#themed environment

[nostalgiapurgatory]

The Threshold of Death ' by Jaden Andrea ( Wynn Thorn) 2018

[flavinbagel]

Themed Environment Sculpting! It's actually very impressive seeing this guy shape and sculpt vertical concrete like this. Making this stuff look like natural rock is NOT mindless, and he makes it look easy.

[cherryfennec]

Summer Times

Hi! I'm finally back from my two week abroad trip!

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

In the world of heavy metals, love is denser than hate!

[unbfacts]

At Puy du Fou theme park in France, specially trained rooks-a member of the crow family-pick up cigarette butts and small litter from the grounds. Each time a bird drops trash into a special box, it receives a food reward.

[katabay]

RESERVING JUDGEMENTS IS A MATTER OF INFINITE HOPE

And, after boasting this way of my tolerance, I come to the admission that it has a limit. Conduct may be founded on the hard rock or the wet marshes but after a certain point I don't care what it's founded on. When I came back from the East last autumn I felt that I wanted the world to be in uniform and at a sort of moral attention forever; I wanted no more riotous excursions with privileged glimpses into the human heart. Only Gatsby, the man who gives his name to this book, was exempt from my reaction—Gatsby who represented everything for which I have an unaffected scorn. If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him, some heightened sensitivity to the promises of life, as if he were related to one of those intricate machines that register earthquakes ten thousand miles away. This responsiveness had nothing to do with that flabby impressionability which is dignified under the name of the "creative temperament"—it was an extraordinary gift for hope, a romantic readiness such as I have never found in any other person and which it is not likely I shall ever find again.

-The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

I've been rotating through some ideas for visuals, rattling around thoughts about voyeuristic claustrophobia. idk, summer weather is here and it's got me thinking about gatsby! it's a summer re-read book for me. almost an annual tradition at this point ngl

[incorrect-green-lantern-quotes]

A Brief Introduction to Planet Oa

Nestled in the very heart of the cosmos, at the center of Sector 0, the planet of Oa serves as both the homeworld of the Green Lantern Corps and a symbol of order for the universe at large.

Oa is one of the oldest planets in existence. Its parent star, Sto-Oa ("Light of Oa" in the Maltusian language) is a red hypergiant that formed shortly after the Big Bang. There are eleven planets in the star system (five terrestrial, three gas giants and four ice giants) most of which serve as farmland and resource mines.

Oa is the fourth closest to the star, and it takes approximately 574 Earth days to complete one revolution around its star. The planet is actually tidally locked in its orbit, meaning that it does not have a natural day-night cycle.

However, the Guardians of the Universe have constructed a massive ring of solar arrays that slowly revolves around the planet. The shadow cast by this megastructure simulates "night" by blocking out Oa's parent star from the hemisphere that it shines upon, while simultaneously refracting Sto-Oa's light to the far side to create an artificial "day."

(Would it have been more practical to simply force Oa to spin in its orbit? The Guardians are certainly powerful enough to induce planetary rotation. When asked why they chose this as a solution instead, they declined to comment.)

The Guardians chose to set the length of Oa's "day" equal to their ancestral home's, exactly twenty-and-a-half Earth hours. There are no seasons or months, as the planet does not have any natural moons and only has an axial tilt of about 3°, so the Oan year's subdivisions are almost entirely arbitrary and exist purely for the purpose of timekeeping.

It takes 672 Oan days for the planet to complete one orbit around Sto-Oa. The Oan year is based off the old Maltusian calendar and consists of eight months, each of which is twelve weeks long. Coincidentally, the Maltusians also had seven days in a week.

(That the Oan/Maltusian week has the same number of days as Earth's does is merely coincidence, not an indication of any shared cultural history.)

Oa was a barren rock before the Guardians came and terraformed it into a lush oasis with four oceans and nine continents that host a variety of biomes, ranging from polar to tropical to downright toxic for most life-forms. It has the most varied environments of any world, again thanks to the Guardians’ technology. They engineered Oa's biosphere in this way because the planet also serves as a safe haven for species from all across the universe.

(The Green Lanterns seek to preserve every inhabited world, or failing that, evacuate the populations to safety. But they do not always succeed.)

