#just vibes results everything

[carma-tjol]

alternate opm universe where the suffering isn't perpetual idk

[hivemindscape]

im a big fan of esper powers slipping loose in harmless ways when they're happy

[ironmaidenhead]

thinking about this quote in connection w/ frank and how he wore the mask of a u.s. marine with a wife and two kids and their picnics in the park to obscure the internal struggle of reconciling the family man (married maria after three months because he got her pregnant like any good man™️ would) and the soldier that enjoyed the violence

[codgod-archive]

it’s hard being a chill and patient person in a fandom full of people who jump to the worst conclusions and think everything is going to implode on itself at the slightest sign of things going wrong

[keeps-ache]

that crushed sugar feel

[tangledinink]

I don't know anything about swans so maybe this isn't accurate, but I do have a pet bird and holding him like Leo is holding Donnie would be an INCREDIBLE show of trust. Sleeping so close to a human-not even napping, full-on beak under his wing fast asleep, even my 'tiel doesn't normally sleep like that when he naps on me. And allowing Leo to wrap his arms around his wings means Swanny must feel VERY safe with him. It's sad and heartwarming all at the same time.

Perfect.

[e-adlirez]

The art style of Cloud Castle is absolute ass bro why are their eyes so big

Idk man it just looks.... off

I wish they brought back the og art style like Blue Scarab Hunt because that was gorgeous

Well if you’re referring to the book's artstyle as a whole, then calm down buddy the illustrations as a whole are pretty good all things considered (believe me some of the illustrations in the later books are waaaaayyyyy iffier)

But if you are referring to Danilo Barozzi’s illustrations in the book then uhhhhh… yeah I don’t blame you, I didn’t like the big anime irises either, she didn’t cook with this one,,,

The interesting thing is Barozzi also did pieces for Secret of the Snow and those looked fine (she did well enough that I have to squint to determine which ones were done by her). My guess is either she did a lot of the illustrations for the latter half of SotS and we just got used to it, or it’s because the artstyle of special editions 2 and 3 were more… experimental? Books 4 onwards developed a very specific… look for the artstyle that adhered very closely to the main book illustrations of Spanish Dance Mission onwards, thus the illustrators had to follow suit, resulting in whatever looks off to look especially off.

(Even with this set of pictures, I’m only about 70% sure these are Barozzi’s because of how alike yet different the styles are from each other in the book. The first one could be Barozzi’s, but it could also be Giuseppe Facciotto’s, since he also did illustrations for SotS and his stylization means he sometimes puts the eyes really close to each other in a way that’s weird but still makes sense somehow.) On the contrary, books 2 and 3 (and I would probably even include book 1 there) had a more experimental look to the illustrations, which seems to be based more on (and this is just a theory of mine) Giuseppe Facciotto’s iconic work for the covers of Mouseford Academy books 2-12, 14, 15 and 17 in the English books (he did waaayyy more covers for the Italian Mouseford books— he was basically the cover guy for the Mouseford books for a WHILE) as well as the books from Spanish Dance Mission to Lost Letters. If you’re wondering why those covers go as hard as they do, then now you know why.

(These aren’t all of Facciotto’s works for the covers we know in English but you can see that he popped off <3)

But yeah as you can see with special editions 2 and 3, the art direction seems to be heavily inspired by Facciotto’s artstyle.

However, when Barbara Pellizzari’s works became the aesthetic poster child of the books’ brand, that was reflected in the illustrations and how their aesthetic changed, as seen in the main books and how they look currently, special editions 4-9, and the Treasure Seekers trilogy.

This new profile thing of the girls? This was done by Pellizzari (coloring was done by Flavio Ferron), and thus it became the main reference for how the girls look in the book’s illustrations.

And it’s not just in the general direction to the artists for how to draw the Thea Sisters, but also in the direction given to the colorists. Alessandro Muscillo was the colorist for the special edition books since book 1 and the Treasure Seekers trilogy, and you can see that the direction for the style varied through books 1-3, like maybe direction was experimenting with the mood the illustrations were to convey, beginning with the cartoony and bright colors of book 1, easing into the more grounded and layered palettes of books 2 and 3

Then book 4 was when they transitioned to using digital art /j

I jest, but seriously book 4 was the debut of the coloring style we end up keeping for the rest of the special editions and for all of Treasure Seekers, which is very… bright :D

(I would show more picture examples but I manually took pictures of my physical copies for the Cloud Castle and SotS illustrations and gwuh I’m too lazy to grab my entire collection just to take pictures,,)

