#kudos to all lu time artists

[tekikato]

Outfit Swap (kinda)

[somer-writes]

GREETINGS CAMPERS

WHO IS READY FOR

SOMERS DODECANNUAL MONTHLY BEATDOWN

october edition

OCTOBER 👏 WORD 👏 COUNT 👏: 72,479 WORDS TO Ao3

CURRENT 👏 WORD 👏 COUNT 👏: 1,000,246 WORDS ON Ao3

CHAT! CHAT! WE DID IT! POGGERS!!!

1 MILLION 1 MILLION 1 MILLION

WORKS (new/continued in October): 34 BABY!!!

MOST POPULAR: HAVING BEEN CHOSEN & CHOOSING FOR OTHERS

MY RECOMMENDATION: OBLATION (reader discretion advised!)

IN REVIEW: 1 MILLION 1 MILLION 1 MILLION!!!

also whumptober! 31 days of beating the shit out of twilight bc i can and it sparks joy. also beat up wars and time this month <3 i love them i promise

this month also saw the continuation of Memento Mori, the sequel to the ever popular Burial Rites (reader discretion advised).

further! @crazylittlejester filled twilight with cheese. and i wrote a fic about it. Cheese Whore (thank you @toyouhellohowareyou for the title)

also also 4000 comments!!! FUCK YEAH!!!

ty so much for all the support!! i love reading all your comments, reblogs, tags, and whatever else! thank you everyone who reads, kudos, bookmarks, or comments on fics!! ily!!!

on that note, lets get SAPPY for a moment motherfuckers:

when my brain latched on to @linkeduniverse in September 2023, i never imagined it would lead me to where it has today. it spurred me to not only write freely again the first time in almost 2 years, but to also POST my writing on the internet for the first time in nearly a decade. AND THE RESPONSE! i treasure every single comment just as much as my first comment. i read your bookmarks, i reread comments, i treasure it ALL!

LU has led to me forging incredible relationships. not only in my personal development as a writer with brilliant and lovely peers, dare i say, colleagues, but also deep friendships AND even led me to my loveliest gumdrop beautiful handsome partner @wanderlustmagician

i never IMAGINED hitting 1 million words after 12 months, completing 6 month long challenges, having so many regular readers, being involved in discord servers and reblog wars--! theres too much i cant even FATHOM

i am so eternally grateful to ALL of you. im grateful to the fandom, to its community of artists and writers, to @jojo56830 for creating such a lovely work which brought us all together, and anyone whos ever beta read for me

starting tonight (oct 31 my timezone) and running through tomorrow is the next 24 hour LU writers' marathon! please give it up for @hotcheetohatredwastaken and @not-freyja for keeping this up! also big s/o to @a-manicured-lawn @noorahqar @gia-d @winterfen @tashacee @weavingstarlight @rebornofstars @zarvasace for modding!!!

heres to the next 1 million words!

[needfantasticstories]

SKIP'S LU MASTER POST

List of Collab projects and my fics. All credit for creating LU goes to Jojo, who is amazing! And THANKS A MILLION to @hotcheetohatredwastaken for reading my stuff and offering advice and encouragement. She deserves all the love and kudos for her fics!

(My AO3 name is SkipBreaker)

WRITING PROMPTS

Collection: Write It In Your Style (or draw!)

Prompt: create something about the chain helping a family rebuild their house after a monster attack.

ALL products welcome if tagged appropriately. Let’s see all your styles and beautiful brains at play! Tag all your friends. There is no deadline. Tag works as “LU rebuild the house prompt” and please use TWs.

LU Rebuild the House Prompt | Archive of Our Own

MY FICS

Short Fluff/Crack

Sneaking Apples and Other Tales A collection of one-shot crack or fluff pieces.

Short Angst

Febuwhump2024 Mostly one-shots, some are draft chapters for my bigger fics, especially Hidden Hero because torturing Sky makes me feel big feelings.

Here Now is a short fic collab with the amazing artist @hiimgin over us thinking about how nice it would be for Hyrule to get a hug from the best huggers, Twilight and Sky. She turned it into beautiful art, and I turned it into a whump-lite fic.

Longer Works-In-Progress

Angst-heavy for now, but they have bits of romance, fluff, and crack, and I'm slowly adding more. Update irregularly. If there are things you want to see in them, feel free to tell me and I'll consider it! Feedback keeps me alive.

Hidden Hero: (undergoing rewrites, plz skip to next fic) Prequel to Blood and Blade. Sky has a terrible time during the War of Ages.

(Warrior, I'm coming for you and the battle of Skyloft, someday...)

Blood and Blade: Ghirahim becomes everyone's problem when he ends up in Wild's era. My most ambitious project so far. A lot of elements for this fic and HH were taken from my first LoZ fic, TBD.

Friends and Foes: The start of my Hyrule kick, wherein Hyrule does a very Hyrule thing: gets injured while lost, and makes new friends. They kind of remind him of the Links. What could go wrong?

TBD: my first fanfic, and strictly LoZ set between BotW and TotK for now, though it could become LU. Wild has a terrible time when the Yiga start to recover after BotW. (Romantic fluff in the beginning, and other parts are probably so cringe, but I don't care anymore. I'm allowed to be a little freak. It's unfinished, like all my big fics, and it will probably change a great deal along the way.)

[four-eyed-nerd]

I don’t normally write/talk about stuff like this on my accounts, but I just wanted to say (with all of the Linked Universe ‘drama’ at the moment):

Writers, we love all the amazing things you write, the explorations into characters we love and all the hijinks, fluff and angsty moments that you throw at us! Personally, some of my favourite fics have inspired things in my own zelda/lu story. Also, you guys make me wanna write my own fics!

Artists, we love all the gorgeous pieces you do, as well as the adorable sketches you make as well! All the little details in your art are amazing and just, I want to eat all of your art styles cuz damn guys, it’s gorgeous!!

There’s also a ton of people in the Linked Universe Discord, as well as here on Tumblr, who come up with some of the best headcanons, incorrect quotes and similar things. I love finding new ones that I haven’t heard before. I especially adore all the angst-y ones, like damn, stop pulling at my tear ducts, I’m already crying!

In general - thank you to everyone who creates in this fandom (and all other fandoms but you get what I mean). You guys don’t get enough love (like, I wanna give like or kudos way more than once a fic all the time) and you all put so much hard work into your art and/or writing. Many pieces of art and writing have actually made me cry and/or made my day better, so please keep creating!!

I hope all of you reading this have a great day, and please be kind to each other.

[waterspoutskies]

20 questions for fic writers

(Ty @the-real-azalea-scroggs for the tag!! I know it took me a couple days lol)

1 - How many works do you have on A03?

11, apparently. That's remarkable!

2 - What's your total A03 word count?

57858. Which is pretty decent, nothing to write home about for me, but I'm cool with it.

3 - What fandoms do you write for?

Four Swords Manga (beloved) and LU, which is a subset of Legend of Zelda in the Links Meet area of things

4 - What are your top five fics by kudos?

A) Thoughts Like These B) Piece It All Together C) Beneath the Skin D) Where We Are E) Dancing With My Own Shadow

5 - Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Oh yes, all the time, thoroughly as I can, even though sometimes it might take me a few days. I enjoy comments! Just ADHD brain sometimes!

6 - What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Uh. So far it is the first chapter of Chasing Drabbles, which rather well implies the destruction of a town via natural disaster with no way of avoiding it.

7 - What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Thoughts Like These, maybe? Dancing With My Own Shadow has a fun ending,

8 - Do you get hate on fics?

I don't think so? Not that I know of? I've gotten a couple annoying comments about updating that I've had to delete, but never hate proper.

9 - Do you write smut?

No.

10 - Do you write crossovers?

Not really? I have one crossover with ideas but never a character crossover and really not usually setting crossovers either. I'm not too into the idea.

11 - Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope.

12 - Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope.

13 - Have you ever co-written a fic before?

In a technical sense? Yeah, I suppose, although I am the primary writer and Ruby is the artist more than anything, so like. It os

14 - What's your all-time favorite ship?

Vidow. I have no regrets and I stand by it forever.

15 - What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Uh. I think some vague continuations for Dancing With My Own Shadow will probably be left by the wayside, though the work itself is finished. I had some plans, still have them, but no official prospects for another part.

16 - What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue, building massive worlds that never leave my head, all kinds of joyful things that are wonderful for planning and not for completing bodies of work but that's what sprinting is for right? I'm also good at that, writing under lots of pressure for a deadline via the sprint bot, woo!

