#sorry if some look kinda weird... i kinda suck at pixel art Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[pardycity]

hi sovstuck fandom. have some sovstuck blinkies!!! (if you wanna use them, feel free!!!! credit isnt required, go fucking wild :o])

[smaradog]

time for an introduction

hello! im smaradog but you can call me smara or mar for short, i have a weird sense of humor that feels edgy but i dont do jokes that are at anyones expense, or say weird things, since its not really something thats part of me at all, making others feel bad and/or uncomfortable is against all i stand for, at the same time my humor can kinda be silly/catgirlesque for lack of better description?? (??? ihave no idea what im saying) and kinda fecalfunny style humor overall.

dni if youre a bigot or a terf or some stupid shit like that

anyways im a neurodivergent asexual trans girl (she/her, it/its fae/faer, sli/slime pronouns please!) who speaks spanish and stuff idunno!! (i am not from spain dont pile me on with them IHATE SPAIN!!!! /j)

so yeah i draw a lot of lesbians and whatever else comes to mind

[art tag!]

i WILL start talking about something im working on or something i like for WHOLE PARAGRAPHS so be WARNED!! and heres some insane things i do!

the insane things i do in question:

art (digital and traditional)

pixel art

sound design

3d modeling (learning the basics)

music (regular music and chiptunes, and whatever weird experimental thing i can make also it kinda sucks but shh)

storyboards

modding/romhacking games

kind of a jack of all trades really! so yeah thats basically it! have a list of me dumping like a million interests i have

music: the strokes, arctic monkeys, gorillaz, daft punk, indigo quest, red vox, muse, crx, albert hammond jr., royal blood, enjambre, bandalos chinos, comisario pantera, lemon demon, tally hall, the voidz, fish in a birdcage, nelward

chiptune (counting psg chips, fm chips, low quality samplers, etc.) [fade, tim follin, jeroen tel, squarewave, shoob2000, 4mat, rushjet1]

animated shows:

the owl house

amphibia

ena

one piece (at enies lobby arc rn)

yu yu hakusho

jojos bizarre adventure (i cant deny it even if i dont talk about it, stopped at part 5)

one punch man (kinda, dont remember a lot)

adventure time (havent kept up since grass sword episodes)

ok ko (literally dont remember what the last thing that happened was)

regular show (stopped keeping up at some point) showing interest in: gravity falls, infinity train, hunter x hunter and mob psycho

films:

literally any spiderman movie from anything 2002 - now (i know theres older obscure ones)

(cant think of anything else whoops)

games:

terraria

halo (anything pre 343 sorry)

castlevania series

bloodstained

undertale/deltarune

omori (kinda lost interest)

doom (classic series, havent played 2016 and eternal)

half life series

sonic series

mega man series (classic)

minecraft (kind of? i'd rather play beta 1.7.3, but especially a fan of better than adventure)

celeste (havent finished, one of the few insane people that didnt use assist mode at the hotel chapter)

umjammer lammy

parappa series

castle crashers & battleblock theater

serious sam series

splatoon series (havent played splatoon 3)

dont starve together (i dont play often and im not super familiar with the lore) night in the woods (looks nice but. didnt finish at ALL)

portal series (i 100%ed the first game)

streamers:

vargskelethor joel (probably on top along with jerma)

vinesauce vinny

jerma985

grayfruit (i watch sometimes)

simpleflips (i watch very rarely)

i also like a few webcomics but honestly i dont remember at the time of making somehow, you can ask me about one of them though! (its not homestuck i swear /gen)

i ALSO also have super weird interests over niche little 80s - 2000s technology and stuff

due to personal reasons, i have 3 things i dont wanna hear about, but im not gonna mention them on this post.

if you made it this far reading you are insane honestly but shoutouts to you

[fizzyeggg]

i should really actually post my art on this site either way i'll still answer this lol

1. ms paint, used to use it before i moved to aseprite, paint.net kinda counts but i do use it sometimes because the magic wand tool in it is cool

