#Been trying to practice different poses recently

[roosterarts]

What are you looking at?

I swear there is no other version of this.

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[yougavememyopia]

Can we pls get more of masochist yandere I love him so much!!

For you anon <3

Tags: PT.1, dirty talk, he's trying so hard to seduce you, bunny costume, "miss/mistress," 18+

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“Hey roomie~ I wanna show you this new thing I bought. I hope you'll like it!” You groaned at the sound of the cheery high-pitched voice, hating how sweet his voice sounded. You could practically hear him jumping from excitement. His foot lightly tapping the ground in impatience. "I wore it all for you, y'know? It'd be rude if you didn't look."

You hummed, unamused. "Don't tell me it's another one of those shirts that says 'I belong to her' or whatever. Those were fucking childish."

Scrolling through your phone, you didn't bother making eye contact. A part of you enjoying the exaggerated whine coming from him. "First of all, mean! Second, it's nothing like that. It's totally different. Come on, come on. Look at me! Please. Pretty please?"

A tired sigh unintentionally escaped your lips. All he ever caused was annoyance and a headache. You finally took one glance at him before going back to your device. Pausing for a second to register what you saw. Your eyes traveling back to his figure, scanning him up and down from his bare thighs to his exposed collarbone. He was wearing black over-the-knee socks, with a bunny costume tightly hugging his torso. Accessorized with detachable white cuffs and collar with a set of fluffy ears and tail to complete the look.

“Ta-da~ Don't I just look so cute? Hm?” He brought his hands to his cheeks and posed for you, one of his legs lifted in the air behind him.

"W-what the hell?!" The words left in a mumble. An unexplainable feeling stopping you from looking away. "I should've predicted that you were gonna do something like this."

He had recently convinced you to let him move in with you. Surprising you by breaking into your house with a smile and a prepared meal on the table. Proving his commitment by coming day after day until you gave in. The long romantic dates, the humiliating begging by your feet— all finally worth it when you helped him unpack his boxes.

You finally managed to turn your head. Trying to find something interesting on your phone to distract you from what you saw.

"Awe, come on! Why'd ya look away? It's good material and I got it at a good price! Don't tell me you don't like it..." His words weren't a way to guilt-trip you, but instead an accusation. As if he knew, without a doubt, that it was something you liked.

Realization settled in. "Have you been going through my phone, you fucking creep?"

"Mhm, you know I have. There I was, on my nightly visit to your bedroom, when I saw that someone forgot to close their incognito tabs. It was a real treat~" He giggled evilly, the teasing grin on his face growing as your eyes widened. In a chilling whisper, he said, "I know how filthy your thoughts are. There's nothing you can hide from me." His hands rested on the couch armrest while he leaned down to kiss your cheek. Making a 'mwah' noise before pulling away.

You involuntarily gulped. An embarrassed warmth flushing your cheeks and some place else. "That is a huge invasion of privacy, you asshole! Shit. How did you even managed to guess my password— no, what the fuck do you do during your nightly visits?!"

"ANYWAY, we never take anything further than kissing... And I'm tired of jerking off. So I thought this will help our relationship. I mean, seriously, don't I look fuckable?" He turned around to show you a view of his backside. Harshly slapping his barely-covered bum. "I would fuck me."

"I have a lot more self control than you think. We won't do anything of the sorts. Our relationship, if you can even call it that, needs more time. I don't fucking know how to love an annoying shit like you."

"But don't you want to have a good time? Again, with your tenseness... You need to relax. Making out is really nice and all, but it causes a problem down there... y'know?" He gave you a sly grin. It made you recall the times you caught him with your panties stuffed in his face. "I hope you didn't forget you're the one responsible, so for once, take care of it! It's all your fault."

He plopped down on the couch with crossed arms, the force of his anger bouncing the cushions slightly. A pout on his lips and a playful glare in his eyes. He circled his arms around your shoulders. Giving you a hug from the side and starting his whining. "I'm impatient, roomie~ Dammit, please! Please, please, please! I feel like I'm gonna EXPLODE soon. Augh!!"

"..." You refused to even look at him. Afraid of the flutter in your heart growing.

He continued, taking advantage of your silence to persuade you. "Don't you wonder what I sound like in bed? Don't wanna know how I'd moan your name?" He leaned in way closer. Your body stiffening at the breath fanning your face. A shiver sent right down your spine when he moaned in your ear. "Oh please, miss, please fuck me faster~ Ah~!"

You couldn't look at him, quietly mumbling a curse in defeat. Hands clutching your pants. Hoping he didn't hear how your voice shook. The truth was, you didn't want to deny him any longer, conflicted with how soft you were becoming to him. A part of you wanting to just throw him over and ride him, yet another, more sadistic part wanting to make him cry frustrated tears and beg you to just let him hump your leg. Ultimately, you were unable to stop the dirty scenarios flooding your head. The feeling of arousal growing longer by the minute when his lustful eyes met yours.

You mustered up your strength, "no."

"N-no?" His eyes widened in shock. He thought he had you convinced with his amazing performance.

"No."

You pushed him off of you. Immediately going on your phone. He exhaled a loud huff and leaned back against the couch, arms hugging himself instead. Blankness crossing his features. Why were you so difficult?

A few seconds of silence was shared until he got a new, brilliant idea.

He cleared his throat. Adjusting his fake bow and pushing a random object off the coffee table. "Oops! Better get that~"

He bent down in front of you, in a way that his round buttocks rubbed against your lap. Another way to evoke you.

"Answer's fucking no. Horny bitch." You kicked him away and he gasped in surprise. Dramatically humphing. Slowly losing his cool.

He stood up straight and stomped his feet to the ground. The sexy bunny outfit not making this situation any easier. He came off as adorable, rather than threatening.

"You aren't impressed by my big ass? I worked hard on it, y'know. Don't you just want to hit it? Punish me for dressing so naughty? I won't stop until you put me in my place. There are sooo many other outfits I can try on. So just spank me already! I won't give up. If this doesn't work, I'll just try again and again and a— Who are you texting? I swear I'll find them and kill them! You're supposed to pay attention to ME!"

His hands formed fists when you didn't respond. Fuck, he was getting tired of this. An exhausted moan left his mouth. He fell to his knees in front of you, burying his face in between your tights. Soft cheek nuzzling up against your leg. "Please. Just head pats. At least praise me, call me your bunny. I'll be satisfied with that..."

Finally, you put your phone away. A surge of satisfaction in your chest at how you made him docile only by ignoring him. Your fingers grazed the tip of the fluffy fake ear. Pathetic eyes looked up to observe your movements. Silently asking for more affection.

"Good pet." You praised. Your hand lightly scratching the back of his head. "That's so much better. You were gonna give me a fucking headache with all that whining."

"Ahh, it hurts." He looked so pitiful as he whimpered.

"What hurts, bun?"

A lazy smirk formed on his face. "My pants... they feel so tight~"

You rolled your eyes, You felt a bit dumb for thinking he was actually going to be satisfied with mere praise. Your grip became harsh, fingers tugging the strands of his hair up. He moaned— his eyes closed in pleasure while his bulge twitched against your leg.

"M-mistress, please..." He begged as your spit landed on his lips. He licked the liquid slowly, not breaking the eye contact. Groaning at the humiliating act. "Don't you wanna let me use my skillful tongue on you? Please just sit on my face. I want to taste you, so so so bad!"

"Licking my panties isn't enough for you anymore? Huh? Did you get bored of them that fast? Pity." You teased, pulling one last time before letting go of his head.

He winced. Fixing his hair, and soothing it with pets. "Miss, you treat your poor bunny so harshly. Not that I don't like it. Can I... tell you a secret? I'm wearing a pair of your underwear right now~"

"Ugh, you fucking disgust me." Your insult only caused him to greedily grind his hardness to your leg faster. He loved the look on your face. "Shit. Stop moving your hips!"

"Mmh, but I want relief, miss. I need it."

A harsh slap rang through the room. He gulped. His movements immediately stopping to obey you. "You'll get relief when I fucking give you permission. Understand that, dumb rabbit?"

"Finally— I mean, yes, mistress. Anything you say!" An endearing smile reached his eyes. "You have no idea how long I waited for this~"

You, too, felt excited. Thoughts swimming through your head about how you'll proceed with this. His fingers spread out to form a V, his tongue flicking up and down between them, giving you an idea of what you wanted to do. Thighs clenching together as you imagined it in your head. "Maybe we'll finally see whether you were lying about your skills, hm?"

[floralpools]

Guard Dog

Warnings: Part one of two (is smut), stalkerish lol, fluff, mentions of death, mutual pining

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x you

Summary: Set after joining Alexandria, Daryl's overtly having issues settling in, and even more problems leaving you alone.

Word count: 1.8k

...

You and Daryl have known each other for years. Through thick and thin, your found-family has each other's backs. But your group has been wearing thin. From Beth to Tyreese, now in Alexandria, a strange and new environment— it's safe to say, Daryl’s been on edge. He was losing his nerve, and that somehow entailed keeping you close, very close.

Every and any second you're alone, he appears, determined to invade your space, and it's becoming difficult to keep your feelings at bay, because you’ve been in love with him since your time at the prison. Even then, when shit hit the fan, he raced to get you out. Though you feared your affections for him made such a delusion — one that posed he would think to save you first— his recent clingy behaviour has made you believe in said delusion.

Today, he's back at it. You’re alone gathering food for dinner, for less than 10 minutes, before he marches into the garage. Bearing in mind that he has no reason to be here, and spent most of his time hidden from the locals, his appearance would be considered unusual.

You let Daryl silently stand there, patrolling the entrance for a few seconds, till your heart gives out.

“Is something the matter?” You utter, shifting your eyes to his dark ones, and they snap to you, slightly taken aback. “Nothin,” is all he grumbles before looking outwards to your surroundings, observing and scanning like the hunter he is.

“Daryl, we’ve been here for weeks," huffing, "we’re alive, and well,” you state, swallowing quietly. “You can relax you know.” You turn to lift a basket of supplies. When heading for the exit, Daryl swiftly steps in front of you.

“I ain’t doin' nothin' but standing,” he rumbles defensively.

