#nd series
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tryslora · 10 months ago
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ND Creative: Time, Focus, Organization
Time, focus, and organization can be complicated things as an ND creative.
Objectively, I know what I need to do. I know all the steps. I even know that in order to get it done, I have to list out all of those steps, note how long each will take and their dependencies, then reorganize them into a timeline.
Then I stare at the screen, or the piece of paper, and my brain just stops. Says nope. Hits the mental and emotional back button to get the hell out of that mode.
Makes it kind of hard to get anything done.
I’m currently struggling with this exact thing on multiple levels. Why am I blogging about it? Well, I’m hoping that if I talk about the places where I’m stuck, maybe I’ll become unstuck.
Oh, the funny ways we try to trick our minds, yeah?
Big List Things I Need to Do:
Publishing stuff with DPP (timeline not under my control)
Publishing stuff for independent book (oh hey, a release date would be nice and I’m the one who has to set that)
Plotting and outlining the next PHU novel (is it over a year overdue? I’m sure no one noticed…)
Plotting and outlining the next 7Lakes novel (because when the first one comes out, “where’s the sequel” will hopefully be the obvious first question)
There are a million other things on my list in various sizes from small through medium and even large, but none quite as unwieldy as all of those.
I’ve been blocked on these timelines—both for publishing and for plotting—for a long, long time. I feel like I’m trying to do too many things at once, or attacking things on too many fronts. I worry about well, what if one thing overlaps with another—are the people who want to read my work going to be like “nah, I can’t buy two books” and just nope out of everything? Am I screwing it all up?
I keep telling myself I need to let go and just Do The Thing.
Seriously.
Do The Thing.
So, let’s break down what needs to be done at the highest of levels for the writing-related things (and ignore all the blog posts, TikToks, video editing, etc that also needs to be done).
For publishing with DPP, there is: 2nd edit on book 2, large revision on book 3 before it goes to first real edit, then 2nd edit on book 3, and final edits on all of that. Plus cover reveals, blog posts, teasers. Pulling out quotes I want to use for stickers. I am pretty sure I’m forgetting things. The nice thing is that all of the big overhead things like planning a campaign has been done for me. YAY Duck Prints (Seriously, they are AWESOME). I think my sticking point here is that I have no realistic expectation for how long each editing round will (or should) take, so I’m not sure how to slot it in. Plus I know it’ll be overlapping with the other book.
For solo (independent) publishing, I have so much more to do. I have to create accounts with both the private and public profile information that’s required on publishing platforms. I need to create a logo and develop a description of my “publishing company” (me, it’s just me) and I need to business work for that company, like buying ISBNs. I need to finish the final book editing, then do the layout so I know what the spine width is. Then I can contract for and get a cover. After that it should get easier, right? Pull out quotes, do blog posts, cover reveal, announcement of the release date (probably not in that order). Get the news out. I can set a release date once I get everything else on a calendar. And if the bulk of the editing is done sooner rather than later, my editing energy can be spent on the DPP books while I’m doing production and marketing for the 7Lakes book.
Okay. This all starts to feel like something I can get my arms around. I’m going to let the high level/low level plotting go for now, and come back to it in another post.
So—why is this a blog post anyway?
I mentioned before that I was trying to unstick my mind. By talking out loud to someone else—even though I can’t see that someone, and who knows, maybe I’m shouting into the abyss—I feel like I’m being held accountable. I’m working through it in public. In plain sight. It means I have to keep putting one foot in front of the other, considering every word. It has to get out of my fingertips and onto the page because I am here, not just trying to make notes privately for myself.
I can’t back button out of it.
Sometimes that’s how I get things done.
Will this translate to me taking the things I’ve said above and moving them into something where I can add timeframes, and schedules, and put it all on a calendar with due dates and start breaking it down into even smaller tasks?
Gods I hope so. It’s a goal, anyway.
Getting back to where we started… time, focus, and organization can be complicated as an ND creative. 
Time—I spent thirty minutes and a thousand words of chatter.
Focus—It’s like body doubling—by talking to you, I got something done.
Organization—I think I have a list. Or a start of one. It’s more than I had!
It’s a complicated way of doing things, but fingers crossed that my next step is getting to cross off the first part of my timelines task.
