writerbits

[writerbits]

@phantom-z0ne Batfaminsideout and 30 mins working on a life series animation, please!!

Joy, his smile gone stiff and pleading. Still treating Disgust as the problem like Sadness isn’t committing social suicide. It shouldn’t be a surprise. Joy is always too busy chasing after what they want to realize what they need.

“Maybe we can let sadness try?” He asks, squeezing Disgust’s shoulder. Disgust brushes the hand off. Schools his face to hide the sudden twist of betrayal he feels.

“Sadness.” He says as coldly as he can manage. “Is going to make us cry in the batcave.”

“Tim’s stopped frowning at us.” Joy insists gesturing at the veiwscreen.

Wip Wednseday | Batfaminsideout

Before:

After:

[writerbits]

hello can I get more baby wizards please? (ducklings)

Johnathan’s magic reaches out tentatively, wraps around the spell and holds it close like he does during lessons. Richard drops him. Watches him drift towards the ground before dragging his eyes back to Aiden.

There’s no time to mother hen.

“I can cast it.” Aiden insists as Richard reaches toward him. He screws his face up in concentration. Richard sighs, places a hand on his forehead, but doesn’t cast. Any arguments will lead to questions and Aiden will stay agreeably if he feels he doing something important. As Aiden cast the spell Richard adds a layer over it, nudges bits of the spell into a shape that’s easier to maintain. Aiden looks up at him and Richard nods. The boy had cast it correctly. Probably didn’t even need the corrections, but they settled Richard’s nerves.

Ducklings | Wip Wednseday

[writerbits]

I love that it's the kids who named his staff topper lol. they saw a pattern and ran with it

I don't think they even told him. I think they just started running around like 'Oh profesor let me get stomp' *fetches staff* and 'hey aiden get in line, stomp says it's time to go'

richard just thought they had a collective imaginary friend or something and was just happy they didn't seem to bring it up around other teachers. he got there eventually tho.

[writerbits]

@stonemaskedtaliesin Batfaminsideout please!

@tyrantonutx Batfaminsideout please!

@eriquin Batfaminsideout please!

“I- but-” Joy stammers. “That is why we’re doing this isn’t it?” He helps Sadness of the floor first and Disgust notes the slight. Shoves away the hand offered to him like he’s some sort of after thought.

“Drake doesn’t need to know that!” Disgust hovers over the panel trying to find a way to save this. Hesitant fingers skitter across various buttons and Damian wipes his eyes in a way that’s meant to look like he’s just tired.

“B can be shortsighted sometimes.” Drake says, tone a touch softer than neutral. Like Damian is a child to be coddled. It sends Sadness lurching toward the panel. Disgust grabs him.

“Haven’t you done enou-” A hand on his shoulder stops Disgust up short.

Wip Wednseday | Batfaminsideout

[writerbits]

@wizisbored 30 minutes animating please :)

before:

after:

[writerbits]

July 30

i really am here every other month huh <3

Batfaminsideout

Pet51

Gremlins

Ducklings

30 mins working on a life series animation

as always feel free to 2 for 1 animation and writing

A snippet from pet51 because i haven't worked on the others in a while:

Its crew was prone to the many malfunctions that plagued biological pattern recognition systems.[5] To keep them safe Logan had to pick up the slack. A task outside the scope of its programming.[1] Currently the autopilot was struggling.

They were outside the bounds of the ship. Collecting resources to bolster their supplies. Logan’s only method of connection to the crew was via a multipurpose droid they’d bought for cheap.[6] It could hover and had a foldable arm designed for object manipulation. Its camera was hooked into Logan’s system and it took task designations on Loan’s input.

[writerbits]

@combeferres-mothematics 30 minutes of art fight refs + Ducklings please!! :D

Ducklings

Gently as if he’s petting a real bird. The children had comitted themselve to naming everything he owned in the same way he’d named Snap and Whistle. He startles when the wood starts to warm and then grabs the carving with both hands.

“Careful.” Richard murmurs as he shifts to dangle the toddler out the window. He give Johnathan a moment to adjust to the soft weightless feeling of the spell. Aiden lets out an excited gasp.

Wip Wednseday

artfights almost over here's a revenge:

[writerbits]

@twyrewolf Pet51 please!