2. left or right is equally easy for me, but forward? hhGRGAAAAAAAAA

3. i like to remaster a lot of really really old drawings i made on ms paint (because i got a computer wayyyy too early), only one i can think of off the top of my head is the mushroom guys

4. humans are just bitches to draw in general. hate those things

5. i keep literally all of it to myself

6. adventure time's art style tends to creep into some of my stuff, also eyes are a weird motif in a lot of my art that i just kinda throw in because it's the first cool pattern i can think of

7. sculpting man... HOW do they do that?? i've tried it before but i can't touch clay without proceeding to just squish and knead it for an hour instead of making anything of value

8. oh i got a ton of those. deltarune missing link (the discarded vessel having spooky shenanigans in the void), a deltarune swap AU i came up with where papyrus switches with susie, rouxls switches with ralsei and other stuff, deltascryption (deltarune/inscryption crossover spritecomic) so mostly deltarune stuff. sorry deltarune

9. batshit insane. i crawl to my computer like a dying rat and sift through hundreds of files titled shit like "743567hgrgh", "cheese" and "glumbo go glumbo go glumbo go" only to find the one i was looking for, titled "scrunk table" which is just a bunch of pvz fanart

10. i hate drawing clothes, but overalls are fun i guess

11. usually my playlist filled with STRANGE and EVIL music, but this board game podcast my dad listens to (called ludology) is also nice

12. most of the human body sucks but can i choose bug body parts?? a thorax or abdomen perchance?? pretty please?

13. this is hard to answer since most creators i admire are My Thing so instead i'll say My Thing is absolutely whatever the hell bep/anne and squimpus mcgrimpus' vibe is, their art is the goofiest coolest shit and i love it so so much

14. EYES EYES EYES EYES EYES EYES

15. in my cave, on the puter

16. i don't really know tbh, my motivation for anything is because it's fun

17. i mean if i happen to have food there yeah. which i usually do, and it's usually dried fruit, nuts and/or cheese because i have the diet of a pet rat

18. HAH!! GET A LOAD OF THIS GUY!!! THINKS A DIGITAL ARTIST CAN "BREAK THEIR ART SUPPLIES" HAH!!!! (i have accidentally snapped a drawing tablet in half once please don't ask)

19. impossible triangles man... i care them

20. BUGS BUGS BUGS BUGS BUGS BUGS BUGS

21. as a pixel artist i really like people who can pull off 1 bit / two colour stuff and i do want to try it at some point

22. NONE!!! (my dyspraxia grows worse by the second)

23. i have artist friends who draw normal, sane digital art and cry as they realise they've drawn on layer #7769 instead of layer #5443. they work on a new inch of their drawing and open up another layer, catapulting the total into the millions. as their tired eyes look upon me, they ask "hey how many layers do you use" my face contorts into an evil smirk "ONE" they cower and scream at my raw power

24. yeah, i probably don't notice though

25. okay... d-dwarf fortress?? it's all CHARACTERS what do they MEAN by this

26. okay so i was drawing my evil lesbian lady "Dr. E. Vile" and she has a bunch of arms with cartoon gloves on them i have no idea how five separate friends of mine said "I like her chef hat" THEY ARE GLOVES WHERE DID IT ALL GO SO WROOOONGG

27. my warm up drawings tend to be me going "time to draw the Thing", and immediately creating the most wretched abomination known to man, so abhorrent in its anatomy that i have to start over entirely

28. nope. too much pressure man WAIT I WAS IN A RAIN WORLD THING https://youtu.be/jBu7gOwtYSY?t=1628 LOOK MA I'M ON TV

29. this is a weird way to answer the question, but i DESPARATELY want to draw in a similar weird and 'unfinished' type of style that stuff like yume nikki, ENA and INTERFACE have it's just that i have no idea how to actually emulate it, like how to create that specific uncanny/eccentric vibe well

30. hahahahahahahahaha (they all are)

Weirdly Specific Artist Ask Game

Didn't see a lot of artist ask games, wanted to make a silly one.

