#several frames get reused and THAT appears EVERY TIME that one frame comes back

[inksandpensblog]

Excellent post op, mind if I hop on?

Chosen uses his feet to fly exactly once. On Reddit.

Also text isn’t the only thing Chosen can eat with his pac-man mouth! In AvA2 he gobbles up several menu buttons as noogai is activating the antivirus.

(I do wanna note as an aside that Chosen actually isn’t unique in his ability to eat things that aren’t food, as we’ve seen Purple eat League data and we all know about Blue’s escapades…but he is still the only one with a mouth.)

It’s interesting that he doesn’t need the mouth to breathe fire but has used it when breathing fire anyway. I wonder if that means anything. (I once tried to figure out how many different fire-powers Chosen has by how the fire is stylized and whether certain stylizations correlate with how he uses it, since Dark’s fireballs are stylized very differently from the fire he uses to fly with; I failed because Chosen’s fire was animated differently in every episode of season 2 😭)

Thank you for emphasizing the lack of damage Chosen suffers from the vira-tech, as opposed to Orange. I've always found it interesting that Orange had visible wounds while Chosen didn't.

Also you’ve already pointed out the weather/cloud thing regarding his lightning, but something else interesting about his storm powers: of the three times he’s used them, he was only in the air for two, and both times he stopped using his fire to fly yet he remained in the air.

As for his vacuum-punch, as my discord friends call it, he does use it twice in The Flashback but the first time we actually see it is during his Return!

Interestingly, the Adobe debris seems to get pulled into it when he uses it here

(Would you believe I've been watching this series since 2017 and yet I only just noticed Chosen's double-jump for the first time earlier this year?)

Also Chosen has only said one word ever in his life.

Well, now that AvA 11 has put my heart in a wood chipper, let's finally get around to making a post about Chosen's powers! Which I've been meaning to do since I made my post about Dark's powers! Yippee!

(This post will contain no AvA 11 spoilers or screenshots, for the record.) (It is, however, very gif heavy, as a lot of their abilities/the examples I have are best viewed in motion.)

Like the Dark post, this isn't meant to criticize how anyone portrays Chosen's abilities. This is just a reference for what powers they're shown to have in canon, and how they seem to work. With that said, let's get into it.

Unlike Dark, Chosen never got any sort of power boosting/altering item (as of the time of writing, anyways). Their power set is straightforward, and largely consistent throughout the series. Most of the powers they have as of season 3, they've been shown to have had since AvA 2, excluding a handful of one-off abilities I'll make note of at the end.

Starting off with powers they share with Dark, and also their most used power, pyrokinesis. Their pyrokinesis seems to function pretty much identically to Dark's. They can fly, breathe fire, and throw fire as a projectile.

They're also shown setting themselves on fire, usually in a large, explosive blaze, which Dark is not shown doing.

And an interesting note: Chosen (and Dark too) seems to only produce fire from their hands and mouth. This appears to be true largely due to the fact that they only ever use their mouth or hands, even to fly, even when propelling themselves some other way may be more convenient.

I feel I should note here, as I said in the Dark post, that Chosen does not seem to be able to create 'fire bombs'. So far, the only characters shown to have that ability are Dark and Firefox.

They also share the heightened strength and resilience Dark has. Alongside this, Chosen seems to be resistant to deletion, being attacked by both Dark with the V blade, and the Virabots, multiple times, and showing no signs of the deletion that RYGB experienced, or even the physical damage sustained by Orange at Dark's hands.

Getting out of shared abilities, another common power of theirs is their lazer eyes. Able to cut through solid concrete, and the limbs of Virabots. They also seem to have a physical force to them, and can set things on fire.

They also have cryokinesis, the ability to create and control ice. They're able to create truly massive icebergs, and apparently also freeze themselves. Presumably, similarly to how their pyrokinesis seems to work, they likely have a resistance/immunity to freezing, hypothermia, etc as a result of this power, though that is largely speculative on my part.

I've seen people say before that Chosen seems to gain new powers sometimes, and I think they're usually talking about this ability or the next one I'll mention, but they've both been present since AvA 2!

Speaking of, they have... either electricity powers, or some sort of storm manipulation, I'm actually not 100% sure what's going on here.

They're capable of controlling/summoning electricity/lightning, but every time they do it, a storm cloud also forms. So... /shrug. Make of that what you will, I guess.

This ability does not seem to give them an immunity to electricity, much like electric eels.

Not totally certain if this counts as a power or not, but I have to make note of the pac-man mouth. What even is this thing (affectionate)

They can eat text, and breathe fire via this mouth. (Though it doesn't seem like the pac-man mouth is required for them to breathe fire, as they don't appear to use it in Wanted or The Box, despite breathing fire multiple times.)

This next part is where I'm gonna list all the powers that Chosen only uses once/a handful of times, and that don't seem to be directly linked to their other abilities in any way.

First up, in AvA 2, they double jump exactly once and never again. Please bring this back it's so unreasonably funny

The rest of their one-off powers come from season 2.

In The Chosen One's Return, they use some kind of golden wave attack to force the Virabot out of control of the PC, and back into a form that they can actually attack (and ultimately defeat). This attack seems to weaken the virus in some way, though it's not entirely clear why.

Also in this episode, we see Chosen create a Wifi portal for the first time. Some kind of white light appears, before the portal opens up under their hand. It's unclear if this is an ability unique to Chosen or not, but we also don't see them do this again after this moment.

And finally, in The Flashback, twice during the fight with Dark in their workshop, Chosen throws a punch that's surrounded by a swirling white light of some sort. It's very unclear what this is, or what it does exactly.

Good lord Chosen has a lot of powers. I guess they live up to their name??

I might make another post like this for Orange at some point, though I have a hunch that that would end up being outdated pretty quickly. Will probably do it anyways tho, if just for the sake of completing the set. That'd end up being a Lot of speculation tho, so...

[love-and-monsters]

In the Woods

M forest creature X F human, 5,671 words. 

The world has ended and strange creatures now roam the Earth. You survived the end, but can you manage to make your way in this strange new land?

The trees above my head groaned and snapped. I froze, pressing my stomach to the ground. Something skittered through the branches, tiny claws scratching against the bark. It was probably a squirrel. It was almost definitely a squirrel. Regardless, I pressed myself close to the ground until it was gone.

When the forest was still and silent again, I pushed myself to my feet. My muscles were stiff and achy. I’d broken my back building my garden yesterday, and, regardless, I had to tromp through the woods in search of something to eat.

Despite my aches and pains, the hunger gnawing at my stomach, I was still one of the lucky ones. I was alive.

The Surge had happened nearly three months ago. Within two weeks, every major city had been leveled. The ground itself seemed to reach up, like the Earth was trying to slough off its outer skin. Plants had grown lighting quick, vines and roots overwhelming steel and stone within moments. Aftershocks had wracked the globe for another month, but when it was over, there was precious little of humanity left.

And then they had come. Strange creatures. Some of them looked human. Some of them did not. I avoided them. They were unnatural beings, things that grew plants from their bodies and were impervious to attack. I’d been with another group, for a while. The creatures shrugged off bullets and plants jumped to their command. I had been the only survivor.

I had no interest in fighting them anymore. The Earth was gone. I hadn’t seen another human in weeks. For all I knew, I was the only one left. I hoped not, but even if I wasn’t, I didn’t have much hope of ever finding another one.

I’d been lucky to find even a small patch of land to carve out a home in. I’d managed to scrounge up a tent and some blankets, located a few wild plants to start a garden, and even found some prepared food, though not a lot.

Hunting was my main way of sourcing food. I set several snares every night. Guns were difficult to find, bullets were worse, and even if you managed to locate both of them, they almost certainly didn’t go together. Knives didn’t run out of bullets and, providing the snares weren’t badly damaged, I could reuse them.

A rabbit already dangled from my belt. I was getting better at butchering them, and I was glad for its thick fur. Winter was on its way, and I could use all the warming items I could get.

Most of the traps were empty. I reset them one by one and headed to the snare closest to my camp. It was rare that there was anything in that one- maybe the animals knew I was there and didn’t trust the area.

Something crunched as I approached. I froze. The crunching continued. It didn’t seem to be getting closer or further away. There was a wet tearing noise and a sickening snap and my stomach rolled over. That wasn’t something moving through the undergrowth. That was the sound of something eating.

I crept slowly forward, shuffling my feet so I wouldn’t step on any twigs. I slipped behind a tree, breathing deeply. When I was sure I had myself under control, I peeped in the direction of the sound.

There was something hunched over the snare. The wet, snapping noises came from the corpse of a groundhog, which had been pulled open, its red, dripping flesh spread across the ground. The hunched figure was humanoid, roughly. Its limbs were long and spindly, with its fingers coming to dark brown points. Twisting, gnarled branches sprouted from its head, though they were small, probably so they wouldn’t impede its movement. It had long, deep green hair that fell loose down its back. It seemed to be wearing a long coat that flowed around it when it moved. The creature ripped chunks off the dead animal and bit down on them, messily tearing into them.

I gagged. I couldn’t help it. The creature’s messy smacking was disgusting. One of its pointed ears twitched and it spun around.

It was nearly seven feet tall, standing on thin, bony legs. It balanced on its toes, feet elongated like a four-legged animal. Red was smeared all down its front. Its face was human-esque, but its mouth had only sharp teeth and its eyes were flat green, no pupil or sclera. Its chest was the oddest part- it shouldn’t have been able to live. I could see its ribcage, but it seemed to be made out of gnarled wood. There was no skin stretched over its chest. Instead, there seemed to be a small bush in its ribcage, with tiny flowers sprouting out between the bones. It still lifted and fell with breathing, even though it didn’t seem to have any lungs.

Cold terror made me freeze. My knees were trembling. I brandished my knife, but I had no illusions. If this thing wanted to kill me, I would be dead. It could breathe without lungs. How would I even start to kill it?

We stared at each other. The creature cocked its head to one side. A long, slender tongue flicked out of its mouth, trailed around its lips. It seemed to be assessing me as much as I was assessing it.

We stood there for several long moments. I was almost afraid to breathe. Curiosity seemed to be the only thing keeping me alive.

Something snapped a few feet to my left. The creature’s head swiveled, ears twitching. It snarled, baring its red-stained teeth, then plunged off into the undergrowth. There was a crashing, snapping noise that got fainter as it moved away.

I let out a slow breath. Relief made me dizzy. It was gone. I had lived.

Mechanically, I cleared the trap, dragging the dead body away from it. I wasn’t eating it. Scavengers could have it. After some consideration, I reset it. If the creature came back, then I would consider moving it, but I wasn’t shifting it on a one-off. Maybe the creature was just passing through.

I headed back to my tent and butchered the rabbit. It was tasty, juicy. I tended my garden, making sure that everything was properly arranged before I headed to bed.

I didn’t sleep well that night. There was something howling in the woods, a constant screaming that sounded like a cross between a wildcat and a human.

Over the next few days, I became more and more convinced that seeing the creature hadn’t been a one-off. I didn’t see it hunched over, crunching on any more raw animals, but I saw signs of it. Traps that had clearly been tampered with, that had scraps of fur and blood on them, but hadn’t been reset. Trails of disturbed dirt around my camp. Claw marks on the trees, roughly around the creature’s height.

I didn’t like the fact that one of those things had set up camp near me and was stealing my food, but I wasn’t sure there was anything I could do. I hadn’t seen it again, and I was fairly sure I couldn’t drive it off. The only thing I could do was hope I kept avoiding it.

The howling at night hadn’t stopped. It seemed to be getting closer. The sound seeped into my dreams.

It was a chilly morning when I stepped outside to find a dead deer sprawling in the middle of my camp.

I froze. The doe had been killed by something with claws and teeth, its throat torn open and stomach slashed in ragged edges. But it hadn’t been savaged or eaten like it should have been. And it hadn’t been killed here. My camp wasn’t disturbed and I hadn’t heard the sounds of a struggle in the night. Something had killed the deer, dragged it to my camp, and left it for me.

There was a tingling sensation on the back of my neck, like something was watching me. I looked around. Nothing.

Was the deer a threat? ‘If you stay here, this will happen to you.’ I couldn’t move. I’d set up a life here. Moving would mean abandoning most of my belongings and starting over. With winter bearing down on me, it would be a death sentence.

I dragged the deer a short distance away. If this thing wanted to drive me out, it was going to have to do it the hard way. I wouldn’t be taking its threats.

My traps were undisturbed for the first time in a while. There was a chubby groundhog in one of them, which was nice. I attached it to my waist and returned to camp.

It seemed undisturbed. That was reassuring. I tried to fortify the camp a little more, setting up a makeshift fence. I was pretty sure it wasn’t going to stop anything, but it made me feel a little safer.

There was a pile of small animals in my camp when I woke up the next morning. They’d all had their necks neatly snapped and were arranged together neatly. Something intelligent had placed them there.

I buried them outside of camp. The tingling feeling of being watched was worse than ever.

The noises at night were getting closer. I could barely sleep. They were close by, just outside of camp. I kept thinking of that thing I’d seen in the woods, the human frame with those green eyes and strange, open chest.

Animals kept appearing in my camp. They varied in size and killing style- some of them had their necks snapped, some were messily eviscerated, some had simple, clean killing cuts. I dragged them out of camp each time. The amount of corpses was starting to disturb me. They were going to attract scavengers to my camp.

Several days after the corpses had started appearing, I emerged from my tent to see the creature hunched in the clearing. It was crouching over the dead body of a stag. There were no visible wounds on it. It could have been sleeping, except for the unnatural angle of its neck.

The creature froze, staring up at me. Its blank, green eyes betrayed no emotion. My heart thundered in my chest. I didn’t even have my knife on me- it was still in the tent. I’d gotten careless. If this thing killed me, it was totally my own fault.

The creature looked back down at the stag, then, slowly, deliberately, it pushed the carcass toward me. It looked up at me, back down at the stag, then up at me again. Its lips parted over its many sharp teeth.

“Good?” Its voice wasn’t what I was expecting. I thought, if such a thing could speak, it would have a rasping, unnatural quality to it. There was a strange tone to it, an echo that made it sound like two people were speaking at once. The dominant voice, though, was a baritone and surprisingly soothing.

“You can talk?” I said. The creature blinked at me. It took a moment to parse my words, then it rose to its full height. At nearly seven feet tall, it towered over me.

“Is this acceptable?” One of its hands spread, gesturing down to the carcass at its feet. I gaped at it, uncertain what it meant. It waited, still as a statue.

I licked my lips. There was an odd sense in the air, like I was partaking in some kind of ceremony I didn’t understand. But the creature was clearly offering the stag to me, and it felt improper to reject the gift. I took a deep, steadying breath.

“Yes. It’s… acceptable.” There was a faint quaver in my voice. “Thank you.”

The creature bent into a deep bow. Without another word, it turned and walked back into the forest.

I stared after it until it had completely vanished from view, then sank to the ground. My hands were shaking as I examined the carcass. I tried to review everything that I knew. The creature was the one that had been bringing me dead animals. Accepting the gift had some kind of significance, I was sure, but I didn’t know what it was. Stories of fairy deals and people being spirited away marched through my head. I shook them off. Whatever the creature wanted, it didn’t seem to want to drag me off anywhere.

I spent the rest of the day in my camp, carefully butchering the carcass. Maybe it was a bad idea to accept the gift, but I had to admit that it was a lot of meat. Properly dried, it could last a while, maybe over the whole winter.

It was silent that night. I finally managed to get a peaceful night’s sleep.

The creature was still gone when I emerged in the morning. And yet, the tingling feeling of being watched was worse than ever. Every nearby rustle or snap of a twig made me jump. Sometimes, I thought I saw something shifting between the trees, but it vanished whenever I tried to get a look at it. I couldn’t bring myself to leave camp again.

There was no avoiding going out the next day, though. The traps needed to be checked, and I needed to forage. It only took me a few minutes to realize I was being followed.

I couldn’t see what was following me, but I could hear it padding through the undergrowth behind me. I was pretty sure I knew what it was. The creature seemed to be content to follow me from a distance, so I tried to be content just ignoring it. I managed to catch one or two glimpses of it as it slunk through the foliage, but it was pretty good at staying out of sight.

It was as I was checking the trap furthest from my camp that I heard it. The heavy, crushing footfalls of a behemoth.

Behemoth was the general, catch-all term for the oversized monsters that roamed the lands now. They were enormous, unstoppable, and virtually unkillable. I’d seen one get hit with a missile and keep moving. When I’d been with other humans, a behemoth in the area prompted a mass exodus. You didn’t engage. You just ran.

I turned, slowly, and saw it moving through the trees. It looked like some horrifying combination between a bear and a moose. Larger than either, it had a great, sloping body patched in moss. Enormous antlers sprouted from its head, with points like spears, and its muzzle was large and full of jutting teeth.

Its head was low enough that I could see its enormous eyes rolling around to focus on me.

A growl vibrated from its chest, loud enough to set my bones trembling. I scrambled back, but fear was making my limbs numb and clumsy. There wasn’t a point in running, not really. It could catch me easily. And this one was enormous and heavy, ready to bulk up for winter. There was no way it was going to pass up such an easy meal.

I couldn’t turn to run. I couldn’t take my eyes off the enormous, saliva covered teeth as the behemoth opened its mouth. It could snap me in two with a single bite. A solid certainty formed itself in the pit of my stomach. I was going to die here.

There was an echoing, enraged shriek from behind me. I whirled around just in time to see a pale, slender form bolt out of the undergrowth and lungs at the behemoth.

The creature, the one that had been following me, had sprung to an impressive height and attached itself to the behemoth’s face. The behemoth staggered backward, swinging its great head back and forth. Its scream was great and keening, loud enough to make me clap my hands over my ears. The creature seemed undeterred. It raised a clawed hand and plunged it down, gouging a create cavern in the behemoth’s eyes.

Blood sprayed down from the behemoth’s face. I gaped. It was bleeding. I’d never seen one injured. I didn’t know they had blood. But the creature was tearing into it as easily as it would tear into any other animal.

With another grating scream, the behemoth turned away. Apparently, I was no longer worth the effort. The creature dropped from its face and screeched after it, claws digging furrows into the ground.

The thundering footsteps of the retreating behemoth sounded for several minutes in the otherwise silent forest. The creature stared after it, stiff and focused as a hunting cat. When the behemoth’s footsteps had finally faded into silence, it whipped its head back toward me.

Blood trailed down its front. It was dark, almost oily, and an odd sort of rust color. I froze. Had it chased off the behemoth because it wanted to eat me itself? But then why hadn’t it just killed me before?

The creature approached me so its face was only an inch from mine. Its solid green eyes bored into mine. Then it reached out and took my shoulders in its hands, fingertips trailing along my skin.

“Safe,” it said in a tone that could almost be described as soothing. “Unhurt?”

I gaped at it. The creature tilted its head further to one side. “Unhurt?” it repeated. It was asking me, I realized.

“Yes,” I said. “I’m… I’m okay.” I hesitated for a moment. “Thank you.”

Its strange chest rose as it took in another breath. Then it leaned forward, nestling its face into my neck. Its arms came around me in something like a hug. It made a long, quiet noise of satisfaction before pulling back.

It- he- had saved me. I swallowed and slowly climbed to my feet. He watched me, unmoving. After a moment of hesitation, I unhooked a rabbit from my belt and handed it to him. It seemed right.

He took it from me with surprising delicacy. His head lowered and his jaws snapped shut around a chunk of flesh, tearing it from the bone. I grimaced at the wet snapping and tearing.

He followed me as I continued on to the rest of my traps. This time, he didn’t even bother to hide himself. He walked just behind me or at my side, munching on chunks of rabbit. I kept glancing back at him. He blinked back at me.

I’d sort of expected him to break away when we made it back to camp, but he strolled into the clearing like he belonged there. I watched him as he padded around the edges of the camp, sniffing at things. I couldn’t very well drive him off- if he could injure a behemoth, there was no way I was going to beat him in a fight. And his presence was certainly less unsettling than it had been a few days ago. But I didn’t know what he was doing here. What did he want?

When I headed inside my tent for the night, he made to follow me. I froze in the entrance, staring back at him. Fighting him was still out of the question, but I did not want him in my tent with me. There was a long, tense pause, then the creature backed away and slunk to roughly the center of the camp. He curled up into a tight ball, apparently trying to sleep.

I retreated into the tent and wrapped blankets around me. There was something strangely forlorn about him curling up in the middle of camp, alone. He looked… small. Harmless. The unsettling feeling twisted in my stomach until I fell asleep.

He was still in camp when I woke up, ripping chunks off a fat squirrel. He made a soft humming noise as I walked toward him.

“You’re still here, huh,” I said. Talking to him felt weird. I knew he could talk back, but it still felt odd to try and have a conversation with him. He looked back at me steadily. He looked neither confused, nor comprehending. “I don’t know what you want.”

If he could understand me, he didn’t seem to want to answer. He just ripped another chunk off the squirrel and chewed it, still looking at me.

When he was done eating, he stalked around the camp, examining the border. Often, he would reach up and run his claws down the length of a tree, leaving long scores in the bark. I watched him as he completed a circuit, then started fussing at the small barrier I’d created. He seemed to be trying to build it up.

And so it went for several days. The creature stayed in the camp with me, building up a small barrier around the edge of the camp. Whenever I went out to check traps, he would follow me. Occasionally, he would hunt, dragging carcasses back to camp. He always allowed me to take some of whatever he brought. Eventually, I found myself offering a section of my hunts to him. It only seemed fair. A tense sort of partnership had formed between us. As odd as it was, I had gotten used to him. I was enjoying having some company. When I woke in the morning and he wasn’t present, I found a stab of loneliness sinking in between my ribs.

He meandered back into camp near midday, hands cupped around something. I glanced up at him. “Hey,” I said. “What have you got there?”

He opened his hands. There were clumps of bright red berries in his hands. He held them out to me, head tilted, waiting.

“Uh.” I didn’t recognize the berries and, with no leaves or branches to help identify them, I wasn’t going to eat them. “Sorry. I don’t think I can eat those. You can have them.” He blinked at me and extended his hands again. “Uh, no. I can’t have those.” I reached out and carefully curled his fingers over them. His hands were surprisingly warm. I was rather expecting them to be cold and corpse-like. Something twisted in my chest, a wave of loneliness that I couldn’t quite choke back. I was so unused to having someone with me. I’d managed to bury the feelings of loneliness, but they were starting to come bubbling back up.

He stared at me for a moment, then walked toward the edge of the camp, munching on the berries. I went back to the tending the fire. It was starting to frost overnight and the fire was becoming more and more necessary. If I wasn’t huddled close to it, I was walking around to keep my body temperature up. Despite not wearing much more than a cloak and pants, the creature seemed unbothered. He slouched next to the fire, staring into it. I could see the fire reflected in his eyes, a burning emerald flame.