“Standing in front of me, might I add,” you retort, smiling, trying to ease the strange tension, but his face remains stoic. Daryl stares directly into you, and a shiver rolls down your spine. His intense gaze doesn’t last long, as he chooses to walk off without a goodbye. Your shoulders instantly deflate, and you exhale, closing your eyes.

“Now what was that?” Sasha’s voice makes you flinch, popping your eyes open to peer at her. “You tell me,” you sigh and she laughs.

“I’ll be damned if I ever try to read that caveman's mind,” she grins, “You're better off leaving that question for Carol.” Her smirk tells a different story, one that says she knows something more, and you can’t help the second shiver that racks through your body.

...

Desperate to figure out Dixon, you go to Carol’s, asking for her assistance with dinner as a cover.

As you both cook, it takes little time for her to notice your incessant gawking. She pronounces your name, and your eyes snap back to the sizzling food. “Cmon, you can talk to me,” she assures.

When you decidedly stay hushed, she releases a sigh that eases into a snicker. “You should speak soon before Daryl finds us, or you, rather,” she mentions, attempting to contain her humour. You spin to face her. “What do you mean by that?” You question far too quickly, that the words practically jumble together. “Exactly what it seems,” she smiles pleasantly, ignoring your eager tone. “You’ve got yourself a lifelong, loyal guard dog.”

“Why? I mean, Daryl’s protective of everybody? But why does he only follow me?” You ramble, “Doesn’t he trust me to not end up dead, in a friendly, gated community?” You pout and Carol laughs again.

“That isn’t quite why,” she dwindles.

“Please just spell it out for me, I can't take it anymore.” Now square to her, you drop the stirring utensil, and tug your apron over your head. She watches you move, absorbed in her thoughts, as you jump to sit on the edge of the kitchen island. “He’s making you uncomfortable?” She asks warily.

“Yes,” you pause, “and no.” Your head lowers in embarrassment.

After a moment, you look at Carol, while she refocuses on adding more ingredients, to the dish you abandoned. “Why does he do it?”

Her moving actions falter, and she pivots to face you. “It isn’t for me to say, but being around you, knowing you’re safe, clearly calms him." Though you don’t truly get it, you nod slowly so Carol goes back to finishing the meal.

Just as she puts meat in the oven, Daryl waltzes through the door, without so much as knocking or giving some sort of warning. You yelp when you spot him. When you lock eyes, you refuse to hold it, so you turn your head over your shoulder quickly, with a grimace, one that doesn’t go unnoticed by Daryl.

“What? Somethin' happen?” His hoarse voice sounds almost panicked. As you swivel your neck to soothe Daryl’s unnecessary worry with a "No," he suddenly grips your wrist, far too roughly. You squeak as he grabs your full attention.

You assess how he stands motionless in front of your knees, eyes widened, regarding his hand as it holds your wrist. He looks kind of appalled, as if he couldn’t believe he touched you. He then briskly lets go of your arm, like it burned him, retracing into himself.

You gulp and your bottom lip trembles. 'Was he disgusted? Did he see you as a child? What had you done to warrant this behaviour?' You think anxiously.

You look between Carol and Daryl now, as they share a lengthy stare. You swear under your breath, then push Daryl's chest with your fists, shocking both of them.

“I’m leaving, do not, follow me.” You order, with a vexed, yet hurt look. His mouth gaps with a soundless word, and you leave.

...

Sitting alone in your home, your empty stomach growls, and you start to seriously regret what you did earlier, which left you too ashamed to stay for dinner.

As your thoughts run wild, a quiet knock at the door diminishes them. You stay still, almost wondering if the noise is no more than a tree branch, moved by wind, but he bellows your name.

"Daryl?" You respond, and his voice simply calls your name again, almost like a plea. You turn the lock and knob, opening to find Daryl, fidgeting on his feet uncomfortably at your doorstep. "Um, come in?" You allow meekly, and he enters, faintly brushing your side.

Picking up his musky, pine scent, you bite your lip examining him, slowly leaning back on the closing door. He looks around agitatedly, seeming completely out of place, and somewhat flustered.

Growing stiff, you can't bear the awkward silence for much longer.

"I'm sorry," you mumble an apology for something, you're not sure what, and clearly, neither is he. He whirls towards you, stepping into your space. "For what?"

"I was rude earlier and-"

"Not rude, just, confusing." He interjects, brows furrowing in tune with his sentence. You scowl, "Well, if I'm being honest, I wouldn't say I'm the 'confusing' one here." Your remark reminds you of your previous feelings, and they bubble to the surface.

When he says nothing, you continue. "I'm safe here Daryl, and pretty happy, all things considered," you breathe out in exasperation. "Is there some danger that I should know of? Is someone here out to get me?"

"No-"

"So why do you keep chasing me around?" You just about shout, interrupting him. Daryl flinches and looks as though he wants to be anywhere but here, with you. He fixates on the door behind you. "I ain't doin' nothin-"

"Daryl! Please just," you cut yourself short as your voice escalates. "Please be honest with me, after everything we've been through, you owe me that," you beg.

His tense frame withers in defeat. "I just can't leave your side," he grumbles, his words barely understandable. "Why?"

"Don't wanna lose ya," Daryl's voice trails off as his head wheels to the side. "You won't, and I can take care of myself, just like the others, who you don't follow around." You fail to hide your ignominy, visibly disappointed that he believes you need special attention, over the rest of the group. "Can't," he mumbles.

"'Can't' what?" You inquire, now stepping into his space, voice rising.

"I can't, 'cause I don' wanna lose you," he exclaims again in a burst. Your face twists further in ignorance. "Christ woman," he runs his hand down his tormented expression. "Daryl, please stop dancing around what you mean." You cry out, "'Lose me?' Tell me what you mea-"

Abruptly, he grips your shoulders. "I want ya." He states, baring his teeth as if it were a threat. "I want you, I want you to live."

"You 'want' me... To live...?" You ask slowly and his eyes roll back in frustration. "No, not just to live-"

"Because I love you," you blurt and immediately try to pry your shoulders from his clutch. He stills with you firmly in his grasp, so close that his nose nearly grazes yours. His hold increases its strength, and he shakes his head to himself, seemingly battling his own thoughts. "Daryl?" You whisper.

"How can you?" He utters so quietly it's barely audible, so quiet you don't think he expected to say it out loud.

While his eyes squeeze shut, you snake your arms around his waist, and his entire build clamps up. Now afraid of a possible rejection, you loosen your embrace. But his hands move from your shoulders to your upper back, arms drawing you to him, fully caging you in. You take in his broad chest as it presses against your less impressive one. Your fingers seize his leather vest, aching to know how it feels in your palms.

His heavy breathing fans your nape, and you swear he sniffs your hair, as his nose and scruff tickle the skin behind your ear. His fingertips tease the ends of your hair, and you take this as an opportunity to breathe him in. Just as you do, he pulls away, moving you to an arm's length. You blush.

"Sorry," he mutters and your brows crease. "I smell bad, I know," he murmurs and goes fairly red himself. "I don't mind," you say sweetly with a smile, ignoring the urge to tell him you like it.

Finally getting a chance to gaze into his eyes properly. You virtually melt when his pupils appear glassy. You've only seen him cry once, after losing Beth. 'So would he really be brought to tears over a confession? From you no less?'

"Daryl?" He peeks up from behind his fringe. "Do you 'want' me, or like me, like I like you?" You ask, trying to minimize the pressure he may feel to admit any feelings, but you so desperately want to know —how desperately you want him to hold you again.

"Both," he rasps.

You nod and smile sheepishly, "I can work with that."

When a comfortable silence envelops the room, your stomach growls loudly. A modest smile takes shape on Daryl's face. "I put some food aside for you, back at Carol's." He emits, gesturing to the door behind you, wordlessly asking you to go over there, with him. You nod a yes and your heart pounds, swooning at his thoughtfulness. "Thank you."

You reach your hand out, and he very hesitantly holds it, after wiping his twice down his thigh. You beam, heading out the door.

Part two

[biancasaidstfu]

So many of y'all are focusing on Nicola's eyes in that cursed photo, but a big thing you're missing is her smile.

Nicola has a very specific type of smile she does when posing for photos. Whether it's close-mouthed, parted lips, or showing a bit of teeth, it's noticeable from a mile away. It's meticulous, practiced and perfect.

People say you can tell if a smile is genuine by whether it crinkles the corner of your eyes, but tbh I find it very easy to smile with my eyes on demand and I'm no actress...

What neither I nor any professional actor nor model can do tho, is pose for a candid shot. It simply cannot be done. There is always going to be a certain stiffness when one tries to pose a candid, and that's exactly what Nicola is doing in the photo with Jake.

There's a reason so many people clocked it but can't exactly describe why it's different to all the shots of Nic looking up at Luke with heart eyes. How it's not that she isn't smiling with her eyes (she is), or the dilation of her pupils (that's unreliable at best because we can't know what the lighting was like outside the frame at the exact moment the shot was taken), but it's her photoshoot-ready, posed smile that gives her away.

It's a lovely smile, don't get me wrong, but it's not the kind of smile that comes from the heart. You know, the kind where you're filled with such joy or love that it can't help but shine on your face. No, it's the kind of smile that's been perfected over years of shoots and media-training. It's the kind of smile you keep in your back pocket and whip out at a moment's notice.

And that my friends, is why I know this was some bizarre stunt. I can't tell you for the life of me what their angle is, and frankly I don't give a damn. Because try as they might, Lukola had the truth plastered over their faces during the entire press tour and even recently at SAGs, and it's all in the smile :)

👏👏👏

[soularsss]

Drawing Likeness: with Tem!

okaay since a few people actually showed interest in me sharing a bit of what I've been doing to figure out how to really capture likeness, specifically Temuera Morrison, I figured id do my best to write it out

I am also going to entice you with some of my recent clone art! (oooh some of it is unreleaaasedd)

I am putting the whole thing under the cut because I have a feeling its going to be long:

Read more!!!

a couple disclaimers before we start

-This is not some definite post about how everyone should be drawing clones, nor is it in any way claiming that this is the right way. This is just my musings as I stare at a mans face for way too long and try to replicate it

-I am inexperienced. As kind as you all are to me, drawing real people is relatively new to me, capturing a persons identity through their features is difficult for anybody, and I am no different. I have watched many a video on likeness and had my share of classes, but If im being honest, i rarely put it into practice successfully. So there'll probably be errors in this post or things i will come back to in a few months and wish I had said/done differently

ANYWAYs you guys get my vibe im just here to ramble and today we are rambling about mr copy paste. I am doing this for Law, my clone boy, because I plan on delving further into oc fanart and I want to put effort into representing him correctly!

