#my style depends on the emotion or the character or the scene i'm drawing. and i hope seeing how messy my process can be

[fernsnailz]

cleaning out the files, sonic sketch edition

[heretherebeturtles-comic]

How long does the process take you to get one (or more) comic page done? I love the idea of making comics but i suck at structure, you know with the script and posting/layout. I was wondering if you had any tips or what you wish you knew before you started.?

Sorry if this had been asked before

OOOooooo a fun question for me!! I love talking about comic creation :D

I do my best to keep the full process under 2 days (or 12-14 hours of work) per fully coloured page. I'm trying to get faster, but speed comes with time and experience.

Hmmm as for tips and things I wish I knew... so many things... I should let it be known that I am an artist and not really a writer, but your questions are focused on script/planning/structure, so I'm going to focus the advice on that.

Start with something small - Learn about making comics and find a comfortable style through making a couple smaller comics and then try your passion project. Writing and planning smaller comics with fewer pages takes a different kind of puzzle solving and thought process. Smaller page limits can force you to try new things which you can then apply to larger projects to save time; limitations breed creativity after all. Every attempt made (even an unfinished project) is knowledge gained that you can apply again for future projects.

Study comics! - It's hard to create if you aren't feeding the mind and giving it things to learn and create from. Read comics made by professionals and study how they handle pacing. How many pages are they dedicating to each moment? What do you think of their pacing and what would you change? Take a sketchbook and make small rectangles and draw out the panel layout from that comic. What are they doing that works and what don't you like about it? How would you do that differently? ... I think this is me assigning homework... i am so sorry.

Set a hard page limit - Try to get your story told within that limit, and then add more pages if necessary. More pages = more time you have to spend working on it. Most standard single issue American comics are roughly 24 pages. I try to work inside that limit using a rough 5 page per scene structure.

Condense or Cut - I struggle so hard with this one, but comics aren't written in the same way as a novel is. They have a slightly different plot structure and a much more limited amount of pages to tell the story in. Obviously it depends on the story being told, and what kind of scenes are important to that genre of story, but in general, unnecessary scenes should be cut out. examples...

CUT! Having the characters go out to get ice cream is cute, but you don't need to show them each ordering their ice cream unless the flavour they choose is an important plot point. Skip to the last one receiving their ice cream and turning to the others who already have theirs and are having that deep discussion. OR skip that scene entirely and have a quiet panel of them sitting in the park at sunset, already holding their ice cream, before delving into the deep emotional conversation they will be having.

CONDENSE! You can combine two scenes if you need to. If you have one scene where two characters are having a casual conversation and another where they are sneaking into a building? Stick them together. They can sneak AND talk and now you've only used up 5 pages instead of 10.

Comics take a LONG TIME to make!! - you have to make peace with that _(:Ⅰ」∠)_ Comics, especially full colour ones, are an extremely labour intensive and time consuming way of telling a story. If one page takes 1 day (8 hrs of work) and you have 24 pages, that is 24 days of working on one comic.

Thumbnails! - Draw the pages small and rough first! It's easier to plan things and mess around with the layouts when you don't have an emotional attachment to how the art inside looks. Once you have a layout you like, you can then draw it again in full page size and work on it from there.

Page and panel layouts are my favourite part of the whole process, I could talk forever about it, but I do not have the energy for it right now. I'll save panel/page layout for another time.

It doesn't have to be perfect!!! - IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE PERFECT!!!! (shouted with excitement btw). Panels can be boring! A page can be extremely simple! The art can be messy! The dialog can be simple! The plot can go nowhere! In fact it is really really fun to make a messy imperfect comic on purpose. Destroy the perfectionist in you, because they will always and forever hold you back from actually creating things. "what if it's bad?" what if it's fun? what if you learn cool things?

Anyway, those are my tips/advice, idk if I actually answered what you were asking... sorry about all the time commitment ones, that is something I really wish I had figured out a few years ago lol.

Comics are fun to make and a lot of learning how to make them is just jumping in, encountering a problem, and then learning how to solve it.

[tamayula-hl]

I am sure many of you are surprised that I suddenly started drawing MC eyes (personalities) 🤣

1. As I started to draw the boys in a more realistic manner, I started to feel uncomfortable drawing the MC with no eyes drawn 2. started to feel difficulty in expressing MC's emotions without drawing his eyes 3. And after thinking about my future creative direction, I realized that what I really want to do most is to draw MCs with eyes (personalities) (there are so many attractive MCs in this fandom, I was afraid to present my own MCs with personalities… 🤣🤣🤣)

These are the reasons why all of a sudden I started drawing MCs with eyes! I'm sorry to everyone who has been looking forward to seeing MCs with no eyes (≒ readers), but I'm going to try my best with my new creative policy from now on🙇‍

First of all, thank you so much for liking my NSFW piece! I have been getting requests from various people about their aftercare, and I have a strong desire to draw it myself, but I haven't been able to come up with a good expression and idea for it yet 😂. I can't wait to draw how the Slytherins, who were dominant and devoured the MCs like animals during the intimate act, treat the MCs sweetly and politely during the aftercare 💪💪.

Oh thank you!😫🙏💕✨ おそらく同じ人からでしょうか？このように私の慣れ親しんだ日本語でたくさんの温かいお言葉を頂けてとても嬉しいです！ あなたがくれたたくさんのメッセージのおかげで、元気になれました！心からありがとうございます😌

Awww what a fragile, sad, yet somehow beautiful story 😭😭✨ Yes, the time when the Titanic sank and the time when Ominis lived are exactly the same… (I sometimes look at the movie Titanic when I paint to see what the characters are wearing 😌) The fact that Ominis and MC died at the young age of about 37 years old on the Titanic to escape from the spell of Gaunt is too sad. But I can't help but hope that their only son, the fruit of their love, survives and lives a happy life with the Ominis bloodline 😭✨

This adorable message from you (and this precious dog and cat!) made me smile! Thank you so much💕😌🙏

Wow, really? I've never helped with a drawing like that, but I'm very curious and would love to get a sneak peek of that work 😌🤣🙏. On a side note, I must confess that my recent drawing style has been very much influenced by a cartoon called “Veil” by Kotteri! It is my goal to create amazing and beautiful drawings like those vintage movies and posters 😍

Hehe, thanks! I am very happy to receive such compliments and warm words 😌💕🫶

I've always wanted to one day replace that famous 1852 painting of Ophelia as Sakurako, and the story of Hamlet Sebastian and Ophelia Sakurako would be very interesting 🤣💕💕. I love Taylor Swift's “Love Story” so I would love to paint a Romeo and Juliet homage Ominis x MC someday 😌

Very difficult choice 🤣. I can be a Seb girl or an Omi girl depending on my mood at the time, so it's really hard to choose one or the other! By the way, today I am Omi girl 😂💕

I actually haven't read most of attack on titan, but I know its famous scenes and I'd love to draw a touching comic that pays homage to them someday 🥲💪

[leoneliterary]

i love how you write SO MUCH, youve inspired me in so many ways, and one of the mcs i made for your game has turned into a personal oc who i love DEARLY. do you have any writing tips, specifically on description? i love how you describe things and show not only emotion and actions, but the WORLD AND HISTORY of hashind itself! its all so amazing and im just RLLY eager to see if u have any tips i could use to improve my own writing

Aww thank you so much! This is so kind, and I don't feel like I'm equipped to give anyone advice, but here goes nothing!!

