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someone straight : u can’t make all the characters queer !

me :

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Blogs to Follow to Help Develop Your OC

On top of having this blog to encourage creating OCs, I also want to give people access to resources that can help you out in creating your OC! Here is a compilation of blogs to follow, as well as a few other links to help further your development!

maxkirin - Novelist blogger who offers many great pieces of writing advice, as well as videos!

about-your-oc - Writing prompts and resources for OCs

character-prompts - A collection of short character prompts

develop your oc - A collection of prompts and questions for your OCs

faceclaims-rpg - A blog dedicated to finding “face claims”, or irl people to represent your character’s appearance. They include a large array of tags and a directory of faceclaims, including POC.

tasksweekly - A blog dedicated to bringing more advanced prompts to get your creative juices flowing. Check out their info page and just snoop around.

dear-indies - A blog dedicated more specifically towards RPers with guides, tutorials, masterposts and face claim help.

howtofightwrite - An excellent resource for tips and tricks on writing combat and fight scenes, as well as what not to do.

The Script Family - This is a link to a separate masterpost, all of the blogs listed being absolutely excellent resources for writing and research. Just reach in and take a look, there’s answers to questions you didn’t even know you had.

writing-prompt-s - Short prompts to write stories off of

tiftswritingcorner - Prompts and challenges

helpfulwritingstuff - Reblogs of random resources and tips for writing.

heywriters - Writing tips, inspiration and resources

writingwithcolor - A blog dedicated to writing and resources centered on racial & ethnic diversity

fixyourwritinghabits - A collection of resources and tips for writing

fuckyeahcharacterdevelopment - A hub of information for character creation, development and writing

writeworld - A blog dedicated to prompts/inspiration to get writing via pictures, art and music

promptsandpointers - A blog dedicated to bringing advice and inspiration for writing

yourocs - Questions to flesh out your characters

writing-questions-answered - A blog dedicated to answering questions about writing help

I visit almost all of these blogs quite regularly, and I highly recommend going through these blogs for help and inspiration. These are just my personal recommendations, there are definitely more blogs out there you can dig for of course!

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The best way to learn more about your OC is make one of those My Daily Routine things for them.

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character: *has frost powers* me: your backstory is family related trauma isn’t it

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Instead of a stoic hero and a chatty villain or a chatty hero and a stoic villian imagine if they’re both chatty. Just, the villian trying their best to kill the hero while the two of them have a in-depth discussion about their opinion of pumpkin spice

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Prompt Masterlist

This will be updated as new prompt sets are posted. All of these are dialogue prompts, except for the ‘pen pals’ set. 🙂

Best Friends to Lovers Prompts

Angst Prompts

Wistful Prompts

Rivals to Lovers Prompts

Gift Giving Prompts

Pen Pals Prompts

Dark Academia Prompts

Betrayal Prompts

Estranged Friends to Lovers Prompts

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Trying to draw buildings

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I've been putting so much of my own personality and experiences into my characters lately that they might as well be horcruxes. I'm never gonna die

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Alright.

Instead of whispered, consider:

murmured

mumbled

muttered

breathed

sighed

hissed

mouthed

uttered

intoned

susurrated

purred

said in an undertone

gasped

hinted

said low

said into someone’s ear

said softly

said under one’s breath

said in hushed tones

insinuated

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Height difference

Try it yourself

Tagging :

@u-make-my-heart-tsumtsum @keibby @akaashi-bby @cultsumu

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where the superhero and villain have a common friend that they have to hold it together for

“claire is getting married next week”

“i can reschedule the death ray”

“OH CAN YOU?” 

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Developing a Character’s Personality Using Psychology (Part 1 of 5)

Big 5 Personalities: Conscientiousness

A well rounded, developed character feels real. They feel like someone you would meet at school, at work, or at the coffee shop. They could be your family member or part of your circle of friends. But how do you develop such a realistic character? How do you go beyond basic characteristics such as hair and eye color, job preference, and favorite color? In this post, I’m going to show you a tool based in science and psychology that I use to create my characters.