SO LETS BEGIN

Before even deciding what specific pose of a person I want to draw, I tend to grab a bunch of references and compile them like so

(all of these can be found on my pinterest)

Why so many? Well, we are about to delve into facial features, so when we are dealing with photos we have to take into account that there are an abundance of circumstances that will influence how a persons face will appear, some of these include:

focal length: All of these are taken on different devices, and focal length can play a big part in distorting faces

age will play a part, your face changes a bunch throughout your life!

lighting, while not as major, can muddy the waters and make it difficult to interpret facial planes and features

SO, to make sure we get a proper grasp of what's really going on, I like to make sure we have lots of options to compare and contrast with.

Next up! What I like to do is block out the main facial features with colour on different layers, the features I block out usually are the general face shape, eyebrows, eyes, nose and lips. But what you are looking for is the defining features of a person, so that could include other things! Maybe a scar, or some particularly prominent cheekbones.

I dont have any rhyme or reason when it comes to picking my colours, all that matters is you can see all the shapes clearly.

Now I may be biased, because Ive been staring at these for 4 hours, but notice how it still looks like Tem? :D

Anyways, now we can break these parts down, and you'll see what I mean about compare and contrast:

We'll start with isolating the facial shape, putting all these next to eachother you'll notice they arent exactly the same (partly because of my shoddy work) But the distinguishing features run through each shape! Namely the very soft rectangular shape I sketched out in the bottom right there. Along with his soft, wide jaw structure.

I did the same for the rest of his features!

You'll notice I highlight the prominent shapes and ratios,

When drawing anything, it is important to start from the very base shapes and build up.

When drawing something you want to look like someone, those shapes relative to other shapes is what makes it look like them.

I didnt use the same technique with his eyes and lips, but I wrote out some helpful info for them! More importantly for his eyes.

When drawing eyes, I find the most important part is where exactly I draw the creases, (along with the overall shape of the eye itself) it is important to understand where those will present themselves with hooded eyes.

NOW, with an understanding of his facial features in place, lets take a detour to colours:

before I start, a couple things to note:

-Temuera morrison versus the clone troopers in the animated shows:

While I love the animated shows they don't exactly stay close to their source material. Im going to link here to an excellent post discussing whitewashing specifically in relation to the clones.

Temuera is Māori, of Te Arawa (Ngāti Whakaue) and Tainui (Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Rarua) whakapapa, and also has Scottish and Irish ancestry.

The Māori people are the indigenous Polynesian people of mainland New Zealand (Aotearoa). Māori originated with settlers from East Polynesia. Māori people often vary in skin tone, Skin colour doesn't determine ethnicity. There's often a correlation but it's not a requirement.

But that is a tangent! What we are aiming for is to stay true to Temuera.

Bringing back my reference photos from before, Ive colour picked a buncha values and theyre all over the place. Why doesnt this work?

Similarly to earlier, you have to take into account the photos themselves. Many things like lighting, colour grading (when it comes to filmography) and makeup, can alter how a skin colour presents in photo.

You can attempt to get true to life by swatching from certain places on the face. Here I've tried to pick some photos with good lighting, and I've also tried to avoid overly lit/shaded areas.

Tem has a very warm, tan skin tone, Instead of colour picking I tend to try and replicate it myself, but I do often bring in references to make sure Im staying true to the source!

a brief intermission to talk about colour theory, something I myself struggle with alot. Often, when putting in flat colours without a background, I will forget to make sure the colours i intend to use will work with the skin tone i have picked! (something that is apparent in older works of mine, not just in relation to clones, but in general, the colours I end up with stray largely from their original sources and it is something I am doing my best to keep in mind and improve in! Although I don't think i am nearly experienced enough in the topic to say I have succeeded yet lol.)

anyways back to Tem :))

Now we can put all of that into practice! Things to keep in mind when drawing out a piece next to a reference like this:

the distance between the eyebrows? how far down his face does his nose go? Basically just, in relation to eachother, where do all those shapes we found earlier, sit?

The screenshot above is from before I did it myself, but instead of directly tracing from the reference, a handy trick I use it to complete your sketch first, and then overlay a traced version to see where your inconsistencies are! Alternatively, you could move your sketch over the image, but I didnt do it that way so!! uh!! im sure it works exactly the same!!!!

When it comes to a final illustration, or any sketch that isnt a direct study, of course you can push and pull and stylise! You'll see below that I'm not exactly 1:1 to my reference photo either.

The important thing with stylisation, or at least my own personal understanding of stylisation is that you need to thoroughly understand the thing you are stylizing! "You need to know the rules to break them" and all that. While shapes, lines and rendering can change, when it comes to drawing someone, and making it look like them, you have to make sure to keep their core features true to source. Caricature can capture a persons vibe whilst drastically exaggerating features, but it will only look like them if you KEEP THOSE FEATURES!!!! SHAPES!!! AHHH!!

But that is just my perspective on the discussion of style versus realism, please dont take is as Law, I dont know what Im on about half the time!!

anyways, after fixing your sketch, add local colours!

I rexified him because why tf not! But this is where you can go crazy with that clone personalization!

And then here is a very very barely rendered version (if you guys want me to explain how i RENDER that would need to be a completely different post, and I havent had anyone ask about it yet so who knows! maybe one day) But I digress, hopefully you learnt something new through my ramblings! It has certainly helped me organize my thoughts and I have also found some areas I would like to focus more on in the future to improve my own art!

TLDR: In order to understand an object, be it a face or a building or literally anything, you have to break it down to its simplest forms, understanding LARGER shapes will help you immensely in the long run

If you guys like this sorta content do let me know! I'd be down to do similar things for armor/anything really, I am very anti gatekeep so really anything at all you want to know! Send me an ask :))

also if you see a spelling mistake.. i don’t know how that got there

[24hlevi]

— THE IDOL

itoshi rin x male!reader

summary: y/n is a famous pop idol, and rin is his biggest fan. what happens when y/n announces his brand new album "mood swings in this order" along with a tour to be held later in the year? surely, nothing too bad. right?

warnings/tags: language, nsfw implications (cum is said)

wc: 2.6 k

chapter one of the PAPARAZZI series

Being a pop star was difficult at times. From dealing with promotions, tours, and interviews, to crazy fans, trolls, and stalkers. But, none of that fazed you. Should it? Compared to some other idols, you went through a bit more than others, purely because of you embracing your sexuality in both the romance aspect and the performance aspect. You weren't afraid to do crazy concepts that would make fans turn and hate on the idol immediately. You definitely weren't afraid to express how you liked men, and while that may have caused a ruckus during your debut, it all worked out in the end somehow.

At the current moment, you were doing a photo shoot for your new album that you were soon to release the first single for. You had been taking photos for at least two hours, and you were getting irritated by the photographer telling you to do the same pose you’d already done fifteen times. After one last shot, you clasped your hands together.

“Can we take ten?” You said it loud enough for everyone to hear.

Murmurs of yes and thank gods came from the staff at your words, and everyone immediately split off into different areas of the house. With a sigh, you got up off the bed and walked outside where the balcony was, looking down at your backup dancers practicing the routine.

“So, how do we feel about the shoot, Y/n?”

You turned your head to see your assistant and best friend, Mikage Reo standing beside you. “Well, I’ve been taking the same photos for hours, how would you feel?”

Reo chuckled and nodded. “I know.” He followed your gaze towards the dancers before speaking more. “How do you feel about the choreo? Is it too hard? Do I need to make any adjustments? Do you not like any of the backup dancers?”

“Reo,” You said, placing both your hands on his shoulders. “Everything is fine, I swear. As long as things don't go shitty, everything will work out amazingly.” You reassured him.

Reo sighed and nodded again. “I guess,” he said. “I just want this album to be your biggest yet, and that's what Anri wants as well. She’s been super stressed recently trying to put all this together.”

“I understand,” You acknowledged, removing your hands from his shoulders. “But everything is going to be fine, stop worrying so much.”

“Okay,” He sighed again and nodded.

Meanwhile, your manager, Anri was dealing with a big problem with some of the other staff.

“What the fuck do you mean?” The woman spat out angrily at their social media manager.

“Look,” They handed Anri the phone.

She looked at the picture and her eyes went wide. “Has this hit the public yet?”

“Yes.”

“Shit,” Anri cursed, handing the phone back. “We have to tell him.”

“Are you serious?” The social media manager looked at her with shock. “What if it causes a breakdown of some kind?”

“He can deal with it. Follow me.” Anri told them, starting to walk to where you and Reo were.

“Y/n!” Anri called your name. “We have a big problem!”

You and Reo both turned to look at Anri speed walking towards you two, making you look at her in confusion. “What’s wrong?”

“This.” Anri shoved the photo in your face. “What the hell were you thinking going to a club with Ryusei and having this happen?!”

Looking at the photo, your eyes widened at the image. “I thought- he told me he deleted it!” You defended.

“And you believed him?!” Anri exclaimed. “Y/n, this is already trending on all social media, and not in a good way. You and Ryusei are not together. But now that everyone has seen this image, it's chaotic. His management isn't responding and either we have to say it's not real or you admit it and we pray this doesn't fuck anything up. So what do you want to do?”

“I guess I should admit-”

“We’ll say it's fake,” Reo cut you off before you could finish, making you look at him with confusion. “This will damage everything if we say that it's real. Can you imagine what the public will think? How are we supposed to hold a tour when they have seen someone's fucking cum on his face?”

“It’s not like Ryusei is some stranger,” You said.

“It’s still not good, Y/n,” Reo replied. “We have to say it’s fake, and hope his management says the same thing.”

“This is the best decision, Y/n,” Anri told you. “This also means you cannot see Ryusei anymore, he is going to damage your whole career if you go out with him again. Do you understand?”

You felt cornered. It was rare for Reo to take this kind of side in things, and it made you feel like you were being cornered into doing what they thought was best. While, usually they were right in matters like this. It was like you had no real control over anything anymore. With a short nod, you responded. “I understand.”

“Good, now get back to finishing the shoot while I figure out how to deal with this,” Anri said before walking back inside the house.

