#(especially about tracing stuff like screenshots and figures)

[cherryblossomfaewilds]

working on a sailor moon screenshot trace to practice line weight variation more and i am!!!!! so happy with how this looks right now!!!!!!

[fatehbaz]

Edit: Removed the screenshot so as not to share dm stuff, but I got a message from someone who couldn't send an ask, inquiring: "i was wondering what book it was that you mentioned about the philippines? i'd be interested in reading it." Sorry to post; figured it would be a subject worth sharing with interested others. Good news: It's an article, so it's relatively easier to access and read.

Jolen Martinez. "Plantation Anticipation: Apprehension in Chicago from Reconstruction America to the Plantocratic Philippines" (2024). An essay from an Intervention Symposium titled Plantation Methodologies: Questioning Scale, Space, and Subjecthood. Hosted and published by Antipode Online. 4 January 2024.

Basically:

Explores connections between plantations in US-occupied Philippines and the policing institutions and technologies of Chicago. Martinez begins with racism in Chicago in the 1870s. Coinciding with Black movement to the city (from the South during Reconstruction and the Great Migration) Chicago was, in Martinez's telling, a center of white apprehension. Chicago public, newspapers, and institutions wanted to obsessively record information about Black people and labor dissidents, including details on their motivations and inner life. Between 1880-ish and 1910-ish Chicago then became a center of surveillance, records-keeping, classification systems, and new innovations in collecting information. Within a year after the labor rebellions, the Adjutant General of the US Army who led Chicago's militarized crackdown on the 1877 Great Railroad Strike immediately moved to DC and proposed establishing "the Military Information Division" (MID); eventually founded in 1885, MID started collecting hundreds of thousands of Bertillon-system intelligence cards on dissidents and "criminals." Meanwhile, National Association of Chiefs of Police headquartered their central bureau of identification (NBCI) in Chicago in 1896. At play here is not just the collection of information, but the classification systems organizing that information. The MID and related agencies would then go on to collect mass amounts of information on domestic residents across the US. In Martinez's telling, these policing beliefs and practices - including "management sciences" - were then "exported" by MID to the Philippines and used to monitor labor and anticolonial dissent. Another Chicago guy developed "personality typing" and psychological examinations to classify criminality, and then trained Philippines police forces to collect as much information as possible about colonial subjects.

The information-gathering in the Philippines constituted what other scholars like Alfred McCoy have called one of the United States' first "information revolutions"; McCoy described these practices and social/professional networks as "capillaries of empire." Martinez suggests that it's important to trace the lineage of these racialized anxieties and practices from Chicago to the Philippines, because "such feelings were fundamental to linking plantations which at first seem so spatially and temporally distant." And "[u]ltimately, the US colonial plantocracy in the Philippines built its authority around information infrastructures [...] and feelings emanating from Chicago [...] that extended from the image of the American South."

Important context: 1899/1900-ish is when the US occupied or consolidated power in Panama, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, Hawaii, and the Philippines.

---

Side-note:

The Bertillon system (bertillonage) was standardized at about this same time, 1879-ish, and in similar social and racial contexts, becoming popular in other Midwest/Great Lakes cities, especially to track Black people (though it was also rapidly and widely adopted famously as an essential approach across Europe). The system used body measurements to identify and classify people, especially "criminals," significantly involving photography, such that Bertillon is also sometimes credited as the originator of "the mugshot."

I'd add that the aforementioned police chiefs National Bureau of Criminal Identification (NBCI) stayed in Chicago from 1896 until 1902, when the killing of President McKinley frightened officials with potential of wider popular movements; at that point, it was moved to DC, as William Pinkerton (co-director of the Pinkerton agency) donated the agency's photograph collection to build the new bureau, and NBCI strengthened itself by collecting fingerprints and became the precursor to the FBI, founded 1908. (After 1895-ish especially, European authorities were transcending their petty rivalries to attempt forming international police agencies and share documents, tracking each others' domestic radicals/dissidents.)

---

You could compare the colonial use of Bertillon-style intelligence card systems in Chicago and US-occupied Philippines to the rise of fingerprinting as a weapon of Britain in India.

Edward Henry was the Inspector-General of Police in Bengal, appointed 1891, basically the top cop in British India. He exchanged letters with notorious eugenicist Francis Galton, wherein they specifically talked about the importance of developing a classification system for fingerprints that could be used alongside the Bertillon system of anthropometric identification. (Another British imperial administrator in India, Sir William Herschel, had previously been the first to pioneer fingerprinting by taking hand-prints.) By 1897, police forces in India had been adopting the so-called Henry Classification System, and the Governor-General of India personally decreed that fingerprinting be adopted across India. By 1900, Henry was sent to South Africa to train police in classification systems. By 1903, Henry was back in Britain and became head of the Metropolitan Police of London, now the top cop in Britain. (Compare dates with US developments: British police in India adopt fingerprint identification system the same year that Chicago police found their proto-FBI central identification bureau. Less than a year after the US head-of-state gets killed, Britain super-charges the London police.)

So, the guy who pioneered fingerprinting classification for use in maintaining order and imperial power in India and other colonies was eventually brought in to deploy those tactics on Britons in the metropole.

The kind of colony-to-metropole violence thing described by many theorists. (Britain also developed traditions of police photography in context of rebellions in Jamaica and India. Outside of London, the first permanent "modern" police forces across the rest of Britain were legally provisioned for with the Irish Constabulary of 1837 and County Police Act of 1839, "coincidentally" just before/during a 27th of July 1838 "Vagrancy Act" law that made "joblessness" a crime which was put into effect JUST FOUR DAYS before the 1st of August 1838 date when emancipation of Black slaves in the British Caribbean was allowed. As in, four days before nearly a million Black residents of the Empire got legal freedom, Britain outlawed vagrancy and was building permanent national police forces.)

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The 1890s were outrageous. Japan's domestic 1880 Penal Code was built on French models. The Ottoman Empire built a system of passport requirements to monitor movement; France did something similar in Algeria. In 1898, the Austria-Hungary imperial foreign minister called for the formation of an "International Police League." This prompted an Italian radical at the time to write:

"The police are the same in all parts of the world. Laws have been fabricated by the bourgeoisie on the same model; in this, the bourgeoisie is more international than we are."

And Great Lakes cities, after the Great Migration, were notorious for this kind of police violence. Consider how the Bertillon system was used early-on by Minneapolis police to track and target Black "alley workers" (try keyword-searching "Minneapolis Bertillon alley workers"). Or how Chicago was a focal point of antiblack violence in the Red Summer of 1919. Or how Milwaukee has some the most distinct Black-white segregation of any large urban area in the US. Or how, after Elliot Ness lionized law enforcement officials in Chicago during the Al Capone case, he then led policing operations in Cleveland culminating in the mass eviction and the burning of Kingsbury Run shantytown. (Chicago is like a funnel, a node, a hub. Especially after the 1860s: Center of railroad networks. Center of telegraph networks. Destination for Texas/Kansas cattle shipped to Chicago meatpacking houses. Destination for Corn Belt prairie agricultural products. Hence the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and Chicago's turn of the century image as a modernist metropolis. So they had to keep the laborers in line.)

---

Anyway, the other story that I mentioned regarding Philippines was from:

Gregg Mitman. "Forgotten Paths of Empire: Ecology, Disease, and Commerce in the Making of Liberia's Plantation Economy." Environmental History, Volume 22, Number 1. January 2017.

For context, I'd note that this takes place in the midst of the US's "conquest of the mosquito" in its militarized occupation of Panama, where the canal was completed by the US between 1904 and 1914. (Again, US was occupying Philippines, Hawaii, Guam, Puerto Rico, and Cuba.)

In Mitman's story, Richard P. Strong was appointed as director of the brand-new Department of Tropical Medicine at Harvard in 1913. Shortly thereafter in 1914, as he toured plantations in Panama, Cuba, Guatemala, etc., Strong simultaneously took a job as director of the Laboratories of the Hospitals and of Research Work of the United Fruit Company (infamous for its brutal labor conditions in plantations, its land-grabbing in Central America, and its relationship to US corporate power). Harvard hired Strong partially on the recommendation of General William Cameron Forbes, who was the military governor of US-occupied Philippines from 1909 to 1913. When Harvard hired Strong, he had been living in the Philippines, where he was the personal physician to Governor Forbes, and was also the director of the Philippine Bureau of Science's Biological Laboratory, where he had experimented on Filipino prisoners without their knowledge; Strong fatally infected these unknowing test-subjects with bubonic plague. Then, Governor Forbes, after leading the US occupation of the Philippines, himself became an overseer to Harvard AND a director of United Fruit Company (also Forbes was a banker and the son of the president of Bell Telephone Company). Meanwhile, Strong also became a shareholder in British rubber plantations; Strong approached Harvey Firestone to help encourage the massive rubber company to negotiate a deal to expand plantations in West Africa, where Firestone got a 99-year-long concession to lease a million acres of land in Liberia. So there's an intimate relationship between military, plantations, colonization, medical professionals, corporate profiteering, land dispossession, etc.

---

So, in each case, there is imperial anxiety about the threat of potential subversion from recalcitrant laborers. Imperial authorities cooperate and learn from each other. The rubber plantation owner is friends with the military general, who's friends with the laboratory technician, who's friends with the railroad developer, who's friends with the cop, who's friends with the forestry minister, who's friends with banana plantation owner. There are connections between the exercise of power in the Philippines and Panama and West Africa and Bengal and Chicago. Connections both material and imaginative.

[docdufresne]

how r you so good at drawing (halo) armor. You’re literally one of the best I’ve ever seen. Tips please if possible? (specifically for the shapes of the armor)

Oh god heLLO; I'm super bad at explaining my process of drawing RvB armor, as it's been multiple years since I've done it up until recently, so I'm super rusty but I will do my best to explain myself!!!

I've never made any sort of tip guide or tutorial, so please bear with me!

USE REFERENCES!!! This can go for renders from the Halo games directly (ArtStation was a great place to start, I'm not sure how things are post AI ""art"" surge, though) but at the very least, screenshot the heCK out of the series from whatever season you want to draw. There are a lot of different angles, and after they started to animate, it made it easier to get references with arms up or splayed out to the sides, or legs bent and hand motions!! Depends on what you're looking for!!

For this Reference, I used a Halo 3 render, as well as the Caboose-isms poster render. There are more clear renders out there, I'm sure!

First step that I take in learning to draw a new set of armor is color coding the sections that I'm going to draw, and then labeling them with points of interest that make me remember the detail later; Like grooves, or a bevel that looks weird or silly. Color coding and labelling the parts made it easier for me to break it down into smaller bits to draw piece by piece, bc let's face it; Armor can be super tedious and daunting, especially if you're just starting out.

Remember It's ALL SHAPES!!! IT'S JUST SHAPES!!!! Break them down into more simple shapes to find what works best for you! Keep it loose in the sketch stage, so you don't get lost in the pesky details

Remember that the armor goes on TOP of a body, and isn't a part of their body! Halo Infinite dOES have prosthetics that are a bit smaller than the armor, which adds depth and flavor to your armor though!

When in doubt, draw it larger than you mean to, and size it down to fit your other pieces!

SIMPLIFY IT!!! TRACE TO LEARN!!!! Really just figure out where the pieces go and put them together like a puzzle! Armor is simply just, hard, and there's no easy way to learn quickly how to do it efficiently and well; It really does take a lot of practice and trying and sketching and watching clips and staring at other's art to maybe notice shortcuts or even details you didn't notice before!!

But the biggest tip that I can give you is just, don't be afraid to make "bad art" don't be afraid to draw "bad armor" !!! It doesn't have to be perfect, the details don't all have to align on model 100% of the time! All of my art, paintings and all, have things that I fudged or missed, or messed up on and didn't notice, but I still have fun painting and drawing because I like making people laugh with my comics and I like having them feel stuff about my paintings!

Sorry if this wasn't what you were looking for, but I hope this helps even just a little bit!!

[creativecapybara]

hellooo I do have a question !! If you don’t mind !!!

so I’ve seen a few of your traditional animations and I’m (well first off I’m IN LOVE with them they’re done SO WELL) just curious if you have any tips ?

I was thinking about trying a small one of my own but . I’ve never done . anything like this before .