(I wrote this while sick out of my mind last year and it's been collecting dust in my drafts, I might as well let it run free) 1. Art programs you have but don't use

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

3. What ideas come from when you were little

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw

5. Estimate of how much of your art you post online vs. the art you keep for yourself

6. Anything that might inspire you subconsciously (i.e. this horse wasn't supposed to look like the Last Unicorn but I see it)

7. A medium of art you don't work in but appreciate

8. What's an old project idea that you've lost interest in

9. What are your file name conventions

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw

11. Do you listen to anything while drawing? If so, what

12. Easiest part of body to draw

13. A creator who you admire but whose work isn't your thing

14. Any favorite motifs

15. *Where* do you draw (don't drop your ip address this just means do you doodle at a park or smth)

16. Something you are good at but don't really have fun doing

17. Do you eat/drink when drawing? if so, what

18. An estimate of how much art supplies you've broken

19. Favorite inanimate objects to draw (food, nature, etc.)

20. Something everyone else finds hard to draw but you enjoy

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways

22. What physical exercises do you do before drawing, if any

23. Do you use different layer modes

24. Do your references include stock images

25. Something your art has been compared to that you were NOT inspired by

26. What's a piece that got a wildly different interpretation from what you intended

27. Do you warm up before getting to the good stuff? If so, what is it you draw to warm up with

28. Any art events you have participated in the past (like zines)

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically

30. What piece of yours do you think is underrated

[captainquestionart]

hey my man, amazin work on act omega- the team behind it is wonderful!! im lookin to make a fanventure myself, could you give any tips as to pixelling in gg and how to edit images? you know like basically any recoloured, edited clusterfuck of an image in homestuck that hussie does (planets, for example) + how you tilt to have them at different angles? sorry if this sounds like a loooot and you can completely ignore this ask(!), but im just clueless and motivated, my guy

Thank you for asking! I never get asks and I’m always glad to help with any questions like these.

…Anyway, the team behind Act Omega is definitely wonderful, take it from me. My job is typically to do all sorts of sprites/ sprite edits (like the ones in the [S] Resume animation) and I draw the characters and/or backgrounds for panels often enough, so I can definitely give you some tips on those things.

Most editing effects like the ones you asked about aren’t really my domain - a lot of them are done in Photoshop by (among others) our amazing art director @joyfulldreams (she’s seriously great go follow her please), so I asked her for some additional tips.

(This is probably going to turn out long enough to be annoying to scroll past, so I’m putting it all under a read more.)

First off, I have to clear up that when it comes to editing the typical Homestuck sprites (like the ones in [S]:Resume), GraphicsGale hasn’t been my main tool.

The first thing I did for Act Omega was drawing some talksprites (for Tumblr asks, mine were never actually used). I used to do that in Gale, but as soon as I tried it using Paint Tool SAI’s aliased brush (Legacy Pen) instead, I decided that was more comfortable. Most of my work for Resume, redrawing sprites from Collide we couldn’t find elsewhere, was done that way too.Pros of using SAI (and probably Photoshop too? Not 100% sure) for sprites compared to Gale include:

The layers are much, much easier and more intuitive to use than Gale’s. To me Gale’s layers kinda suck and using them is always a pain.

Using a sketch is easier too, and you can make it semi-transparent

Gale doesn’t really do pen pressure, which is most important in talksprites but still can be helpful for the regular sprites too.

That said, when I had to make entirely new animations (like the one above), I had to use GraphicsGale, with its handy preview feature, and it is perfectly possible to use only Gale for everything. Rotating things also had to be done in Gale and then manually cleaned up a little, since SAI will turn anything you try to transform into an ugly anti-aliased mess.

So, bottom line is, I personally prefer to use Gale and SAI in combination, but that’s not strictly necessary. If you’re going full-on Gale (and now I’m gonna assume you haven’t used it too much before), here’s

A few quick practical tips on using Gale I wish I had figured out earlier:

The default settings of Gale include a 1 pixel brush and a 3 pixel brush, but no 2 pixel brush. Since pen pressure won’t save you here, that’s inconvenient. The less you need to go back and painstakingly correct your lines to be the right size, the better. You’ll want to make that brush yourself by opening a new file in Gale, 32x32 pixels, and 1 bit (2 colours). Make it look like this and save it as a bitmap (BMP) image: 

And then find this option:

and put your bitmap in there. Gale will recognize that as a custom 2px brush.

