#not that i should post for the algorithm i should post/draw for myself but the validation of number go up (also working to overcome this)

[hplonesomeart]

Hey!! So turns out a video I made between a certain “well beloved but highly sensitive/emotionally reactive T.V” and an “orange haired inkling-turned-human” has managed to sweep my YouTube channel and accumulate 100k VIEWS!! THAT’S A LOT OF PEOPLE ACTUALLY?? My most widely viewed video EVER to exist in this moment in time?? AAAAA?? Not even mentioning the various comments and staggering increase in subs! It’s so much more then what I expected or even prepared for—might even be the most impactful thing to happen for me this year <3

…aside from graduating high school + the social connections I’ve been fortunate to make lol

BUT THE POINT IS I’d been closely monitoring the YouTube growth through the entirety of October. It’s make me smile like a dork, gawk in astonishment, dance frantically in my room from the energy boosts, and grow courage to stop being so selective/self-conscious with what I wish to share with the world! It’s kept my ambitions going!

I needed to find some way to celebrate the occasion and express my thanks—because I can’t NOT acknowledge this milestone jksjskp. Typically I try to avoid getting tunnel visioned focusing on the metrics/numbers. Mr. Puzzles had already demonstrated how much those things can mess with the minds of creatives. Caring too much about chasing views or placing your artistic value in attention seeking gets damaging. But at same time…it’s hard to deny the sense of pride the 100k achievement has filled me with. I understand that reaching 100k views doesn’t immediately make me any “better” or “worse” then I was before. I’m still just me! It only helps me feel seen by others—and that’s all I really needed. To hear some nice words & receive reminders that my ideas are cared about. So thank you SMG4 fandom for that, seriously thank you.

Please accept this Mr. Puzzle drawing as a way of sharing the happiness around. He’s so entertaining. Love him for simply existing. So glad we can all collectively be super attached to him (and the rest of the SMG4 cast of course). Can’t wait to see more incredible artworks from the fandom :)

Just incase anyone is confused by my vague description over which “animated video” I’m referring to here—hopefully this photo will help clarify lol. It’s this one!! Sorry about not outright stating the title at the start, I got carried away with writing!!

I’ve been in an odd place mentally when thinking about it. Wondering to myself if any of the attention is deserved considering it’s not even fully colored and could be dismissed as “low effort” content (despite taking several days making it). It’s easy to get into a trap of comparing yourself to others and questioning how much of the videos success is based on your skills, sheer algorithm luck, or only because you used popular characters and catered to a specific fandom. And then judging yourself by looking at other peoples videos. I’ve seen several artists post higher quality works then my own but it somehow gets less views. So why did mine succeed when others (who should have gotten just as much attention if not more) didn’t? Sometimes you feel like you’ve unfairly robbed them of that chance to be seen. However I’ve realized that I can’t ever expect views to be consistent—and comparing is pointless. So why worry about it or feel inadequate? I mean it’s pretty common for funny cat videos to go viral, so who am I to question the system lol. “Popular” YouTube videos can range from a passion project which took 7+ artists…to a clip of Toad singing Chandelier or a nonsensical Vine sketch. Anything can happen when it’s the internet! And just-so-happened my video was chosen. I should stay glad about that and get rid of all the overanalyzing. So that’s what I’ve chosen to do :)

[tinyfantasminha]

👍

[mercurymacaroons]

please god just take it

long time no post, sorry for the hiatus but lmao my rl job threw me through the ringer and then whoops!!!!!! didnt draw for 2+ years. im in a new job now and found out that my settings for clip were fucked up so i did some messing around and now i am having a blast so yeehaw.

this was supposed to be a nose sketch then it somehow turned into the smtv nahobino idk what happened. for a while he looked like chad from accounting but i think i salvaged it kinda maybe. def need to do some more studies on asian people bc it is def not right but i didnt really use any references so thats on me. i dont think im going to finish this, hence the ss, but maybe i will one day. i just wanted to post something since ive started drawing again and should probably dust this blog off at some point

anywho, morbid ordeal of being known aside - if any of yall are still here, do you wanna see just like sketches like this? maybe not this detailed bc that damn nose took too damn long, but i think i could do sketches and thumbnails

[lynxnothinks2]

FR Fanart Stats

Have you ever wondered which FR dragons are the most popular to draw? No? Well clearly you're not a university student with looming deadlines, a severe procrastination problem and unlimited access to research grade statistics software let's dive in

Originally I was doing this to see which dragons I'd drawn the most for commissions over the years, but then I got curious generally about if the popularity of dragon breeds correlated with the amount of fanart produced. We artists are always fighting algorithms and trends, so this info may be useful to those of us looking to utilise them!