Just something like if you have a trick for drawing things the same size , or how to draw stuff in motion

obviously practice is a factor !!! But figured I’d at least try an ask ! anything helps !!! Your stuff always looks amazing hehe <333

Dawww thank you I'm glad you like what I do

I have uploaded quite a bit of traditional(mostly rw related) gifs and I think here I can attempt to show something akin to a tutorial. At the very least these are the steps I use for animating on paper

So first off for making small gifs I usually use a single sheet of paper and separate it into a number of evenly sized parts by using a ruler and **LIGHTLY** tracing with a pencil. My papers are 9" by 12" so measuring the portions is usually easy. How big/how many parts you separate your sheet into depends on how many frames are in your gif

Then we start with the sketches. For me it helps with keeping the animation smooth and the same size by using shapes(especially circles for me but it depends on what you wanna draw). Be aware that this might be considerably difficult for anyone with little to no experience with animating

Then you wanna get the simple sketch done using the shapes as a work-around to draw details while keeping the animation smooth. Be sure to keep the sketches LIGHT so you can draw over them or erase any mistakes you make without them being too obvious in the final product

Next it's time to work on lineart(and shading if you wanna but personally I don't prefer to do that too much when it comes to animations)

Now it's time to actually compile the frames. You can choose to screenshot each and every frame and compile them in order on an animation app or website(like Flipaclip for example) but for me when it comes to short gifs it's faster to use Capcut and simply separate the image into six parts while zooming in appropriately for each frame

And you could end it here by making this into a gif but me personally I prefer to use Exgif to turn the mp4 into a gif since it has a higher quality(and also to adjust the frames and crop the gif to your hearts content)

And then that's it! Enjoy your gif lmao

And in the meantime also enjoy dancing Moonie

[ghoulsbeard]

2025 fic TBR tag from @elfroot-and-laurels :) very fun idea thank you Laurie… the idea is you pick nine (or however many you want) fics that you plan to read this year, and post screenshots of their titles.

( I did summaries for each fic bc of who i am as a person but thats not at all required... )

dont have as many stories bookmarked for later as i usually do, this was kind of tough... to any and all wandering writers, please send a link to your fic in the comments, I’d love to read it :]

passing the tag to @dandenbo @isayashai @aphota @nuwanders @dreadfutures @waterbearable @lichposting @jiubilant @lemon-embalmer @spectrumcore @nine-blades @ehlnofay if you are interested, no pressure, & to anyone who’d like to grab the tag

ok i have seven to talk about…

currently reading ghostwise’s matacuervos - one of the best DA fics i have ever had the honor & pleasure to read. what i enjoy about good DA fics is they are head and shoulders better than the canon while utilizing what makes the canon enjoyable, and this fic is a perfect example. masterful worldbuilding especially for Antiva and the Antivan Dalish, a deeper view of the people and places within Zev’s past, Crow politics, local unions, resonant & poetic prose, fantastic character writing for an ensemble cast— and i must shoutout the incredible arc for Zevran especially. if you are a DA fan and haven’t read matacuervos yet, what are you waiting for… go read it…!!!

rereading oopsallmabari’s FBaGS a DA:I longfic following a noble-born mage of Ostwick as she struggles to adapt to life outside of the Circle, reckon with her magic, chantry politics, the threat of the world ending and her dangerous job as the face of the second inquisition. Grounded and thoughtful, this story explores the nitty-gritty of life during the game’s plot, follows an intriguing woman through her portion of the story as well as a slowburn romance beneath the main narrative action (very satisfying). Thanks to this fic, I was drawn into the inner lives of characters that I had not thought about much before! I am enjoying the reread and I think the story has either recently updated or may update soon…

planning to begin wispstalk’s Ten Days’ Walk which explores the span of time after the sacking of Kvatch, before Martin is ensconced at Cloud Ruler… aka his last free air… I am very excited to give it a go, i hear it will be character focused… really enjoyed Idle in Their Thrones by the same author, nice returning to the cast… :)

vita practica is the series, velut fructus is the fic i am currently reading/preparing to read a second time after zooming through the first and bawling my eyes out. watching the game it’s drawn from but as it’s historical fiction i need to read more of the philosophers and notable figures who appear therein… esp Cato… and on the culture of the era to appreciate the prose’s grace notes... tremendous fics overall; exquisitely penned, perfectly paced, with an incisive writer’s eye finding the marrow of each scene and character…cant praise these enough.

currently reading elfroot-and-laurels’ LOHC, a DA:O longfic tracing a dual HoF worldstate where two Cousland cousins join the wardens together... My favorite aspect of this fic is the alternating POVs, each of the two women develop unique relationships with companions that reveal new sides to themselves and their friends/lovers; the interiority of their hopes, fears, loves, preconceptions, etc deepens the game’s narrative in a very personal way.. I also enjoyed the breadth of worldbuilding done for the grey wardens & for ferelden as a whole… fell behind on new chapters, catching up this year

wyllzel’s Common Concepts is a richly plotted romance that meshes Wyll and Lae’zel’s romance routes together, and also explores their individual arcs as they fall in love. It is meticulously written and filled with charming banter, snappy fights and encounters, crunchy DND stuff and insightful character exploration. Only three chapters long and wonderfully penned. I never got around to reading the last chapter </3 which gives me a perfect excuse to reread from the beginning

rereading nuwanders’ King and Lionheart a sweeping TESV longfic following two siblings, their cousin, and the Dovahkiin herself. I love the depth & breadth of this fic, each character POV is filled with personality and quirks of their narration and broadens a different part of the game, so much deft and thoughtful world expansion. Beautifully paced. I love the slow build of each character’s arc… some great slower burning romance in this story as well (smiles serenely)… enjoying the reread

[oracleofsecrets]

Zelda EOW cosplay log: circlet

After giving up on the staff, which was already another means for me to take a break from sewing, I got started drafting the circlet

I had some Eva foam from another cosplay ish project that didn’t go very well due to inexperience, so that seemed the most logical choice. I forgot how annoying it is cutting Eva foam though… the “headband” part was easy since I could use my rotary cutter, except the length I needed was longer than my ruler, so there’s a wobbly bit from where I had to scoot my ruler. Didn’t feel like cutting out another piece, so it’ll have to do ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Studied some screenshots and Sketched out the gem and metalwork bits on paper to get an idea of relative sizing between all the pieces. That damn pvc conduit ended up coming in handy here—I pressed down onto the foam and traced the indent for the gem. Cutting the crescents was realllly fiddly bc I was using scissors. But idk if I could’ve gotten those curves otherwise with an xacto knife

Only on the smaller bits did I think to transfer my sketch onto the foam instead of eyeballing it. My “transfer” method was poking pins along the outline into the foam, kinda like for pumpkin carving. Nice and clear and easy to follow with the scissors without having to worry about painting over anything

I thought I read somewhere that Eva foam can be sandpapered ? So I tried doing that to fix the uneven edges. Idr what grit level sandpaper I used. I mostly used a nail file board actually lol

Somehow I lost my circle gem piece, so I had to cut another one out and sand that :/ I don’t have proper primer so i figured I’d just spray a little modpodge on it to give me a workable surface to paint on. It didn’t occur to me that the pieces were so small that they’d fly off bc of the aerosol blast, so I had to find those in the dark ground bc I keep forgetting to tell the landlady that the outdoor lightbulb is out

I ended up mostly kinda mopping up the modpodge that was left on the parchment paper to get it nice and covered. Then I remembered I should grab a scrap to prime for when I test out paints. Was smart enough to hold the foam with a clothespin so no more glue would get on my hand. A day later It does kinda look like a nice subtle topcoat on my nails though :3 let it dry overnight so I could play some hades 2 and bc I didn’t want to fiddle with mixing paints at like 10pm

The next evening I tested out the paints. At the store I’d been between one metallic red shade and another, and I’d gotten the one that hadn’t seemed Too bright red. This was a mistake. It’s indeed a lovely garnet color, but that’s not quite light or red enough for this. Mixed with a little red looked pretty good. The gold metallic was perfect straight out of the bottle

Also tested whether to use black or white as a base coat. Going with white to keep things brighter

✨The next day ✨

Got my base coat of white on

(Using some weird Catholic local newspaper that some lady who lived here before me still has delivered to catch the mess lol)

First coat of gold. Probably should’ve made sure my sponge was fully dry before painting on the gold… I’m using makeup sponges since they’re denser than the sponge brushes I got for cheap a while ago. Repeating to myself Trust the Process Trust the Process so I don’t get neurotic about how sloppy it looks rn….

Okay yeah second coat is looking a lil better. Added a Little more red to the mix for the gem. I like how the shade looked overall, and especially layered over the other. I dont need another coat on the gem but def will for the gold stuff

Third coat, now we’re talkin. That’s good enough for the crescent pieces, but I think I’ll give the band another coat tomorrow. Testing my gloss sealant on the back of one of the smaller crescents after putting the first coat on the gem to see how that looks

Im planning on using satin modpodge finish though bc it’s an aerosol spray and bc I think that’d contrast nicely and subtly with the glossy. But the glossy is a normal spray bottle, and I wasn’t careful the first time I used it so it got clogged…I usually borrow the spray top from something else, but it’s not the same diameter as the bottleneck so I have to hold it weird :/ I should just buy a replacement nozzle fjsjdhd. But since the pieces are so small I’m just unscrewing the nozzle, taking it out and letting a few drops of sealer fall onto a plastic lid from something or another, then dabbing it on with a sponge

Now that I’m more like Live blogging and not posting about stuff I’ve already done I think I’ll end the post here lol

[shjiyemis]

can you share some of the refs you use for your art? specifically the anatomy ones

I really use whatever I can find! I also tend to play around with my pose that kind of differentistes from the actual reference sometimes as well. I also sometimes frankenstein poses if im having a hard time with BS'ing the pose from the ref too.

Rennaissance paintings and other painting similar to them are also really helpful when trying to make accurate anatomy poses and stuff too! I also recently started taking pictures of myself to get a quick ref instead of searching online for one.

I also recommend looking at music videos and scenes from movies and screenshot poses you like rather then finding an already set up pose picture! sometimes those are too stiff but in music videos and movie clips theres much more movement so their poses feel more fluid!

Practicing different bodytypes help a lot too! I find myself being able to draw anatomy much better when I learned multiple types of body shapes bc it made it easier for me too understand that ppls bodies are very different and all you need to do is take away any strict rules about the body and build the pose and character without those limitations!

Another thing that helped me with anatomy is tracing!! Whether its poses or other art it helps A LOT! Especially if your having trouble with stuff. Honestly the way I got best at anatomy is from tracing and being more open minded about bodies and their individuality. For me I got really good at building fat on to a body when I learned how to properly draw muscular figures! Not sure why but it helped!!!

Examples:

^^^Love this sheet bc it shows so many different bodies, shapes, and sizes! You can easily find bigger/better pictures on google of you search "olympic athlete(s) bodies"

I also sometimes use those 3d models in clip studio, but thats a rarity, others use them a lot tho.

I also simply BS poses and body types until im satisfied, I do just NOT use references a lot of the times bc sometimes I just need to do my own thing without a blueprint. And a lot of the time it turns out good!! Trust ur gut and ur eyes bruv GYVBHJNK

[ask-obt]

What steps do you usually have for creating each page, and how long does each one usually take you? Do you do stuff like thumbnail entire chapters in advance, etc?