As soon as Anri was out of hearing distance, Reo quickly turned to you. “Dude, what the fuck?”

“What?” You asked, looking back at him. “It’s not that big of a deal.”

“You look like a whore!” Reo whisper-yelled to you. “Do you understand that? This is not good! Ryusei is going to ruin this whole album! You need to stop seeing him!”

You stared at your friend in slight shock. Yet, you knew he was right. Consistently time after time again Shidou Ryusei has done something to fuck over your reputation leaving you to rebuild it again and again. But, you couldn’t stop seeing him. It was hard. But, you had to stop now. “Okay,” You said quietly, nodding your head.

“Now let’s get back to the shoot,” Reo said, grabbing your arm and pulling you along with him back inside the house.

You sat back down on the bed, adjusting your robe as the photographer came back and stood in front of the bed. You stared at the camera with what they later called a “killer look” that you should’ve had from the very beginning in your debut album. But, they didn’t understand what that look really meant. Not even Reo, who had been your best friend since you two were in middle school. They said the distant look in your eyes was perfect for the album, but they didn’t realize that this was going to end up being just the beginning of things. It was just that no one knew it yet. Not even you.

…

“Y/n, wake up,” Reo’s voice woke you up as he opened the curtains of your room.

You groaned lightly, covering your face with your hands as Reo sighed, walking over to you.

“Come on, you have to get up. We have to talk with PR,” He said, handing you a cup of coffee.

“Oh, great,” You mumbled, sitting up and taking the coffee from him. “I’m fucked, aren’t I?”

“Not yet,” Reo shook his head. “Ryusei’s management finally responded an hour ago.”

“What did they say?” You asked, taking a sip of your coffee after.

“Well, they are with us on saying the picture was fake,” Reo started. “Which is good, but…”

“But?” You tilted your head to the side.

“But, they also want to say it’s for your concept of this album,” Reo finished.

“What?” You questioned.

“Anri already told them how terrible of an idea that is so hopefully that won’t happen. But, it’s obvious Ryusei is trying to work his way around things. You must not let him, do you understand?” Reo told you.

You nodded your head slowly. “I understand.”

“Good, now get up.”

…

After finishing the long meeting with your PR team, you were finally able to go back home. You sat at the pool with a drink in your hand, sunglasses on with your eyes closed when you heard footsteps approach you.

“Yo! Y/n!”

You opened your eyes and turned your head to see your best dancer for your career so far, Hyoma Chigiri. “Chigiri! What’s up?” You replied, taking a sip of your drink.

“Do you wanna go out tonight?” Chigiri asked you. “There’s this new club I checked out last week and it was killer. You should come with me tonight.”

“Will Ryusei be there? I’m not really allowed to hang around him anymore.” You said, stirring the straw around in your drink.

“Nope,” Chigiri shook his head. “But who knows! Maybe you’ll meet someone better.” He smiled.

“True,” You acknowledged with a nod. “Sure, why not?” You eventually answered.

“Awesome, I’ll be here at 8 to pick you up then,” He said, patting your bare shoulder before walking away.

You hummed shortly in response, waving your hand and taking a sip of your drink. Hopefully, this would be nice for you. If not, it at least couldn’t hurt to go out with your friend. You finished your drink in another sip and set it down beside you, putting your arms behind your head as support and closing your eyes again.

…

Chigiri showed up a little late, which you didn’t mind since you weren’t even ready in the first place. You put your shoes on and heard your phone buzz, making you look at it to see Chigiri’s message that he was there. You put your phone in your pocket and left your house, immediately spotting the car near the front gate and you hurried towards it, the cool air freezing through the light materialized shirt you were wearing.

You opened the door and climbed inside the car, seeing Chigiri and he smiled at you.

“Hey! Looking good,” He said to you.

“You too,” You responded, putting the seatbelt on. “So, where’s this place at?”

“Only where the best clubs are,” Chigiri answered, pulling out of your driveway and back onto the road.

“Awesome,” You said, leaning your head against the headrest.

By the time you two arrived, it was half past nine, and the club had just opened at nine. When you stepped out of the car, your eyes squinted at the bright neon lights saying the name of the club that you were unable to read.

“Come on,” Chigiri grabbed your arm and pulled you inside with him.

You were immediately met with the loud booming music and neon lights, making you look around in awe at the place. “This place looks wicked,” You said.

���It is,” Chigiri answered, pulling you along more to get drinks.

While waiting for the drinks, you felt eyes on you. You turned your head to see a man staring at you. He quickly looked away once you noticed his gaze on you, and you watched as one of his friends started talking to him. You looked away when the drinks arrived, and Chigiri took his and went off somewhere, leaving you alone at the bar. You took a sip of the drink and made a sour face.

“Not your taste?”

You turned your head at the voice, seeing the male who was staring at you now standing in front of you. “Not really,” You shook your head. “I like harsher drinks.” You answered.

“Hey! Rufio!” The man called for the bartender, who hurried over to you two. “Get this lovely man here a new drink. Let’s say, a double jack and coke?” He said, glancing over at you for confirmation.

“Yeah, that works,” You nodded your head.

The bartender quickly made the new drink and handed it to you. You took a sip and looked at the male in front of you. “You can sit, if you want,” You offered, gesturing to the chair.

“I was actually going to ask if you wanted to dance,” He said.

“Ah,” You let out. ‘Well, I usually like a drink or two before dancing.”

“But-”

“Hey!” A voice echoed throughout the club.

The man looked away from you and at the younger male approaching the two of you at a fast-paced walk, and he looked terrified.

“What the fuck did I say about you coming back here, huh?!” The younger male exclaimed when he finally reached you two, smacking him in the face.

“I-I’m sorry! I th-thought-”

“Thought what? Get the fuck out!” The male kicked the older man a few times, watching him scurry away.

You stared at the new male in front of you with shock on your face, not knowing entirely what the hell just happened. When he looked at you, his face dropped, making you look at him confused.

“Uhm, do I know you?” You asked politely.

“No,” He shook his head. “But, I know you.” He answered. “You-You’re L/n, Y/n.”

Ah. A fan, great. “Don’t tell anyone, please,” You said quietly, holding your finger up to your lips. “I really just wanted a night out with my friend.”

“I won’t say anything,” He quickly shook his head. “I’m Rin,” He held his hand out to you.

“Nice to meet you, Rin,” You shook his hand.

“Do you maybe wanna dance?” He asked.

Looking at your drink, you took another big sip and set it down, nodding your head and standing up. “Sure.”

Rin grabbed your hand and pulled you with him to the main dancefloor. His hand let go once you both were in the middle of everyone, starting to dance to the electronic music blasting throughout the club. You generally weren’t one for electronic music but you didn’t mind it at the current moment. You felt hands wrap around your waist from behind and a body press against you, turning your head to see Rin towering over you while behind you. His gaze was stuck on you as he moved against you to the rhythm of the music.

He leaned down to your ear and quietly whispered. “Is that your friend over there?”

You followed his eyes to where Chigiri was talking to someone else and started walking towards the exit, and you nodded. “Yeah,” You said.

“Looks like he’s ditching you,” Rin spoke quietly. “Is he your ride?”

You nodded again.

“Hm,” Rin hummed, his hands gripping your sides tightly. “How about you let me take you home?”

You looked up at him with a mixture of confusion and shock. “What?”

“You have no way home now, right?” Rin asked. “You can’t get an Uber cause of your status, and I’m the only one who knows a famous idol is in my club right now. So, I say you have no other choice.”

You stopped dancing by now, his hands keeping you in place as you thought. He was right in all sorts of ways. You couldn’t afford to let anyone else know that you were here, and who knows what would happen if someone took a picture of you out clubbing just after the issue with Ryusei? You were stuck. “Okay,” You nodded.

“Come on,” Rin said as soon as you spoke, grabbing your hand and dragging you out of the club through the back entrance where his car was.

You followed him out to the back, mentally praying that you wouldn’t die on this ride back to your house as he opened the passenger side door for you. You hesitated for a split second before getting in the car, letting Rin close it behind you. He got in a few seconds after and started the car.

“So, what way to your house?”

feedback and reblogs are greatly appreciated!

tag list: [ @d4y-dr3am3r ; @paleenthusiastfox ; @kaitfae ; @will-o-the-wisp ; @pleniluneg4ze ]

[kozachenko]

Here's a digital sketch dump of some pose/anatomy practices and some 2hu doodles, I think from now on if I don't have any big final piece to post, I'll just post sketches I liked that I did digitally (might also reblog some drawings of mine that I want more people to see, maybe idk).

Artist's Notes:

Ok so after the recent Hifuu fanart I did, I've been hoping to experiment more with how I draw faces, how I render, as well as how I stylize things. In some of the earlier sketches I did, I had an idea for a pose that I wanted to try drawing, so I took a ref pic of myself doing said pose (the leaning one btw) and then did a sketch over top of it just to get an idea for the shapes, negative space, and silhouette. After that, I wanted to do some simpler breakdowns of the shapes so I can get better at simplifying the body (these ended up being the bottom right sketches in the post). I also did some experimenting with how to push certain parts of said sketches to create a different body type (via liquify and then a more refined version based on that sketch), as well as figuring out what makes a pose feel natural and not stiff. This was also a bit of a foreshortening practice just so I can get more confident with it, and I ended up using the arms from the liquified version for the coloured Zanmu sketch I did since I liked them so much (dw I'll get to that).

The next thing I wanted to try and draw was Hisami, mainly because.... I am very bad at drawing her in my style. Last time I drew her I made her look really creepy and spindly, and it is my headcanon now that she can switch between a more human, and more creepy look whenever she wants. I'm liking where the face is going a lot, might have to refine a few things about it in the future, but it's cute (I also made the blush purple which I think is what I'm gonna do with her face from now on). I also like how her hair in the sketch turned out a lot, but the outfit..... not as much... Ever since I started changing my style to something less cartoony, I've had a hard time drawing her outfit in my style. Especially the flower veil thing she has on, which, I did try to find a way to draw, but I ended up deleting that sketch because I didn't like it. I'm also not a fan of using the colour purple, like, pure purple, magentas are fine, indigos are fine, but not strict purple. I also have a hard time with drawing all the little pattern details on her dress. I also need to find a way to draw the flower veil in a way that looks good because everytime I try it ends up just looking off (very similar to whenever I try to draw Zanmu's blue spears). I think the only solution to this problem is to do what I normally do and make my own version of the outfit, but with adjustments to suit my style while still trying to keep core elements from the original design intact (like I do with Zanmu and Keiki, and yes I am going to get to that Zanmu drawing just gimme a minute).