Bright as in like… the colors are very defined and saturated. I dunno how to describe it, but when you see it, you get what I mean. It’s very bright and pretty and colorful and it stands out. There are still variations that happen on occasion (Star Fairies in particular uses a good dose of airbrush for the lighting and shadow effects, and Crystal Fairies looks like someone had a bit of fun using sparkle brushes), but other than that, it’s very bright. I don’t hate it, but I do acknowledge that yeah, if I was introduced to the series when it had fully transitioned to the new style, I never would’ve gotten into the series in the first place, because the older books had something that didn’t make it feel specifically catered to girls. The colors were bright, but not too bright. Colorful, but unified. They weren’t that complicated, and they didn’t have to be because the colorists (plural, there were at least 3 per book once upon a time) were popping the hell off with the colors they were given. But y’know, the newer books’ consistent style did give me a good spot to practice drawing mouse furries so I’m not complaining too much about the newer style, haha.

(Tiny baby E’s (it’s literally from 2020 what’re you on about mate) her first mouse Violet drawing using Barbara Pellizzari’s artstyle in Treasure Seekers 1 as an anatomy guide!!)

With that said tho, yeah I miss the old books -m- dunno if it’d fit the aesthetic of the special editions but m a n we could’ve had it and it probably would’ve looked cool

Also the illustrations go way harder in the older books, like Prince's Emerald? I've talked about Prince's Emerald and how it goes hard before, and I still stand by it and say that it does in fact still go hard

Maybe it won't fit the uh splash of color they gave the hardcovers, but imagine they grabbed Giulia Basile's coloring work for the graphic novels and used that as sort've a basis for the coloring style of the hardcovers. Not exactly the same-- would probably still add a touch of whimsical watercolor and/or paint to the very cel-shaded style, but we could've had something pretty dope -m-

Anyway that's my ramble simultaneously defending the hardcovers' artstyle and reminiscing on what could've been haha

[jamiebluewind]

GUESS WHO'S IN THE HOSPITAL AND FREAKING OUT ALL THE NURSES WOO!

[ace-and-the-rpg-horrors]

since i got into Project Eden's Garden, i thought that maybeeee i'd re-check the official DR games because maybeee i've been having a sort of... opposite of rose-tinted glasses thingy and have just thought of them as bad because i associate them with a shit point in my life among other bitter feelings...

... nah. they're somehow worse than i remember

[firestorm09890]

so sad when someone is a very funny person but has terrible opinions on your favorite media and/or characters. get well soon 😔

[deadbeandrop]

this is like my ummm... i don't know, like my holy grail? i am like extremely anti-flanderization, if i ever worked in the industry or something i would just be doing all in my power to make sure it never happens or for this to almost never be broken. i'm pretty sure i have it drilled into my head more than the writers did at this point

[hauntingblue]

Jaya time

I love these moments of nearly cosmic horror when they encounter inexplicable things (at first) they are so intriguing

Is strawhat here?! *Megan thee stallion saying AAH 😜*

This cover just goes hard... Get it chopper

[eric-the-bmo]

Leo’s playlist got some updates btw, bc I realized I should change it up now that I’ve got a better grasp on who he is. So here are the new songs:

Murder Your Memory- Title Fight

You Think Your Skull is a Mighty Fortress- Dirt Poor Robins

Poison Tree- Grouper

All The Things She Said- Poppy

Me and the Devil- Soap&Skin

[elodieunderglass]

It’s because due to the specific alchemy of daemonAUs, any picture of trans femme Laios Touden is inherently and inescapably a picture of human AU Palinode Touden!

However, Palinode would mostly wear this top for the specific purpose of hyping up her brother.

They would go out like this together and do this at every opportunity.

Bee doesn’t know them.

saw this post

[puzzlebug]

suddenly was overcome by a wave of nostalgia for meridiem and its stupid worldbuilding. the naming system on pangea memoriam is so fun. people being named after things lost to time (arkansas and idabel named after places that no longer 'exist', for example). perovskia's naming situation isn't odd, either- she's referred to by her last name because it's the only segment of her name that fits that convention (archaic terminology for russian sage- a plant which is also probably quite different in the new millennium than it was in the 2ks)- it can be inferred that her birth parents probably chose her first and middle name so that she would primarily use her surname. nisa's a bit of a special case- i think her name fits the convention in the sense that it's a family name found in records from hundreds of years ago. considering her family situation it would make sense if this was a convention they had used for several generations. anyway the worldbuilding was just me coming up with cool stuff and then when asked how the cool stuff is all connected going i dont knowwwwwww

[spectrearia]

obsessed with the vibes of this song - it's the perfect mix of creepy and cute and the CATS!!! ᓚᘏᗢ I keep going back to listen to it haha