I don't know how big your page buffer is, but you seem to get pages done at a really impressive rate, especially considering every page is clean and colored, so I'd love to know how you manage it :)

// this is a long ask, so buckle up!

all of my pages start with an outline, which is then fleshed out into a script- over time I've found that having an entire chapter done before starting any other step cuts out unnecessary fat that comes with editing. if there's one thing I learned from preboot OBT, trying to figure out what exactly happens on a page as you're drawing it can lead to a lot of heartbreak if you decide to change it (a lot of preboot OBT's chapter 4 was subject to this- I have a million drafts of rune and fienne in the market because I didn't know what I wanted them to do there). my scripting program is actually the beta version of a program one of my classmates in college made, and if it ever goes public I'd be happy to pop a link since I believe they want to make it open source eventually. on average my scripts are about 5000-6000 words long, and are written (casually) like film scripts since that's the format I was trained on as a film student.

my outlines are a bit sloppy because it's just like a stream of consciousness flowing out while I try getting ideas slapped down as quickly as possible. I try not to worry too much about details unless I have a clear vision in mind because I think writing the plot out in one go flows the most smoothly.

and then from there, I expand that outline into a script.

after the script is completed, and assuming I have enough buffer, I thumbnail the entire next chapter- or at least as much as I can stand in one go. I'll usually either be working on rendering the previous chapter during this step, or I'll have the previous chapter completed so I can devote my attention to it. either way, I try and give myself room to do a variety of tasks depending on my mood. thumbnails are easy to work on while on-the-go for example, but they require a lot of thought to put together. coloring can be tedious, but it's great to do while multitasking of on lunch at one of my jobs.

part of the thumbnailing process for me includes putting down text bubbles. surprisingly, this is a very tedious task, so I try to get it all done in one go so I don't have to agonize over it. and this is where my process gets a bit convoluted, so bear with me.

to do this, I take a look at my script and break all the dialogue into different text bubbles. I've gotten to the point where I think I do pretty well naturally finding breaks in pages, and I just go in chronological order putting text down. for this step I have page templates prepped, which show the safety margins that I need to follow to prevent text from getting stuck in the binding when printing into books. I make sure all the text is safe, and then move onto the next step.

after that, I copy the page with text bubbles, and then shrink it really small into thumbnail size. on a layer above this screenshot I trace the text bubbles, and then treat those bubbles as "dead zones" to draw around while working on the thumbnails. this might be an unnecessary step if you have a good grasp on how much text takes up a panel, but I am historically awful at judging that so knowing the exact text bubble size when thumbnailing helps prevent my bubbles from getting in the way after the art is already rendered. then, rinse and repeat for the rest of the chapter!

some chapters I'm quicker at thumbing than others- on the low end we've got chapter 5, which I wrapped up in 2 months (I did roughly 1 thumb per day)

and then chapter 6 which I dragged my feet on a little bit, at around 6 months

(and chapter 7, which is twice the length of a normal chapter for me, took 4 months!)

after that is sketching, the part I dread most when working on a chapter. it's the part that requires the most thinking on my part, and I did away with sketching completely for most of chapter 3- but I've been trying to make my lines thinner lately, and until I build up the confidence to work without sketches, I'm afraid I'm stuck with them. I try to do 1-2 pages of sketches per day, but some days I just don't do them if I'm not feeling up to it.

(I'm actually avoiding sketching while I work on this ask)

while most of OBT is done in CSP, the one thing I don't do there is lines- for that I use a free program called Sketchbook. Sketchbook has a pretty incredible predictive stroke tool that adjusts your strokes after you make them. it takes a bit of time to get used to, but with it I can draw much faster than any other program or with any other stabilization tool. I gave CSP an honest shot with lining by trying to use it for 6 months, but sketchbook was just too powerful so I live the multiprogram life. I try my best to keep all my lines closed during this process because it'll make coloring WAY easier. like I think coloring used to take me an hour, now it takes me 20 minutes tops.

then I flip off the visibility on all layers except the lineart layer, save as a PNG (saving a working file as well if I'm feeling spicy), and then import to CSP! where the most fun part begins.

to start, to do that colored lineart thing where the lines on my characters are darker on the outside than the inside, I start by coloring characters their inside color first (using the "lock transparent pixels" layer option). for comics this is reduced to a simple "warm palette" color and "cool palette" color, which are brown and blue respectively. it's subtle, but you can see it in action with rune and eilwyn here.

then I use the magic wand tool, my best friend. I select the negative space around the characters, invert it, and then with the dark color selected in my palette (for me it's a dark brown approaching black) and the transparent pixels still locked, I use the "outline selection" option to outline the characters. I usually outline them by 6 px, but it'll depend on what looks best.

then for coloring, with the characters still selected, I use the "shrink selection" option to shrink it by 1 pixel. this helps prevent aliasing when I use the fill bucket to fill characters in with a base color! after that I pick them out by character and manually add their main color by hand, so they look something like this.

and here's the part where I impart upon ye, dear reader, with the forbidden knowledge I learned while doing the Monster House Marathon this month. see, I really like doing these daily events because they push me to my limit. a page a day is the most comfortable fast pace I can work on the comic, but it can still be a bit of a strain to get a page done before my bedtime, so I'm much more willing to learn shortcuts in order to get a nice juicy 6 hours of sleep instead of 4.

if you do a closed lineart method like me for most of your character's markings, the "Set Reference Layer" tool is going to become your new best friend. using this, I set the lineart layer as the reference layer (and only the lineart layer), move over to my coloring layer, grab my fill bucket tool, and then I can just start literally filling in characters within seconds. some characters have unclosed markings that I'll have to do by hand, but this is extremely quick and I love it so much.

finally I add a multiply layer where I do some light shading. this step used to be full cel shading, though over time I've found that my art reads a little more clearly without it. and shading also used to be miserable because it was another 30 minutes to an hour of rendering that kept me from completing a page.

and finally, I add backgrounds and lighting effects. I have a pretty decent library of pre-rendered backgrounds I've made that I can just plop in a scene, but sometimes for new or one-time locations I'll make a new one by hand.

and that's a completed page! it's a bit hard to calculate how long a singular page takes start to finish since I try doing everything before the lineart in batch style, but I'd say it all roughly evens out to 2-4 hours. breaking it down, it looks something like:

Thumbnail - 10-20 minutes Sketch - 30 minutes - 1 hour Lineart - 30 minutes - 1 hour Coloring - 10-20 minutes Rendering - 10-20 minutes Background - 20 minutes - 1 hour

so pages are pretty quick for me to make! this helps me build a pretty sizeable buffer, I think my previous record was somewhere around 40 pages? maybe 70 if I included dielle's wish. though I will admit during this Monster House Marathon, I actually ran out of buffer on day 7, and I'd been laying the tracks in front of the train until, uh, checks watch, the 27th! as of writing this I finished the buffer through the MHM, so I can rest easy. this ask probably won't queue until after the MHM has ended so this probably sounds a little comedic. the main reason I was able to manage these daily updates without a buffer was because of an art high I was experiencing this month, which is also why I did a marathon in the first place.

though usually, I really am an advocate for buffers. having a buffer of at least 3 months means I can hop around with different processes as my interest in them flips around. my brain usually likes to focus on one task at a time, and a lot of it, so having that freedom is great for me. and sometimes, I just wanna take a month off to play a new game or hyperfixate on stardew valley once again! it all comes down to practice and developing a workflow and schedule that works for you.

[pawborough]

I was really excited about this project, and got immensely disappointed with the release of the UI. The fact it's almost a carbon copy of FlightRising's interface is just so... sad. It basically drains Pawborough of its own identity. I really-really hope you guys will consider changing it, because the original concept is lovely. Here's a few things I'd like to comment on: 1. FR's interface is dated. Currently, they're refactoring the site, and i wouldn't be surprised if their next goal after the refactor would be a UI redesign. And you guys, instead of trying to modernise it and make it your own, are copying a UI from *a decade ago*. 2. Why are you keeping the narrow column format of the site? Most people have a wide-screen monitor nowadays, and it looks bizarre to have such a compressed website. Please consider automatically adapting the site's layout to a user's screen width, sorta like Wolvden/Lioden does. IIRC, they have two columns of content (main stuff in the center & a column with user's data on the left), which stack into one column when you're using a mobile device (aka a narrow screen). But since you're planning to make a mobile version anyway, you should consider making the desktop version of the site wide and, well, desktop-friendly, and then figure out the mobile version as it's own thing. 3. Does the user box in the top right of the site really have to be literally identical to FR, with the same data placed in the same way, and also with the energy bar literally having the same exact segments on it? Especially since you have removed the flight banner, making that user block much less balanced looking. Instead, I think you guys can consider making it much more horizontal and narrow. Assuming the two variables on the right (book and turnip icons) are pet/familiar count and cat count, I feel like they can be dropped completely and moved to the user page. I don't think they need to be displayed at all times on all site's pages.

Image link

Alternatively, you can also use Lioden/Wolvden's approach and make a separate column, and then put all user information and bookmarks in that side column. As a compromise between FR & LD, you can place that user column on the right. Here's a screenshot from google for reference:

Image link

I'd also like to point out the bookmarks box in the column with user data. It's virtually unlimited and you can name your own bookmarks. Introducing this would allow you to largely collapse the left column with site navigation, because you don't use most of those links every day. As a FR player, I would only keep ~13 links in my always-visible bookmarks instead of the 29 available in the left navigation bar. It would be especially nice if I could add emojies into my bookmark names like you can on LD/WD, so it's easier to see what i need right away. As a mini-addition, please work on the navigation column on the left. It's horrible on FR, and it will be horrible on PB if you introduce it. There's gotta be better ways to navigate the site. 4. I hope you reconsider some of the artstyle choices regarding backgrounds and decorations. What got me excited about PB was the absolutely fantastic character art from NPCs to the breed artworks. You seriously couldn't have picked a better artist for this over Amelia B. It has so much personality and immediately elevated PB in my eyes over Lorwolf, which had absolutely soulless art and looked almost traced from photos. But then I was absolutely heartbroken to see you have went with this odd, textured, sketchy style for the backdrops. Why? I'm assuming it's something like anime-style logic, where characters are cell-shaded and flat and backgrounds are painterly, but to pull that off you need a simply spectacular background artist and... i'm sorry, but your artists just don't pull it off. There's color going outside of lines on the opal waterfall background, some "hairy" scratchy lines that don't follow the shape of the object and dang it just looks flat in terms of values. Its not a terrible thing to make the cat pop, but the fact it's literally the opposite of the cats' style just makes it look odd. The obsidian sentry artwork is probably my least favorite out of everything shown by far. the head anatomy is all over the place and the shading is blurry and muddy where it looks like it should have sharp edges. It just seems like you hired a professional to do the breed artwork, and an actual newbie to do some of the items/backgrounds. Addittionally, i noticed that you're planning to introduce player-made familiars/decors, so that would introduce even more style variation into the equation. Please, please consider making the style same-ish for all site assets. It's not bad if the background assets stay low-contast and a bit flat, but at least give them the same linework as the cats in terms of weight, texture, and quality. Perhaps you can use colored lineart in decorations and backgrounds to make it more muted in comparison to the cats. And I see I'm not the only one asking for this, so please don't fall for the sunk cost fallacy and rework the assets you already have, instead of "dooming" your sites for decades of having blurry, sketchy backgrounds. Anyway, all of this is coming from a good place, I promise this wasn't written in bad faith. Im extremely excited and passionate about this project and I really-really hope it succeeds. But please, not only listen to user feedback, but also make changes before it's too late.

Thank you for the feedback. To address a few things I believe were lost in translation that we hadn't made clear, and to address this feedback:

The narrow width of the container actually is a placeholder! We do wish to switch to a wider version, and the demo utilizes an early test build. We do already utilize flexbox, which will adjust to the player's screen size, but it's our intention to make the container limit bigger. On top of that, we are hoping to modernize much of the old interface style while keeping a nostalgic charm, including things such as integration of flexbox as an example. Thank you for pointing this out, as this was something that wasn't made clear, and that we did not think to mention.

The userbox is our design nadir right now, we understand, and we are looking to redesign it immediately. Our idea at this time is to disperse the pixel components among it into the ribbon, place where a graphic was intended to go into the navigation, and leave only the icon and energy bar at the top. Actually, we have design mockups with much similar placement to your mockup! Though we were considering putting money in the ribbon too so as to distance ourselves as much as possible. We will consider the feedback of leaving the components strictly on a user's page, so we will fiddle with this. As well, we will fiddle with information potentially in a column. Thank you for the effort you put in!

Regarding the user navigation, we could potentially make it collapsable, as well as introduce bookmarks for those who prefer it. However, to avoid the inaccessibility of dropdowns, the default state would have to remain uncollapsed. Making the navigation collapsable has actually been discussed previously as a good idea. As of now we are looking into increasing the margin of the list and importing imagery into it for better readability, thinking similar to Marapets and early Neopets, but different. What we enjoy about the navigation is a consistent knowledge and potential memorization of everything on a site that collapsed information does not provide, but perhaps we can design something that will allow for the best of both worlds. We are taking in this feedback to heart. Thank you for sharing what you as a user prefer from your game experience!

