#wip: nn

[vulpixelates]

brain storming a project and already winning

[pigeonstab]

he has a kalachnikov now

[physalian]

How To Make Your Writing Less Stiff 5

Movement

Dredging this back up from way back.

Make sure your characters move, but not too much during heavy dialogue scenes. E.g. two characters sitting and talking—do humans just stare at each other with their arms lifeless and bodies utterly motionless during conversation? No? Then neither should your characters. Make them…

Gesture

Wave

Frown

Laugh

Cross their legs/their arms

Shift around to get comfortable

Pound the table

Roll their eyes

Point

Shrug

Touch their face/their hair

Wring their hands

Pick at their nails

Yawn

Stretch

Sniff/sniffle

Tap their fingers/drum

Bounce their feet

Doodle

Fiddle with buttons or jewelry

Scratch an itch

Touch their weapons/gadgets/phones

Check the time

Get up and sit back down

Move from chair to tabletop

The list goes on.

Bonus points if these are tics that serve to develop your character, like a nervous fiddler, or if one moves a lot and the other doesn’t—what does that say about the both of them? This is where “show don’t tell” really comes into play.

As in, you could say “he’s nervous” or you could show, “He fidgets, constantly glancing at the clock as sweat beads at his temples.”

This site is full of discourse on telling vs showing so I’ll leave it at that.

Epithets

In the Sci-fi WIP that shall never see the light of day, I had a flashback arc for one male character and his relationship with another male character. On top of that, the flashback character was a nameless narrator for Reasons.

Enter the problem: How would you keep track of two male characters, one who you can't name, and the other who does have a name, but you can’t oversaturate the narrative with it? I did a few things.

Nameless Narrator (written in 3rd person limited POV) was the only narrator for the flashback arc. I never switched to the boyfriend’s POV.

Boyfriend had only a couple epithets that could only apply to him, and halfway through their relationship, NN went from describing him as “the other prisoner” to “his cellmate” to “his partner” (which was also a double entendre). NN also switched from using BF’s full name to a nickname both in narration and dialogue.

BF had a title for NN that he used exclusively in dialogue, since BF couldn’t use his given name and NN hadn’t picked a new one for himself.

Every time the subject of the narrative switched, I started a new paragraph so “he” never described either character ambiguously mid-paragraph.

Is this an extreme example? Absolutely, but I pulled it off according to my betas.

The point of all this is this: Epithets shouldn’t just exist to substitute an overused name. Epithets de-personalize the subject if you use them incorrectly. If your narrator is thinking of their lover and describing that person without their name, then the trait they pick to focus on should be something equally important to them. In contrast, if you want to drive home how little a narrator thinks of somebody, using depersonalizing epithets helps sell that disrespect.

Fanfic tends to be the most egregious with soulless epithets like "the black-haired boy" that tell the reader absolutely nothing about how the narrator feels about that black-haired boy, espeically if they're doing so during a highly-emotional moment.

As in, NN and BF had one implied sex scene. Had I said “the other prisoner” that would have completely ruined the mood. He’s so much more than “the other prisoner” at that point in the story. “His partner,” since they were both a combat team and romantically involved, encompassed their entire relationship.

The epithet also changed depending on what mood or how hopeless NN saw their situation. He’d wax and wane over how close he believed them to be for Reasons. NN was a very reserved character who kept BF at a distance, afraid to go “all in” because he knew there was a high chance of BF not surviving this campaign. So NN never used “his lover”.

All to say, epithets carried the subtext of that flashback arc, when I had a character who would not talk about his feelings. I could show you the progression of their relationship through how the epithets changed.

I could show you whenever NN was being a big fat liar about his feelings when he said he's not in love, but his narration gave him away. I could show you the exact moment their relationship shifted from comrades to something more when NN switched mid-paragraph from "his cellmate" to "his partner" and when he took up BF's nickame exclusively in the same scene.

I do the same thing in Eternal Night when Elias, my protagonist, stops referring to Dorian as "it" and "the vampire" instead of his name the moment they collide with a much more dangerous vampire, so jarringly that Elias notices in his own narration—the point of it being so explicit is that this degredation isn't automatic, it's something he has to conciously do, when everyone else in his clan wouldn't think twice about dehumanizing them.