17 - What are your writing weaknesses?

Probably the description as it relates to scene setting and avoiding white room syndrome. I'm so guilty of this.

18 - Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I think it can work, provided it's not just thrown around! I haven't done it that I can recall, but it's sometimes useful and can be a fun little thing to have in.

19 - First fandom you wrote for?

Four Swords! Zelda! LU! All of the above! Ahhhhhhh!!

20 - Favorite fic you've ever written?

Uh, I suppose I like Beneath the Skin the most? I don't think I really have a favorite fic. I'm not much of a fic writer!

Other folks to tag... Oh, I don't know. I'll do that later.

[musical-chan]

Screw it! I'll take that imaginary tag!

How many works do you have on AO3?

18! Not too bad considering I only started in November or so.

What’s your total AO3 word count?

212,094, most of it is in Father of Time.

How many fandoms have you written for, and what are they?

All Zelda currently but back in the day I used to write for more! Sailormoon, Inuyasha, Shoujo Kakumei Utena, World of Warcraft even!

Top five fics by kudos:

"Father of Time" with 296 kudos! Not bad! It's my longest fic and ongoing so I'm always happy when I get new people to it. I wonder if I'll get to 300 sometime soon.

"A Wild Time at Calamity Ganon" with 222 kudos! This is my rising star and I wonder if it'll pass FoT someday soon. It's my newest non-FOT fic and was a gift to an artist I really like, who in turn drew more art for the fic itself! Amazing how popular it's been!

"Defeat or Deity" with 155! This was one of my early fics and an LU one. Sky versus Time trapped in the Fierce Deity mask. It's one of my shorter ones but it was great fight writing practice.

"The Unbearable Weight of Three Days" with 109. I love this fic. It's another LU one and honestly the whole premise for it was so great. I always wish this one gained more traction because the interactions between Time and Young Link are so interesting. Well, at least I enjoy it.

"You Want to Talk to Link, Right?" with 91. This one was *fun* and I started writing a second part to it but it went in a direction I wasn't ready for so I'm thinking on it. Basically, the Chain finds out that a song Time plays actually tries to contact someone named Link! I wonder who it is?

Do you respond to comments?

Yes! Almost every single one! I won't always respond to every nested comment if it seems like the conversation is over with but I love engaging with commenters on my fics!

What’s the fic with the angstiest ending you’ve ever written?

I haven't really been doing a lot of angst in my current return to fandom writing but I'd say "Time and Time Again" probably has the most bittersweet ending. "The Silent Realm" maybe comes in as a close second?

Do you write crossovers?

It depends on how you describe a crossover. I have in the past but not really much in my current Zelda phase. But I've had thoughts about crossovers if that counts!

Have you ever gotten hate on a fic?

No real hate yet! this is not an invitation to send me hate, haha.

Do you write smut?

Naw, that's not really my jam!

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not as far as I know

Have you ever had a fic translated?

No

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Oh gosh, this is a hard one because I like to leave options option, you know? I really do love Skyward Sword Zelink though; they are adorable and I want them to be happy forever. I'm also very partial to OOT Malink because I feel like Link wouldn't handle Zelda's rejection well and Malon is just a cutie.

What’s a wip that you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will?

I had to look through my docs for this but there was a fic I started back in the beginning that was basically what BotW Link experienced while he was in the 100 year sleep. I almost forgot about that! It's a neat idea but I don't think I'll get to it anymore. You never know though.

What are your writing strengths?

I like to think I have a nice style, that I try to write in a way that makes the words flow well through one's thoughts. Maybe that's just me but I always try to write in a way that makes my brain happy. It means I spend a lot of time re-structuring sentences until they "flow" well but it's worth it.

What are your writing weaknesses?

I probably over-think phrases and passages too much. It's hard to let go and just let something be.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fics?

I think if you know multiple languages and can do it well, it's great! I'd love to put more languages in my fics but even fictional ones can feel awkward at times.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Probably Sailormoon, officially. I don't think I ever wrote them down but I definitely had a lot of story ideas in my head for, like, Xmen and stuff in the 90s.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written so far?

Father of Time, definitely. I write this one because I love it and I need to see it through to the end so I know what happens. I like all my fics and I could gush here about every single one but yeah, I think I'd always come back to Father of Time. Fierce Deity my beloved. <3

Oooohh, I should tag some people maybe! @aeghina I usually tag you, haha. Man, my brain is mush. Please someone else join in as well!

Ao3 tag game!

THANKS @ragecndybars FOR THE TAG I APPRECIATE IT

*cracks knuckles* lets do this

How many works do you have on AO3?

24 works! I would have never expected to have that many 5 years ago, hahaha

What's your total AO3 word count?

186,291! oh wow, almost 200k!! (unsurprisingly PT minato takes up over a third of that LMAO)

How many fandoms have you written for, and what are they?

10 fandoms! I'm counting Persona 3, 4, and 5 and separate, but I'm grouping all the Zelda fandoms together since it's all Linked Universe fic.

Here's the breakdown!

The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms (6)

Persona 5 (5)

Persona 3 (5)

SPY x FAMILY (Anime) (3)

Wizard101 (Video Game) (3)

SPY x FAMILY (Manga) (3)

Runescape (Video Games) (3)

Pirate101 (Video Game) (3)

Persona 4 (2)

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild/Tears of the Kingdom (2)

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga (1)

Star Wars - All Media Types (1)

The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Warriors (1)

Top five fics by kudos:

The Ghost of Mementos/Stygian Ringlet (Persona3/5) - to the surprise of absolutely no one, since this is currently my longest fic. I'm very happy with Stygian Ringlet being the top because I love my boys :)

True Crime Special on the Midnight Channel (Persona 4/5) - my Ren has a TV Dungeon fic! also very proud of the dungeon concept for this one, I really need to finish the last two chapters

Dark Clouds on the Horizon (Linked Universe/TOTK) - I feel like this one got a lot of momentum partially because it was directly in the wake of TOTK's release, but I'm happy with how it turned out :)

Strangers Are Just Friends You Haven't Met (Persona 3/SPY x FAMILY) - this was a collab series with mewrose and a few others in the marigolds discord! we were throwing ideas at the wall to see what stuck and I really had a lot of fun with Shinjiro-related prompts, because I LOVE him and hitting him with the isekai baseball bat into a universe with Anya brings me great joy

Salt Tears and Raindrops (Linked Universe/TOTK) - directly related to Dark Clouds, and I'm glad people enjoyed good ol' fashioned angst >:) (I do need to post more of my wips, I do have a couple more roleswap AU wips that I want to post)

Do you respond to comments?

Yes! I almost always do because I really appreciate them and its my way of saying thanks for the comment! If I don't comment it's because I lost track of it or because I can't think of a response.

What's the fic with the angstiest ending you've ever written?

Probably Salt Tears and Raindrops. I was in a Mood and decided to go for the tried-and-true method of putting fictional characters I like through the emotional wringer. That's how I got the rough draft for this fic :)

Do you write crossovers?

*looks at my persona fics and recent LU fics*

...I think it's safe to say most of my fics these days fall under crossovers lmao

Have you ever gotten hate on a fic?

I wouldn't say I have? One or two comments that came off as rude, but no actual hate, thankfully. If I did, I forgot about it. I've been blessed by wonderfully nice readers <3

Do you write smut?

Nope. I don't read it, so I wouldn't know how to write it anyway.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of? I sure hope not.

I have seen a couple short fics slightly imitate Ghost of Mementos though, which I thought was really sweet that they liked it enough to inspire their own writing.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope, but I'd definitely be open to it!

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

RYOMINA. Hands down. I love them so much, I am so mentally unwell about these two

What’s a WIP that you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will?

My two Runescape fics, Whispers in the Temple and Welcome to the Jungle. I absolutely loved going hogwild with rewriting old quests in Runescape, but I psyched myself out of Welcome to the Jungle because I got overly anxious about accidentally doing bad representation.

(in hindsight, it probably wouldn't have been as big a deal as I thought; it's hard to make it worse considering how bad Legend's Quest was with the british-african stereotypes. that quest DID NOT age well.)

I also want to finish Snake in the Grass; that was my first attempt at a genuine mystery plot and I really liked playing with Warriors in that fic in the context of the gang trying to figure out who the heck is trying to murder him.

What are your writing strengths?