We understand your distaste for some of the Kickstarter assets, and should there be a demand we can reconsider the rendering for some of them, such as decor. We do, however, have several artists on the team that can do backgrounds and decor, and we shall work to better instruct style discrepancy. We apologize for the distaste in the assets, and we will improve with both stylistic direction and artistic synergy. The intention for our backgrounds is to bring a storybook feeling, and there is going to be an amount of subjectivity to the judgement of this choice. We apologize that it is not to your taste. Regardless, we appreciate your feedback, will note it for future adaptation of our stylistic direction, and once again apologize for your distaste. To clarify, "user-made" decor and companions will simply be user instruction on the design, while our art and design team is still controlling the final piece.

Thank you for feedback on the user experience, and we promise we have not been writing off these points entirely, but rather wanting to express that we understand and, as stated, want to incorporate this feedback while remaining true to our philosophy. We apologize that our communication was lackluster and will be keeping this as our statement on the matter before updating with our new designs. We will do better to communicate our intentions. We do want to hear what a user will most value from an interface experience! Once again, thank you for taking the time and effort to share this information with us, and thank you for the patience as we learn!

[maxismatchccworld]

Welcome back to our latest - and last! - Deep Dive into the gameplay of The Sims 4 Nifty Knitting Stuff Pack. I’ve really enjoyed sharing the designs and development of this pack with you, and I hope to continue doing these sorts of posts in the future. It’s been a super cool experience, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading these! In today’s post I’ll talk about the feature that is core to everything in this pack, Knitting! Once again, I have to remind you that we’re still in active development on the pack and so some things may change between now and the final game. Now, let’s talk about some nifty knits!

READ IT I PROMISE YOU GONNA LIKE IT!

In order to start knitting, you’ll need to purchase a Yarn Basket from the Build/Buy catalog. You probably remember voting on these baskets a while back. This was the winning design, presented to you now in all its colorful glory! Don’t like color? That’s okay, because we included a solid black and white variant.

We have one more knitting basket coming too! Remember this one?

The basket acts as the crafting catalyst(neat term, huh?) similar to the Easel or Woodworking Bench in The Sims 4 base game. But unlike those examples, the Yarn Basket is meant to live in a Sim’s inventory so that they can take their knitting anywhere they want to go. Knitting itself is relatively straightforward: click on the Yarn Basket in your inventory, OR, with the basket in your inventory, click on the chair you want to sit in while knitting (perhaps a rocking chair?) and select the Knit interaction. Your projects are saved to your Sim, so you can pause your progress at any time and resume later, and even juggle multiple projects at once. Starting a project costs a small amount of Simoleons for the cost of yarn, but nothing too outrageous.

(Children can knit too!) As a Sim levels up their knitting skill they’ll have access to new patterns. They’ll start with knitting socks and beanies, but as they grow more skilled they can tackle more challenging projects like sweaters and toys for kids. But if you only want to specialize in one thing - perhaps knitted mailbox cozies? - that's fine too! Just keep knitting anything and everything, and you’ll be level 10 before you know it. Speaking of knitting skill, sometimes your skill is reflected in your knitted work, or rather your lack of skill. Knitting projects can fail, and when they fail they can get weird. But it’s all subjective, and maybe you’ll end up accidentally knitting the cutest derpy companion, or the perfectly itchy sweater. No mistakes, only happy accidents!

(Just own it.) One of the niftiest parts of the knitting skill is unlocking the ability to Teach to Knit, where Sims sit down together and have a knitting pow-wow. We wanted this to feel special, so we got a really sweet animation for it (Thanks Haeju!). Now that you can infect other Sims with the knitting bug, no yarn ball will be safe!

(The knitting needles aren’t finished on the Teach To Knit interaction yet, but trust me it's SUPER CUTE.) So, what can you do with all these knitting projects? Lots of stuff! Not only can knitted objects be listed on Plopsy, but you can also Donate them to charity. If you want to surprise a loved one, try Gifting a knitted object too. If you want to destroy all traces of your knitted failures, you can Frog the object and start again! If it's a particularly nice Sweater that you made, consider Adding it to Wardrobe to make it available in Create-A-Sim to all family members.

(Everyone appreciates a nice gift!) We want Sims to be able to knit something for their whole family. Not only will Sims be able to knit Toddler Onesies, but Baby Onesies as well. So put your little grubworm in a handmade knitted outfit. I’m sure they’d thank us if they could! (And if they didn’t like it I’m sure they’d be polite about it.)

(Here’s a sneak peek at some of the concept art for new clothing for the littlest of Sims!) It also felt like a good idea to add an Aspiration to tie this passion for knitting all together. So if you want to master the fuzzy art of knitting, consider signing your Sim up for the Lord(or Lady) of the Knits Aspiration. With yarn running through your veins, there will be no knitting mountain too hard to conquer! Master the Aspiration and you’ll be rewarded with the Sacred Knitting Knowledge trait. What does it do? Lots of stuff! What does it unlock? Something special! Am I being vague? I am! Come on guys, I can’t share all the secrets quite yet.

As I’ve mentioned previously, we’re trying to get as much cross-pack functionality for knitting as we can. Cats can play with Yarn Baskets and Yarn Balls, there will be new Club rules for Knitting, new class electives at University, and knitting counts for Emotional Control, just to name a few. I’m hoping Knitting feels nice and snug alongside our other gameplay systems. Now let's have a chat with our lead Object Modeler, Beth Mohler! Conor: Can you tell us a little bit about what an Object Modeler does on The Sims 4? Beth: As an object modeler I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to make objects work in The Sims 4. This is actually a very involved process, and somewhat different from the wonderful work our environment team does. We work with designers, concept artists, engineers, animators, vfx artists (basically everyone!) to make sure that Sims can use an object properly in an animation, or that all of our objects will work with each other. Once we understand the design for a new object, we will create a rig, a block model (a very generic version of the object used to help us make more of the same object in the future), and a footprint (tells us where the object can go and how Sims move around it). Once those are tested by animators and other disciplines we can model the final version, create UVs, and add textures. We also hook up and test everything in the game to make sure it all looks good. There is a lot to think about when it comes to making objects because we know players can find so many interesting ways to place and use them in game. That makes it a very fun challenge to make them work with everything else we’ve built before. Conor: What feature are you most excited to work on in Nifty Knitting Stuff? Beth: I’d say I am most excited to work on the rocking chairs! I love that we are bringing them to the game and can’t wait to see them in some cozy living rooms or on porches. Conor: What are some of the challenges you are facing working on this pack? Beth: One of the biggest challenges is ensuring that the knitting itself looks good and is fun to watch! This is a challenge given that it needs to work for everything you can create. Figuring this out takes a lot of iteration between modeling, animation, engineering, design, and art direction so that we come to a conclusion that will work the best given our time and technical constraints. Another interesting “challenge” is the fact that I crochet as a hobby myself! When you are knowledgeable about something (yarn!) in real life, working on it in the game it can sometimes be hard to separate the things you know and may expect in reality from what is possible or best within a video game. I have to make sure to keep a balance and to conceptualize how we can best convert the knitting experience into The Sims 4. As someone who also generally enjoys interior design and architecture, this is actually one of my favorite challenges and one of the things I love about working on objects in The Sims 4. Conor: What is your favorite feature you have ever worked on in The Sims 4? Beth: I think it has to be a tie between the mini fridge or the robotics table in Discover University. That pack was the first time I got to really take an entire feature from start to finish. I’ve been with Maxis for a while, but I’m relatively new to The Sims 4. Both of these objects had some complex features we wanted that required a lot of iteration. I learned a ton about the technical aspects of our game during the process as well. I’ve also worked on a few very cool things between then and now, but those can’t be shared yet ; ) As a fan of The Sims since the very beginning I am so happy to be able to share a little about what I do on a daily basis on The Sims 4 with you! I haven’t been on The Sims 4 for quite as long overall, but some of you may also recognize me from my time on Sims Mobile where I shared some of our workflows on Twitter for making a juice bar. Thanks! Conor: You shared a screenshot of the In-Progress Rocking Chair in our Rocking Chair Deep Dive. Can you share an updated screenshot now that the Rocking Chair is further along? Beth: I would love to! I hope everyone has been enjoying seeing the progress on this object so far! Here it is a little further along. This program allows us to set the rules for the object materials, footprint size and rig it should use, as well as all the color variants and swatch colors you see in the catalog.

Thanks Beth! By the way, Beth is on Twitter @SimGuruBeth, so be sure to Follow her! And thanks to all of you Simmers for following this pack’s development, this has been a really fun project in a very crazy time. A big thank you to my Stuff Pack teammates, and especially SimGuruSarah who edited my inane ramblings and wrangled the miscellaneous bits for these posts. While this concludes my design Deep Dives, we still have more forum posts with development insights on the way! Keep checking the Community Stuff Pack forum and we’ll have more fun stuff to show off in the weeks to come. Until next time, SimGuruConor

Source: The Sims Forum

[loopy777]

Non-Review: Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)

With all the hype around 'Suki Alone,' it looks to me like most of the fandom missed that an additional Avatar comic with a story from each cartoon's era was just released for Free Comic Book Day. You can read them for yourself on either Dark Horse Digital or Comixology where it's mislabeled as being for ages 17+ (free accounts are required for both), but I'm sure one of the reasons you all love me is because of my willingness to jump in between you and these comics like the deadly bullets they can be. Well, I'm happy to die (metaphorically) for the sake of (a little anonymous internet) love, so I'm doing a full snarky review for each ten-page story. Also, I'm bored, and it's more fun to make fun of mediocre stuff than to praise stuff I like.

It's time for me to review "Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)" or more specifically "The Legend of Korra: Clearing the Air" and "Avatar: The Last Airbender: Matcha Makers."

CLEARING THE AIR

The cover makes this look like a story about Jinora and Ikki having a sibling conflict. That's a lie. The Air Sisters arguing is merely the inciting incident for Tenzin telling a story of his youth. I should note that, as inconsequential as the Air Sisters stuff is, it's actually written very well because it posits Ikki as a victim of circumstance and Jinora as a bully who terrorizes her little sister with threats of getting thrown in jail by Metalbenders for an accident, cementing the characterization from the cartoon. This is not sarcasm. I really do think Jinora is presented by LoK as a Holier Than Thou little snot who just so happened to be naturally gifted with magic spirit-powers, but for some reason the rest of the fandom doesn't agree with me.

Anyway, Tenzin comes in to find the arguing (and Meelo just running amok for the fun of it and so far these characterizations are perfect), and rather than telling Jinora to shut her stupid face, he delivers a tale of his youth about conflict resolution.

So the meat of the story is how, when Tenzin was "a few years older" than Jinora, a pair of vandals got onto Air Temple Island and burned some graffiti into the spinning-panel things that Korra will destroy out of frustration during her Airbending training. Literally, the vandals are depicted as scorching the wood with enough smoke to be seen across a plaza. Tenzin goes after the vandals and they flee across the bay back to Republic City proper (one of the vandals is a Waterbender with a surf-plank). Tenzin pursues, catches them, and attacks them hard enough to smash some dockside crates. They are all then arrested by Metalbenders and dragged before Chief Toph. She's going to let Tenzin go (yay Toph!) and throw the vandals in jail (YAY TOPH!) and makes this face, and this entire comic is worth it:

However, Aang arrives and instead arranges to forgo the jail-time in favor of an Air Nomad Conflict Resolution Ceremony. This is nice and in-character, but I'm totally with Tenzin that these vandals should have been thrown in jail. They literally burned insulting graffiti into antiques from a genocided culture. But instead, Aang demonstrates conflict resolution by having Tenzin explain why he's hurt and what needs to be done to redress the wrong. And so the vandals help Tenzin scrub the graffiti off the panels with water and rags and mops- how, I don't know, since they were literally burned.

They also do a ceremony thing where they each take turns bending their element into a central space between them to 'clear the air' (GET IT GET IT HA HA IT'S ALMOST LIKE A PUN BUT NOT), so it's a good thing they were all Benders because this is kinda racist. This fixes all the problems and everyone is friends. Yay!