If you want to make your images have a transparent background, make sure you tick that box in the options of the frame, not the layer (the little ellipsis button next to each Frame thumbnail -see below). Gale still has no way of telling if your BG is transparent or just white, so I recommend always working with a different color as a background. That way you can tell from the animation preview - if the BG looks white there, it’s transparent. Also make sure these settings apply to every frame by changing “current frame” to “all frames”.

If you want to change the opacity of something (like, say, god tier wings on a troll), you need to save the image as a .png first and tick the box “With Alpha Channel” underneath…

     …then open the image again. Only then will the transparency slider above the palette sliders actually work. You can also use the thick blue pencil button:

    …to set your pencil tool to opacity mode, which will make anything you draw over into the opacity set by the slider.

Now for some more Homestuck-specific tips:

You’re probably better off making sprites in separate parts (a layer for the head, one for the body, one for the arm(s)… from the start. It’ll save you a lot of trouble when you need to animate them. In fact, it might not be a bad idea to also put all of those parts into a neat spritesheet so you don’t have to look too far when you need to reuse something.

(I didn’t see this one all the way through because there was too much to do but you get the idea)

If you don’t already, make sure you have a big folder of references from Homestuck, both panels and sprites, just so you know how The Huss would have done it. That might be more important for Act Omega since we’re trying so very hard to be as close to canon as humanly possible, but it’ll be very handy regardless.

What else is there… well, I could say some more stuff about the art style itself but I figure if you want to start a fanventure you’ll probably have the basics of that stuff down already.

Now, for what Joy had to say about editing images:“Say you need for example a scene on Prospit or Derse, then the process goes like this:1. Find an image (or images) on google that are generally of italian cities and cathedrals. A lot of iconic “Derse and Prospit” images actually come from pictures of the roof of the Milan cathedral, but generally you should get the gist with the Florence skyline and by cobbling together a bunch of cathedral images. 2. You want to use Photoshop tools like the magic wand or selection tool to cut out the sky and anything else that isn’t the actual building. Usually anyway depending on the image. If you have a picture with a bunch of tourists you could just crop them out or use the clone stamp tool to make them disappear oooooo.3. Turn the entire image grayscale, and (optional at this point but you might want to do it eventually) bump up the brightness and contrast. 4. Then you want to eye-drop pick from a canon Derse or Prospit image the light and dark Derse/Prospit colors. For prospit its like a bright saturated yellow and a more dark orange color? You can actually play around with the two colors you use to vary contrast and stuff if you’re putting together a bit scene. 5. Copy the cathedral layer and lock the opacity, put it above the original layer, and fill it with the solid light color. Set the layer mode to overlay.6. Do this again but with the darker color, and put it below the original layer.7. Lower the opacity of the original layer. It should start to look how hussie makes it look.8. Sometimes to give it an additional rough pixellated look, I’ll go to image>adjustments>posturize and play around with it. It gives the image some of that gif-ified look.But basically when it comes to hussie-fying images these are some of the basic main principles you want to keep in mind. The posturize effect, using overlay layers, and finding images and mashing them together creatively.

Also another key thing to note is that when you resize or transform things, there are different transformation MODES. In order to transform pixellated stuff, you want to use Nearest Neighbor. That will preserve sharp edges, but sometimes it can distort things and make it look weird. In situations like that Hussie often uses Bilinear instead, and then sharpens the transformed part. He usually ONLY does this when he is making things smaller or rotating them, not to enlarge anything, because then the blurred/sharpened-ness of it becomes way more obvious.This is honestly the best advice I can give. A lot of it is kind of fucking around with blending modes and layers until you get the right LOOK lol.”