This myriad of environments on Oa is what allowed Appa Ali Apsa to create the Mosaic World. Even in the throes of his insanity, he was able to utilize the extant biomes to house the cities he kidnapped. In most cases however, those who are brought to Oa are refugees who only live on the planet temporarily until the Green Lanterns find a new home for them.

Consequently, the only permanent settlement on Oa is the Emerald Citadel, which is located directly at the center of the starside hemisphere. It's a grand city consisting of enormous skyscrapers that are built to varying scales to accommodate the many body shapes and sizes of the Green Lanterns- as well as any diplomats who come to seek an audience with the Corps or the Guardians. The Central Battery of the Green Lantern Corps and the Guardians' Council Chambers are located here.

Oa has been attacked and even destroyed on multiple occasions. The Green Lantern Corps and the Guardians of the Universe have had many powerful enemies over the centuries, such as the Empire of Tears, the Reach, and various other Lantern groups. Some have questioned the wisdom of maintaining a static headquarters in a known location, even with all the power that the Guardians can bring to bear.

But the value of Oa extends beyond the mere strategic. It is not the nature of the Green Lanterns to hide in the shadows. Their light is as symbolic as it is functional. For all that the Guardians have their skeletons in the closet, the Green Lanterns are the defenders of justice and peace for the universe at large. No evil shall escape their sight, and in turn they will not hide themselves from the sight of those they protect.

Of course their homeworld is the shining jewel at the center of the cosmos.

[devizakura]

Brainrotting about the Cherri - Angel - Husk dynamic again bc as a lover of psychologically charged narratives I find its potential so compelling.

It's the "I love you as you are" (a good sentiment on the surface but not when you're kind of a bad person that makes horrible life decisions) vs. "I love the better You I know you can become" for me, really.

Both Cherri and Husk obviously care about Angel and I don't think Cherri (in her pursuit of cheering Angel up in a way that's always worked before) is a bad friend, but she IS an unhealthy friend. She caters to what Angel wants, even when the things he wants are bad for him. Simply put, she's an enabler, even though she means well.

Meanwhile, Husk teaches and keeps Angel accountable for what he needs. He encourages him to be a better person, even if it's a harder road to take and might, in Angel's eyes, potentially make Husk look like a bad friend sometimes.

They are quite literally an angel and a devil on Angel's shoulders, lol

[solstrix]

Thalassophobia - 4/4

Thalassophobia is a persistent and intense fear of the ocean, or other aquatic depths, which may be characterized by acute anxiety, panic, and/or avoidance.

1 2 3

[lily-on-the-fence]

Ahhh the Human Domestication Guide might be taking over my life >w<

I read the original and then started reading Dog of War yesterday and spent nearly the whole day readingg :3 Honestly it's so good and sweet and has just a liiiitle~ bit of tension to keep things fresh.

God it's such a dream of a setting I can't wait to sink my teeth into it and maybe write a little something or other!

[munthespaceboi]

Spiraled back into my Hollow Knight phase and ended up doing a Grimm inspired living room for my background/environment practice. I want to do the rest of his house so badly now

[girl4music]

I love the contrasting colours and tones and textures in Arcane for Zaun’s Undercity and Piltover’s Topside.

Zaun is Cyberpunk. It’s all technicolour and neon.

(Cold colours and tones and textures)

Piltover is Steampunk. It’s all pastel and metallic.

(Warm colours and tones and textures)

It demonstrates visually very effectively the colossal stark and striking differences between the twin cities. The political ideologies and economical environments its people live in and by and the laws they all adhere to.

Topside is posh and prestigious but it all feels fake. No one says what they mean and means what they say and the population would sell each other out in a heartbeat.

Undercity is violent and dirty but there’s solidarity here and the people stand by each other as if they’re family because they know how hard it is to survive in the pits.

Undercity is constantly ravaged by terrorism, plague and addiction due to the poor financial climate and Topside have so much of everything they could ever want but they’re just throwing it away as if it means nothing. It’s a really honest depiction of segregation.

And don’t think I missed the fact that most Zaunites are minorities like Black/POC, queer or disabled. That must be intentional because it’s something I realized quickly because even though our protagonist Zaunites that are human are white (Jinx and Silco’s grey coloured skin tones notwithstanding) most of the ones you see really struggling are not. And the rest of them aren’t human.