Ok next up is Keiki, my favourite Touhou character who I haven't drawn since the beginning of the year. Since my style has changed a lot, I wanted to just do a face sketch of her to get a hang of drawing her again, and I..... really really like how it turned out! When I drew her eyes, I realized that a good way of keeping faces too same facey can be via varying the sizes of their pupils, so that's an idea I'm gonna keep in mind from now on. I had a lot of fun with her hair, I initially was gonna do it like how it is in the official art, but I ended up not liking it, so now I'm gonna draw Keiki with wavy heir like this because it's fun and it looks nice. I also included my base sketch for Keiki's face since I was initially struggling with drawing her bandanna, and in the coloured sketch I added some more detail into her hair.

Now to finally talk about the sketches for Zanmu. Good lord was I having a tough time with her face. I also did this sketch before I figured out how I wanted to draw hair, so that's why the rendering on her hair is different (I did this soon after the Hisami sketch actually). Since I changed my art style a lot, I had to find a way to translate her face from my more cartoony style to my more detailed style, so while the face shape, nose shape and mouth was fine, I was really struggling with the eyes. I did get somewhere eventually though, and I am super happy with how it turned out. I wanted to lean more towards the androgynous side of the gender presentation spectrum, mainly because I think that makes sense for her character. Also made sure to include the silver hairs and some wrinkles just to bring some signs of her aging into her face because those are just staple features of how I draw Zanmu at this point lol. You will also notice that I gave her some scars on the right side of her face, and that's because I am a Zanmu-with-scars truther, I fucking love it whenever I see someone give Zanmu visible scars like that it just adds so much omg (I also tried to put a wolf bite mark on her arm in the full body drawing but idk if it reads well). While you can argue that her not having scars sells the idea of her being this "powerful, untouchable mastermind who is impossible to defeat," I'd say that instead of those scars representing times she got injured, they represent everyone who has failed to defeat her.

As I was drawing Zanmu's face, I referenced my sketch of to help with contrasting their features since I made Keiki's face more traditionally feminine. I also didn't mention this in my commentary on Keiki's face because I wanted to save it for here, but giving Zanmu scars also plays into the fact that she used to be human, wheras Keiki doesn't have any scars because she's a god who doesn't follow the rules of normal human biology. Plus I'm thinking about the two of them interacting again (return of Zan/Keik??? (I'm a multishipper btw) maybe???) so drawing their faces together will definitely help me in the future if I wanna draw them together (again, maybe as a ship? I've kinda been ironing out the kinks in their potential interactions (romantic and non-romantic) for a while now so idk maybe expect that in the future lol).

And now for the full body drawing, when I was doing the face sketch I did this little snippet of an outfit, had a vision, and the made it into a reality. I'll admit, part of me was worried that it would end up looking too much like Yuugi's outfits in the spinoffs and mangas, but I feel like I made enough changes to differentiate them. I tried to keep a few of the major details in Zanmu's design (i.e. the red tassles and yellow lining on her shirt) while putting a new spin on it. I also dialed up the scars to 11 since without them the whole thing kinda looked incomplete. Also, while I could say that the leaves on her kimono are "a nod to the fact that technically she should be a tengu because back then people belived that corrupt monks would turn into tengu but no Zanmu is an oni and they're maple leaves because...tengu...ahahahaha" what really ended up happening was that I looked up clothing patterns from Sengoku era Japan, liked the leaves the most because the red picked up on the red from the rest of her design and just ran with it. I also always had the idea to put Zanmu in men's clothing from Sengoku era Japan and while the accurate thing to do would be to put her in a Buddhist's clothes from that era.... from a character standpoint, I don't think Zanmu is pious enough to strictly wear the proper monk uniform, and also since she's basically the king of Hell, she would probably dress herself like royalty from that era. TBH, I probably could've been a bit more historically accurate, but again, this was mainly for conceptual purposes because I had a vision and I needed to see it through.

If I were to draw her in this sort of outfit again, I should probably try and use more references, although now that I look at it, if she were to wear it properly this would maybe, probably look a bit closer to a Kyūtai sugata (a very huge stretch, but it just kinda reminds me of that) just without the layers under and over the main piece of clothing (In the website that I searched up to try and compare the outfit in my sketch to, they name the outfit pieces but don't label them on the image, so I don't know 100% what everything is called) so I will definitely have to use that style of clothing as a reference going forward.

Also, I was kind of inspired by the ToTK design for Ganondorf since I have finished the game a while ago and I absolutely love what they did with his design (it's just so fucking cool omg) and I thought that sort of look would look good on Zanmu, so yeah got some inspo from that.

And those were all the notes for each of the sketches, I'm motivated to draw rn but kinda art blocked, so doing these little coloured sketches helps a lot.

[prettiestofpisces]

Breanna Stewart x Reporter

💋: smut, fingering

-personally i wouldn’t know how to act if she looked like THAT around me

- i’m posting this on an airplane but autocorrect is always against me so if you see an error lmk ( ex. stewie turns to steve lolll)

-as always any and all feedback is appreciated…muah

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

standing up you fixed your pale blue blouse and tight black skirt, strutting through the libertys tunnel doors.

the new york liberty now stood at a new record of 17 wins, the number one best in the eastern conference.

questions cascaded your mind to ask the panelist, breanna stewart and jonquel jones yet none of them sounded good enough.

you practice with yourself still strutting down the empty stadium hallways.

“how did losing in the commissioners cup fuel the fire tonight to win by almost double digits?”

you scoff, kicking yourself at the originality…no.

“looking back at your previous loss to the lynx, what part of their game did you study coming into this one?”

this time a sigh exited your mouth.

hm a little better, but still no. you needed an obscure question for this post press.

you like to pose questions to athletes that bring out a side of them no one’s seen. whether it be excitement or vulnerability.

your companies sports articles offered rarity to sports news and discussed various, taboo topics, outside of ball.

wanting to impress your boss, this conference was to be no different and you needed a fun statement for this upcoming article.

as you entered the room voices could be heard everywhere. chatter was ambient, fellow reporters waiting patiently for the athletes to make their appearance.

looking around for a seat you find one in the front row off center to the left.

ten more minutes pass and suddenly complete silence takes over the room. shuffling in is breanna stewart and jonquel jones.

amungst the tallest in the meeting their prescence is almost intimidating.

sitting down right in front of you is stewart who’s expressionless. that is till her large dull eyes connect with yours and somehow it feels like it’s just you and her.

the two of you were fimiliar with each other, performing interviews here and there, but a true discussion was never held.

you take a deep breath looking around the room once more, and the press conference begins.

after thirty minutes or so the mediator announces.

“yes, final question coming from the front row, satin blouse.”

painfully boring questions had been thrown at them both left and right, now, finally it was your turn to do the talking.

you wiggle in your seat and inflate your chest to instill confidence. first introducing yourself and your company you lock eyes with breanna for a countless time and speak.

“…after a tough win, stewart i see you’ve changed into something more comfortable…” you look stewie up and down.

she he wore black sweat pants and a wife beater so tight her nipples, hard as ever, poked through perfectly.

“…fitting since you recently released new lounge wear to go with your new shoes color way. is it everything you envisioned and where is your brand going?”

stewie takes her hands and drags her palms down her chest and chuckles.

“yea it uh- doesn’t leave much to the imagination now does it” smirking directly at you.

“no, it doesn’t” shaking your head, you biting your bottom lip seductively.

jj takes notice of your flirtatious encounter, deciding to interject. “man if y’all don’t get a room or answer the question, we trying to get out of here!” stewie whips her head to her teammate laughing with her hands on her face.

“sorry…yea no the collection is called city of love and i’ve been dying to talk about it so thank you that’s a great question.”

stewie finishes up her statement as she watches you finish up your notes and record her the rest of her statement.

“alright, if that’s it we’re all free to go” the woman over the conference says.

breanna and jonquel thank everyone who attended and you place everything in its designated area in your purse.

feeling eyes on you, you take one more look around the entire room catching stewies bolted on your skirt.

you glance down and rush to pull down the fabric that had bunched exposing more of your bottom half than you’d like.

walking over to the exit where stewie stood you place yourself right infront of her. standing tall to her ear and whisper a quick message, “stop being a pervert.”

not taking another look at you she rubs her face with her hands as the other draped her side.

you roll your eyes and walk out into another empty hallway.

on your trek to leave the stadium you gaped, appreciating the structure now that it was almost vacant.

all that could be heard were the clicks of you heels against the tiled floor.

while nearing the exit, the ache in the balls of your feet were enough to need to sit down for a quick minute.

spotting some bar chairs you throw your purse and the rest of your belongings on the table before deciding to take a seat.

relief infiltrating your body, especially your feet.

kicking your heels off you huff “jesus christ.”

suddenly hearing footsteps behind where you sat, you can’t help but to turn your head.

the women behind you catching your eye, rightfully so. still in her lightly worn wife beater and sweats, breanna stewart appeared.

she took it upon herself to sit at your table and you watched as she did so.

“figured you could use some company.”

“i don’t but you’re welcome to sit..” you joke.

“ouch” she laughs.

there’s a pause of silence with you both looking at one another.

“you uh- with someone, single?” breanna blurts.

“what- who’s asking?” the questions catching you by surprise.

breanna points at herself signaling she wants to know, and in the blink of an eye she’s standing, towering above you in your chair.

you waste no time to stand up yourself as two can play that game.

“is there an issue stewart?”

you put a finger in her chest, pushing breanna outwards.

“you tell me” she says snarkily.

“honey you’re the one looking up my skirt” you counter argue.

“who’s to say you didn’t do it on purpose?” stewie shrugs with a toothy grin.

“ugh please” your bickering coming to an end as you turn on your toes and slip your heels on to head out.

that is till stewie pushes you against one of the surrounding walls. flipping you around to then face her. “oh shit-“

stunned, she left you pinned, arms by your side.

stewies grin gone, she gets just centimeters from your face

“listen, honey, not a single word leaves these lips while we’re here”

your breath hitches “okay..” eager for breanna to do whatever she wants to you, you comply.