(-Joyfulldreams 2017, give her a round of applause)

…So that’s pretty much some general technique pointers. I’ll post them publicly in case anyone else would like to know.I hope I haven’t just been stating the obvious here, wasn’t entirely sure what I could say that would really directly be helpful, but in any case, if you have any more specific questions you think I might be able to help with, please feel free to send me a PM.

[digitalanddead-inruins-blog]

Rachel [off-site]:

B4 our WALK (Wed. Aug 29th)

This is the weird thing... I can’t stop thinking about Fascism… Esp lately, b/c my knee is busted and all I do is stay in reading AntiFa clickbait… B/c my Grandaddy was in WWII and he had stories… B/c it scares me… B/c of Mussolini and his fetishization of Ancient Rome (and larger habits of folks who author connections with a simplified notion of the past to bolster their position/ideology/nationalist identity etc.)… But I’m just some privileged white girl from Canada who never had to experience Fascism first-hand (just geographically distanced observations on the net, or historicized musings)… at least not yet… what am I even doing talking or thinking about ancient history at a time like this?

 So, back in 2008-2010, during the financial/housing crash, I made a bunch of work in Los Angeles (that was re-framed in 2015) about the weird link btwn the 2nd wave of American Neo-Classism and their banking system (it’s tangled and almost shockingly synchronic)… apparently bits and pieces of this get discussed in the more academic end of Copyright Law (a friend’s mom who’s a world renowned expert/prof/editor [she knows her shit] of a major journal on the subject told me so… so, yeah)…

So that whole thing got me to thinking about buried shit… how we take-on and dig-up this buried shit... how we shape and clean it and in doing so distinctly author it. The permeating compressed dust, dirt and nitre gets scraped off and discarded, and the remaining matter is shaped into an augmented sign; transforming the Aggregate Clump into a Sharply Formed Declaration …

It got me thinking about how this buried shit gets used (sometimes forcefully) by governments, assholes, even well-intentioned assholes...artists... it doesn’t matter… it gets cleaned up and scrubbed up and (re)shaped and hoisted back up again… and again… and again… All that repeated and meme-y and calcified Benjaminian Fossil shit (thank-u Susan Buck-Morss <3). We forget that marble and stone and terracotta was gaudy and painted and dirty and fleshy and stinky and messy... that the gods lived in the stone and they were lusty and corporeal… they fucking LIVED in them… that people shat around here… gods shat around here… literally shat… ate and shat… look around this necropolis… someone has shit and pissed here, I guarantee it. Ritual and Reverence, wtvr. There’s someone’s garbage over there (old and new and ancient and plastic)… Someone has taken a dump here! Dig it. The chaos is resistance...

I dunno, I want to talk about the fetishization and re-authoring the past and Fascism and nostalgia but I don’t know if I’m allowed to… if it makes me a real fucking asshole for even attempting it (making that association). A dumb Canadian ex-pat/migrant walks into a Roman/Italian ruin and immediately goes to ______ism… This is usually the kind of harsh narrative voice I have spoken through a surrogate when I do my performances because I’m such a fucking pussy and sometimes scared of my own words (ok, ok, there are obvs considered/conceptual reasons but this is personal/casual email format, so here’s some performative vulnerability)… But every time I want to talk about impressions and thoughts and imaginations and Imagineering and all that about a solid place, a (HARD) Place (especially one that screams HISTORY in bloc capitols), that I don’t know abso-fucking-everything about (as if panomathic knowledge can be achieved – w/o going into debates on who’s knowing is legit/cannon [speaking of fascism/colonialism/empirical thinking]) I get scared as fuck… because lets face it… Monuments = (HARD) Power and Framing =  (HARD) Power. The solid-as-a-rock, simplified, uni-lateral presentation of these (HARD) objects/architecture is about Power... Declarative, Shaped, Authored POWER (and that is kinda scary)…

But I’m post-net-y/net-y-native enuff-to-kno that the infinite refractions of opinion and speculation that bounce like imperfect fleshy radar off of these objects and spaces can potentially offer up a whole multi-verse of meanings, readings… pasts, futures, presents… the (HARD) stuff is still permeable and plastic under the right conditions… Embracing entropy and all that (I’m sorry, I spent too much time in California/@CalArts and art-bro’s in Cali spend waaaaaay to much time talk’n bout the entropic, ugh)… So, yeah, order and chaos, excavation and neglect... I’m violently ambivalent as usual.