—

Any literary device should be used with intent if you want those layers in your work. The curtains are rarely just blue. Whether it’s a simile with a deliberate comparison or an epithet with deliberate connotations, your readers will pick up on the subtext, I promise.

[suzukiblu]

WIP excerpt for 🦄; Kon meets pink kryptonite and decides to fuck Tim and his boyfriend about it. (( chrono || non-chrono ))

Tim would date a girl too, is all. Like, he’d be just as down to date a girl as he would a guy. He’s said that before, even, and Kon remembers teasing him about it during some random training session–how he was just being a fucking Bat and trying to maximize his options with a contingency plan because he sucked at talking to chicks so bad. Tim had thrown one of the MMA gloves he’d been stripping off at him and he’d dodged it and laughed, and Tim had laughed too, and– 

Just, like . . . if it were Steph under him right now, or if Bernard were a girl . . . 

Kon’s weird little thought remembers the idea of “Robin” bossing him around as a reward for good behavior back in the day, and then it thinks about Tim bossing him around now. Like–they wouldn’t necessarily have to, like . . . do anything, but if Steph had ever asked him if he wanted to come over, or if Bernard were, he doesn’t know, a Bernie or a Bebe or a Beatrix– 

They could’ve done some of this without the pink K getting involved, then. Like–right? Like . . . they could’ve . . . shared somebody, kind of, or Tim could’ve just told him what to do for somebody, or–

If Tim would be . . . into that, anyway, or . . . just like, Tim likes watching, clearly, and Kon's not exactly body-shy or anything, and it’s not like he'd have minded if Tim had maybe ended up getting off a little bit to him too and not just whatever girl’d decided she was willing to put up with both of them at once in the clearly noble pursuit of getting doubly dicked down–he'd probably have just been a smug asshole about it, if anything–so . . . 

Except it wouldn’t really be Tim sharing someone with him, some weird, uncomfortable and also uncomfortably turned-on little part of Kon thinks. It’d be more like Tim sharing him with–

He feels weird, immediately, and shuts down that whole line of thought before it can get any weirder. 

But it’s–there’s something about it that he doesn’t . . . that he . . . 

Kon stops thinking about it, because for one thing Bernard’s dick is still pressed up warm and hard against his stomach and he is still more than pink K’ed-up enough to appreciate it being there, and for another–for another, it’s just a dumb thought. Just–some weird little thing that occurred to him; not even a real fantasy or whatever. 

Just–a thought, kinda. 

That’s all. 

“Your curiosity is a gift and a treasure, sir,” Bernard says approvingly, lifting his hands up to slide up the sides of Kon’s neck and cup his face, and Kon bites his lip and tightens his TTK up around him again just a little. “Ah–nn. Sorry, I was saying things and having thoughts, but apparently they weren’t that important because I have forgotten literally every single one of them. Hey man, what are you and your aesthetically perfect dick’s thoughts on getting some more data about that whole ‘can we get you too sensitive to go any longer?’ experiment. It’s for science, you know. Science and the good of humankind. Or . . . sapientkind, maybe, since actually ‘humankind’ is not a useful descriptor in this scenario, is it, hm. I should maybe be picking my words more carefully in these situations, yeah, sorry.” 

“Sorry for what?” Kon asks, wrinkling his nose at him in a little bit of confusion. 

“I don’t know, you’re half-alien, was that, like, half a microaggression? A demi-microaggression?” Bernard asks, looking briefly sheepish. “Well–okay actually you’re zero percent alien, I guess, technically speaking, unless Cadmus Labs is not located where I thought it was.” 

“Uh,” Kon says, still a little confused. “They were outside Metropolis . . .?”

[trashisstillhere]

Finally!! The comic that I showed one wip from just a few days ago is finally done!!

Here it is!!

Warning: a dying ninja boy with a bloody wound in chest. (No seriously-) a bit more blood, dead bodies. (Nothing too graphic tho plus most of them are seen as shadows here but I still wanted to put this just in case)

(Click on them to fully read these!)

In case you’re wondering, this takes place in the cursed Samurai/ Cursed Honoka’s hideout/home! (While she is originally and still is the main villain from my Rc9gn story ‘hidden danger’, she is also a villain here in the new ninja AU!)