In the present, though, things are not so nice, because Tenzin's kids are still screaming at and provoking each other. Korra comes in with Asami at the end to ask what's going on, and Asami says nothing, so I still think everyone is characterized with perfect consistency with the cartoon.

I made this sound silly, but (aside from the spinny-panels getting cleaned with a little water and elbow-grease, which doesn't matter because Korra will eventually blow them all up anyway), I actually like this one. It has Tenzin demonstrate how much he's always had to work to be the Perfect Air Monk that everyone expects him to be, and Aang acknowledges how this is unfair but that Tenzin will never let him down no matter what. It also has Katara come in at the end (for just one line, boo!) to acknowledge that this was an especially easy little conflict for Tenzin to practice on and he'll eventually face worse. I found it a nice adult moment in a story that's otherwise clearly aimed at 8-year-olds.

The art is good. It's simpler than the LoK cartoon, with flat colors, but it captures the story and has enough liveliness for everyone's character to come across in their look and body-language. The brief action-sequence where Tenzin attacks the vandals is well done, moving quickly but showing the full flow of the fight and every move Tenzin makes.

MATCHA MAKERS

Apparently, "Matcha is finely ground powder of specially grown and processed green tea leaves, traditionally consumed in East Asia" according to Wikipedia. I had to look that up. I'm curious how many people understood the full reference in the title, especially since these comics are aimed at kids too young to be allowed on the internet.

This is a very simple story about Iroh in his tea-shop in Ba Sing Se. He has an assistant/waitress named Feng, a new character who wears glasses, ruining the hopes and dreams of all the fanfic-writers who were so sure he'd rescue Jin from the Lower Ring. A frequent patron of the tea shop is an elegant, older lady (very clearly Upper Ring material) named Li-Mei, who cannot go a single panel without giving Iroh a HEY BIG BOY look. She is very clearly smitten. Also, I feel the need to clarify that she knows his name is Iroh, so apparently Ba Sing Se is okay with the Dragon of the West serving tea to their wealthy. I don't say that as a criticism, I'm just noting it.

That night, Iroh meets up with his friends- the Pokemon-style spirits that we saw in Legend of Korra. (I don't know if they're the actual spirits from LoK, or just new spirits in the same style. This is because I would sooner grind matcha into my eyes than rewatch Book Spirits.) He serves them his special blend of tea and talks about how he's totally into Li-Mei but isn't going to pursue it because he's feeling old and doesn't want to take a risk. At this point, I could stop describing the plot because between the title and what I've said so far, I'm sure you could figure out every single plot beat that will follow.

The next day, the spirits trip Feng so that she drops Li-Mei's tea and Iroh needs to bring a replacement, and they've drawn hearts on top of the replacement tea with foam or sugar or milk or whatever. I don't know because I've never bought tea in a place that will even put the bag in the hot water for me. Iroh gets out of the situation without starting any love-affairs and runs into the back to tell the spirits to knock it off, dudes, they're totally embarrassing him! The spirits respond by giving him a flyer for a romantic restaurant. I don't know how they got it, so I can only assume that some Upper Ringer had their mail diverted.

Iroh refuses, so when Li-Mei orders more tea and he brings it to her, the spirits hover just out of her sight and threaten to smash the furniture. I am not making that up. They literally threaten to smash Iroh's furniture unless he asks the lady out. He submits to their tyrannical threats, Li-Mei happily accepts the date, he happily accepts her acceptance, and the story comes to a close. Iroh thanks his spirits friends for opening him up to new experience, but hopes that next time (so I guess Iroh is signing up for Tinder after this?) they won't threaten his shop.

At best, I can describe this story as 'harmless.' But it's been a long week and I just got a bunch more extra work at my day job that I really don't want to do, so I'm going to go ahead and call this story 'dumb.' It's rote, leans towards humor without actually being funny at all, and turns the spirits of the setting into Pokemon. And not even the cool dragon kind.

The art is strangely stiff. The coloring is soft and nice, but the drawings seems more 'assembled' than actually drawn. I swear there are even a few panels that reminded me of 'How I Became Yours' with janky poses, horrifying expressions, and just enough resemblance to the original cartoon to make me think a screenshot was partially traced and then ruined. (I'm not accusing the artist of tracing, BTW. I wouldn't even condemn the artist for tracing if they did. I'm just describing that HIBY feeling I got.) It was so stiff that rather than hear Iroh's dialogue in Mako's rich tones, I instead imagined Greg Baldwin doing a stiff Mako-impression with no naturalism to the delivery.

This story is definitely worthy of its "Also Featuring" billing. I'd rate it below Gene Yang's Mai and Suki FCBD short stories, but above everything else he wrote for Avatar.

So there you go. Overall, this is very middle-of-the-pack for Avatar FCBD stuff. It's very much of the nature of the 'Team Avatar Tales' stuff, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Iroh story was a leftover from that project. On Free Comic Book Day, you often get what you pay for.

[sunnykeysmash]

mac and dennis’ breaking point

Or, a continuation of the analysis of the development of Mac and Dennis’ dynamic, starting from season 9 all the way to season 14.

I’ve been thinking about this post, this post and this post for quite a while now, and since the OP of the first post, @softhowerton​, never continued the analysis post as far as I’m aware, I wanted to continue it myself and throw my two cents in as I believe there is an actual, clear point that shattered the relationship as we know it at least until season 14, and it isn’t just hero or hate crime as the post suggests, in my opinion. Spoiler alert or tldr: it’s Suburbs, click read more to understand why I think so.

Ok so, I’ve been rewatching sunny casually, trying to figure it out, I’ll admit I haven’t rewatched all of them so this is only gonna be a partial analysis up until hero or hate crime, after which I’ve rewatched all episodes, but anyway I still think I have enough proof on my part. I’ve had a little bit of a journey so I’m just gonna go through it in this post to make it comprehensive. 

Sure, in the past Dennis had said he hated Mac, but it was in front of the gang (Mac Day), and even so, his actions still seemed to contradict it, and especially Mac had not noticed any significant change in behavior on Dennis’ part despite all of this. Besides, it seems his hate was born out of Mac’s tendency to seek other people’s validation and change himself in the process, which we know is something Dennis hates. 

Anyway, see Flowers For Charlie for reference of their relationship still being fine here, the You’re The Inspiration scene. We can assume Dennis saying he hates Mac to the gang in Mac Day is not when he actually starts growing distant, quite the contrary, he cares a lot, as his outburst near the end when he demands Mac to be true to himself indicates.

So at first I thought the breaking point was Boggs, the season 10 premiere. It made sense as the episode ended up being very relevant later on and it’s the first instance of Mac letting Dennis go and accidentally hurting him, plus symbolically speaking, the episode right before it is Squashes Their Beef, where the macden apartment burns down.

However I thought more about it, looked at episodes after that, and Dennis still seemed to be very close to Mac. Especially considering them not having an apartment and sleeping on Dee’s floor (presumably close to each other) as pointed out at the start of Suburbs, they did have problems and yes Dennis had already began to shift his attitude, but they were still close, a breaking point had not been reached yet, post Boggs.

See The Gang Group Dates, the episode right after Boggs, where Dennis admits to giving star ratings to his own sex tapes for Mac (and Charlie) to make it easier for them to watch the best ones.

Or see The Gang Spies Like U.S., where they share their porn recommendations together and allegedly also jack off together. In fact, if anything, it almost seems like sleeping together in Dee’s apartment has made them closer, they’re back to being attached at the hip around these episodes, so again the crack of which we are witnessing the fallout to has not happened yet.

No episodes in season 11 ring any bells in terms of major conflicts until, you guessed it, Mac & Dennis Move to the Suburbs.

And if we take this entire episode into consideration, it’s clear that they had not had a breaking point prior to this, prior to Dennis snapping and saying to Mac that he hates him right in his face.

I took the liberty of screenshotting some moments prior to their big conflict in Suburbs that really highlight how close and comfortable with each other they still were.

No episode after this one has them be this close anymore.

I don’t think I need to point out that the breaking point is in fact Dennis saying to Mac’s face that he hates him.

For Dennis, it’s a build up, he has been silently collecting reasons to be pissed in general and at Mac during the whole episode, for Mac it comes all at once, with the realization that comes with Dennis outright saying it. Nevertheless, this is when their dynamic experiences the fracture, and it’s especially detrimental that it happens in the episode where they’re framed as a stereotypical heteronormative couple, roles they’re obviously not meant to fulfill, at which they fail miserably, and which plant in Dennis’ head the idea that they might not be meant to live as a couple at all (which will later play a role in his decision in DDL), and this living as a couple while not being one and failing contributes to the overall stress.

Let me explain what I mean by Suburbs framing them in stereotypical heterosexual roles since I’m at it, it’s quite simple, it follows most tropes you’d expect.

Dennis is the typical husband; he goes to work and provides the money, he has no time to provide emotionally for the wife, and contributes nothing to the home life, while also not letting the wife experience fulfillment in other ways, out of jealousy. Despite this, he himself does seek fulfillment elsewhere, reflecting the typical husband who acts jealous while also cheating.

Mac is the typical wife; cooking, cleaning, fixing. His work is hardly acknowledged at all, so he feels underappreciated. He feels cooped up and lonely because Dennis is emotionally unavailable, and all his attempts to cope with it are met with anger, possessiveness or frustration because they’re not what the husband allows.

Finally, they get a "reparatory child" in the hopes that it’ll fix the situation, and of course it doesn't work.

Keep all of this in mind for when I’m gonna tackle DDL later on.

Furthermore, speaking of Dennis saying he hates Mac, in the episode right after Suburbs, Being Frank, we get this dialogue:

Mac: “Hey, Frank? Do you think that Dennis hates me?” Frank: “What?“ Mac: “I just want him to think that I'm cool, you know? And I just feel like- is this a little bit lame? I just feel like I can talk to you about this kind of stuff.” Frank: “Yeah? Oh, yeah, you can tell me anything.” Mac: “Really? Oh, well, honestly, I just feel like...” [...] Mac: “You know what I mean?” Frank: “Yeah, yeah. Totally, totally.” Mac: “Yeah, okay. Well, look, if you could just casually, off the cuff, mention that I can bench-press [...] I think that he'll respect me.”

Now, I might be mistaken since as I said I haven’t rewatched every episode, but as far as I remember, Mac has never asked to anyone or himself if Dennis hated him prior to this moment. Aside from all of this, it suggests a correlation between fitness stuff and impressing Dennis for Mac, which makes Mac being ripped at the start of season 13 all the more tragic, and is again reinforced when the doll shames him and he starts doing crunches in response to it.

Again, I wanna stress that Dennis and the gang knew about Mac being gay before he came out, of course it’s said in Mac Day, but we’re reminded of it yet again in The Gang Goes To Hell pt1, with the dialogue:

Mac: “There are two guys in this church that are gay.” Charlie: “Who's the other guy?” Mac: “I don’t get the joke.” Dennis: “What’s wrong with that [anyway]?”

And later when Mac actually comes out, we’re reminded by the reactions.

All this time, and especially in Mac Day, it has been implied heavily that Dennis dislikes Mac when he’s in denial and desperately trying to be someone he’s not, yet, as soon as Mac actually comes out for the first time in The Gang Goes To Hell pt2, Dennis becomes outwardly angry, defensive and distant. It’s no wonder that in Tends Bar Mac seems to think that Dennis acts like that because he’s uncomfortable with Mac being gay, as the two elements seem to coincide perfectly every time, but as Charlie rightfully points out, he already knew, so that can’t be it.

The Gang Goes To Hell pt2 actually has some interesting dialogue relating to all of this.

Mac: “Welcome to my first ever dinner party. I'm gonna have lots of these types of functions in the future, you know, with my new lifestyle.” Dennis: “Wow, you're really just diving right into that, huh? Just, stereotypes and all.” [...] Frank: “So get rid of my dog?” Mac: “Yeah, no dogs. [...] We do not allow dogs in our house, right, Dennis?” Dennis: “Wh- Our house? Wh-Why's it our house?”

A couple of interesting bits, such as Dennis getting suspiciously pissed about Mac supposedly stereotyping his own sexuality, despite it not being Dennis’ place at all to get offended.  Mac saying that dogs are not allowed in their house, one could assume because of the Suburbs incident, so again, another reference to that conflict. And finally Dennis somehow being surprised that Mac would call it their house despite the fact that they have lived together for 20 years so it’s only natural that he’d say that. Again, Dennis gets defensive.