A brief intro/some disclaimers to the data:

I've only included modern breeds as they are more numerous than ancients on-site, have been around for less time (excl. Obelisks) and Excel was already protesting with what I had so I saved myself the headache. Look forward to the ancient breed sequel ahahahah :P that's a joke i'm not doing this again

For my 'tumblr popularity' data, I counted the breed of dragon of the first 100 featured in the '#flight rising art' tag. I excluded ancients and any unidentifiable breeds. Each individual dragon was counted in multi-image posts, unless if the dragon(s) in question were in a comic, series etc. in which case each unique dragon was counted once.

Assuming my personal commission stats are the least interesting to most people, but I'll give some background. I started doing comms in mid-2018, producing art at a relatively impressive volume (rip my time and motivation.) I do a lot less FR art now, but if we assume breed popularity has stayed consistent since then the only breed this should really effect are Obelisks as the newbies.

And then finally, on-site breed popularity. I used the dragon search feature on FR to identify the number of named, active dragons for each breed. Total dragons as of 27/01/24, if you were curious: 12,924,070! That's a lot of guys!!

I threw everything into percentages, then made a graph. it's got issues probably but my degree isn't in niche pixel dragon info and i was getting bored at this point

I ran some stuff through statistical tests but they don't show anything remarkable that you can't see in the graph. Rstudio claimed a few more years from my lifespan for naught

Conclusions:

Skydancers and Imperials are crazy popular in all categories, but SDs are Tumblr's favourite

Obelisks and Ridgebacks do disproportionately well on Tumblr compared to their site popularity

Snappers and Bogsneaks are pretty unpopular across the board. I've never drawn either! But at least snaps are getting a bit of love on here

The popularity of Faes and Guardians on-site is not significantly reflected in fanart (excl. Guardian comms for me which is? an odd outlier??)

Mirrors and Nocturnes are not popular on Tumblr - found the latter interesting as I thought there may be lingering bias from NotN, but apparently not

Coatls, Pearlcatchers, Spirals and Tundras are pretty consistent between categories. Nothing really of note for these guys except for less people wanting me to draw spirals (good they're complicated)

I could draw a Wildclaw with my eyes closed and although that will not make me popular, it can make me money

Well that was a good use of 4 hours I'm going to write my essay now

and if you'd like to show your support for this cool art stats guy check out my main @lynxnothinks commissions are open thank you byeee

[redslug]

Denoiser wisdom

Since a lot of people showed interest in my workflow of using SD like a renderer for existing sketches, I'll be sharing the little tricks I find while exploring the capabilities of SD with Neuroslug. Read the inpainting post to understand this one. When inpainting, the model takes into consideration what is already in the area it regenerates and in the areas around it. How exactly it'll follow these guidelines is determined by denoising strength. At low values it'll stick closely to the areas of color it sees and won't create anything radically different from the base. At high denoising strength it'll gladly insert colors, shapes and silhouettes that weren't there originally. Basically the more you trust your sketch the smaller your denoising strength should be. It doesn't mean you won't need the high denoising at some point. Let me explain it using yesterday's artwork. It all starts with a rough sketch.

Since I have a particular composition in mind and want it to be maintained, I'll be using a low denoising strength to fully regenerate this image.

It means that the algorithm won't have enough freedom to fix my large-scale mistakes, it's simply not allowed to change the areas of color too dramatically. So if you want to do this yourself make sure to set the image to black and white first and check that your values are working and contrast is good.

To make sure the result isn't too cartoony and flat I used brushes with strong color jitter and threw a rather aggressive noise texture over the whole thing. This'll give the denoiser a little wiggle room to sprout details out of thin air.

It kept the composition, the suggested lighting and the majority of flowers kept their intended colors too. This was denoising strength 0f 0.4. To contrast that, same base image with denoising at 0.7:

It's pretty, but it's neither the style nor composition I wanted. Let's refine the newly redrawn base to include the details that were lost in transition. These were intended to be roses.

It's here where I learned a little trick. You can mix and match different models to achieve the look you desire. Neuroslug is good at detailed moths and painterly environments. It's not good at spitting out really detailed flowers, they end up looking very impressionist which is not what I want in foreground. So, I switched to an anime focused model and let it run wild on this bush with high (0.7) denoising strength.