As soon as the sun started to lower, the cold really set in. The sun and the fire were the only bits of warmth in the bitingly cold air and without one of them, the chill came on swiftly and remorselessly. There was no going back to the tent. I huddled next to the fire, shivering. The flame kept guttering in the wind. Leaving the fire to grab extra bits of wood was painful, my fingers stiffening in the cold and my skin almost burning in the wind. I huddled in on myself, wrapping fur over my body. It was still early winter and I was already half-mad from the cold. How was I going to survive the really bad months?

Something nudged my leg. I looked over. The creature was crouched next to me, half his face illuminated by the firelight. The sharp planes of his face made harsh shadows dance over his features.

“Need something?” I said. The creature pressed close to me. He was warm against me, driving the shivers out of me.

Slowly, like he was trying to give me a chance to stop him, he wrapped his cloak around my shoulders. He pressed me in close to his side. Warmth radiated over me, like there was a miniature sun beaming out from his chest.

I leaned into him. If I closed my eyes, I could pretend that there was a human there with me. His hand pressed gently to my back, and where his fingers lay, warmth radiated through my skin. I wrapped my arms around his waist and pulled him closer. My shivering abated somewhat.

Once I was feeling better, I looked up at him. He was blinking down at me, his green eyes difficult to read, but still utterly focused on me.

“Why are you doing this?” Speaking was a little difficult. Breathing in seemed to freeze my lungs. But being close to his warmth helped, and the curiosity was eating at me. He looked down at me. I wasn’t really expecting an answer, but his mouth opened and his voice issued softly forth.

 “Protect you.” His voice was whispery, still with that strange double-tone.

“Protect me,” I repeated. He lowered his head until his chin was resting on top of my head. I could smell him, I realized. It was sort of pine-like, with a smell under that, like sawdust.

“Pack protects pack,” he said. His chest shifted as he drew in a deep breath. “We are pack now.”

“We’re… a pack?” I tried to make sense of his words.

He drew back a little bit so he could look down into my face. “You accepted my offering,” he said. “We have exchanged prey. We are bound now- a pack.”

Things fell together in my mind rather quickly. The marking of trees, the prey dragged into the camp, the way he had lunged to my rescue- he was trying to impress me. He was courting me. And in giving him the rabbit, I had accepted.

I leaned into his chest. It shifted, and his arms came tighter around me. For the first time in a long time, I had a companion. An image of him leaping out to protect me filtered into my mind. A small smile tugged at me mouth.

“Okay. We’re a pack,” I said. And just like that, it was no longer me against the world. It was the two of us.

Underneath me, somewhere in that strange, hollow chest, a rumbling purr started.

I spent most nights with him after that. He was incredibly warm and when I wrapped a blanket around the both of us, it was impossible to be cold.

The first snows came and I carefully kept the camp free of as much snow as I could manage. He focused more on creating a stronger barrier around the camp, fussing with brambles and branches. There was much less prey in the traps now, and I’d taken to ice fishing with little luck. He was much more skilled at catching animals than I was now, and every few days he would bring back some small morsel to the camp. I was always fed first, and he would only eat after I was done. I found myself wondering exactly why I’d been so afraid of him in the first place- after watching him catch snowflakes on his tongue and chatter insistently whenever I didn’t finish a meal, it was hard to see anything frightening in him.

Whenever I decided to check my traps, he came with me. It was reassuring, to have him there. If he could drive off a behemoth, I was fairly certain there wasn’t much that could bother him.

It was when we were checking the traps on the edge of our territory (I assumed it was the edge- he marked the trees there and didn’t like going beyond that boundary), that he stiffened. His pointed ears twitched. A low growl started in his chest and he bared his teeth.

I went still too, straining to listen. There was a faint rustling, like something was moving through the undergrowth. That wasn’t unusual, though, not enough to make him react like that. I drew closer to him and he shifted, like he was trying to cover me with his body.

“What is it?” I whispered. He pulled his lips back from his teeth, the growl coming deeper and stronger.

Something snapped nearby, the sound echoing through the stillness like a gunshot. Our heads whipped toward the noise in unison. He gave a resounding, challenging cry.

Slowly, something emerged from the bushes. It was like him, I realized. The same species, or whatever. They both had long hair, open, wooden chests that had flowers twining out of them. The newer creature didn’t have the small, branch-like antlers, though, and something about its posture or its shape made me think it was female. Regardless, she stood taller than him and her claws seemed longer.

He made a snarling noise that I interpreted as a warning. The other creature’s head turned as she looked between me and him. An expression like confusion crossed her face and she made a questioning noise.

He snarled out another warning, a thin strand of saliva dribbling from his bared teeth. The other creature considered him for a moment, then crouched down, teeth bared. The hairs on the back of my neck lifted. I recognized a hunting crouch when I saw one.

She lunged. He knocked me aside and took the brunt of her attack, rolling backward into the snow. I expected shrieking and snarling, but they were oddly silent as they rolled in the snow. All their energy was focused on defeating the other.

He was trapped beneath her, teeth snapping everywhere he could reach. She was struggling to keep a hold on him, but it was clear she was in a better position. Her claws dug into his side and her teeth snapped dangerously close to his throat.

I needed to do something. But what could I do? These things were practically indestructible, at least to humans. But I needed to help him. Her teeth snapped close to his throat again and he made a strangled whining sound.

Fuck it. I grabbed a stick from the ground and lunged. If she killed him, she was going to kill me anyway. Might as well die trying to protect him.            

I jammed the splintered end of the stick down into her face. It just barely missed her eyes, scoring a long, bleeding line down her cheekbone. She shrieked, startled, and turned to see her attacker.

It was the opening he needed. He drove into her, knocking her off him and into the ground beneath them. Before she could focus back on him, he swung down, claws plunging them deep into her shoulder. Blood sprayed into the white snow. With a final, agonized shriek, the other creature squirmed away and bolted back into the forest. He didn’t bother to pursue her. He just stood and watched as she vanished into the trees.

As soon as she was gone, he turned toward me. “Okay?” he asked, looking me up and down. “Safe?”

“Yeah, I’m all right. You?” He appeared uninjured, for the most part. There were a few small scratches and he was moving like he was in some pain, but he didn’t seem badly hurt.

“Bleeding,” he said, pointing a claw at me. I looked down. There was a long cut running down the length of my right forearm. It must have happened when she rounded on me. I hadn’t even been able to feel it. Now that I was aware of it, I could feel the stinging pain.

“Ow,” I said, probing at it lightly. It wasn’t particularly deep, but it wasn’t shallow, either. He moved closer to me and crouched, taking my arm delicately in his hands. His long, sinuous tongue slid out of his mouth and ran once along the cut. The pain grew dull, more of an unpleasant tingling than anything, and the blood dripped sluggishly.

“Home,” he said, tugging on my arm. He stayed close to me as we headed back to camp. We leaned on each other. I appreciated the comfort.

When we returned to camp, I dragged out my medical kit. He helped dress the wound, giving it a few more licks. I was a little leery about allowing him to clean it like that, but he seemed to know what he was doing. I figured it couldn’t hurt that much. Once it was fully wrapped, I lay down next to the fire. He lay down with me, arm draped over my body.

“Who was that, the one that attacked us?” I asked. Warm breath huffed against the back of my neck.

“Wanted a pack. Tracked my scent,” he said. “Was not happy that I already had a pack.”

“She recognized that we were… uh. A pack?” I said. There was an odd, fluttery sensation in my stomach.

“I claimed you,” he said. “My scent surrounds you. As your scent is around me.” He nuzzled closer to me. “We fought her off. She will not return. She knows she is beaten.”

“You did most of the work,” I said. He laughed.

“Would not have won without you.” He pressed his head into the back of my neck. “My mate.”

I looked up at him. “Mate?”

He nodded slowly. His eyelids were starting to droop. “The first two members of a pack are mates,” he said. “We will grow our pack over time. But not now.” He leaned into me, eyes closing. “Now we will wait.”

I reached up and stroked my fingers through his hair. He made a soft purring noise and leaned into me more. The world was different now, I thought. It was a place with new creatures, new ways to live, and you needed to be new in order to survive in it.

It was new, but perhaps it was good. With a yawn, I settled in against my mate for a nap.

[angelanimedesaray]

Survive Or Live Chapter 1: The Barren World

AN:  Its a wee bit short cause it’s more of an introduction, but it’s not prologue material, sooooo here we are.  Just ask if you would like to be tagged in future chapters for updates.  Also, I will tag all updates #survive or live

Characters:  OC (Mae Brooks)

Pairing:  Levi x OC

Warnings:  Apocalypse Typical Violence, Gross Zombie Descriptions, Language

Word Count:  3103

Masterlist   Next Chapter --->

(Gif owner Dave Mosher on Gify)

The crunch of broken asphalt beneath her feet made enough sound Mae couldn’t help but cringe inwardly, worried that the sound would be just enough to attract attention to herself.  At the moment, there wasn’t anything moving along the street other than herself, but that was only what her light brown eyes could see so far.  Her calloused fingers shifted slightly along the bowstring she pulled tighter at the thought of what could be lurking out of sight in the shadows, the index finger of her other hand rolling over the wooden shaft of her knocked arrow.  Her shoulder rolled, adjusting the left strap of her hiker’s backpack that had started to slide down her shoulder, managing by some miracle to avoid getting her shoulder-length auburn hair caught under the strap in the process.

At least it was still decently light for now, even if that would be a bad sign if she left with a light bag.

Eyes on the two story white house several paces ahead of her and to the left, Mae stepped around a stray rusted car bumper and quickly approached the building, eyes darting around for any sign of movement.  A gurgling followed by the sound of shuffling feet drew her attention to the right side of the house just in time for Mae to see a Rotter shamble around the corner, not yet noticing her presence.

The walking corpse stumbled across the dead grass of the house’s front lawn, pustule spotted flesh hanging in strips or appearing shriveled and wasted on the once-human creature’s frame.  Dried blood and fresh ooze from ruptured pustules smeared across the remains of sallow skin, frayed hair, and tattered clothes.  This Rotter was missing an eye, which meant it wasn’t fresh since the larger parasites tried to move on to another host after about a month, and the eyes were their choice of exit.

More asphalt crunched under her foot, and the Rotter spun around off-balance but still upright, focusing on Mae and the noise she’d made.  Its remaining foggy eye focused on her as she raised her takedown recurve bow, arrow already knocked and drawn and simply holding so she made sure she made her shot count.  A rattling snarl regurgitated from its gaping mouth as it sudden lunged at her, twitching as its sprint hurried it towards her.  The Rotter only made it three steps before Mae released her arrow, which sunk right into the open eye socket and through its head.

The snarling stopped with a gurgle, the Rotter collapsing to the ground as Mae hurried over, hoping her arrow would be retrievable.

“Shame on you, Dave, sneaking up on me like that, it’s rude,” she muttered under her breath, boot on its neck as she yanked the arrow back and quickly moved away in case any of the squiggly parasites tried to latch onto her as a host.

It looked like it could still be used.  Good.

Another snarl--much closer now--had her quickly backing away from the sound, knocking and drawing the arrow as fast as she could, loosing the arrow on instinct more than aim.  It sunk into the back of the advancing Rotter’s throat, which didn’t do any good killing it, unfortunately.  As soon as her drawing hand was free of the arrow it reached for the machete at her waist, and she swung with as much force as possible, the blade slicing nicely into its forehead.  It slumped forward and she backed away to avoid the Rotter falling on her, yanking the machete out along the way.

“Oh, Mary-Ann, you’re here, too?  Why didn’t you say anything?” Mae continued, wiping the machete off in the grass and scowling at the now broken arrow still sticking out of its throat.

Perfect.

Still holding the machete firmly in hand, Mae made sure to air on the side of caution--more than usual, anyway--and do a quick check around the house to make sure there weren’t any more Rotters lurking around.

Thankfully she managed to loop back around to the front without seeing any more Rotters, glancing back at the two she’d already killed as if to make sure they were still dead.

“How are the kids?” she asked a little louder.  With a grimace, Mae looked away and made her way up the steps to the house.

Okay, that’s a little too morbid, Mae, shut up.

The house creaked with her every step, causing her paranoia to rear its head again.  Every sound made her twitch uncomfortably, her teeth on edge with every step.

She passed by the living room quickly, a goal of the kind of supplies she was looking for firmly in mind.  She went to the kitchen, the obvious choice, scouring open cabinets and looking for anything that might still be good.  It looked like someone had already searched the house, but there were a few bouillon cube packages shoved in the back, an open and spilled box telling her someone had tried to taste the powdery cubes to see if it was an edible, but quickly decided otherwise.

Their loss was her gain.  Thank God she knew how to use these things.

“Maybe there is still a God,” she murmured, shoving the beef and chicken bouillon packages into her back, including the open box.  She’d been hoping to find another box of some kind of pasta, rice, canned meat, but even though she’d scoured three streets of homes, so far no luck.  She was starting to come to accept that this town had already been picked over.  She’d still check all the houses (eventually) just to make sure she didn’t miss any hidden gems like the bouillon, but she wasn’t optimistic about what she’d find overall.

If all else failed, she could see if there was anything left over in the local ransacked convenience store.

Heading upstairs, Mae started with the bathroom to see if she could find anything more medically beneficial.  She had a supply of meds she kept carefully guarded she’d had ever since this whole mess started, but it never hurt to try and find more.

There was a package of cotton balls under the sink, and she didn’t hesitate to pilfer the two washcloths and one towel, but she couldn’t find anything else she thought might be of use.  She’d even take a pair of tweezers to help this scavenging trip feel a little more productive.

After that it was simply a matter of looking for any kind of scrap she could reuse.  The bedrooms had some clean clothes inside them that she picked through sparingly, only packing the best into her backpack so she could use the cloth for any need that arose.

“You’d think a hoard of goats came through and ate everything, with how little there is around here,” Mae said softly, sighing as she left the house, bow in hand again and eyes scanning the street for any more Rotters.  She gave the ones she’d killed earlier a wide berth when she saw that the pustules on their bodies were bursting and oozing now that the hosts were dead, not wanting to get too close and risk the ooze landing on her.  It was only infectious if the parasites got to you, but the ooze did a good job of masking the smaller parasites, and it was better to be safe than sorry.

Which was why she was wearing a flannel, jeans, and boots despite it being mid-spring.  It was better that as little skin was exposed as possible.

Mae wiped the sweat on her brow with her flannel sleeve, continuing through the small town’s residential area while she prattled on with utter nonsense to herself and any Rotter she came across.

“Do you think there’s any other perks to being covered head to toe in warm weather, despite all the sweat and the lowered risk of getting infected?  Think it helps protect me from getting a sunburn?  That’s an annoyance I don’t want to deal with during the apocalypse, though I doubt anyone is tearing apart any Wal-Marts trying to find sunscreen.  Except maybe Rotters trying to get to Annabelle hiding behind the sunscreen.  She probably should have tried to hide under the giant teddy bears.  Or is it the circus where you find those?  I wonder if I could make a giant ass teddy bear chair out of one of those.  It’s not like there’s any dumbasses around to judge me for buying a giant teddy bear to sit in like a weird armchair...er, or like I’m going to be buying it, since money’s useless for anything but toilet paper or tissues these days.”

She quieted her ramblings and slowed down, eyes suddenly drawn to the abandoned daycare on her right.  The cloudy glass was busted out and littered what once was probably a neatly trimmed lawn, quarantine sheets and caution tape fluttering weakly in the breeze.  A filth-covered doll was ripped almost all the way through the middle, resting between two broken panes of glass still jutting out from the bottom of a window.

She tore her eyes away with a lump in her throat, mood souring rapidly as she noticed the legless Rotter trying to drag its way over to her, what had once been sunday-best clothes now dirt and blood stained tatters.

“You’d think I’d be used to seeing this kind of thing by now, but every now and then, you see one that just…” she started to say to the Rotter, but the words died down, tasting like ash in her mouth as she watched the thing’s filthy nails clawed its way towards her feet.

It’s come down to me talking absolute nonsense at mindless creatures that want to eat me, huh?  Something I’m starting to do on the regular…

Mae angled her head up at the sky, squinting at the sun high above her in silence for several long moment until she couldn’t stare at the bright sky any longer.

“...God, I really am going crazy, aren’t I?”

No one answered.  There was just the continued raspy growls of the Rotter whose fingers had almost reached her boots.  Seeing its proximity, Mae unstrapped her machete again, scowling at the creature.

“It’s because you’re terrible company, Steve,” she said bitingly, ramming the machete into the creature’s head and waiting until it stopped twitching to pull it free, making a point not to glance back behind her towards the depressing scene of the daycare as she moved forward a little faster, wiping the machete off in the grass of the next home she saw.

By the time she left the residential district and started to pick her way through the ransacked stores of the abandoned town--a few arrows lighter than when she’d started, but her pack a little heavier--the sun was starting to set, warning her that she needed to start heading back.

It was amazing how many potentially useful meds were passed over in a panic when people were only looking for the familiar drugs like ibuprofen or acetaminophen in stores.  It also gave Mae a reason to be overwhelmingly grateful for her occupation before the world went to shit.  If it hadn’t been for her pre-apocalypse background, she wouldn’t know anything about most of the medications that were now stuffed into her pack.  In the mess of abandoned useless nicknacks and crushed, spoiled foodstuffs, she’d also managed to find a bottle of iron supplements, and heading back into the employee break room where their lockers were, she managed to find elastic bandages, and a bottle of ibuprofen after picking a few padlocks on the employee lockers.

Not a bad haul at all.  Far less food than she would have liked to find, but she had enough stored up it wouldn’t be a disaster if she had to wait to raid another town for food a little further down the line.

She kicked a stray stuffed basketball plush aside, pushing her hair back out of her face as she made her way back to the main road, machete once more in her free hand in case any infected had gathered outside.  To her surprise, there was only one standing in the street, twitching along it’s jagged sprint towards her once it had noticed her.  She swung her machete into its brain just like the rest, a small frown on her face as it dropped to the ground in front of her.  She crouched down in front of it--still a safe distance away, though.

“Any idea where your friends are?  I expected to see far more of you Rotters shambling around town,” she asked, even pausing a few seconds as if waiting for an answer.  “It’s like they have somewhere better to be...I’m offended.”

Mae pushed back up to her full height of five feet six inches--and three quarters, never forget the three quarters that brought her so close to seven inches--shifting her hiking backpack to a more comfortable position.  She put away the machete for now and returned to her bow, knocking an arrow but not drawing the string back all the way as she walked casually back the way she’d come, eyes scanning her surroundings and ears listening for the tell-tale sounds of Rotters.  If she’d seen more coming into town, she would have been a lot more cautious, but because of how scarce they had been through town all day, she was a little more relaxed going back through the area she’d already cleared.

A little relaxed.  She wasn’t stupid, Rotters could still show up when she least expected--they had a knack for doing that.  She wouldn’t have survived this long if she had ever let her guard all the way down.  Even now, she couldn’t decide if this stroke of luck with the scarcity in Rotters was invigorating or unsettling.

As she’d suspected, retracing her steps through town was even less eventful than when she’d foraged her way through it, with Mae only coming across the occasional Rotter here and there.  Perhaps something had drawn the attention of most of the infected to the other side of town, and that was where they all were?  Wherever they were, she wasn’t going to complain.  She was simply going to throw her pack into the back seat of the truck with the two gasoline tanks she’d filled yesterday, and head back home to get some rest.  After such a slow-going scavenging trip, she felt drained--the kind that came from constant disappointment and even some boredom.

Not to mention months since I saw another living person--and that was from a distance; I didn’t even get involved.  Didn’t like the look of them…

She was finally understanding the true horror of being driven to madness from isolation.  Talking to rotting corpses and the sky was only going to get her so far.

Dwelling on the thoughts of her own state of sanity only served to make her view the overall silence of the town as irksome, a scowl on her face when she reached the home garage she’d hidden her truck in while she scavenged around town, muttering unintelligible nonsense about a world record for the quiet game as she opened the back door and threw in her pack, slammed the back door shut, and climbed into the driver’s seat.

A glance at the fuel gage told her the four wheel drive vehicle only had a little less than half a tank left.  Enough to get her back home, but she’d have to fill up once she arrived.  At least she had two more tanks in the back seat.

She kept the windows down as she cruised back through the residential streets, partially to listen for any sounds of Rotters, and partially to let the cool breeze blessedly blow against her sweaty face.

With several streets left to go before the houses started spreading out instead of being so packed together, the edge of town mere minutes away, Mae finally heard the sound she’d been dreading.  The distant sound of an angry hive of snarling Rotters, growing closer with alarming speed.  She thought she heard it ahead of her and on her right, instinctively rolling up the passenger’s side window to keep Rotters from flinging themselves through the opening as her head turned towards the sound, eyes scanning her immediate surroundings as her foot put a little more pressure on the gas, ready to peel out of town the first visual sign she had of an approaching hoard.

Finally, her eyes spotted a roiling mass of bodies squeezing its way down one of the narrow alleys between homes, more in the next alley, and the next, and--

Mae’s foot was already pressing down on the gas to give the truck a burst of speed and race by the incoming hoard before she finished processing the sight of the second alley full of Rotters.  The idle wonder crossed her mind if it had been the sound of her truck which had drawn their attention--which didn’t seem likely to her--or something else.

A sudden thud and bounce of the truck bed, plus the brief flash of a shadow being cast over the truck, caused Mae to tap on the brake of her truck for the briefest second before survival instincts reminded her there was a hoard descending on her, and now was not the time to stop the truck.  But there could very well be a Rotter in her truck bed, and she did not want one of the infected to eat her while she was dri--

“Fuck!”

Rotters didn’t curse, especially not loud enough she could hear it in the driver’s seat as the truck shuddered from her momentary tap on the breaks and something seemed to violently shift in the truck bed.

Since the road ahead was temporarily open, Mae risked glancing back to see what was happening.

The survivalist in her noticed the terrifyingly sized hoard racing after her in a mass of unnaturally twitching bodies, with a few clinging to the edges of the truck bed and snapping their jaws furiously at something within.

The rest of her focused on the figure that was sitting up with its back to the truck’s cab, one hand removing itself from its place pressed against the back of the head of a man with black undercut hair, a black and green scarf tied around his face with the fabric covering everything below his eyes.

Steel grey blue eyes that, as his head turned just enough to regard Mae in the driver’s seat of the truck, focused on her with all it’s hardened intensity.

“Drive!”