First, don't focus too much on emulating another writer's style. Some people prefer their descriptions short and punchy, others like them long and flowery. You can like to read all of them, but prefer to write in one specifically.

As for how I write my descriptions of settings, I lead with the sensations. If it's sunny, I think about the warmth that you feel on your skin, how the sun heats the rocks under your feet. Then I try to tie that with mood. The beginning of HAT is dreary and has an air of hopelessness, so the heat needed to feel stifling, dire, and oppressive. When the MC is an adult, Cusmo feels less large and looming and your character has more mastery of it, so I try to describe things as if the character is used to them, with minimal discomfort.

Writing world and history ties into worldbuilding. There are plenty of resources for how to do it online, but nothing beats actually doig it. Draw on real history or geography (always with respect and sensitivity of course) but also rely on your imagination. Some people create a world aound their characters, while others think of what characters and stories would inhabit the world they've created. You have to explore that for yourself.

Ask yourself if your characters are outsiders to the world or actively live in it. The MC in HAT knows Cusmo, but not the palace or outside Hashind. So I describe these places differently based on level of familiarity.

Finally, emotions are difficult. People may say show, but don't tell, and I say that there is a time for both. For a main character's internal thoughts, sometimes I just tell the reader. With characters like the ROs, sometimes I tell, hint, or show through mannerisms. It just depends on the scene.

Do whatever works for the story you want to tell, and learn to love and improve your writing style. Don't be disappointed if it doesn't look or sound like someone else's and take all advice (especially mine lol) with a grain of salt.

Thank you for the ask and I hope this was helpful!

[snugglesquiggle]

hi again! I have another question😭 do you have any tips on writing pre-existing characters? (while still adding more to the table of course.) How do you keep it in character? like how you write J or Uzi for example.

unfortunately, this is an area where my expertise is more intuitive than theoretical.

before i'd ever written a word of Hostile Takeover, i had watched murder drones a few times and read many fanfics (in addition to being moderately versed in character writing already), so i already had a decent knack for holding a character's idea-shape in my head and rotating it into new configurations.

but let me try my best.

there are two different things you need to grapple with when writing an established character. it's simple enough: you need to understand them both internally and externally. but let me explain

external understanding is easiest to recognize and for me, easiest to pull off. it's the character voice, style, and vibe. for J, it's the buzzwords and condescension, for Uzi it's the sardonic teenage lilt and the insecure grandiosity.

for this, i recommend getting the episode transcripts and reading them. copy/paste all of the lines for the character you're studying into a personal notes document, and pay attention to how their lines are constructed. what words do they use most often? how do they structure their sentences?

there are some broad spectra you can clock dialogue on right away. what sort of vocabulary do they use? is it simple or complex, formal or slang, gamer or sailor? do they speak concisely, or at rambling length? confidently or insecurely, politely or rudely, passionately or callously, convincingly or deceptively, literally or flowerily?

these are generic buckets, but even if you treat them as dichotomies, ten yes/no binaries is already enough to write a thousand subtly different characters. and i already know you can think of specific vibes i didn't list out here, because there's so many to choose from

sometimes, when i'm writing J, i feel my command of her voice slipping, and i just write her as an archetypal Articulate Dominant Lady. but to a first approximation, that is J. she's confident and she comports herself with sophistication. not every panel of a comic will or can have a character fully rendered, and not every frame of animation has them completely on-model

another thing to note here is that just how a character sounds depends on who they're talking to; J won't address Tessa the same way she addresses N, nor V the same way she addresses Uzi. so the possibilities i listed off aren't even true spectra, because a character falls differently on them in different scenes, in different moods

it's something you should consider practicing, the way musicians practice scales or artists do gesture drawing. can you write someone who sounds angry? how do you write an expert vs someone ignorant? how do you write someone talking to someone they deeply respect?

if you can get a handle on the general principles of portraying characters, it's a skill that'll generalize pretty broadly.

but don't just practice this. you'll struggle with certain emotions, certain mindsets — everyone does. what you want to do is be on the look out when you're reading and watching stuff — try to catch a writer pulling off what you struggle with, and think about how they did it

if there's a fic that captures the characters about as well as canon, don't be afraid to make a note of it, quote it somewhere where you can study it (but be sure to keep it labeled and sourced; don't plagiarize. it's for reference, not tracing). you have my permission to dissect my fics if you think it'll help you

but enough about general character writing advice. how do you practice writing specific characters? here's an exercise. take some lines of dialogue from somewhere, the more the better, and think. how could you rewrite it so that it sounds as if the character you're studying said it? what words would you have to swap around, what sounds all wrong and needs a rephrase — would they even say it all, and if not why?

all the better if you do this with multiple characters at once: then you can see side by side how their voices differ and how to distinguish them. (as well as what they have in common — sometimes it's surprising)

but speaking of distinguishing them, a great exercise is to try writing a scene that's just dialogue. not even with he said, she said tags, just the quotes. how can you make it clear who's speaking from their cadence alone? (hard mode: do this with more than two characters)

i've been pretty laser focused on dialogue so far (i suppose it might be why my dialogue is what everyone compliments), but it's far from the only thing that constitutes an external understanding of a character

body language and small scale action are key components of a character. J glares and puts her hands on her hips, Uzi balls her fists at her side, N salutes. in a sense, "body language" generalizes to the style of how they approach actions. V famously takes every excuse to crawl on the ceiling; is it really Uzi if she isn't going for style points in combat?

this depends on the medium, somewhat; the techniques for portraying character in prose are different from those of a visual medium.

people (myself included) always say the mark of good dialogue is that you can tell who's speaking without needed it attributed. rarer, in my experience, for someone to assert that you should be able to tell who's acting without a name or face. but shouldn't you?

and more importantly, what does it take to make actions characteristic? understand this, and you understand how to present characters

still, an external understanding of character is only enough to carry you through a scene or two at best. you can't effectively tell a good story if this is all you have. what we've developed so far is less a character than an aesthetic tendency.

what an external understanding gets you is a way to ornament and present words and acts so that they evoke a certain character. what it doesnt get you is the worldview and motivation that generates those words and acts

to truly write a character, you need to know what they value — no, you need to know what they're afraid of.

every character is a story. now, every story has a beginning, middle, and end. (or as i spelled it out in my last answer to an ask of yours, presentation, transition, and conclusion). so, my assertion there is a little bit misframed, because characters aren't really like this.

rather, every character is an incomplete story. beginning, middle, and to be continued. they have a backstory, their current entanglement in the plot, and the future directions they could go.

in my previous answer to you, i suggested stories should start in a state of falsehood. an example was that story of Uzi killing N, where she's thrilled at first, only to later realize she's feels kind of guilty. and i think this lens is the perfect one for understanding character arcs, and characters in general

the inciting incident to a character's life story is a problem that demands some resolution or cope to deal with, and a character is defined by how they deal with that problem. even (especially) after they're no longer dealing with the problem, those coping mechanisms remain

let me be more concrete. take Uzi for example. why is she Like That? her mom was killed by murder drones, and her dad neglects her. so she acts out in class for attention, so she comes up with a brazen scheme to win her dad's respect, so she's brash and insecure. because she's isolated, she'll never get anyone's recognition unless she fights for it

or consider Khan. he watched everything his people built be torn down, and the only way for things he cares about to survive are if he builds something protects them. why wouldn't he be obsessed with doors?