Nice definition, but it looks too smooth and isn't in line with what I want. Switching back to Neuroslug with denoising at 0.5 and letting it work over these roses.

This way, I get both the silhouette and contrast of the anime model (counterfeitV30) and the matching style of Neuroslug. It's also useful in cases where the model doesn't know a particular flower. You can generate an abstract flower cluster with the anime model and use the base model to remind the AI that what you want is in fact a phlox specifically. So I did this to basically every flower cluster on the image to arrive at this:

It's still a bit of a mess but it has taken me about 80% of the way there, the rest I'll be fixing up myself.

My "Lazy Foliage" brush set was really helpful for this. I'll release that one once it accumulates enough brushes to be really versatile. Now we block in the character.

Yes, I left the hands wonky since I intend to be drawing them manually later, same about the foot. There's so much opportunity for the AI to mess them up that I'd rather have all the control on these details.

When it renders the face it can really mess up everything, so I do it with low (0.45) denoising strength to discourage new eyes popping up in inappropriate places. Take note that I kept the antennae out of the mask. AI is easily confused when one subject overlaps the other.

Good, good. Wait. Why are your eyes hairy? Now, mask out the eyes, remove all mention of fur from the prompt and

That's about right. Since the eyes are all one color block I can afford to raise the denoising strength for more wild results. Same for areas of just fluff on the entire body, it's all one texture and having the denoiser at 0.6-0.75 is beneficial because it's going to add locks, stray hairs and other fluffy goodness. Just make sure to not make the mask too tight to the silhouette, it needs some space to add hairs sticking out.

With the skirt it was back to really low denoising. The folds I blocked in make sense with the position oh her legs under it, so I didn't want it to be lost.

Lastly, I drew in a flower that she's planting and ran over it with moderately high denoising to make it match the surrounding style. Ignore the biblically accurate roots there, I'll fix them by hand.

One last pass over the whole thing in Procreate. I draw the hands and add details such as the round pseudopupils, face ridges and wing markings to keep the character consistent with the previous image of her. And a bit of focal blur for a feeling of depth. Phew, even with generous use of AI this whole thing took an entire day of work. In the end what determines quality isn't the tool you use but the attention you choose to pay to finding inconsistencies and fixing them.

[atalienart]

Just some random thoughts.

I know that numbers and likes don't really matter on social media and when you draw, you mainly draw for yourself but it's funny how seeing people get interested in you stuff makes you want to create more. Yes, perhaps it's short-lasting satisfaction and you should just focus on doing your thing but it still has its impact.

Social media these days are demanding. You have to post certain things at particular time, be everywhere, all the time. People migrate to different sites looking for something better and you need to follow. But I'm too tired. Too tired to manage every site that doesn't even work on my old phone, follow trends, pay attention to the ever-changing algorithm, escape from billionaire idiots, greedy corporations, flesh and mind consuming robots, people that don't care.

So, seeing someone's comment or a spike in interest, seeing real people being really curious about something I created, seeing that someone found me in a pile of trash that's today's internet is a little reminder that posting another drawing or sharing an update about my writing isn't a complete waste of time.

Though I notice how everything changed while I was absent for those couple years and I wonder sometimes if I should maybe stop posting and come back when, or if, I have something really worth showing, a bigger project. Maybe what I have right now isn't good enough to share. And then someone leaves a nice message or more people start to follow my blog and I think: okay, maybe one more drawing, maybe one more writing update.

I know that commenting and showing you care about someone else's projects require energy but I try to do it more often myself. I'm rarely on social media these days because they're exhausting and I suck at commenting but I still try. And I appreciate when people try for me. Thank you guys!

(btw, it's not fishing for attention and engagement, it's just something I thought about lately looking at drawings of my characters that kinda appeared out of nowhere xD)

[evanezco]

Hey I saw your art and I am really impressed. I am 27 an artist myself but I am way to shy to show my art online. I have been working on my craft a lot. Actually I do paint with oil and digital... it feels like I have two lifes. One is really traditional, like old painter style... the other one is my passion... drawing more comic art things. I wish I would be brave enough to share or connect with other artists. I feel rather burned out and depressed... I am sorry for using your inbox to vent. Maybe you have some advice for me? Thank you so much for listening.

Hey, first of all thank you and the inbox is there for a reason so anyone is welcome.

