#so i figured i'd just do them all at the same time

[newttxt]

hi quip! i really like your one piece comics and i am curious how you do them! i'm not good at comics and want to be better at drawing them! how do you learn how to make comics?

thank you!

uh oh... im afraid u have caught me at the perfect crossroad of "bored at work" and "unrelated task ive been meaning to do but keep putting off."

this is long. i hope you like reading (and grayscale progress pics). and of course!!! disclaimer before we begin that this is just how I, personally draw comics. there is no "right way."

quip's comic-making process!

Switching my typing to make this more legible...

My process can kinda be broken down into 6 steps:

Brainstorming

Thumbnailing

Sketching

Panels & Text

Lines

Tones/Colors

1. Brainstorming

My brain is a leaky sieve on a good day, so I sloppily jot down ideas in my phone notes the moment I have them. This helps me when it's time to draw too, because if I feel art blocked, I can look through old concepts and see what catches my interest.

Otherwise, I love drawing for other people's writing. :) And if worst comes to worst, doing manga/comic page redraws in my style teaches me new things every time.

Once I have my idea, I'll usually make a bulletpoint list of "plot points" or "story beats" I want. Then I plan the comic with this format that I've adapted from a tutorial I read once. I'm going to use my most recent comic (original comic post) as an example.

I start in the third column, writing notes of what I'd want to see in each panel. I also include the dialogue (in this case, I didn't have to write the dialogue! it's from the fanfic linked in the original comic post!). I usually write the whole name like [Luffy:], but at this point I've drawn so much of these guys, just the first letter works.

I like to handwrite these notes to get an idea for how much text I'm putting in a single panel.

After I describe all the panels, I go back and separate them into pages. I can't tell you how to know how many panels to a page. It's whatever works for you. I just kinda know about how big each panel will be, and so I can feel when I'm probably running out of space. (Also. You can change things later. I don't in this example, but I add/drop pages/panels all the time.)

2. Thumbnailing

Thumbnailing—as the name suggests—should be done tiny. Too tiny to accidentally get sucked into details.

This is about marking down blobs where items/characters go, and figuring out the paneling. I'll draw and redraw these a bunch of times too.

This is also the most time-consuming/brain-working part for me. If I were in a zine that did progress percentage, I'd try to finish thumbnailing around the 50% mark (but I'm also a moderately fast artist, so your mileage may vary).

I think the terrible quality makes them charming, actually. I really like how silly they look. :')))

I will add, when you draw your "page" rectangle, make sure it's the same proportions as your actual canvas for the final image. You want an accurate idea of how much space each panel will take up, especially if you have a lot of text.

3. Sketching

This is my most recent change to my usual workflow, and it's saving me a lot of time. I make my thumbnails a bit bigger (each one about half the size of the final canvas), and I sketch these basic body forms right over them.

It just helps give me placement for my actual lines!

I usually draw these in a paleish color so I can lower the opacity and not get distracted by them while lining. The random darker parts are to either help keep two forms separate (like when two characters have their limbs all over) or to better define sections that were too sloppy/poorly proportioned.

I also think this helps my poses stay looser, because I have more dramatic/wriggly shapes that aren't too bogged down by proportions yet.

Sidenote: I CANNOT show this here, but sometimes this is when I take videos. Of myself. I prop my phone camera up and shoot a video of me acting each panel. :/// It looks really dumb, but it also shows me fun body language ideas like hand gestures, expressions, weight distribution, etc. Just pretend you're an overdramatic cartoon character, and try not to worry about your roommates or mother walking in on you doing odd things. (You can also use the video for anatomy reference later, but I usually just capture the vibe and don't try to copy the actual video frame.)

4. Panels & Text

Oh, boy. So, the panels are usually just straight lines (though it's fun to make creative exceptions, like a round panel to mimic looking through a spyglass), but there are some fancy rules that I don't strictly adhere to.

I believe (I have no technical training in this. Take everything I say with a grain of salt) the vertical gaps (between two side-by-side panels) should all be a consistent width and the horizontal gaps (between two panels on top of each other) should be another. The vertical ones? Should be thinner? Because you want the eye to easily glide between them, whereas the horizontal gaps should be a visual barrier to keep you from jumping ahead. Just something I've vaguely noticed.