“thank you baby” she says beginning to kiss on your neck, each sloppier than the one before.

you lightly close you eyes and in mere minutes she trails the hand that was once pinning yours up and down your thigh.

lifting your left leg to cradle her waist she then brings the hand to the hem of your skirt toying with it before reaching under.

your mouth agape ready for her digits to explore your cunt. moans escape your lips as grunts escape stewies.

she pauses removing her hand from to skirt to simply hold your leg in place.

your eyes flutter open to reveal breanna studying you and your face, the dimly lit stadium behind her.

“what’s wrong?” you whine.

she shakes her head. “nothing, i just wanted to make sure you wanted to do this” letting your leg fall. her accent being so thick made your pussy throb all the more.

you nod you head. “yes, i want you right here, right fucking now, no one’s here this late.” the corners of your mouth pull upward.

breanna pulls you off the cold wall for just a moment only to slap your ass.

“stewart!” you giggle, once again liking how rough she was being with you.

she returns the smile, her gums showing.

“even if there wasn’t i know you’d like a crowd”

you playfully slap her chest. “who’s the pervert now” she teases.

ignoring her comment you eye breanna, shimming off your panties and reaching for her hand, yearning to be touched. you place her hand back on your hips as you hoisted your leg over breannas waist again. she does the rest pecking your ear, then your jaw.

gliding her hand over your clit you groan at the sensation. “stewie go faster, or put your fingers in me, now-.” stewie cuts you off with a demanding kiss. no longer wanting to hear the attitude you were giving her.

stewie continues to rub your clit in agonizingly slow circles.

feeling how slick your hole was, she then knew you were ready for her fingers, her long, slim fingers.

you drag out a load moan as she inserts not one but two, her middle and pointer.

pumping her fingers in and out of you, you become more and more vocal.

“shit”

“mm fuck, just like that!”

“stewie baby, i’m sooo close” tears running down your face.

you felt drunk, spiraling with how good your body felt, tingles radiated all over.

her two fingers sped up and she rubbed your clit vigorously with her thumb. the new friction sending you over the edge, orgasming.

the audible gasp and sloshing of your pussy’s juices were all breanna needed to come herself.

your knees buckled forcing you to collapse.

you would’ve hit the floor if breanna wasn’t there to catch and pull you in.

whimpering you regain your balance and embrace stewie in a hug, tired but in bliss.

she kisses your temple.

“you’re so beautiful”

with your head buried in her neck, stewie feels you smile against her pale skin. “you did so good for me”

the praise erupting butterflies in your stomach.

you finally look up her eyes glazing your face and the tear that stained your makeup.

you release from the hug, putting everything back in its place, your skirt, your hair and…

“you forgot something” stewie says, holding your underwear in front of her face

“oh- you’re sick” you say as she shoves them in the pocket of her sweats. you throw your head back in laughter.

“call me” she says nearing exit of the stadium.

you laughed “why so you can start a collection of my panties?!”

“exactly.”

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

breanna stewart i hope both sides of your pillow are cold

[maybefae]

November 2024

Pile 1 - Pile 2 - Pile 3

Remember, this is a general reading and it may not resonate for everyone or completely. Tarot is a tool to help guide but you are responsible for your actions and life, you choose your path.

Tips!

Pile 1

Tarot: The Lovers (King of Swords), King of Cups (Seven of Pentacles and Death), Eight of Cups (Queen of Swords), Judgement (Two of Pentacles and Three of Wands), Five of Pentacles and Two of Wands (bottom of  the deck), The Tower

Oracle: The Fate, The Hound, The Tailor, The Enchanter, The Puppeteer, The Merchant, The Weaver (bottom of the deck)

I wanna preface by saying that I don’t really like covering readings that entail relationships to the general. However, while I was shuffling the cards and getting them ready, I saw The Lovers twice and then it fell on the table. And the messages I’m getting are specific but you can apply these messages outside of romance.

I believe that this month for you will focus heavy on your relationship with someone. And I keep having the word “gaslight” repeated and the oracle cards to denote manipulation being at hand. Deception and Trickery. And my anxiety is high. I keep second guessing myself and how I wanna write these messages which does confirm what I’ve been feeling. If you are in a dangerous situation, please reach out to someone that could help you (and I know that it’s hard and could pose more of a danger in some situations). 

I believe that most of the people here probably keep going back into this relationship because this person probably promises loyalty and that they will be different but it’s a trap. They’re manipulating you and trying to keep you chained up and still wrapped in a red string. They keep offering explanations, apologies… This could be a third party situation. I really don’t like this energy, by the way. This is very hard to channel. 

But I think this is the month where you finally have enough (thank god). I believe you will probably speak your mind and cut it off. But I think you will probably be scared to. I think you’re scared of the unknown, most likely because you’re so used to this cycle. Even if it was a very difficult relationship, you had grown used to the routine of it. You’ll be scared as much as you are curious and hopeful.

Some of you will probably have to pull more weight to get your life back on track, most likely responsibility and money wise, but I believe you will embrace this new solitude. Rediscovering yourself in this transition will be hard but you will look back on it and be grateful that it happened because you will be in a better place. You will get your self-worth back.

I do want to warn that I do feel like you will have to turn this person down a few more times. If you are into witchcraft, I would do some form of cord cutting spell, a protection spell, and/or banishing spell. 

Pile 2

Tarot: The Unknown (Nine of Pentacles, Five of Wands, Ace of Swords), Death (Eight of Wands, Eight of Pentacles), Six of Wands (Page of Wands), Three of Wands (The Vessel, The Cosmic Tree), Five of Wands (bottom of the deck)

I believe that most of the people that have picked this group are probably rebuilding from a recent chaos (it could be all the chaos that had happened to a lot of people this October). But you guys are rebuilding, dusting your pants off, and looking forward to your goals. At the same time, the chaos has left you in a state that you aren’t taking bullshit. You’re cutting it off as soon as someone wants to create more chaos. 

I was also getting distracted a lot when doing this reading. I was pulled into conversation with my sister and I was just veering off and practically distracting myself. I think this month will also have to do with reigning yourself and having to force yourself to do things. I believe it’s most likely out of exhaustion from having to deal with all the chaos and things still wanting to distract you. 

This month will probably have to do with focusing on your own life, resting, and trying to lead yourself in the direction you want/need to go in. It will take more effort than usual. If you have seasonal depression, I believe that definitely plays a part. But you’re embracing the unknown and letting yourself follow your intuition when it comes to directions. Also, I’m being told to tell you that it’s okay to stay in your comfort zone this month, especially if you need to rest. 

Inspiration could come back to you this month and out of the blue! Although this will be more of a slow month for you, you will be thinking of these ideas and planning to work on them. You may also have other people inviting you to work on a project with you or you will be planning on a goal/project with others (I feel it’s more towards the end of the month).

Pile 3

Tarot: The Chariot (King of Cups), Ace of Cups (Six of Wands), Five of Cups (Seven of Wands), The Tower (Knight of Cups), The Empress (bottom of the deck)

Oracle: Other’s Wishes, The Empress, Slept Through the Rumor, The Hierophant, Unseen Eye (bottom of the deck)

I think this pile will feel good about themselves this month and the things happening. This is a pile that is following their heart and doing what they love despite people telling them that they shouldn’t be going after their goals. And this could just be happening in the background without you knowing or you are simply ignoring the comments. It could also be because of the high you are experiencing with working towards your goals. You could be feeling really confident and sure of yourself just by the meer act of what you’re doing because you could be seeing progress in real time. It’s like you assured yourself that you’re goals are tangible by actually taking the steps (no matter how small). 

I believe you are encouraged to continue on this route. There could be a bigger breakthrough towards the end of the month and you could also find that someone else shares a similar goal/interest. This could be a potential project partner or simply a companion that shares a similar goal so you both encourage each other.

There will still be hard work being done but I don’t think it will feel like any work at all because you are enjoying the process. 

Decks Used: The Rider-Waite Tarot Deck, The Citadel: A Fantasy Oracle by Fez Inkwright, Ethereal Visions Illuminated Tarot Deck by Matt Hughes, Ophida Rosa Tarot by Leila and Olive, Maiden Oracle by Leila and Olive

Dividers: @inklore

[ar-cadez]

Count Duckula Fan Rewrite!!

Recently I’ve been working on a Count Duckula rewrite that aims to give it a slightly more serious tone and semi-serialized story like many modern cartoons! It took some time, but I made redesigns of the main cast. I had fun making this project and I REALLY hope you do too! Because I’m extremely nervous that the small fan base Count Duckula does have will hate this

I haven’t actually finished the show btw so if there’s an antagonist or smth that shows up later I should’ve redesigned.. lmk! I’m open to suggestions I really like this show..

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Basic Concept

Practically the same as the original show! There is a long line of reincarnations of a wicked vampire duck named Count Duckula, the most recent reincarnation went wrong and now the current Count is a vegetarian and much more interested in becoming famous than being evil.

Some major differences include the tone and story structure, being semi-serialized and having more serious arcs mixed in with the antics, along with a lot of changes in characterization. A big story change is also that Nanny was not hired until AFTER Duckula was reincarnated so Igor was the one who screwed up the ritual.

Tone wise I’d also like to slightly age up the target audience so it could get away with a bit more dark humour. My favourite part of the original show was moments that were just so morbid and completely brushed past. 13+ would be fine methinks.

Basic plot of the average episode would be about the count’s hyperfixation of the week and trying to get famous or profit from it. Not every episode would follow this structure though.

The grander themes of the series would be all about expectations from family and strangers and how those expectations can be completely false.

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Characters

^^ Final lineup! ^^

Sketches (less interesting poses but shows off some things better)

Count Duckula!

What I wanted to change

I feel like Duckula from the original spin-off was already a really strong character! There is a lot to him and really all I would want from a more emotional reboot is to dive into what’s already there. I did kinda project on him a bit in this rewrite though… gotta write what’cha know!