As for the advice, only post online if you want to, don’t post for others, not everyone likes to share their work online and it’s fine. Also remember that probably your first pieces are not gonna be seen that much, don’t expect thousands of likes or comments, there’s nothing wrong with the art, the algorithms are just…. There I guess. If you want to share your art on social media just go for it, and if you don’t like the experience it’s as easy as delete the account or the pieces if that makes you uncomfortable.

Connecting with artist is something I feel I don’t do as much as I would like, but some stuff you can do join discord servers of your fav artists (most likely than not they will have one) talk with artist in the same fandoms that you are, I met many cool artist while doing the supercorp zine for example, comment on their work and stuff like this.

I don’t know if this helped you, let me know if I should try to elaborate more on something but hopefully it will help a little ^^

[winguontheweb]

i hope this isn't an odd question but how does one become confident about drawing fat characters? i've always wanted to draw bigger body types but when i do i'm often met with way less likes or sometimes even rude comments, and i kinda just delete the art and retreat back to drawing skinny characters

i've tried my best to learn all i can about drawing fat bodies but i just can't like. get myself the push to keep drawing and posting them i guess? i think i'm too caught up in the idea that i need social media approval on my art, but i also feel so empty and lacking if i don't show my art to the world i guess

(also your art is really really inspiring to me! it's amazing!!)

I'll be honest, I was really afraid for a lot of the time too, I was worried people would get the wrong idea. But coming to terms with the fact that I am just an admirer of big ladies has made me more motivated to break out of my shell, because otherwise I'd be SCREAMING,,,

I'm really sorry about the rude comments :< those people just can't comprehend someone's out there enjoying what they enjoy and putting art of that into the world. I know it's not always as simple as that, but I'd say buck the haters and keep posting if you can. If you keep getting rude comments from the same people, highly recommend a block/mute, as well. Liberal use of the block button is in fact highly recommended.

Your art deserves to be shown to the world!!! All art is!! some people just hate fun, but that shouldn't make you stop posting!

As for the less likes though, if you're posting to twitter, I'd highly recommend an extension called the "Twitter Demetricator" which removes all numbers of likes and retweets. I've been using that for about a year and a half and it's helped me a lot in no longer caring about how well my posts perform. There might be a Tumblr option? I know this is kind of a roundabout answer, but I guess, it should be that you're confident in your art, rather than basing its quality on how well it does in the Algorithm

anyway, I hope some of that is able to help!! I really appreciate being able to inspire, thank you so much for the kind words ;0;

[the-mad-owl]

Posting art online is so discouraging. I have the direct comparison of handing out the pride stickers irl - they're so cute, woah did you make those yourself, thank you so much here's stickers in return, so many people were brought joy by my art - and posting them online - 3 likes 1 reblog, dead.

This isn't to beg for interaction and more to say... if I had to start drawing all over again, in today's social media environment, I don't think I would manage.

Tumblr's friends/mutuals/reblog structure is breaking down, and while instagram used to be the place for artists and I was able to gain followers that enjoyed my art through the use of specific Hashtags, nowadays the feature to search by latest is removed and the algorithm punishes your harshly for being a small account or average at your skill.

Looking only at my social media, one should think I am getting worse and worse at art, I started out being quite good and worth seeing and 8 years later I have forgotten how to draw. This isn't true of course, I am improving. But there's no way to gain a kind word anymore, no artists at roughly the same level as me to find me and follow me for a friend through interaction. Nor am I able to search out people like me myself, tumblr is... tumblr (currently still the best option), and the algorithms of all other apps only recommend me the best and most entertaining.

Now I don't do good strategies. I still mainly use tags, nothing else. I don't post according to user schedules or make art to show off every single week, my art account is new and was dead for a while, i don't use fanart to draw people's attention. I don't know how to make tiktoks of my art - I aim to create pictures and be good at that, not make video content.

Of course I don't get much interaction. But the comparison: The same art, handed to people online and in real life, both for free, both by a stranger, is so striking. People are happy about your art, they like it, they really do, but by posting it it's rare to get that feeling anymore. I hope new artists keep drawing.

[fainthedcherry]

Haven't posted these 2 lil bbys anywhere yet, I think!! Soo let me post something, to try to get back into the habit. I don't think it's a secret, that I hate social media and mostlyyyy do not like posting on it, plus it's hard for me to keep up with algorithms. I wanna be my own artist, without algos, to determine, whether people see my stuff or not. I guess it's an advantage, starting so small again. On some days, I was embarrassed to post stuff, on others I wanted to be seen by everyone under the sun. So let me just...Post something for the sake of myself.