I feel like I'm pretty good at dialogue! I try to make sure it matches the character's speech patterns and personality. Really well-written dialogue can tell you who's speaking without actually telling who it is. (For example, the way I write them: Minato speaks as few words as possible and has very little filter with his observations when he does share them, and Shinjiro is pretty rough around the edges, with shortened words and the occasional swear. Warriors is good with words and wit, but he has a certain military-esque directness and doesn't dance around the topic.)

I do try hard to keep the plot clear and understandable over everything else, so probably that as well.

Also, now that I think about it, maybe fight sequences? I don't do them much, but I do enjoy the challenge of making a clear sequence of what happens in a fight and trying to make it understandable. Fight sequences are easy to skip or gloss over, but I think of them like their own miniature plot. What happens? What surprises are there? What are their movesets? How do they get the upper hand? (and of course, what looks cool as fuck)

What are your writing weaknesses?

Time management. I tend to over-proofread since I beta my own work, and often I'll go back to tweak stuff if I had additional thoughts to add to it, or extra insight. Lately, it takes longer to write chapters than I'd like.

Also, dialogue-heavy scenes often get very chaotic in my WIPs because of the way I rough out fics. I'll throw together a bunch of dialogue bits I think would be cool to include, and sometimes they'll clash or get really messy, especially if there's lots of characters (looking at the latest two chapters of Stygian Ringlet)

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fics?

I think it's cool! It adds flavor to fics. If it's more than one short phrase though, or if it's story important, then I do prefer that there is a translation in the author's notes. I haven't done any non-English dialogue in fics, save for one memorable adventure into trying to figure out how Latin grammar structure works for a character that didn't speak English.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Wizard101 and Pirate101. I was obsessed with those two for YEARS. I really, really liked pirate stories in high school, and having a cast of crewmates that accompany you throughout the game really inspired me to write my first fic featuring my OC. (I was also into One Piece at the time, but I never wrote for it.)

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written so far?

Stygian Ringlet. It's really dear to my heart. I have poured so much love and effort into that fic, and the reception on it has completely blown me away.

THANKS FOR THE TAG!! Uhhhmmm for tags I'm going to go with @skyward-floored, @catreginae and @breannasfluff (but only if you want to!! no obligation of course)

and of course any other writers that want to do it as well!! go forth

[thesinglesjukebox]

LADY GAGA - STUPID LOVE

[6.42]

Far from "Shallow" now...

Brad Shoup: Thudding sixteenths and vocal chop straight out of a Todd Edwards remix... it's always great when she visits. [8]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: It must be exhausting to be Lady Gaga. Here's a short list of her accomplishments since 2013's ARTPOP: winning a Grammy for a jazz duets album, winning a Golden Globe for her role in American Horror Story, headlining the Super Bowl, co-hosting arguably the best Met Gala in years, winning an Oscar for A Star is Born, getting a number one Billboard single from the soundtrack, launching a vegan make-up line, and starring in a Las Vegas residency. And yet, the dominant critical narrative has still essentially been: Gaga is absent from pop music. (For comparison, Katy Perry has been a judge on American Idol.) Of course, her self-mythologizing is partially to blame for this, but it's unclear what could have possibly satisfied her critics and die-hard fans outside of re-reinventing music à la 2010. So what's her move given the weight of the world's impossible expectations? To make simple, unpretentious pop music on her own terms. In a recent Billboard interview, she laughed while stating, "I would like to put out music that a big chunk of the world will hear, and it will become a part of their daily lives, and make them happy every single day." My first reaction upon reading this was: yes, we should hold Gaga to a higher standard because she's Gaga, but how can we balance that with the potentially damaging effects for her mental health and sanity? So on "Stupid Love" when she sings, "Now it's time to free me from this chain/I gotta find that peace, is it too late?" I like to hope it's meta-commentary on her rediscovering the joy in her music and being, free of expectation. Gaga tracks are often described as "huge" or "epic", but none has ever so perfectly embodied "fun." I'm definitely excited about how this track sounds -- an ebullient return to her earliest disco pop roots, at a time when radio is dominated by trap -- but "Stupid Love" stands out to me because of her embrace of radical self-love. This is the Gaga that I've always loved -- and she's always been enough. [9]

Leah Isobel: The production filters back an entire decade's worth of Stefani's influence into a three-minute Fruit Gusher burst of tang, but the lyrics are decidedly forward-looking, all declarative statements of "now is the time!" bullshit. In the middle of this past/present/future time-play, as the beat drops out beneath her, she asserts the key line: "all I ever wanted was lahv." If it's a disappointingly shallow retcon for an artist whose initial breadth and ambition was the entire point, the promise of it lingers in my brain. After all, it's not too far from a similar pop megalomaniac realizing that she "traded fame for love without a second thought" about 20 years ago. That rich vein of popstar self-examination writ large is so suited to Gaga's talents as an artist -- a provocateur, fake-deep philosopher, musical theatre nerd, and hook-writing master all at once -- that I have listened to this song five times in a row pretty much every single day since it, uh, appeared on the internet. My paws are reluctantly up, Stef. Don't fuck it up. [7]

Jessica Doyle: Fun, and otherwise unremarkable. If you've been a Gaga fan for a while -- if you're invested in the narrative of this hardworking woman, who has been through downs and ups and downs and then ups again -- I imagine the fun is enhanced by a certain comfort and relief in seeing her have fun; in imagining her feeling strong and secure enough to release a fun song that doesn't have to upend anything. But I am a heartless, acontextual consumer, for whom the marginal cost of listening to something else is zero, and I miss "Bad Romance." [5]

Tobi Tella: For an artist who at her peak overstuffed everything with too many ideas, there's really not much happening here. It's loud and upbeat, sure, but the lyrics are barely the thread of a coherent song, and the production reminds everyone who wants "pure" pop to come back to be careful what they wish for. Maybe that A Star is Born "pop music bad guitar music good" cynicism rubbed off too much? [4]

Katherine St Asaph: Just when I thought Gaga was lost to the land of Real Music™, or worse, flailing attempts to be chill by the least chill performer in pop music (yes, including Taylor Swift), she goes and releases this, 50,000 firecrackers on a Eurovision stage. The thicket of hooks is packed, with Black Midi levels of referential density. The whole thing sounds like "Born This Way," which is to say it sounds like "Express Yourself"; there's a juddering sequencer out of "Do What U Want" (reminds me more of "Weekend" by Class Actress, but which is more likely to be the actual inspiration?) and a touch of, of all things, September's "Cry For You." Gaga fills every crevice of the song with singing, throaty and belty and huge: a relief after years of songs filled only with half-assed #vibes. If it feels frivolous against much of Born This Way and The Fame Monster and some of Artpop, and far less ambitious, it at least pulls her out of the "Shallow" piano muck. [7]

Vikram Joseph: Perhaps a stupid song about making stupid choices is the Lady Gaga lead single we both need and deserve in 2020. The battering-ram synths feel like running down a hill into a gale-force wind; the best thing about "Stupid Love" is that Gaga sounds like she's having a lot of fun, and by extension so are we. [7]

Alex Clifton: "Stupid Love," much like "Born This Way" before it, is ready-made for pride parades, grown from the same mystical lab that gave Lady Gaga her incredible melodic sensibilities. Unlike its predecessor, though, it has more euphoria in it, presumably because it's not making a political point. Gaga's more focused on having fun here, and you can tell. The verses aren't my favourite, but the chorus hits as an overwhelming rush of dopamine, and now I can't stop dancing in my computer chair. Between this and Dua Lipa's album, we're in for a hell of a good time for pop music this spring, and I am extremely excited. [7]

Thomas Inskeep: She was doing this better a decade ago. A lot better. [2]

Joshua Lu: The narrative surrounding "Stupid Love" regards it a return to the Pop Gaga that's been mostly absent since 2013: A revival if you're a fan, a regression if you're not. The issue with this narrative is that "Stupid Love" lacks any key similarities to the Gaga of yesteryear; the only real sonic link is how the bassline brings to mind the since-redacted "Do What U Want" beat. Instead we have something that's somehow not a Kygo song, with vocal chirps that got old last year, serviceable but clichéd hooks (the entire pre-chorus has all the charm of a Taio Cruz album track), remarkably basic lyrics filled with platitudes, and a title that has no bearing on anything in the song -- there's nothing lyrically or aurally stupid about anything here, and Gaga has shown a deep capacity to be stupid in her past pop works. In reality, what we have here isn't a return to anything, but rather the continued flagging of Gaga's desire to develop genuinely off-beat or interesting pop music, whether intentional or not. Gaga's talents as a vocalist elevate the song beyond the usual pop pap, but it's not nearly at the level I once hoped she could remain at. [6]

