmmakers put their all into [name any Disney/big studio 2D animated movie made from 1990 to 2004].

In order words, they more than understood the assignment, no matter how flawed the picture might've been on a writing level. (Like say, POCAHONTAS, an utterly gorgeous movie that the filmmakers clearly went HARD during its production.)

There are so many 2D movies made around the world or independently. I recently saw Disney and Pixar veteran Jim Capobianco's THE INVENTOR, a half Rankin/Bass-style stop-motion half European-like 2D film, in a theater! All by myself, may I add. 10 years in the making, a personal labor of love of his own.

Are these complainers *ever* there for those types of films? I thought so.

Where am I going with this? Ah yeah, that's a big reason why 2D was shuffled out of the question by executives. CGI was huge in the early 2000s, and it seemed that even the least-liked features (note SHARK TALE and CHICKEN LITTLE's critical reception) could outgross or out-success the most beloved 2D features of that period. Both of those movies outgrossed LILO & STITCH, for context...

Now, couple that with CGI being less of a hassle in certain ways. Suppose a big change is made to a movie well into production, and scenes have already been animated. Shaded and lit, even. Well, the sets and character models are still there, so the worst they have to do is shoot a scene from a different angle and reanimate their digital puppets. In 2D? New background to draw and paint, gotta redraw and reanimate the characters AGAIN and keep them ON MODEL- ahhhhh! You can see why CG is preferred in this instance. Perfect for a pipeline of movies that can't be disrupted.

So to bean counters and execs, it was only about getting movies made and them making money. In the early 1990s, CG wasn't at a place where it could sustain a feature-length film, so big-time animated movies were done in 2D almost exclusively. And it just so happens... The animators at studios like Disney, like DreamWorks, like Fox Animation, like Kroyer Films, like Warner Animation, etc... The makers of all your faves from HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME to THE IRON GIANT to THE ROAD TO EL DORADO to ATLANTIS, etc. The filmmakers got the assignment. That assignment being "Make big family film that's sure to be big franchise and McDonald's Happy Meal hit". They took that assignment, and WENT HARD. They didn't have to, but they did anyways. They gave us the coolest damn 2D animation we could've asked for, no matter the writing or the finished movie and how it would fare with critics/audiences. And even the writing, it's like, they did what they felt was right - even if it didn't register for critics nor get audiences interested.

So, again, it was all assignments, and 2D was pretty much the only method they could use. Stop-motion was reserved for the likes of NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS and CHICKEN RUN, more off-beat projects. There was never a stop-mo wave. LAIKA literally runs off of commercials and shoe money, the exploits of a nepo baby. So, it was mainly 2D til TOY STORY came along. TOY STORY came out in fall 1995, and once you started seeing films like ANTZ, A BUG'S LIFE, TOY STORY 2, SHREK, etc. That was it. And these developments coincided with audiences choosing the 2D animated movies they wanted to see, and avoiding the rest... And also them getting so wowed by CGI, while seeing 2D as same-old same-old. Capitalism then cemented 2D features' fate, unless it's based on a TV show, like SPONGEBOB or MY LITTLE PONY. It didn't matter that the CGI wow factor was a fad, and that by the end of the 2000s, audiences didn't flock to see *every* CG movie on the block. CGI was the way, and that was that about that. Because it's about getting the thing made and released without the special challenges a 2D movie presents.

Only FIXED is the anomaly right now, which Sony Animation was willing to take a chance on. It is still unknown if it hits theaters or streaming. If it's the former, this is... I think the first 2D animated **theatrical** movie from a mainstream animation studio that's *not* based on a TV show in ages. Like, since... What? WINNIE THE POOH? (Which is based more on the classic Disney shorts/feature than any of the TV show iterations of the character.) THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG?

You can never guess what audiences will flock to see. If you randomly threw a solid 2D feature out in, say, 2027... It could be big, it could flop hard. But the studios, the industry, they're unwilling to chance that. Thus they aren't, and will not. Quality doesn't matter, because you could throw a **great** 2D movie out, and it could still flop just because... If FIXED does well, I don't know what it means. Could move a needle, maybe not. I kinda don't care, because capitalism is an unmovable object. I don't have a crystal ball, and I can't say for sure what could happen. I guess you could say I'm "Will 2D Come Back" Agnostic. I don't deny it, but I don't think it'll for sure happen. I DO NOT KNOW, haha.