This is an angst scenario I have had in my head for quite a long time and finally got to draw out now!

Quick (and rushed and lazy) explanation:

New Ninja and Randy went in there along with First Ninja and Plop Plop (it’s kinda long and complicated story -), Plop Plop was taken hostage by Cursed Honoka and she threatens to kill him to try to scare them enough to leave her home, she ends up almost attacking NN with her cursed katana to use the life steal ability on them (yes, she has that and so does her weapon since she put her powers in it just like said on her ref post), only for Randy to come forward to protect them which led him to being stabbed instead in the chest.

He so quickly fell down the ground after that so it looked like he just died. The others are horrified, especially NN who gets so upset that they get into their ninja rage form except it’s a kitsune version of some sort (and no those aren’t tails they have, it’s actually multiple scarfs!) and immediately tries to kill the cursed samurai but First Ninja stops them, mostly because the attack they were about to use had a big chance on possibly badly hurting Plop Plop too.

And the rest is seen here in the comic!

That one part where NN cries over Randy’s struggling body where it suddenly shifts to the other scene is supposed to be a flashback of First Ninja’s from when his family died cuz what he was seeing started reminding him of that too much.

And that scar you see under First Ninjas eye is a burn scar! How did he get it? Well, take a closer look at the start of the first page.. notice how one of the scarfs of NN’s is a bit on fire? And how First Ninjas eye seems to slightly tear up like he just got that scar with it slightly burning like it’s hurting him?

And on the last page at the last part: zoom in more and you’ll notice how NN seems to be quietly apologising to him for something….

But yeah! This is finally finished! Now it’s time for the other wip! Tho I will take a small break rn after working a lot on this one!

[ragnarokhound]

hi fenris. (rlly big fan of ur writing). im still thinking about that theatre au. i was a stage manager for many many years & tim ‘control freak’ drake i think would absolutely love that role.

and with jason as a lead, just him absolutely loving to press tim’s buttons, badgering him to help run lines or go over blocking. the whole cast can see the tension between them and is constantly rolling their eyes about whenever jason starts opening his mouth again.

tim loving to single jason out during rehearsals, they’re always the last two to leave.

the power imbalance between them, tim always getting to boss jason around. but then when things finally come to a head jason taking the lead and talking tim through things. maybe they fuck on the catwalk (👀) right before a rehearsal and tim is just trying sooo hard to keep quiet but jason is doing Everything he can to make him not.

aaaaahhhh hi!! I am ALSO thinking about the theatre au because omg. Dude. DUDE. I was in a couple of productions in early high school, and it's sending me RIGHT BACK THERE.

And oh my god. The original post saw Tim and Jason as rival actors gunning for the lead, but I'm losing my MIND over stage manager Tim fjldsfja [*cough* it's fitting right into the headspace I'm in for my gladiator!Jason WIP *cough* unbalanced power dynamics who* cough cough*] I am SUCH a sucker for that flip flop lmao - I love when one character has all the power EXCEPT in the bedroom fjdlsfja it's tasty self-indulgent food and I am Eating OwO

The Brat (tm) behavior of it all from Jason fjdlksjfa making Tim pay for his power tripping sexual style. It's absolutely serving side characters in the romcom who are always at each other's throats in all of their scenes, but ofc we then later see them making out in a broom closet. 10/10 A+++, got a little spicy with it under the cut lol:

"Nothing to say?" Jason asks lightly.

Rehearsal starts in an hour, a fact which Tim finds about as impossible to ignore as Jason's thigh shoved between his legs. "No corrections? No critiques?" Tim tries not to groan, stifling himself on the heel of his hand; but Jason grabs his wrist. He tugs it behind Tim's back, sliding his other palm further up Tim's chest to wrap around his neck, and Tim gasps wetly. Jason's teeth graze his ear. "No notes for me this time?" Tim swallows, and Jason's fingers clench for just a moment, constricting. "S-sloppy delivery," Tim mutters between clenched teeth. "And your form leaves something to be-- desired-- nn--!" "I'll get right on that," Jason murmurs, and squeezes Tim's throat one more time before he reaches down; as requested.

[a-whispering-echo]

This ficker is SO difficult to draw! Fucking pale ass bitch, with your damn ass pretty face make it FAR more trouble that it's worth waaahhh /oh /nn

Anyway yeah, wip

[youvebeenlivingfictional]

18 for Bruce and Shop girl!!