It’s hard to pinpoint why he would, if we stress the fact that they were all always aware of Mac’s sexuality. It might be because when Mac was closeted, it was never an actual discussion, but now that he’s out he’s always mentioning it, and in general we have enough proof in the show to say that Dennis tends to get defensive at any mention of gay that could be traced back to him, even if not related to Mac at all. Remember how offended he got on Mac’s behalf in The Gang Texts when Dee called him the f word, and then how abruptly he changed the subject.

This is interesting, as the dialogue that I included from part 1 would have you assume he has no problem with the subject in general, only when it can be traced back to him, when he feels exposed or when it’s been talked about negatively. So we can assume Dennis feels uncomfortable being perceived as non-straight, and this still rings true as of season 14, to a lesser extent.

So we arrive to season 12, and what stands out to me is that Mac keeps noticing how Dennis has started to act pissed towards him all of a sudden and for seemingly no reason. Remember, both of the times Mac acknowledges it in any way before Tends Bar (which are, Being Frank and Making Dennis Reynolds A Murderer) happen when he is not out yet. So despite Dennis acting pissed in Goes To Hell pt2, he has no clear reason to be distant as of yet if we don’t consider Suburbs the breaking point, because Mac is not out yet in those two episodes.

In Making Dennis Reynolds A Murderer, we get this dialogue, after a short bickering between them with Dennis acting annoyed about their new movie night antics which Dennis insists are not funny, while Mac insists they are:

Dennis: “Are we done with this? Can we be done? I'm tired of saying the same things over and over again.” Mac: “Well, wait. Wh- hold Dennis, d-don't leave without me. I mean, dude, look, are you mad at me?”

As we know thanks to Texts, Dennis supposedly hates repeating himself. It seems there’s some communication issues at play, with Dennis constantly saying some things and Mac misinterpreting them, which deeply resembles Texts’ conflict as a whole. 

Dennis is mad about something;

Mac senses that he’s mad about something, is distressed by it which leads him to either avoid the situation or confront it directly, in this case he asks him about it. The distress also makes him insecure, which Dennis dislikes.

Dennis thinks Mac is not genuine about his distress, that he’s not actually sorry and just wants Dennis to stop being mad. Mac becoming defensive and lying, hesitating or doubling down doesn’t help his case. Mac’s track record in misunderstanding Dennis doesn’t help either (see, Dines Out, when Mac didn’t get the speech was for him, or Suburbs, when Mac didn’t get that Dennis was implying he got him a dog until he literally had to tell him). Mac does not perform well when subtext is involved, either positive or negative. Dennis only communicates in subtext, again both positive and negative. This creates a discrepancy.

Anyway, because of this, Dennis does not come forward with the reason he’s upset at Mac. He just keeps being upset.

Dennis at this point thinks Mac never listens and never gets him and is never remorseful for his actions, so he has stopped trying to communicate his hurt to him, resorting to suppressing his feelings of anger instead.

This dynamic started with the Suburbs conflict, but I need to go more in detail to explain why I think so.

Let’s take Dines Out as an example of their ideal, usual dynamic.

How do Dennis and Mac behave usually when one hurts the other?

For Mac it’s:

Dennis is hurtful to Mac (laughs about the karaoke machine)

Mac demands respect and confronts him directly

Dennis doesn't take him seriously

Mac almost goes away

Dennis reveals his feelings/apologizes to keep him from leaving

For Dennis it’s:

Mac is hurtful to Dennis (not recognizing the speech was about him) 

Dennis snaps

Mac apologizes

It used to be like this, but then Suburbs happened, and suddenly Mac is afraid that if he stands for himself Dennis will hate him, and Dennis thinks Mac doesn’t care about his feelings.

So now, post Suburbs, it’s like this.

For Mac it’s:

Dennis is hurtful to Mac

Mac doesn't say anything because he doesn't want Dennis to hate him

Dennis keeps being hurtful to Mac because he’s unaware he’s doing it 

For Dennis it’s:

Mac is hurtful to Dennis

Dennis doesn't say anything because he thinks Mac won't be genuinely sorry or won’t care

Mac keeps being hurtful to Dennis because he’s unaware he’s doing it

So it started with the explosive conflict in Suburbs, and Dennis has been clearly distant, or mad, since, as the episodes seem to point out, and it only got worse, eventually becoming exacerbated with Mac coming out and risking damaging Dennis’ public image, but not starting because of his coming out.

Dennis is also not mad because of the dog or for what Mac did, necessarily, of course that hurt him but he’s mad more in general about Mac’s inability to recognize when he has hurt Dennis and own up to it and apologize. We have seen it time and time again, that’s usually when Dennis scratches Mac, and in Texts it’s especially apparent when he comes up with an excuse instead of apologizing. Aside from that, he’s also mad at Mac’s constant need for attention and validation that was also showcased in Suburbs, amongst other things, with the terribly oppressive visual gag of Dennis opening the closet only to be inundated with Mac and Cheese boxes, symbolizing Mac’s overflowing need to please Dennis and receive praise from him.

As of Chokes and Texts, it seems that both of these conflicts have found a resolution. 

Chokes resolved Mac’s problem in dynamic, letting him once again stand up for himself even against Dennis. Texts on the other hand resolved their problems of miscommunication but specifically Dennis’ problem in dynamic, letting him know that Mac does feel sorry when he hurts him. Again, all very positive developments.

So, getting back on track, the episode right after Making Dennis Reynolds A Murderer is, in fact, Hero Or Hate Crime.

Despite saying that he hates Mac at the end, which I interpret to be entirely performative, he still makes the very nice gesture of proposing that they let him have the rest of the day to feel happy. 

Not only does this clearly show that Dennis doesn’t hate Mac, even post Suburbs, it shows that he cares about Mac’s feelings to some extent, and it also shows that he’s happy for him that he came out. He’s not reacting negatively, he’s not lashing out at Mac. He might’ve been deeply impacted, as we see in his expression and behavior, but he does not hate Mac for the choice of coming out. I’d go as far as to say that he’s proud of him. And it checks out with what we know thanks to Mac Day.

PTSDee doesn’t give us more insight on his relationship with Mac, but he doesn’t go out of his way to try to include Mac at all.

The episode after this, The Gang Tends Bar, is a clear example of the argument I was trying to make. Dennis ignoring his feelings and acting like everything is fine, until he no longer can, he’s cornered and he snaps.

Everything I can say about this episode has already been said better by the post I linked at the beginning, but still, notice the dialogue:

Mac: “[Dennis] is acting, like, so weird, especially towards me. I think it's because I'm gay and he's, like, totally uncomfortable with it.” Charlie: “Yeah- Well, no, 'cause he's known that forever, so it's, you know...”

The episode itself does not show us Dennis being particularly distant to Mac, so we can assume that this is meant to be taken in general. Again reaffirming what we know.

All in all, Dennis wants Mac to care about him and his feelings, wants to feel loved by him, but is not ready to be perceived as non-straight, so he ends up pushing Mac away, which comes easier considering how he’s still mad at Mac at this point in time.

Although, more than mad, as Dennis’ Double Life happens, I’d say he feels hopeless, that’s what his final stare communicates to me.

As the RPG, the symbol that represents romantic love and the possibility of a romantic relationship with Mac, sits on the counter right at the end, as the apartment is fixed like nothing ever happened (which reinforces the concept that Mac tends to sweep conflicts under the rug in Dennis’ eyes), he wonders if maybe what he has with Mac is truly unfixable, and decides to go away and try to seek what he truly desires (romantic love and to settle down) with someone else, but not before hesitating at the door, hoping Mac will care enough to stop him.

By going away, he’s in part trying to rebuild a life for himself like he wants, and in part hoping that the drastic gesture will lead Mac to care, without realizing that he already does. As the title suggests, a true Double Life.

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that Dennis’ Double Life deeply parallels Suburbs.

Starting from the obvious, the trend of the names of Dennis’ serious lovers starting with “Ma” continues.

Maureen, Mandy, Mac. 

Yes Mac is not a lover as of yet, but the implication is clear, and it doesn’t end there.

Check this dialogue:

Mac: “You got me a dog?” Dennis: “Yeah.” Mac: “Oh, Dennis, Dennis. I'm gonna name him Dennis. You're Dennis. He's Dennis Jr.” [...] Dennis: “You with me, buddy?” Mac: “I'm with you. I'm gonna raise this guy like he was our own son.”

So, metatextually, Dennis has a “son” with Mac in Suburbs, that Mac names with Dennis’ name + Jr.

And then, in DDL, it’s discovered that Dennis had a son with Mandy, which she called Brian Jr. His perceived name, Brian LeFevre + Jr.

Making a parallel this clear leaves me to assume that Dennis’ “double lives” mirror each other in every aspect, including his potential relationship with Mac being that of a couple.

And with the RPG, which again symbolizes their romantic love (it was inside the crate, which Dennis remarks “is always empty, there’s nothing in it”, because he has “opened crates” all his life and never found love, which is, as he says, “the one thing he wanted more than anything else in the entire world”; so, as I said, a loving relationship where he can settle, like he was trying to build with Maureen, and like he tries again to build with Mandy, failing both times as there is no love on his part), again sitting on the counter in DDL as Dennis leaves, it seems that the only thing standing between Mac and Dennis and a relationship at that point in time is the conflicts born because of Suburbs, which were still unresolved during DDL. And so Dennis leaves.

What happens from this point forward is shrouded in mystery to me.

The entirety of season 13 is vague, ambiguous, and I can only give my personal interpretation of it, so that’s exactly what I’ll do.

Verbally, and in public, Dennis keeps pushing Mac away. Of course, they’re still mad at each other because the ND incident has scarred them both and they’re hurt, plus they haven’t resolved their issues, but surprisingly enough, Dennis shows no problem with inconspicuous intimacy. He holds Mac by the shoulders when they’re alone in Escapes, he keeps his leg uncomfortably close to Mac’s in Times Up and even shares complicit glances in Time’s Up the likes of which we haven’t seen since Suburbs. He also outwardly seeks Mac’s attention in New Wheels (you could argue he seeks the gang’s attention, but the framing of all the shots make it look like he’s talking only to Mac), and wants him to come to the concert in Bathroom Problem.

Mac on the other hand is letting Dennis have full control, but it appears that he’s no longer walking on eggshells trying not to get Dennis to hate him, he’s not avoiding saying when he’s hurt when he has to. He doesn’t protest often, but he does do it, in Bathroom Problem for example, or when he asks Dennis when the photo of him he shows in Time’s Up was taken, or when he ignores him at the start of New Wheels, so the reason for Mac not saying anything most times must have changed. I don’t know what it would be, possibly just not to hurt Dennis if he can help it.

At the same time, Dennis is going out of his way to be mean to Mac, by lashing out where he knows it hurts. The first thing he says to him as he comes back is “Hey, Mac, did you gain a little weight?”, and in Time’s up, again “Well, guess what, pal? You are ugly, and it doesn't matter how much you work out. It's never gonna change that fact.”

Actually, let’s take Time’s Up.

His whole rethoric and speech towards Mac falls apart at face value the moment you actually recognize his message.

Dennis: “But guys, I got some good news for you. Okay? It's not a crime to be ugly. But you can't be ugly and sloppy.” [...] Dennis: “I got the documents to prove it, so don't try coming at me. But some of you you just haven't been careful enough. So you're asking yourself, "What can I do to save myself now?" You got to clean up your act. Otherwise, you're going down, and you're gonna take me down with you, and I ain't going down.”

When it comes to the others, it makes sense, what they do is recurrent criminal activity, and if they get busted he gets busted. But in which way does this apply to his very personal rant to Mac? How is Mac being affectionate the way they’ve always been in the past going to bring him down, especially considering he never had a problem with it in the past and especially considering he has not done anything particularly unusual that we could see in recent times? 

Continuing:

Dennis: “I'm just saying we need to be more careful so we don't get accused.” Mac: “And we should probably stop harassing them.” Dennis: “Uh, well, you know, I don't know. One step at a time.”

Dennis’ point was never “stop doing what you’re doing”, it was don’t get caught doing it, have proof that you didn’t do it, that you weren’t complicit. What’s his proof? The public rejection he just did.