Doll's another clear case. she watched her parents be killed, so she must grasp for purpose and power by plotting revenge. but i think the important part of the trauma here isn't the injustice of it, or even the loss, but specifically the loss of control. V violently reshaped her life, nearly had the cheerleader at her mercy — and thus, the revenge plot reasserts her control.

this distinction matters, because i think when she's killing the prom court, she isn't thinking it's an unfortunate means to an end, she's relishing that for that moment, she's the one in control, and killing V represents finally returning to the way things were and are supposed to be. not morally, but a order with Doll securely, comfortably, at the top.

you can trace an interesting throughline, and imagine that before V happened, Doll enjoyed a position at the top of the pecking order, unchallengeable with Uzi and the other losers beneath her.

throughlines are why i find this reading so compelling: because how else do we explain what happens after prom, where Doll quietly ditches the priority of taking revenge on V in favor of the solver plotline?

one analysis is to parse it as, structurally, distinct. the story of Doll the Avenger has reached its conclusion; and since every character contains multitudes, you can tell a different story with the same body. Doll the Afflicted, thus, would be one with its own separate beginning, middle, and tragic end.

but isn't it more compelling to notice that one concern echoes in both stories? they're both about control. before Doll fully understood her plight, she viewed V as the thing that had torn her life out of her own control — but after taking a bullet to head, after searching for a purpose in the wastes of Copper-9, after meeting "Tessa", she comes to understand (almost) the truth: the Solver is what's threatening to take total control, and thus is her true enemy and goal. her demanding a patch to exorcise the possession is then simply a maturation of the same thing she was attempting when she subjected V to rebar-cruxifiction.

the key to this model of understanding characters is knowing that every character has a theory, a logic that defines how they view the world.

a character believes. i have a problem, that problem is this, and i have to do something, if I do that, then everything will be fine.

remember what i said about falsehoods? you can tell a lot of great stories by having the character be wrong somewhere in that core logic. maybe they're wrong about what their problem really is, wrong that their approach to solving it is the best or only solution, wrong that their approach would even work.

there's more to be said about how this theory of character informs how you should write character arcs, but i realize this is getting a bit abstract and removed from the problem of how to characterize them.

but take that model of doll, for instance. if we're right that her overriding theory of life is that being in control is the most important thing, how does that inform how she talks to other characters? one obvious consequence is she probably wouldn't care about them except insofar as she could use them.

no matter how good your formulation of a character in these terms is, you can't reduce everything to it. Doll is a cheerleader, she likes fighting with kitchen knives, she's russian. you can tie a lot of character details back to their fundamental traumas and beliefs, but there's a line to walk between insightful and boiling everything down to low effort archetype-matching

still, knowing what logic a character believes in deepest of all is huge. another way to put this is — you know how they say every character thinks they're the protagonist of their own story? a corollary of that is believing you have a life story means believing you're in a certain kind of story. it's driving a certain conclusion by certain tropes.

if you want to know what a character would do in a certain situation, look at it through their story-lens, and ask what the obvious next chapter would be. if Doll thinks she's in a story of regaining control, she tried to do whatever would give her a sense of security and superiority.

this, i think, finally brings us to the real thing i want to offer. studying a character's speech tics and mannerism can help you on the line by line level, and figuring out a character's inner philosophy can illuminate their arc and core motivation. but despite being important, i don't think either is the most important thing, structurally.

what lies between the two extremes? what marries the gap of abstraction? how do you decide the broad strokes of what a character does in a scene, in a chapter, in an arc?

the best way to think about characters, i think, is in terms of verbs

you can't understand uzi purely through the lens of seeking recognition, but you can broadly group the things she does and the ways she acts into behavior patterns.

uzi rebels against authority. uzi hacks together and into technology. uzi blushes and stammers when boys are nice to her. she broods angstily and quips sarcastically and she theorizes conspiratorially. she gets scared and needs someone on her side. she gets manic and ready to kick everyone's ass.

that's not everything, but that's a pretty expansive palette to work with, isn't it?

every one of these tendencies is contextual. to rebel, uzi needs to be confronted with authority. she can't be scared if there's nothing to be scared of. key to writing a character, then, is to look at what's going through their mind, and figure out which of their preset scripts they'll try to fall back on.

this is a place where limitations breed creativity — so it can be better if your list of verbs isn't all-encompassing, at least if you know how to get creative in how you interpret them. for instance, imagine if Uzi encountered a person that she thinks is best talked to like a hacker trying to crack a system (imagine her talking to J like this :3)

but i've been yapping for a while, and if i don't wrap this up soon my evening walk is about to become a night walk.

in summary, to understand a character:

study their dialogue and actions and try to imitate it. practice different moods, different scenarios, and keep an eye out when you're enjoying other stories for stuff you can mine and repurpose for portraying characters

once you've taken a good look at their external components, try to group them into a broad but specific verbs. think about what situations prompt what behaviors, and see if you can't collapse different behaviors into expressions of the same impulse

once you have a effective summary of a character, think deeply about what trauma or dramatic incident prompted this behavior. what must they believe about the world for their behavior to not only make sense, but seem like the only sensible way forward?

if you manage to pull all that off... well, i can't tell you if you really understand how to write that character — but you'll be doing as well as i am, at any rate

P.S.: you'll note i didn't really talk about J in this essay. consider it an exercise for the reader. if what i said made sense, if the concepts are understood, you should be able to break her down, too.

in a way, doing this for her is both easier and harder than all the others. be careful out there — my friend tried to understand J and wound up with over twenty thousand words of character study. this J shit is serious. but it was also some of the best fiction i've read, so maybe it's worth it :3

[qoldenskies]

Oooh, I'm interested, too. (Just don't answer the ones you've already answered, I'll check later).

2. Do you plan each chapter ahead or write as you go?

14. how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

18. Do you title your fics before, during, or after the writing process? How do you come up with titles?

40. If someone were to make fanart of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see?

43. Do you take a sadistic joy in whumping your characters, or are you more the "If you hurt them I would kill everyone and then myself" kind of person?

46. How would you describe your style? (Character/emotion/action-driven, etc)

55. Of the characters you write for, which is your favorite? Has that choice been swayed at all by your followers/readers’ reactions to certain ones?

76. Did you have any ideas that didn’t make the final cut of Canary Continuity?

Also, this has nothing to do with the questions, but since you were talking about playlists and songs that remind you of/inspire you for this series, I just wanted to recommend an artists that I love named RY X if you didn't already know him. I personally think his music is so fitting for this au. "Your Love" by him especially :]

WOOHOOOOO THANK YOU FOR THE RECOMMENDATION!!!

2. Do you plan each chapter ahead or write as you go?

it really depends!! i started out cw with a really broad outline and saw where the wind took me with it, before making a way more concrete outline a couple of chapters in. in cvd (god i need to update her my baby!!) i have about up to 10 outlined because its the first "arc" of the story, but improvising it is a part of the fun so im not worrying about it much.

and with wwww i know EXACTLY where im going with it. but when it comes to a lot of smaller details and motifs/parallels, i think them up as i go! i just keep an eye out for when i can insert them, cackle maniacally, and then add them LMFAO

14. how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

already answered this one here!