Non-modifiable features such as ethnicity, age, and physical characteristics (hair color, skin color, eye color, etc.) are important only to character development only to a certain extent. While these features might give a reader a clue regarding the character’s background or culture, they are not certain. Families and cultures are diverse. Being part of a certain nationality won’t immediately win the hearts of your readers.

So, what will? Their personality. In fact, there is nothing more important that the quirks and baseline emotions that make up your person. If you have the character’s personality down, then certain things such as job preference, favorite color, favorite tv show, will flow together naturally.

When I have a character in mind, I will often take an online personality test to see where they line up. There are several out there to choose from. Myers Briggs is probably the most famous personality tests, but I don’t usually start there. I use the Big 5.

The Big 5 tests a person in the following 5 areas: consciousness, neuroticism (or negative emotion), openness, extroversion, and agreeableness. Now, when you look at this list, there are certain negative or positive connotations associated with each of these characteristics, however, when the data is analyzed, that’s not always the case.

For example, people extremely high in Conscientiousness (characterized by people who are always busy or are very orderly) can become too orderly. This can give rise to certain conditions such as anorexia. This is, of course, not to say that all people suffering from anorexia are high in Conscientiousness or vice versa, but the personality type that is common among people with this disease is Conscientiousness.

All of the big 5 personality traits are like this. They are a spectrum, and each are associated with pros and cons.

Conscientiousness is broken down into two categories: orderliness and industriousness. People high in orderliness have a higher sensitivity to disgust. Cleanliness is next to godliness. They often see the world as black and white, geometrical in shape, and everything in it has its own box. These are your perfectionists. Now this is not always bad, but you can see where it could go a little off the rails. With people extremely high in conscientiousness, anything perceived to be wrong or flawed must be removed or eradicated—or starved.

On the opposite side of this spectrum would be an individual unbothered by messes or disorder. It’s like the just don’t see the mess. Or they see the mess, but are not bothered by it.

In industriousness, your character has trouble sitting still and relaxing. They are always doing something—almost as if they have an aversion to inactivity. These people will often say they ‘just have to stay busy.’ Obviously, the problem related to this is that overly industrious people rarely relax and can wear their bodies down through constant stress.

However, personalities with high levels of conscientiousness are often on track to find success. Their perfectionism and constant work increase the odds that their ventures will turn out. Most people lie somewhere in the middle of the spectrum—neither unaware of messes nor overly concerned with them.

The most interesting part about these personality traits is that they are modifiable. A person can train themselves to become more conscientious over time. Often this can be done through forming a schedule and sticking to it, setting goals for oneself and working to meet them, and create habits conducive to accomplishing more work.

As an example, I’m going to talk about one of my characters who is very high in conscientiousness. In my novel SURVIVING MIDAS, my character Jared is a seventeen-year-old slave working on a drug farm. He has very little in terms of personal items, but each of them have a place and are always neat and tidy. His high levels of industriousness have not gone unnoticed by his captors—not that he is overly interested in their venture, he just can’t help himself—and he is given more responsibility than the others. When he’s not working for his masters, he’s always scheming and working toward escape.

So that’s a very unusual setting for a character with high levels of conscientiousness. Notice that I didn’t say he had excellent hygiene—because his current life doesn’t allow him this luxury. But his personality still shows up in other ways throughout the story.

So where do your characters line up in the conscientiousness spectrum? Tell me about them in the comments below.  

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Writing a Blind or Visually Impaired Character

A Multi-Step Guide Written by a Visually Impaired Writer and Blogger

I’m hoping this blog will over time develop its own following, and when it does people will inevitably see my bio and notice what I included: I’m visually impaired.

Yes, a visually impaired writer, and I’ve written with two blind characters before so I have some practice in the field.