There are lots of fun "default layouts" you can look up. Or keep it a consistent grid. I think it's fun to sometimes have characters/objects sticking out of panels and overlapping others. This is just a matter of taste, creativity, and inspiration. (Read Witch Hat Atelier... It has some of my favorite paneling...)

You may also notice I have already done the speech bubbles. This is, to me, a crucial step. This helps me catch early if I don't have enough room for all the words. It also lets me plan the art in each panel with the speech bubbles in mind. There's nothing worse than working really hard on a panel, and then you realize there's no room for the bubbles.

I also try to lay them out in a way that guides the eye! Even without art, can people tell where to go next? Better yet, if I want people to look at panels out of order (aka not left to right, in my case), can I use the speech bubble path to make them? Here's just a vague example of what I mean.

As an added bonus, doing speech bubbles early also allows me to be lazy! :) Ignore the comic; I'm not supposed to post it yet oops,, There's a whole lot of drawing to do on each comic page, and I am not wasting my time on stuff that will be covered up. So yes, if I hide my bubbles, there are a lot of unfinished lines trailing off into nothing. (As a bonus, if there's a part of a character you're struggling with—and it won't look weird to do so—you can move speech bubbles to just hide the problem area yayyy)

Making the actual bubbles could be their own whole tutorial, tbh, but there are some general guidelines I use.

Zoom out when you choose your font size. You want to know how it will look to the average reader, so it isn't super teeny tiny or way too big. You generally want to keep the same text size for all your pages/bubbles.

When I draw bubbles, I try to size them about one vertical letter height (and some change) around the words [left side]. This isn't always the case though, because humorously large or funny shaped text bubbles can convey different feelings [right side].

On Procreate, I set my bubble lines to Reference and just drag-and-drop the white fill on a separate layer below the lines. (Remember to turn Reference back off again when you're done, or your fill bucket won't work right when you're drawing.)

To get the white outlines I use to keep the bubbles from cluttering up the art, I literally just Gaussian blur an all-white copy of the lines + fills... and then I copy and merge it 5 times until it's opaque enough. This is a terrible way to do it, but it works for me. :')

5. Lines

This is the part that I can't tell you how to do. I literally just. Draw right over my wacky sketched body forms. Boom. Comic drawn.

I'll make three suggestions:

Don't focus on making every panel perfect. Give a little extra love to big ones or ones you want people to linger on. Otherwise, know that people are typically speeding through the art. It's way more important to focus on storytelling than art technique. In my opinion, a good story that's told well will always be better than a beautiful one told poorly. (Some comics are beautiful AND well-written... Alas, I am just a hobbyist who needs to get the ideas out of my head at top speed.)

Put your background lines on a different layer. Put your foreground lines on a different layer too, if you have those. Basically, I try to keep the main part of each panel (usually a character or object) on my lines layer so I can erase background/foreground/etc lines to ensure clarity/focus.

You can make background lines lighter colors too. I have too many numbers sorry. (1) Background. The stuff that's farthest away. Lightest lines. Few details; more focused on shapes and the suggestion of a background (I'm not good at backgrounds). (2) Midground. Same distance away as the characters are. Lines can be black. (3) Also midground, and also the same distance away. But they're very detailed, so I lighten them so they aren't so distracting. (4) The characters. Black lines for focus. For people who haven't seen the comic, I swear they are just hugging. This is SFW. D:

6. Tones/Colors

Do not. Do NOT ask me. I don't understand colors. I hate working with them, but I try because I want to improve. I hate doing anything beyond the simplest grayscale shading. Please go elsewhere for your coloring/tone advice. This is how my color picker looks 95% of the time. I have pre-set "percentages" of black that I got by lowering the opacity of a black layer and just color picking it. I don't even know the exact percentages I used. Good luck out there. Be better than me.

7. Sharing

This is a bonus step that I didn't mention earlier, but it's actually the most important of all of them.

You need a friend. Or maybe a groupchat or discord. A family member or coworker if you're really close like that. I don't know.

Find SOMEWHERE you can spam wips and be cheered on. Drawing comics takes a while, especially if you're trying to tell longer stories than I'd dare to attempt. If I don't force someone to praise me for every line I draw, I shrivel up and die.