(This drawing is almost a year old again, fresh posts will be rare from someone like me with low energy btw, to new people visiting my page by some sheer stroke of luck)

I made this back when like...I freshly changed my chibi style again, to something I'm more happy with.

I love drawing Chloe and Leo together but....I still yearn the day, where Finn and Marco overtake via "most images" category on TH. I just can't stand to see Chloe is my most-drawn character. I do NOT want to accept that fact. I want C.I.Ta or my boys to stay on top. I don't even LIKE Chloe that much, which I think, bothers me to the core, that she has so many drawings to begin with. My fault ofc, that she's so easy to draw as well. But that begs the question, why I keep putting my more detailed charas along with someone like her together sdfgkjsdg.

One thing I might need to get rid of btw, is my bad tendencies to CONSTANTLY write long descs. Like idk. Does anyone read these? Should I just..Stop adding these? Even though I love rambling? Does it stop people from looking at my art? You can let me know, if you want. I spend 1-2 hrs just...Putting down my process and my thoughts about a drawing down here. But I'm not sure, if people want that. Yes, it's my blog and all, but I try to keep it more professional and high-key here, unlike my Insta, which is just...My garbage dump basically, 0 fricks given.

Anyway, I'll see if I can schedule a posts for a bit, so that I don't just drop off the face-of-the-earth again. Between all the death that surrounded me and just overall, the many migraines I had last week, I am ever so mildly concerned, about my own wellbeing not getting any better, yknow? Also btw, I am a bit rusty with tagging things, so expect me to possibly get tags wrong again, but as mentioned in a previous post, how tf do you tag something properly anyway. There's no rules to tags, just basic human decency, to add the right ones and not be a scumbag bot-advertiser LMAO

[alfgifu]

analysing my own fic: the navel, the gaze, and the wanging on about it

So.

I used to be fairly active online in fandom-adjacent spaces but almost entirely as a lurker. I was still following various tumblr accounts through a feed-reader, but had otherwise kind of switched off for a decade or two. I spent more time online in other places, discussing religion and politics mostly, and hadn’t really done much for myself or for fun.

I kept writing, both at work and in my spare time. I got better at explaining things concisely and persuasively. I spent hours over drafts of novels that I knew were shit, partly because I wanted to improve but partly because [black hole of self-sabotage due to stress of undiagnosed autism].

In the autumn of 2022 I was doing what I imagine a lot of us did that year - getting my head around life adjustments after the acute phase of the pandemic. The trauma, the impact on my spouse and kids, the impact on my job. Jobs, I should say, because I had whirled through a lot of them in the previous couple of years and ended up somewhere I couldn’t have predicted and wouldn’t necessarily have wanted to land.

It was by chance that I found and enjoyed Victoria Goddard’s writing that year, when I was unsettled and reaching around for things to try. There was a link to a fan-run discord community in the afterword of At the Feet of the Sun and I was curious enough to check it out. I had been disengaging from social media for a while - algorithmic feeds drive me up the wall - but there seemed no harm in finding a new place to lurk.

I hadn’t realised that new arrivals are actively welcomed in discord servers. I also hadn’t realised how easy it is to join a voice channel by accident while you’re trying to figure yourself out. Two interactions with friendly people - enough to lower the internal friction to posting something else. And something else after that.

And I had been thinking, hadn’t I, that I might want to write some fanfiction? Twenty years of reading and not writing… It was surely my turn. It would be good practice, a chance to test myself on sharing fiction in public.

Perhaps, I thought, one or two people will read it. Perhaps I’ll get some feedback.

Welp.

I hadn’t allowed for how welcoming and supportive the community would be. I hadn’t realised how hungry a tiny fandom is for new content. I hadn’t known how addictive any kind of validation about my writing would prove.

Anyway my fingers slipped and

So that happened.

In November it’ll be two years since I joined the fandom; in December, two years since I first posted a fic chapter to AO3. It seems like a good time to take stock.

My writing pace has dropped like a brick in the past six months due to other life stressors, which has kiboshed both fanfic and the ambition to finish another original novel this year (and with it the hope to maybe, this time, writing something less shit and more shareable).