18. Do you title your fics before, during, or after the writing process? How do you come up with titles?

i honestly just have been going based on symbolism for cc (caged lungs = the purpose of a canary is to breathe carbon monoxide to warn miners; miner's eulogy = a eulogy is a positive speech given at a funeral for someone who just died, miners and canaries you know the drill; clipped wings = pretty self-explanatory, especially calling back to a line in CL where donnie mentions he metaphorically did it to himself!!)

otherwise its uhhhh idk just vibes. im all over the place with it. having titles be lyrics is very appealing though i should do that more. ONE TRILLION CRANE WIVES LYRIC FIC TITLES NYOWWWW

40. If someone were to make fanart of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see?

pretty much everything about the second half of CL is something i see as a goldmine (HAH), especially when it comes to symbolism ngl. there's also quite a few scenes that havent come yet, those four mikey chapters in a row have pretty much all of my favorite scenes in cw.... trust me there's so much good shit there (i love b team)

and leo's fight against kitsune is also pretty banger even if im a little iffy with how it came out, i think about her holding his arm and him craning away against the wind pushing him forward a lot. very cool visual

honestly whenever i think about what i personally would make i just think in animatics and that's not really helpful so. goodbye my danish sweetheart CL animatic in my head how i love you..........

43. Do you take a sadistic joy in whumping your characters, or are you more the "If you hurt them I would kill everyone and then myself" kind of person?

:)

46. How would you describe your style? (Character/emotion/action-driven, etc)

i notice i describe body language like a lot? a lot of tracking where their eyes go, how their breathing stops and starts, gritting their teeth, furrowing their brow, flinching away and shifting positions, how they move their hands when they speak, etc. i also try to get the tone of their voices down because i have a specific reading of how they look and act in my head, i want to make sure things are easily to visualize above all else!! i especially put emphasis on it early in CL because i wanted to put them HARD in the uncanny valley.

i am still not as prosey i would like 2 be... a shame

55. Of the characters you write for, which is your favorite? Has that choice been swayed at all by your followers/readers’ reactions to certain ones?

i think ive answered something similar in another similar ask game but im clearly a huge donnie fan, i think my favorites from most to least would be donnie > raph > mikey > leo,..... although i like WRITING from leo's perspective more than i do mikey's, who i have a tougher time with. he's hard to nail down

and this is not me disliking leo at alllll (I ADORE HIM) it's just that sometimes that guy. he is just everywhare. i'm sure that's shifted my perception of him because i know he used to be my second favorite on first watch. i have no idea how raph took his place there, i think i just thought about him too much and became insane. i love raph!!!!!!!!!

when i write wwww im definitely gonna go out of my way to keep arcs as balanced as possible despite my favorites.,,,, genuinely dont like when sunset duo gets put aside for disaster twins because theyre great so i strive to dedicate more time to them !!!! especially because mikey's definitely panning out to be the main main character of this one, with donnie (despite being the other pov) taking on more of a supporting role. probably because he perpetually dgaf and mikey is a feral little ball of passion, that's what happens when you grow up with raph as your only role model i guess LMAO

76. Did you have any ideas that didn’t make the final cut of Canary Continuity?

ive already answered this one here, although i will say since this applies to cc in general that i planned to write what happened after donnie passed out at the end of CL and then mainly gave it up because i couldnt choose between raph or splinter pov,,,,, but i keep THINKING ABOUT IT. oh well guess i'll die

i also originally wanted to reveal donnie's first suicide attempt in chapter 9 and decided against it just because i couldnt find an organic way to fit it in, and i think chapter 12 was a better place to put it because its more immediately pressing. originally i wanted to have the reveal to come from donnie himself and not april! but they're not going to get answers out of him with that until some uhhh things happen! so

[stacys-museum]

My rant about AI art and comics.

Hadn't really expected to ever write a post about this, but here I am. Also, I'm not a native english speaker, so there might be grammar mistakes.

This is just my opinion. If you don't want to read it, skip this post.

The topic of AI "art" was brought by conversation with my teacher, who's a big fan of comics (and I don't mean superhero comics, he's more fond of detective stories). He mentioned a comic which was made using an AI, which he thought of as insulting. And I agree with him.

For an artist, whose style was inspired by various comics I've read, this is an insult. Making a comic is not as simple as writing "make a page of comic with this and this and this" or writing a short script and sending it to AI with "create a comic out of this". Making a comic is a process of both creating the story and the visuals - either by one person or a team - where you're making sure that art enhances your story just as much as dialogue, where each scene conveys emotions you want it to convey.

My teacher and I agreed, that, just like with other mediums of art, you can recognize the artist even if they decide to switch styles. There is a way with which they use draw their lines that makes it recognizable.

Think of manga for a moment, where each mangaka has their distinct way of drawing things - you will know it's them even if it's a different series or if they paint something (like cover) instead of drawing it. True, mangakas might have assistants who are good at replicating that style. And if two mangakas draw the same character (good example is BNHA's spinoff series Vigilantes) there are either big or subtle differences. This is even more visible in western superhero comics, with many artists working on the same series; sometimes the style changes every few issues.

It's not just drawings or comics. If you're a big fan of one guitarist, you'll also be able to recognize them even if they play something completely different than what they normally play.

An artist's style reflects their mastery and experience. It's rarely perfect, it doesn't need to be. First artist will use pencil and lean on hatching as shadows, second will prefer painting with broad strokes, third will work digitally and render semi-realistically. I don't follow many artists online, being mostly into traditional art, but let me ask: It's easy to recognize a piece by SamDoesArts, isn't it?

Now, AI doesn't have a single style they follow, nor does it have experience. It's taught by being fed art made by us, humans, and emulates it.

Kinda similar to mangaka's assistant, but an assistant knows what a specific thing should look like. AI makes mistakes no human would - it's all in details, where some things blend together instead of being separate, the deph in those pieces is plain wrong. Even a small kid knows that when the cat is behind tree, they draw cat behind tree, not cat blending into tree - they might draw cat a little too close, or a little too big, or it's legs are too long, or their cat is made of crude shapes - but you can see a CAT BEHIND A TREE. Tree and cat are separate entities. That's one argument - AI blending things together.

Another is that, where humans usually keep to one style or make multiple styles harmonious with each other, AI mashes those together. The bigger pieces produced/spat out by AI might have this issue. One side may be in style based on Jujutsu Kaisen, the other on Berserk - what's the difference, it's all anime, isn't it? It doesn't notice a difference, anime was requested, anime it will give.

There's also people who want something drawn in "anime style" and make the same argument - that anime is a singular style. At this point, I'm tired of explaining to people in real life that anime is animated, manga is drawn; and that comics differ depending on their place of origin. That's for different rant.

Hell, this post isn't even covering that, to train their AI, corporations commited copyright infringement.

Anyway, now for reason why I even started ranting. EMOTIONS. AI can't convey emotions properly.

For this post, I found an AI comic (if you want to read it, look it up - I don't want to link or promote it) and I looked through Twitter's (not calling it X) ai art community. It was to make a small experiment. I called it "How many times I spot the same lack of emotion?" and felt some vindictive pleasure to see my hypothesis proven.

