#[[ and a lot has happened since then ]]

[min0uze]

Bless me with your smile

[sysig]

Ah, childhood memories (Patreon)

[penumbraphantasm]

long time no dunmeshee

[haunth0use]

Vague wano spoilers

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

Hello may 31th anon! Look at that, another year behind us and a new one to come. Have a nice day! ₍՞◌′ᵕ‵ू◌₎♡

[andthebeanstalk]

Hey anyone else remember the episode of Adventure Time called "Evergreen" where it's revealed that the original bearer of the crown to whom it was "forever linked" was actually a neglected child (and prior reincarnation of Finn) named Gunter trying to be like his wizard father?? Anyone??? Because I had fully forgotten until re-watching the episode last night and I'm losing my mind about the implications.

(This episode is also a devastating look at how a mistreated child unconsciously learns that he must treat himself and those he has power over as cruelly as he has been treated. Adventure Time has so much sadness and madness, y'all.)

[forecast0ctopus]

Any advice on drawing McCoy? I’m not used to drawing ancient wrinkley bastards (affectionate) and it’s surprisingly tough v-v

FOR SURE lmao i made. a diagram. just a warning that i am going to be irritating and long winded because u just hit a topic i really like sorry lmao

so first off i did some traces just to show whats there vs redraws to show my interpretation

ive said this on other asks but again jsyk, tracing isnt bad!! its a tool. theres some stuff with intellectual property and whatnot but using tracing to study shapes and forms is a really valuable practice.

also just taking some time to learn facial structures and anatomy is super useful, reading what bones and muscles are where and how they interact with one another. taking this info and staring in the mirror and moving your face around and thinking about it. just really furthers understanding of how the face works. trying to sound normal about this but i love anatomy and motion and physics and whatever

anyways im going to go through all the numbered points so there's no confusion. 1. forehead lines - self explanatory. more prominent when brows are raised 2. crows feet - at the outer corners of the eyes, more prominent when smiling or squinting 3. nasolabial folds - the folds that go from the corners of the nose to the corners of the mouth. more prominent when the mouth is wide, like smiling 4. brow furrow - self explanatory, most prominent when brows are furrowed. mccoy tends to have two right next to his eyebrows, kirk has one in the middle. everyones face works different lmao 5. chin crease - caused by how the chin and lower lip interact. 6. nasojugal groove - start from the inner corners of the eye and can extent over the cheeks. everyone has these and idk why people dont like them i think theyre really cool!!!! but Society. i guess. :/ 7. eye bags - caused by the skin sagging beneath the eyes. mccoy isnt even that old in tos i think hes meant to be mid 40s by the end of the 5 year mission, hes just got really prominent eye bags lmao 8. idk what the name is for these, but when the mouth is wide and pushes the skin to the sides, these folds sometimes form outside of the nasolabial folds 9. philtrum - the groove above the upper lip. i dont usually draw this but mccoy's struck me as prominent enough that i usually draw it on him 10. masseter - the muscle that moves the jaw up and down. its a pretty rugged muscle and while i wouldnt say mccoy's is especially prominent, it kind of extends that nasojugal groove from certain angles/positions 11. orbicularis oris - mouth muscle, usually easier to see when lips are pursed or frowns are pulled. mccoy's is pretty prominent from 3/4ths or side, his mouth tends to protrude in profile 12. this isnt a muscle but more of a line defining the planes of the face, but since i drew it i felt i should explain lmao

a few points:

im an animator i tend to exaggerate and emphasize certain things so i usually make him more square.

i like to combine eyebags and crows feet for brevity/flow, same with nasojugal grooves, eyebags, and masseter lines. my approach is always subject to change based on pose, expression, reference image, etc.

i take out details that i deem redundant or cluttering and keep what details i need to make things feel Right

all this info is applicable to any character of any age, its just in how you apply it and facial proportions that willl change how old a character is perceived to be

there's a lot more with drawing a Character rather than an Actor, just because the features are there doesnt necessarily mean things will feel correct? its very much in the mannerisms and poses and expressions

i only went over my approach to his likeness but not really body type or posing or anything idk if u want that i could always try to answer that later haha

_______________

anyways all that info kind of exists nebulously in my brain while i draw its not like im sitting there thinking Must Draw. Nasolabial Fold...... i jsut do what feels right with the visual info i have. also i love specificity in faces.... i dont like to be a hater but when every character is drawn the same it pisses me off a little lmao. so

also dont take my word as The Only Way to do anything i just draw how i like to draw and no one should feel like these are things that Must be done to be a good artist or anything do whatever the hell u wanna do