This month I’ve mostly been drawing Inktober doodles instead of writing. I hope to recover a bit that way. The other life events continue but unlike earlier this year the stresses seem likely to end in a good place - eventually! - and when things are less full-on I have to believe that the urge and capacity to write fiction will recover.

For now, having blown the dust off this tumblr, I’m going to do some processing by taking a look here at the various things I’ve written and contributed to over the past two years. I’m planning to reflect on how and why they came about, on what worked and what didn’t, and on what I learned from writing them.

[vidreview]

VIDEO ESSAY ROUNDUP #1

[originally posted october 11th 2023]

so, i watch a lot of video essays.

i started this blog with the intention of reviewing video essays at length, in the hopes of highlighting best & worst practices, discussing the history of the form, and using them as a jumping off point for personal/political introspection. but as time has gone on, i've found myself encountering more and more videos that i didn't have a whole lot to say about, but that felt worthy of a spotlight anyway.

WITH THAT IN MIND, welcome to video essay roundup, an occasional list of stuff i've watched recently that i think is worth your time. enough preamble, let's get started.

"Self-Discovery Stories | Video Essay" by Glouder Glens.

are you watching Sylvia Schweikert? i know you're not because its numbers are disastrously low. her video about it/its pronouns is a genuine work of art, a video essay about the dehumanization of trans people that seamlessly transforms into lesbian werewolf erotica. this newest video is just as beautiful and strange, not least because it's rendered in portrait mode like a tiktok. it's an honest, far-ranging and personal essay whose sub-300 views is genuinely criminal. seriously, seriously, Sylvia's an essayist you NEED to be paying attention to. it's making the kind of stuff that simply does not play well with the youtube algorithm, and that's the stuff that i live for. watch her videos and share them with your friends. give it money on patreon for gods sake! also definitely go watch her short film "Self Centered," it's a haunting and masterful work of art.

"More unremarkable and odd places in Mario 64" by Any Austin.

i stumbled across Any Austin a couple months ago and he's quickly become one of my favorite "it's time to relax" creators. his "unremarkable and odd places" series scratches an itch i never knew i had, as someone who loves exploring the least interesting corners of any digital world i find myself in. his other series involves calculating the unemployment rate of video game locations by talking to every NPC and deducing their employment status. the editing is calm, his tone is measured and matter of fact, and his sense of humor ties it all together. this is the kind of thing that used to be the bread and butter of video teams at outlets like Cracked or Polygon, before they were summarily laid off or pushed out. it's good to see someone else picking up that mantle in a way that seems relatively sustainable and isn't under the umbrella of a layoff-happy corporate enterprise (except for google of course, but we're all in that boat together aren't we?)

does this count as a video essay? i think that's a reasonable question. i'm inclined to say yes, with the understanding that there are many different types and genres of video essay. but that's a conversation for another day.

"On the Ethics of Boinking Animal People" by Patricia Taxxon.

i should do a full vidrev on this one honestly, but i can't do a post like this and not include it. if you play around in any sort of furry-adjacent fetish space, have opinions about the sexual proclivities of furries, or are otherwise prone to pearl-clutching as an outsider, this is an essential watch. Patricia here does a great job drawing attention to how even well-meaning defenders of, say, feral furry porn, often give up unnecessary ground to opponents with fallacious devices like the Harkness test. i've talked to a lot of fellow kinky furries who came out of this essay exalting in the joy that finally, someone said it! many of the arguments made here, especially in underlining that all furry porn is immaterial and imaginary, are thoughts i've had since i first made a furaffinity account in 2007 or 08 (though i swore up and down i wasn't a furry until 2019) but was always too afraid to express.

this is scary, sensitive territory, but that's what makes this such an essential intervention. this is the perspective of an autistic transfem furry who just wants to have an honest conversation without all the moral fearmongering and shortsighted kneejerk cliches that come up when a topic skirts dangerously close to taboos that we just, generally, refuse to talk about like adults. these are conversations that, in my experience, only ever happened among friendgroups with a long-established repartee and understanding of each other's boundaries, if at all. otherwise, even progressive supposedly kink-positive spaces can encourage a sort of cop-brained punitive attitude towards imaginary sex acts that very easily bleeds over into puritanical takes on, say, kink at pride. frankly, i'm sick of the language & rhetoric of Respectability, because saying "no, most of us aren't like the freaks" only ever results in a liberal block decrying the deplorables and subjecting them to further marginalization and abuse. it takes a lot of guts to make a video like this and i'm so, so glad that Patricia Taxxon stuck the landing.