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majunju · 7 months ago
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(1/?) messy eater
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crunchycrystals · 1 year ago
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this makes me want to cry
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chrliekclly · 8 months ago
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lyceal · 24 days ago
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She was just so tall and so,, tiger lizzie
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MY EWIFE IS HOME MY WIFE8
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gronjon44 · 1 year ago
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So now that ND Stevenson got Nimona to finally release y'all know what that means-
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tinderbox210 · 2 months ago
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Had to gif, because I just love this little but so meaningful interaction in the cut scene after ND-5 saved Kay again.
I love how awkward and coy they both act, and how ND does that little headshake over his lack of articulation, and how Kay follows him with her eyes.
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emileedoodles · 11 months ago
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Catradora travel Etheria 8/12 🏜️ Crimson Waste 🏜️
"Once devoid of life, the Crimson Waste was now bristling with magic."
☀️
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This one was probably my favourite location (of course!) and it was such a surreal moment getting it signed by Nate 🥰
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cjvarte · 2 months ago
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The Veteran (Canon)
Source: "Star Wars Outlaws" is a Canon 2024 action-adventure game developed by Massive Entertainment and published by Ubisoft in collaboration with Lucasfilm Games.
ND-5 mentioned General Grievous once more.
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forthehonoroflove · 1 year ago
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NACE in 4x03: THE DANGER OF THE HOPEFUL SIGIL
+ bonus gifs under the cut
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dribs-and-drabbles · 1 year ago
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I keep thinking about the band aids on the goldfish slippers...
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and the band aid on Rung's car.
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And how they must be intentional. Because GMMTV has probably made those slippers to be able to sell in connection to the show. So they've deliberately designed them with the band aids.
The car (Mhok) and the goldfish (Day) each has a symbol of damage, and also of protecting and healing that damage: Both Mhok and Day are in need of healing, and they will be each other's. This might seem obvious already but I needed to say it.
I wonder if we'll eventually see that band aid on the car coming off, with Mhok finally fixing it and moving on from the guilt and memory of his sister's death...
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egginfroggin · 1 month ago
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*yeets this and runs*
My hand regrets my decision to try for more realistic wings, frankly
Transcriptions:
Mabel Pines - Steller's Jay
Dipper Pines - Blue Jay
fledglings
can't quite fly yet
wing's aren't adult-sized yet
Dipper often forgets to preen
Mabel likes to put glitter in her wings (and Dipper's, when possible)
Dipper collects his primaries to make quill pens
Mabel collects their feathers for crafting
Yeah so I'm just gonna drop this here and uhhhhh run, thanks for checking this, and I hope you have a good day
(program: krita; time taken: about 1 hr 45 minutes)
#eggin creatin'#dipper pines#mabel pines#gravity falls#first time drawing for gravity fallsa nd it's. it's a wing au. bro I've never drawn these characters before in my life but the VISION#they preen each other's wings your honor#they're gonna have tails btw I just. completely forgot them#basically with wings you get them from one parent or the other#twins often have the same kind of wings#not sure about the specifics as far as like. subspecies go#but anyway#dipper and mabel are both jays#their mother and father were probably jays#shermie was (is??) a raven his wife was a jay#ford and stan are magpies#filbrick was a magpie caryn was a raven#tldr the pines family consists of various corvids and that explains their penchant for trouble mischief and also family-motivated violence#hey fun fact magpies and some other corvids will teach their families to hate you if you upset them enough#just sayin man bill better stay dead#anyway yeah also mabel having steller's jay wings was solely because steller sounds like stellar#as in stars#and she's. well. shooting star and all that#as for dipper being a blue jay look man blue jays and pine trees they're just inseparable in my mind#there's something to be said about the stan twins and avarice/stubbornness/grudges I think and. magpies are kind of. stubborn critters#who also collect many shiny#and are oddly ride-or-die. also the aforementioned grudges#welcome to my au where all the explanation is in the tags#I'm just rambling now honestly#putting off actually watching gravity falls#yeah that's right folks it's wtst all over again I'm making stuff for a series I haven't watched/played yet!