[sugarpasteltmnt]

(whispers) hey friends I appreciate your excitement but gentle reminder it’s not very polite to ask fanfic writers when the next chapter is gunna come out

[pierogish]

important summer activities

[radiantmists]

reading animorphs sequentially instead of in whatever random order you can get your hands on them is such a trip because you can see these kids getting progressively better at war and worse at being happy, you can see how traumatic events from one book echo into the next ones but never quite get dealt with because these kids have no real way to take care of their mental health, you can see their relationships deepening but simultaneously gaining friction and faultlines as they learn just how far they'd go for each other but also how far they'd go in general...

obviously this series was meant to be episodic in nature, and i actually think that might be the better way to first encounter it, but the arc of the series in publication order is extremely well-crafted

[buckttommy]

One thing that was very interesting to me in this episode is the way Eddie was just... not joking about Buck's love interests.

That stuck out.

Usually when Eddie talks to Buck about his love interests, it's with an edge of fond exasperation, teasing laced around his gently delivered truths, but there was none of that this episode. Buck told Eddie he went to see Natalia and it was like something switched. Eddie's entire affect changed when Buck started talking about Natalia. He went from being loose and easy (as loose and easy as one can get when standing at a grave) to being... not combative, necessarily, but visibly actively not wanting to engage in conversation about her either, and it's not...

It's not even jealousy!! We joke a lot about Eddie and jealousy, but it wasn't that at all. It was a fatigue that comes with silence, that comes with holding your tongue, that comes with keeping secrets. Especially when Buck said that he feels like Natalia sees him. That look Eddie gave him immediately after? That was pure hurt. That was him saying I see you too, I've always seen you. But he can't say that. He can't say that, because to say that would be to say so many other things about the way he sees Buck, and to say so many other things would mean to have to unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth about the ONE thing he's been holding onto ever since he was shot.

I don't know. I don't know, but I think Eddie taking Buck on a date and I think about how Eddie left his son—his heart—in Buck's care so they could bake cookies together (which becomes profoundly more significant in an episode where Christopher was talking about baking smores with his mom), and I think about Kenny saying Ryan has been doing some very nuanced work in the back half of this season, I'm like

Oh. Oh. I see it, thank you. Loud and clear.

[ruvviks]

hanan at age 24 vs hanan at age 35 :] becoming a test subject at arasaka special programs really changes people huh

taglist (opt in/out): @shellibisshe, @florbelles, @ncytiri, @hibernationsuit, @stars-of-the-heart, @vvanessaives, @katsigian, @radioactiveshitstorm, @estevnys, @adelaidedrubman, @celticwoman, @rindemption, @carlosoliveiraa, @noirapocalypto, @dickytwister, @killerspinal, @euryalex, @ri-a-rose, @velocitic, @thedeadthree

[lycanthian]

they should invent a blaseball that is

[bonefall]

Do you have a design for Bright Storm? I'm fond of the wise older figure thing you're doing with her

I do NOW

Made her, as well as a revamp of my old Thunder Storm design (I last drew him like a year ago!!) in preparation for some character summaries I plan to bang out after finishing a couple drafts, but Bright in particular gets requested so much (anon you're like the 4th person) that HERE, lady girl and her son be upon ye

I'm thinking about doing the BB!DOTC character summaries in "family" posts, so they're all grouped together the way I plan them to act in the story. Every family is telling a little mini-story of its own, in a way, from the Frost family and their inventing prowess, to the Heart family and how the kits react to Bumble's exile, to the Storm family and how they grapple with Clear Sky's influence.

I wanted to make sure Bright Storm was very large and powerful looking, but in a round, kind of "humble" way. She downplays her strength, her intelligence, and even her better judgement.

So she has these big cheeks, fluffy primordial pouch, poofy tail, keeps her head low-ish. Tends to deny compliments.

I was commiserating with my partner the other day about how intelligent characters aren't allowed to be thick-bodied. So between my fat, beloved Bumble the translator and Bright Storm the wise woman battle strategist I'm feeding us both

I needed to "finalize" their stripe pattern, because I actually plan for TIGERSTAR to have the same one. I'm probably going to update my Tawnypelt and Bramblestar designs to have it too; if they don't look better with Goldenflower's.