Also if and when you post online, add alt text. I'll admit I'm the first person to complain and drag my feet on this, and I literally use a screenreader myself when my eyes hurt (strong prescription glasses wearer). Comics should be accessible, because stories are fun and everyone should be able to enjoy them.

***

Learning???

And I guess lastly, how do you learn to make comics? Two steps: 1) read them and 2) make them. This is the tragedy of creating things.

1) Reading them: I grew up reading comic strips, western serialized comics, and webcomics. I've always loved graphic novels too. Then in late middle school, I started reading manga (Death Note and Haikyuu were my first two), and now I'm trying to read more webtoons (sorry im so slow bree)!

I also... mass-consume doujinshi, thanks to proxy mailing services and bilingual friends/Google Translate/knowing some Korean. (I have an entire bookshelf of doujin, actually,,)

The thing is, it's not usually enough to just read comics. You also need to be thinking. :/ I notice paneling, comic devices, clever comedic timing, etc. as I go. It's just a lot of studying/learning while also enjoying the story.

2) Making them: You just have to start. :( Even if you think they're "bad." My first comics were actually just drawings placed randomly all over the page, connected by speech bubbles (yay... I was already practicing how to place bubbles to lead the eye around the page...). I was going to post a pic here, but I'm a coward. Backscroll my account and you can find some older ones though.

I also know my art in general improved dramatically when I did ten comics in ten weeks for my friend's fic. Don't do this. It hurt my hands/wrists. But do practice in moderation.

***

If you actually read all that... I hope it made even a modicum of sense. And maybe it was even helpful? Just know at the end of the day, there is literally no right way to draw a comic.

And if you aren't ready to go for it yet, you can start by just adding a couple speech bubbles to your illustrations or doodles! It's a way to add storytelling and dialogue writing to things you may already be making.

Yay. I love comics. :))))

[the0p]

letters

based off of "to all the boys I loved before" cuse YES I AM A LOSER LIKE THAT FIGHT ME. mlm, fluff, and some spice?? very long story also a bit of a size thing going on cuse...yeah.

I sat on the floor of my bedroom writing yet another letter to a guy I had complications feeling towards.

it was a recurring patern in my life as the moment I shared something special with someone instead of telling them my feelings I'd write them down on a piece of paper and trow it in a box I kept under my bed.

it was a bit pathetic for sure, but can you blame me? love has never worked out for me before, so I much rather admire from a distance.

this letter was addressed to a guy in my school.

Jeong Yunho.

back in 6rd grade, me, him, and some other friends had a small party where we played spin the bottle. at the time a friend of mine had a crush on him that I knew about, so I begged for the bottle not to land on him, but of course it did. I was hesitant, but nonetheless, we shared a short, small kiss, which was my first. safe to say me and her are not on good terms even till this day.

the cringe letter was finished, and I folded it up nicely, putting it in an envelope and writing down his name on it before throwing it in the box and sliding it under my bed.

I didn't think much of it knowing they couldn't get out, so I chose to go to bed for the night.

in the morning, I rushed to the kitchen, my sister sitting on the sofa on her phone, ready to go as I ran around looking for my laptop.

"we'll be late, you know." she said, looking at me from the sofa standing up, trowing her bag over her shoulder.

"I'm sorry, okay, i just can't find my computer. can you go back to my room and look? maybe I missed it. please?" I asked her with a pleading look, hoping she'd go check, and thankfully, with an annoyed groan, she agreed.

she came back after a few minutes computer in hand. "it was by your bed, clothes trown over it."

"Thank you so much." I said, taking it from her and rushing out the door to my car, her following not too far behind me.

the school day passed by normally. the usual boring classes until lunch period hit.

I never ate in the cafeteria as it was way too crowded for me, so I always camped out in the bathroom eating and scrolling through my phone. sure it wasn't the most sanitary thing to do, but it was quiet.

as I was enjoying my lunch devouring a sandwich I made in a rush I heard the door open a familiar voice coming trough.

"y/n? you in here?" it was yunho. I was confused about why he was looking for me, but I didn't make a sound, wanting him to leave in all honesty. I brought my legs up so he couldn't see which stall I was in, but sadly, my phone fell out of my lap as I did so making a lot of noise.