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motherforthefamicom · 4 months ago
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happy 35th anniversary mother 1!!!!!! love this game 2 death <3
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raayllum · 1 year ago
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Been thinking recently about the idea in fandom that boils down to, usually, "the Character that Changes the most being deemed 'the most complex'" and that character development (i.e. character change) being held up as The Golden Standard of a Good Character and...
I fundamentally disagree, but first, a little bit more explanation about what I mean
Very often shows and movies, when being recommended on tumblr, are sold on the basis of having enjoyable/in-depth characters. Often times this also means conflating enjoyable with likeable, but that's a discussion post for another day. And even more often, it means there are characters who are seen as Deep because of how radically they change over the course of a story.
Lots of times, this falls into two camps:
Characters change radically, but early on in the story, and remain largely the same past that point of change (think anytime in a first season) until the end of the story
People recommending shows based on characters having traditional redemption arcs (enemy or bully to friend / good guy / love interest)
Now, I'm not saying that 1) character change can't be deep or 2) that character growth is bad. Neither of those things are true, even subjectively. What I am saying is that 1) character change / a character changing is not the same as automatically being a good, interesting, or well written character and 2) character growth is not the be-all-end-all of character writing. Yes, there can be problems with characters be overly stagnant, but typically that's only an issue if 1) a work is serialized and concerned with character development and they don't change at all, 2) a character never adjusts (rightly or wrongly) according to their mistakes, or 3) all of the above but they're a main character.
However, assuming that Character A has to be radically different at the beginning of a story in terms of their personality/values/etc. as they are at the end of the story is just... not how it works, necessarily. This is, I think, one of the reasons why antagonists who get redemption arcs tend to be more popular than heroes who had good values the whole time, because there's more opportunity to point and go "look, they've changed! they act on and have basic compassion now!" Which, fair enough, but again: other types of characters are fine too.
Particularly for characters fandom tends to have the hardest time with: paragons.
Paragons are characters who are usually the central hero, pretty morally if not entirely moral upstanding, and because they already start out in a place of "always doing the right thing," they rarely radically change by the end of the story. Instead, paragons are used to progress theme/messaging and inspire other characters around them to change (a good example might be Buddy from the Christmas movie Elf and to a lesser extent - as he's more transformative as a character - Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender, who's there to return childhood to his friends as an ideal and carry on Air Nomad values).
And for TDP, that's Ezran.
He's the youngest in the main cast and by far the most measured. While Callum and Rayla are off fighting, he keeps a level head. He assumes responsiblity largely without guilt, holds other people accountable most often without being cruel, he's kind and deeply compassionate, he shows regular empathy for his enemies even when he has to treat them like enemies, he loves his father but does not idealize him, he is king without craving power, he's trusting and honest and while he has his flaws (overly optimistic, his passivity, sometimes struggles to consider other people's emotions, naivety, etc), they - as of yet - are not overly connected to his sense of morality (which is a distinct difference compared to the rest of the main cast).
Now, TDP is less concerned with the theme of Childhood compared to something like ATLA, but Ezran being a child (again, in a way the rest of the cast is not) is also very important. Ezran, and Callum to a lesser extent, is the embodiment of the concept that children aren't born with hatred in their hearts; it's learned, or earned, through experience, society, and suffering. And as Ezran spells out for us in 4x03, he has suffered and been hurt - and he believes in breaking the cycle and believing in hope for a better future anyway.
Ezran's steadfast reflection of the series' core theme of "true strength - to break the cycle - is found in vulnerability, in forgiveness, in love" in both word and action does make him the closest thing to a paragon in the series. He's the one who finds the egg; he's the one who forgives Rayla and Soren; he's the one who still tries to help Claudia; he's the peacemaker, the literal bridge between peoples and species in spite of witnessing so many of their worst crimes/actions.
In both arcs, there tended to be a trio of characters who rapidly change, and a trio of characters who are more, comparatively, stagnated. Early S1 Rayla, Callum, and Soren are radically different in a ton of ways than they are even at the beginning of S3, but especially by the end. On the other hand, Viren - post 1x03 at least - Claudia and Ezran are far more consistent in arc 1; their circumstances change, but their viewpoints and realities and choices are largely the same from season to season - they just keep doubling down. This doesn't mean they don't change at all, but they don't radically transform - they just become more of what they already are.