 *          *          *

The WALK (Wed. Aug 30th)

How do I feel, what are my impressions?

Wikipedia tells me that the Greeks used this as a minor outpost, didn’t really care much about it. It was too far out from anything else, isolated.

I keep thinking of Ballard’s The Crystal World...

*          *          *

 You (Sarah) Skyped me and the connection sucked but the images were nice. It was like back in the day when I would steal my brother’s World of Warcraft login and go fuck-about with his Orc (he didn’t like that). Whenever the connection was dropped-and-returned you loaded in slow, long lags… long fucking lags… then sped-up fast catch-ups when your voice would go all robotic. The necropolis looked like Minecraft (which was fitting, considering we used a Minecraft “grave” in our last work tgthr)…

It’s difficult for me to get a sense of the “flesh” (in the embodied theological/corporeal sense) of the place. Like I mentioned earlier… gods, people, animals shit and pissed [with]in these places and forms, and I’m trying to figure out how that embodiment shifts/relates/translates/transubstantiates to a pixel.

 At the end of our “walk”, Anthony Gormley’s dude taking up the best view in the whole park pops up, and our connection starts going haywire and I got weird feedback and its all so “slender-man” creepy, haunted shit… screeches and hiss and this black “shadow” figure…The whole landscape blurred and chunky. I wanted so badly to post this to one of those digital folklore pages on reddit but the feedback sound didn’t record and it kinda killed the spookiness.

 Still, sound or no sound… glitch-blur or no glitch-blur… bad connection…  wtvr got lost… collections of impressions... for my purpose it made good video.

-Rachel

[modernpolymath]

Eurovision Semis #1

a.k.a. Aria’s running commentary.

Intro:

Mel, I don’t know how you’ve kept getting these assignments, but please don’t stop. I know GBBO isn’t around anymore, but please don’t leave just because you are now our default entertainment presenter. 

Ukranian rap/hip-hop artist? Eyesore? I’m confused. 

Okay so top of head braid ponytails are a thing now? Is this a trend I’ve missed out on.

Who are these three guys? I don’t think I could pronounce their names if I tried. Having three presenters is weird enough, not having a male-female double act is just wrong. I still think they missed a trick with not bring Verka back. EPIC FAIL UKRAINE.

#eurogenius The term is accepted.

I wonder if they actually speak French, or if he just learned these phrases. 

“And the odd horsehead.”

Their smiles are REALLY WIDE. 

And we’re off!!!

Sweden:

First act to ever start backstage? I mean sure, why not. 

I can’t get over these super 90s suits. The haircuts and the mock turtlenecks. Also his suit is purple? Props for diversity though. 

And I just gotta say: didn’t we move past the treadmill performances when OK GO did it like 8 years ago?

WHAT IS WITH THE OKAY SIGN????

I think Sweden is trying to go retro and reclaim their former glory.

Georgia:

I LOVE THIS ALREADY. Her hair. Her cape. Her dress. Red and fog and minor keys. YES. 

That eye make is on point. Wink on point. 

CAPE IS OFF. THE CAPE IS OFF. 

I think she can actually sing...? Or not. She does well until the refrain, so I don’t know. 

FIRE FIREFIREFIREFIRE We have our first fire!

I really want to like this song. And I think I do.

OH SHIT, it looks like she stole the UK’s ball graphic. 

EPIC END. 

“Several key changes and a cloak.” Mel knows whats up.

Australia:

“Which I don’t feel bitter about in any way.” Say it Scott. We all hate them.

OH MY GOD he’s in the graphics in the background. OZ!! I think you figured out how Eurovision works. Sorta. Hot guy who can sorta sing, over-do it on the effects

I am distracted by his lack of socks.