I knew he heard as he knocked on the door. I didn't answer until he slid my letter under the door.

my heart dropped.

I quickly put my things in my bag, stuffing the sandwich in my mouth, and opened the door.

"how did you get that?" I asked my words a bit muffled thanks to the food.

he stumbled back as I opened the door, putting one hand into his jean pocket.

"I found it in my locker this morning. you didn't put it there?" he asked obviously a but confused.

I was panicking. the thought of him knowing how I felt about him was one of my biggest nightmares. I shook my head, no trying to figure out how he could have gotten it and if any of the other guys got it.

he must have picked up on the panic "your hand writing is nice. I'm actually quite flattered you think of me this way."

his words caught me off guard. was he playing, or was he for real?

"Look, you were never supposed to get it. just forget about it, okay?"

"What if I feel the same way? do I still forget about it?"

I stayed quiet, staring at him, not expecting anything like that to come out of his mouth. he sighed, putting the letter in his bag and turning his attention back to me.

"it's actually a bit funny how you never picked up on any of the signs. I don't just go around the school campus trying to strick up a conversation, give compliments, and try to hang out with random people, but you seem quite obvious."

the last sentence struck a bit of a nerve. "I'm not obviou-"

my words were cut off by a pair of soft lips on mine. I was shocked, eyes wide in surprise, tho slowly I calmed down and returned the kiss my hand making its way to his cheek.

he pulled away first, both of us silent as we registered what we (he) just did.

he opened his mouth to say someone, but the bell rang, signalling us that lunch was over.

I pulled away, clearing my throat, and my ears a bit red from embarrassment.

"Let's talk after school, okay? we can meet you back here...if you want, of course."

he nodded the sweet smile on his face that I always adored. "See you then"

...........time skip............

I stood in the bathroom waiting for him. I was a bit scared he would end up not showing up, but I tried to have a bit of hope. my sister decided to go hang out with her friends after school. I didn't really have anything to rush.

20 minutes had passed, and he was still not here. it was upsetting, but somehow, I wasn't too surprised, so I just chose to leave. I got home relatively late as I had stopped at the store to get some food since our fridge was very empty.

my sister was already home sprawled out on the sofa watching a movie as I placed the bags on the kitchen counter.

"How was school?" I asked, glancing at her. for some reason, she was avoiding all eye contact and seemed a bit on edge.

"it was okay. how about you...?"

"it was...interesting, to say the least." I responded, putting the food away as she nodded and stayed quiet.

Once everything was done, I went into my room and instantly checked the box that I kept my letters in. the rest where there but the one yunho got. I instantly knew my sister must have done it in the morning. I wasn't mad, tho since maybe she even did some good?

I sighed and changed, choosing to put my homework off for a bit and relax for a bit to decompose everything that happened today.

it was calm for a while. silent even. until my sister barged in practically braking my door down as I quickly sat up from my bed worried that something had happened. i looked her way, a mischievous smile on her face as she pushed yunho inside my room.

wait, yunho!?

he stood there an awkward smile on his face as he looked around and back at my sister, who closed the door quickly.

"use protection!!" were her last words before she left us there.

I got up quickly and started picking up my clothes, throwing them in my closet to make the place some what clean.

"Hi yunho, I wasn't really expecting anyone, so it's a bit messy"

he laughed and took off his coat, placing it on my dresser that was by the door looking around the room. "it's okay. I did show up without a warning."

I hummed fixing myself up as well to not look too much of a mess.

"I'm sorry that I didn't show up today. I got held back in class. I promise I didn't do it on purpose."

his words seemed honest, and his face had regret written all over it. he walked closer to me, towering over me thanks to his height.

"I couldn't have even texted you a heads up cuse I don't have your number, and I'm so sorry"

I let him finish staying quiet. I had figured as much cuse he didn't seem like the type of person to do something like that. Once he was done, I just kissed him.