I also changed his design quite a bit. I never thought the suit fit his personality and I wanted to go with something a little more bright. If I go back again I might saturate his shirt a bit more. I also wanted all the residents of castle Duckula to have purple in their designs and for duckula and Towser to share similar colour’s inversed

Character Traits

Hatred of his legacy

Duckula is the first member of his lineage to not be an evil vampire and he hates that role that is expected of him. This is partially what drives him to be the nicest duck he can be, in hopes of shaking off his legacy. This also causes him to reject anything that's “spooky” or has to do with vampires. He physically can't eat meat or blood due to his botched resurrection, but even the sight of either distresses him.

Attention Drive

Due to his infamy, all Duckula wants is to be liked by the general public. Everyone in his town is automatically scared of him and he tries really hard to change their opinions on him whether that be through attempting to bea good samaritan or by performing in town. (Both tend to end poorly for him)

ADHD and Theatre Kid Behaviour

Duckula is constantly picking up and putting down new forms of art and performance. This can be anything from oil painting to American football. He does tend to get frustrated or distracted and abandon projects or crafts entirely. His favourite artform is acting and music so as you can imagine he's very into musicals. His musical talents are decent but his acting is awful. He’s also known to loud and overly excited over his interests

Ego and Cowardice

Being given a position of power the day you came into existence does have the tendency to make you… immature to say the least. When in danger, if he even realises there is any, Duckula’s first move is to use his title as leverage. If that doesn't work, his second is to beg, grovel, and lie his way out of the situation. That, or hide behind his much more intimidating companions.

Rich Kid Syndrome

Having the majority of people you know be your house staff really messes with your sense of responsibility. Duckula can hardly do many basic life skills on his own because of this. It's not like he is completely lazy but he does have executive dysfunction and has yet to realise that fact, causing him to procrastinate on many things and completely forget or just get someone else to do it.

Not Naturally kind

Being his father’s reincarnation, it only makes sense that Duckula would inherit many traits from his past lives. Many of the other Counts were ego-driven cowards with desires for fame. They just went about it differently. Duckula actively tries to be kind and polite but a lot of passive aggression and snark slips through the cracks of that veneer. He would never want to admit that he has ANYTHING in common with his ancestors and he hates that being nice doesn't just come naturally to him. Being an immortal, Duckula also has a skewed sense of mortality and often doesn't understand the severity of certain injuries and situations.

This Duckula has ADHD and Autism in this rewrite and he struggles most with executive dysfunction, restricted interests, memory issues, atypical empathy (not specifically low or high), sensory issues (mostly with eating and some sound), and social cues. He also stims.

Towser!

What I Wanted to Change

Towser isn’t even really a character in the original. Just a running gag without a face. I wanted to balance out the main cast by adding another female character since I have feelings on Nanny as a character and i didn’t know if i would even be able to salvage that.

I really like what I came up with! She’s fun to me and I’ll probably flesh her out more later.

Character Traits

Family drive

Towser has little interest in birds that aren't close to her and it usually takes awhile for her to get used to new people. However, she’ll protect those that she does care about with her life. She is the castle’s guard dog and will do whatever’s necessary to protect it. This often comes at the cost of her sleep, because she feels like she always needs to be awake to protect them.

Tag Along

Following Duckula around like a puppy is what Towser does best! She might not fully understand his enthusiasm on certain subjects, but she's always up to backing him up on his newest fame seeking endeavours (though she herself prefers physical activity over creative works). She never expects anything to come of it, but hey, at least it's something to do. She also likes to hear Duckula rant to her about his interests.

Big Sister

Towser is of a much more stable mental state than Duckula, and as his only friend around his age, he trusts her more to be someone to talk to about his identity issues and issues in general. The two are a lot warmer towards each other than they are anyone else, and can also get away with messing with the other a lot more.

Big ol Lap dog

When in werewolf form, Towser tends to forget her size and often crushes them with her size. This usually wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that she's always a lot more cuddly and energetic in wolf form than bird form. This is because, as a werewolf, she's only in wolf form at night and being a fully nocturnal bird that should only be awake at night, this messes with her sleep rhythm a lot.

Igor!

What I wanted to Change

Personality wise Igor is already really strong and I didn’t change much of that. You’ll probably notice from the sketches that Igor has a skeleton hand, that’s because I made him undead in this version just to give a reason to how he’s been able to live this long since the original doesn’t really have one (which is fine)

Character Traits

Devotion to the role

Igor has been the Count’s butler since the first incarnation. He was assigned to keep the Duckula legacy alive by reincarnating his master every time he meets his fate and helping him readjust every time. Helping each new reincarnation bring misery and fear to the town they reside by with a smile… Until the most recent incarnation of course. He’ll stick it out though, because he still has hope for him.

Taste for the macabre

Whether it be killing innocents behind the back of his new master, decorating the castle with cobwebs and bones, or using his undead nature to scare and torture those around him, Igor certainly has an interesting idea of fun. Igor gets a sick enjoyment out of causing others distress and despises all things kind and cute, something which definitely frustrates Duckula, who's desperately trying to fix his own image.

Bitter Traditionalist

Having lived through the centuries in castle Duckula, Igor has gained an appreciation for the history of the place and the vampire ducks that have resided there over the years. He’s rather invested in the lives of his previous masters and is extremely cross with the newest incarnation for not only not caring about that past, but also completely disowning it. Igor tries desperately to get Duckula to be a normal vampire, truly believing it could work with enough effort. Less he spend the next few centuries with a vegetarian for a master… Igor would not have a problem with Duckula pursuing fame if it weren't for the fact that he thinks it's distracting him from true vampirism.

Tired old man

Igor has lived for many centuries and he does not feel as if he should have to babysit for an immature man child like Duckula. He would rather ignore or snark the young count rather than actually talk to him. When the two argue its a constant back and forth of passive aggression and personal jobs that they almost always forget what they're actually arguing over. Duckula is physically and mentally very young (17-early 20s) compared to Igor’s other masters due to the botched revival and he doesn't know how to, or want to, deal with it.

Nanny!

What I Wanted to Change

I’m sorry to any hardcore Nanny fans out there but this is practically a whole new character. I find Nanny to be frustrating and annoying in the original and who I personally feel is a very sexist and mean spirited character. There’s absolutely nothing I would want to write with a character who’s just “big stupid fat woman inconveniences everyone around her” it’s just uncomfortable after a certain point.

My idea for a new take was just an extremely kind older woman who’s a little airheaded but is a lot smarter than people give her credit for. This sets her up as a foil to Igor. She’s also the only non-monster resident of the castle in this version which I personally think is really interesting.

Character Traits

Only good influence

While Igor actively sets out to make Duckula a bad person and Towser couldn't care less about how Duckula acts, Nanny is the only direct influence in Duckula’s life who pushes him to do better. Nanny believes Duckula is a good person at heart and pushes him to take more responsibility in his life. She wants him to learn a good work ethic and is fully supportive of him trying to better himself.

Good Christian Woman

Nanny is, in fact, a christian. She is fully aware of the demonic nature of her companions but believes that everyone can better themselves no matter their circumstances and attempts to better those around her. Igor hates her for it but she’s totally ignorant to that fact.

Assertive Mother Figure

Though Nanny is a very kind woman, she is also not a pushover. She will assert authority over Duckula and anyone else if necessary, and most are compliant once she puts her foot down, if they aren't, however, Nanny does pack a punch and won't hesitate to use her strength to protect her family.

Smarter than she seems

Nanny is an airheaded optimist with a big heart and those traits make her come off a lot more clueless than she actually is. She may seem like she has no idea what’s going on but she’s actually very observant and is fantastic at assessing a situation and finding the best course of action.

Dr. Von Goosewing

What I Wanted to Change

I really liked the idea of the antagonist to Duckula was in a liniage of vampire slayers and that their ancestors have been fighting for generations. It gave me the perfect set up for a ✨SHADOW ANTAGONIST✨ I wanted to make this rewrite have the two reflect each other a lot more. To do that I wanted Goosewing to still be a really cooky guy but I didn’t want the public to know that.

Also I have no idea why he’s dressed like Sherlock Holmes in the original if he’s a Van Helsing parody and also an inventor. You could’ve leaned into either of those ideas but for some reason he’s dressed like a detective? so I tried giving him a more fitting outfit but keeping his colours for recognisablity.

Character Traits

Playing Village hero

Goosewing is considered a big deal in town because of his family of vampire hunters. He’s prepared his whole life to kill Count Duckula the moment he comes back and to protect the common folk from the paranormal. Despite this, Goosewing isn't actually particularly skilled at his job and usually ends up failing his assassinations due to his own incompetence. He feels like he has to play the role as a hero to continue his family’s legacy despite not particularly enjoying it or being good at it.

Overestimating the enemy

With how cunning and malevolent the past Duckula incarnations were, Goosewing expects the same from this one. Goosewing believes that Duckula is a dangerous and clever foe completely focused on causing others pain. In reality, Duckula is the most incompetent bird in all of Transylvania, aside fromGoosewing himself, of course. Goosewing also comes to believe that Duckula is only acting nice to later betray the public, a belief he is not quiet about and that keeps the public from trusting Duckula.

Mad Scientist

Goosewing definitely falls into the eccentric scientist trope with his innovative but scatterbrained nature. He would much rather be working on an invention than actually doing his job. The public sees him as a hero but while hunting vampires or when hes alone he comes off as more of a mad scientist than the hero character he plays. His intentions are ultimately good but are completely based on the assumption that he’s the wholly good protector of the people and that Duckula is a cunning villain who's out to get him and everyone else.

Shadow

Goosewing and Duckula reflect each other in a lot of ways. They both have a legacy they are expected to uphold despite not wanting to or even being able to, they both care deeply about the public’s opinion on them while the public has an incredibly incorrect view of the both of them, and they both have creative interests outside of the roles expected of them that they'd rather be persuing. Duckula fully rejects anything to do with his ancestry, while Goosewing is actively trying to fulfil despite not enjoying it.

The Murder Brothers!

What I Wanted to Change

Haha I called them the murder brothers bc they’re crows and criminals Im actually so funny… anyway. I don’t know if I should’ve even done these guys but I really like them as antagonists so!!

I gave the younger two names and a personality. The wiki said they didn’t have names but if they do lmk and I’ll just fix that. Other than that I didn’t change much except try to give ‘em a bit more depth and changing their physical designs a ton for fun.