Alfred Soto: Kudos to Jamieson Cox for catching an obvious forebear: the rattling sequencer recalls 2013's forgotten "Do What U Want," which was all set to do some business until radio programmers remembered R. Kelly had been a menace for years. Amiably confusing lack of affect with simplicity, "Stupid Love" flexes its pop strength with the expectation that fans will admire it. [7]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: The synths pack a punch but they never quite get me to where I should be. I wanna feel desperation, exasperation -- that love is worth looking stupid for. All I get is a familiar, quasi-stoic performance that sounds like Gaga's doing some excellent karaoke. [4]

Kayla Beardslee: Sure, it's competent, but Gaga is capable of so much more. Many other blurbs will discuss the song's aggressive datedness and bland lyrics, but what really bothers me is that the two halves of "Stupid Love" -- the dramatic vocals and the unrelenting gallop of the synths -- don't fit together. Gaga is giving her all with those signature "laahv"s, but there's just not enough empty space left for her in the production. Her performance ends up laying flat on top of the track, adding nothing except a sense of laziness from her producers and engineers. [5]

Pedro João Santos: Serviceable Max Martin bopathon scams its way into my brain again -- no matter how direly in need of an incubator this whole structure is. Gaga's weakest lead single feeds you Kygo, threatens to ascend during "All I ever wanted was love", and still can't fight the aura of afterthought. [6]

Jibril Yassin: "Stupid Love" is a giddy rush of EDM-pop fun, but it's the first time experiencing a major Gaga single entirely devoid of surprises. Bracing yourself for a twist that never arrives or a strange turn of vocals rearing its head from nowhere, "Stupid Love" makes up for its unremarkableness with a masterclass in songwriting. What Lady Gaga hasn't forgotten how to do is translate the feeling of having your initial gut feelings completely validated. "Stupid Love" makes its magic in casting the act of love as necessary and dare I say it -- radical. [7]

Jackie Powell: On "Stupid Love" Lady Gaga achieved a corollary. By trying to put her healing process into simple poetry, she also created an accompanying sound that's comparable to an analgesic. The function of the track is to heal and liberate. (Truth be told, Little Monster or not, the song has helped me get out of bed in the morning.) Gaga's latest cut is packaged into a familiar formula, and that's part of the reason why this track serves as a formidable lead single and symbol for the upcoming Chromatica. The equation is one that mirrors the "best of" Stefani Germanotta. What's brilliant about "Stupid Love" is that its visual and lyrical messaging and surrounding sonic arrangement and melody bring what Little Monsters and casual music fans with a Gaga fascination expect. And that's okay. She has told Oprah that her goal now isn't just to shock people but rather to exude authenticity. She stirs elements from all of her pop eras into the most hearty and flavourful version of Gaga soup (and that does include Joanne contrary to popular belief.) Each ingredient works and is soluble. She tossed in the elements of the The Fame that made fans want to Just Dance and sprinkled some catchy Swedish-sounding pop melodies (Max Martin, hello!) and sung onomatopoeia from The Fame Monster, à la the "hey-ah, hey-ahs." A suspenseful build, uniquely potent and soaring vocals are ounces of Born This Way. Don't worry, ARTPOP is doused on this track not only in color, but in sound. There's a reason why that sped up "Do What U Want"-esque bassline works. There's a contrast between her bright vocal performance and the electronic bass' darkness. Joanne comes across in the allegorical concept which once again can be interpreted to reflect the current American experience. Music video director Daniel Askill confirmed that Gaga wanted to portray the "warring tribes as a metaphor for the state of the world today." So, Mother Monster is on a mission to introduce the world to her new brainchild, ever-developing ideologies and honest ways to examine life. "Stupid Love" isn't the end-all but merely the beginning. Paws up and welcome to Chromatica bitches. [8]

Nortey Dowuona: NOPE! WAIT. wait. This is actually a welcome back for... the bass, who is joined by his drumming sister, his synth bros and Lady Gaga, who has come here from the Make A Wish Foundation to take him around New York. They have a wonderful day together, with the synth bros getting their percussive background vocal girlfriend an NYPD hoodie, and the experience convinces Lady Gaga to make bright, happy pop music again! (The bass, in the midst of a happy dance, got hit by her limo and had to go back to the hospital.) [8]

Scott Mildenhall: Between its hyperventilating over-excitement and ever-exciting hyper-sincerity, Gaga seems to have finally created a pop emergency. The false alarm of "Applause" was overstuffed and underpowered, but "Stupid Love" redresses that balance by going harder and clearer, like a newly thawed cut from a cryogenically frozen, course-correcting Artpop Monster edition. Time might seem to have turned in on itself, but no: the greater lyrical directness arrives in a way that feels culminatory. The plainspokenness of that indelible "all I ever wanted was love" makes it almost an epitaph, grounding it in a present in which all experience has been lived, and all realisations are realised. Undeniably, Lady Gaga is not dead, but this is what she knows. [8]

Will Adams: I defended "The Cure" and lamented the immense pressure on Gaga to make every release the Next Big Thing, however even that soured when it turned out to be part of A Star Is Born's ~superficial pop~ world. So where to next, when she's caught between turgid rock balladry and ill-fitting trop-pop? On "Stupid Love," we get the best possible outcome: whizzing past Joanne, making a brief stop at Artpop but ultimately landing on the dazzling excess of Born This Way. Like any good synthpop number, the synths display a wide range of textures: they tunnel, they drill, they poof, they gleam. Gaga is more than willing to match their energy. Noteworthy, though, is that she takes a brief pause only on the pre-chorus's "all I ever wanted was love"; even the way the title scans it almost sounds like she could be singing "I want just to be loved." This is the essence of pop: amidst the big dumb fireworks display, a human message at the core. [7]

[coffeelions]

tagged by the super wonderful Lu and the super lovely Erin, here are ten songs i’ve been listening to recently!

1. “Don’t Think Twice” by Utada Hikaru

i don’t kingdom hearts, but goddamn this song is so good. i’m happy that you kh folks are getting kh3 soon!!

2. “Rokutousei no Yoru (Magic Blue ver)” by Aimer

it’s a new arrangement of “Rokutousei no Yoru”, otherwise known as the No.6 anime’s ending theme. it’s an absolutely stunning song nyall, and i recommend No.6 as well.

3. “Kill the Lights” by Set It Off

i actually learned about this song from this awesome ndrv3 MV by the skilled keebokuun. the video has major spoilers for chapter 5, and possibly endgame, so finishing the game before looking at it is probably for the best.

4. “Mind Brand” cover by Kuraiinu

he’s got a really amazing voice and damn the rap part of this song is so well-done. honestly i have no clue what the song is about (it’s rlly raunchy), but it’s just so darn catchy!

5. “Yoru wa Nemureru kai?” cover by Zenpaku [dj-Jo Remix]

i haven’t watched the Ajin anime, but this song is really hecking good! i love the remix sm!!

6. “Sand Planet” cover by Aruvn

gosh i adore aruvn’s voice! it really suits this kinda song!

7. “Sincerity Nature Drastic Measures of Ignorance” cover by Kuraiinu & Rachie

wanted to avoid repeating artists, but since this is a collab, it’s fine, right? ^^;; it’s such a boppy song, and these two have great vocal chemistry!! so energetic and fun!!

8. “Dramaturgy” by Eve

honestly everything by Eve is incredible and catchy and melancholy and i fully recommend!! dramaturgy does have a special place in my heart as one of my favourite songs of all time!! a friend of mine calls it very kokichi ouma-esque, and that makes it hurt a lil more :’)

9. “Happy Synthesizer” cover by 96neko

it’s so happy and fun!! i’ve been a fan of 96neko’s voice for years, it’s so lovely!! and their voice is so flexible, just wow!!