@oriharaizayadividesintoslytherin 30 minutes of art fight refs and Pet51, please

@tamsinswriting "30 minutes animating pinecones" and "Pet51"

Pet51

Its crew was prone to the many malfunctions that plagued biological pattern recognition systems. To keep them safe Logan had to pick up the slack. A task outside the scope of its programming. Currently the autopilot was struggling.

They were outside the bounds of the ship. Collecting resources to bolster their supplies. Logan’s only method of connection to the crew was via a multipurpose droid they’d bought for cheap. It could hover and had a foldable arm designed for object manipulation. Its camera was hooked into Logan’s system and it took task designations on Loan’s input.

Wip Wednseday

Art fight refs are long done but here's 30 mins of a revenge:

Pinecones has gone from this:

to this:

[writerbits]

affirmations for writers: i know how to write. i have seen sentences before, and i know how to make one. i can identify up to several words and their meanings. i am not afraid of semicolons.

[writerbits]

harder to write logan now that ive grown up and dont know enough current slang to put on his flashcards

[writerbits]

[writerbits]

I'm sorry your writing strategy is WHAT?? I'm going to need a thorough explanation of this because I'm FASCINATED

[brian murphy voice] I DIDNT SAY ANYTHING WEIRD!!!

okay i did. but also! if it ain’t broke…

here’s how this crumbles cookie-wise. sometimes (as is currently the case) i feel like i am trying to hold onto a whole novel in my brain at once. this does not feel particularly good because the novel doesn’t belong in my brain it belongs Out There. so i make a very detailed outline and then i start at chapter 1, and i write to 100 words (give or take a few). then i move on to chapter 2 and write to 100 words. then to chapter 3 and so on until i have at least 100 words in each chapter. then once i’ve run through the whole book, i go back to the beginning and make sure each chapter is up to 200. then i’m usually in the Meat of each scene so i’ll get everything up to 500, then 1000, then 1500 and then usually i clock out of chapters around or just under the 2k mark.

this appeases the hyperactive part of my brain by making sure i’m never bored, and helps the project manager in my brain so i can keep track of many moving parts in the novel and also ensures that scenes at the end speak to scenes at the beginning since i’m (sort of) writing the whole book at once.

NOTE: sometimes i get lost in the sauce and write way past 100 or wherever im at, and that’s fine. it just means i probably skip that chapter during my next pass since it’ll be past my goal wc for each chapter of the run.

that is all. try it, if you want. i honestly don’t know how to write books any other way

[writerbits]

🍖 How to Build a Culture Without Just Inventing Spices and Necklaces

(a worldbuilding roast. with love.)

So. You’re building a fantasy world, and you’ve just invented: → Three types of ceremonial jewelry → A spice that tastes like cinnamon if it were bitter and cursed → A holiday where everyone wears gold and screams at dawn

Cute. But that’s not culture. That’s aesthetics.

And if your worldbuilding is all outfits, dances, and spice blends with vaguely mystical names, your story’s probably going to feel like a cosplay convention held inside a Pinterest board.

Here’s how to fix that—aka: how to build a real, functioning culture that shapes your story, not just its vibes.

─────── ✦ ───────

🔗 Culture Is Built on Power, Not Just Style

Ask yourself: → Who’s in charge, and why? → Who has land? Who doesn’t? → What’s considered taboo, sacred, or punishable by death?

Culture is shaped by who gets to make the rules and who gets crushed by them. That’s where things like religion, family structure, class divisions, gender roles, and social expectations actually come from.

Start there. Not at the embroidery.

─────── ✦ ───────

2.🪓 Culture Comes From Conflict

Did this society evolve peacefully? Was it colonized? Did it colonize? Was it rebuilt after a war? Is it still in one?

→ What was destroyed and mythologized? → What do the survivors still whisper about? → What do children get taught in school that’s… suspiciously sanitized?

No culture is neutral. Every tradition has a history, and that history should taste like blood, loss, or propaganda.

─────── ✦ ───────

3.🧠 Belief Systems > Customs Lists

Sure, rituals and holidays are cool. But what do people believe about: → Death? → Love? → Time? → The natural world? → Justice?

Example: A society that believes time is cyclical vs. one that sees time as linear will approach everything—from prison sentences to grief—completely differently.

You don’t need to invent 80 gods. You need to know what those gods mean to the people who pray to them.