And then on Topside, you do see some Black/POC, queer and disabled characters but they’re not native to Piltover. They’re either a Zaunite too who got a lucky break or they’re from some other city in the Universe.

It REALLY stands out what they were trying to do here and yet this show is popular with both conservative watchers and liberal ones. That’s a really good thing because it means both sides of the coin are privy to the intentional division and corruption of political and economical warfare that’s so boldly painted in Arcane from what you see in the visuals alone, never mind plot.

And it’s really clever because there’s no labelling on it.

There’s no contextualization of what’s Right or Left, Blue or Red, Republican or Democrat. There sides but there’s no relation contextually to real life terms and definitions other than the subjective experiences and observations that are the symbolism for those things.

And why would there be? It’s supernatural/fantasy.

None of it is the reality. Yet it is resonant, is it not?

Well done animators! I picked this up quickly but I’m not the intended audience that really needs to see it because I already know and understand this shit well. But you can see that it is intentional that they did this.

They showed you the poverty and they showed you the wealth and they let you decide on which you want to root for. But if you’ve really took the show in visually and thematically, you naturally would root for both cities. You’d naturally want both to prosper and be at peace because you can clearly see that both have severe problems and are very unhappy with the civil unrest regardless of who has it better or who has it worst.

Bringing magic and the supernatural in general into the mix all the more just proves that this is a piece of TV art/entertainment that knows how to use metaphor and symbolism to great effect because it resonates well. Art will always resemble real life and real life will always resemble art because all we’re doing is just telling OUR stories but leaving out the lexicon of language that only ever distorts, distracts and deceives from experience.

It doesn’t matter what you call it or how you define it - you see it, you hear it and you feel it. You experience it.

Arcane is exceptional storytelling and representation because it resonates enough with us to make us move the obstacles that get in the way of being only human.

TV art/entertainment of the supernatural/fantasy kind always has a reach that no non-supernatual/fantasy art/entertainment ever can and it’s because we use it for escapism from our reality. We use it as our hideaway. Only to find that all it’s doing is recontextualizing it, subverting it or even outright parodying it. We’re not escaping reality. We’re just learning to tolerate what frustrates or even torments us because it’s more fun when it’s not us - not our world - not our people that has to face the drama. But at the end of the day, the only reason why we love it so much is because we self-insert it. We subconsciously look for characters, themes and narratives that relate to and resonate with us. That represent us as expressions of who and what we are - what and who we most care about, what we aspire to - what drives us as a human being on Earth right now.

The most successful TV art/entertainment does this intentionally but they do not let on as to why they do.

Your job as the observer is to find out the why as you watch it, report - and the cycle repeats all over again.

That is how art/entertainment is and always should be. If it isn’t, then give up on it. They’re not doing it for you.

But you’ll add to their sales week revenue regardless.

It is EXTREMELY RARE nowadays to get both great storytelling and great representation in one creative product or project. Don’t take Arcane for granted and do what you can to make sure it continues to provide and deliver the quality that it has done for 2 seasons because Netflix are fucking ruthless. They’re the type of network/streaming service company that believe if they don’t see insane immediate numbers - then they’ll axe it and pretend as if it never even existed in the first place. But Arcane is worth the effort. If both its creators and viewers are adamant enough, we will succeed at keeping it going for at least 1 more season. We need it.

[bonefall]

the cats of the park is just frostpaw finally getting some therapy

tbh tho I feel like them being separate from clan life would help her immensely. They’re not so wrapped up in this culture of battle so they have a new and refreshing perspective (and also frost doesn’t have to worry about ulterior motives because they are STAYING AWAY from THAT trainwreck that is the clans)

(Future edit: this ask is a follow up to this one)

RE: Nothing in BB!ASC is set in stone until the arc is done BUT

One excellent thing ASC has done with the Park cats that is commendable, is that they're treated as legitimate. Not inferior or malicious. They're just another culture that Frostpaw is going to learn from. The bar is UNDERGROUND but we've finally hopped over it.

So I'd want to keep and acknowledge that.