Next Chapter --->

[ducktracy]

130. let it be me (1936)

release date: may 2nd, 1936

series: merrie melodies

director: friz freleng

starring: bernice hansen (emily, hens)

this has an interesting backstory. bing crosby has actually SUED warner bros over 2 cartoons. it’s common knowledge that he’s at least sued over one cartoon, which is bingo crosbyana, also released in 1936. however, he also sued over this one too—and lost both. you’ll see why, but he sued over unflattering depictions of him. bing would be a common celebrity featured in many a cartoon, as well as fellow crooner frank sinatra. if i remember correctly, i had heard that he didn’t like his portrayal in frank tashlin’s iconic swooner crooner, the only porky cartoon to get nominated for an academy award. so, with that! crooner bingo has won the hearts of millions, including country bumpkin emily. emily’s husband isn’t too enthused when bingo and emily start hanging out with each other and get too close for comfort.

a gaggle of lovestruck hens crowd around the outside of a radio station, all trying to listen to the warbly strains of bingo crosby’s (as he’s not so subtly named in this cartoon) voice. sure enough, mr. bingo is recording the title song “let it be me”, cozying up to the microphone and putting on his shtick.

no hen is immune to bingo’s charming voice. a flock of adoring hens crowd around a radio, complete with a framed photograph of bingo on top, as if the radio is some sort of shrine to a feathery, crooner god. one hen in particular struggles to join in with the crowd, almost like a kitten trying to squeeze in with the rest of its litter to get some of its mothers milk.

elsewhere, a scene reused from i wish i had wings (and would again be tailored in wise quacks to fit daffy and his wife) has an adoring hen embracing her own personal photo of bingo while listening to the radio. her husband walks in, and quickly she hides the photo behind her back. the husband demands to see what it is she’s hiding, turning off the radio so she can give him her full attention. she eventually gives up and peeks out of her hands in giddy embarrassment as the husband ogles at the photo. to say the least, he isn’t too pleased—he throws the picture on the ground and stomps all over it for good measure, leaving her in tears. the plight that is bing crosby!

bingo wraps up his recording session, and struts outside of the radio shack, parting the waters that is his adoring fans. he tips his hat and tugs on his bow tie, bidding them a sly “good morning, girls.” the hens giggle and guffaw and blush in response, as if every single movement he makes is the funniest thing in the world. bingo meanders along his way, accompanied by a lovely underscore of “i wanna woo”, which would be prominently featured in the opening portion of porky’s romance. bingo, ever the charmer, coyly tosses his boutonnière to his fans, and a cock fight ensues as the hens tackle each other for the flower. an oldie but goodie for sure.

some nice juxtaposition: we fade out on the calm, cool, and collected bingo crosby and fade in on a hayseed, dopey farmer who is clearly the opposite in every which way of the former. he merrily struts along with a bouquet of handpicked flowers. he knocks on the door of a rural house, and out comes a quaint little country bumpkin hen. a precursor to the dopey voice kent rogers and later mel blanc would perform in their cartoons (very beaky buzzard-esque), the rooster guffaws “ah-i-i bought you some posies, emily,” dragging his feet around as he giggles while emily smells the bouquet. emily squeaks out a “thank you!” as the two yokels flirt together.

there’s a lovely undershot of a long, fancy, quite frankly intimidating orange car rolling down the dirt road. it’s none other than bingo, honking his many horns (each imitating his voice, giving a “booboobooboo”—a favorite to use amongst all WB directors with their interpretations of bing) to mark his arrival. emily cries “ooh, there’s mister bingo!” and drops her flowers as she rushes over to the end of the driveway, her husband obviously hurt.

bingo screeches to a halt at the front of their driveway. emily is tickled pink to see him, and her husband... not so much. bingo tips his hat and croons “good morning, my pretty maid.” she giggles and covers her face as bingo checks her out for a prolonged amount of time, evidently to his liking. a great visual as emily’s husband (i guess moreso boyfriend, but we’ve gone this far already so i’ll just keep it as husband loosely) literally turns green with envy, kicking the ground in aggravation. “how’d you like to go for a ride, baby, and i’ll show you the sights of the city?” a country bumpkin going out into the city—joy! emily eagerly accepts bingo’s invitation and hops right in his car. with that, the two speed off and the poor rooster is left to his own devices.

a very creative transition: fade out on the bewildered rooster. soon enough, the black screen is showered with balloons, confetti, and noise. fade in to a nightclub filled with rowdy patrons. emily and bingo are situated in the back, eagerly surveying their surroundings. bingo offers emily a glass of wine, but she refuses, shaking her head no. instead, bingo resorts to charming emily with a few “booboobooboo”s, and she’s wooed enough to take a sip. wow, what a lovely guy. just a great guy. regardless of bingo’s nefarious intentions, emily coughs and sputters after just one sip.

enter a curvaceous, beautiful turkey with an impressive fan. my first instinct was that she was a mae west caricature, at least by looks, but she appears to be french, and the mae west caricature would have played much heavily on her voice. a doppelgänger, perhaps! regardless, the singer launches into “i’ve got my eye on you”, and bingo is immediately taken with her. she approaches bingo and they flirt together, much to the chagrin of a neglected emily. she gives bingo’s sleeve a few haughty shakes, to which bingo motions at her to buzz off. thusly, emily breaks down into tears, bingo summoning a waiter to kick her out. what a charmer!

indeed, emily is booted onto the streets, bearing an imprint of a foot on her behind. “TIME STAGGERS ON” bellows a time card, and we’re transported to the wintry city streets. emily attempts to peddle some violets in the midst of the harsh storm, but receives no takers.

meanwhile, her hayseed rooster husband(?) paces around in his home anxiously. he sighs longingly at a framed portrait of emily, unable to discern what she sees in that stupid crooner. his thoughts are echoed as the radio broadcasts the vocals of mr. bingo himself, once again warbling “let it be me”. the rooster is furious and slams the radio to the ground, the radio giving a few last dying “booboobooboo”s.

time to take action. the rooster courageously wraps a scarf around his neck and prepares to brave the storm as he opens the door. however, the storm is much stronger than the rooster’s determination, the wind blowing him back through several doors in the household and out of the back door. instead, the rooster marches out into the streets from the back of his house. his march grows only more hurried and vitriolic as visions of bingo dance in his head—visions of wringing him by his spindly little neck.

the radio shack pops up in sight, and the rooster storms right in. bingo’s croons are put to a halt and are replaced by the sounds of offscreen, comical violence as the rooster pummels him behind closed doors. i wonder why on earth bing tried to sue them. hmmmmmm. the rooster takes care of his duty, but is hardly fulfilled. he treks glumly along in the snow, still longing for his dear emily.

he can only sulk as he treads on, ignoring the squeaky voice of some random woman selling violets on the street. he halts. sure enough, it’s his beloved emily, freezing her feathers off. he bellows “emily!” with outstretched arms, and emily happily responds “clem!” (clem kadiddlehopper?) as the lovebirds embrace.

time marches on, and our heroes now have a happy family. clem reads by the fire while emily knits, both watching adoringly as their chicks playfully cheep and chase each other, a fitting underscore of “home sweet home” furthering the coziness of the scene. relaxation is disturbed when one of the chicks begins to sing, sounding awfully similar to a familiar crooner as the chick gives out a few “booboobooboo”s. he’s quickly shut up as an offscreen book is hurled at his head. iris out.

i enjoyed this cartoon! friz’s cartoons are getting better and better, and this one made me smile. just knowing that bing tried to sue warner bros for this cartoon definitely adds to the appeal. it seems he wasn’t too great of a guy himself (which is a shame, i love his music), so this is almost cathartic. bernice hansen does a great job of voicing emily (like always), and whoever did the voices for bingo and clem also deserve recognition. lots of funny gags, such as clem turning green with envy and the bastard child at the end. i’d say go watch it! if anything, it’s worth watching knowing it sparked a lawsuit.

link!

[misstinfoilhat]

Whumptober 2019 #9: Shackles - Bungou Stray Dogs

“Uhu, no.” “Kunikida-kun...”

“No.”

“I don't see the big deal...”

“Still no.”

“In that case, I have to make it an order.”

“B-but, director...”

To Kunikida's defense, he held his sulks rather stoically for a twenty-four-year-old who was throwing a fit inside a hotel lobby.

“You and Dazai-kun is sharing a room, and that's final,” Fukuzawa announced dryly, if not a little miffed. They were all tired from traveling and were looking forward to spending the night in the comfort of a fancy hotel. The Agency had been given a mission by a large corporation in Akita. It wasn't a particularly complicated mission, and they expected it to mostly be of the theoretical kind, which was why Fukuzawa, Kunikida, Dazai and Ranpo had gone, instead of the agents with the more physical abilities like Atsushi, Kyouka and Kenji.

Really, if it hadn't been for the fact that the company they'd been hired employed a large amount of ability users, it would have been a police matter more than anything.

Kunikida growled defeatedly, trying his hardest to ignore the bandaged nuisance that stood behind him, leaning his head on his shoulder and grinning triumphantly. Not only did he have to sit with him on the train, listening to the cacophony of Dazai's double suicide composition, but now he had to room with him too. He usually didn't long to spend any prolonged amount of time with the miniature detective either, who, despite almost being nearly thirty years old was licking a lollipop vigorously while the Armed Detective President was literally helping him with a wry zipper on his coat. But, considering the alternative, he'd take that infantile genius any day.

“Well, let's hit the hay,” Dazai announced cheerily, grabbing the keycard from the reception clerk as she was about to hand it over to Kunikida, leaving the idealistic man fuming with fury.

Calm down, Droppo. It would be highly unideal to blow a fuse as early in the mission like this. You can hang in there for a couple of days. You're a strong person. You can fight the urge to strangle him.

“Hey, MacGyver,” Dazai singsonged happily. If Kunikida had been a little more alert, he would have stopped himself from reacting to such a stupid nickname. Unfortunately, he did look up at the dark-haired idiot, standing a couple of steps up in the staircase, giving him exactly what he wanted. Attention. “Snoozer's losers!” Dazai splurted out and jolted up the stairs with childlike glee. I can fight the urge to strangle him.

                                                           ➈➈➈

The hotel room was spacious and nice, with dark wood parquet floors and crème colored walls with one accent wall in paneling that matched the floors. The lights radiated warmth, which could almost remind one of the illumination of a fireplace. Two single beds were placed in the middle of the room, both with frames in a pleasant brown color, covered in light bedsheets and bedspreads that matched the rest of the tasteful interior.

Dazai noticed how the surroundings immediately soothed Kunikida's sour mood. Good, he thought.

Personally, he had never understood how one's habitat could affect one's mood that much. He had never been one for materialism. Really, he was more than satisfied as long as he had a roof over his head. A bed and a blanket were a bonus, and an own bathroom with bathroom facilities was simply a luxury.

He guessed he preferred the simplicity of having nothing more but the bare necessities. As an executive in the Port Mafia, he had been completely overwhelmed by the opulence of his executive suite. His dorm room at the Agency felt much more comfortable to him. “Well, I guess we should go to bed. We have an early start tomorrow,” Kunikida determined, placing his suitcase on the bed he had decided on (the one farthest from the window, because the air seeps through the cracks and can give you a throat or ear infection, Dazai mimicked in his mind), and started to unpack the neatly folded clothes inside. Dazai shoved his own light traveling bag inside the larger space of the closet, ignoring the disapproving glare from his partner, before shrugging off his jacket and gingerly placing it on a wooden hanger before hanging it inside and shutting the door. The only thing he grabbed from his bag before tossing it aside, was his toiletries which he brought with him into the bathroom to get ready for bed.

At least, seemingly, getting ready for bed. This was exactly what Dazai had dreaded. This mission was going to take at least a week to complete, and he would have to share a bedroom this whole time. Usually, he would unwrap his bandages at night to let his skin breathe, but that was out of the question. The worst part of this whole trip was that he couldn't remember the last time he had gotten an undisturbed night of sleep. There was a lot about his past he couldn't remember. It seemed to have been blocked out of his mind, and he had no desire of getting those pieces of his life back. But at night when unconscious, things tended to come back to him. Nightmares would terrorize him every single night when he was able to sleep. Once, after an especially long time of being unable to even shut his eyes without being struck by his past abuse like a lightning bolt, Yosano had slipped him a bottle of sleeping aids. Apparently, he looked like shit (her words) and it was clear he wasn't getting enough sleep. That night he had tried them. Reading the possible side effects being nausea, headaches, sleepiness (well duh), he saw that one of them were actually suicidal thoughts- so, if he wasn't able to get a peaceful night of sleep from them, there still might be something good to come from of it. It was the worst night he could remember ever having (at least sleeping wise). Before even falling asleep, he started hallucinating terrifying images. The branches scratching at his windows suddenly turned into fingers grasping at the henges and trying to get in. The ceiling was suddenly melting and faceless people were appearing out of the shadows gliding against the walls, throwing their grisly chains after him and trying to pull him back into the hell his mind had been gracious enough to suppress. And when he was incapable of keeping himself awake, he'd been trapped inside the night terrors for several hours, the drugs making it impossible to tear himself awake. That night had covered more of his horrid past than any night before or since. So, he had already decided that he wasn't going to sleep on this mission. He was completely capable of going several days without sleep, he'd done it many times. An entire week though, he was unsure about, but he would do the best he could. Finishing brushing his teeth and changing his bandages, an ordeal that usually took him about forty five minutes, he changed into his sleeping attire, a long-sleeved cotton shirt in white and black sweatpants, and returned to Kunikida in their joint room.

“About time, what the hell were you even doing in there?” Kunikida growled irritated.

“Stealing soap,” Dazai shrugged and settled into his bed. “Are you insane?” Kunikida snapped, starting a tirade about professionalism, hygiene (because; could they really know if they set out new soap to every new guest? They might re-melt old bars or refill bottles with old soap- to which Dazai answered that in which case, it was a good thing that he took it so they couldn't reuse it anymore) and the general criminal system because of it was technically a criminal offense to steal anything.

Dazai tuned his partner out. He actually enjoyed the familiar background noise before the dreaded night. There was something comforting about the normality of it, reminding him that everything was actually just like it was supposed to be and that nothing was going to lurk out from the dark corners or try to get in through the windows in spite the fact that they were currently residing on the thirteenth floor.

While Kunikida set the timer for his nightly ritual, Dazai settled in for the night, putting on his earphones and sinking underneath the hospitality of his thick comforter.                                                           ➈➈➈

The next day, Kunikida woke up at six in the morning like he always did. Even if everyone wasn't going to meet up until nine, Dazai knew that Kunikida would never, not even on the weekends, sleep in late. Dazai was grateful for the predictability of his partner's actions. That meant that he could lay down and pretend to be asleep before he woke up. Dazai had spent the night reading over the mission files more times than he cared to hold a count of, as well as re-reading his trusted favorite book, gathering inspiration in case the mission would become extremely tedious and he had to concoct a suicide poison of office supplies. Ink or battery acid seemed like his safest bets- sniffing sharpies would likely just make the work more entertaining, and before he would even know it, they might have another “mushroom incident” on their hands. Kunikida had not been happy with him that day (which was reason enough for a repetition).

The day went by painfully slowly. It was apparent that he would be stuck in a vacant office for the majority of the week, trying to crack hidden codes left by the culprits to communicate between each other in a series of sealed documents. It seemed like work suited best for Ranpo, but the kid wasn't even able to figure out how to turn on the damn computer, so that left the boring part of their mission to him.

Once nighttime dawned upon them once again, Dazai repeated his schpiel, getting ready for bed and settling under the covers without much hassle, pretending to be asleep before Kunikida was done in the bathroom. He had started to become tired now, but he knew he had another night in him easily.                                                         ➈➈➈ 

The day after looked much like the day before, with him downing coffee, locked inside the office, scrolling through hundreds of pages of numbers and codes, trying to keep himself alert of any series of numbers that didn't seem to add up. It was getting harder now. His eyesight seemed to double from time to time if he didn't stay fixated, and he fell in and out of concentration, staring sheepishly onto the screen, scrolling down the pages mindlessly.                                                        ➈➈➈

On the fourth day, he had started getting concerned glances from his coworkers. He wasn't blind (just nearly, but only on the one eye), he could see the dark circles under his eyes in the mirror, and he had a constant twitch at the edge of his left one. He felt it too. He was so tired that turning his head towards the president to answer his question (that he had no idea what was) at their morning meeting, felt like he had to rotate a small mountain all on his own. “...your daily report, do you have it?” Fukuzawa repeated. Dazai couldn't remember if he asked him to repeat or not, but he nodded carefully, not wanting to rattle his aching head more than necessary, and pulled outa neatly assembled folder and handed it over.

“There's definitely some correspondence there. It's subtle. They're using a...” He couldn't remember the word for it. Frowning slightly, he made a gesture at them to forget about it. “Ranpo can figure it out. I've highlighted what I could find.”

The rest of the meeting went by without much input from him. Only small noises of approval or disapproval when he was being addressed directly, and he was seriously starting to consider sniffing on the sharpies for a shot of energy.

It was almost a relief once he was able to lock himself back into the dark room with the computer and cases of flash drives. Heavily, he collapsed into the comfortable chair he'd been provided with and poured himself a cup of coffee before booting up the computer and busying himself with his work.                                                        ➈➈➈ Before he even realized it, he jerked awake, quickly realizing he had nodded off. Two weary hands came up to drag over his face, and for a short while, he just sat there, resting his head while trying to wipe the fatigue from his facial features. He wasn't sure if he could do this anymore. At some point, he would have to get some shut-eye. Knowing from experience that clinical depression tended to become so much worse from a couple of days without sleep, as well as the increased paranoia that his state of mind could not handle.

The problem was, that the paranoia he would feel when sleep-deprived, was not the same kind of paranoia he should have felt then and there. Because if he did, he might have been more altered to the shadow that lurked behind him.

Before he could register the firm grasp on his hair, his head was thrown forwards, hitting the keyboard at high force. Immediately, he felt his nose crack on impact and he glided, stunned, to the floor.

Within seconds after hitting the floor, a boot stomped on his chest. The wind got knocked out of him, and he struggled to get his body to obey his commands. A little too late, he grabbed at the boot, but it slipped through his fingers before it came down on him once again. A choked gasp escaped him before he kicked with his feet, trying to roll over and get up.

The unknown apparition got in another few hits before he was on his feet. Dazai blocked the next couple of punches as the culprit seemed to start charging an ability induced attack. Dazai calmly touched the person, and the energy he was producing between his hands was killed off instantly. Using the moment of confusion to his advantage, Dazai grabbed the dark-clad figure by the shoulder and spun him around, pressing him violently against the wall. Finally, footsteps were heard outside, and the door was quickly unlocked. Fukuzawa and Kunikida entered, stun gun and katana raised, ready for attack. Ranpo was standing a couple of feet behind them, curious while on guard. “Dazai, are you okay?” Fukuzawa inquired grimly, slowly lowering his weapon as he deemed the situation under control. Dazai tried to sniff in the blood streaming from his nose before he turned around, but the flow was too heavy and he had to admit defeat and let it flow freely.

“Peachy,” he grinned as convincingly as he could, not loosening his hold on his attacker until Kunikida came to take over. Dazai let go and slowly waggled away in a sudden dizzy spell, steadying himself against the wall. He didn't even realize that he drifted down to a sitting position on the floor before Fukuzawa leaned down and held a strong hand on his shoulder.

“Come on, Kunikida can take care of things here. I'll take you to a doctor.”

He was sure he argued against it, but the next time Dazai found himself aware of his surroundings, he sat on the examination table at a doctor's office, getting his broken nose forced back into place with a wet cracking sound.

Apparently, he had broken his nose and a rib and needed a few stitches on the bridge of his nose and over his right eyebrow.

At this point, he felt so out of it that he was unable to argue when Fukuzawa decided to steady him back into the waiting car once he was fixed up, and followed him back to his hotel room. Once inside, he was discarded on his bed, where he fell asleep instantly.                                                            ➈➈➈

He was shackled to the wall. Tight, rough chains bore into his fragile skin as he tried to wiggle his wrists out of them, adding to the burning, bleeding marks varnishing his juvenile skin. He had figured out how to dislocate his thumbs now, making it easier to slip his hands through the firm iron rings of his cuffs. So now, they had placed another cuff around his neck. Even if he tired- he couldn't dislocate that. Not if he wanted to get away from here.

There was no way in hell that he'd give them the satisfaction of killing himself in here- they were not going to see him crumble. Not going to see him give up. He was going to keep breathing until the day he could look them in the eyes as they bled out and suffered from the same torture they had inflicted upon him for years on end. He was going to live until the day he could hear them scream in agony. Hear them beg for release.

Years went by before he could do that. Years of burning hot branding irons, electricity, and painful medical experiments. Years of watching clones of himself being developed inside test tubes, maturing inside small bottles of liquid and being born from sick DNA splicing and engineering.

His clones always turned out so macabre. Usually developing an extra body part or completely missing one. The ones that clearly was lacking his ability of nullification were slain as soon as they were “born”, and the ones who did, usually died a long agonizing death from organ failure, if they were ever viable at all.

Their remains were laying there, rotting inside his holding cell. He couldn't even smell it anymore, he was so used to it.

His head hurt. It always did when he was starting to remember something. Something he had forgotten and was fighting its way to the surface, usually making his grim existence even more unbearable.

What triggered it this time, seemed to be the new chain around his neck. ...it was raining. His clothes felt heavy, making his emaciated body struggle even harder to move. The memory was blue- usually symbolizing that it was bad. All his memories were blue or red. But the red ones had only come recently, and he hadn't even been granted the fortune of suppressing them yet.

He was staggering along, suddenly dropping to his knees in a puddle, quickly being pulled up by the chain around his neck by... someone. A man. He didn't have a face, but he still visited in his dreams sometimes.

It was the day he got here- he hadn't even realized that there was a before. For the longest time, he thought he was one of the experiments. The clones.

...maybe he was. Maybe he was just that one successful clone, abilities, memories and all from the original host. Fuck! He was such an abomination- he had never had the right to be alive at all. No wonder life was so painful.

And then, they were back, those nameless, faceless scientists, and he knew it was time for another round of... of...

...of what exactly, he wasn't sure. He only remembered it would be cruel and extremely agonizing.

The cuffs were taken off- but it didn't matter. He didn't have the strength to hold himself up anyway. His head thudded to the stone floor, while his hands laid uselessly by his side, his body unable to move. New shackles were added, and he felt his already dislocated elbows being tugged forward, forcing him to try and stand up but he couldn't only stumble his way after them, as fast as he was physically able.

Once inside the room (the room- the- the fucking room), he understood what was going to happen. He couldn't quite see it but he still knew and it was bad he had done bad and it was starting all over again. He was hurled onto the table (the cold table, the one that always hurt and he didn't want to please don't-) and leather straps were being tightly fastened on his head, chest, arms, abdomen and feet.