So, inevitably, someone is going to ask how to write a blind character.

Or, at least, I hope you’ll ask someone who’s actually blind or visually impaired about writing a blind character before you get too involved with your new WIP.

All parts will be tagged #blindcharacter in my blog, and I will add links to every post as I finish each part. Follow my blog for more writing advice.

Note, this post updates fairly often and old versions are still floating around out there. The most current version of this post is pinned to my blog with any new guides or links you might of missed.

As of 24 January 2021, this is the most extensive and screen reader friendly version of this post.

Part One: Crafting the Blind Character

In which I tell you how to begin making a blind character who is more than a cardboard cutout

Part Two: Narrative Choice, Visual Description, Verbal Description, Social Interaction

In which I give you a basic rundown on how to write from the perspective of a character who can’t see and still make the narration descriptive

Part Three: Tropes and Clichés to Avoid

Your blind readers will thank you for not being the 5000th person to do this and manage to actually finish your story. (Do you have any idea how many stories I’ve noped out of within two chapters because of these clichés? A Lot.)

-New- Part Four: Canes, Guide Dogs, and O&M

Everything I can tell you about 1) how to learn how to use a cane 2) how a cane works 3) how to describe what your character experiences with their cane 4) everything I know on guide dogs

Part Five: Small Aspects of being Blind You Never Thought Of

5 January 2021 Edit: This link has been fixed to correspond with the correct post

Or, really, very normal everyday things for blind people, the inclusion of which will make your characters more real and authentic. It’s the tiny details.

Part Six: Should You Cure Your Character’s Blindness? (Short Answer: No)

There’s no way to write a cure for your blind character that doesn’t make blind readers hate you. Sorry. We came here to finally experience a relatable character who experiences the world like us, but none of us are getting cured so seeing this character we learned to love become something alien from us in the end feels like a slap in the face

Why I’m Blind and What I See -NEW-

I thought I’d finally make a post explaining the complicated situation about my vision. Includes an explanation of visual snow and exotropia, two of the three causes for my vision issues.

Writing Blind Characters Falling in Love, an Advice Post:

Someone asked what being blind and falling in love have to do with each other. Honestly, blindness changes your perspective on everything and it makes an impact on every relationship you have. This includes some things that you definitely do not want your character’s love interest to be/do.

Writing Blind Jokes (Should You Do It?)

You know those flow charts of “should you do x?” going around? It’s like that, but screen reader friendly. Should you write blind jokes. It’s pretty complicated and there are a lot of possible scenarios and details to consider.

Advice for Writing Toph Beifong -NEW-

In this I discuss what I would like to see done in fanfiction with Toph’s character after ten years of reading Avatar the Last Airbender fanfiction

A small essay addressing the frequently asked question on giving your blind character a superpower to help them “see.”

It’s became a popular question, so to make the answer easier/faster for everyone to access, I wrote what will usually be my initial answer. Below there are a few links to some notable past questions on this subject.

Mourning My Vision, it’s More than Depression. 

A small personal essay addressing the nuances of the mourning period you experience with a new disability. The mourning period is mentioned in other guides, but this is more detailed.

Dealing with Heightened Senses, a video by Molly Burke with additional commentary by me

While Molly talks about the myths and truths about heightened senses, I talk about the correlation with blindness and neuro-divergency and how co-morbid disorders/disabilities might affect sensory processing.

Satirical Commentary on the phrase “that blank look in their eyes” used too often in fiction to identify a blind character

a:tla, I’m looking at you (and my eyes aren’t blank)

I Found a Lost Piece of Blindness History

My grandmother told me about her blind aunt and how she sent letters. It led me to speculate about all the O&M things people develop on their own but never get a chance to pass onto other blind people. Technology and techniques are lost in history and reinvented, including the white cane ad guide dogs.