"Who Is Killing Cinema? - A Murder Mystery" by Patrick (H) Willems.

i've already written two separate vidrevs on Willems, but what can i say? this most recent stretch of work focusing on the business and philosophy of cinema in the streaming era is good stuff. nothing in this particular essay is new per se if you've been paying attention to the business of hollywood for the last ten years, but it does a great job assembling the broad strokes of a lot of different-but-common arguments into one far ranging thesis. much like the prior two videos, i think this works as a solid introductory primer to a more materialist understanding of these trends for folks who aren't necessarily familiar with materialist theory. bonus points for wasting no time getting to the point, unlike his otherwise excellent video on the word "content."

alright, i think that'll do it for this video essay roundup! enjoy :)

ROUNDUP #2 ->

[NOTE: as i'm migrating the archive, links between roundups will direct back to cohost. i probably won't get around to changing that until i write a new one.]

[woodpengu]

Healing from trauma is wild. Especially the long-term stoof.

Here I am with a bundle of skills I developed from youth... only for me to "forget" all of it. Because of how the nervous system works - tying skills and memories together - processing/transforming/healing one can "erase" the other, which is both fascinating and terrifyingly frustrating.

I haven't posted new illustrations in a long time because of this effect. In fact, all of my creative interests are deeply impacted by this. So, on the one hand I'm celebrating the progress and forward momentum of healing. But on the other... I have to re-teach myself skills in a way that is almost learning from scratch because there's no longer trauma.

Because of that... I feel behind. I feel like I'm a child in an adult suit being judged immensely for my lack of capacity. But the only one judging me is me, and anyone I think is judging me is measuring the wrong detail against what they believe should be true. So, I have to remind myself that I need my own patience more than anyone else does. I have a lot to learn and reteach myself at this time.

But it explains why I haven't posted new art or talked about my drawing or barely shared my writing. Among all the other skills. And this is something severely punished by the popularity- or activity-based algorithms throughout the internet, which is a painful hit to mental health when you're a small bean wanting to make a splash in the world.

Maybe my point is... if you're feeling lonely, behind, stunted, or like you've forgotten how to do things... I hear you, see you, and understand what you're going through. Healing trauma is busy work, and you're doing the best you can under all that pressure. Give yourself some credit for trying to live instead of continuing to be a victim.

Loving Kindness

[joshua-beeking]

I'm very sad that fandom spaces (particularly mdzs it seems) have been unkind to you. I absolutely adore your original work but your fanarts have a special place in my heart because that's how I found you and your art is just so absolutely beautiful and I love it so much

I hope you're having a good day, you deserve to have just such a good day

That's incredibly sweet of you, I thank you kindly! It was a really thoughtful gesture and a nice thing to wake up to today.

I'm very sorry that I won't be drawing any MDZS anymore, the attitude of the fandom just killed any inspiration I had to draw for it and I won't force myself to do something I don't want to do anymore, I tolerated a lot for a long while. I know it made me "boring" now to so many people who used to follow me, but I'm far from the first one to "leave" because of harassment or from entitled attitudes for ridiculous reasons. ( Daring to draw " uncanon dynamics" and all that ridiculous debate about it, having Ace headcanons, etc, etc...)

People should take that time to think about recent fandom entitlement regarding artists in general, we are already exhausted from fighting against reposters/fraudulent companies stealing our works for profits/ expected to do -everything- for free and not asking a dime for it and live off sunshine and rainbows/ never getting acknowledged for anything original we make/ having to keep an inhuman pace of posting or be lost to the algorithm/screwing up my body as a multiple times chronically ill artist to keep said pace/social media screwing us OVER AND OVER/ Not having one single place viable for artists/ AI art now adding a big layer of crap over it all...

We are exhausted of swimming against the current and now even drawing things " for fun" gets you crap. It's tiring.

That's part of why I decided to concentrate on my original webcomic now, because there's no " debate" to have over something I created. It's very simple. ( The biggest part being that I am fond of the story I want to tell and want to draw and tell it.)

I'll be doing some fanarts here and there when I feel like it because something particularly inspired me, but I won't feel forced to anymore now that ( Thank goodness, I'll be forever grateful for that opportunity) I have a steady art contract now that will allow me to pay my bills at least. I gain a lot of freedom that I can draw what I truly want now instead of being forced to draw whatever is popular so that I can make sure I get the bare minimum of commissions that keeps me afloat. It takes a lot of time away from my webcomic work so chapters will take a lot more time to update but work is maintained, no worries!