I didn't know I had the guts to do something like that but I was glad I did as he returned the kiss immediately his hands finding their way to my waist as mine wrapped around his neck pulling him down slightly.

it got a bit heated surprisingly enough, which I wasn't expecting.

we had moved to my bed making out. it was obvious to both of us that we've been wanting each other for a very long time as things wouldn't be going this far otherwise.

his hands moved up, and my legs, as I pulled away, taking his shirt off, pulling him back into the kiss, we were both getting desperate, but sadly, we got interrupted by my sister.

she came in, completely ignoring the sight in front of her, and sat down on my bed, throwing her homework next to us.

"help me." is all she said.

me and yunho were both very embarrassed, but nonetheless, we stopped what we were doing and both ended up helping her.

[darkchemistryfanboy]

ok so I love the concept of Jason Todd never being adopted, so here are some Au's I built

Drug lord Au

this universe diverges when his parents are killed by the batman (indirectly tho)

his father got arrested by bats, and that singlehandedly took Jason and Catherine's income away, making Catherine's cancer medicine unavailable, killing her slowly and painfully

also Willis dies in prison for whatever reason you want

still, he understands that wasn't the point, at least untill he sees the batmobile

he sees the freakishly expensive car, realizes batman (or batman's boss) must have a shitton of money, and instantly grows a hate boner for the guy

ok so this is where the druglording begins

years later, he starts doing multiple jobs, using the little extra money he earns to feel the alley kids

since the kids won't accept free food, Jason uses them as a web of informants, spreading rumors and overall moving the pieces around for a new crime lord to rise to power

he wouldn't be called the red hood, but Jason becomes a crime lord all the same

he does the benevolent crime lord thing, no drugs to kids, castrating rapists and pedophiles and all that

he even busts some meta trafficking rings and creates a meta safe space in some abandoned gym

once he can get away with it, he starts killing some rogues

not every rogue, and definitely not any particularly famous ones, but starts killing them

he also notices Bats pays less attention to drugs and robberies when there are escaped rogues, so he starts to regularly break "tame" rogues like ivy or nygma out of Arkham

he also goes to college

this is all backstory

anyways eventually the opportunity presents itself to kill Joker and Jason takes it

this is the inciting incident

Bruce, Damian and Barbare are looking all over the city to find the person who killed, upon further inspection, multiple rogues without them noticing

Dick stays in Bludhaven (sorry Nightwing fans, but without Jason and the subsequent addition of Tim to the family, there's no reconciliation between Bruce and Dick)

Tim (who never became robin, but continued to stalk the bats) and Cass (who was found by Tim instead of Bruce) are trying to figure out how Ivy and Riddler keep escaping so easily

And finally, Steph and Duke are trying to investigate a meta gym whose owner apparently shares some of Steph's college courses

that's all I have planned but I assume they eventually figure shit oit and fight each other

also, if you want, you could add a third party (Court of owls, LoA, or something) for them to join forces against at the end

but do whatever, all I can provide is halfway decent ideas

No one is adopted Au

this one I have basically nothing but vibes

but dick becomes a talon and somehow tales control of the court of owls

Jason becomes the most relevant players in the Gotham underworld via crimelording

and Tim, when Bruce is scattered throughout time, goes and infiltrates the LoA, collapsing it and becoming it's new leader

neither of them were ever adopted by Bruce btw

anyways, these three want to make Gotham better, and are willing to fight for it, but since they have different visions of "better" there is s lot of fighting, with Bruce and Damian trying to prevent the city form collapsing

that's all I have for this one

like I said, literally just vibes

anyways tag me if someone writes a fix based on this I'd love to read it

[hypewinter]

Just a heads up I'm trying something new and all of my prompts for the week are going to follow a specific theme. They'll all be somehow related to Superman being good to Connor. Just figured I'd let y'all know in advance so you wouldn't think I'm pushing an agenda or something.

...Or am I?

[gaycrittercentral]

STREAM DOODLES BABEEYYYYYYYY

the context for all of these is somewhat lost due to them being based on jokes between me and everybody in chat while I was streaming, so I've added in some explanations in the image IDs. I owe a lot of these ideas to everybody who came and hung out with me during the streams, so if you ever have an idea you'd like to chat with me about or see me draw feel free to come hang out at the next one! I'm always happy to take suggestions ^^

[a-couple-of-notes]

hey sorry i wanna talk some more about no one mourns the wicked.

when glinda's introduced, her first celebratory lines slide into a question:

Isn't it nice to know that good will conquer evil, the truth we all believe'll by and by outlive a lie for you and - [I]?

and in a song full of double meanings, glinda isn't asking that question (only) to the ozians. she's asking it to elphaba, who has always been that other half of "you and i." even though glinda has promised not to reveal the truth, she's still hoping that it will come to light someday for her and elphaba. and it's also a heartbreaking call-forward to defying gravity, because just like that moment where glinda almost gets on the broom, there can't be a "you and i" here--it's cut off by the world they exist in.