The mass refusal to make 2D animated features in mainstream theatrical feature animation (not streaming, mind you, as we did get KLAUS, WOLFWALKERS, and MY FATHER'S DRAGON from some of the high-end services) was so firm, so absolute, that the idea of traditional animation might as well been tax write-off'ed and Men In Black-erased from our minds. That's how FIRM these companies were in getting rid of it, that's how FIRM they are in NOT wanting to utilize it for a feature film.

So instead, we get stylized CG films like the SPIDER-VERSEs and PUSS IN BOOTS 2 and MITCHELLS VS. THE MACHINES and NIMONA and such. We get maybe a brief 2D scene in a larger CG movie, or some small 2D elements. That mix has got the advantages and the 3D immersiveness of CGI, mixed with that special sauce people love about 2D... And even then, for some people, it just isn't enough. Some will insult the artists and their work, which is not cool. But I'm sorry, either take what you can get or continue to be unsatisfied... Or, seek out 2D stuff that's regularly being made. That's just not by studios as big as Disney and DreamWorks, and not being made in America at that. Broaden your horizons, they're EVERYWHERE.

Anyways, had to vent. Sorry. WISH looks cool, will be seeing.

[meimi-haneoka]

Thank you so much for everything. Yes, real life gets hectic and unfortunately, it will be more hectic for me for a while soon. ;-; Hope everything is going fine for you now. As for the chocomint post, hmm, I don't remember the exact chapter number (probably 60/61/62-ish?) but it had Lilie and Kaito in it and because I had never picked up Clear Card as I wanted to binge read/watch it, I was left very confused as to who these two were once I began coming across them in Tumblr. The reason I even came back into the CCS tags because I am actually taking a hiatus from Boruto (yeah, I will confess that I am one of the rare few who went straight from Naruto to Boruto and actually enjoys its sequel). Boruto right now is in a "let's torture the protagonist" phase ala Tsubasa style and it's actually becoming painful to read (actually good writing, it makes you squirm and feel pained for Boruto, he is shaping up to be one of my most favourite shonen protagonists). I am thinking of keeping my hands off it for a few months for binging purposes and thought why not check out my first preteen/nearly teen OTP. And yeah, I come back to find that it is nearly in its arc end. And then I search tags and of course, I find very confusing and disconnected things, especially with random chocomint references, and people being very critical about a lot of things. I totally understand the valid criticisms now that I have caught up but I admit that I did enjoy a lot of things in Clear Card as well and I am looking forward to watching season 2 on weekly basis just because of this. I wonder when that is going to be aired because I can't find any info regarding it beyond its production announcement.

And now I can proceed to reply to this ask of 20 days ago 💦 I'm sorry, but I reaaaaaaally wasn't in the mood to write anything, back then.

Thank you for explaining how you reconnected with the CCS franchise and how you found my blog! 😆 AH yes, our main chocomint sponsor Lilie 😂😂😂😂it makes me laugh so much everytime I think about it...

Now that the manga is ending, I can start working again on the long list of posts addressing many topics, and one of those (I think it'll actually be my next one in line, after the one I did of the literary references) will precisely be not only about the significance of chocomint inside the story, but actually all the food and all the handmade stuff. Yes, they're there to bring a very special message and not only to waste time in the plot. 🙂

And yes, we're all waiting for more info about the sequel of the Clear Card anime, because ever since the announcement on April 1st they haven't said anything else. I expect we'll hear something along with the release of the next chapter, the final one!!

[faungirlbulge]

Oki!!! First box gone thru!! (Most of them have really simple names or no name at all I'm sorry, I do love them a whole lot tho, I super prommy!) This might be long so I'll try and put a readmore here but I'm not sure I it'll work?