Dennis: “You know, you got to stop kissing me, man. I don't want it. I don't want you touching me at all. Okay, it's never gonna happen. All right? Not willingly.”

By publicly stating this, he’s constructing a clear alibi for himself in case he gets caught, but his intent was never to ask anyone to stop what they’re doing, just to stop being sloppy with it.

Which is why this whole episode, coupled with the subtext in Escapes about “keeping it between themselves”, is very confusing to me, as a whole, for their implications.

Either way, in Bathroom Problem it’s shown that Dennis still feels insecure in his sexuality or uncomfortable with being mistaken for non-straight, going out of his way to point out time and time again how much of a heterosexual male he is.

Skipping Clip Show’s moment of realization (”Dennis, everyone knows that the most annoying person in the world is Mac. So why would you ever want to live with him?”) since it’s unclear what exactly happened, this leads us to Mac Finds His Pride.

Nothing of note here, except for Dennis supposedly feeling claustrophobic driving the pride float, and Mac saying he’s “not ready for a relationship”.

And that is pretty much it. Despite everything, aside from Chokes and Texts, there isn’t much indication of what’s going on between them in season 14.

They seem to be back to being reasonably close, and there seems to be something that is making Dennis progressively angrier as the season advances, but it’s left mostly unclear what that is, especially considering that he’s still unbelievably mad in Global Warming, Jumper and Chop, despite the conflict between them being already resolved by that point.

Dennis is somehow shown to be “uncomfortable” sharing a bed with Mac, despite having slept next to him on Dee’s floor for at least a good year in the past, but he’s not against physical contact, he has no problem stretching on top of him in Chokes, or letting him massage his pecs after a workout (although that’s in private). He looks happy when Mac winks at him, and he even winks at Mac himself while saying “smash test” in Jumper, whatever that implies.

All in all, they’re comfortable with public touching and vicinity again, and the problems that stemmed from Suburbs should be resolved, so it must be something else making Dennis mad and frustrated, and whatever that is it has something to do with Mac failing to do something. Thanks to Chokes, Global Warming and Jumper, we know it seems Dennis wants Mac to do something, but what that is hasn’t been revealed in text yet, so we can only assume.

Still, Dee Day seems eager to remind us about Dennis’ Feelings, with the dialogue:

Dennis: “Today of all days, and now I'm being forced to listen to her feelings? I won't do it. And who cares about her feelings anyway? Nobody, that's who. What about my feelings? Now, that's interesting.”

So I’ll leave it at that. Either way, if season 15 does happen, it seems the direction their dynamic is headed towards is very much promising. Fingers crossed.

[thesims4blogger]

The Sims 4 Nifty Knitting: Knitting Deep Dive

SimGuruConnor has released a forum post providing details on The Sims 4 Nifty Knitting!

Welcome back to our latest – and last! – Deep Dive into the gameplay of The Sims 4 Nifty Knitting Stuff Pack. I’ve really enjoyed sharing the designs and development of this pack with you, and I hope to continue doing these sorts of posts in the future. It’s been a super cool experience, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading these!

In today’s post I’ll talk about the feature that is core to everything in this pack, Knitting! Once again, I have to remind you that we’re still in active development on the pack and so some things may change between now and the final game.

Now, let’s talk about some nifty knits!

In order to start knitting, you’ll need to purchase a Yarn Basket from the Build/Buy catalog. You probably remember voting on these baskets a while back. This was the winning design, presented to you now in all its colorful glory! Don’t like color? That’s okay, because we included a solid black and white variant.

We have one more knitting basket coming too! Remember this one?

The basket acts as the crafting catalyst(neat term, huh?) similar to the Easel or Woodworking Bench in The Sims 4 base game. But unlike those examples, the Yarn Basket is meant to live in a Sim’s inventory so that they can take their knitting anywhere they want to go. Knitting itself is relatively straightforward: click on the Yarn Basket in your inventory, OR, with the basket in your inventory, click on the chair you want to sit in while knitting (perhaps a rocking chair?) and select the Knit interaction.

Your projects are saved to your Sim, so you can pause your progress at any time and resume later, and even juggle multiple projects at once. Starting a project costs a small amount of Simoleons for the cost of yarn, but nothing too outrageous.

(Children can knit too!)

As a Sim levels up their knitting skill they’ll have access to new patterns. They’ll start with knitting socks and beanies, but as they grow more skilled they can tackle more challenging projects like sweaters and toys for kids. But if you only want to specialize in one thing – perhaps knitted mailbox cozies? – that’s fine too! Just keep knitting anything and everything, and you’ll be level 10 before you know it.

Speaking of knitting skill, sometimes your skill is reflected in your knitted work, or rather your lack of skill. Knitting projects can fail, and when they fail they can get weird. But it’s all subjective, and maybe you’ll end up accidentally knitting the cutest derpy companion, or the perfectly itchy sweater. No mistakes, only happy accidents!

(Just own it.)

One of the niftiest parts of the knitting skill is unlocking the ability to Teach to Knit, where Sims sit down together and have a knitting pow-wow. We wanted this to feel special, so we got a really sweet animation for it (Thanks Haeju!). Now that you can infect other Sims with the knitting bug, no yarn ball will be safe!

(The knitting needles aren’t finished on the Teach To Knit interaction yet, but trust me it’s SUPER CUTE.)

So, what can you do with all these knitting projects? Lots of stuff!

Not only can knitted objects be listed on Plopsy, but you can also Donate them to charity. If you want to surprise a loved one, try Gifting a knitted object too. If you want to destroy all traces of your knitted failures, you can Frog the object and start again! If it’s a particularly nice Sweater that you made, consider Adding it to Wardrobe to make it available in Create-A-Sim to all family members.

(Everyone appreciates a nice gift!)

We want Sims to be able to knit something for their whole family. Not only will Sims be able to knit Toddler Onesies, but Baby Onesies as well. So put your little grubworm in a handmade knitted outfit. I’m sure they’d thank us if they could! (And if they didn’t like it I’m sure they’d be polite about it.)

(Here’s a sneak peek at some of the concept art for new clothing for the littlest of Sims!)

It also felt like a good idea to add an Aspiration to tie this passion for knitting all together. So if you want to master the fuzzy art of knitting, consider signing your Sim up for the Lord(or Lady) of the Knits Aspiration. With yarn running through your veins, there will be no knitting mountain too hard to conquer! Master the Aspiration and you’ll be rewarded with the Sacred Knitting Knowledge trait. What does it do? Lots of stuff! What does it unlock? Something special! Am I being vague? I am! Come on guys, I can’t share all the secrets quite yet.

As I’ve mentioned previously, we’re trying to get as much cross-pack functionality for knitting as we can. Cats can play with Yarn Baskets and Yarn Balls, there will be new Club rules for Knitting, new class electives at University, and knitting counts for Emotional Control, just to name a few. I’m hoping Knitting feels nice and snug alongside our other gameplay systems.

Now let’s have a chat with our lead Object Modeler, Beth Mohler!

Conor: Can you tell us a little bit about what an Object Modeler does on The Sims 4?

Beth: As an object modeler I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to make objects work in The Sims 4. This is actually a very involved process, and somewhat different from the wonderful work our environment team does. We work with designers, concept artists, engineers, animators, vfx artists (basically everyone!) to make sure that Sims can use an object properly in an animation, or that all of our objects will work with each other. Once we understand the design for a new object, we will create a rig, a block model (a very generic version of the object used to help us make more of the same object in the future), and a footprint (tells us where the object can go and how Sims move around it). Once those are tested by animators and other disciplines we can model the final version, create UVs, and add textures. We also hook up and test everything in the game to make sure it all looks good. There is a lot to think about when it comes to making objects because we know players can find so many interesting ways to place and use them in game. That makes it a very fun challenge to make them work with everything else we’ve built before.

Conor: What feature are you most excited to work on in Nifty Knitting Stuff?

Beth: I’d say I am most excited to work on the rocking chairs! I love that we are bringing them to the game and can’t wait to see them in some cozy living rooms or on porches.

Conor: What are some of the challenges you are facing working on this pack?

Beth: One of the biggest challenges is ensuring that the knitting itself looks good and is fun to watch! This is a challenge given that it needs to work for everything you can create. Figuring this out takes a lot of iteration between modeling, animation, engineering, design, and art direction so that we come to a conclusion that will work the best given our time and technical constraints.

Another interesting “challenge” is the fact that I crochet as a hobby myself! When you are knowledgeable about something (yarn!) in real life, working on it in the game it can sometimes be hard to separate the things you know and may expect in reality from what is possible or best within a video game. I have to make sure to keep a balance and to conceptualize how we can best convert the knitting experience into The Sims 4. As someone who also generally enjoys interior design and architecture, this is actually one of my favorite challenges and one of the things I love about working on objects in The Sims 4.

Conor: What is your favorite feature you have ever worked on in The Sims 4?

Beth: I think it has to be a tie between the mini fridge or the robotics table in Discover University. That pack was the first time I got to really take an entire feature from start to finish. I’ve been with Maxis for a while, but I’m relatively new to The Sims 4. Both of these objects had some complex features we wanted that required a lot of iteration. I learned a ton about the technical aspects of our game during the process as well. I’ve also worked on a few very cool things between then and now, but those can’t be shared yet ; )

As a fan of The Sims since the very beginning I am so happy to be able to share a little about what I do on a daily basis on The Sims 4 with you! I haven’t been on The Sims 4 for quite as long overall, but some of you may also recognize me from my time on Sims Mobile where I shared some of our workflows on Twitter for making a juice bar. Thanks!

Conor: You shared a screenshot of the In-Progress Rocking Chair in our Rocking Chair Deep Dive. Can you share an updated screenshot now that the Rocking Chair is further along?

Beth: I would love to! I hope everyone has been enjoying seeing the progress on this object so far! Here it is a little further along. This program allows us to set the rules for the object materials, footprint size and rig it should use, as well as all the color variants and swatch colors you see in the catalog.

Thanks Beth! By the way, Beth is on Twitter @SimGuruBeth, so be sure to Follow her! And thanks to all of you Simmers for following this pack’s development, this has been a really fun project in a very crazy time. A big thank you to my Stuff Pack teammates, and especially SimGuruSarah who edited my inane ramblings and wrangled the miscellaneous bits for these posts.

While this concludes my design Deep Dives, we still have more forum posts with development insights on the way! Keep checking the Community Stuff Pack forum and we’ll have more fun stuff to show off in the weeks to come.

Until next time, SimGuruConor

[havenester]

with the resurgence of scenecore and the rawring 20s i was reminded of one of my favorite things to do on ye ole day of deviantArt: using anime bases made in ms paint, that were traced from a screenshot.

there was something freeing about just slapping some color on a premade base, like your own coloring page, or a paper doll, that made creating somewhat cringey OCs really easy and just plain fun.

of course, tracing other people’s art is problematic, especially without their permission, but if you’re like me you still enjoy loading up a shoddy pixel doll and making it your own in one of the most primitive imaging editing softwares out there.

So! i just kinda. made one myself. the basic process is down below and i’ll explain it a little more in detail. I used, you guessed it, MS Paint.

shitty resolution aside, i start by sketching the figure in a light color, blue in most cases, basic stuff.

i go over it in a darker color, red, and use a couple of shortcuts to phase most of the previous color out. you can fill the canvas with the lighter color, and then fill THAT in with white again to get a large chunk out, and scraggling pixels can be removed like this:

make sure the foreground color is your lighter sketching color.

double check your background color, default is white.

using the eraser tool, hold down the RIGHT CLICK to remove just the foreground color!

once i’ve cleaned up the sketch, i use a combination of the line and curve tools in black to��‘ink’ it. make sure to go back and clean up any stray pixels so the outline is smooth.

i remove the red in the same way i remove the blue, and then you’re left with your lineart! spruce it up with some classic base colors and a palette for easy recoloring, optionally you can change your background color, and bam!

your own circa 2010 dA anime base.

feel free to use my finished version down below!