[ratmonky]

have an inspection for my apartment tomorrow morning, my last day at my small ass uni apartment is today and i'll be doing my last bit of cleaning!!

i literally have nothing else in here other than my new laptop that i only do editing with so i spent last night and my morning just now writing lol

i've partially finished my dbd chapter (4k+ words atm) but it introduces another killer that the reader will be paired up with and the next segment is the michael myers' trial!! so my question is--- would you rather to have me post it now or after i've also written michael's trial? (might take a week or two to write and post michael's trial, if i post it now you'll have another chapter within the next month)

was gonna make a poll but i like to interact personally so let me know in the comments heh <3

i'll make it easy so you can copy paste your answers like this:

i waited 3+ years for michael i CANNOT wait any longer

i waited 3+ years for michael i can wait longer

[sysig]

A bit more Defeated, and thinking about this post (Patreon)

[gardensnakie]

How’s life? No pressure question ofc, but if you want to share please feel free to do so with this ask :3

Eh, it doesn't feel all that great right now. I'm tired and hungry a lot, but I just have to get a routine together. My sleep has been wonky, I've been waking up too early, but I feel fine then but it also feels like I can't rest completely- I have dreamless nights mostly. And I also just get annoyed a lot, but it feels better being around people I like.

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

today on my When All You Have is a D10 project: Rolling a 6 with a D100.

-

1-16: Option 1

17-32: Option 2

33-48: Option 3

49-64: Option 4

65-80: Option 5

81-96: Option 6

97-100: Reroll

-

if you get that last one you can reroll the ones column, tens column, or both, up to you. tune in next time for so fucking help me i WILL find an efficient way to substitute dice for a deck of playing cards

[byanyan]

Which Imaginary Illness Do You Have?

storm syndrome

ㅤyou never really knew how to be yourself, distancing yourself from your own existence - standing outside of the house even as the storm closed in. you are going through the motions of everyday life, uncaring except for the toughest storms. each one feels like the one - the one that will finally be too much for you. somehow it isn't - it never is (except the last one). and as the people around you pick their lives back up and move on, barely bothered by the storm, you still carry it in you - one foot in your life and one out of it. and when they'll ask about you, asking questions about your future, your plans, your dreams, the only honest answer would be "i don't know, i never thought i'd make it this far".

tagged by:ㅤ@gnarledbite ♡!!

[zorthania]

A piece about survivors guilt.

This comic isn't perfect. I started it back in October 2023, and every time I picked up my pen, I wept.

I bring this to you today, on 9/11, in hopes that you reflect on this day a little differently than how most Americans would. Let it move you to continue to boycott, protest and challenge your family, friends and colleagues. You have a bigger impact than you would believe.

Thank you for reading this with an open heart.

From the river to the sea...

I'd like to bring to attention the fact that the figures depicted above are a gross undercount of the actual number of deaths. I scoured the internet high and low to source my findings and not a single one could break down the devastation that befell an individual ethnicity. Instead, they lumped a bunch of ethnicities together, provided a general timeline, and called it a day, reinforcing the sheer scale of dehumanization propagated in the west. The only consistency between all the articles I looked up was the 4.5 to 4.7 million figure I've included above, and even then, they were all published by western media news outlets... the very same that have been so unreliable and complicit in the genocide of Palestinians today. So I have to take everything they say with a grain of salt.

We are not just numbers.

All of us have ambitions and desires and lives worth living.

With that said, this is your friendly reminder to:

Donate an e-sim

Donate to PCRF to provide Palestinian children aid

Donate to Pious Projects to provide woman with feminine hygiene kits

Donate to CareForGaza to provide food to displaced families in Gaza either through their Gofundme or their paypal

Donate to any of the vetted gofundme campaigns on GazaFunds to help Palestinians trying to flee Gaza.