I think I might have an interesting idea for Frostpaw's journey. Also, side note... I'm thinking BB!ASC will rename every book because these titles are actually awful, im sorry. So I'd call this one ASC: The Source of the River

Gonna jot these down;

So, to begin with, Frostpaw calls the human. While being heavily sedated, she has her first vision of Riverstar.

FROSTPAW DOES NOT HAVE A SPECIAL CONNECTION TO STARCLAN.

She NEVER would. Screw that. Instead-- learning to connect to this vision of Riverstar, to her ancestors and their wisdom, is a SKILL she would learn.

Frame the journey less as Riverstar's Side Quest and more as Frostpaw chasing the Revelation she had while anesthetized.

So when she wakes up, she's thinking about how incomprehensibly VAST Riverstar was. She can't even imagine how there's enough space in the world to contain such a being.

Even the Lake itself... the lake is just a droplet, being suckled like a kit on the teat of the Southern Inlet river

For a second, her troubles seemed like a small flea on the nose of a great, cosmic being. But as she reconnects with the mortal plane after her dream, the flea becomes an infestation. She doesn't know where to begin, or how she can save her Clan.

She thinks back to Riverstar. The river that feeds the Lake. Was that what he was trying to tell her? That she has to follow it to the source?

STOP 1: RIVER WARD

The BB!Tribe is massively overhauled. The Tribe of Rushing Water defines themselves as three Wards (Cave, Mountain, River), connected by living on the same stretch of river.

From them, she learns about connections. They are simply able to call upon each other for all they need, there's no need to "appoint" someone to manage everything.

Families and friends hold each other accountable, networking and negotiating constantly. When the group must act as one, it casts stones.

Their Stoneteller is a religious leader, but all cats connect with their ancestors by personally interpreting omens, even without needing to go see him.

(Contrast to BB!Clans, whose Clerics are the KEEPERS of holy knowledge, and it is a sin to interpret StarClan's will on your own)

Yet, there are downsides. She can see ostracised cats who skirt at the edges of the Ward, especially the descendants of a particular group (called Flicks) that she learns once tried to invade the River Ward.

Though they welcome travellers and have a positive view of Clan cats as "family," she learns that they freeze out those who break taboo. Even for smaller offenses-- social faux pas and personal disputes have caused rifts within the Ward.

And the personal omen interpretation means that two cats can try and justify their feelings with religious commands, leveraging any "soothsayer" (particularly religious cats) connections they have like a social pissing match, unless they're both willing to get dragged to Stoneteller.

From all this, Frostpaw learns that she CAN connect to Riverstar and her ancestors, even if she can't speak to them... and that she must LISTEN. Not allow herself to twist her ancestor's words.

And all the Wards are connected, by the source of a river. Suddenly she answers her question.

"How could the world be big enough to contain a being like Riverstar?" Because water isn't all in one place. It's everywhere. It pools where it can and flows where it cannot.

And yet-- a single people is connected by its water. Three wards, one River. Five Clans, one Lake... three siblings, one belly.

Her heart aches thinking about Curlfeather.

She thinks of when quarreling Tribemates are brought to Stoneteller to arbitrate, and be taught the truth. Brought up the river, to its source at the waterfall.

That has to be it! The source, the BEGINNING.

Stop 2 would be WarriorClan as she heads south, but I'm not sure what they'd teach her yet lmao. Monkeystar says "Hi! Do you want to learn how to play a kazoo"

STOP 3... I'd want to rename the Park Cats. Maybe the New Park cats.

(evil brain: "Neopark. Make terrible petsite joke. Be reincarnated as a lotus flower)

There would also be a BIG recap of Ancient Park culture, and the River Kingdom. Frostpaw knows they had KINGS.

And a lot of aspects that modern Clan cats have-- ceremonial sparring, mentors and apprentices, the Law of the Deputy... those came out of the River Kingdom, before its collapse in the Code Era.

But these cats are NOTHING like the glorious tales of a Kingdom warrior. In fact... this is THE park!

THE park that was destroyed, which King Arc-of-Park lead his people away from. How could it have been ruined if it's still here?

(Reality: the Park was shrunk and landscaped. It was destroyed in that time to the perspective of cats. Maybe she'll have some visions of the past through meditation...)