10. “Renegade” cover by Amalee

i haven’t watched this anime either, but golly this is so boppy!! i’ve been listening to this song while jotting out an au i have, and it’s just!! super good!!

now, i’d like to tag: @enbymob / @cara-cakes / @hydrachea / @beanpots / @petitesponge / @cosmetreee / @keebokuun / @lizardcube / @trans-shuichisaihara / @peachypasta

sorry if you’ve already been tagged!! and, please don’t feel pressured to do this if you don’t want to! and, for those of you not tagged and actually got through this whole post, kudos to you, and pls feel free to do this as well!! i hope you all have a lovely day <33

[laurelkrugerr]

A Monthly Update On All Things Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

Every month, we present an overview of things the Smashing team has been working on — all in one place. The past few weeks have been quite challenging: COVID-19 crisis, #BlackLivesMatter, and so many other ongoing issues taking place all over the world. Here’s what’s been happening on our end in the meantime.

The entire Smashing team has been doing its very best to bring you live sessions with real experts — people with practical experience who love to share what they have learned throughout their careers. We organized Smashing Meets on three days — events that were open to everyone in the web community. With sessions on performance, CSS, GraphQL, and creative courage, we made sure to leave plenty of time for Q&A, networking, competitions and prizes.

We’re overwhelmed with the feedback we’ve received since then; many of you seemed to mostly enjoy spending time with speakers, and asking questions directly. A huge thank you again to everyone who joined in — it was such an incredible experience to have shared with you all!

Henri Helvetica, Yiying Lu and Vitaly Friedman live on screen at the recent Smashing Meets event. (Image credit: Yiying Lu)

Smashing Meets Schedule Overview (May & June)

Smashing Online Workshops: Coming Up Next

Mark your calendars! We’ll be organizing even more online events in the next weeks. Whether the spotlight shines on CSS, accessibility, performance or UX, we want to help you boost your skills and learn practical, actionable insights from experts in the industry.

The previous workshops have been incredibly popular with many becoming sold out, so do check the details and save your spot as soon as you can.

Staying up to date can be so difficult. It’s a jungle out there, but we have you covered! See online events →

One last thing. In case you find yourself thinking twice about joining in a Smashing workshops just because you think your manager could need just a little bit more persuasion, then we’ve got your back with a neat lil’ template: Convince Your Boss. Good luck!

Our Latest Addition To The Smashing Books: Shipping Now

We’re so proud to have officially released Paul Boag’s book, “Click! How To Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks”. It is a detailed guide on how to increase conversion and boost business KPIs without alienating customers along the way, and we’re sure you’ll find it tremendously useful.

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee. Tell me more →

Smashing Podcast: Tune In!

18 episodes in, the Smashing Podcast has been better than we had ever expected! Every two weeks, Drew McLellan speaks to folks from different backgrounds, and there’s always so much to learn and share! You’re always welcome to tune in and share your questions and thoughts with us anytime.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

We publish a new article every day on various topics that are current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers seemed to enjoy the most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Modern CSS Solutions For Old CSS Problems

We all know that CSS can sometimes be tricky to master. Just think of the classic question of how to center a div. In ��Modern CSS Solutions for Old CSS Problems”, Stephanie Eckles explores solutions to those big and small CSS problems she has been solving in the last 13 years of being a front-end developer.

Apart from the old centering issue, the series explores challenges like creating elements of equal height, making dropdown menus accessible, styling buttons, and much more. Be sure to check back regularly as Stephanie keeps adding new topics. Brilliant!

Illustrations For Everyone

Illustrations are a great way to add a personal touch to a design. However, not everyone is a born illustrator and not every project has the budget to hire someone who masters the craft. During the lockdown, Pablo Stanley and a few of his friends decided to change that and created a tool that makes art more accessible and gives everyone the ability to use illustrations in their creations. Meet Blush.

Blush is a collection of 13 mix-and-match illustration libraries created by artists from around the world. Whether it’s characters, cityscapes, plants, food, or a piece of abstract art, you can pick your favorite illustration from one of the packs and customize every little detail until you have the combination you need to tell your story. As Pablo puts it, it’s “like playing legos made of vectors”. The illustrations can be downloaded for free as high-quality PNGs. If you are an illustrator yourself and would like to make your work available to other makers, too, you can apply to get featured in Blush. A fantastic example of sharing and caring.

Learn Flexbox With Code Tidbits

You’ve always wanted to learn Flexbox but the whole undertaking seemed a bit, well, daunting? It doesn’t have to be. In fact, it might only take 30 code tidbits to get you on the path to mastering some Flexbox magic. Samantha Ming has got your back.

In her free course Flexbox30, Samantha takes you through 30 short and crisp Flexbox lessons. After learning the core concepts of Flexbox, you will explore the ins and outs of parent and child properties. Each lesson comes with a cheat sheet that you can download which makes the course also a great refresher if you already know your way around Flexbox but struggle with some of the properties.

Global Website Speed Profiler

Performance benchmarking tools usually measure performance form a single location. But how does your site perform for real-world users who aren’t based in that one location? To get more precise results for their own market, the folks behind the WordPress security plugin Wordfence built Fast or Slow, a tool that measures real-world performance from different locations around the world.

Fast or Slow gets its data from a network of 13 servers in 13 cities around the world. Each server was calibrated to have the same performance so that the speed measurements give a true indication of what the site feels like to a real user. The performance test provides you with an overall score of a site’s performance and breaks the results further down by geographic location, while audits on CSS minification, image optimization, caching, and more help reveal specific performance bottlenecks. Fast Or Slow is free to use.

Sleek Browser Frames For Your Screenshots

With screenshots, there are usually two options: You take a screenshot of the entire browser window with browser extensions and maybe even bookmarks visible or, if you want something less distracting, you decide to only take a screenshot of the site without any border at all. If you’re looking for a more sophisticated solution, Browserframe might be for you.

Just drag and drop your screenshot into the tool, and it wraps it into a neat browser frame. There are multiple browsers, operating systems, and themes to choose from, and you can adjust the background color, shadow, padding, and some other details before you download the image. Perfect for blog posts, social media, slides, or wherever else you might want to use a screenshot.

SVG Path Data Syntax Explored

Do you know what the SVG path data syntax actually means? If not, you’re not alone. Mathieu Dutour has been working with SVGs for quite some time but always struggled to understand the path data structure. That’s why he built a visualizer for it.

The SVG Path Visualizer visualizes the SVG path data you enter and lets you discover all its different commands. There are also several examples you can explore to get more familiar with the syntax. An insightful look into the skeleton of an SVG.

The Future Is Here

Imagine you are working on a project and want to add a picture of a book to it. You have the book right beside you on your desk, so you take out your phone, take a picture of the book, send the picture to your computer, open it in Photoshop, remove the background, and, finally, include the picture in your file. Well, now what if you could copy and paste the book from reality onto your screen, just where you want it to be? What might sound like science fiction, is already possible today.

The research prototype AR Copy Paste allows you to copy elements from your surroundings and paste them into an image editing software. Three independent modules make it happen: a mobile app, a local server that acts as the interface between the app and Photoshop and finds the correct position on your screen, and, last but not least, an objection detection/background removal service to cut the image into shape. An impressive peek at the future of AR.

Black Illustrations

Black people and people of color are often underrepresented in illustrations and visuals. To spark change in the digital landscape, the team at 5four created Black Illustrations, illustration packs that paint a more diverse picture and show black people and people of color in a myriad of tasks.

There are six illustration packs that can be used on websites, pitch decks, infographics, or anywhere you like. Two of the decks are free to download: “The Office Hustle” shows people in an office environment, working from home, and having conversations, as well as in a healthcare setting, while “The Movement Pack” calls attention to #BlackLivesMatter and the fight against racial inequality. Other packs include education- and lifestyle-themed images. Beautiful designs with a powerful message.

See Easing Curves In Action

Movement in the real world is something fluid, no harsh or instant starts or stops, no constant speed. Easing curves help us bring that natural feel to motion on the web. However, in practice, they can be quite abstract to grasp, too.

With Easings, Paul Macgregor built a useful tool to visualize the effect common easing curves have on a range of interfaces — from a gallery carousel to a side menu, scroll jack, and modal. Just choose an easing curve from the collection to see it in action or enter a custom one. One for the bookmarks.

Insights Into How Developers Work Today

Since almost a decade, the yearly Developer Survey conducted by Stack Overflow is the largest survey of people who code. This year, they made it more representative of the diversity of programmers, asking 65,000 developers from around the world how they learn, which tools they use, and what they want. The survey was conducted in February and the results offer a comprehensive look inside the community.

The survey covers the developers’ professional and demographical background, looks at tools and their popularity, what the respondents’ dev environments look like and how they learn and solve problems, just like at their career values, job priorities, and working conditions. Interesting insights guaranteed.