And if you or someone you know sees or experiences a hate crime and can afford it, SUE. This is a more effective use of your money than most realise. The reason zionists act with impunity is because of the normalization of white supremacy and oppression of ethnic minorities. Challenging that in any capacity tells them that there are consequences to their actions and makes them think twice before engaging in hate crimes and helps raise all of us up against the systems currently in place that let them get away with it.

If you can't donate or spend any money, you can:

Do your daily clicks.

Boycott targeted companies on the BDS list (if you're like me and you don't want a single dollar to go towards anything supporting Israel right now, you can use Bdnaash to double check what products are okay to buy, but the BDS list is sufficient as it is a strategic attack and proven very effective thus far)

Flood your representatives emails and voicemails with how you won't be voting for them unless their politics align with an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

Attend a protest, be LOUD.

Challenge your circle of friends, family and colleagues with conversations about Palestine. (THIS IS THE MOST UNDERRATED AND MOST EFFECTIVE THING YOU CAN DO)

and if you're really up to, be disruptive in any capacity that you can think of towards major corporations benefiting from this onslaught. (i.e. halting military manufacturers from production + shipments, sticking boycott stickers on products at your market etc)

And finally, if your country wasn't mentioned in the above excerpt, it was no deliberate omission on my part and I encourage you to come forward and tell your story about the suffering of your people so that this may be a learning opportunity for everyone.

You are seen.

You are not alone.

Thank you again if you've read this far.

From the river to the sea...

[valiantnomore]

.

[snekdood]

bitches prolly out here psychoanalyzing my old art on behalf of my abuser to cushion their belief that im a Horrible Person but then dont see the irony when I point out the shitty things my abuser has drawn and how I see it as clear evidence of their mindset and beliefs (of what's okay to do and how to treat people) descending and pairing that along with everything else they've done and it paints a clear picture of how this person got to the point of thinking it was okay to abuse me the way they did and then the people looking for reasons to hate me through my art will act like "they're just drawings !!!" about their art. which one is it. does someones art say something about them or not? or does it only say something about them if you hate them?

[pibsboots]

I've always had chronic fatigue. I remember being twelve, and an adult mentioned how I couldn't possibly know how tired they felt because adulthood brought levels of exhaustion I couldn't imagine. I thought about that for days in fear, because I couldn't remember the last time I didn't feel tired.

Eventually I came to terms with the fact that I was just tired, and I couldn't do as many things as everyone else. People called me lazy, and I knew that wasn't true, but there's only so many times you can say "I'm tired" before people think it's an excuse. I don't blame them. When a teenager does 20 hours of extracurriculars every week and only says "I'm too tired" when you ask them to do the dishes, it's natural to think it's an excuse. At some point, I started to think the same thing.

It didn't matter that I could barely sit up. It was probably all in my head, and if I really wanted to, I could do it.

When I learned the name for it, chronic fatigue, I thought wow, people that have that must be miserable, because I am always tired and I cannot imagine what it would feel like if it were worse.

Spoiler alert, if you've been tired for a decade, it's probably chronic fatigue.

Once I figured that out though, I thought of my energy as the same as everyone else's, just smaller in quantity. And that might be true for some people, but I've figured out recently that it absolutely isn't true for me.

I used to be like wow I have so much energy today I can do this whole list for sure! And then I'd do the dishes and have to lay down for 2 hours. Then I'd think I must gave misjudged that, I didn't have as much energy as I thought.

But the thing is - I did have enough energy for more tasks, I just didn't go about them properly.

With chronic fatigue, your maximum energy is obviously much smaller than the average person's. Doing the dishes for you might use up the same percentage of energy that it takes to do all the daily chores for someone else.

If someone without chronic fatigue was to do all the daily chores, they would take breaks. Because otherwise, they're sprinting a marathon for no reason and it would take way more energy than necessary. We have to do the same.

Put the cups in the dishwasher, take a break. Put the bowls in, take a break. So on and so forth. This may mean taking breaks every 2-5 minutes but afterwards, you get to not feel like you've run a marathon while carrying 4 people on your back.