The doctor prepared the needle that was supposed to make him mellow and obey but it hurt- hurt so much and it slowly, agonizingly slowly, was being lowered towards his...

“Dazai!”

Finally catching his breath, he threw himself off the bed he suddenly knew he was lying on and scrambled across the floor, pushing his back against the wall (because the wall is safe, no one can come up from behind- no one can surprise me and I can fight if they do) and curled tightly in on himself, hiding behind his knees and simultaneously protecting his vitals.

How long had he forgotten to breathe?

He was out of breath, panting, before he realized that he wasn't tied down anymore.

And he was certainly not alone. Shit.

Hesitantly, he looked up and into the somber, steeled gaze of Fukuzawa, who was standing over him in a slight crouch. Dazail looked to his sides, making sure that there weren't any more spectators before he warily brushed both of his hands through his hair, winching a little as his fingers brushed over the newly stitched wound over his eyebrow.

“I had a bad dream,” Dazai chuckled apologetically, trying his best to glue on a smile for his superior.

“Yes, you seem to be prone to those,” Fukuzawa answered gravely, not averting his eyes from his subordinate.

“Tsk, not really,” Dazai tried but understood that his bluff had been caught long before this moment. He lowered his head, resting it on his knees while waiting for Fukuzawa's verdict.

The silver-haired man used a bit more time than Dazai had anticipated before he spoke again.

“I'm sorry for this.”

His reply made Dazai's slightly swollen eyes peer up. Unintelligble, he uttered a weak, “Huh?”

“I'm sorry for putting you through this. I know sharing rooms is hard for you.”

Dazai had no idea where this was coming from. How in the world could Fukuzawa know about his nightmares? Unable to say anything in return, he just looked quizzically at his elder.

“I've read Yosano's reports, Dazai-kun. I know about your nightmares. They’ve occurred everytime you've been commited to the infirmary since you started with us, and I don't think I have to tell you that it's been quite a lot of times during these past years.”

There was a small pause, clearly left for Dazai to say something. But when he didn't, Fukuzawa continued.

“So, I know how you struggle with sleeping. And I knew before going on this mission that you'd have a hard time... I know you, Dazai-kun. You wouldn't want to be a nuisance. Unfortunatly, we only got these two rooms, the rest of the hotel is stacked. I thought that sharing a room with  Kunikida would be the best way for you to relax. If I could, I'd put Ranpo, Kunikida and myself in one room and you by yourself... but that would've been a bit strange...”

Dazai was slowly beginning to relax now that his boss was starting to speak a little more informally. He always liked to witness the humanity of the usually stoic man. Lowering his shoulders a bit and working on the strenght to get back to bed, the trembling in his knees made it clear to him that he wasn't ready to move just yet. Now, he felt like he needed to say something. Something to disarm the situation.

“I...” was all he could muster before his voice broke off and he had to settle back into his defensive seat on the floor. Fukuzawa seemed saddened by it, which only crushed Dazai’s heart. He never wanted to see the man who had taken a chance on him when no one else would in such disarray because of his own foolishness. He loathed himself for it.

“If it's of any consolation, the guy you caught has admitted to everything. He's given us all the names of his culprits, and we're looking at a hefty bonus for finishing the job early.”

Dazai mustered up a smile, tired eyes creaking at the raising of his cheekbones. Fukuzawa retuned it and leaned down, helping Dazai stand up and settle onto the bed.

“Now, I want you to sleep. We're not leaving until tomorrow morning, and the rest of us have a lot of work to do down at the police station. You've done your part and then some. We probably won't return until late. Will you be okay here by yourself?”

Dazai was already half asleep on the bed but nodded vaugly before letting out a deep, easy exhale and grabbed onto his pillow. Never had he been comfortable being in such a vounerable position in front of anyone. He wasn't sure if it simply was exhaustion or if it was... trust? But for the first time since he didn't know when, he felt happy to settle into bed, for several hours of a good night's sleep.

Fukuzawa stayed with him until soft snores were heard steaidly with each breath of Dazai’s broken nose. Then, he gingerly pulled the comforter over him, before shutting the lights and exiting the room.

Ranpo and Kunikida was waiting outside.

“How's he doing?” Ranpo asked worriedly with a slight knot between his eyebrows.

“Better,” Fukuzawa answered with a soft smile, ruffling his as-good-as-adopted son's head over his hat.

“Is he asleep?” Kunikida asked grimly, trying to get a look inside the room before Fukuzawa carefully closed the door, trying to make it as soundless as possible to not jostle their sleeping coworker.

“For now,” the silver-fox replied earnestly. There wasn't any quick-fix to Dazai's issues, but this was a start as good as any.

The three of them walked silently towards the second hotel room, ready to settle in for the night. It was time for Dazai to rest comfortably. And if that meant for one of three grown men to swallow their pride and sleep on a sofabed, that would just have to do.

[rinthehufflepuff]

Agent M pt. 2

Parings: Clintasha x Reader

Summary: You’ve been on the run for four years, never staying in one place too long, until you stumble across an abandoned house that seems the perfect place to bunker down in for the winter.  Just as you’re getting comfortable, however, and the seasons start to change, the homeowners appear and they are far different from anything you could have expected.

Warnings: Language

Word Count: 2915

A/N: Tags are open in case you want to say up to date.

Part 1

The next few weeks were more than a little awkward for you, but Clint and Natasha didn’t seem to mind.  Over lunch that first day, Natasha explained she and Clint had odd jobs that required them to be absent fairly often and more often than not ended up being more than a little dangerous.  This meant that you would be doing most of the housework once they left, but they would make sure the electricity was kept on and they would set up a joint account for taking care of the house so you wouldn’t have to spend too much of your personal money.  Clint had gone on to lay down a few rules that neither he nor Natasha elaborated on.

Rule one, the basement was off-limits unless there was an emergency.  Unless a murderer was chasing you - you chuckled nervously but Clint’s voice was very serious - or a tornado blowing through, the basement was to remain locked and essentially forgotten.  You weren’t even allowed to help renovate it.  The door inside the house would be locked and the key kept next to the door frame while the entrance form the cellar doors on the exterior would be chained shut.  The pair insisted it was for your safety and you didn’t bother pushing the topic.  You were lucky they were letting you stay.

Rule two, if anyone asked, you lived alone and had never seen or heard of Clint or Natasha.  Natasha said she would draw up an NDA that would make what you could and couldn’t talk about more clear, but until then you were, essentially, sworn to silence.  When you asked if you could talk about Clint to Natasha and vice versa, Natasha groaned and complained that she had been tricked into sharing a house with two dorks rather than one.  Clint just smiled and gave you a thumbs up in approval.

Rule three, no bringing people to the house.  If something needed to be fixed while Clint and Natasha were away, either you needed to fix it yourself or you had to wait for them to come back.  When you explained that you had already been fixing up the house, to begin with, Clint had you talk him through what you had already done.  Apparently, he had not been in the house for over a year by the time you had found it and he had not realized that what he had seen upon arriving was only because you had been working on the house for months on end.  Clint assured you the longest you would be alone now that he was back was a month - either he or Natasha would try to be at the house when they weren’t working.  

You were the one to insist on rule number four - if Clint or Natasha needed anything fixed, whether it was at the house or while they were doing whatever it was their job entailed, they would give you a call.  You had a phone, a small flip phone that you paid for by the minute, that you used for work.  You insisted both people at the table put that number in their phones.  When Natasha asked why you’d just shrugged and said, “Cheaper to get talked through it than pay some guy who might not know what they’re doing.”

In return for rule four, Natasha insisted on rule five - you had to call both Clint and Natasha in an emergency if they weren’t with you.  If you had to go to the hospital, you had to call them.  If someone broke into the house, you had to call them.  If you felt unsafe or felt like you needed to leave, you had to call them.  While you had insisted on rule four to be nice, the way Natasha stared at you and Clint’s firm voice insisted you pull out your phone that minute to put their numbers in, made you shift uncomfortably.  Yes, it was nice to think that maybe you could all get along, but you hadn’t trusted anyone to more than stab you in the back for a very long time.  The concern was foreign at this point and with the way Natasha scooted a little closer, you felt like she knew.  Maybe she did.

Rule number six was an unspoken rule.  You were responsible for Lucky when Clint and Natasha weren’t around.  You didn’t mind in the slightest, the one-eyed retriever had kept his head in your leg the whole lunch while you occasionally scratched behind his ear when you got too nervous.  Clint didn’t say much about what exactly happened, but apparently, he had taken Lucky in on one of his job assignments.  When his employer refused to let him keep the dog without some sort of training, Clint had gotten Lucky into a program to be a licensed therapy dog.  Whatever Natasha had been yelling earlier had been his command to come to them, which made you feel a little better.  You’d never had a therapy dog before, how could you afford one, let alone take care of it, while you were living in the woods?  Natasha promised to teach you his commands when she had time.

After that lunch, you had shown the pair around the house and explained the repairs you had already started in more detail.  Clint pointed out some of the rooms to you as you went, but some of the rooms he simply ignored despite them obviously having been used at some point.  You couldn’t be sure, you did your best to avoid looking anywhere near the man’s eyes, but he seemed particularly distressed when you came across the room with the broken wire bed frame.  Clint said you could have that room instead of sleeping on the couch as you had been for the past few months.  Clearly, he had been avoiding the house rather than just not having the time to visit between jobs, but you kept your mouth shut.  It wasn’t your business what Clint did.

Over the next few days, the house started getting new furniture.  Natasha dropped the bed frame off at the dump and she and Clint picked up two new wooden frames along with mattresses, one of which was for you as the two of them shared a bed.  Even though you appreciated the gesture, you had slept on the floor for a few nights before you got used to sleeping in a bed again.  Kitchen appliances started showing up as well and you would install them at night when you couldn’t sleep.  You had to admit, it was nice to not have to use the fireplace to cook food.  

You would go to work before the sun had fully risen, just as you had been, but when you came back to the house there were always small improvements.  Cans of paint would appear, the holes in the wall would disappear - one day the wall between the kitchen and living room simply vanished - and the floors would get cleaned or ripped up and replaced.  You usually worked on projects alone while Clint and Natasha would tackle whatever they had decided on while you were at the garage, but every so often you would join them or one of them would wordlessly lend a hand when you would struggle.

Meals were often the most awkward bit of your new living arrangement.  With Clint and Natasha living in the house and helping pay for repairs and appliances, you had more money for food - which they also helped pay for despite your protests.  Usually, it was you who cooked since Clint and Natasha were usually so tired by the time you got home.  How they were so worn out, you could never figure out because you seemed to run off of endless amounts of energy, especially after being at the garage all day.  The meals themselves were usually simple and cheap but nutrient-packed in simple ways you had learned over the years.  Clint and Natasha never seemed to mind, though, seemingly enjoying having food that had been made in their home rather than an industrial kitchen like they were used to at their company.  Every once in a rare while, Natasha would cook, usually something you had never had before with some foreign name.  On those nights you would sit at the small table and quietly watch, letting her jabber away at you and sometimes asking questions about whatever it was she was doing.  She was always more than happy to share.  Clint, on the other hand, never cooked.  Natasha had explained that she had banned him from doing so several years ago after an accident while they were working abroad.  The awkward bit was always the eating part when all three of you were in the same room.  You hadn’t taken long to warm up to Natasha as much as any other person you had known in the past few years, but you never knew what to say to Clint.  You didn’t dislike him, he actually seemed quite nice and he always made an effort to include you in conversation, but you didn’t know how to interact with him.  You still couldn’t look him in the eye, let alone hold a full conversation with the man.  

Weekends weren’t as terrible as you had initially assumed.  You still woke up as if you were going to work, but instead of working on the house, you would get dressed and work on the barn for a little bit - a project you hadn’t even considered before Clint and Natasha showed up.  Though neither one ever said anything while you were working on the building, you could often feel their gaze following you as you worked.  

The barn itself was very well built, the foundation built well below the frost line and the main structure was still as sturdy as you imagined it had always been.  Most of what being stored in there, however, was junk.  Some bits you could scrap or reuse, but most of the tools were rusted or rotted and practically useless.  The tractor was broken down, a project you couldn’t shake from your mind and were excited to take once the barn was finished.  From about dawn to dusk Fridays through Sundays you would work on the barn.  

It wasn’t until the end of June that the pair had to separate.  

“Well, it looks like it’ll just be you and Nat for a while, Y/N,” Clint sighed over lunch one Friday.  The pair had managed to distract you from the barn long enough to shove a sandwich in your hands as a quick lunch, knowing you wouldn’t eat until late unless they did so.  “Work called me in so I’m taking off in about an hour, but I shouldn’t be gone too long - two weeks at most.  Think you can handle Nat on your own?”  Natasha playfully swatted at him while you nodded.  You knew with Clint gone Nat would look to you for company.

You weren’t wrong.  It took all five hours after you heard Clint's truck pull out that Natasha appeared on the ground level of the barn while you were working on patching a section of the roof.   

“So, where are you from?”  You sighed at the inevitable line of questioning.  If anything, you were surprised it had taken three months for it to start.

“Florida, ‘round the Tampa area,” you huffed, wriggling a bit on your back to try and get a good angle.  “Guessing you aren’t from anywhere around here - my guess is Russia, but I’ve been wrong before.”

“What gave it away?”

“Yelling in a foreign language kinda does it, plus you talk to yourself in it all the time,” you grunted, nearly hitting your hand with the hammer as you drove the spike into the beam.  “It took me a while to figure out it was Russan though, kept trying to block it out.  Might have not meant anything if it was Spanish, could’ve had an immigrant in your close family.  Plus you make foreign food, kinda screams “I’m not from here.”  Not that it’s not good, I’ll let you make that beet soup thing any time you want.”

“Huh,” is all she says in reply.  For a while, you work in silence before she’s asking other questions.  “Where’d you learn to fix cars?  That’s what you do right, work at the garage in town?”

“Picked it up as a kid, dad owned a chop-shop.”  True enough, just not the whole truth.  “Ended up going to college for engineering.”

“Really?”  You paused and looked down at Natasha to see she was already staring up at you.  She actually sounded interested in that bit of information and it made your stomach flip.  “Auto-engineering’s kinda cool, I’ve picked up a bit of it myself.”

“Well, uh, the auto stuff I already knew,” you admitted.  “Chop-shop kid, remember?  I, erm, I - I went for mechanical engineering at first.  Thought I’d expand my horizons a bit.”

“At first?  What did you change to?”

“Well, I ended up with a mas- fuck that hurt - masters in electrical.  The doctorate, though, is in mechanical engineering.  That didn’t change.”  You rolled and sat on the edge of the upper level so your legs dangled above the floor below.   Natasha looked surprised at the news, though you couldn’t be sure if it was because she assumed you hadn't received a formal education or achieved the level of education you had.  Maybe it was both.  

“You’ve never mentioned a doctorate,” the redhead frowns.  “How come?  It’s pretty cool.  Nerdy, but cool.”

“No one’s ever been interested before,” you shrugged.  “Most people don’t care about that kind of stuff, yeh know?”

“But, Y/N you could do just about anything you wanted with those areas of engineering with that kind of education.”  She wanted to know why you were at the garage.  Why you had been homeless until she and Clint let you stay with them.  

You just shrugged and rolled back to continue working on the section of roof you had been repairing when she arrived.  You didn't want to talk about it - any of it.  Seeming to understand that the conversation was over, Natasha started talking about the project she had just finished and what she was thinking about starting while Clint was gone.  She wanted your help painting the rooms that were finished - the kitchen, living room, and the downstairs and upstairs bathrooms.  She wanted your opinions on colors, on if you thought she should get Clint to make the windows in some rooms bigger to let in more natural light rather than just artificial light.  She wanted to know if you could figure out a way to make a large spice storage and pantry that would be unobtrusive and a little tucked away.  Did you think that she should remove the ivy that still clung to the house or try to cultivate it, cut it back and reshape it so that it looked like it belonged rather than being just an annoyance?  Should she surprise Clint and paint their bedroom - you would need to help pick out the color for that as well - or should she wait for him to come home?  

You couldn’t help but feel remarkably domestic and, dare you say it, normal, as Natasha talked.  You moved from one project to the next the rest of the day and she just kept chatting away while you occasionally gave one or two word answers.  At first, it was because you were annoyed, this was your barn time - something you had designated as sacred alone time - but slowly it turned into a game.  How little could you say while also answering Natasha’s no longer personal questions?  It was easier than you had thought to slip into some sort of comfortable space with her, even though Clint - who you had thought of as a human buffer between you and Natasha - had left.  You weren’t sure how she did it, but by the time the sun was just about gone, you had come to enjoy the game of few worded answers that she had coaxed you into playing.  Because she had coaxed you into playing, you realized as you munched on a hamburger.  It was something you were quickly realizing about Natasha, she had a talent for getting you to do things without you realizing she was the one pulling the strings until after the fact.  

Saturday morning was another break in the routine you had grown accustomed to with Clint and Natasha in the house.  Natasha was already up when you crept downstairs to grab your usual cereal bar before you set out to work on the siding for the barn.  Natasha was curled up on the couch, a book in her lap, and when you didn't spot any sort of foodstuffs near her, you figured she hadn’t eaten yet.  You hesitate for only a moment before ducking onto the kitchen and making some scrambled eggs with cheese and bits of bacon.  By the time you had finished, she hadn’t moved from her spot so you fixed a cup of coffee like you had seen Clint do several times - cold, from the carafe in the fridge, with a splash of half-n-half and a spoon of sweetener.  You wordlessly deposited the plate and mug on the box you had all been using as a coffee table before setting out to start repairs for the day.

Part Three

[finca-arcoiris-sin-fin]

Pura Vida Adventures: A True Story About a Day in the Life

Many people here are true odd-balls. We assumed that we would stick out like two sore thumbs in this small, rural community --  that the people would think we were super weird with our grungy-unabashed hippie gayness -- but we were kind of wrong. People don’t judge us or find us weird because everybody is a rare creature in this community. They are mega hipsters (the Latin American version) without even knowing they’re cool. The most memorable and interesting person we’ve met yet appeared in our life about two weeks ago. He is an extraordinary coffee farmer and tinkerer from Northern Costa Rica named Manuel (pictured above, left). He had been referenced to us several times by our helpful neighbor, Don Juan (pictured above, right), as “the ariete man.” Arietes are amazing old-fashioned machines that use a series of hoses and tubing to redirect natural sources of water to wherever it is needed, often pumping it hundreds of meters up a mountain, all without using any electricity. They told us that he could help us become water self-sufficient, but they did not tell us what a cartoon character he is…

Last week, we went to visit Manuel’s farm, which is close to ours and we arrived to find that his driveway consists of miles of rocky road carved into the side of a mountain. Thankfully our newly-acquired vehicle is 4x4 and just high enough off the ground to handle this boulderous and uneven terrain.  As we bounced along in our Tracker, we tried not to acknowledge how utterly impossible it would be to turn back should the need arise...and just enjoy the beautiful scenery of La Amistad National Forest and Volcan Baru in the distance. Our grandpa-neighbor Juan was chillin’ in the backseat verbally processing the crazy ride we were on. 

When driving or riding in buses it’s always reassuring to have locals around because they are accustomed to the insanity of the road conditions. They are a thermostat for actual danger on the road.

When we pulled up to the main gate of Manuel’s 500 acre farm, we waited for a while, unsure if he was even aware that we were there. We took the time to check and make sure nothing broke off of the car on the journey, but within minutes he appeared on his moto to let us in. We could feel the buzz of energy and excitement immediately. Manuel was JAZZED to show us his farm. From those first moments we knew that this tour was going to be a way bigger thing than we had anticipated waking up that Sunday morning. He started by showing us his coffee drying area. The harsh midday sun was beaming down and glaring off of ten or more giant wooden-framed boxes covered in fabric and filled with drying coffee cherries. There he literally screamed from the mountaintop about his passion for growing coffee and using the four elements of nature to run his plantation -- earth, water, wind and sun. The intense energy radiating from the sun and Manuel’s spirit made for an abrasive but fascinating start to the experience. After that we drove through pathways lined with luscious vetiver to Manuel’s work shed to learn about the innovative technology he worked with. His shed was dark and cluttered with all kinds of machine components and other odds and ends. Even inside that small space, standing only inches away from each other, Manuel’s surprisingly high-pitched voice ranged from loud to louder as he explained in great detail the different types of arietes he has utilized to irrigate his entire property. He has three different pumps made from 50-year-old parts that he somehow acquired from Germany and England. 

We still have a lot of questions - probably always will...

After that, we took a lunch stop at his house, as is customary whenever a Tico family invites you to their farm. We were seated at a small booth table with a white tablecloth outside of a wonky-looking little cabin. Through the open windows we could see that the house was not much different inside than his eclectic work sheds. Outside there were various plants and succulents suspended from the awning in planters made from old, plastic soda bottles and jugs. Everything was adorably handcrafted  from reused and repurposed materials. There were also a few awkwardly quiet young men staring off into space on the porch who never spoke to us and were never introduced. Manuel’s wife promptly popped out of the house with fresh-squeezed lemonade and lunged down three hilariously oversized concrete steps at the front door to serve it to us. We looked at each other and giggled because at this point we felt like we were straight-up trippin’. Everything was so overwhelming and funny. Our hosts did not eat with us. While Manuel’s wife waited on us like a pro, he was busy showing us fancy framed photos of himself on huge horses and rattling off stories at 1000 words per minute.

 After lunch the tour resumed. Manuel guided us on a 300 meter descent into the jungle at the edge of the pasture. He told us to be careful as we climbed down the steep slope to the river where he basically said that the temperature would suddenly drop and that we could fall off the edge to our death at any moment. As we neared the bottom, the rhythmic sound of the pumps got louder and louder. He had built a series of concrete tanks and used various hoses and pipes to store and redirect the water from the stream into the ariete which would pump aka “shoot” the water hundreds of meters back up the mountain. As he showed us the first ariete, we realized that it functions like a heart. Using only the momentum and pressure that gravity lends, it continuously pumps water up from the ravine back up to the top of the property so that it can be distributed throughout the farm. Every time we thought we had seen everything, he would take us further in our descent. We wish we had pictures to show because there is not enough time to describe all the crazy mechanisms he had crafted down there. At one point we found ourselves scaling down a ledge on a narrow, vertical hand-made ladder of rebar with the river flowing below us. We nervously watched as our 80 year old friend, Juan followed us down the ladder without hesitation. Every step of the way, Manuel was telling us so many random stories in high-speed Spanish we could not keep up with what was going on. It was endearing at first, but he never stopped. Eventually it became stressful and we wondered if he would even have a voice the next day…

The final stop on the river was a breathtakingly beautiful jungle spot. There he showed us the last ariete (which supplied water to his house) and also a giant rock with an impossibly flat underside that he said was an ancient, overturned sacrificial table made by the indigenous people long ago. Considering that this area of Costa Rica has more indigenous people and artifacts than any other region, we believe him. 