SHEEP!!! They're so soft and you can hold like hamburger! Their eyes are portals to comfy cozy void sleep land <3

WAGE!!! She's one of my Uglydolls and was originally released as male but then changed to girl so shes trans now >:3c She has her own store iirc and is super friendly and I love her so much<3

THADDEUS! He was a gift, he has a cute lil scarf and a pointy triangle tail like a kitten, sometimes I worry that his tail will get bent but I try to take care of him as best I can!

BLUE<3 Now i know what ur thinking "uh Faun, that's green Link, why's he named Blue?" He was named after a friend who heavily identified with toon Link, his sword is a little loose but that's okay, he's still Blue <3

EASTER! Hehehe the first of my bunnies to be unvaulted >:3 Easter is super soft and cuddly, their left ear is a lot more floppies than their right and it gives them a really cute style along with their pink and white polka-dots <3

BABY YELLOW!! Theyre peep bunnies! I have a few other Baby buns but I think they got vaulted separately T.T they're so cute and precious and I love them all <3<3<3<3<3<3<3

MAMA BUN! Look at her!! She's so big!!! She's pretty firm too but that's okay, she can support her kids when they return to her! She was originally a porch decoration with plywood and stuff but my mom modified her to be just plush for hugs and have a weighted bottom. She's a product of love and care, and that's what she gives for others! Pictured with Baby Yellow for size comparison :3

[skelekidd]

2 for you as well, aaand 11!

Hello Travis My Lovely Mutual Travis!! :)

ask game here

2. Song or two you've had on repeat recently?

Recently, I've only really been listening to some witcher game soundtrack music to help me sleep sometimes lol. Out of the playlist, my faves are probably River of Life and The Dike by Paweł Błaszczak.

11. Ideal haircut/color on yourself? If you could do anything

I've been cutting my own hair for ~6 years now and I'm alright at it, mostly doing some variation around mullet/wolf cut territory. I never found a reference that hit the right spot I've been thinking of, until the other day I saw this tiktok and I was like THERE THAT ONE. It's a little hot to have my hair that long atm, but it'll be all over for the haters once it gets chilly again. My hair color/texture looks pretty similar to the example in the tiktok (maybe a little blonder? Depends on the lighting). Mine doesn't hold shape that well because of how fine it is, and I haven't found the right product(s)/routine to get it to behave how I want it to consistently. Probably using a blow dryer would help? lmao

So anyway, that would probably be the ideal style for me atm, but color is another issue. I have thought about dyeing my hair, but picking any fun colors would mean that I'd have to coordinate my outfits with that color (already involves many bright colors and patterns and shapes), which might mean ruling out some of my outfits. So I guess ideally, I would want something that I could change to coordinate with my outfits and mood. but part of it is that I wear a lot of different colorful outfits, and if I made my hair something more fun, then all my outfits would have to take my hair color into account in the coordination. Which could potentially mean some outfits/clothing pieces wouldn't be as viable anymore. So I guess ideally I'd just be able to change it whenever I want based on my mood/outfits, lmao. I was thinking that maybe having sorta cloud gray hair tinted with some color coordinated highlights/ends (probably like teal, lavender, lime green, hot pink would be faves). I think my ideal hairstyle would probably be a similar cut and length to the one in the tiktok, but with some slight differences in how I style it personally.

thank you for the questions ! :) <3

[lesbianpoptartsphd]

Im about to be fr. I'm a lil sapiosexual. And I didn't know there was a word for it until this moment. You gotta hear me out. It'll sound very rick and morty esque right. Like, "To be fair you have to have a really high IQ to comprehend --" ass shit. But hear me out. It's an attraction to people romantically/sexually based on intellect/intelligence. Not just finding yourself attracted to people who are intelligent, but prioritizing/valuing intellectual connection with people in your relationships bc that is a primary means in which you find yourself developing romantic loving & desire feelings for people!