This song needs something more.

MORE FIRE

When I meant more, I didn’t mean riff Issiah, you’re not a strong enough singer for that. So In that, good job Aussies, you put forward an appropriate contender this year. You have learned your place.

“Another sockless man on stage.” MEL KNOWS WHAT’S UP.

Albania:

What’s with all the ballads this year? 

Her eyes are so big.

Albania’s feeling like the white, purer version of Georgia. 

Wind machine. We have wind. 

I’m not sure she can walk in this dress.

Whoa? Did we move from sort of clock to a futuristic floating world? Don’t get it, but sure. 

At least this song picked up more than Oz did. But it still needed to drop the beat or something. It just stayed so constant. Meh.

Belgium:

It’s so Mumford and Sons. But wow, the audience is so into it. 

I am not entirely sure she’s singing more than 2 notes. 

This song is good but your staging sucks. 

UGH all of these ballads need to pick it up mid-song. They’re so monotonous. This one in particular. 

She should have sung in her head voice the WHOLE TIME. 

She seems like a super sweet girl who is maybe a bit overwhelmed. 

Montenegro:

YES YES YES SLAVKO

WAIT IT’S DETATCHABLE?!??!?! I am slightly less impressed now.

Nevermind. OMFG I love this entire thing so much already. 

This whole thing is so Eurovision. 

PANTS PANTS PANTS

Rock it to the stars. Yes let’s do that. These pants need to shining down on us at all times. 

This overhead shot of him laying down on his face is amazing. 

It’s cheating if you twirl your braid with your hand! THERE WE GO. 

I get the feeling this is probably a better to watch on TV than in the audience. 

“Absolute quality.” MEL KNOWS WHAT IS UP.

Finland:

This postcard posing is so Finland.

Fog so much fog this year. 

First singer who is actually singing and singing to the way their song is written. 

I still don’t get this song though... I mean I kinda get it, but the lyrics with the composition doesn’t make sense to me. Also is this a Eurovision song? Maybe? 

IS THAT A BURNING PIANO?!??!?! No, just a bit of fog, but I’ll count it. 

We’re red and angry now. 

I do honestly like this song, and she may be one of the best signers in the competition.

Azerbaijan:

OH MY GOD I LOVE THIS POSING AND LOOK SO AMAZING YES YES YES

Azerbaijan, super props for making up for your rather sucky act last year.

This act is amazing. It is so out there, but it’s also so amazingly perfectly Eurovision? In a way that Germany’s last year was not but tried to be this. 

They are committed. Is she seducing a man with a horse head? Are these people actually members of the band, or just prop men? I don’t know but it’s working. 

Consistency and thematic integration A++ for Azerbaijan.

“Only at Eurovision.” “We have told Finland their piano is on fire.” CALLED IT.

Portugal:

“That means if you think she’s rubbish tonight you cant even tell him.”

Oh, we have a mini-stage!

What.... what is this? 

Don’t get me wrong, I love jazz and lyrical contemporary music. I go to jazz clubs for fun. But I.... what is this? What happened to Eurovision this year? 

Okay, but he’s adorable. And I 100% love the audience for getting into it with him. 

Is this ballad year though?

“Pure art alert.” True story. I feel like this is Australia 2016 all over again: Portugal came back to win and forgot that this is not an event you send your best artist to. 

Whatever, I’ll take it. 

Greece:

Ooofffff, harsh entrance girl. 

This is traditional Eurovision right here. 

I don’t even have anything to say about this act other than it’s a back to basics. Half-naked men, electric upbeats, high notes, dancibility, light shows, some odd staging gimmick. 

Yup.

Poland:

VIOLIN

Here’s our quintessential be yourself, be stronger, ballad. 

WIND MACHINE

This is very Rise like a Phoenix.

Could she be bound any tighter to get some cleavage out of her though?

Have I won ESC Bingo yet?

UBER WIND 

Moldova:

EPIC SAX GUY

Violin and sax and tuxedos.

This song will so get stuck in my head for the next 3 days....