I'd say that in arc 2, things have switched up, with Callum, Rayla, and Viren being the three who are radically transformed (thus far) with Soren, Claudia, and Ezran still being in the more stagnated corner. (For more notes on Claudia and Ezran's shared passivity, check out this pre-S4 meta.)
Ezran starts out the series as a good hearted, slightly mischevious little boy who loves his family and believes that people can be good. The point of the series is not to change these parts of him. It's to demonstrate the difficulties - losing both his parents, taking on the kingship, struggling to make the right choices, keeping his friends together, caring about peace and sentiment in a world that increasingly does not - of maintaining those positive traits, again, in a world that is determined to test those ideals and attributes.
Ezran is not here to be transformed by the storm, the same way his friends and some of his companions are. He is here to demonstrate the strength and necessity in weathering the storm so that the world cannot make you cold, or uncaring, or violent, even when those paths and emotions would be much easier to go down.
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Good character development isn't about changing your character; it's about changing your audience's understanding and perspective of your character. Sometimes that means the character is also changing simultaneously, but that's far from a requirement for a character to be interesting. Like most things in writing, what it really boils down to is execution.
And I could go on about why I think people gravitate towards characters who start off evil (often part of imperialist empires or older, institutionally backed systems) and learn that the evil was wrong actually (and sometimes not even that) but that's a meta for another day, and this one is long enough.
TLDR; Ezran, like a few other characters in the show - antagonists and protagonists alike - is not meant to be a radically transformative, even though he very much has grown and changed. Instead, he's meant to exemplify the importance of not losing your sense of self in an increasingly cruel or difficult world, and what parts we should arguably try our best to hold onto as well.
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autisticzenitsu · 3 months ago
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I don't know who needs to hear this, but character development does not equal a complete personality change.
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harpuiaa · 1 year ago
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i've been dead and gone bc of school and jobsearching and everything happening all at once but ive been playing the boktai series games lately and i'm enjoying it a lot. I just got past the third boss in boktai 2. I don't know why but i'm enthralled with these games, i highly recommend them
#WOE TEN THOUSAND TAG MUSINGS BE UPON YE (this is a warning)#boktai#(pointing) the battle network fan has fallen for the crossover marketing 20 years late#the first gif is bc i imagine the bosses waiting all polite like for django to finish eating healing items when heal scumming in fights.#twenty apples a day keeps the damage away#django is like a son to me hes just a little guy#if the text is hard to read in the third image it says “The tick damage in sunlight brothers”#i find it funny that vampire django still gains his energy from sunlight after turning. his voiceline changes too#it's hard to tell if it's bc hes supposed to sound gruff or like hes in pain. but it makes me feel bad for recharging energy like that#i figure he'd be wound up abt this since it seems he views any connection to his father with a lot of weight#(e.x: zazie pointing out he's crying just after the gun del sol got stolen at the start of 2)#hence why he's depressed in that image#also all the official art of him looks very cool but im incapable of seeing him like that his sprite makes him look like a scruffy dog#im torn between thinking it's cute nd wanting to make fun of him with doodles. least typical vampire appearance with the most typical power#the way you kill immortals (vampires) in this game is so metal i need to rant abt it Somewhere#so like boktai is a game series abt vampire hunting but it's rather sci-fi abt it. instead of more typical weapons you use solar energy#the immortals resurrect after being killed#but this can be prevented via purification. the way this goes is#after winning a bossfight the enemy will get sealed in a coffin. that you then to drag allll the way back outside the dungeon#(often with new puzzles thanks to the coffin being an extra weight)#all the while the immortal inside tries to escape#the objective is to get the immortal to a. summoning circle i guess?#housing devices called pile drivers. they're more like lenses or mirrors though.#they focus sunrays on the coffin purifying the immortal after a brief fight that's like#preventing the boss from attacking the pile drivers until it dies#like. this doesn't sound all that special but most bosses you fight are sentient and i just think it's a bit of a brutal method#for a main protagonist to use#i keep thinking of how it must feel to do it for a living. something like a funeral driver but you're the murderer and the corpse isn't dea#and instead of a funeral you're taking them to a mega death laser array that'll slowly chip away at their health#and then boktai 2 inflicts that on django and im like. is he ok (he's ok but he died)
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