He told us that he never goes to that area too late in the afternoon because one time he did, and a spirit appeared and violently shook all the trees as if an earthquake was happening yet no rocks were moving, making it clear that he was not welcomed there at that moment. At that point we thought surely the tour was over (it was definitely the climax), but about an hour later we found ourselves at the top of the mountain about to pass out from being talked at all day. We didn’t want to be rude, but we simply could not take any more talking--we HAD to get out. Manuel was not picking up on our body language either. As we got in our car we shook hands, expressed deep gratitude for his time and energy and made plans for him to come assess the natural water sources on our farm so that we could implement an ariete here also! A week later he showed up at our farm (of course with no warning) to check it out, and hopefully by next month we will be using all of our own water for our house and the farm!

This is just an extreme example of the type of crazy adventure we have to be prepared to roll with on almost any given day down here. It may not be what we had in mind for the day, it may be exhausting and overwhelming...but the payoff in knowledge, friendships and sweet perks is always more than worth it.

[precuredaily]

Precure Day 133

Episode: Futari wa Precure Splash Star 35 - “The FInal Round is Here! Fight, Nagi Jr. High Softball Team!” Date watched: 17 June 2019 Original air date: 8 October 2006 Screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/6r2R12Q Project info and master list of posts: http://tinyurl.com/PCDabout

Now that’s an epic game turnaround

It’s a sports tournament episode. You’ve seen this a dozen times in shows and movies from all over the world. This story is pretty universal. So how does Splash Star manage to make it resonant? Very carefully. Obviously, after 35 episodes, we’re invested in Saki and her friends, and want to see them succeed. They don’t waste time getting to the game, either, we jump right into it after the cold open and intro. And right off the bat (no pun intended), and similar to something Max Heart did once or twice, we see that their opponents are every bit as competent, because they get a run on YJH immediately.

Saki takes it personally because she’s the pitcher, but the captain, Izumida (who may have appeared before but has never been named) tells her to brush it off. They manage to get a triple out on the opposing team (see video) and Izumida takes a minute to further encourage Saki to relax and just play her best.

They proceed to the seventh and final inning with a score of 1-0, neither team giving an inch, and in the top of the inning they keep Ohnami Academy from scoring, so all Yuunagi has to do is score 2 runs in their at bat to win the game. Unfortunately, after Izumida makes it to first base, the next two batters strike out. Saki steps up to bat but gets two strikes. The pressure and tension at this point are off the charts, but she hits the third ball and starts running. Time slows down as she hits first base, thinking they’ve finally managed to turn the game around, but as she rounds the corner to run for second she sees Izumida just standing there between the bases, looking to the outfield, and she sees that the centerfielder has caught the ball, getting an out on Yuunagi and ending the game.

Yes, that’s right, after all this investment, you’re expecting a come-from-behind victory but instead they actually had the main characters lose their final game! How often does that happen? It’s a bold storytelling move and I love it. Sometimes you can try your hardest and still lose, whether due to personal blunder or just because your opponent was better than you. As Picard said: “It is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose. That is not a weakness, that is life.” (I’m not a Trekkie but that’s a good line)

Saki is distraught, because she was fighting her hardest to win for all the graduating seniors in their last game, but Izumida is happy that they had a great game, and tells her that even if they lost, there was still meaning and value in the match, a measure of her maturity. However, Kintolesky was in the audience, and he has other ideas. He finds Saki moping with Mai on the dugout bench after everyone else has left, and while he apologizes for intruding on their moment of weakness, he grills her for what he feels is a naive belief that there is meaning in losing. Saki gets mad at the insult, not towards her, but towards the upperclassmen she fought so hard for, and when they transform into Bloom and Egret she chews him out. Kintolesky is unmoved, and uses a liquid metal Uzainaa to thrash the girls about in an honestly impressive fight.

Bloom continues to retaliate against his reductive values, spouting the importance of setting high goals and doing your all to reach them. Progress of any kind is a plus! Kintolesky just doesn’t get it and he charges the girls himself, but Moop and Foop release the Spiral Rings, and Bloom and Egret use Spiral Heart Splash to destroy the Uzainaa. Kintolesky tries to block it but he realizes he can’t hold it back and retreats, honestly admitting that today was his loss and there’s no excuses to be made.

Afterwards, Saki heads off for the bus to return to school (why has it been sitting there for hours, it’s dusk now and it was broad daylight when the game finished), but she decides that to prepare the team for next year they should all run back to school instead! Izumida likes this idea and has them do it, and we close on this lovely shot of the team.

I think the biggest flaw of this otherwise fantastic episode is that we’ve never met Izumida before. In FWPC, we met the lacrosse team captain Yumiko on multiple occasions. Even if she wasn’t very prominent, she was established and named. I can’t recall Izumida appearing before this, certainly not named. I suppose this is related to the lacrosse team not having an apparent coach so the captain was more prominent, while Ms. Shinohara takes the mentor role in this season. Anyway, while I respect Saki’s conviction to win the game for Izumida and the other seniors, it would have meant more to me if we were also invested in Izumida herself.

I suppose I also have to criticize Saki’s specific motivation. She feels that she is letting down the graduating seniors at YJH by losing the championship game. But the other school also has graduating seniors who have also worked hard to get to this championship game, and also want to score a victory. They aren’t villains, it’s is a sport, and there will always be winners and losers. Someone has to lose. In this case, it was YJH. I’m not trying to “both sides” this too hard but I think Saki is investing too much into the idea of winning for the sake of her team rather than trying her absolute best to have a good game between opponents who have proved their strength by making it this far. (That sounds like something Kintolesky would say) It’s a lesson Nagisa actually figured out in the latter half of Max Heart.

How about some easter eggs? They seem to have reused a background from FW/MH because in several shots you can see students in the Verone uniforms.

There’s also a lot of reused animation in this episode, from within the same episode but probably also other softball eps. I haven’t paid close enough attention to the various shots used throughout the show, but in this episode I saw repeat pitches, swings, and running to bases. Sometimes they mirrored the shot to cover up the recycling. Also there’s only one still frame of the opposing school’s students cheering that they use two or three times.

What new animation there is for the softball games is average to low quality. The overhead shots are bereft of detail, making it hard to figure out what’s going on. The close-ups are fine. They seem to have put most of the budget into that fight with Kintolesky and the uzainaa, which is really dynamic and fluid. There are some wonderful facial expressions in this one, so be sure to check the gallery.

On the music side there’s extensive use of Saki’s march theme, which is normal for softball episodes. It really gets you in the mood.

On the whole it’s a good episode that could have been improved slightly in a few areas, but it bucks the trend of having the protagonist’s team win their championship and I appreciate that a lot. Next time, Mai is under a lot of stress from her peers and I’ve got some things to say about that. Look forward to it!

Pink Precure Catchphrase Count: well there was a “Zekkouchou nani” (”I thought I was in top form”) by Saki, and a “You’re in Top Form” by a teammate, so I’ll count it collectively as one even though she never explicitly said “Zekkouchou nari!”

Miracle Drop Count: 2

[b1a4seeyou]

Hacked Your Heart

Summary: They say that fate brings people together no matter how far apart they may be, but what if that fate separates these two people quicker than it should be. As Haneul tries to bear with her everyday lives herself, how will she embrace this tragic ending she’ll face?

Genre: A N G S T with a pinch of fluff.

Rating: None but do embrace with its wonderful “ending“ :3c

Note: I hope you dont mind me ruining the mood with this long angsty fic huihui.This is for @saeyoungweek‘s day 3 prompt, identity. Idk if it is related to it but I’m just winging it lol. Anyways, I had this in my draft for SO LONG like idk when I’ll post this, and when I saw the Saeyoung week thing is coming, I just HAD to shove this in here, hehehehe. The character names are originally from my previous fics so I just reused the names to make my life more easier. Enjoy ;3c

“I have never thought that my life will change after this.” Time passes by as the memories of her late beloved dances in her little mind which made her felt empty. Ever since that incident, she had never gone out of her apartment nor go socializing with her neighbors who are worried of her absences and health. All she ever done was crying, mourning and whining for that one person she wanted in her life. This had all started when she met him back in a few months.

Song Haneul, a normal everyday woman, would always leaned by the doorway frame and wondered who is this person that lives right in front of her, everyday, every night. A door room numbered ‘707’, never been opened but the lights from underneath the door were never went off. She suspected whether this room was possessed or there’s no owner who lives here, but from the other neighbors she had heard, there’s a suspicious man inside the room who locked himself in there and never came out ever since he moved in. A man, she thought. What if he’s a shut in? What if he works late at times when people had gone to bed? What if he is just too shy to talk with people? Questions that never been answered kept piling in her mind until a little girl interrupted her thoughts. “Omma, I’m ready for school. Can we go now?” “Oh! It’s time already? Sure, let’s go.”

Ji Hye, the name of the girl, was her so-called adopted child who she found her near a dark alley at the back of her apartment. She was only 4 years old back then. No one was there and she kept crying out the word ‘mother’ several times. Haneul sent the child to the police but it’s been several days, no one even came to pick her up. Haneul can’t bear to leave her be so she took care of the little girl as her own.

 Haneul took her coat and keys then headed outside. Ji Hye had went ahead, waiting her from the stairs. As she tried locking the front door, she sensed that someone was watching her. She looked around but there’s no sign of any human presences. Weird, she whispered. But she shrugged it off and ran off to meet up the little girl.

Few hours had passed, the sun has go down and lights had illuminated the streets. Haneul just arrived home with Ji Hye, who’s jumping around and talking about her school days. Haneul didn’t mind with how enthusiastic the child was, so she just listened through, even though she’s very tired with her work. She turned on the television to the news channel and preparing for dinner. Just she was about to start working on the coffee machine, she heard the female news reporter reading about today’s news. “On today’s report from the police investigators, the on-going case about the missing stolen confidential documents stating that the suspect is a hacker among us. The detective of this case added the suspect would strike again if they can estimate the right time and date.-“ Oh gosh, this is getting more worse. Hopefully they catch the suspect sooner or things would get disastrous, Haneul said in her thoughts as she focused her eyes to the news.

While she was waiting for her coffee, the child pulled the hem of her skirt with a curious expression. She crouched down and asked, “Yes, Jihye?“ “Omma, why don’t I have a father?” Haneul was surprised with Ji Hye’s question but instead she giggled, “Why are you saying that? Not all families has a father. Some had passed away, some had been divorced….” “But you said you’re my adoptive mom. Why don’t I have an adoptive dad?” Haneul went speechless. She actually was expecting this kind of discussion might come to her, knowing she adopt Jihye out of pity. She averted her gaze from the child, trying to think of something that won’t cause any trouble. She then looked to face the child and stroke her head, “I’ll try to think about it.“

Once Jihye went to bed, Haneul tried to finish up her work that night but she was too distracted with the previous conversation. A father huh? She sighed again and ruffled her hair. “I better go get some fresh air,” while walking towards the coat stand, took her coat and left the house to the rooftop. At that moment, a cricking sound of a door opening was heard by Haneul but as she turned around, no sign of a door opened. Just flat closed doors sticking to the wall. “Ooookay, that’s scary. Probably the wind or something.,” she said and continued walking upstairs. As she disappeared, again, the cricking door sound was heard and appeared a red-coloured hair, popping out of the opening.

At the rooftop, Haneul was leaning on the railings and stared at the night scenery of the city around her apartment. Even though she felt calm out there, but the thought of finding a father for Ji Hye’s sake still bothers her mind. ‘Did she really mean that or maybe she was joking around?’ she thought. ‘Aaah!! This is really trying to mess my head. I knew this might come to me but never knew it could this soon. Finding a father for her is one job, getting into a relationship is WORSE.’ But then, she suddenly thought of that door with the number ‘707’ The door that was never been opened, never a person behind that door was outside NOR she ever talk with the owner. ‘Huh, strange. Why am I suddenly thinking about that?’ As she focused on the night scenery,...

“Song Haneul. 23 years old. Born in Gwanju and moved here for work purposes. Status: Single. Appearance: Pure, baby face, long hazel-coloured hair, tall as a bird flies to the air but lands on a tree because it’s too tired. Haha~.” “HUH?!” She turned around and there he was. Red messy hair, golden-like eyes behind those tiger-striped glasses, unique designed hoodie with a pair of headphones around his neck. She was speechless and still blinking at the guy’s figure. Just a few second stare, he walked over to her, She too tried to step back from him, and offered his hand. “Saeyoung. Choi Saeyoung. Never seen a pretty girl in this area, until I laid my eyes on you.”, and winks. She hesitated for a moment, not feeling like she could trust this guy but seeing Saeyoung with that enthusiastic smile, she shook his hand. “Guess I don’t need to tell mine. Haha.” Saeyoung released his hand and walked over to the railings, enjoying the night scenery. “Man, never expect the city to look so big.” She’d been staring at him, wondering who is this unknown person in front of her. Never seen him among the neighbors she met, until she recalled the man’s name. ‘Choi Saeyoung......Hold on-!‘ She remembered her landlord stating someone moved here with that name, and there’s only one apartment that everyone knows which was occupied with a newcomer. “Wait, are you-“, Saeyoung turned to lean on the railings with crossed arms and interrupted Haneul. “If you’re wondering where I came from, then your guess is right. I’m the person from number 707.“

Haneul’s eyes widen. So it is him! She finally get to see his figure for the first time. She looked at him from top to bottom and gave out a sigh of relief. A curious expression was on Saeyoung’s face so he waited until Haneul spoke, “I firstly thought you might be an old man, sitting in his home for decades. Guess my expectation was wrong.“ Saeyoung laughed at her joke. Both of them stare to the outside world in silence, until Haneul decided to ask him, “But wait, how do you know much about me? We never met and I never told you anything about me.“ Saeyoung stroked his chin and answered, “Well, you probably slipped some private information about you somewhere and I found it.“ “Wait what?!“ and she hurriedly checked her pockets, making Saeyoung laughed in amusement. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding! I’m actually an investigator so I looked through your personal information from the files.“ Haneul sighed in relief. So much for a serious joke like that. They then started making introductions and conversations about random stuff until they realized its a little late. “Ah. I should head back now. I don’t want to leave her alone.“ “Her?“ “Oh, you might not know but I have a daughter. Not my actual daughter though, I adopted her out of pity and as a mother, it’s my job to look out for her.“ She brushed off her coat and faced Saeyoung, “Well, it was nice meeting you, Mr Choi. This probably is our first time seeing each other so welcome to the neighborhood.“ Saeyoung scratched the back of his neck with embarrassment, “Please, just call me Saeyoung. Our age is pretty much close.“ She nodded and turned to head home.

Few days had passed since the sudden meeting. Haneul was preparing for lunch until a sudden door bell was heard. “I’ll get it!“, Jihye shouted enthusiastically. Jihye took the stool beside the door and peeped through the peep hole. “Umm, Omma.....Is this your friend?“ Curious, Haneul wiped her hands with a cloth and peeped through the hole. ‘Oh!’ She then opened the door to reveal the red-haired man. “Saeyoung! Didn’t expect you’re gonna come by.“ “Well, we’re only just a few steps apart haha. Plus, I was gonna ask if I could ask for food.“ He scratched his hair in embarrassment. Haneul was a little confused when Saeyoung’s stomach rumbled in cue. Jihye laughed quietly while Haneul’s lips formed a small smile. “Well, we were just preparing for lunch. You’re welcome to join us.“ She said and gestured him to come inside. Saeyoung looked around the place while Haneul went back to cooking. Once Saeyoung sat on the couch, Jihye jumped on his lap and convinced him to play with him. He looked at Haneul and she just gave a nod of approval.

The food was served and everyone started digging in. Saeyoung was impressed with the food and gave all the compliments to Haneul, which made her feel embarrassed. “Wish I could eat these everyday. Though, I can’t really cook much at home and I only ate chips hehe.“ Jihye then spoke up, “Why not come by if you feel hungry? Omma made the best foods in the world! Right, Omma?“ Haneul was a little hesitated but since Saeyoung is her neighbor, she wouldn’t mind at all. After all, neighbors gotta help each other. “Sure. Just swing by if you want.“ She gave him an approval nod which made Saeyoung cried with joy.

(Pst~ I recommend you to listen to this for this part~)

From then on, Saeyoung would occasionally came by to her place twice a week. Sometimes, he would hang out to play around with Jihye because of Haneul’s busy work schedule. As time pass, he had been coming pretty often like this is his second home. One day while Saeyoung was playing with Jihye, the little girl suddenly asked him, “Mr Saeyoung, you came here a lot lately. Do you by chance liked Omma?“ Haneul almost choked on her coffee and Saeyoung was kinda shocked but ruffled the girl’s hair, “Aww, you little cute princess. You’re really too young to ask that haha.“ But both the adults took a quick glance while smiling to each other. The more Saeyoung came by, the more Haneul’s heart started to feel warm and fuzzy. She’ll sometimes feel like her heart started to call out for him, her mind started to think of him everyday, her hands would sometimes tried to touch him. At some time, Jihye and Saeyoung slept on the couch, tired from all the playing. Haneul covered them with a blanket but paused to look at Saeyoung’s peaceful sleeping face. She wanted to confess her true feelings to him but sometimes the timing isn’t right. Without thinking, she leaned onto his face and gave a peck on the cheek. She felt a sudden touch on the back of her head, realizing she woke him up. She was about to apologize but Saeyoung shaked his head and whispered, “You kissed the wrong spot.“ And his lips were on hers.

But after what happened, Saeyoung suddenly stopped coming to her place. She thought maybe because of that day but she received a call from him, saying something major at the station so he had to stay there and help out. She would be lying if she said she won’t miss him but everyone has their own work to focus on so she had to understand it. Days to months, she hasn’t seen him ever since. She tried to visit him but every time she knocks the door, no sounds or reply was heard from the other side, not even the light underneath the door. ‘Maybe he did stayed at the station. I’ll try to check on him soon.’

One day, she decided to go grocery shopping. As she walked along the street, televisions from an electronic store was showing the recent news reports. “Here reporting, the police are now tracking the hacker who is behind the stolen documents. The chief leading this gave a few words that the suspect is now hiding in the abandoned government building. The police are now surrounding the building and ready to encounter the suspect. We’re now witnessing the activities of the capture.“ The droid then showed the building being surrounded with police cars with their sirens. ‘Ohmygod.’ Haneul covered her mouth in shock. Suddenly, her phone started ringing and without looking at the number, she answered. “Hello?“ “It’s me.“ Haneul almost felt like dropping to her knees once she heard the person she missed so much but she steadied herself by leaning on the wall. “Saeyoung! Are you okay?! I heard the news that the police are catching the suspect.“ “Yeah, I’m fine...........Well, for just awhile.“ His sudden change of tone from the phone made Haneul anxious and nervous. “S-Saeyoung?“ “Listen here, Haneul. We......I.......don’t think I’ll be seeing you again.“ “W-Wait, what are you saying? I’m sure everything’s al-“ “It’s not, Haneul.“ He sighed, “I just wanna ask you a favor. Please, forget about me. Forget about me being in your existence. It’s for the best for the both of us.“ “No! I don’t understand why you would say that. I know you can come back in one piece. You’re an investigator-“ “I’m sorry.“ Haneul can hear the sounds of his sulking from the other side of the phone, “I’m sorry, Haneul. I.....lied. I’m not an investigator. I’m not even with the police.“ “Wait.......Then-“ “I’m sorry but........I’m the person they wanted. I’m the hacker they’re looking for. I had to fake my identity and stay hidden so no one would find out about me. And I’ll be honest, from the day I first stepped into my new place, I’ve seen you looking at my direction so often. I firstly thought you’re maybe one of them so I installed a small CCTV but the more I see you look at me, the more my mind told me you’re someone to be trusted. So I digged through all your personal information, trying to get to know you better and made my first step on finally talking to you. I was really happy to get close to you. You’re the first person who made me feel like a normal person.“ As Haneul listened, she dropped herself to the ground, holding on her tears from flowing. “So I beg of you, forget about me. So you don’t have to suffer from the pain.“ “NO, SAEYOUNG! If I forget about you, what about our memories together? You’re the first person who I ever love and you’ll always be, no matter who you are. Please......Live......For me.“ “I’m sorry, Haneul. I did terrible things in my previous lives. It’s better if I end this myself once and for all. It was a pleasant feeling to finally meet you-“ “No.“ “- and finally loved you.“ “Saeyoung no!“ “We’ll meet again someday.” “SAEYOUNG NO!“ “Goodbye........Nae sarang.“ “SAEYOUNG!“ But it didn’t reach him as he ended the call. Just a few seconds later, she heard an explosion from the televisions. She quickly got up from the ground and watched as the building crumbled to the ground. ‘Saeyoung...........Saeyoung......No......‘ As she witnessed this, she dropped to her knees and let the tears flow from her eyes, not caring the people looking at her direction. She can feel her heart crushed to pieces and her breathing went rapidly fast. She bend herself to the ground and shouted the name of the man she’s desperate to see again.

[makaiarchives]

All About Vampire Interview

The following is a translation of a developer interview from All About Vampire.

Differentiating from SF2

What got the development of Darkstalkers started? First of all we had intended to make a fighting game, but our big precondition was that we had to make something that went in a different direction from SF2 both visually and thematically. With that in mind, in order to create an entirely new type of cast and setting we chose “monsters” as our theme. We thought that by using established, well-known monster archetypes it would be easy for players to grow attached to them despite never having been in fighting games before.

In what specific sorts of ways did you differentiate it from SF2? Even though it is a different game from SF2, it is a versus fighting game after all, and SF2′s rules have firmly established themselves in the genre. So doing something completely different would likely have a hard time finding an audience. So the overall rules are the same, but by using monsters, we’re able to depict all sorts of things that human characters wouldn’t be able to do.

Tell us about the number of people and length of time involved in Darkstalkers’ development. I can’t give you exact numbers, but there were likely a lot more people involved than you’d think. Every little bit of balancing required a huge amount of effort to get things to an acceptable level.

What exactly was difficult about balancing Darkstalkers? At any rate, we didn’t have enough time. (Laugh) It was too much for the main planner to do alone, so by the later half of development we were calling in help from other departments, and we ended up having quite a few people working on balance. In the end we had one balancer assigned to every two characters. I’d say taking all of that data and thoughts into consideration and tying it all together was the hard part.