Do you know how hard it is not to convey emotions in art? I have one specific character that is supposed to stay stone-faced, but I either fail or on drawing it seems that this character looks bored. I tried to draw specific things that didn't convey much emotion - did I succeed? I don't know. Even quick sketches convey emotion - from expression to the pose. That emotion may be boredom, but it's still there. And we all look for those emotions.

In my expreriment I looked over pieces featuring people and mentally checked off my list of possible drawn emotions. There was little variety, mostly the same "expressionlessness" that can sometimes be mixed up with boredom. The characters just stare straight at viewer (me in this one) or stare ahead if it's in profile. With those souless eyes - because I couldn't see any emotion in this faraway look, the face didn't scrunch up at all like a person's would.

The comic was even worse. I had to ignore my mind recoiling at inconsistent design of characters and enviroment, as well as horrible layout of scenes and speech balloons (which I could make into another argument) (mind you, the style itself would've looked rather appealing had it not been for those things). I focused on main character's emotions. There. Were. None.

Just like other AI generated graphics, she stared at the viewer in 90% of the scenes. The same smight curl of lips, the same fake fucking smile that doesn't reach eyes as she spoke of horrors (it's supposed to be post-apocalyptic setting). Not ONCE have I seen any variety to her expression. No quirk of lips, no crincling in corner of the eye, nothing.

I finished looking through the comic even more disappointed than I had already been.

On quick glance for someone who knows jack shit about visual storytelling, it would look good. For me it's just shit. I don't know a lot about history of comics, hell, I know little about comics outside of those I've read; but I know enough about drawing emotions that I think only the most ignorant people would praise that abomination.

Those are my closing statements.

Comics are medium of art between pictures and books. They can be interesting, beautiful, humorous and remarkable - both visually and as stories.

To anyone, who reads comics, have fun reading them. To anyone who wants to read them, go find something you'd like. To anyone, who doesn't read comics, you don't have to, but don't hate on them.

To anyone, who draws comics, you are incredible. To anyone, who wants to draw comics, I encourage you to try. To anyone, who thinks they lack the skills to draw comics but wants to, I recommend you start learning and craft stories - you can use anything as characters. Stickmen, animals, robots, vehicles, rocks, kitchen utensils, etc.

Just please, don't generate comics using AI.

Thank you for reading.

[kentuckyfriedmegumi]

Hi KFM!!!

For the fic writers ask:

How about 4, 7, 11, 13, 14, 23, 24, 46, 61, 68, and 76 (for CTD)? thank you :)

(that was a lot sorry lmao)

HIII FJSLDK SORRY IM SO LATE THE HOLIDAYS GOT CRAZY

ok ok ok let me pick apart this BEAST let's GO

4. Where do you find inspiration for new ideas?

so it just kind of depends. i base things roughly around my life experiences. for example, CTD started out as an online gaming fic, based off my experiences playing minecraft as a wee babe, but as you can see it quickly devolved from there to something much, much more. another life experience that i took and turned into a fic was my degree, which is how HOTP was born. i also will sometimes draw inspiration from songs, like i did with skinny dipping, but i feel like for the most part, i just sort of take what i know and either build from there or i dramatize it for story purposes!

7. How do you choose which POV to write from?

i guess it just kind of depends on the story? in yuji's plan, i sort of did both, but that's mainly due to it being my first fic and getting back into creative writing. for my other works, i tend to switch back and forth bc i like giving the readers a full perspective, but in the event where i want to keep something secret (such as HOTP yuuji's reason for quitting boxing), i sort of have to stick with a single pov. i want to leave some suspense in some of my stories, so i usually come up with a general outline and major plot points, and from there, i decide which POV would be more impactful to learn it from.

11. Link your three favorite fics right now

easy. i re-read this often.

my blessing; my love. by toomanyonions Twitch Streamer Yuuji and Youtuber Megumi by kat_likes_writing (@kat-likes-writing) Perfect Shots by narutanjiro

13. what’s a common writing tip that you almost always follow?

don't get too granular. i learned this in one of my college journalism classes, where my prof had once said not to get too hung up on the little details. that's something that i try to avoid but often find myself stuck in. when you write yourself into a corner, you need to know how to get out of it and how to avoid doing it. you don't want to be too detailed, because in the end, it's not that important. you want to be able to tell a story and to set a scene, you want the reader to feel present and invested, but not every little thing needs an explanation, or you'll find your story dragging a bit too much.

14. how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

emotional scenes come to me pretty easily. i sometimes do draw from personal experiences to get an idea of things. first kisses, arguments, crushes, things that i've experienced, i think back to how i feel and write that for my characters while keeping their personalities consistent. it's kind of hard, and i often have to stop and ask myself if this is something a character would actually feel, or does it only feel right because i felt that way. i try to balance it out by reading previous scenes and other material for a character, so i can keep who they are as a person in mind when i write.

23. Best writing advice for other wirters?

take notes. i've talked about this with @hijinks-n-lowjinks before and how we like to take notes when we read. it's something that i've done since i was little. it's not like crazy annotations or stuff like that, tho i have done that in the past and i tend to sometimes do that in my monster comments, but when i see something i like - a specific transition, a phrase, a metaphor, etc. - i write it down in a note on my phone and use that to draw inspiration for how i want to shape my writing. it helps when i'm sort of stuck on how i want to describe a scene, because i can go back to these other great examples that i really liked and try to emulate that feeling while staying original to my work and writing style.

24. Worst writing advice anyone ever gave you?

this is hard, because i can't think of a single piece of advice that i've ever been given where i thought it was bad or terrible. i guess one thing that didn't work for me, specifically, in the past would be when i was told to just keep writing. like no matter what. while i think it's good to keep the practice up, burn out is real and there are times where it is necessary to take a break. i took a five year break, and there was a point where i didn't think i'd ever write again, but here i am. but it was definitely necessary for me to do that so i could get to where i am now. i think even if it's a few days or something, taking a bit of time to breathe and marinate in your writing really helps you from feeling like your drowning.

46. How would you describe your style? (Character/emotion/action-driven, etc)

oh this is interesting, i'm not too sure, honestly. i guess i would say that i'm pretty character driven? i like to focus on the who's and their actions to continue a story, but i also feel like i do a good job at focusing on their emotions and using that to create tension. this is tough tho, i hate perceiving my own writing ksdfljsd

61. Why do you continue writing fics?

part of it is that i just started writing fics back in august of this year. i had actually never read any sort of fan fiction before in my life, and then about a month after that, i thought "hey, maybe i could try writing again." part of it is that this is a good stepping stone to get back into creative writing; i have a lot of abandoned original stories that i always wanted to get back to, but never knew how; and another part of it is that i love writing stories for these characters. i think that's a good combo that will keep me in the ao3 world for a while.

68. What, if anything, do you do for inspiration?

it depends! sometimes i listen to music or read other fics, other times i like to picture myself in a scenario to really try and get into the story myself. from there, it's sort of like "ok this is how i felt in the situation," now try to imagine that for this character. as for coming up with a story to write in general, ideas just kind of come to me out of no where. whenever something jumps out at me, i like to latch onto it and mold it until it's something that i think i can build a story off of.

76. Did you have any ideas that didn’t make the final cut of CTD?

this is sort of a scrapped idea in one of my earlier outline drafts, but originally, in CTD, yuuji was not supposed to know that meg knew about his "childhood friend" until chapter 13. that's the only major deviation from my original outline that i can think of, which would have made a specific megumi line at the end of chapter 13 hit a bit harder because he reveals that he knows yuuji is still in love with his childhood friend. but the boys tend to rewrite the story for me, so you all got out of a bit more angst than i had originally intended.