─────── ✦ ───────

4.🫀 Culture Controls Behavior (Quietly)

Culture shows up in: → What people apologize for → What insults cut deepest → What people are embarrassed about → What’s praised publicly vs. what’s hidden privately

For instance: → A culture obsessed with stoicism won’t say “I love you.” They’ll say “Have you eaten?” → A culture built on legacy might prioritize ancestor veneration, archival writing, name inheritance.

This stuff? Way more immersive than giving everyone matching earrings.

─────── ✦ ───────

5. 🏠 Culture = Daily Life, Not Just Festivals

Sure, your MC might attend a funeral where people paint their faces blue. But what about: → Breakfast routines? → How people greet each other on the street? → Who cooks, and who eats first? → What’s considered “clean” or “proper”? → How is parenting handled? Divorce?

Culture is what happens between plot points. It should shape your character’s assumptions, language, fears, and habits—whether or not a festival is going on.

─────── ✦ ───────

6. 💬 Let Your Characters Disagree With Their Own Culture

A culture isn’t a monolith.

Even in deeply traditional societies, people: → Rebel → Question → Break rules → Misinterpret laws → Mock sacred things → Act hypocritically → Weaponize or resist what’s expected

Let your characters wrestle with the culture around them. That’s where realism (and tension) lives.

─────── ✦ ───────

7.🧼 Beware the “Pretty = Good” Trap

Worldbuilding gets boring fast when: → The protagonist’s homeland is beautiful and pure → The enemy’s culture is dark and “barbaric” → Every detail just reinforces who the reader should like

You can—and should—challenge the aesthetic hierarchy. → Let ugly things be beloved. → Let beautiful things be corrupt. → Let your MC romanticize their culture and then get disillusioned by it later.

─────── ✦ ───────

📍 TL;DR (but like, spicy): → Culture is not food and jewelry. → Culture is power, fear, memory, contradiction. → Stop inventing spices until you know who starved last winter. → Let your world feel lived in, not curated.

The best cultural worldbuilding doesn’t look like a list. It feels like a system. A pressure. A presence your characters can’t escape—even if they try.

Now go. Build something real. (You can add spices later.)

—rin t. // writing advice for worldbuilders with rage and range // thewriteadviceforwriters

Sometimes the problem isn’t your plot. It’s your first 5 pages. Fix it here → 🖤 Free eBook: 5 Opening Pages Mistakes to Stop Making:

🕯️ download the pack & write something cursed:

[writerbits]

If you ever tagged me to do one of those tag game thingies and I never did it:

1) Thank you, seriously. Those are fun and being included shows that my followers care enough to want to learn more about me.

2) Very sorry about that, it’s extremely likely that I said to myself “Cool! But I’m busy at the moment, I’ll have to do this later today or tomorrow” before proceeding to just straight-up forget, now it’s too far back in my notifications and/or your blog to find again.

[writerbits]

@auburnlaughter Requesting 30 minutes of art fight refs and Batfaminsideout please!

Batfaminsideout

They’re down on the ground in a heap. The memory goes clattering off somewhere.

“Ow…” Sadness whines trying to shove Disgust off of him.

“Disgust!” Joy shrieks

“Me?” Disgust shoves a hand against Sadness’s shoulder to prop himself up well enough to see the veiwscreen. Some look has flittered across Drake’s face, but Disgust only manages to watch the tail end of it as Drake expression shutters back to a careful neutral. “Why’d you let him do that!”

Thirty minutes... an hour and a half... same dif Art!

f2u deviantart bases my beloved

[writerbits]

@zyrafowe-sny Ducklings please

@whimsicalmeerkat Ducklings please!

Followed by a rooms worth of tired groans.

Well it wasn’t as though subtlety was still on the table. Richard slid open a hallway wind and hefted up Johnathan to sit on the sill. It's not often Richard uses his staff for focusing. It would warp and burn the wood over time. But he’s certainly not going to cast five spells in quick succession with his hands.

“Hi Stomp!” Johnathan says as Richard swings the staff toward him. He runs his little hand over the mallard carved on top of the staff.

Wip Wednseday | Ducklings

[writerbits]

@tamsinswriting "Ducklings" please

“Can I help!” She demands yanking Richard’s sleeve. He nods and she hurries after Liliana. He ushers the boys a little ways down the hall. "Sofia!" Comes a muffled shout from inside the dorm's sitting room.

Wip Wednseday | Ducklings