Today, I had a moderate amount of energy. Under my old system of go till you drop, I probably could have done most of the dishes and wiped off the counter and then been dead to the world for the rest of the day.

Under the new system, I scooped litter boxes, cleaned out the fridge, took the trash out, cleaned the stove, and wiped off the counter and did all the dishes. And after all that, I still had it in me to make a simple dinner, unload the dishwasher, and tidy the kitchen.

It was complete and utter insanity. Just because I sat down whenever I felt myself getting more tired than I already was.

All this to say, take fucking breaks. It's time to unlearn the ceaseless productivity bullshit that capitalism has shoved down our throats. Its actively counterproductive. Just sit down. Drink some water. Rest your body when it needs to rest.

There will still be days where there is nothing to do but rest, and days where half a load of dishes is absolutely the most I can do. But this method has really helped me minimize those, which is so incredibly relieving.

[getvalentined]

An open letter to @staff

I already submitted this to Support under "Feedback," but I'm sharing it here too as I don't expect it to get a response, and I feel like putting in out in public may be more effective than sending it off into the void.

The recent post on the Staff blog about changing tumblr to an algorithmic feed features a large amount of misinformation that I feel staff needs to address, openly and honestly, with information on where this data was sourced at the very least.

Claim 1: Algorithms help small creators.

This is false, as algorithms are designed to push content that gets engagement in order to get it more engagement, thereby assuring that the popular remain popular and the small remain small except in instances of extreme luck.

This can already be seen on the tumblr radar, which is a combination of staff picks (usually the same half-dozen fandoms or niche special interests like Lego photography) which already have a ton of engagement, or posts that are getting enough engagement to hit the radar organically. Tumblr has an algorithm that runs like every other socmed algorithm on the planet, and it will decimate the reach of small creators just like every other platform before it.

Claim 2: Only a small portion of users utilize the chronological feed.

You can find a poll by user @darkwood-sleddog here that at the time of writing this, sits at over 40 THOUSAND responses showing that over 96 percent of them use the chronological feed*. Claiming otherwise isn't just a misstatement, it's a lie. You are lying to your core userbase and expecting them to accept it as fact. It's not just unethical, it's insulting to people who have been supporting your platform for over a decade.

Claim 3: Tumblr is not easy to use.

This is also 100% false and you ABSOLUTELY know it. Tumblr is EXTREMELY easy to use, the issue is that the documentation, the explanations of features, and often even the stability of the service is subpar. All of this would be very easy for staff to fix, if they would invest in the creation of walkthroughs and clear explanations of how various site features work, as well as finally fixing the search function. Your inability to explain how your service works should not result in completely ignoring the needs and wants of your core long-term userbase. The fact that you're more willing to invest in the very systems that have made every other form of social media so horrifically toxic than in trying to make it easier for people to use the service AS IT WORKS NOW and fixing the parts that don't work as well speaks volumes toward what tumblr staff actually cares about.

You will not get a paycheck if your platform becomes defunct, and the thing that makes it special right now is that it is the ONLY large-scale socmed platform on THE ENTIRE INTERNET with a true chronological feed and no aggressive algorithmic content serving. The recent post from staff indicates that you are going to kill that, and are insisting that it's what we want. It is not. I'd hazard to guess that most of the dev team knows it isn't what we want, but I assume the money people don't care. The user base isn't relevant, just how much money they can bring in.

The CEO stated he wanted this to remain as sort of the last bastion of the Old Internet, and yet here we are, watching you declare you intend to burn it to the ground.

You can do so much better than this.

Response to the Update

Under the cut for readability, because everything said above still applies.

I already said this in a reblog on the post itself, but I'm adding it to this one for easy access: people read it that way because that's what you said.

Staff considers the main feed as it exists to be "outdated," to the point that you literally used that word to describe it, and the main goals expressed in this announcement is to figure out what makes "high-quality content" and serve that to users moving forward.

People read it that way because that is what you said.

*The final results of the poll, after 24 hours:

136,635 votes breaks down thusly:

An algorithm based feed where I get "the best of tumblr." @ 1.3% (roughly 1,776 votes)

Chronological feed that only features blogs I follow. @ 95.2% (roughly 130,077 votes)

This doesn't affect me personally. @ 3.5% (roughly 4,782 votes)