END

WOO and i think that's it??? thank you so much for this ask, it was sooo fun to really get into my writing process and share some things about my works and show off others that i enjoy. thank you!!! <333

[miasmat]

for the ask game: 10, 17, and 20 :]

Hi Hi HI 10. how many different sketches do you usually have until your piece is finished

Usually 2 or 3, depending on how detailed the drawing is. I'm a fan of cleaning up the sketch rather than drawing an entirely new lineart layer so I mostly go from a rough sketch to figure out the shapes, the actual sketch and then the cleaned-up sketch, and there's possibly another layer if I need more deets

17. what do you love getting compliments about

The expressions and emotions! I worked very hard to make it the focal point of my art so I do enjoy when people point out that emotions are clear to see and that it's clear that they're complex. I always try to make it so there's more going on than just the surface, so I really am grateful when people notice just how much is going on inside the character's head, both with their expressions and body language. Of course, there's often the context that is needed too, but if I managed to make someone connect the dots and read into the whole story that I'm trying to tell, I couldn't be happier.

I think both this piece and the car one above are good examples of what I want to achieve, not that much going on at first glance but the more you look at it the more emotions you unravel from their faces and bodies.

20. a piece from this year that you're really proud of I can't possibly choose one, I'd love to list all of them but I'll try to narrow it down not to make it too long I like them all for different reasons

These two I feel like are the blooming buds of what I want my style to be - scenes that show more than just what you see. There's action in them and you can see both what happens before and after. I want them to feel like they're moving, and I think with these two I achieved that.

And this one from the start of the year, I'm really proud of the whole atmosphere, the background and the pose work together well to create this dark but magical scene, I like the idea of the ruined theatre, long forgotten to the world placed in contrast with the simmering passion of the two of them.

[seethesunny]

14, 23, and 33? - @adhdprincess

Get to know your fic writer

Hello there! Thank you for sending these Mimi :)

how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

Not to be that person because I swear I'm not projecting as much in my writing but yes, I tend to really get into the character's shoes to make is as faithful and expressive as I can and, like most things of my art, I borrow from my own personal experiences (whether good or bad).

As for writing them, I'm cautious of telling instead of showing, and I try to remember that people usually behave differently depending on the context lol that makes me sound like an alien but. When writing the emotional bits, that's easy, trying to get the characters in the scene without ruining the mood is complicated.

Does that make sense? I can build an emotional scene, keeping in mind what emotions are present and the context beforehand (and the aftermath), but involving the real characters can be a task 😅 and the dialogue. Oh that makes me suffer 10x times.

Best writing advice for other writers?

Don't be afraid to start something because you're not good enough or talented or skilled or whatever your brain is telling you. We all start somewhere, and if you keep the idea, you'll probably polish it more and more as you write.

If it takes you years, that's fine! It took me years to have a decent style of writing, and if I keep pursuing it, I'll improve even more. So, start the idea that's been roaming around in your brain.

Do you want to be published some day?

I don't think so! I haven't thought about doing original stuff in years, and honestly, I've never believed I could do something compelling enough lol

Is a no for me.

[error-dream-was-found]

ooooh okay, for the fic writer thing! 1, 4, 14, 16, 33, 40 and uhhh 56? bonus of 39 (if you want)

Thank you for asking <3

1. "Do you prefer writing one-shots or multi-chaptered fics?"

I prefer multichaptered fics ... my last attempt to write one-shot turned into 160 000 words long fic (still updating btw)

4. "Where do you find inspiration for new ideas?"

Everywhere ... seriously, it´s a mix of shower thoughts, 3 Am ideas and random things I thought of while reading another fics. For example the 'enderchest torture' idea hit me while I was reading some fic where to get Dream out of Pandora they hide him in an enderchest and my brain just went "wait for how long was he there? What was it like for him? Would it even be possible?" And I moved from there. That one is one of my less developed ideas but it´s a good example of my thought process ig. Or fics like 'monsters don´t deserve hugs but you aren´t a monster' came from that single sentence. I thought about it while reading some fic where Dream went "I´m a monster I don´t deserve nice things and it spiraled from there.

14. "how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?"

It depends on my mood ig? If that makes sense. Sometimes I really get into it and even make myself cry. But sometimes I'll ruin these characters lives with zero care. I certainly draw from personal experience as much as I can. Although I don't really have much personal experience with the stuff I'm writing about so *shrugs*

16. "How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Share one of them?"

*counts on fingers* ehm ... well if I count in the half-baked ideas and all that ... I think I could have roughly 15-20? (I wanna talk about them T-T)

You already know about the superhero one (although I have new trauma for blob!), so I'll say a bit about a different idea one of my dremon fics perhaps? I don't have a name yet but the mail story line pretty much goes like this: Dream is a demon - cruel creature feeding off humans emotions, mostly happiness. Demons in common are manipulative, heartless and selfish beings that prey on humans.

The rest of the characters are mostly demon hunters (not sure on all members yet but Sapnap, George, Sam and Quackity are certainly there).

The plot basically begins when the hunters catch Dream. He's not very strong and thus not considered a serious threat. Instead of killing him immediately they decide to experiment on him (to learn more about demons), the problem is - Dream is the sweetest person ever. He's nothing like the other demons they've met and well it's kinda hard to dissect someone alive while they rant about the adorable cat that lives in the backstreet behind the convenience store ... (sry for ranting)

33. "Do you want to be published some day?"

Yes but unfortunately I'm not too good with creating original stories and my writing style isn't really good so .... maybe one day ... (until then the closest I'll get is printing my own stories ... that is also a way to practice book binding lol)

40. "If someone were to make fanart of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see?"

Honestly? I have no idea. There're just so many scenes I love and I'd absolutely love to see drawn. But if anyone ever were to make a fanart of my fic I'd be over the roof about it, I wouldn't care what scene it is I'd just be so damn happy that they liked the story enough to go through the trouble of creating the art. And any scene they'd pick would be perfect because then I'd know which scene they liked the most.

56. "What's something about your writing that you pride yourself on?"

... I'll be honest I don't think my writing is anything special, there are a few scenes I'm happy with but overall .... *shrugs*

But if there's something I'm really proud of it's probably the fact that I was able to write a story that many people enjoyed. When I started writing 2 years ago I never thought I'll have this many people not only reading my story but also liking it. Sure, it's not that much but it's a lot more than I ever expected! It blows my mind because I know that there are much better fic out there, yet people still decided to read something I wrote. It´s really crazy

39. "Share a snippet from a WIP"

daamn this is getting too long ... Imma sharing a snipped anyway! But what snipped .... I'm feeling like doing an villain arc today so I´m gonna post something from a story I haven't published yet and probably won´t be able to publish for at least few months:

Note: this story is still sitting in my drafts so the grammar check wasn't done yet, therefore there are extra grammar errors which I apologize for

He tripped over something. The tiny sharp rocks covering the forest floor dug painfully into his palms as he tried to slow down his fall and the pain shooting from his scraped knees pushed a new tears into his eyes. He just wanted to stay there on the floor and cry but hte monsters were getting closer. He can´t let them get him, he can´t! Desperately trying to wipe the tears out of his eyes, Dream stood up, only taking a second to glance back at the thing he tripped over. It looked like a fence … looking forward again, the blonde saw a tall dilapidated building. 