But the survivors, and those who chose not to follow their King... they remained. And they continue to thrive.

Like canon, have them teach her the ability to meditate. Unlike Tribe cats, meditation is about SIGNS, not OMENS. Omens are physical. Signs are psychic.

(Also i like Bee so im probably gonna keep him as Frosty's yoga coach)

She sees Riverstar a few times, has details of Curlfeather's scheme revealed to her in enough chunks to piece together,

but is eventually bowled over when her best, most productive meditation yet... results in a black shadow.

He has a shining pearlstone adorning his head, and deep, wet pools for eyes. Very few other features can be made out, besides his paw, which is shockingly normal compared to his wraith-like body.

Somehow, Frostpaw understands she is looking at a Patron. But she doesn't know who he is until he tells her, he is King Arc-of-Park.

Though remembered, he is not invoked often. The details of his appearance are lost. All that remains of him is his paw-- carried on in a few expressions and the -paw suffix. The one which Frostpaw herself currently bears.

Since Riverstar, his beloved son, so rarely speaks in straightforward terms, he has come to give Frostpaw her answers.

But before she speaks, trembling with desire for finally FINALLY getting the truth, almost frozen by the sheer volume of things she needs to know, he stops and tells her,

"You have earned the truth, Frostpaw. Be not afraid to ask for what you are owed-- but we only have time for three questions, and I shall ask three in turn."

Question 1: "What did you need me to learn?"

"Many things. How to find your own answers. The perspective of the thousand eyes you've met. The wisdom that only a pilgrimage can bestow. I, too, was no leader before I brought my people up the river, and now you too must save RiverClan. Have you learned what we sought to teach?"

She feels unsure... "I don't think I can know if I have, until I go home."

Even though he has no mouth, she can hear his smile, "That is a yes, child."

Question 2: "What am I learning about RiverClan and its history, if these New Park cats are nothing like my Kingdom ancestors?"

He hums, "You have come to the source of the river, and are vexxed to not find the water that is already swirling downstream? No cat stands in the same river twice, for it is not the same river, and they are not the same cat. Are my people gone, Frostpaw, or do they live on?"

Stunned, her jaw hangs open ever so slightly. She thought she knew the answer right away, but his simple question becomes a riddle on her tongue.

He tells her not to worry. She does not need to answer his questions immediately, as they're running out of time. Ask your last.

Question 3: "...did my mom love me?"

IMMEDIATE, "she did. Child of my distant blood, she loved you like a king loves his prince. Ferociously, ambitiously... selfishly."

He cradles her face in his one, massive, silk-soft paw, like he's reaching out of the shadows, across time itself. His last question, "She put you in a terrible position, didn't she?"

A lifetime's worth of love and agony bubbles out of the kid, "SHE DID. She DID and I never did ANYTHING to deserve this, I did everything she told me, and I just wanted to make her happy, and... and i miss my mom."

When she returns from her trance, she's crying.

But her companions are here to help her unpack all of what she just learned.

Will probably end up letting her recruit a little DND party lmao... maybe one cat from each pit stop. Heartstar shouldn't be the only girlie who's allowed to get expansion packs.

Make a little found family here that Frostpaw returns home with.

RE: NOT. CONFIRMED YET. NONE of this is BB canon yet. Just thoughts I need to get down.

[dracomort]

if there's one bit of fanon masquerading as canon that i would like to see die in 2024, it's the idea that voldemort can't love because he was conceived under love potion

that's about as canon as jkr supposedly planning to kill off ron and serve up fred/hermione endgame

Interviewer: How much does the fact that voldemort was conceived under a love potion have to do with his nonability to understand love is it more symbolic? J.K. Rowling: It was a symbolic way of showing that he came from a loveless union – but of course, everything would have changed if Merope had survived and raised him herself and loved him.

Source

[annabelle--cane]

[walks out of the gothic art history lecture covered in blood] actually I think hal yorke is like that because he grew up in the wake of late medieval macabre arts culture

[hypotheticalprose]

Between Severence, Mythic Quest, The Studio, Ted Lasso, and Shrinking, Apple TV has really cornered the market on “most dysfunctional workplaces of all time” prestige shows.