I have always felt the primary means of my connection with people started in the mind & being on the same page intellectually, and ppl I can have intellectual conversations with I feel connected to in a different way - connected being the operative word. There is something weirdly (but lovingly) sexual about meeting minds like that, and the studying of that person and that mind to understand where they're coming from. Not that I don't like my friends or ppl I become into who I have shared stuff or similarities or just fun vibes with that fall outside of that, but tbh if we're not meeting minds then it'll never be all "me" showing up there in a way that is satisfying to me in my romantic/sexual endeavors. Fun is fun, but it's not the same as fulfillment, and it's not the same as excitement, and it's fun sometimes bc it's silly and stupid - which there's not a thing wrong with. It's just when I have the kind of relationship style with someone where it is a lot of being able to talk/share earnestly, and not have to have the silly dial turned on all the time, well. Yeah it's fucking awesome to have. And I find myself opening up more in those dynamics. Pursuing a kind of authenticity that feels safe because I feel grounded. And I don't know that I can find myself feeling as vulnerable & truthful, as honest & real as I want to show up. If I can't talk about complexity in ideas and have productive conversations & if it's clear that other person has no interest in like, trying to meet minds on that level, meaning they don't really add much or care enough to learn to be able to add much, then. I'm sorry but it'll always be just a lil too superficial for me to ever think me and that person could have anything going on to make a relationship work.

When I do have the mental connection, I don't know why, but it also makes me FEEL LEGITIMATELY LIKE A SLUT Like bro I. It activates the weird part of my "shut up and 🥴🤤" part of my brain. And I've long felt a little weird or stitled for legitimately feeling aroused from when people EXPLAIN things to me lmfao. Or I hear them talk extensively about their thoughts & they're really further thought-provoking and interesting ideas and stuff, and they can phrase it so well and thread different concepts or metaphors through it, or in their stories, that it feels like witnessing a profound lesson or they're infodumping about their niche passion.... And dude seriously, that's deeply attractive. I would legitimately watch a fucking deep dive video essay or something with somebody aa foreplay ahahahhaha we turn that on, i'm getting turned on. They pause it to add their own thoughts and then i'm gonna pause it so i can smooch them.

But it's more than that! It's how they talk, too! It's how when they talk they can't help but *teach* you too, and they get so excited to do that for stuff they know a lot about. And then their tone can take on a degree of great depth and seriousness once they're deep in it, and that's deeply romantic. And to pivot away from their special interests and stuff - people who are able to have pretty nuanced intellectual conversations about just kinda any topic you broach or even on a whim in random conversations and stuff, who demonstrate a lot of self-awareness & desire to learn and understand and have their mind be opened/changed, people who pursue their own intellectual interests outside of anything they "have" to and consciously make deliberate efforts to know more and understand deeper. Bro. Bro. It's joever.

There's a kind of intensity + spark associated with it, and a straightforward kind of bluntness often times to their ability to accurately comment on something and just say it. Or because they are just locked into explain mode. Or they are really feeling the weight of what they're thinking about and talking about or their mental wheels are really goin. Or they just speak really matter of factly. Or can't help but to respond to something with a really strong sense of stoicism that looks like intensity bc they'll just answer your questions or respond to your statements really like, genuinely, because they know better, and they value the perspective you're coming from, and that you may be able to add on a topic that maybe rings resonant for them. And when you're on the same wavelength of when you're both knee deep in a conversation about something, the kind of electric undercurrent of their mind racing and your mind catching up and the shifting gears and then they way you can see in BOTH your eyes when you are thinking the same thought ---- BROOOOO it's HOOOTTTTTTTT.

I feel all the feelings I wanna feel sexually/romantically from that in a desire way! Feeling kinda submissive, and a desire to almost be a little 'babied' as they're so patient to help me understand something, and their having a very blunted affect that feels a little dominant but super grounding and reassuring and frankly relaxing to be in the presence of that melts through not just in everyday but in a sexy context too. But also! In a happy romantic/friend way, I love the feeling of falling deeper in that sense of love bc it's like falling down the rabbithole, and being relaxed enough to just speak your thoughts at any time & they will listen and even if your thoughts are not "intellectual" in nature or in service to some kind of discussion, you know they're the type to take in everything they hear. You know whatever they take in, they think about, and they maintain a level of curiosity & appreciation for learning. And oh my fucking god I'm sorry I just feel like I've cracked an important code here because I think about the times in my life I've experienced this & it really has been in very unforgettable + meaningful relationships (whether platonic or romantic).

Please lord let me marry a smartypants lol