CSS Art In A Single Div

What can you do in a single div? Lynn Fisher has a lot of creative answers to this question, as her CSS drawing project A Single Div shows.

Every drawing is made up of CSS living inside a single div element and uses a combination of Pug for templating and Stylus for CSS preprocessing. From lettering and geometrical patterns to random objects and little characters, each colorful tile is a wonderful example of what can be accomplished with CSS.

A Magic Notebook For Exploring Data

Open source has transformed software development, making sharing, collaboration, and transparency the norm. Inspired by this, Observable aims at reimagining data science for a connected world. To make it more approachable, accessible, and social.

Described as a “magic notebook for exploring data and thinking with code”, Observable lets you sketch with live data. You can prototype visualizations, connect to Web APIs, and see your “notebook” update instantly when changes are made. Learning from one another, sharing and reusing components with a community of fellow authors is a key part of the concept, teams are even able to edit a notebook together in realtime. Now what to make with it? Reports, explanatory visualizations, UI prototypes, documentation, art projects, visual designs — only your imagination is the limit.

(cm, vf, ra)

Website Design & SEO Delray Beach by DBL07.co

Delray Beach SEO

source http://www.scpie.org/a-monthly-update-on-all-things-smashing/ source https://scpie1.blogspot.com/2020/06/a-monthly-update-on-all-things-smashing.html

[riichardwilson]

A Monthly Update On All Things Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

Every month, we present an overview of things the Smashing team has been working on — all in one place. The past few weeks have been quite challenging: COVID-19 crisis, #BlackLivesMatter, and so many other ongoing issues taking place all over the world. Here’s what’s been happening on our end in the meantime.

The entire Smashing team has been doing its very best to bring you live sessions with real experts — people with practical experience who love to share what they have learned throughout their careers. We organized Smashing Meets on three days — events that were open to everyone in the web community. With sessions on performance, CSS, GraphQL, and creative courage, we made sure to leave plenty of time for Q&A, networking, competitions and prizes.

We’re overwhelmed with the feedback we’ve received since then; many of you seemed to mostly enjoy spending time with speakers, and asking questions directly. A huge thank you again to everyone who joined in — it was such an incredible experience to have shared with you all!

Henri Helvetica, Yiying Lu and Vitaly Friedman live on screen at the recent Smashing Meets event. (Image credit: Yiying Lu)

Smashing Meets Schedule Overview (May & June)

Smashing Online Workshops: Coming Up Next

Mark your calendars! We’ll be organizing even more online events in the next weeks. Whether the spotlight shines on CSS, accessibility, performance or UX, we want to help you boost your skills and learn practical, actionable insights from experts in the industry.

The previous workshops have been incredibly popular with many becoming sold out, so do check the details and save your spot as soon as you can.

Staying up to date can be so difficult. It’s a jungle out there, but we have you covered! See online events →

One last thing. In case you find yourself thinking twice about joining in a Smashing workshops just because you think your manager could need just a little bit more persuasion, then we’ve got your back with a neat lil’ template: Convince Your Boss. Good luck!

Our Latest Addition To The Smashing Books: Shipping Now

We’re so proud to have officially released Paul Boag’s book, “Click! How To Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks”. It is a detailed guide on how to increase conversion and boost business KPIs without alienating customers along the way, and we’re sure you’ll find it tremendously useful.

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee. Tell me more →

Smashing Podcast: Tune In!

18 episodes in, the Smashing Podcast has been better than we had ever expected! Every two weeks, Drew McLellan speaks to folks from different backgrounds, and there’s always so much to learn and share! You’re always welcome to tune in and share your questions and thoughts with us anytime.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

We publish a new article every day on various topics that are current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers seemed to enjoy the most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Modern CSS Solutions For Old CSS Problems

We all know that CSS can sometimes be tricky to master. Just think of the classic question of how to center a div. In “Modern CSS Solutions for Old CSS Problems”, Stephanie Eckles explores solutions to those big and small CSS problems she has been solving in the last 13 years of being a front-end developer.

Apart from the old centering issue, the series explores challenges like creating elements of equal height, making dropdown menus accessible, styling buttons, and much more. Be sure to check back regularly as Stephanie keeps adding new topics. Brilliant!

Illustrations For Everyone

Illustrations are a great way to add a personal touch to a design. However, not everyone is a born illustrator and not every project has the budget to hire someone who masters the craft. During the lockdown, Pablo Stanley and a few of his friends decided to change that and created a tool that makes art more accessible and gives everyone the ability to use illustrations in their creations. Meet Blush.

Blush is a collection of 13 mix-and-match illustration libraries created by artists from around the world. Whether it’s characters, cityscapes, plants, food, or a piece of abstract art, you can pick your favorite illustration from one of the packs and customize every little detail until you have the combination you need to tell your story. As Pablo puts it, it’s “like playing legos made of vectors”. The illustrations can be downloaded for free as high-quality PNGs. If you are an illustrator yourself and would like to make your work available to other makers, too, you can apply to get featured in Blush. A fantastic example of sharing and caring.

Learn Flexbox With Code Tidbits

You’ve always wanted to learn Flexbox but the whole undertaking seemed a bit, well, daunting? It doesn’t have to be. In fact, it might only take 30 code tidbits to get you on the path to mastering some Flexbox magic. Samantha Ming has got your back.

In her free course Flexbox30, Samantha takes you through 30 short and crisp Flexbox lessons. After learning the core concepts of Flexbox, you will explore the ins and outs of parent and child properties. Each lesson comes with a cheat sheet that you can download which makes the course also a great refresher if you already know your way around Flexbox but struggle with some of the properties.

Global Website Speed Profiler

Performance benchmarking tools usually measure performance form a single location. But how does your site perform for real-world users who aren’t based in that one location? To get more precise results for their own market, the folks behind the WordPress security plugin Wordfence built Fast or Slow, a tool that measures real-world performance from different locations around the world.

Fast or Slow gets its data from a network of 13 servers in 13 cities around the world. Each server was calibrated to have the same performance so that the speed measurements give a true indication of what the site feels like to a real user. The performance test provides you with an overall score of a site’s performance and breaks the results further down by geographic location, while audits on CSS minification, image optimization, caching, and more help reveal specific performance bottlenecks. Fast Or Slow is free to use.

Sleek Browser Frames For Your Screenshots

With screenshots, there are usually two options: You take a screenshot of the entire browser window with browser extensions and maybe even bookmarks visible or, if you want something less distracting, you decide to only take a screenshot of the site without any border at all. If you’re looking for a more sophisticated solution, Browserframe might be for you.

Just drag and drop your screenshot into the tool, and it wraps it into a neat browser frame. There are multiple browsers, operating systems, and themes to choose from, and you can adjust the background color, shadow, padding, and some other details before you download the image. Perfect for blog posts, social media, slides, or wherever else you might want to use a screenshot.

SVG Path Data Syntax Explored

Do you know what the SVG path data syntax actually means? If not, you’re not alone. Mathieu Dutour has been working with SVGs for quite some time but always struggled to understand the path data structure. That’s why he built a visualizer for it.

The SVG Path Visualizer visualizes the SVG path data you enter and lets you discover all its different commands. There are also several examples you can explore to get more familiar with the syntax. An insightful look into the skeleton of an SVG.

The Future Is Here

Imagine you are working on a project and want to add a picture of a book to it. You have the book right beside you on your desk, so you take out your phone, take a picture of the book, send the picture to your computer, open it in Photoshop, remove the background, and, finally, include the picture in your file. Well, now what if you could copy and paste the book from reality onto your screen, just where you want it to be? What might sound like science fiction, is already possible today.

The research prototype AR Copy Paste allows you to copy elements from your surroundings and paste them into an image editing software. Three independent modules make it happen: a mobile app, a local server that acts as the interface between the app and Photoshop and finds the correct position on your screen, and, last but not least, an objection detection/background removal service to cut the image into shape. An impressive peek at the future of AR.

Black Illustrations

Black people and people of color are often underrepresented in illustrations and visuals. To spark change in the digital landscape, the team at 5four created Black Illustrations, illustration packs that paint a more diverse picture and show black people and people of color in a myriad of tasks.

There are six illustration packs that can be used on websites, pitch decks, infographics, or anywhere you like. Two of the decks are free to download: “The Office Hustle” shows people in an office environment, working from home, and having conversations, as well as in a healthcare setting, while “The Movement Pack” calls attention to #BlackLivesMatter and the fight against racial inequality. Other packs include education- and lifestyle-themed images. Beautiful designs with a powerful message.