EPIC SAX GUY

This leg move can’t be good for your hips though. 

Because I can’t get it the beat out of my head, it’s probably going onto the finals. 

Iceland:

Damn girl. You’re postcard is A+++++++++++. Be my friend. “In her spare time, she likes to bathe in unicorn tears.” YESSSSSSSSS

This is like Jessie J meets Madonna meets Gwen Stefani. And I’m kinda of digging it?

Capes are in this year. 

Her shoes are AMAZING

Iceland is my lady crush of ESC 2017. It’s official. 

I so wish this staging was more epic though. 

WAIT WAIT WAIT HERE IT COMES

Laser show, lighting breakdown. Where’s the wind????

Awesome. Yes, more please. 

Czech Republic:

Wait, isn’t their country now Czechia or something??

I appreciate this outfit?

CZE is probably winning best use of lighted floor award tonight. 

I think this song would have been much better received earlier in the night. 

She can sing though. Which is always nice. 

Cyprus:

“Lots of sockless behaviour this evening.” MEL KNOWS WHAT IS UP.

This song has promise, despite your ankles showing. But maybe that’s a positive to show off your footwork?

LOOK IT’S RUSSIA’S BLOCKS FROM LAST YEAR!

Camera work is good on this one. 

Okay the silhouette thing is cool. 

Sorry CZE, Cyrpus just stole your staging award. This whole performance is really well thought out and maybe a bit too good for ESC? I’ll allow it. 

Armenia:

Okay, I was going to count Armenia out 20 seconds in, but then the beat picked up and the camera jumped. Good. 

This has got to be so much better on TV than in person. 

I kinda dig this song. My pole dancing self would totally rock to this.

FIRE

Dancing is good. 

Slovenia:

He’s cheeky. 

I do like this song, I’ve heard it before. It just get weirds at point. Like maybe there should be the opera guy in here somewhere?

You know, it’s basically like a Josh Groban song.

Latvia:

Group act, bring it!

WHAT IS THIS 

Neon. Crazy eyes. Insane hair. I don’t get this outfit. I don’t get this song. I don’t get this staging. Am I missing something?

Oh, well here it is. Maybe this is it. 

Nope still don’t get it.

My TV stream is confused by what to do and how to render all these lights and colours. Pixelation central.

I just don’t get it. Is this Georgia all over again for me?

Voting:

These guys are too stiff. Please just stop trying to be funny. 

OH MY GOD - bringing it back to the OMFG new scoring rules and how fucking stressful that was. I am so ready for it again this year. 

I am still not over the political FU that has happened over this song and over Eurovision. I mean, on the one hand it’s just a song competition, but on the other, shit man, this is why Eurovision has a ban on political songs. That said the Drama has been delectable.

VERKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA  YES. Okay, but still. Ukraine fail that this wasn’t your host. I will never forgive you. Yes yes, Jamal’s great, but we really want Verka and laughs. Ukraine you’re not keeping it fun enough. 

“Wazitgutenuf.” I swear, I am normally good with accents, but wow, Aleks is taking this to a whole new level of speed and incomprehensibility. 

Moldova - duh, of course. 

Azerbaijan - I am so glad, I am so down with this whole thing. 

Greece - eh, sure, it’s traditional, but I thought others were better. 

Sweden - I dunno, this feels like a thank you more than deserved.

Portugal - I am secretly really happy?? He’s adorable.

Poland - nope, sorry, no. You were fine. Iceland was WAY better.

Armenia - okay, sure, but I don’t think you’ll hold up. 

Australia - fiiiinnnnnneeeeee.

Cyprus - totes, 100% well deserved. 

Belgium - ugggghhhhhhhhhhhh, I want to like this song, but it was as shitty performance. 

Montenegro was robbed in that you know this is what Eurovision is about and really he should have gone through on that alone. Ultimately, it wasn’t a strong performance though....

I’m pissed about Iceland. She should have been there. 

At least some of the crazy and stupid slow songs didn’t make it. 

BRING ON ROUND 2!!!