Includes a little history on the introduction of guide dogs into the 20th century

The Following are Answered Anon Questions

Making Your Blog More Accessible

Making Links Accessible to Screen Readers

Reblogging to Add an Image Description to Someone Else’s Image

Why I Write Image Descriptions

Writing Blind Characters

Advice for a Character Who was Born Blind

Over-Protective Parents of a Blind Character, Why They’re Over-Protective and How to Avoid Crossing a Line

A Blind Character in Victorian Era Historical Fiction

Is It Bad Not to Have Guide Dogs in a Fantasy/Historical Setting Without Guide Dogs (short answer: it’s not bad)

Someone Asked About My Thoughts on a Medusa-like Character Blinding Herself to Avoid Hurting Anyone

-New- Characters Who Have Recently Gone Blind and Avoiding Inspiration Porn

Talking about Popular Blind Characters In Media

Does Daredevil’s Echolocation Negate His Blindness

Someone Else was Asked How to Write Daredevil Fanfiction

Blind Characters with Superpowers/Fighting Styles

World Setting where the General Population has a Superpower

Superpowers that don’t involve sight, Five questions to ask yourself if this superpower is a bad idea or a good one

-New- Your character would not use a cane as a weapon, it’s a bad idea

D&D/Roleplaying Blind Characters

-New- Animal Familiars Acting as Service Animals and Advice for Communicating with Your DM

-New- Portraying Older Blind Characters + Causes for Vision Loss with Old Age

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How to draw Afro textured 4c hair - an explanation/Tutorial

For those of you that don’t know what 4c hair is, 4c hair is a hair texture type that contains coils to small and tight that the hair appears to be more puffy rather than curly ( like to photo below ) this is in NO WAY to be confused with curly hair. there is a drastic difference.

As a black artist that primarily draws characters with 4c hair, I’ve been asked many times to do a tutorial on 4c hair so here we go~

before we get into 4c hair, lets take a moment to fully understand it by talking about hair texture in a general sense first

let’s take a look at this example of straight hair vs curly hair ( 1 type straight hair vs 3 type curly hair )

If you take a moment to compare the two you’ll notice straight hair is flat, it has no texture. Straight hair perfectly hangs down similar to liquid-like silk. It’s lack of curl pattern is the reason as to why it hangs perfectly flat.

curly hair on the other hand doesn’t lie down flat and silky like straight hair, It’s more thick. Curly hair in it’s raw and unstyled state has a trapezoid like shape this is because the sides of the hair spread more outward.

So why is this? Why is straight hair flat and curly hair thick?

the answer to that question is a thing called piling up. When it comes to hair texture, the shape of the hair strands aren’t the only thing that matters, its how the strands coexist with each other, Curly hair strands coexist by piling up on top each other.

moisture also effects hair texture too, different hair types absorbs moisture differently, thus the thickness of each hair type is different. 

…..soooo, how does this all relate to how to draw 4c hair?? 

Well let’s take a look at the drawing below. Notice how the arrows go outward more as the hair texture gets curlier. As we’ve already discussed, this is because hair piles up, The curlier the hair texture, the more it piles up on each other, the bigger it gets, the more outward the arrows go.

Out of any hair texture, 4C hair has the most curls. Because of this, the hair piles up on each other so much that it doesn’t lie down flat like straight hair, nor does it make a trapezoid like shape like curly hair, it instead becomes more cloud like.❤️

This is what you need to take into account when it comes to drawing 4C hair.

Think of it as piling up a bunch of cotton balls on each other. The most cotton on top of top to lead to a bigger patch of  cotton. this is 4c hair.

How to not draw 4c hair:

Garnet fanart. Let’s talk about Garnet Fanart. I notice a trend that when artists draw Garnet from Steven universe, her hair texture is usually changed to 3 type curly like texture. This subtle form of White washing has confused me because this is inaccurate. 