Talk to Me About a WIP I’m Currently Writing

18. Share the scene you just wrote, written from another character’s POV I haven't started working on the next chapter, so I chose the opening scene from the last chapter

The incessant beeping of the alarm shakes Bruce from his sleep and makes him wince. He begins to turn away from the sound, and then stills as he feels her shift beside him. His grip tightens around her middle instinctively, fingers curling in the fabric of her soft sleep shirt.

"Don't move."

The warning leaves him in a raspy rumble that would send some scattering, but just makes her giggle.

"I have to," She whines.

"Nope." He tugs her closer, pressing his face into her hair and drawing in a deep, calming breath. He hopes that that'll settle her down, but when she continues to reach toward the still-beeping alarm, he reaches over her, irritably whacking at all of the buttons and huffing as it finally does quiet.

“Five more minutes," He insists. It's the second time he's insisted on it this morning, and she reminds him as such. Bruce doesn't care. If he had it his way, she wouldn't get out of bed all day. Neither of them would. The little tactics that Liv and Grant have meted out are starting to take it out of him. He misses being able to take her out on the town, when she could be herself without worrying about who may be watching. Now and again someone would spot Bruce, but it had been in the minority, and he'd become an expert at ducking cameras. This press coverage has made it impossible for the two of them to just—be. To top it all off, with her new job, they hardly have the odd day or afternoon off together anymore. He's happy for her, of course he is, but he misses the quiet days.

Bruce gives her hand a squeeze as she takes hold of his, and nuzzles into her neck. He hones in on the rise and fell of her belly beneath their hands, and the heat of her body pressed against him.

"You alright?” She asks.

Bruce doesn't answer right away. He considers not answering at all. He didn't sleep well. He'd wanted her when he'd come home last night, but she'd been sound asleep, and he didn't have the heart to wake her.

“‘m fine,” He finally mumbles.  

“Are you sure—?” 

“Ssssssh.” 

Bruce turns his head, nuzzling your shoulder and pressing a kiss to her skin, then slotting his thigh tenderly between hers. Slowly, he thinks. Just a little bit—just enough to lull her into staying in bed for a little longer. He untangles their fingers, smoothing his hand gently over her belly. The brush of a his kisses press more firmly to the hinge of her jaw, and the smoothing of his hand gathers and urges the fabric up, up, up over her belly—

"Nn-nn."

Two syllables that effectively shut him down. He groans, flopping onto his back as she gets out of bed. He has just another moment of calm before he's irritably ducking under the covers, hiding from the morning light as the blackout curtains inch upward.

"You're such a baby," He hears her laugh. He pouts. Maybe he is.

But he can at least have breakfast with her before she goes.

[goodb4i-joejo3]

Hello fellow goobers, I'd like to show art of my first digital (wip) artwork of my Cookie Run OC, Cloud Bread Cookie

Content Warning: mentions of c@nn!balism

He's basically a random ahh cloud that was given life that sometimes lures unsuspecting travelers into his cottage in the woods, sings them a nice little song, and totally doesn't start eating them like they're a 3-Michelin star meal. (He once thought about eating Chili Pepper Cookie because he doesn't like the fact that she steals.)

[vulpixelates]

writer vs. oc

tagged by @thebookworm0001 (thank you! 💕)

me vs. the mc of the novel i'm vaguely working on sometimes

tagging my writing friends that i know are on here @bardofheartdive & @synthetic-witch (but no pressure!) & whoever else wants to join in, feel free to tag me 😤

edit: oops i forgot to link the picrew, but here it is!

[pigeonstab]

look at that chassis

[ahaclownnoises]

haaaii… smalll cassiajn wip…. Ginna dinish this nn n oost it oj meie main soon…. toonervois

[hazelpuff]

I just wanted to say that I'm in love (and a bit jealous haha) with your style. It's so pretty and unique! Your hoods are gorgeous and your sims even more! (may i ask you what technique do you use to make them? Pooklet's? Face templates? A lot of sliders?)

I jumped around a lot between maxis-match, semi realistic, etc. trying to find something i liked (and i still feel i didn't quite found something i like 100%) and I'm in awe of how you made something that doesn't look like ts4 nor ts2 but a so cool and pretty in between!!!