Which characters were considered the strongest among the developers? About that, as we were balancing we were having all of our employees play the game, and eventually everyone ends up finding their own main. Before you know it, that becomes the only character they play. Once you become an expert with that character, you'll start winning against everyone. But if I had to pick which character is top tier... Hmm, I’m not really sure. (Laugh) Generally characters with projectiles are considered strong in fighting games, but if you can master the chain combos, Victor with his high damage might be the best. Anakaris is a bit difficult to control, but he can also be strong... I guess in the end I can’t really declare which character is top. (Laugh)

1300-1500 Frames of Animation

How were Darkstalkers spectacular graphics drawn? First the project planner would think up an overall image and profile, and from there he’ll have the designer start drawing things out on paper. The planner would also think up ideas on how each character would move. Darkstalkers spent a lot of time on its character design, probably close to double that of our other games.

And those paper drawings are then fed into the computer? That’s right. I’d say the production process is similar to TV animation. First, the designer draws a rough draft for the move he was assigned. Once the planner approves it, the designer then starts drawing the lineart for the individual frames that determine how the animation will move. Once all those frames are drawn, they’ll do page flipping tests to check how it looks in motion, just like a traditional animator, then scan them into the computer. Then they’ll check the animation of the lineart on the computer, adjusting the number of frames if necessary. Then they’ll start adding color to the sprites, but at first only in a rough form without any shading or anything. Then we’ll take those half-finished sprites into the game, and use them during play testing and balancing. And if all that gets approved, then the finishing touches get made to the sprites.

Does much retouching work need to be done to create finished sprites from the scanned drawings? “Much” doesn’t begin to describe it. The scanned drawings are less clear than what you’d get out of a 20 year old copier. (Laugh) So without a lot of fine detail work they’d be completely useless.

About how many frames of animation does a single Darkstalkers character have? There is some overlap, but if you keep that in mind it would end up being around 1300-1500 per character. That’s around triple, or maybe quadruple that of the first SF2.

Darkstalkers’ characters seem to reuse a frame or two between several different animations, did you have that in mind when designing their moves? Yes, we did pay attention to that. After all, having every single one of those 1500 total frames be unique just wouldn’t be possible within the amount of time we had. This is where the designers’ skill shows, they’re building on their previous experience.

I would assume you have several character designers, do you have a single designer assigned to each character? Yes, there are certain aspects that don’t fall neatly into that format, but in general that’s how they’re produced. In the end you might have one designer split across two characters, or partway through production one designer might help out another, it varies.

Guard Cancels: Originally Aid for Beginners

I’d like to ask about the distinctive new gameplay elements added in Darkstalkers, so first how did the idea for the Special Gauge come about? You know that Super Street Fighter II Turbo has the Super Combo Gauge. The fact is that Super Turbo’s and Darkstalkers’ developments were overlapping and the decision to add the gauge to each game came almost simultaneously. It seems to be a required feature these days, or rather it was a type of accent that we wanted to adopt for our games.

Next is Guard Cancels. How did this element come to be? Darkstalkers follows the same conventions as SF2, so long term players will quickly become experts. But we wanted newcomers to play Darkstalkers in addition to seasoned fighting game players. So Guard Cancels were intended to be a tool that beginners could use to face experts on an equal level. Of course in the end it turned out to be the exact opposite, just making the game even more hardcore. At first we had it so you could Guard Cancel with anything, even normals. The midair Guard Cancels in the finished game are a remnant of that. As development and balancing proceeded, we eventually settled on the system we have now, for the purpose of deepening the gameplay. Darkstalkers has lots of single attacks that hit multiple times, and those were also designed with Guard Cancels in mind.

The finished game has speed settings and combo bonuses, neither of which were in the location test. What about those? We generally decided to add everything that SF2 had. Anything that gets added to the genre soon gets taken for granted these days. So we went ahead and added everything we could. With regards to speed, preferences vary a lot from person to person.

What’s an “Elbow Bone Skewer and Pull into Electric Uppercut?!”

The strange move commands like Darkness Illusion’s are one of Darkstalkers’ distinctive features. We tried to come up with commands that represent the move’s overall “shape.” Also since the EX Specials were considered secret this time, we tried to come up with commands that would be difficult to find. By the end of the location tests, they had all been figured out except for Darkness Illusion. That one remained a secret to the end. (Laugh)

How do you come up with the special moves’ names? The official names get decided about a month before the game is complete, so up until then the same move might get called different things by different people. For example, Lord Raptor’s Evil Scream. I called it exactly what it was: “Elbow Bone Skewer and Pull into Electric Uppercut.” It was such a long name that everyone found it hilarious, and we all called it that up until the last minute. (Laugh)

Were there any moves that didn’t make the cut during production? Of course we had to cut some things for memory reasons, but we tried in general to avoid cutting special moves. Also there are some normals, for example a light kick and a medium kick that look the same, where we actually drew lineart for different animations that didn’t make it in.

What about moves that didn’t make it past the drawing board? You know Rikuo’s EX Special Aqua Spread, where a big geyser of water shoots up. Originally that was planned to have a big tidal wave fill up the screen, and Rikuo would start swimming at you inside it. But that was a bit too crazy, so we scrapped it. (Laugh) Also, you know how Lord Raptor has that one-eyed monster that appears during his Hell’s Gate teleport. That thing is Lord Raptor’s buddy, and we had an idea for a special where the two of them join together to attack. Huitzil had a thing where he’d transform with a catapult on his back and launch something at you, and Pyron had a special where he’d summon a Stand that would attack independently.

Our Motto: To Make the Best Thing Every Time

Capcom’s fighting games are known for having a play experience that’s a cut above the rest, what’s the key to that? It’s gotta be the programmers. (Laugh) Normally the planners just unilaterally command the programmers, but occasionally the programmers would bring us their own ideas and say “Let’s make this.” And I might give the OK, but the attack ends up feeling slow or unresponsive, and next thing I know the programmers are fixing it up on their own and the character designer will say “Let’s improve the movement a bit.”.. All sorts of people in all sorts of positions checking and fine-tune things, really developing together as a group might be a big part of it.

3D polygon-based games are starting to appear as a new medium for fighting games, but as far as sprite animation goes I feel Darkstalkers is close to being the pinnacle. Our motto is to make the best thing we can every single time. As soon as we finish making one thing, we’re determined to make something even better. Even something just made yesterday starts to feel old. Our development times are long enough that even in the middle of a project it can grow and evolve. We’ve gotten a lot of compliments from our players on Darkstalkers’ graphics, but I still feel there’s even higher to aim for.

In America, Gallon is Jon Talbain

Is Darkstalkers being released in America? Yes, but not under the “Vampire” title it has in Japan. Our development team went on an overseas trip and they saw black kids and white kids playing against each other, and their playstyle was really aggressive. Very rushdown and offense-oriented. They didn’t “turtle” and play footsies like Japanese players, they were all “I’m gonna kick your ass!” (Laugh)

Are there any differences in the overseas version? Aside from the title, some of the character names are different. Gallon is Jon Talbain, Zabel is Lord Raptor, and Aulbath is Rikuo. These names came from a Capcom USA employee who was involved with creating the characters’ backstories and such. He wanted to come up with names that would have global appeal for us. So the names Demitri and Morrigan and such came from America. But in the end we felt Jon Talbain and a few others would sound odd to Japanese players so we changed them.

Huitzil and Pyron Are Not Playable

How has the reaction from players been since Darkstalkers’ release? I haven’t actually gone out to arcades and asked people, but on online message boards there are dedicated Darkstalkers threads full of posts. They know everything down to the smallest detail, to the point where I feel I could learn things from them. (Laugh)

Are people on those boards posting rumors about Huitzil and Pyron being playable? Probably. People might get that idea since we made Akuma playable in Super Turbo. But unfortunately those two are not playable.

Will Darkstalkers have a sequel? Perhaps if the demand from players is enough.

Would Huitzil and Pyron be playable then? I can’t say anything about something that hasn’t been decided yet. (Laugh)

I’ve heard a Playstation port of Darkstalkers is in development. I’d like to push that as far as the hardware can handle. We’ll do our very best to replicate the arcade version accurately, so please look forward to it.

Parting words for our readers? Darkstalkers is a game that the more you play the more you’ll come to understand. So please play diligently.

[shorthaircutsmodels]

Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts - 20+ - https://shorthaircutsmodels.com/rose-byrnes-short-hairstyles-and-haircuts/ - Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, Based on her answers my hair is a perfect fit for this look I've had bang before and it wasn't always a pleasure to deal with so it was a hangup of mine. Otherwise, I'll go to my stylist with this photo and ask for long blasts and medium to long layers that hit just below my collarbone, according to Descoteaux's advice. What about you. I've been lust over and after work with lifestyle will cut the texture of famous hair. Share this post by commenting on it. Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, Her curls remained tact for a polished look but Rose was more carefree and relaxed do to separate her waves and finish with a sea salt spray for a beachy hair vibe. Colour wise chose rose roots and a burgundy brown shade in mid-lengths while the ends were subtly accentuated with caramel blonde shades. This gives her â€make a sun-kissed finish that warms her skin nicely. Rose Byrne's Hairstyles and Haircuts Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, This hair color is suitable for dark-skinned ladies with warm shades. It would be appealing to know about Rose Byrne before discussing Rose Byrne's hairstyle with her hair color. Let's take a look at Rose Byrne's brief introduction. Rose Byrne is an actress famous by profession. He was born on 24 July 1979 in Balmain, Australia. University of Sydney Atlant. This â € do is ideal for adding fullness to your hair as cutting ends with blunt waves creates extra body and bounce. Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, That Bang would look great as it would give her wide forehead some camouflage, but the Centre part works well for her, too. This colouration is best paired with brunette locks, but it's possible that ladies with this complexion and eye colour will also wear gold and caramel shades. Here the Rose goes to a warm chestnut brown with a natural-looking surface. This colour brightens her skin and gives her a warm glow thanks to the golden highlights on her tips. Rose Byrne's Short Haircuts Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, This stunning bob is smooth-blown from Root to tip to get a sleek look and feel. One side is tucked behind the ear, leaving the opposite side out to frame the jawline. This is a great look for any occasion and needs only a small amount of product for brightness and grip. Regular fixes every 4 to 6 weeks will help maintain this fabulous shape. The ends of this bob hairstyle are rough-cut, then smooth-blown with a side piece that makes a great hairstyle to frame a round face. Rose Byrne's Hairstyles Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, made her screen debut in 1992 with a small role in the film Dallas Doll and went on to feature hits such as bridesmaids. I'm itching to do something different with my hair. Not because I'm a hair rut on my own, but more because I'm craving the feeling I get right after I put on some make-up. Rose Byrne's Haircuts Mary Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, Does that probably make me some kind of beauty addict? But at least it's not bad for my health. I imagine something along the lines of Rose Byrne's cut, actually sitting on a chaise longue, dreaming of the cut I'm going to go for. will this cut work on a hair texture similar to yourself. Rose Byrne's Short Hair Mary Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, from Descoteaux said when talking about the cut. this works best in medium-thick hair and a wavy texture. It will basically work for everyone, but if your hair is too thick and curly you'll have to work on it and dry it, she says, adding soft waves to the edges and the back of that style to give that look Movement and fine shape. Rose Byrne's Hair Mary Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, It is easy to reuse with the right tools to do it comfortably and your hair needs products to fly away and tame. Regular fixes will also help maintain a healthy look and feel by preventing split ends. The Rose, an inverted rectangular face shape, has a broad forehead to contend with as well as having a more vertical shape to its face. Rose Byrne Hairstyles, Hair Cuts and Colors Mary Rose Byrne's Short Hairstyles and Haircuts, Voluminous hairstyles full of body and volume around the chin and neck area are ideal for her as they best balance her face shape. The side part makes a great style to compliment a long face and is ideal for any special occasion. This look can be easily recreated with rollers or a curling iron and needs the product for retention and shine. In the disco quartet I used the lavender colour mainly in the upper corner of the eyelids and in the angel quartet I used the soft pink colour in the rest of the eyelid, bringing the shades together. Rose Byrne Debuts a Blonde Blunt Bob I eventually swept two layers of CK into the upper lashes in a show of mascara and one layer into the lower lashes. I used CK One cream + blush duo posh on cheekbones and a bit on temples set with powder blush using cream blush first. To highlight and add size, I applied the CK One Skin Illuminator warm to her cheekbones nose and forehead. Relating. Rose Byrne looks very different with her platinum blonde hair every time she spends this year dyeing her hair, as if the actress was also trying her cut. Rose Byrne's Changing Looks After sticking with a lobe throughout the summer and early fall she was dusted off her tips by several inches bringing her blunt chin length bob cut up. When it comes to romantic bun hairstyles, they often say they're looking at that rather romantic bun hairstyle. Rose Byrne's Blue Jasmine L. A. the only exception she wore to the premiere. That's very creative. This time it was much shorter. He's back in his 20s and is back in groove when the Marc Jacobs Spring collection comes out. As well as Boardwalk Empire, The hit Movie Artist is also turning to Jazz Age style 20. Stylish Hairstyles Of Rose Byrne We need to question whether Rose does change her image just like most ladies or she does like most artists hair extensions again. Have you discovered that Jennifer Aniston's hair modifications are always long? Sarah Jessica Parker. Kim Kardashian's. Hung Vanngo CK Global make-up artist created Rose's make-up look. Creation of the dress you're wearing, the actress wanted to finish it towards soft romantic pastel smoky eyes makeup for the awards Rose Byrne time then I used a brush to apply the foundation and then hot rose bright pink lips with a few drops of CK One face makeup skin. Best Rosie Byrne images in 2020 - 2021 Illuminators 1 of sand before I did Vanngo 3 tsp skin facial moisturizer eye cream added a pop of color to complete a beautiful and modern look and explained. After that she added a fair touch of CK a foam concealer under her eyes and around her nose. Do you like the look? Whether you think it's effortless elegance at its best or a little boring to your taste. If so, I'm afraid we can't be friends anymore. I stretched them out a bit to shape rose's brows and filled them with CK one brow pencil + gel duo wily brunette. Rose Byrne haircut For a pop of colour we used a striking shade of bright pink which I skipped using lip liner so CK looked soft at the edges of lips wow a pure colour lipstick. I finally used Rose's CK One airlight Pressed powder fair in the T zone to adjust her make-up. Stylist Harry Josh created Byrne's tousled updo for a big night look to get a boar brush bristle and quickly start applying foam to the volume of wet hair using what Josh says is blow drying. Then use a three-quarter inch curling iron along the hair to create curls. Rose Byrne blonde hair Finger the curls and pull some into a ponytail above your head. The curly ponies wrap in a high bun pulling individual curls for a Grecian-inspired style with a modern twist, says Josh. John Frieda luxury volume all out Hold Hairspray as strong hold hairspray with a steaming finish. Sometimes major hair transformations do not occur in a single salon session. Switch from dark chocolate brown to full platinum yellow, for example. Rose Byrne hair color These brunette locks are left to fall over shoulders, showing off the natural movement that makes a great hairstyle for those with a natural curl in their locks. This simple low fuss to make only a small amount of product shine and regularly corrects every 4 to 6 weeks to avoid split ends. This Rose Byrne was a lifelong brunette tending to blonde. The platinum actress's journey is more than a year old, starting with honey blonde highlights followed by a bright blonde with visible roots and ending with an icy hue. One day she arrived at a party in Los Angeles with a surprisingly dark brunette bob. I love this short bob look. The way the ends are cut is blind, which gives this look an edgy feel. Rose Byrne bob haircut The soft waves in the hair create amazing texture and the hairstyle has life and volume due to the waves. You will need to straighten your hair every 6 weeks to keep the ends of your hair fresh and keep its blunt appearance to your hairstyle. If you lose bluntness you lose the overall look. Highlights will also need nominations to keep the colour looking vibrant. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Rose Byrne hair colour His wife's name is Bobby Cannavale and he has a child named Rafa Cannavale and Rocco Cannavale. Rose Byrne's versatility for make-up and hairstyle is important for assessing her fashion sense. We first noticed Byrne Bob in an Instagram post by make-up artist Hung Vanngo. Yeah, that soft bronze smoky eye is amazing, but would you look at that cut?. Both bob and the stylish centre-segregated style are the work of celebrity hairdresser Harry Josh, who also shared Byrne's new look on Instagram. Though unapproved, Byrne's platinum hair appears to be spinning in a shade of honey blonde rooted in tone. Rose Byrne natural hair Here you can read The Color of Bob's hair in 2020 from Rose Byrne's short hairstyles. Gorgeous loose waves add mid-lengths to the ends of this mid-length to give this style plenty of movement and make a great hairstyle to complement a long face. This look is easy to recreate with the right tools at home and needs a small product to tame fly hair. Rose Byrne's wavy highlighted bob looks fabulous here. Her hair was pulled back loosely so the waves in her hair remained intact, giving this relief a really nice texture. But it's the backside that I'm really excited about. Her hair was fastened to an elastic hair and twisted into a mini French twist before being pulled into a bun. Rose Byrne hairstyle Smacking your face with Nice has just a bit of hitting extra sweetness. That look would be perfect for a summer wedding, wouldn't it? Love this. When it comes to romantic bun hairstyles, they often say they're looking at that rather romantic bun hairstyle. Rose Byrne's Blue Jasmine L. A. the only exception she wore to the premiere. That's very creative. Rose Byrne new haircut Product description regular fixes are required to tweak the ends for each and 4 to 6 weeks will help maintain a healthy feel by preventing split ends. This gorgeous bob style sits beautifully just below the jawline frame face making easy style with a pulse wave and product for grip and shine. This simple wavy bob gives her slender hair a thicker look with blunt ends just for the Rose. Mary Rose Byrne Does this haircut require a level of care that you can cope with? Descoteaux says Byrne has a very low maintenance haircut to look at. But explosions need to be regularly clipped. Can you make such a haircut using your current cut as a starting point? Any haircut will translate into what Descoteaux says about Byrne's look. If your layers are too short at the moment, then you add some of the things you need to do. How do you need this hairstyle. On a daily basis you can't just blow dry blast and rub a cream in style and let the rest air dry, Byrne Descoteaux said. But if you want a more polished finish dry.

[raifuujin]

To finish out voume 1, an in depth look at Magic Kaito ch 6: The Scarlet Temptress. ( Aka. Akako’s introduction. )

Ch. 1, Ch. 2, Ch. 3,  Ch. 4 , Ch. 5

Okay, but if you were asking about fairest in personality as opposed to looks/charm...

Well, if it were about personality, that mirror wouldn’t even be able to stand. She does not like the idea of not having perfection. Including perfect hair, with her attempt to not seem like she’d thrown a tantrum being hidden by her ‘casually’ brushing it. Entirely in control of her actions, clearly.

This is here mostly to appreciate the details of this mirror frame. Though I also could point out the lines that go over a broken part of the mirror. Also do not know why she didn’t ask who Kid was while she was here. Is this the morning and she’s just getting ready for school and asking the mirror about her beauty is part of her routine. ( And this is apparently the first time it’s told her she’s not going to get every man. Maybe because she just got to this area, it could be the foretelling her getting every man she encounters here. Except one. Which to me makes more sense than ‘absolutely every man will fall for you’. Just limit it to who she’ll be around, and leave a possibility that she’s not supposed to be all powerful charming everyone everywhere. Just most people and it’s applied to all the guys prior to coming here and meeting Kaito. )

Aw, look at all of these unimportant couple things going on with the faceless background people.

...*steeples fingers* There’s a difference between making a translation so the English speaking audience knows what’s going on, and a translation that tries to ignore the culture this is coming from. Because just like in the anime, Aoko is comparing Kaito to Otafuku. A simple translators note for cultural relevance would be fine, and this is why I find it difficult to trust (usually older) translations in general. They can say things that makes sense, but we’re missing full context, and it leads to ignorance. (And it’s a toothache, not a loose tooth. Kaito is way too old to have loose teeth.)

I don’t know, Aoko, he (as a robot), did confess. To you. And he spends all his time with you, even if he’s not interested in your idea of a romantic date. Both of your denials are strong,

Keiko ships them. And Kaito stopped listening to Aoko so quickly when he learned that he could potentially get free chocolate. (Which Gosho later reused in a gag with Kazuha and Heiji.)

I’m slightly interested as to who Keiko’s chocolate was for. Someone who got taken by Akako, as she’s about to talk about it? Or was she going to give Kaito free chocolate, too?

This room should not be able to contain this many guys. Even if we ignore the desks like we hare. This would also cause a bottleneck when more than half of these need to clear out, because this classroom is not 99.9% male. And finally: Did Akako actually make the chocolate, or did she have her servant do it? Or summon them out of nowhere? Because I do not see her being the type to make a hundred chocolates to give out to her slaves, I see it being more like in Brave. Reach tongs into the cauldron and pull out a perfect candy complete with a spell.

I like that Aoko doesn’t judge people she doesn’t know, but I’m on Keiko’s side.

Look at that face. If she were some person lording over all the guys in school and making trouble for others, I’d want to slap her. ( Though that’d be if I noticed it at all, since in real life, I really don’t care for drama or if boys/girls were fawning over someone. )

Hello unimportant girls that we won’t see again. (At the very least, not important enough to name the times they appear. You could argue they appear at the ski slopes in the hot spring, but short haired girl definitely doesn’t exist anymore, and the other two you’d just be guessing.)

B-, how dare you slap that adorable face!

(And while I severely dislike her, she could be taken to know everyone’s names.)

(But yeah, worst sort of person in the world.) Also doesn’t even consider that he’d say no in the slightest, when I doubt she had to slap any of these other guys who are flocked around her. Though, maybe they didn’t have chocolate to begin with, but either way, I don’t feel like she’d have to tell them to only have hers. (And while I believe the majority wouldn’t have had any to get rid of, I’m sure some got at least one from people who were crushing on them or even girlfriends. The idea of Akako making them drop those feelings and possibly legit steal guys from people on the day that girls make their feelings known. Seriously, the most detestable person at her introduction.)

Keiko had already been ticked off earlier, she should be more offended. Or Aoko, Aoko should be defending Kaito as well, he hadn’t done anything to deserve a slap right now. I don’t care if she thinks Akako is pretty, she should be offended that her friend was just hurt by the girl.

Kaito, you should be mad, too. You are far more patient than I’d ever be at unwarranted physical assault. Especially if it made me drop a ton of stuff I was holding.

Her world is literally broken by one person being like ‘no thanks, I don’t want your chocolate’. Has she never dealt with any denial ever? Half the population is female, I’m sure there have to be other people who don’t go along with her terrible actions. (Though I can also just as easily believe she never approaches girls for anything, when she can just make guys do whatever it is she wants.)