Garnet’s hair is in the shape of a cube. Though 3 type hair piles up on each other, it isn’t curly nor thick enough for their hair to stay in the shape of a cube. Curly hair lies down more than 4c hair. So garnet’s hair being in the shape of a cube is a dead giveaway that it is 4C. Why do you think hairstyles like flat tops are usually seen on black men with 4c hair? It’s because, the 4c hair texture is thick and strong enough to stay in whatever shape you put it in.

please, if you’re drawing a character with 4c hair, avoid drawing it like curly 3 type hair, this is very anti-black and texturist.

So, how do you draw 4c hair?

honestly, its the most easy thing in the world

i wanna clarify that blobby looking 4c drawings ( like the one on the top left ) can work depending on how cartoony your art style is.

Another thing that I want to greatly clarify when it comes to drawing 4C hair is, YOU. DONT. NEED. TO. DRAW. EVERY. HAIR. STRAND!…..like, seriously. I’ve gotten many messages about how 4C hair is hard to draw, and it’s always left me confused; but then I find out that the same people that have trouble drawing 4C hair, attempt to draw every single strand of hair. This is unnecessarily time consuming because it’s merely impossible to get every single detail down, especially when you have a simple cartoon style. 4C hair does not require much effort, all you’re doing is drawing lumps. It’s that simple, nothing more nor nothing less.

The reason why I greatly advise all of you to avoid drawing every single hair strand is because in real life, when you look at a 4C textured Afro, your eyes don’t pick up on each individual hair strand like straight or curly hair. 4C hair, appears to be more undefined and cloud like, so attempting to draw each and every individual strand is unnecessary and will most likely end up looking inaccurate.

Anyways! that’s it for now! there will be a part 2 to this tutorial that will come out next week! i hope you guys have learned from this and apply it to your black character in your art!~

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The em dash is rich with power. But you’ll lose yourself.

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i see a lot of ya’ll self-depreciating over how much you cry and like…generally speaking, crying is a very healthy process. it’s an important means of 

expressing & processing strong emotions

relieving stress

experiencing catharsis 

moving on to a recovery period

this mindset that people just need to train themselves out of crying…that really worries me. bc the alternative is to repress those feelings instead of expressing them…and from firsthand experience i can tell you it is very much not worth doing that. i’ve been there, i’ve done it, i’ve bought into that mindset. i thought it would make me stronger and less vulnerable. instead i fell so out of touch with myself, it took years of therapy for me to learn to identify my own emotions again. i literally forgot how to tell when i’m upset or sad, bc my body had been trained out of expressing it. that’s an extreme scenario but it’s not uncommon, and if you spend too much time criticizing yourself over your own emotions, it can creep up on you.

i like to think we all know how harmful it is to tell children to just “stop crying, dammit.” turns out, the same is true for adults.

 just. please change the mindset that being visibly upset is somehow shameful. if you find yourself crying a lot, that probably means something in your external and internal experiences needs to change: you don’t deserve to feel angry, frustrated, frightened, sad, or upset so frequently that it distresses you. those are only supposed to be sometime emotions. 

but telling yourself to just. stop crying, or to stop feeling what you’re feeling? that’s harmful, and it doesn’t work. no one controls their emotions out of sheer will–at best we shut them down, and then pay heavily for it later. if we want our minds to feel better, we need to give them assistance, not threats. threatening or bullying our bodies and minds to behave the way we want them to will always backfire.

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Writer's Guide: Guns

I'm not the biggest fan of guns but I need them in my new WIP. Guns are probably one of the most used tools within most medias, besides being one of the most misused tools. So how can we write them? (my other post on guns focuses on the damage guns can do to a body so go there if that's what your looking for)

Part of a Gun

Action: The action is the brain of the gun. It is the part where you load, fire and eject the casings.

Stock: The stock is the handle of the gun. It is made up of the butt and the fore-end.

Barrel: The Barrel is the nose of the gun, the point where the bullets are fired from. Once a bullet is fired, it travels through the barrel and out the muzzle.