(also a disclaimer because I'm a tiny ball of anxiety: this is no shade to anyone who likes other styles, i find them pretty awesome in other people's games, they just look a bit boring on mine. The sims is about having fun and everyone deserves to play it as they like!)

Hi! Thank you for your sweet message!

(disclaimer at the beginning of the post, my keyboard is dying since half a year and i'm putting aside the moment to replace it, but after this post, I think I'm gonna make my mind soon lol. So sorry for any misspeling - you can get double nn, no n, no m, no c, double cc, no c and many other surprises - i tried to fix everything but I could miss something xd).

I've restarted my hood 5 times I think before I got it to my recent version. I'm terrified every time through most of the process, it doesn't come easily to me xD.

Also ofc, everyone can have whatever aesthetics they like - the sims is the perfect series to express that.

With my sims it really depends. I mostly make a sim that I really like and then use it as a base for other sims, but not always. Sometimes I make a sim that I think looks quite unique but it's still missing somethig when it comes to features and makeup face details. During those moments I just open up my body shop sometime later or the next day and try to tweak this sim, sometimes it's more than once. And other times I end up liking the idk 3rd attempt but i still keep going since i want to make more similair sims, and also it's tiring to start the process from the beginning every time xD.

(pics under cut)

or

OR

OR

sry for the baldness xD - i deleted the wip hair conversion files they had and now i can't never change their hairstyles lol, idk how i did it for those two last sims seriously.

As you can see, all those sims have this maxis chain necklace, which means that I started the process using the same base sim and it just evolved into many differet results lol.

Other times I'm editing some maxis face templates to make them more my style (it's really fun!)

I also made one of my sims face into face template to make the rest of the family. I didn't want their faces to be - mouth: mom; eyes: dad; nose: mom - just a mix of both and adding something extra to make them a little more unique. Kinda pookleted their faces with two face templates.

I just really like this face. It can look either goofy or good xD.

I sometimes get inspired by images of some real life ppl (models, actors). When I'm really out of ideas I'm also dowloading sims made by others and use them as a base - just tweaking their features to be my style, mostly it's about face proportions and replacing the cc they used to the one I have. There is muuuch more examples that I could give but a lot of times it's just a result of tweaking some sims a couple of times xD.

Also due to the fact that i make my sims in body shop, idk how their faces will look whit face expressions. I was always using my sims to create previews for my cc conversions so I'm also testing them that way and if something looks too off - I'm just going back to body shop to fix that.

I think I've developed my style around the clay hair conversions that I've made - I wanted the sims in my previews to go well together with clay hair. I remember that I've picked the hair first, THEN sculpted my sims faces. There just werent that many to choose from at 1st.

I don't really use face templates - I have some, but I don't use them much - i think the proportions on faces of my sims are the closest to the maxis sims 🤔. I like their sharp features so when I'm stuck with making a sim, I'm using the pooklet method with those maxis templates but only a tiiiny bit - like 10-20% and only on those parts of the faces that I want to tweak a little more. After that I'm going back to editing the face myself.

(also a lil bonus of my sim from 2017, the only older picture that i have, i found it recently by accident and i think this is the only time when it's kinda in-context to post it 🤣).

[definitelynotaminion]

Rated "R" Ch 2 Pt 7

Rated “R” for Robin, Chapter 2 pt 6

This is a continuation of sneak peaks for Chapter 2 of this Jaytim fic (7k chapter 1). (Also on ao3) The full wip of chapter 2 is up on my patreon, if you’re interested (the full fic is up to 14,080 words so far). Here’s where to read the rest of the released sneak peaks in chronological order on tumblr.

-

Laughter, tumbling over his lips.

"Think I need you to tell me something sweet now, baby." Jason confesses, listening to the worked up sounds on the line. "Nn, like what did you wear under those stuffy suits?"

"Boxers or briefs, Jay? Really?"

“Ooh, is that a ‘fuck off, Jay’--”

-- baby? Again? Fucking, really? At least Jason snaps his mouth shut just short of fucking saying it--

And deals.

Fucking copes, even.

“‘A fuck off’-- Jay.” Tim’s prissy little voice, reprimanding. “No, it’s not a ‘fuck off’. You just wouldn’t have cared about my underwear. Not at one of those parties.”