It was looming over him in the dead of night like something right out of a scary story his mom would tell him on these good nights when instead of yelling at him she'd put him to bed and if he was lucky she´d tell him a story. He wanted to ran away from the half collapsed building but as scary as it was the monsters were scarier. That building would provide him at least some cover and he needed that desperately. He won´t be able to run all night and the air was already heavily filled with the smell of rain. It was just a question of time till the storm begins. Encouraged by the hisses and groans from behind Dream ran inside. 

It took his eyes a moment to adjust to darkness that was even more prominent now. Once he did he realized he was in what seems to be an abandoned Prime church. He looked around nervously. The place gave him chills. It was clear that no one worshiped Prime here for years, maybe even decades and the place now had a sinister atmosphere to it. As everything holy did when it was forgotten for too long. The cracked, faded paintings of Prime´s angels looked down on him, it felt as if they were watching him, following his every mood. The wooden floors cracked under his weight and from the altar a soft clinging of chains could be heard as the incense swung in the light breeze. 

But the worst of all was the terrible feeling that he's not alone. That there´s something watching him. Someone. No, no he was just being dumb, this place is clearly abandoned. Maybe it's just an animal that settled here. Or these dumb angles. Yeah it must be the angles. It's dark and he's tired, he's just imagining their eyes moving to follow him. 

The first drops of rain hit the ground and a wind whistles through the abandoned church. Goosebumps raised to the surface and Dream shivered. It's just cold, it's just cold, it's just cold. The rain got heavier in just a few minutes. A lightning flashed through the sky and a thunder shook the whole building, just as a voice from somewhere in the shadows spoke up.

“Won't you look at that … a human. What a treat”

The question of who's there froze on Dream’s tongue as another lighting illuminated the inside of the church and the body less shadow floating in front of him. It had a distinct shape of human but none of its features could be seen other than two glowing eyes. It dived for him.

Dream screamed.

- story name: Sweet Little Nightmares (I'm more than willing to talk about this story :)

Sakra nechala som sa uniesť. Dúfám, že som ťa neunudila k smrti a gratulujem ak si sa dostala až sem ;)

[if-loki-was-a-fox]

🐻 Your go-to things to draw when you need comfort?

🐻 Your go-to things to draw when you need comfort?

Usually my current blorbo, or the character (...mcyt) I got into most recently! Lately that's been Etho & Cleo, but before them it was Ren & Doc, and before that it was Grian & Mumbo (and for the whole year before that, cRanboo & cTechno). Blorbo/hyperfixation stuff is just very good for emotional regulations, and is nice and familiar most of the time

depending on exact mood I'm in/type of comfort I want, I'll either draw them just cute and round and maybe a little pathetic or shy/awkward looking to cheer myself up, or I'll pick something very new and more elaborate (different art style for a full scene, for example) so it can take up all my thoughts and distract me better

(ask game)

[moonmeg]

Hey so I really love your art and your body poses ars always so fluent! I have a very simple style what is your suggestion for artists who want to change from cartoony to a more realistic style like yours? And how do you get your anatomy so good!!!Also if you have time or effort could you give a small showcase of where you started and where you are now and how you developed the style!?!?

-Small side note in Watching and dreaming what sene made you cry the most?

-Personally balled my eyes out when the collector started crying.Sorry for the long thread but what do you think happened to the collecotr?

-KEEP UP THE JAW DROPPING ART!!!❤️

Thank you so, so much!

The time skip made me so happy yet so emotional but I think when the collector started crying after Luz "died", yeah that might be the moment :')

I started developing my own style the way it is now with my entry into the Hamilton fandom. I've had a style before, that I drew Miraculous Ladybug fanart with and it looked something like this

I was 14 when I drew this. I was still heavily influenced by an anime art style despite me never having seen an anime at that point in my life.

With entering the Hamilton fandom, however, I found animatics. Szin was an artist that had an art style I looked at with 15/16 and said "I want that.". So I started copying some things from szin's artstyle that I really liked (the way they drew hair and noses specifically). Over time I discovered other artists that I had art-style envy over. That being caw-chan and ziksua predominantly. I think I adapted more from caw-chan and szin than from ziksua but I would lie if I said her art didn't have an impact on me.

So my art style developed year by year.

There are big time skips between these deawings but if you're interested in my Hamilton era search #hamilton on my tumblr and scroll through it a bit. Or if you go down the rabbit hole on pinterest just enough, you'll find old art to. Search "megpeggs" on pinterest for that.

During Hamilton times of course not only other artists inspired me but I also started looking up tutorials or art commentaries on YouTube. Videos where an artist genuinely critiques their viewers art proved most useful, because they show you how to improve the anatomy, what basic rules you can follow to get anatomy right etc. And of course, references and realistic portraits. (That last drawing was created with a reference.)

If you want a more realistic art style you need to study the realistic anatomy and know how to draw something realistic. For that you need a reference that you look at again and again, basically analyzing it and taking it apart to see how what looks and how you can best copy it on canvas.

Depending on complexity it of course is rather time consuming but it's a huge help. If you know how to draw something pretty damn realistic, you can easily cartoonify or simplify certain features. (Not saying I'm so great at realism but I'd say I'm not that bad at it either)

Enter Avatar era.

A show where you can bend elements and a show that is filled with quite a lot of fight scenes makes you want to do fanart that is as dynamic. So you sit there staring at pose references again. Or you take pictures of yourself doing these things. I can't say how much the ATLA and LOK art style influenced me because there barely is any resemblance between the show and my art but I do ghink it had at least a little impact on my art style.

It involved a lot of referencing and copying (important note: not tracing!) in my case. And that's really the most important tip I can give here. Studying and analyzing the reference picture you chose. How long and thick are limbs? How big are the hands? The torso? The neck? How much smaller or bigger does this limb look due to the perspective? Learn the rules before you break them.

Some examples:

Foreheads are bigger than they seem! Remember that your character needs to fit a brain in there.

You should be able to fit one third eye between the two eyes - that's the usual distance.

Eyes are on one height with where the ears begin.

The nose's end is on one height with the earlobe.

The distance from the outer corner of the left eye to the outer corner of the right eye is the same length as the neck (in thickness)

Remember that the neck supports the head. When drawing a side profile it should start at the back of the head and leave some room for a jaw.

Hands are big enough to cover your entire face.

Your elbow is on one height with your waist.

Your whole arm should reach from shoulders to about the middle of your thigh.

There's space between breasts and the neck. You have a collarbone there!

Natural breasts hang. They have weight to them and get pulled down by gravity.

There's bones and organs everywhere in your body and they need space too

Skin wrinkles Angle your arms or hand. You're not a Barbie, you've got wrinkles there on elbow and wrist.. Furrow your eyebrows. The skin on your forehead wrinkles.

Everything I listed here is something you can go check out on your own body and it should be correct. Of course this is just the usual way anatomy is like - exceptions are found everywhere.

If my art style is something you look up to, as weird as it sounds, study it. Look at the way I draw things and try to copy them and incorporate them into your own style.

It's also important you go out of your comfort zone.

With TDAAC I couldn't name what exactly changed or developed in my art style more but I do know I started to hide hands less and challenge myself to actually draw that hand pose, staring at references from pinterest or my own hands doing that pose.