See Easing Curves In Action

Movement in the real world is something fluid, no harsh or instant starts or stops, no constant speed. Easing curves help us bring that natural feel to motion on the web. However, in practice, they can be quite abstract to grasp, too.

With Easings, Paul Macgregor built a useful tool to visualize the effect common easing curves have on a range of interfaces — from a gallery carousel to a side menu, scroll jack, and modal. Just choose an easing curve from the collection to see it in action or enter a custom one. One for the bookmarks.

Insights Into How Developers Work Today

Since almost a decade, the yearly Developer Survey conducted by Stack Overflow is the largest survey of people who code. This year, they made it more representative of the diversity of programmers, asking 65,000 developers from around the world how they learn, which tools they use, and what they want. The survey was conducted in February and the results offer a comprehensive look inside the community.

The survey covers the developers’ professional and demographical background, looks at tools and their popularity, what the respondents’ dev environments look like and how they learn and solve problems, just like at their career values, job priorities, and working conditions. Interesting insights guaranteed.

CSS Art In A Single Div

What can you do in a single div? Lynn Fisher has a lot of creative answers to this question, as her CSS drawing project A Single Div shows.

Every drawing is made up of CSS living inside a single div element and uses a combination of Pug for templating and Stylus for CSS preprocessing. From lettering and geometrical patterns to random objects and little characters, each colorful tile is a wonderful example of what can be accomplished with CSS.

A Magic Notebook For Exploring Data

Open source has transformed software development, making sharing, collaboration, and transparency the norm. Inspired by this, Observable aims at reimagining data science for a connected world. To make it more approachable, accessible, and social.

Described as a “magic notebook for exploring data and thinking with code”, Observable lets you sketch with live data. You can prototype visualizations, connect to Web APIs, and see your “notebook” update instantly when changes are made. Learning from one another, sharing and reusing components with a community of fellow authors is a key part of the concept, teams are even able to edit a notebook together in realtime. Now what to make with it? Reports, explanatory visualizations, UI prototypes, documentation, art projects, visual designs — only your imagination is the limit.

(cm, vf, ra)

Website Design & SEO Delray Beach by DBL07.co

Delray Beach SEO

source http://www.scpie.org/a-monthly-update-on-all-things-smashing/ source https://scpie.tumblr.com/post/621459383154573312

[scpie]

A Monthly Update On All Things Smashing

About The Author

Juggling between three languages on a daily basis, Iris is known for her love of linguistics, arts, web design and typography, as well as her goldmine of … More about Iris …

Every month, we present an overview of things the Smashing team has been working on — all in one place. The past few weeks have been quite challenging: COVID-19 crisis, #BlackLivesMatter, and so many other ongoing issues taking place all over the world. Here’s what’s been happening on our end in the meantime.

The entire Smashing team has been doing its very best to bring you live sessions with real experts — people with practical experience who love to share what they have learned throughout their careers. We organized Smashing Meets on three days — events that were open to everyone in the web community. With sessions on performance, CSS, GraphQL, and creative courage, we made sure to leave plenty of time for Q&A, networking, competitions and prizes.

We’re overwhelmed with the feedback we’ve received since then; many of you seemed to mostly enjoy spending time with speakers, and asking questions directly. A huge thank you again to everyone who joined in — it was such an incredible experience to have shared with you all!

Henri Helvetica, Yiying Lu and Vitaly Friedman live on screen at the recent Smashing Meets event. (Image credit: Yiying Lu)

Smashing Meets Schedule Overview (May & June)

Smashing Online Workshops: Coming Up Next

Mark your calendars! We’ll be organizing even more online events in the next weeks. Whether the spotlight shines on CSS, accessibility, performance or UX, we want to help you boost your skills and learn practical, actionable insights from experts in the industry.

The previous workshops have been incredibly popular with many becoming sold out, so do check the details and save your spot as soon as you can.

Staying up to date can be so difficult. It’s a jungle out there, but we have you covered! See online events →

One last thing. In case you find yourself thinking twice about joining in a Smashing workshops just because you think your manager could need just a little bit more persuasion, then we’ve got your back with a neat lil’ template: Convince Your Boss. Good luck!

Our Latest Addition To The Smashing Books: Shipping Now

We’re so proud to have officially released Paul Boag’s book, “Click! How To Encourage Clicks Without Shady Tricks”. It is a detailed guide on how to increase conversion and boost business KPIs without alienating customers along the way, and we’re sure you’ll find it tremendously useful.

Quality hardcover. Free worldwide shipping. 100 days money-back-guarantee. Tell me more →

Smashing Podcast: Tune In!

18 episodes in, the Smashing Podcast has been better than we had ever expected! Every two weeks, Drew McLellan speaks to folks from different backgrounds, and there’s always so much to learn and share! You’re always welcome to tune in and share your questions and thoughts with us anytime.

Trending Topics On Smashing Magazine

We publish a new article every day on various topics that are current in the web industry. Here are some that our readers seemed to enjoy the most and have recommended further:

Best Picks From Our Newsletter

We’ll be honest: Every second week, we struggle with keeping the Smashing Newsletter issues at a moderate length — there are just so many talented folks out there working on brilliant projects! Kudos to everyone involved!

Interested in sponsoring? Feel free to check out our partnership options and get in touch with the team anytime — they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.

P.S. A huge thank you to Cosima Mielke for writing and preparing these posts!

Modern CSS Solutions For Old CSS Problems

We all know that CSS can sometimes be tricky to master. Just think of the classic question of how to center a div. In “Modern CSS Solutions for Old CSS Problems”, Stephanie Eckles explores solutions to those big and small CSS problems she has been solving in the last 13 years of being a front-end developer.

Apart from the old centering issue, the series explores challenges like creating elements of equal height, making dropdown menus accessible, styling buttons, and much more. Be sure to check back regularly as Stephanie keeps adding new topics. Brilliant!

Illustrations For Everyone

Illustrations are a great way to add a personal touch to a design. However, not everyone is a born illustrator and not every project has the budget to hire someone who masters the craft. During the lockdown, Pablo Stanley and a few of his friends decided to change that and created a tool that makes art more accessible and gives everyone the ability to use illustrations in their creations. Meet Blush.

Blush is a collection of 13 mix-and-match illustration libraries created by artists from around the world. Whether it’s characters, cityscapes, plants, food, or a piece of abstract art, you can pick your favorite illustration from one of the packs and customize every little detail until you have the combination you need to tell your story. As Pablo puts it, it’s “like playing legos made of vectors”. The illustrations can be downloaded for free as high-quality PNGs. If you are an illustrator yourself and would like to make your work available to other makers, too, you can apply to get featured in Blush. A fantastic example of sharing and caring.

Learn Flexbox With Code Tidbits

You’ve always wanted to learn Flexbox but the whole undertaking seemed a bit, well, daunting? It doesn’t have to be. In fact, it might only take 30 code tidbits to get you on the path to mastering some Flexbox magic. Samantha Ming has got your back.

In her free course Flexbox30, Samantha takes you through 30 short and crisp Flexbox lessons. After learning the core concepts of Flexbox, you will explore the ins and outs of parent and child properties. Each lesson comes with a cheat sheet that you can download which makes the course also a great refresher if you already know your way around Flexbox but struggle with some of the properties.

Global Website Speed Profiler

Performance benchmarking tools usually measure performance form a single location. But how does your site perform for real-world users who aren’t based in that one location? To get more precise results for their own market, the folks behind the WordPress security plugin Wordfence built Fast or Slow, a tool that measures real-world performance from different locations around the world.

Fast or Slow gets its data from a network of 13 servers in 13 cities around the world. Each server was calibrated to have the same performance so that the speed measurements give a true indication of what the site feels like to a real user. The performance test provides you with an overall score of a site’s performance and breaks the results further down by geographic location, while audits on CSS minification, image optimization, caching, and more help reveal specific performance bottlenecks. Fast Or Slow is free to use.

Sleek Browser Frames For Your Screenshots

With screenshots, there are usually two options: You take a screenshot of the entire browser window with browser extensions and maybe even bookmarks visible or, if you want something less distracting, you decide to only take a screenshot of the site without any border at all. If you’re looking for a more sophisticated solution, Browserframe might be for you.