Could she manipulate the teacher if she were to get in trouble? Also, looks like the rest of the male army disappeared, probably because now they’re like ‘oh shit, I need to get to class.’ Even the guys in this room immediately drop defending Akako in favor of going along with teacher authority. (Maybe Akako’s magic was stalled at her fragile world being shattered, so she doesn’t have them under her control nor is interested in getting the others back.)

Look at that face. She truly cannot fathom being denied. Shattered.

And because she has such a selfish worldview, and knows she’s supposed to own everyone, automatically assuming that the one person who didn’t beg for forgiveness and lick her feet is the one her magic doesn’t work on. With that kind of mentality, and the implications that she does this sort of thing all the time without repercussions, it’s no wonder she’s not allowed in the DC world. Though that doesn’t excuse nerfing her power in the MK world, Gosho.  (Really, her entire time in the classroom is just. Hate. I think the manga makes her more unlikable than the anime, because her face doesn’t quite capture all the evil going on in these faces. When the style is set in animation, it can lose some expressiveness.)

Though one point to the anime, it gave some reason for him to have lost a handkerchief that he keeps inside his jacket. There’s no explanation, not even a mention that he could have dropped it here. Losing track of something he could use in magic doesn’t feel like Kaito, and I doubt Akako could subtly take it from him.

Pft. The translation leaves a lot to be desired, but it can be entertaining sometimes. ( They were going for ‘worship’. Though, it’d have been easier to use ‘ritual’, since worship wouldn’t have made sense to use in context. )

Never denied, can abuse whoever she wants, someone like her servant only makes her personality worse because he will only ever agree and do everything she demands. I’d really like to know where her parents are and it they were ever terrible as well. Bad upbringing regardless.

Gotta love all the details Gosho used to put into his older works. Though I’d like to know just how this house is set-up, assuming this all basement.

And here we have Kaito being an idiot. Thinking that things are going too smoothly is how he got tricked twice during the heist for the crown. No one there, light shined in face. All the officers knocked out and things too easy, trap because Nakamori popped out and grabbed him. Put them together, and steal Kid’s idea of knocking people out, and we have no one around, trap set up in the case, and going to knock Kid out while hiding in the exhibits around the room.

Note: This is Kaito’s fourth heist that we know about. (First was Anne, second was first attempt at a crown, third was a second attempt at a crown.) It’s ‘KID’s’ overall eighth theft so far as the police are concerned. (Thee of Kaito’s, two for Jii, two for the robot clone.) ‘KID’ should know better, even if Kaito hasn’t actually had the experience. Even if he should have questioned the lack of cops from what he has encountered.

It was a pretty simple trap, Kaito, I can’t defend you on this. (Also, these bubbles are supposed to be swapped. Fluff bubble for the laugh, normal smooth bubble for the comment.)

1) the first spike bubble is supposed to be Kaito’s, and he’s frustrated that he fell for that.

2) I don’t know about other people, but I’m the type who would notice the guy in the white suit on the ceiling. If it’s close enough for Kaito to jump up too, then it’s not tall enough to not see the ceiling even if you’re not looking. I mean, I’m also the type to notice random bugs on the wall that no one else notices, but a full size person in a cape is not as invisible.

I don’t know why people treat the police as an afterthought, this looks pretty intimidating. Just seeing their legs as they walk over to KID knowing he can’t fight back. And all of the troubles he’s going to be facing are prior to any detectives coming to try and deal with the thieving problem.

Also, falling from the ceiling does not sound like fun. (Yet apparently isn’t painful enough to push him past the drug.)

That hood is not on when she’s getting ready to hit, and suddenly it’s shadowing her face when she brings the pain. ( Would she have felt any guilt at all if the spike had managed to break through the doll? Instead of just a sharp hit to the gut. Would she even be aware if she murdered a person via doll? )

Yeah, Nakamori, I’d be pretty confused at to why someone would suddenly be visibly in pain without anything having happened to him. (Unless maybe he things something happened when falling from the ceiling.)

This is basically the same as getting someone to cooperate with you by beating them up and saying you’ll stop if they do what you say. ‘You don’t want me to break your bones? Then give me what I want.’

Have to admit, it’s nice seeing Kaito actually hurt. It happens decently often in early chapters, but when DC hits, it becomes so tame and he’s untouchable. The only redeeming part of chapters 34-36 is that we got these sorts of images of Kaito having trouble again.

Look at all of that blood. (Which is physical evidence that you could definitely take right now. Though I understand that Kid bleeding from nothing would be unnerving.) 

Even if you appreciate the pain, you could wipe your face to that blood doesn’t drip everywhere. Unoless you were hoping someone would follow the blood trail, which I’d love to have seen tbh.

This house looks old as heck and falling apart. I don’t know if that’s what she’d want, staying out of the public eye because of being a witch, but I doubt it helps anything to be so disconnected from the world. No wonder you can only rely on magic, you're not really connected to the world and just treat people as play things. Literally, when you use voodoo dolls.

I do appreciate his gentleman act. Again, he has a lot more patience for this sort of thing than I’d have.

Much as I love this line, this isn’t what he said. What he was saying wasn’t a veiled threat, it was ‘you shouldn’t make fun of your elders/adults’. Which makes more sense if he’s denying that she’s aware of who he is and keeping with the fact KID isn’t supposed to be a teen by insinuating that he’s older and more mature than she is.

Again, an issue here. He’s trying to act more mature, so he’s not yelling at her to give him the doll. It’s more ‘now just give me the doll...’, like he’s talking to a child and trying to coax a toy out of their hand.

(All accounts of ‘black magic’ in the chapter are misleading. Akako is indeed mentioned as having red arts, and every actual time magic is mentioned is just ‘magic’. Nothing to do with the idea of ‘black magic’, because types of magic aren’t synonymous.)

And fun fact for this chapter: This circle is based on the seal of Babalon, a goddess also known as the Scarlet Woman, and women use Babalon to increase their self esteem and gain the attention of men without being under men’s rule. It also explains all the snakes you see with everything Akako is associated with in this chapter.

I’m glad someone finally said it. Though, I wouldn’t have been polite. She’s a spoiled brat, plain and simple, and old enough that her being spoiled is destructive for everyone involved with her.

He gets put through so much pain in this chapter, even if it’s mostly internal.

Ah, seemingly insignificant panel that’s actually showing what’s going to save Kaito.

Would be nice to know how far this was going to go. This heat doesn’t really exist, so I have to wonder if this was going to lead to neverending sort of pain, possible spontaneous combustion, or even if Kaito was actually going to take off his clothes. Because he’s pulling at his tie and probably wanting to more just in this panel.

I really don’t see how anyone could be satisfied winning any hearts through force, for one. (Since it’d be more than clear you had to use coercion and they never really cared and could potentially hate you before hand, and everything would feel fake.) And for two: An observation that the heart says ‘red’.

He actually seemed like he’d eat it. To bad we’ll never know what could have happened if he had. But hey, proof that he’s not the type who’d be able to take much physical torture. ( Since we don’t have more recent chapters for that sort of thing to base how he might act. Old still remains as the one example. )

It’s nice to see their stark contrast in composure. Kaito going through all kinds of things going wrong, including severe pain, and he’s still acting like he has been. But Akako is only ever composed when she has full control over other people, otherwise she’s not okay.

You break her heart Kaito. Good for you. Best you can do, when you wouldn’t ever hit her.

I don’t know how you missed the snow, with how exposed you are, Akako. There might be heat magic going on, but that’s only been shown on Kaito, some of this had to hit you. And if it’s cold enough to snow, Kaito was right, you shouldn’t be out in something that doesn’t cover you much at all.

I like Kaito agreeing with her in this instance, because as a magician, he’d know best that all magic is just deceit and trickery. But it’s not the point of magic to be real, the only point...

...Is to entertain. You’re supposed to make the audience believe magic can be real, but magicians themselves know full well it’s all fake. ( I also have to wonder if he appreciated Akako’s magic being real in this instance, because had he been on his own, his own ‘fake magic’ wouldn’t have helped him when it came to being caught by the police. Akako’s magic being real and her doing voodoo stuff to him is what saves him from falling asleep. Though, speaking of the doll, we never see it after this and there’s no indication if Akako still has it or if Kaito took it. )

The cheating line sounds wrong, since as an English speaker, he should only bring up an ‘actually, you’re cheating’ if Akako had mentioned it. But even in English, they didn’t have her say that.

Also more proof that she needed a better upbringing. She doesn’t know how to get by without using magic at all, and that’s more likely to get her killed in modern day society.

Now I’ll address Kaito. Because it’s not just patience, he sees that Akako has a problem and still wants to help her. Despite the fact that she’s essentially tortured him and tried to make him a slave. He’s constantly shown to be a good judge of character, and it applies even to Akako. It’s a stark contrast to when he does get angry at others, or gets revenge, usually when the motives aren’t just selfish, it’s usually for monetary gain. Akako’s selfishness has only shown that she has a small world view and she feels a need to have control over everything, but she’s had no real motivation shown. And Kaito never asks why she’s doing anything. He remains kind to her when she really hasn’t done anything to earn it. Because she is a spoiled brat, someone who hasn’t been raised right or been shown that what she’s doing is wrong. An ignorant and entitled sort of person, not one who’s intentionally malicious just to hurt people. ( But making people into a tragedy doesn’t mean I’ll like them. She been overall terrible, and it wouldn’t have helped anything if she’d missed what Kaito was trying to say. )

The snakes have been matching her expressions, but I’ll just pick one panel to mention it on.

(I’m not sure how the line is supposed to be taken. I was trying to check the raw, but google is basically saying ‘lose their magic’, which I’m not sure would mean all magic, like some think, or something similar to this where it’s just whatever she’s using at the time. I usually go with the former, but the later would be easier to go through with. Unless you’re emotionally and physically numb, it’s hard to go through life without crying. But who knows, maybe witches have to consciously choose to shed a tear and have control over it.)

Much as I love the anime adaptations, note that Aoko never gives Kaito chocolate. She does seem to have feelings, since it doesn’t mean anything it it’s not Valentine’s day, but wasn’t going to save it for him at any point after, either. Besides, Kaito, you should know it’s not free chocolate day anymore. Aoko only told you it was yesterday, you shouldn’t have expected any more.

I will give props to the anime for giving at least a semi-believable reason why Kaito wouldn’t know what Valentine’s day is. But I also know that that’s looking at it in modern day, and I have to wonder if some time differences are going on. Since Gosho used a lot of his own information when writing Kaito, I wonder if it was something that happened to him while growing up, if Valentine’s day wasn’t quite as major a thing as it had become.

Overall, I heavily dislike Akako in this chapter alone. She does get better, even in just the next chapter. Still manipulative, but not nearly as bad and trying to be Veruca Salt and ‘I want this and I will get it’ with people as she is in this one.

[idesigncafe]

Overcoming Content Challenges

Authors: Steve Glancey and Bryan Meszaros from the Digital Signage Connection

Although often relegated to the back seat, the process of content creation drives the success of a digital signage program. It is therefore essential to develop a mental map of each component stage, from strategizing and budgeting, through development and optimization, and to address the unique requirements and challenges of each one. With a clear plan in place, potential stall-outs are easily avoided, and obstacles, overcome. What follows is a collection of tips and tricks that we have developed in the course of our experience, and found helpful in navigating some of the difficulties that inevitably accompany a creative undertaking. We here pass them on to you to help better position you for your next endeavor.

Obstacle #1: Project Ownership

The nature of project ownership is critical and, unfortunately, often blurred in understanding. Is the person being said to "own" a project responsible, by definition, for all aspects of its design and production? In a word: no! Rather, they manage and monitor the numerous interlocking parts of the creative engine - the gathering of assets, messaging, design, and approval - each of which is the domain of a different person, or team. This last, the granting of approval, is generally understood, and intended as the concluding step. However, its finality hinges upon the clear delineation and coordination of the preceding steps, without which requests for further changes are far more likely to arise. Changing even one textual element could disrupt the flow, look and feel of the whole product, and force the designer to go back and rework it from the ground up to accommodate the change.

Obstacle #2: Content Strategy

Designers create content within "closed environments;" they alone experience, and interact with their creations during the design process. Yet given that their creations are ultimately destined for display in "open environments" subject to such variables as viewing distance, demographics, audience journey, time of day etc., it's important to keep in mind that every content piece adhering perfectly to fundamental principles of design in the abstract carries no guarantee of effectiveness when it goes "live." All these variables, and more, should be researched and applied to your content: type, structure, design, refresh rate etc. as they will deeply impact the audience engagement with, and effectiveness of the intended message.

Obstacle #3: Playlist Strategy

Optimizing your playlist requires the delicate counterbalancing of numerous considerations, all within the framework of your budget and network objectives. Loop length, for example, must be in step with audience dwell time. Make your playlist too long, and it will be a waste of network resources; too short, and you will forfeit network opportunities. Couple dwell time with the return rate of your audience; multiply by an effective frequency of 4-7 (the number of times a viewer needs to be exposed to a message before it is thoroughly communicated); and add to that any wish to day-part, or employ triggers, feeds, or logic that activates different content depending on the time, or viewer body-language or demographics and you will begin to get the measure of what it is to develop a strategic plan that truly capitalizes on the possibilities of digital signage.

Obstacle #4: Gathering Assets

The process of gathering assets is more complicated than the phrase would suggest, as they are not, in fact, necessarily useable simply by virtue of being "digital" - a reality difficult to concede for clients unfamiliar with concepts such as image quality, and display resolution. Fortunately, a little proactive education explaining such fundamentals within the specific context of your plan to develop content for a client (using which editing program, and in which output format) often goes a long way towards bringing about the submission better-quality files, even if they are not all vector graphics, files of 300dpi or more are ideal. Of course, there is always the possibility that there are no usable assets to uncover. Sometimes the image quality of a graphic is too poor, or the asset does not exist in a version that supports editing, requiring you to start from scratch. The bottom line is: avoid assuming anything about your client's level of knowledge or organization, and be prepared to explain why their idea and/or materials may need to be scrapped or revised.

Obstacle #5: Content Licensing

Content licensing does not abide by the "finders, keepers" rule. Possession of an asset does not necessarily confer the right to display it in a commercial setting, even if it was acquired "for free" - a reality sometimes difficult to accept in a world where side-stepping costs is so often possible. However, several lawsuits over the years have been brought against digital signage companies whose network owners failed to negotiate an agreement (either in the form of a one-time payment, or an ongoing subscription) with the owner of every asset in their playlist. Given the costs incurred by such a lawsuit, it's essential to address licensing costs early and often, and to ensure that a line item appears in the budget from the very beginning. "But that CNN feed says that it's free..." Look again at the terms. Free news feeds, and most free or inexpensive weather feeds are available only for non-commercial use.

Obstacle #6: Creative Budgeting

Talking money is like talking politics: everyone has an opinion, and no one is right. The question of budget must therefore be addressed both early in the development process, and regularly throughout the lifecycle of a project, for content carries a cost not only to create, but to maintain. The viewing frequency, and relationship it bears with its physical context give it a limited shelf-life, and while you would ideally have a surplus of content from which to chose, and/or assets with an automated feature, the project will, in fact, require ongoing programming, editing and management. True, most CMS (content management systems) now support advance scheduling, but someone still needs to oversee that task. The success or failure of a digital signage project therefore will depend on the project owners ability to accurately and creatively manage the fixed initial costs and variable ongoing costs to collect, license, and schedule content assets all powered by the most costly line item: human capital.

Obstacle #7: Stretching the Dollars

Were money not an obstacle, we would all simply hire ABC or Lucasfilm to build out our playlists, and keep them fresh. But money is an obstacle. Budgetary constraints come into play for everyone at some point. That is why I am a proponent of building playlists with an eye to maximizing value, as opposed to maxing-out one's resources. This can be done in a variety of ways, including investing up-front in custom templates; reusing assets that your company originally used elsewhere; leveraging user-generated, and data-driven content; strategically recycling content; and outsourcing parts of your playlist to licensed feeds or competitively priced creative agencies.

Obstacle #8: CMS and Hardware

This subject, once broached, easily leads the ensuing discussion down the proverbial rabbit hole, but my goal is simply to highlight a few of the cascading effects of your choice in CMS, and hardware. With respect to CMS, some solutions are new, and less refined due either to their time on the market, or target simplicity, and for content managers posting only simple messages, they present an appropriate solution. However, with simplicity come limitations, and complex networks may feel the lack of editing and programming options, readymade app stores, KPIs, feeds, triggers, localization, advertising market platform integration, weighted playlists and logic playback configuration. They may also feel limited by the breath of file-type options, API, security settings, reliability, remote management features, emergency messaging capabilities, etc. If so, there are other more established, robust CMS to consider.

The playback quality of the hardware you choose is also something to consider carefully, as it has a profound impact of viewers' visual engagement with your message. And finally, careful thought must be put into your connectivity strategy. Will you connect your system via Wi-Fi for which you pay with a monthly bill, or through a mobile provider that you pay by the gigabyte - a costly proposition if your playlist includes large video files or frequent content updates. There is no right answer, just the solution that best fits your content strategy.

Obstacle #9: Optimization

The effectiveness of your content is in direct measure to the quality of your messaging, so even the most thoughtfully designed content campaign can benefit from regular, controlled tests of its effectiveness. A/B testing or before and after comparisons are the easiest, most affordable kind of assessment, and can bring to light adjustments likely to increase the ROI (return on investment) of the campaign at hand. For example, how did one store do vs. the other without the promotion running or using the same content in two different locations with a slight change to the CTA? Audience engagement and reaction are surprisingly difficult to anticipate; that which is relevant, which resonates with viewers, and speaks to them in "their language" changes all the time, so if effectiveness is your end, self-assessment is your means.

Obstacle #10: Creating Value

What objective do you aim to meet by means of your digital signage network? From your viewers' point of view, a digital sign is not much different from a traditional printed sign. Both boil down to a message on a wall, and therein lies their value for audience and advertiser alike. Why then is so much attention and money diverted to the frame and mounting instead of the message? Mounts, frames, and hardware are inherently depreciating assets. It is the quality of your content strategy and execution that will make your 2-million dollar investment in digital signage worth 1 million, or 5. Funneling every piece of content through your network objective (ROO/ROI) is therefore the aim to which you should direct your primary energy as a network operator on day one and year five.

Interactive Design Cafe provides end-to-end digital signage solutions with the latest touchscreen displays and multi-screen video walls, to glasses-free 3D signage and holographic advertising players. We also offer both out-of-the-box software solutions, as well as fully customized software, while specializing in branding, customer experience and service design. We are a design consultancy, not just a “sales” operation, so we often fly out to our clients location to install hardware / software, and we strive to develop long lasting relationships with our clients. Our goal is to provide the most innovative and engaging experience for your brand with top notch service and support.

To learn more about Interactive Design Cafe and how we can help your business, please visit our website http://www.interactivedesigncafe.com

[pixelpoppers]

Bubsy: Paws on Fire! has a really interesting level structure and I'm gonna talk about it.

The short version is that it allows for a lot of player freedom in approach and in forming the difficulty curve, and has a lot more content than it might first appear.

The long version follows.

The foundation is the four playable characters, each with their own abilities:

Bubsy the Bobcat plays similarly to what you'd expect from a Bit.Trip Runner game. His levels are 2D side-scrolling platformers. Bubsy runs automatically and can jump, ground slam, glide, and "pounce" (a forward dash-attack).

Virgil Reality (whom I had never heard of just a few days ago and who is now my spirit animal) plays very similarly to Bubsy, but with slightly different abilities. He runs automatically and can also jump and ground slam, but instead of a glide and pounce he has a double-jump and a "slide" for ducking under obstacles.

The Woolie is different. Her levels are also 2D side-scrollers, but she doesn't run - she's in a flying saucer, and while her levels scroll automatically just like Bubsy's and Virgil's, she can move freely within the current boundaries of the screen. Her only other ability is a forward-firing laser, and she moves more slowly while firing. (There are also power-ups she can pick up that give her a double shot or a triple spread shot.)

Arnold the Armadillo is even more different. His levels are like a 3D tunnel racer. The camera is positioned behind Arnold as he automatically rolls forward along a cylindrical tube, with his only ability being to move horizontally around the tunnel wall.

Every character uses their abilities to progress through levels, picking up collectibles and avoiding obstacles. There are 150 standard collectibles in each level which show an ideal path, but you don't actually have to get them. They increase your score and can be spent on new costumes, but they have no effect on your progress through the game. The first time you reach the end of level with a given character (which is a significantly easier goal than getting all the collectibles) you get a "victory medallion" for that character and level. That's the mechanism by which progress is gated - later levels require that you have some total number of victory medallions. But like Stars in Mario 64 or equivalent systems in other collectathon platformers, this number is always less than what you'll earn if you finish each level with each character, giving you some freedom in what order you approach challenges and letting you skip ones that are giving you particular difficulty or that you don't find enjoyable.

The one kind of weird thing is that Arnold is positioned differently than the side-scrolling characters, which has a couple of implications. Arnold levels aren't immediately playable - to get access to an Arnold level, you must collect special collectibles as the other characters. Each of Bubsy, Virgil, and Woolie's levels have three fragments of an Arnold medallion in them (sometimes hid more sneakily than the standard collectibles). Get all nine fragments and you unlock the corresponding Arnold level.

Arnold levels, in addition to playing quite differently, are actually bonus levels. You can't fail them - the obstacles only break your point combo and make it harder to see what's coming. And 40 of the 150 collectibles are put together in a giant unmissable collectible at the very end. So even if you have terrible aim or just put the controller down, you are guaranteed to hit the end and get a victory medallion and 40 standard collectibles. It's legitimately a bonus reward for getting all the Arnold medal fragments and you can treat it as such if you don't enjoy Arnold's gameplay - but optionally you can also try to get all 150 of the collectibles and max out your score.

The downside of this structure is that the game looks shorter than it is. The game has three worlds, each with nine main levels and then a boss level. Each main level can be played as Bubsy, Virgil, or Woolie, and has an associated bonus level for Arnold. (Boss levels are one-shots.)

So this looks like the game has thirty levels, but in practice it has one hundred eleven - nearly four times as many, because each main level is really four levels in one. Officially you play the same level as Bubsy, Virgil, and Woolie, but their collectibles are placed differently and their abilities mean they take different paths. To me, they feel like completely different levels (especially Woolie) and if they hadn't been grouped together on the map it wouldn't have even occurred to me that they reuse content, because in practice they really don't. They are three different levels - and Arnold's of course are completely different since they are in a tunnel.

It's a little unfortunate the confusion this framing can cause, and it makes the game look much shorter than it is which may put people off of the price tag (though it's already at a budget price). I'm not convinced it was the best idea and perhaps there was a clearer way to handle it. But once you understand it and how much content it means there is, it's a good thing.