[meowhawkk]

hey help a dumbass out how do u go about finding poses on ur own? im tired of looking for hours at stock photos and art and shit trying to find a goose pose

OK SO TWO TNINGS.... stock references are good! it provides accuracy in terms of human anatomy and where things go. problem is.... it can be a little stiff and tricky to use as reference, bcuz the human body is quite complex.

literally search anime pose references. if you want better results, search anime bases (just don't use them as a yknow, base- just reference it, usually they're traced from anime screenshots so it may help composition too). OK. I know anime is notorious for breaking anatomical rules HOWEVER... anime is already simplified. its easy to see what the pose is trying to convey and bcuz you understand it instantly, generally your sketches and what not will appear much less stiff.

generally I'll use both and cross reference, especially if the character I'm drawing isn't a stick thin anime girl (you will encounter that a lot) just to give myself some wiggle room in terms of posing and stuff. what I usually do is think of a pose I like, get a stock image similar, get an anime pose similar, and then go about the sketching process. then I can see how it SHOULD look on a human, but also get a better gist of where things go on a simplified character

other things: design doll is your friend. get it. download it. you can just make your own poses. it's so good. or even use a poser app on mobile they're all the same just use em djdjdjd

ALSO FIGURE DRAWING! give it a shot! it'll help break down poses and help understand lines of action! so your art can look naise and fluid......

using reference is always a good thing and don't be afraid to use "too much", there's never too much :3

[lynzuglyliar]

Lynz Way & Chantal Claret: Stalking & Online Bullying, A Masterpost.

This post is intended to document and expose Lindsey Way and Chantal Claret’s bullying behaviour, which has been discussed a lot on this blog and on others. In this post we touched on some of this behaviour, such as Lindsey using her art to mock Lucinda Montano and testimony from Lucinda that Lindsey and Chantal online bully fans.

You may also want to read our previous post about Lindsey’s estranged sister and mother so that you have some background knowledge needed for this post.

To cut a long story short, Lindsey dropped her mother and sister, Amy not long after Bandit was born:

It looks like Lindsey has dropped her family- they’ve met Bandit once. When her mother was sick, Lindsey didn’t get in touch. Amy thinks Lindsey is embarrassed of them. Not nice, but then again, a lot of people fall out with their families. So, if Lindsey doesn’t want anything to do with her family, then why does she continue to monitor what they do? Why does she share this information with her friends?

Here is an extract of the court documents between Frances Bean Cobain, Courtney Love and Frances’s ex-husband (Silva v. Love et al.):

Here is a screenshot of the original text messages between Frances and Lindsey (Way):

We have highlighted the areas where Frances refers to Lindsey’s sister and mom.

First up “even her go fund me pic is with the papa roach guy. That’s some stalkerish dedication right there”. What is Frances referring to?

Well, Amy just happens to be a big Papa Roach fan:

Please note the date of the court documents as September 2015. Why was Amy setting up a GoFundMe page? Well, at this time, Amy was single, around six months pregnant and working full time to earn money for the arrival of her first baby, as well as supporting and caring for her ill mother single-handedly.

Frances Bean mocking Amy for setting up a GoFundMe is all the more disgusting when you remember just how much she is worth from her father’s estate alone.

Also, when Frances laughs at Amy being “stalkerish” for using a photo of her with her favourite band, is she not laughing at all of us who have ever been excited to meet their favourite celebrity?

Luckily, she’s never done anything embarrassing like that, right?

No matter what happened between Lindsey and Amy, whether she did drop her family out of embarrassment or whether it was something else, mocking Amy with her friends is not cool. It’s mean, it’s nasty and it’s just the kind of behaviour that Lucinda said she was was responsible for.

Ok, so how about “our bloodlines suck”. I get that Frances had a turbulent upbringing with the loss of her father and instability from her mother. Lindsey’s dad was also absent for most of her life, but that’s not what Frances is referring to here, she’s directly referring to Lindsey’s mom and sister. What exactly have they done wrong? They weren’t ‘cool’ enough for Lindsey’s L.A. lifestyle. That’s it. Does that make them the same as a drug addict mother or a father who (no disrespect intended to Kurt) killed himself? Is getting a picture with your favourite band really that bad? Are their bloodlines comparable, really?

To our final point, Frances says, “anyway let me know what info you get about ur mom and sis”. Not only does this look like Frances is fishing for more of Amy’s “stalkerish” behaviour to laugh at, but it suggests that Lindsey was actively researching what her mom and sister were up to and sharing it with her ‘coven’, despite taking nothing to do with them (by her own choice). Lindsey saw her sister’s plea for money to support her new arrival and help with her mother’s care and what did she do- laughed about it with her multi-millionaire friend. Classy.

So let’s take another look at that screenshot, because Amy isn’t the only one on the receiving end of their taunting:

Charlie is also being called out for her own “stalkerish dedication”- “it’s gonna be Charlie in 5 years”.

So, to Charlie. By now you’ve probably heard the Legend of Charlie. She’s famous in the MCR/MSI fandom (mostly for the wrong reasons). We believe that she was one of the first victims of Lindsey and Chantal’s bullying. Here’s a quick recap (of what we know, anyway) about the Charlie saga.

Charlie was an MCR fan. She had a popular blog and was well-known in the fandom. Like most MCR fans, Charlie became an MSI fan when introduced to them through Gerard and Lindsey’s marriage. At 14 years old, Charlie even met Lindsey during the 2008 MSI tour:

In 2010, (when Charlie was 16) Lindsey Way and Jessicka Addams announced an art show. Charlie, being a big Lindsey fan, booked her tickets from the U.K. to L.A., excited to meet Lindsey again and see her art show. Lindsey and Jessicka ended up moving the art show to another date, when Lindsey heard that Charlie had already booked her flight, she kindly invited Charlie to visit her at the studio during her trip, since she would be missing the show. Here are some pictures from this meeting:

Lindsey even gave Charlie this note after their time together:

But soon after this, things turned sour. We’re not exactly sure what happened, we don’t think anyone but Lindsey and Charlie know the full story. Some people speculated that Lindsey wasn’t happy that Charlie posted the letter seen above. Anyway, there was a backlash against Charlie. Her and her friends’ Tumblrs were hacked and their private conversations were leaked, including this one:

You can imagine just how much flack Charlie got after this message was leaked. Also, please note that ‘fandom mom’, agony aunt and Lindsey’s “lady-friend”, Anna posted this, despite being around 10 years older than then teenage Charlie. Nice.

We’ve tried to avoid mentioning Charlie on here and contrary to popular beliefs, such as this one:

 .... it’s not because we think she’s completely innocent. Certainly, she did some problematic, ‘fangirly’ stuff. But so do most fandoms and it’s not like Anna wasn’t doing exactly the same thing. Mainly we’ve tried to leave her out of it because she’s not a public figure and because she’s had enough shit from the fans as well as Lindsey et al. especially from her BFF, Chantal Claret.

It has been widely speculated for years that Chantal has set up fake Twitter accounts to bully fans. So after we saw this Twitter exchange (below), we thought it was time to bring Charlie’s story to the forefront. Please note that Charlie is now more or less out of the fandom and this post is in no way intended to drag her back into this mess.

So why would Chantal be so intent on bullying Charlie, one of Lindsey’s biggest fans?

We did a bit of digging and we’ve traced it back to a Vimeo video that Charlie and her friend made when they were 16. We remember seeing it years ago, but we think it’s been deleted now. Here’s our best recollection of it: in the video Charlie’s friend (sorry, we don’t know her name) talked about how she was friends with Donna Way on Facebook (please note: at this time, Donna accepted most requests from MCR fans on FB). Apparently, Donna had taken a shine to the girls and invited them to stay with her in New Jersey. Charlie and her friend were talking fangirly shit about how funny it would be to be invited to Gerard’s old house and maybe even stay in his old bedroom. Not the most mature thing, but it was typical shitposting talk that you’d expect from a couple of excitable teenagers. It was a video for their friends, after all.

Unfortunately for them, Chantal was up to her private investigator work (much like when she made the nowaymikeyway blog with Lindsey) and set about making sure the video went public and everyone (including MCR members and Charlie’s then-boyfriend) knew about it:

As you can see, this is the account ‘morrisseystears’ that Charlie and @poisondwarfiero were discussing in the twitter exchange above. We can’t 100% prove that this was Chantal but knowing her behaviour, Charlie’s confidence that it was her and based on these tweets (below), we are convinced that this was one of her many sleeper accounts.

“#HiC” clearly means Charlie and “stay on the internet and stuck in their houses” refers to Charlie dealing with panic attacks and agoraphobia due to the fallout from her divorce from Lindsey and the MCR/MSI fandom.

Can we also talk about Chantal’s use of the term “skin wearers”? Does that sound familiar? It should. It’s what Lindsey and the rest of the spooky pie coven refer to their fans, fans like you, as:

So, if you’re a fan of Lindsey, be sure to know that this is what her and her friends call you. Cute. Wonder what other terms of endearment they have for fans?

Here’s some more proof from Lucinda that Chantal and Lindsey bullied Charlie (although Jessicka has since owned up to also being part of the group that bullied her). In our previous post, we blanked out Charlie’s name as we didn’t want to cause her any more upset. However, we now think that her story should be told as it is an important part of demonstrating how cruel and conniving the ‘coven’ can be:

Chantal’s bullying was so bad, referring to people (mostly teenagers) as “cunts”, “bitches” and “whores” that she’s now deleted all her tweets from before 2016/2017. She’s also fallen out with A LOT of people, including those who used to be her close friends. See this friendly twitter banter directed at Chantal from Giuliana Mayo:

Fast forward from February 2013 to September 2013 and we have this:

and this:

Also, notice Jessicka sticking up for Chantal and claiming that she is not a bully (lol). This is the pack mentality of the coven. But now they’ve dropped Jessicka and are online bullying her with references to her mental health.....

Anyway, we digress.... But it wasn’t just Chantal that bullied fans online. Christian Addams, Jessicka’s husband also got involved in the bullying of Charlie, a 16 year old fan (who is British btw) :

Considering that Lindsey followed all these people at the time - Jessicka, Christian, Chantal - there’s no way that she didn’t know that this bullying was going on.

It doesn’t end there though the @JOJrobot twitter account was also used to bully fans (along with another account @CourtneyThug- now deleted and owned by someone unrelated to this mess). Jessicka claims that she did not run the JOJrobot account but it has now been re-appropriated to the @JOJ_official account (that she ALSO says she doesn’t run... funny that). You can see that here:

So Chantal was @Morrisseystears, Jessicka was @JOJrobot, meaning that Lindsey was most likely @CourtneyThug as these accounts would ‘tag-team’ the bullying of fans, often interacting with each other. The JOJrobot account (as you can see is now @JOJ_official) was responsible for these tweets bullying teenage fans @ruthieforadream and @AyeraJeanGrey:

Notice that the JOJ account uses the same bullying tactics that Chantal implements, tweeting famous people that their target is fans of in order to embarrass them and maybe even get their idols to block them. This is a pattern of behaviour that can also be seen in CourtneyThug’s tweets. The @CourtneyThug account was equally as nasty and also targeted another teenage fan, all because they briefly followed an anti-MSI twitter account. They tweeted disgusting stuff about the people she/he was a fan of (another Jared Leto fan, not that that’s important though) and refused to back down, even when they unfollowed the anti-MSI account and begged to call a truce:

Not really related, but a bit of a lol, Jessicka the JOJrobot accounted tweeted to get self-promo for Jessicka:

and, even weirder, tweeted Eliza (Cuts) Siep (ex-girlfriend of Gerard Way and fanfic writer extraordinaire):

Since Jessicka has been booted out of the coven, she seems to regret her bullying past and is trying to make amends and distance herself from them:

So to sum it all up:

- Lindsey monitors the actions of her mom and sister despite taking nothing to do with them

- Lindsey and Frances make fun of Lindsey’s relatives

- Chantal is a bully

- Charlie isn’t the devil

- Jessicka was a bully, is now (hopefully) reformed

- Christian Addams was a bully

- Lindsey knew about the bullying and was most likely @courtneythug

These women in the ‘coven’ are still operating fake and sleeper accounts. To our knowledge (and we will update if anything changes) these are their current sleeper accounts-

Lindsey Way- @weirdtrufax on Tumblr and Twitter (previously @ratsinyourwall on Tumblr and @ceilingrats on Twitter) also @Vee00181 on Twitter.

Chantal Claret - @mcrIord on twitter