I just like the irony and bitterness of it. That these ancient stripes, once so associated with compassion and righteous fury, turn into a "legacy" so divorced from what Thunder Storm and Bright Storm stood for.

Becoming a symbol for the idea of modern ThunderClan and the culture of the new times, not the principles it was founded on.

Also I HAD to do the design thing where Thunder Storm's stripes look like top surgery scars lmao, my beloved transmasc boy

Anyway, I've decided that Thunder Storm was a REALLY dark orange. It bugs me a little, especially in-canon, that he looks nothing like either parent. So in BB he's not too far off color-wise from his mama.

I also removed the old "mane" and replaced it with combination white chest + his father's shoulder burls. The mane is going to become a Forest Cat trait, which is why it's going to get so prominent in ThunderClan.

Instead, Mountain Cats have a REALLY high concentration of ear tufts in their genes. They're also huge and generally hairy.

Funny enough though they're also "oily." They come from the Lake Cat population which was pretty water-resistant because of constantly dealing with the lake, and they haven't lived in the Mountains long enough for natural selection to get rid of it.

It's going to become SUPER advantageous for those who move to the River Kingdom, but become less prominent in the other populations.

But for now, Mountain Cats are kinda... well, naturally 'stinky.' That's not a BAD thing to cats who are animals who LIKE strong smells, but it is a notable trait that I'd like The Wind Runner in particular to comment on.

Thunder Storm: "Well? What did she say?"

Bumble: "Ummmmmm......"

Thunder Storm: "be honest"

Bumble: "she says she smelled you coming when you were upwind. rudely."

99% of the time when I'm changing character eye colors, it's to make them NOT blue because there's too many blue-eyed characters in WC imo. BUT.

I think it was another tiny waste to have the narrative constantly stressing Clear Sky's blue, blue eyes, almost like they're hypnotizing, and then they never really comment on what Thunder's eye color signals to other people.

So I've got an idea; instead of amber, Thunder Storm has ELECTRIC BLUE eyes. Almost green, like his mother's minty ones.

Intense as his father's, but more focused. Sharp. Shocking.

Side note: in my research I actually learned it's easier for tripod cats to RUN than it is for them to walk. They can "canter" like a horse, but when they go slow they have to hop. Taking this into consideration.

I put a splash of white on the little bit of lower limb that Thunder Storm has on the leg, so it sticks out a bit more. I don't want it to be hidden I want it to be prominent

I also figured out a hilarious trick for Bright Storm to pull on Sky's Clan at some point lmao

Thunder's crew is in conflict with Sky's cats and the attacks are getting more and more frequent. They decide they need some extra time to carry out some kind of hunt or diplomatic mission, but Bright Storm only has a small group of cats to pull off a stunt with.

She knows she can't fight them head on, but she NEEDS to buy her son more time, so she hatches a plan.

Clear Sky values his intelligence and his ferocity very much. To a fault, even. He loves to outsmart his opponents and overpower them-- so Bright Storm gets all her cats to build a very large, very tall, nearly impenetrable wall out of briar thorns. There's only one way in; the well-guarded tunnel they've constructed in the front.

It would be a challenge for a lesser cat. But Clear Sky, clever devil he is, realizes they've made a fatal flaw; they've built their camp right next to the trees. His fighters don't need to jump over the wall or push through it, the oaks are their allies!

So, while Thunder's cats are all surely sleeping, he gathers his best men and come through the canopy. In well-trained patrols, they swoop down into the camp and prepare for battle.

and no one is there.

You see, there was only one way in... and only one way out.

And Clear Sky and his best fighters watch with HORROR as the tiny crew of guards seals that entrance up like the neck of a bag. There are no trees to climb INSIDE the wall, and it's too tall to hop out of. It won't hold them forever, but it will hold them JUST LONG ENOUGH.

Bright calls this little plan "Operation Timeout."

[shummthechumm]

sol and his guard, jingo (aka rewrite ramblings)

[shakingparadigm]

hey have we considered the possibility that the reason ivan specifically choked till was because he was mimicking what mizi did to luka in round 5

Yup, pretty sure that's where he got the idea. Ivan got to witness exactly what the consequences were in that kind of situation. He became aware of the near-immediate death sentence, a way to eliminate yourself before the scores are even tallied. Ivan was desperate, and this seemed like the only sure-fire method to ensure Till's survival since he was underperforming. It's most likely thanks to Mizi's outburst in ROUND 5 that Ivan was able to pull off this sacrifice.