So to recap, Bubsy: Paws On Fire!'s level structure means that:

There are three distinct styles of play (or four, depending how you count the similar Bubsy/Virgil styles - I find they feel different enough that I have a distinct preference for Virgil) making for frequent changes of pace. But you always know what play style you're signing up for and won't be suddenly surprised by having to learn a new style in the middle of a level or something. And you get to decide when to switch things up - I rotate through all four characters on each level before proceeding, but you could do a bunch of Woolie levels and then go back and do several Virgil levels if you wanted to.

Levels have a nice wide competence zone - the skill floor of just reaching the end of a level is all you need to progress in the game, and the skill ceiling of getting every collectible (without hitting any obstacles, if you're truly hardcore) is significantly higher. This allows you to set your own goals and tailor your own difficulty curve. Since I'm an experienced Bit.Trip Runner player, I'm getting every collectible before moving on, but not requiring bonk-free runs - though note that the score combo system does grant higher scores to bonk-free runs, so if you want to show off your ability to do so on the leaderboards, you can!

Arnold levels are a legit bonus reward for getting the special medallion fragment collectibles, but also an optional source of additional gameplay and challenge if you enjoy them. I've seen some reviews call out these levels as their least favorite, but if you don't like them you can basically skip them and still get a reward. I've grown to like all the play styles, and I actually prefer Arnold levels to Woolie ones.

There's nearly four times as much content as there appears to be at first glance. I'm expecting the game to take me about ten hours, which is pretty good for the price tag. People coming in without having played Bit.Trip Runner might have more room to practice and learn the skills, and thus get even more entertainment out of the game.

[aurelliocheek]

The Artificial Intelligence of Shadow Fight 3

Banzai Games’ Producer Mikhail Dragovalovskiy writes about his experiences in creating the AI for the popular mobile fighting game.

Game Designers regularly face the challenge of creating a ­credible AI. This process can be either ­relatively simple or extremely complex, depending on the requirements of the project and the goals that you pursue.

Every genre has certain principles on which the game mechanics are based on. You first need to understand these ­principles for your game to develop a good bot. For example, in platformers, this is the height of the jump relative to the height of the character, as well as the interaction of the character with the environment, such as platforms and vertical obstacles.

Fighting, on the other hand, is based on frame data – a markup of animation that ­defines its parameters.

Here are three main phases of an attacking animation in a typical fighting game:

Starter – the time from the start of playing the animation until the ­striking surface (e.g. the blade of a sword) ­appears. During this period, the player is vulnerable.

Attack interval – the time interval of the animation where there is a striking ­surface. In the event of a collision between the striking surface and the enemy’s character model, it will cause damage and a hit reaction.

Recovery – the period of time after an attack interval or after a hit reaction. At this point, the player does not have control over the character and may also be vulnerable.

The key to creating a good AI in a fighting game is to teach the bot to interpret the frame data and choose actions that cause the enemy’s HP decreases faster than the bot’s HP.

The action game series Shadow Fight is developed by Banzai Games and published by Nekki. Part 3 has already been installed on over 50 million Android and iOS devices.

Differences between SF3 and most other fighting games The Shadow Fight series was designed with a number of unique features that distinguish it from many other fighting games:

The use of autoblocks: If the player’s character simply moves but does not attack, he automatically blocks any regular attack of the enemy.

A slower pace and smooth animations as a tactical component: the player must have enough time to recognize what kind of blow the enemy strikes and which technique he should choose for a successful counter-attack. This intentional slowdown of combat speed also allowed us to make the animations as beautiful and physically realistic as possible.

Real collisions: This leads to very cool scenes in which one character dodges the attack of the opponent and immediately strikes back in response. Thanks to the smooth animations the player has the time to notice these details very well.

Shadow form: When a special energy bar gets completely filled, the player can enter the shadow form and perform several spectacular tricks that penetrate his opponent’s block.

We already used AI logic to control the opponents in our previous fighting game Shadow Fight 2. But due to the transition to 3D graphics, the use of real character collisions and the introduction of the ­shadow form, we could only reuse a part of the existing AI ​​logic. The rest had to be reinvented from scratch.

Where to start working on AI? If you don’t want to use a bot that is ­powered by machine learning algorithms, there are two main other approaches:

1. Use a weak bot, then strengthen it to the desired level with new features. 2. Use an invincible bot and then weaken it.

The second option sounds very attractive: you create a cool AI that beats the players first, and then you mercifully reduce the difficulty of the bot. From a developers point of view, this may be more convenient, because you can pre-design all the features of the bot’s behaviour and have a full idea of its final performance in the fights.

Of course, we chose this option first, although we later realized that it wasn’t so simple: with our balance of animations, automatic blocks and the variety of special skills, a highly skilled player can almost always find out the necessary tactics and tricks that allow him to defeat the AI. We did not understand this right away, but after measuring the winrate of the players at different stages of the game, it became obvious. This, by the way, contradicted the fact that for many people, judging by their feedback on the game, the bot was almost invincible.

Since truly lag-free PvP was not yet possible on mobile devices, PvP in Shadow Fight 3 is simulated by an AI-controlled bot.

So how does our AI work? Triggers or rules of conduct: The system of rules under which the bot performs random actions is called triggers. Here is an example of this set of rules:

The bot evaluates the distance between itself and the player and generates a list of those attacks that could reach its opponent. Then it chooses a random attack from this list.

The bot does not spam the player with throwing weapons.

After being hit by a throwing weapon, the bot has a guaranteed chance to dodge the attack for a certain amount of time.

A bunch of other things that a bot should or should not do.

If you release such a bot against a beginner of an equal level, the result will depend on the armed weapons of the opponents. The one with the faster animation will win. Because, in fact, both just hectically push all buttons, except that the bot does it in a more meaningful way.

Decision-making The logical step to improve the AI is to reduce this randomness and add a ­decision-making system that will guide the bot to victory. To do this, you need to understand which decisions are right in which situation. For fighting games, two ­situations happen all the time:

1. The enemy is waiting. 2. The enemy is attacking.

There are two solutions, too:

1. You need to attack when there is a high probability to hit. 2. You need to block when you’re attacked and can’t counter-attack.

It turns out that for victory, the AI ​​must interrupt enemy attacks with its counter-­attacks, or block if it cannot interrupt them.

We distinguish two groups of decisions that the bot has to make: first – when the player is standing, and second – when the player is attacking. In order for the AI to know exactly how to counter, we came up with collision tables.

At the right moment, the AI starts a special attack.

Collision Tables This is where the principles of fighting games come in handy – the animation ­stages mentioned above.

Remember how Doctor Strange looked through all the possible outcomes of the battle with Thanos? The collision tables work similarly: a computer calculates the outcomes for each attacking animation at every possible distance in advance.

In more detail: we simulate a strike with a sword and at the same time a strike with a katana, and then we look who will hit whom. We do this procedure for all ­ attacks in the game, at all distances and with ­delays of a different number of frames. Example: “I launch a blow with a sword, and my opponent starts a katana strike after N frames”.

All results are recorded in tables. We ­repeat this elaborate procedure before each game update and store the resulting tables in compressed format inside the game build, so the calculations don’t eat up the device’s resources in runtime. This way the player’s client already has a complete list of all the outcomes for any possible attack combination. The AI can see in these tables which action can counter any attack of the player at a specific distance, or understand that it’s best to block the attack.

As a result, the AI effectively responds to the player’s actions with the optimal counter-attacks. Next, we need to teach the bot to attack in the optimal way, rather than using only random strikes.

Wrong decisions and erroneous behaviour are important ­characteristics of a credible AI.

The choice of distance and the right strike An attentive and intelligent reader could say: “Stop! Why even attack by yourself if the enemy is in the autoblock mode most of the time? We simply have to wait for the player’s action and punish him with a quick blow that will interrupt his attack!” Yes, this is true, but a bot that does not move and does not attack without the player taking the initiative looks at least strange. A ­credible AI ​​must also be able to choose effective attacks, even if the optimal ­strategy is to play just with counter-attacks. To do this, we have developed a system for choosing the best distance and strikes. We know that most players have a ­repertoire of several favourite punches. For us, this means that our bot should specifically choose such attacks that cannot be interrupted by these typical player punches (at a given distance).

To do this,

we gather statistics of all strikes of the player.

we calculate the optimal distance for the most effective counter-attacks against his favourite strikes.

we feed this value to the bot and make it stay on this distance throughout the battle.

In theory, it sounds cool, but in practice, it has proved to be unsuitable: players rarely stand idle – they almost always press buttons and attack the bot. Too often, the bot was busy only reacting to the player’s actions, instead of taking the initiative. So, the choice of the right strike only works against passive players. But at least the choice of the right distance improved the effectiveness of our counter-attacks – they’ve become more diverse because the bot has more choices. At this stage, the bot is already quite effective: it recognizes the best moment for an attack, it knows when to counter-attack and when to block. Next, we will talk about the systems that allowed us to set the required level of complexity and weaken or strengthen the bot.

Resentment and forgiveness This is an interesting concept in our balance system. Through this, we create a sufficient level of complexity for beginners and professionals, as well as motivate the player to use different strikes, which increases the interest and fun of the game.

The essence of this concept already lies in the name: the bot takes offence at the player’s attacks if the player uses the same ones too often. Resentment is an internal variable in the game that reduces the AI’s chance of making a bad decision and increases the chance that the AI ​​will conduct a perfect counter-attack.

On the other side of the scale lies forgiveness. This variable increases the bot’s chance of choosing non-optimal solutions and reduces the chance of a counter-­attack, when the player stops spamming and switches to using different attacks more ­often. If we want a challenging bot, we reduce the speed of forgiveness and set a high starting level of resentment. If we want to make a weak bot, the opposite is true.

The emphasis in Banzai Games‘ next project, Shadow Fight Arena, lies on synchronous PvP battles.

The interaction of collision tables, ­aggression and forgiveness Obviously, under certain conditions, some actions cannot be performed: the bot cannot hit the player while he is on the other end of the location, for example. He must first approach. To do this, the bot’s behaviour is configured through logical chains – if you can’t execute the first element, go to another. If you can’t carry it out, again – go to the next one, and so on. It could even be that the whole chain cannot be completed.

There are two general types of such chains in a fighting game, and it’s easy to guess them:

1. Aggression – is activated when the player moves or stands and does not attack. 2. Counter-attack – is activated when a player attacks.

To make the bot’s behaviour more diverse, each chain has its own weight. If the player is standing, there are certain chances that the bot will approach the player for a strike, use long-range weapons, or enter the shadow form. The same applies to counter-attacks – ­accurate punches that will 100% hit a player are not realistic. Therefore, there are chains of erroneous behaviour, and there are chains in which the bot simply dodges the attack, which is also an effective move but creates a different experience for the player.

We set up the chances of triggering the chains ourselves during the development process, but they are also modified during the battle by a system of resentment and forgiveness so that the bot is behaving in the context of the actual events in the fight.

The resentment system works differently for aggression and counter-attacks. The forgiveness system works only for counter-attacks.

Aggression case: The bot attacks the player, but the player outsmarts the bot and interrupts his attack. In this case, the bot will get offended, and all the chains from the aggression section will change their weights. This way, the chain with the long-range attack will get more weight, for example, because the bot will become more cautious.

Counter-attack case: Because a counter-­attack is a reaction to a player’s action, we can store the weight of counter-attack chains separately for each player’s strike. This way, the bot will perform more ­effective actions against spam attacks.

On the other hand, we have a forgiveness system to ensure that the bot is not offended by all the player’s strikes and doesn’t counter-attack them with 100% effectiveness. This system will reduce the weight of some counter-attack chains.

Example: the player attacks the bot, the bot selects a chain that is ineffective against the player’s actions, and the bot gets hit.

In this case, the weights increase only for the counter-attack chains that are effective against the blow that the player used. So if the player chooses this blow again, the bot has a greater chance to counter-attack him. At the same time, the bot forgives all the previous blows, and the corresponding chains for these blows get lower weights. So if the player alternates his types of ­attack, the bot will forgive him from time to time and will have lower chances to counter-attack effectively.

Additional AI systems Delay: Every bot in SF3 has a delay in making a decision. This parameter causes the bot to pause N frames before choosing an action option. It’s useful because it creates an illusion that the bot is thinking. The simpler the bot we want to make, the higher the delay we set for it.

Checking conditions: In order to make some parts of the game more vivid, more emotional, we are constantly monitoring the states and relations of various game variables. For example, we can force the bot not to use throwing weapons at certain distances. We can reduce the speed of forgiveness if a player has more hit points than a bot, or make the AI more aggressive if the player has fewer hit points.

In general, this is an add-on that we use to generate situations in which the bot dramatically changes its behaviour and effectiveness. If necessary, we restrict some actions of the bot in certain situations. For example, we made it more difficult for a bot to make a throw than for a player. ­Otherwise, the player would never be able to throw a bot. Since the distances for a throw are the same for both fighters, the bot would always be the first to start the throwing animation.

Based on all of the mechanisms described above, we have created nine basic AI presets that we use in different situations and sections of the game. This approach ­allows us to change the balance step by step and track the effecting changes.

Asynchronous PvP Presets Having many AI presets allows us not only to fine-tune the complexity of PvE but also to simulate PvP realistically.

Now we are working on the next game in the series – Shadow Fight Arena, where the emphasis lies on synchronous PvP battles. But the goals of SF3 were different, and all fights against other players were implemented asynchronously – meaning the bot completely controlled the opponent’s character, but with the actual equipment of a real player. This is, by the way, a typical approach for most mobile games.

Players who play successfully in this mode rise higher in the PvP-rank even with poor equipment. When the matchmaker picks them as a PvP opponent, we use more complex bot presets to simulate the playstyle of these gamers. At the same time, average players are simulated by a bot of medium complexity. This gives the impression that the tactics of the bot are different as if you are playing with different people whose skills vary and that victory doesn’t depend on the equipment.

Result The process of developing our bot tactics was a long one. We introduced these ­features gradually, so sometimes our players suffered, and then we suffered ­reading their complaints and curses. When we released the latest iterations of AI modifications, the flow of negative reviews regarding the behaviour of opponents stopped, which made us proud of our work. Our latest experience shows that the current approach to bot improvements will not give a noticeable further increase in quality. Therefore, we started working on a neural network that will simulate the ­actions of a player.

There are several reasons for this decision:

1. We are developing a new PvP fighting game – Shadow Fight Arena. Its special feature fights between heroes with very different tactics, different abilities, and mechanics. Creating a realistic bot under these conditions is many times more difficult than in the case of SF3.

2. We already have a positive experience using neural networks to solve animation tasks in our new product Cascadeur. This is a software for creating realistic animations that we use for all our games.

3. We want to assemble a team of competent ML specialists in order to increase our expertise in this area further and use it to improve Cascadeur and our games.

Mikhail Dragovalovskiy Producer

Mikhail has been in the in­dus­try for 6 years and joined Banzai Games two years ago. He started his Game Designer career at Wargaming and Social Quantum. As a Senior Game Designer at Banzai, Mikhail has been responsible for meta-gameplay and improving the bot AI of SF3. Lately he was promoted to producer of Banzai‘s new PvP game Shadow Fight Arena.

The post The Artificial Intelligence of Shadow Fight 3 appeared first on Making Games.

The Artificial Intelligence of Shadow Fight 3 published first on https://leolarsonblog.tumblr.com/

[manuel82z-blog]

Awesome best photo editor for PC

Colorize a picture is great with the best photo editor for PC

Shoot nice photographs for your photo album to one point and also that is method. Make a point to produce three pictures every day no issue if you're out and also concerning or home lying at your sofa bed reading. Best photo editor for PC performs possess a few of the features is actually well recognized for, which happens pretty handy when you have actually chose you've like to attempt your hand on one thing extra opulent than change the size of an image as well as removal of unwanted elements.

Best photo editor for PC can also bring in screenshots from video recording clips, in addition to varied reports. And when you are actually really feeling a bit idle or even it is merely ordinary uninformed concerning how to use several of the tools, an assistant can aid you modification the fundamentals just as lighting fixtures, concentration, color, as well as turning of graphics. For those that like their photographs in wide scale editions, the tool app aids you perfectly put together images to make a gorgeous picture.

And also when it is actually opportunity to series off your digital photography skills, you can easily choice amongst the image bundle design templates to instantly publish all of them in a particular size.

Easy best photo editor for PC for saturate pictures

This photo editor is best for willing students with a great deal of opportunity in their manpower to identify the also technical functionalities that will discourage very first time photo editing individuals. It additionally happen got ready with a 360 degrees panorama plan. Probably the gleaming gem in the strategy would certainly be actually the beautiful skin layer impact, which takes reddish spots and also evens out the skin tone. Whereas there is actually no self-regulating different colors fix selection very necessary to solution the low quality lighting very most electronic cameras squeeze, there are actually still the regular functionalities of color adjustments.

Among the most well-known misinterpreted parts of electronic photography is what happens once you make the photo shot as a matter of fact editing and enhancing your image. That is the moment where you modify the photos you have actually taken, to develop the end product. Modifying your pictures is the equivalent of the dark chamber from the time very long time back. We are going to be covering some concepts for editing and enhancing your images, from the basics like photo draw and crop a photo, through more challenging functions.

The cut out item enables you to alter the dimension of your photo, and likewise to alter the element proportion. You can chop a picture from a rectangle-shaped shape to a square form. There are lots of reasons you would certainly intend to cropping, consisting of for posting in different styles and aspect proportions. Contrasted to the initial, I have actually cropped the image with best photo editor for PC to get rid of the dark part of the middle of the image and reassembled using the guideline of quarters. This makes the lightning bolt a lot more the focus of the shot. You may ask yourself why I did not just make up effectively when taking the picture. Well, in this case, I was actually performing an extensive presence photo shooting without having a tripod, so had actually the camera stabilized on the side of the pier for security. That quite minimal my ability to flawlessly frame the minute, so I just shot bigger, understanding I had to be able to chop the photo shot suitably right after the truth. In this both cases, cutting out is very basic and also it is simply includes you selecting the crop technique and after that picking the location you wish to keep with your mouse. You use the changes and your new chopped image is ready.

Experts are often make researches on the market for the best photo editor for PC to invert photos

People are often searching for the best photo editor for PC to rotate pictures

Check this best photo editor for PC download for starters and pros with a lot of powerful functions or powerful best photo editor for PC for Computer for amateurs for easy flip photos and simple insert objects into another photo. Best photo editor for PC and software to edit an image to soften a photo or photos gradation. Free download best photo editor for PC for professionals and software to edit a photo to invert images and photo solarization. If the horizon contour in a photo is not degree, one of my individual casual annoyances in photography is. Occasionally whenever we are captured up in the second, this simple policy is forgotten yet fortunately is such enhancing your shots with the photo editor to make them degree is likewise really manageable. Balancing the video camera on the corner of the pier implied that the shot was not level that is notably easy to see to the vision whenever the picture has actually a clearly defined horizon line, such as the ocean. This focusing device belongs to the cut out method, and also you can easily simply just revolve the photograph to match. The moment you choose the focusing technique, a grate will certainly appear to assist you obtain the positioning proper. Focusing an image is a really basic job that will certainly take just a few seconds, causing a lot more visually wowing picture.

Often times if we take a photo, parts of the photo may wind up being actually brighter than we really want. We describe the brighter locations of the picture as shadows, and also the colorful areas of the shot as high light. Contrast has to do with emphasizing the distinction in between the light fixture and also darker areas of the photo. Increasing the contrast of a picture can substantially improve the graphical impact in which has, by creating the borders in between those light and also dark components clearer.

Coloring correction is yet another significant component of the best photo editor for PC. We can easily adjust photograph color or texture in all kind of ways, from transforming the overall warmth of the photograph like how red or green it appears, to individually changing the hue and also saturation of certain colorings contents of an image. I just want to cover a few really helpful color adjustments anyone are able to utilize to help to make your images just a bit more visually amazing. The best method in order to change the different colors related to a picture is using the shade tool from the photo editor. This changes the visual aspect related to any color or texture inside an image to produce it essentially saturated.

As with numerous modify, the secret is to choose a good harmony excessive shading the images often tends to seem instead abnormal. Hue images may be very useful, and certainly white and also dark is an amazing choice for all kind of scenarios, specifically, construction, as well as certain surroundings scenes. More info about enhance pictures with the best photo editor for PC free download and new photo editor for amateurs to simple blur images and professional photo orientation. Best photo editor for PC for PC and edit a picture software to saturate a picture. Download for free this photo editor for speedy and smart flip pictures.

Best photo editor for PC for invert a photo

Photo editor free download for experienced for very easy saturate photos or very easy photo printing. Discover more about blur photos made simple with the nice modern photo editor for Computer. Free download photo editor for pros and software to edit a picture to saturate images and photo effects with masks. Often times there will be something inside an image that you truly do not wish to exist, like an undesirable dark spot on someone else's nose. That is quick to remove in almost all the significant best photo editor for PC.

It is definitely easy to remove any kind of objects taken away a picture however the photo editor functions ideal on distinct, smaller objects that are actually circled by the same colorings. This is due to the fact that the heal tool needs to change the area you desire to remove with another thing, and also this functions best when it has a location close by that looks comparable. So as an example, a red point on a face is bordered by a great deal of similarly tinted best photo editor for PC skin, so the recover device can quickly determine what to change the dark point based on the surrounding location. This is simply just because the best photo editor for PC needs to repair the spot you wish to get rid of together with something besides, as well as that runs optimal anytime it gets an area near that seems identical.

Best photo editor for PC has actually become really complex and effective and it is feasible to adjust photos and so they come to be completely various from the original. There actually are loads of photo editor and plenty of means of having the exact same or similar end results.

The intent most for a lot of photographs I publish procedure is normally to produce all of them look as natural as actually possible. I know this is an exceptional point to start off, even in case you intend to continue on and develop even more surreal appearing photographs.

Hue array in a photo is among the most important concerns. Your eyes can usually see a wider range of tone than your video camera possibly shot.

The significance of photo editing and enhancing is the act of modifying an image, basically. Yet this is simplifying a subject that is quite complex. You can commonly carry out basic image modifying strategies such as photos fisheye effect fairly easily and also quickly however complicated strategies and also electronic editing may call for best photo editor for PC as well as more practical experience. Best photo editor for PC is a tool which you can make use of to control as well as beautify pictures. Because pictures include an increasing variety of usages, more people are discovering ways to reuse images and also utilize them on many networks. Download now the best photo editor for PC free download for trainees and experts with a lot of cool features or brand-new photo editor for PC to easy photo batch processing or easy invert a photo. Smart invert a photo with a photo editor for amateurs to cropping a photo. Get this best photo editor for PC for fast and smart sharpen a photo.