Muzzle: the muzzle is the hole the bullet exit from.

Bore: The bore is the inside of the barrel

Cylinder: The Cylinder holds the rounds in a revolver. It rotates as the gun is fired, pumping bullets into the chamber.

Grip: The Grip is where you hold gun.

Hammer: The Hammer on a revolver is a pin like instrument that strikes the primer which fires the bullet from the gun.

Clip: An clip stores the rounds of ammunition on a single line-like device that can be placed into magazine.

Magazine: The Magazine is a container that is spring activated, which can be detachable of fixed. It holds cartridges for a repeating firearm.

Trigger: The Trigger is what you pull yo fire the gun

Trigger Guard: The trigger guard is the loop that fits in front of the trigger to shield it from accidental firing.

Ammunition

Bullet: is the projectile that exits the gun.

Cartridges/Shell: This is the case, primer, propellant and projectile (bullet). The bullet sits in the cartridge case.

Shotshell: Are rounds of shotgun ammunition, containing pellets rather than a bullet.

Gun Safety

1. Keep the muzzle pointed downwards (not near your feet or others) when not using the gun.

2. Unload gun when not in use

3. Always check the safety.

4. Be sure of your aim. Don't fire blindly because you'll end up wasting bullets and you might hurt somebody

5. If the gun is jammed, don't look down the barrel to see why it's blocked. Point it away from you, open the action and remove the blockage safely.

6. Keep your barrel clean. Any excess cleaning fluid even dirt can mess up your shot or even cause blockages that can burst the barrel

7. Don't alter your gun in any way on your own. Even if you're a self proclaimed expert, don't touch the gun. You can fuck up the intergrity of the weapon.

How to Hold a Handgun

1. Your dominant hand should grip the gun, high along the back strap (back of grip). This will give you better leverage and handle the recoil better.

2. Place your other hand against the other side of the grip. Four fingers should sit snugly under the trigger, while your index finger should rest against the trigger itself.

How to Hande a Rifle/Long barrelled Gun

Hold the rifle with two hands, hold the grip of the rifle with your dominant hand. Your fingers should wrap about the base of the rifle, under the trigger guard.

Your non-dominant hand should be wrapped firmly around the base of the grip. Holding the gun right will help reduce recoil and ensure better control.

How to fire a Gun

Align your sights. Your gun has a sight at the front and at the rear. Aim and align your sights through these points. There should be equal space between the sights.

Set your sight. When you’re aiming a gun, you’re you are looking through the front sight, the rear sight, and your target. When you're aiming at the target, it will look blurry. The sights should but clear.

Press rather than pull the trigger. You should squeeze it, applying constant pressure until the weapon fires.

Things every Writer should know about Guns

Hollow Point Bullets are not more deadly than full metal jacket bullets. Though a hollow point will cause damage, full metal bullets are actually more likely to over-penetrate and move when with the flesh, causing a more devastating wound.

Guns are really loud. How loud exactly? Most heavy duty guns could cause hearing loss. It simply isn't possible for two characters to have a lovely chat while firing weapons.

Rifles with scopes make it easier to shoot but they won't make a beginner a sudden genius marksman. Scopes help but they don't perform miracles.

Shotguns shoot shells not bullets.

Your character should not tuck a just fired handgun into their waistband or else they will get a nasty burn.

Silencers or better yet, suppressors do not silence your shots. They actually lower the sound by a few decibels.

Don't have your character fire gun sideways. They will fuck up their wrist and look stupid while doing it.

Most rifles and shotguns aren't pump action

If you drop your gun, if won't fire itself.

The clip and magazine are two different things. They can't be used as synonyms.

When somebody is shot, they don't go flying back. They crumple on the spot.

The exit wound of a bullet is larger than the entry point.

Most beginners will have trouble with recoil. Bloody noses and black eyes are common is one doesn't know what their doing.