Just drag and drop your screenshot into the tool, and it wraps it into a neat browser frame. There are multiple browsers, operating systems, and themes to choose from, and you can adjust the background color, shadow, padding, and some other details before you download the image. Perfect for blog posts, social media, slides, or wherever else you might want to use a screenshot.

SVG Path Data Syntax Explored

Do you know what the SVG path data syntax actually means? If not, you’re not alone. Mathieu Dutour has been working with SVGs for quite some time but always struggled to understand the path data structure. That’s why he built a visualizer for it.

The SVG Path Visualizer visualizes the SVG path data you enter and lets you discover all its different commands. There are also several examples you can explore to get more familiar with the syntax. An insightful look into the skeleton of an SVG.

The Future Is Here

Imagine you are working on a project and want to add a picture of a book to it. You have the book right beside you on your desk, so you take out your phone, take a picture of the book, send the picture to your computer, open it in Photoshop, remove the background, and, finally, include the picture in your file. Well, now what if you could copy and paste the book from reality onto your screen, just where you want it to be? What might sound like science fiction, is already possible today.

The research prototype AR Copy Paste allows you to copy elements from your surroundings and paste them into an image editing software. Three independent modules make it happen: a mobile app, a local server that acts as the interface between the app and Photoshop and finds the correct position on your screen, and, last but not least, an objection detection/background removal service to cut the image into shape. An impressive peek at the future of AR.

Black Illustrations

Black people and people of color are often underrepresented in illustrations and visuals. To spark change in the digital landscape, the team at 5four created Black Illustrations, illustration packs that paint a more diverse picture and show black people and people of color in a myriad of tasks.

There are six illustration packs that can be used on websites, pitch decks, infographics, or anywhere you like. Two of the decks are free to download: “The Office Hustle” shows people in an office environment, working from home, and having conversations, as well as in a healthcare setting, while “The Movement Pack” calls attention to #BlackLivesMatter and the fight against racial inequality. Other packs include education- and lifestyle-themed images. Beautiful designs with a powerful message.

See Easing Curves In Action

Movement in the real world is something fluid, no harsh or instant starts or stops, no constant speed. Easing curves help us bring that natural feel to motion on the web. However, in practice, they can be quite abstract to grasp, too.

With Easings, Paul Macgregor built a useful tool to visualize the effect common easing curves have on a range of interfaces — from a gallery carousel to a side menu, scroll jack, and modal. Just choose an easing curve from the collection to see it in action or enter a custom one. One for the bookmarks.

Insights Into How Developers Work Today

Since almost a decade, the yearly Developer Survey conducted by Stack Overflow is the largest survey of people who code. This year, they made it more representative of the diversity of programmers, asking 65,000 developers from around the world how they learn, which tools they use, and what they want. The survey was conducted in February and the results offer a comprehensive look inside the community.

The survey covers the developers’ professional and demographical background, looks at tools and their popularity, what the respondents’ dev environments look like and how they learn and solve problems, just like at their career values, job priorities, and working conditions. Interesting insights guaranteed.

CSS Art In A Single Div

What can you do in a single div? Lynn Fisher has a lot of creative answers to this question, as her CSS drawing project A Single Div shows.

Every drawing is made up of CSS living inside a single div element and uses a combination of Pug for templating and Stylus for CSS preprocessing. From lettering and geometrical patterns to random objects and little characters, each colorful tile is a wonderful example of what can be accomplished with CSS.

A Magic Notebook For Exploring Data

Open source has transformed software development, making sharing, collaboration, and transparency the norm. Inspired by this, Observable aims at reimagining data science for a connected world. To make it more approachable, accessible, and social.

Described as a “magic notebook for exploring data and thinking with code”, Observable lets you sketch with live data. You can prototype visualizations, connect to Web APIs, and see your “notebook” update instantly when changes are made. Learning from one another, sharing and reusing components with a community of fellow authors is a key part of the concept, teams are even able to edit a notebook together in realtime. Now what to make with it? Reports, explanatory visualizations, UI prototypes, documentation, art projects, visual designs — only your imagination is the limit.

(cm, vf, ra)

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source http://www.scpie.org/a-monthly-update-on-all-things-smashing/

[squadron-of-damned]

For the fanfic ask: 5, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19, 21, 23, 30

5) most popular fic this year

Both by hits and kudos, according to AO3, it’s The Many Deaths of Me.

12) favorite character to write about this year

That would be Ricin “Raven” Korbie. Although, only one of his stories (it’s an original story) is on AO3 so far and most of the writing has happened in text DnD.

13) favorite writing song/artist/album of this year

Hmm... Ben Kaplan.

17) fics you’ll continue next year

Cosette Chapeau, The Many Deaths of Me, and The One in which He Didn’t Make it Home, hopefully. If I kick myself in arse, there might be an update on Present Perfect too, but I don’t count on it.

18) current number of wips

10

19) any new fics to start next year

There certainly is going to be something, but I don’t know what. Downey/Vetinari as old retired gay couple of clever men who are the Disc’s biggest idiots, ft. dogs not named Emma, like I have one started, but there is going to be more of that. Maybe something focused on Constantin and Twinklemon. I am planning to make a backup of WoWHQ to my AO3. If I am lucky to receive prompts, I’ll do the prompts.

21) most memorable comment/review

“I started to read this story because there are so few Bolvar fics, let alone Bolvar the Lich King fics. Finding another is always exciting. I am happy that you are writing this. We need more Lich King Bolvar and it always nice to see more of Kel'thuzad, the second in command that seems to keep outliving the master(s).I love on all the OC and minor canon characters that present the Scourge in a more interesting light. It was also clever having the lichs being able to cosplay as themselves. It would avoid the otherwise unavoidable 'Lich sighted... attack' issues.I love on how you create multiple potential story lines such as Bolvar concerned about the switch of loyalty but Kel'thuzad is too important, Bolvar struggles with the change of leadership styles for the Scourge is vary interesting to see for him to accept certain behaviors and expectations that while common in the Scourge is very out of place in most other armies (including Stormwind's), not to mention that rampant PTSD for the undead that can think, plus the background of what is happening in the rest of the world.I agree with the critic that descriptions is handy for mood. A good example is in chapter 2 with '... but Bolvar was lost in thoughts and when Kel'thuzad noticed it, which was quite soon, he went silent too. The cold chamber of the Icecrown Citadel was filled with echo.' Throw a few more of those into the fic and that will help with ambient mood of the story.It is interesting on Bolvar and Kel'thuzad relationship as reluctant King and professional second-in-command. They are also both are affect by memories that they both inherited. I wonder on how the Cult of the Damned fit into this. It is weakly suggested that Bolvar does not care for them. Care to elaborate? I am generally curious about Bolvar's opinions. I also agree with that critic on having more of Bolvar's opinion. It is the reason I am reading this fic. Especially once you veer off of canon.I am curious on what abilities that Bolvar have. He was a paladin-warrior, fused with life based magic, with that memories of a shaman and necromancer. It would be ironic if the Lich King, the King of the Dead having the ability of bring plants (and maybe animals) to life. Or be able to somewhat feel the land like Kel'thuzad did in chapter 5.Oh... and more mention of the numerous cats. Cats are awesome. Maybe have a kitten start sleeping on the rather warm Lich King. Much to Bolvar's surprise.Keep writing -Ra.“

(Seshat-ra on Chapter 6: Thorough the Valley of the Dead of The Many Daths of Me.)

23) fics you wanted to write but didn’t

I wanted to write Author’s Foreword/A Foreword from the Author, I have it WIP, but just... didn’t manage to get past the first part and it’s now in the “uh” file where are stored all WIPs I am going to finish eventually, just so they don’t occupy space at the front of my mind. It is eventually going to be a continuation of the It’s Quiet in Basketville series, and flips views from present to past and back. In the present Vetinari is being melancholic and lonely during May while Downey is on business trip in Glitz, and the former is offered different points of view on the later by Lucius “Lus Twinklemon” Twinkle-Clement-Monger, as well as there is made a parallel betwenn Constantin and Twinklemon, and Vetinari and Downey and their respective relationships. In the past we watch young Downey more or less managing in Snapcase’s Ankh-Morpork. One of the things it should have featured was young Madam July, I wanted to include Offer Littlegood and his immaculate machine which stood behind Verbo Incooperativus Testis, and most likely than not letters to Ludo.

30) favorite fandom to read fic from this year

A tie between Les Misérables and Discworld. Sadly, other fandoms had too few things I’d like to read in he quality I was willing to read, and haven’t read yet at the same time.