The biggest compliment anyone can give to me right now is to keep on enjoying my works, whether that be my webcomic or my artworks in general. I give my entire gratitude to people who -stayed- regardless of fandom, purely because they enjoyed my works, and truly understand the struggles an artist face on the internet now.

Thank you.

[starrysharks]

Sorry if this question is a tad bit too real and hefty for you, but,

What is your advice on growth?

Loosely to somewhat grow a fandom??? If that's the right term

Making your art seen by people, to make people interested in original works and content, to somewhat truly engage and immerse people within your visuals/world?

Rather than relying on things such as fanart to gather a crowd

(unless, of course, fanart is part of the process of building and such)

I myself am a nooby when it comes to art and character building, just kind of a seed in the soil atm.

Thought I'd ask since me and many other people enjoy your content to bits ❤️

I'd like to hopefully someday do the same deed and spread that same feeling of joy and excitement within such artworks

for me, i would say that growth is dependent, to some extent, on what people already know and recognise - of course, this doesn't mean that you have to draw fanart! lots of artists gain popularity from stuff like animals, food, etc... things that people already know and enjoy. i, personally, have to thank fanart for my own growth, but you should never feel obligated to draw to fit an algorithm/draw 'what's popular' unless you really want to. and when it comes to making others interested in your own work and projects, there are a lot of different factors. i'll put what personally helped me under the cut, but know that i'm just one person! i'd encourage asking around about this topic ^_^

for me, the best way to get people interested in my personal works is through drawing them. this can be simple technical turnarounds, references, or fully rendered illustrations - simply presenting a character (especially one with an interesting or unique design) can help to get people wondering what their deal is! i'd also recommend adding a bit of info about that character and their backstory to anything you post about them, as a way to 'sow the seeds' of interest of their world into people i guess.

i'm not really the best at 'promoting' (for lack of a better word) my OCs, but i have seen a lot of people, some who haven't even started their personal projects, gain a lot of eyes on their stuff just though posting about the characters and their lives. writing, mini-comics or 4komas, interaction art - stuff that brings depth to characters and shows their personalities. and when it comes to tumblr don't be shy to go into detail if anybody sends you an ask about them!!! of course you don't need to post spoilers about your project, but even hints can draw people in.

other than that, i'd say try to be confident in your work - by that i mean act like it's already super popular lol. basically fake it till you make it! do oc ask takeovers, requests, infodump about them, whatever! it's a really fun way to get people into your characters.

of course i am just one guy and i myself feel like i need to follow these rules myself more, but i hope this helped regardless ฅ^•ω•^ฅ

[atalienart]

Long explanation why I don't have enough ectoplasm to rattle doodles. It's nothing important, just stupid thoughts in the morning.

I know I should post art but when I sit and draw and think I'll have to post it I feel miserable. I'm so impatient with everything when I feel this pressure to please. I start a drawing and want to abandon it instantly. I have ideas and sometimes I really want to draw but the thought of posting art on social media sucks all the fun out of the process. And everything I draw turns out awful. I'm so not happy with my skills right now too. I want to draw for myself and not to think about who's going to see the results, but then there's this voice that says "you have to post something, artists are creating all the time, their works look stunning, they do projects and stuff, and you're so lazy and useless, and your art lost all the quality, you don't improve, no wonder people don't want to see your stuff anymore" idk. I'm aware social media changed, the algorithm doesn't help, things people like switch constantly and I don't even want to get passionate about anything because I blink and all of a sudden everyone likes some new shiny thing. I don't want to keep up with the trends. I'm tired of catching those gossamer threads that tear when I want to hold them for a while longer. I guess that's why I created my own little world where I can build my love for it brick by brick, word after word, spend a whole year in it and not get enough. But then... it feels pretty lonely in this world. I look at the other side through a glass wall and don't feel like I belong anywhere. I just look. And I think, maybe if I give more, post more art, then it will feel less lonely, because people will react and I won't be invisible, for a little while I will exist in that other world. But I'm not sure being a ghost who haunts people from time to time, rattles a shitty doodle in front of them and then disappears is the best choice. Welp, sucks to be me because I don't know how to be anything else but the ghost. Anyway, I guess I don't have enough ectoplasm to rattle doodles this time. Maybe next time.