Art is a matter of learning and studying. It's time consuming, it's nerve-wreking, you may sit there and ask yourself why the hell you decided to do art but it's worth it all.

I'd recommend keeping your old art around somewhere. Over the years you can then always go back to it and compare it to your current art and see just how much you grew as artist. And that is something that definitely comes. The more you draw, the more you learn. It's not witchcraft, even if it might seem like it sometimes.

I'll add some more art of mine in a reblog, since tumblr only allows me to add 10 images.

[ladytauria]

<333 4, 8, 14, 18, 22, 35, 46, 58, 74 for the ask game pls!!

thank you mayaaaa <333

4. Where do you find inspiration for new ideas?

Everywhere! Fics and books I've read, random song lyrics (whether the rest of the song fits or not), random posts on tumblr, images, posts on twitter, prompt lists, prompt blogs, etc. etc.

8. Do you prefer the beginning, middle, or end of a story?

Vastly depends on the story. I've had fics where I've had the beginning and ending figured out, but the middle is a mystery. I've also had fics where the middle was a breeze but the beginning and ending were both like pulling teeth!

I will say I tend to enjoy middles more on shorter fics (uhh, less than 15k) and beginnings & endings more on longform stuff!

14. how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

I try to put myself in the character's shoes as much as possible! Figure out what emotion(s) they're feeling and then draw on my own experiences with it, lol. Especially if I can feel it a bit myself <3

18. Do you title your fics before, during, or after the writing process? How do you come up with titles?

Yes.

Sometimes the fic title is the thing that inspired the idea, like when I'm inspired by a lyric. Sometimes it just comes to me in the planning process.

Sometimes a fic title comes to me during the writing process. I'll write a line that just seems to capture the core of what I'm going for, and use that or something like it for the title!

A lot of times I end up titling the fic after, though. I'll scroll through the song lyrics I have saved for potential titles, just in case one fits. I'll look up songs that may have the theme or a similar vibe to what I'm gong for. I'll read through the fic looking for a line. I'll summarize it, try to capture the vibe. It can take a bit!! But I get there eventually. After a lot of whining :P

22. Are there certain types of writing you won’t do? (style, pov, genre, tropes, etc)

Speaking specifically for fanfic!

Probs won't ever write first person again. It's not something I vibe with in fic, it's hit or miss for me in published fiction too, and it's just... Not a style I like?

Omniscient POV. When I try it it feels too much like head hopping to me, so xD

Can't see myself writing cheating or hard non-con. Dubcon, yeah; gentle nc especially if its nc-to-c, but not anything harder. I will do comfort after, though!! Hmm... Detailed torture scenes or anything gory bc that squicks me out a little lol ^^;

I can think of a few others but I think that's good for now xD

35. What is one essential thing to remember when writing a villain?

Good question.

Honestly, I haven't written them in fic a lot? But when I do, I generally try to keep in mind their motivations and like... reasons for doing what they do.

46. How would you describe your style? (Character/emotion/action-driven, etc)

Hmm... Character or emotion driven!

58. What part of the writing process do you enjoy the most? (Brainstorming, outlining, writing, editing, etc)

Hmm, I mean, all of them at various points! I guess I'll give brainstorming the top slot because I just have... so many ideas. Therefore I must enjoy coming up with them 😂😂😂

Although nothing compares to writing when it's flowing!!

74. You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

Does it feature two characters taking care of each other? A lot of focus on trust and vulnerability and willingly offering up the softer parts of yourself? Is there an overuse of "x says"? Can you tell fic was fighting not to be overrun with em-dashes? It's probably a Tauria fic :P

[ get to know your fic writer! ]

[uppastthejelliclemoon]

3, 6, 14, 22, and 32 for the fanfic author asks?

Describe the creative process of writing a chapter/fic

for most of my non-Cats fics, they usually start as just basic Tumblr posts!! A lot of my star wars fics started off as just me rambling about my hcs, and then that develops itself into a whole fic!

for Cats, i have so many ideas, so i have so many different wips. For chapters themselves, I usually write down little ideas in my docs when i first think of them, and later on, when i get to that point in writing, i'll be able to elaborate more on those bits!

Do you have your work beta'd? How important is this to your process?

it depends! if it's something new, like a new plot or writing style, then i definitely ask one of my lovely mutuals if they can read it over!! if it's something containing another mutuals' OC, then i absolutely send it to them to read it over, to make sure their OC is in character! i do this a lot with Hestia and Jubilee fics with @queen-with-the-quill, and with our Newsies AU!!

how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

i LOVE writing emotional scenes. emotional angst hurt/comfort is one of my favorite tropes. i've definitely cried a few times writing fics, especially writing Hestia fics, just because she's so important to me.

my latest Cats fic, i've mentioned, has a lot of personal meaning to me, because i based Tugger and Munkustrap's relationship and their reconciliation on my own relationship and reconciliation with my older sister.

Are there certain types of writing you won’t do? (style, pov, genre, tropes, etc)

i don't write anything NSFW or gory

and for POVs, i really really don't love first and second person POV (writing in it, obvi)

Name three of your favorite fanfic writers.

@storyweaverofgondor (is that me being biased? ofc it is, but my bestie is one of the BEST fanfic writers)

people who follow my main are probably sick of me mentioning them, but faythren is one of the BEST fanfic writers i've ever seen. every single one of their fanfics is absolutely incredible, and if i could force everyone to read just one of their fics, it'd be Move Along, which is probably my favorite fanfiction of all time.

also ArcticVulpix on Ao3 has written some of the best Encanto fics EVER, so i'm also obsessed with their writing

[marshmallowprotection]

I want to play :3

12, 14 and 22 please ❣️

12. how does receiving or not receiving feedback/support impact you?

I thrive on it. Don't all writers thrive on a reply? I don't always hear from my readers, but when I do, it makes my day. I have the drive and energy to write more! I feel like people are having fun with what I'm reading and not only is to worth sharing, it's worth sharing more as I continue to work on that passion project. I don't get as disheartened as I did when I was younger and I didn't get reviews or feedback, but hey, I'm human. It all stings sometimes.

14. how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

It depends. I put my entire heart into what I'm writing, and I take inspiration from things I've experienced to help me better write the situation in question. I have to take my experiences and connect the overlap in emotions to reach it.

Like, for example, I don't know what it feels like to be kidnapped, but I know what it feels like to "feel like you're being held hostage". So, if I'm writing a scene were MC was kidnapped by Saejoong, I can draw on that emotion to understand the distress and fear that needs to go into the words.

But, a better example is my fic Gardenia et tu Polaris. I, like many other people, have suffered religious trauma. That fic has a lot of elements I know like the back of my hand because I've been hurt when someone used Christianity as a weapon. Cathartic process to write that story, to be honest.

I have intense empathy so I do feel what my characters feel and that can be tough when I'm writing angst!

22. Are there certain types of writing you won’t do? (style, pov, genre, tropes, etc)

I used to write in first-person but I can't do it anymore. It just doesn't feel right. I can read first-person without an issue but I just can't do it in my own craft anymore. There are definitely things I won't do when I'm writing, but those things are squicks and icks, so they don't really qualify as something I should share. They're common themes that a lot of people don't do because of the content warning, like harm to one's self.