“I would’ve probably given you the chance.” Jason admits, clenching fingers into a fist at his thigh. “Just-- the rich kids were almost always as fucking empty and boring as the adults at those stupid parties, but there was always...”

“A ‘chance’?” Tim prompted, eyebrow-raise evident. 

“Heh. Yeah.” Jason rolled his shoulders, got more comfortable on the cheap couch. “A small chance. A barely nonzero fucking... Didn’t stop me from being disappointed every time one of them opened their mouths.”

Tim is quiet for a beat, a telling little pause that has Jason huffing.

“You wouldn’t disappoint me, Replacement-wonder.” Jason rolls his eyes. “Come on, at the very least you had thoughts behind your eyes, about something other than gossip and lip-service fundraising.”

“Thoughts. Yeah.” Tim says, more of that self-recriminating wryness jumping in. “I wasn’t... but I suppose if I could have formed a sentence around you, it would at least be entertaining.”

“Cat got your tongue, Tim?” The right name again, hitting just like it should, as the comm picks up Tim’s breathing. “Were you worried about giving yourself away if you talked to me?”

A mutter Jason can’t quite pick up, then a breath of laughter.

“I wouldn’t have been able to talk to you,” Tim laughs, sounding strangled. “Not about anything. But if you talked to me... I wouldn’t have been able to do anything else, either.”

He could almost see it, a wide-eyed little Tim, acting different around Jason, a little breathless and interested. Interested in something beyond the newest Wayne charity case, anyway. Interested in Jay.

Even if he didn’t remember their one, stolen meeting, there was... possibility. So much possibility that he ached.

[squid-bunny-msi]

ur art is so scrumptious we’re moots on tt but im so happy u have tumblr now bc I’m never on tt 🙏

Hi there! Im also happy to be on tumblr nn

Always wanted to make a fandom tumblr account it was my 13 year old me dream yesyes

AND when I feel the need to post a wip I can now post it here instead of an ugly camera shot on tiktok stories lmaoa

[trashisstillhere]

Oof… today has just been ton of hard work and chores so I barely got time to at least doodle something.

But at least I got to finish this today before I am bout to drop off to bed-

Ninja cuddle pile!!

Randy with 4 of my dear rc9gn ninja ocs.,, ft. First Ninja.

Yes, even Esther is here lol,, this is more of him in his ‘redemption arc’ (he ain’t evil but he did cause lots of damage thanks to the crystals in his back that he unfortunately haven’t gotten out yet.)

Just like me, they’re very exhausted. They didn’t even feel like taking off their ninja masks and everything, while tired ninja dad mentor watches over them..

Yeah just some fluff I wanted to make real quick hehe,,, plus i really needed it honestly.

Speaking off.. it’s about time I told this big news before it keeps eating me alive which it has for few days now (may be a bit ranty and venty so uh yeah, be prepared for that):

on the beginning of June, I’ll be going on summer vacation with my family. From what I have heard from mom (the one who planned this vacation), we’re probably gonna be out of the country for about like…2 whole months.. yes, 2 months. Meaning both June AND July. Which honestly is too much for me. This isn’t the first time we gotten on a vacation this long either, this has happened before years back. And ever since I got this news just a few days ago, I’ve been feeling not so well, like in a ‘mixed’ mood (both good and bad). I don’t mean to sound like an ungrateful complaining no fun having kind of person but.. I ain’t that excited about it. Why? Like I said, this has happened before and the last time we had this, it… was shitty. Just.. literal shit. and along with a few more vacations shorter than that, it didn’t get any better honestly, still a few ‘complaints’ here and there. THATS why I don’t feel so giddy about it.. plus I am absolutely terrified of airplanes and my fear of heights isn’t really helping with that And this whole thing has made me not quite be able to focus on things i really want to work on rn, such as the next part of the NN AU Fanfic that is still a wip.. egh…

Uh yeah, that is the news. Again, sorry for it being kinda venty and all.. I just really needed to tell this now. Though it would be better to do so now then just before the day comes.

,,,,

Anyyywayyyy,, don’t mind me, just go enjoy this Nina fluffiness while I’m off to bed-

I’ll be fine, no worries. /gen