Character Traits

The Murder Brothers, as a whole, are a tight knit family of con men crows who pull any grift they can to get their hands on some cash. Though they may act like their only loyalty in life is to money, they do genuinely care about each other's well being

Ruffles

Ruffles is the short tempered and eldest leader of the group. He’s constantly frustrated with his brothers’ incompetence and isn't quiet about it. He believes that if it weren't for them he'd probably be a lot further in life by now (which isn't true) and he’ll say he doesn't care about them, but he actually does.

Burt

If he didn't insist on helping his brothers, Burt would be the most likely to be living an honest life. As the second oldest sibling, Burt holds a position as right hand man. He’s a naturally kind and enthusiastic bird who, while a bit dumb, does openly express his love for his brothers. He takes on a lot of the abuse from his older brother and is often used by the group to talk to others, because he's so naturally trustworthy.

Reggie

Reggie is the second youngest of the brothers and the most relaxed out of all of them. He has an impeccable sleight of hand and is the go to for lockpicking and such. He’s a decent smooth talker and is often the one to break up fights, though he's not above getting angry at the others himself.

Leroy

Leroy is the youngest of the brothers and by far the least skilled. His speech is incomprehensible from under his mask (although he can see through it for the most part) and he’s often left with the worst jobs during their cons because of that. He’s the most timid out of all of them but I’m sure if you took that mask off of him he’d be really talkative.

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Ending Words

Well that’s all I got! I spent way too long on this project that maybe two people will care about and one of them is me 💔 Anyway if I make anything else for this rewrite/au I’ll tag it with #wbcd . I wouldn’t count on it because I mighttt get burn out from this but im just so glad I finished it! I’ve thought about writing a pilot script just for fun but idk. I’d like to do more long format au stuff, I was going to make a YouTube video about this but I almost cried trying to record myself so I gave up 💔

[diapydemon]

A Little Magick, Chapter 5

————————————————————————

Content Warning: ABDL, MDLB, MDLG, Manipulation, Fantasy Violence

————————————————————————

Chapter 5: Field Trip Gone Wrong

Read Chapter 4 here.

“Have you ever been to the Belatras Gardens?”

“No actually.”

“Well, it’s pretty unique, even for a dungeon,” Alveria explained, “most other dungeons have a consistent progression; the second level down is a bit more dangerous than the first, and so on, but the Belatras Gardens are different. The top six are all relatively safe, but the lower six all pose a higher threat.”

“So what level are we going to?” I asked eagerly, “Level 7 to slay monsters with fireballs?”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, cutie,” Alveria chuckled, “we’re just going to the first floor to collect some magik flowers that I need for my potions store.”

“Oh.” I hoped my disappointment wasn’t totally transparent.

“Hey, this will be a great chance to practice your Silver Mirror runes.” Alveria tussled my hair, “You’ve come a long way in the last few days; you don’t even throw temper tantrums anymore!”

I blushed.

“It will be a great opportunity for you to perceive the magical frequency that dungeon fauna produces, so I still want you to take it seriously.”

“I will,” I grinned. The prospect of observing a dungeon in a whole new way did a lot to dissolve my earlier disappointment.

“Good. I also want you to wear a couple things when we go into the dungeon for safety reasons.”

“…what kind of things?” I asked with a speck of trepidation; these kinds of requests from Alveria tended to be infantalizing.

“Well first, I want you to wear a protective talisman I made. It will soften physical blows and lesson magical effects. Also, it’ll help me find you in case something happens.”

“Oh, cool!” I don’t know why I was worried; this magical artifact sounded useful and powerful.

Then, she produced a pacifier clip with an oversized binky attached to it. I guess I spoke too soon.

“Just clip this to your clothes and you’ll be under the protection of the talisman.”

“But does it have to be a pacifier?”

“It has added functionality,” Alveria shrugged. “if you put it in your mouth, it should help calm you and recenter yourself.”

“Is… is it enchanted to do that?”

“No silly,” Alveria laughed as if I had asked something ridiculous, “Pacis just do that.”

“Right… thanks.”

“And there is one other thing…”

“What is it?” Her tone made me nervous.

“Well, there’s no bathrooms in the dungeon…”

“Ms. Alveria, no!”

“Calm down cutie, you haven’t even heard what I’m suggesting yet.”

“You want to put me in another diaper!”

“It wasn’t such a bad idea last time.”

“That’s no fair!” I protested, “you know I only had an accident because it was my first time using magik!”

“And that turned out to be a good idea.”

I fumed silently, trying —and failing— to think of a logical response more compelling than ‘I don’t wanna’.

“Here,” Alveria moved fast, popping the pacifier into my mouth in one fluid motion, “doesn’t that feel better?”

I refused to admit that it did.

“Look cutie, you don’t have to use it if you don’t need it. But if you do need it, it’ll be nice to have. Just trust me, ok?”

Alveria had saved me from dozens of monsters and had been by my side through twice as many combat encounters. At the end of the day, I trust her.

“Okay,” I sighed.

€====={===========================>

Unlike most of the dungeons I’ve visited in my relatively short career, this dungeon was gorgeous in ways that others just weren’t. In place of glowing caverns, ancient ruins, and magically manifested colosseums, this dungeon was overflowing with different magical fauna that would never coexist in the same ecosystem otherwise. It was an arboretum filled with dancing palm trees, bouncing evergreens, and a plethora of flowers with pedals that changed colors in a way I could only describe as psychedelic.

“Woah…” I paused my slight waddle of a walk to take it all in.

“See cutie,” Alveria grinned at the obvious awe on my face, “I knew you wouldn’t be disappointed.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, “this place is gorgeous!”

“Isn’t it?” Alveria frowned as she glanced around the floor, “though, there’s usually more people here. Since it’s pretty safe, even some non-adventurers come here to enjoy the sites.”

“I see why,” I glanced around, “but there’s literally no one here.”

“I know,” Alveria’s lips tightened, “Oh well. I guess we have the whole place to ourselves today.”

“Cool.”

“I wouldn’t be so excited, cutie,” Alveria blipped a worksheet and a crayon into existence with her magik, “now you can’t ask people for help on the scavenger hunt.”

“A scavenger hunt?”

“Yep,” she smiled at me, “don’t worry; it’ll be fun! There’s even a prize if you finish the whole thing! You just have to find and identify different fauna based on their magical frequencies and check them off the list. It’ll help you hone your magik sense, which is foundational to quickly understanding more complex spell craft.”

“Right,” I nodded, “so take this seriously.”

“Mhmmm,” she confirmed.

“If you need anything —and I do mean anything,” her eyes lingered on my padded crotch, “I’ll be on this floor collecting ingredients. The first floor isn’t too huge, so come find me, or I’ll come find you.”

“Sounds good.” I appreciated the autonomy, regardless of how limited it was.

Alveria soon wandered off on her errands, and I was left to explore the dungeon. I concentrated the magik in my aura on my fingertips and traced the Silver Mirror rune into the air before enchanting my ears with it.

This dungeon already felt like another world before, but being able to hear all the fauna’s magical frequencies created an even more transcendent experience.

I looked down at my scavenger hunt. The bouncing evergreens were the easiest to place. They made a low ‘O’ sound when they compressed and a higher pitched ‘O’ sound when they sprung back up.

I continued exploring the gardens and completing my scavenger hunt. I was only three away from completing the entire thing before Alveria approached me.

“Hey cutie,” she held a satchel stuffed with flower pedals, bark, and leaves, “how’s the scavenger hunt going?”

“Good!” I held up the worksheet, “I only have three left!”

“That’s fantastic cutie,” she casually grabbed the waist band of my plated pants and pulled them back to eye my diaper, “you’re doing so great!”

“M-ms. Alveria!” I staggered as I realized she just casually checked to see if I had an accident.

“Oh hush, I’m just checking.”

“I could just tell you,” I grumbled.

“Well we’ve been here for awhile, and I knew you might’ve been shy.”

It was true; we had been here for a couple hours, and I did have to pee. But I refused to tell her that!

Before I could reply, our conversation was interrupted by an ominous rustle from the bushes. Soon after, we heard a breathy male voice: “Alveria? Is that you?”

A gnome dressed in all black with what seemed to be two hand-held meat tenderizers appeared from the bushes.

“Gyrfoyle!?” Alveria asked with excitement in her voice, “What’s it been? Sixty years?”

“More like 75,” Gyrfoyle corrected.

“What are you doing here?” Alveria asked, “this dungeon’s way below your pay grade.”

Gyrfoyle blinked, “You don’t know?”

“Know what?”

“A high level cockatrice that can petrify its victims with a glance is loose in this dungeon. I’m hunting it. That’s why I thought you were here actually.”

“Oh. No,” Alveria looked over her shoulder at me, “Actually, I’m here to collect potion materials and take my apprentice on a field trip.”

The gnome leaned to one side, so he could see me past Alveria’s comparatively taller figure.

“Can you say hi, cutie?”

“Oh, uhhh hi.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” he shoved his hand up at me.

I grabbed it to shake, and I immediately noticed the leathery calluses. This gnome must’ve seen many battles.

His eyes widened in shock when I grabbed his hand and our auras intermingled, though his trained features quickly reverted back to normal. Maybe I imagined it.

“Well, we should probably head home,” Alveria said.

“What?” Gyrfoyle looked up at Alveria incredulously, “You’re really not going to help?”

“We’re not ready for that. My apprentice just started learning magik and—“

“I’m sure they’re more than capable if they’ve managed to catch your attention.”

“I said no, Gyr.” Alveria growled.

I stayed silent. I hated to admit it, but Alveria was right. Cockatrices were vile creatures; massive, angry roosters that had a basilisk head in place of tail feathers. I had never fought one before, and I definitely didn’t want to start by fighting a high level cockatrice that could petrify you if you made eye contact with it.

SCREEEECCCHHHH

A horrifying screech came from down the path. A cockatrice that was thrice the height of Alveria stood atop the path, clawing at the floor with one of its talons.

“It looks like you don’t have a choice,” Gyrfoyle muttered.

The cockatrice bolted in our direction with a velocity that would’ve been impressive if it wasn’t mortally threatening. I reached for the leather handle of my sword.

“Grab hold of me!” Gyrfoyle shouted.

I was too focused on the impending cockatrice to comprehend what he said, but Alveria wasn’t; she gripped my bicep first before grabbing Gyrfoyle’s shoulder.

Gyrfoyle held the two meat tenderizer mallets in either hand and swung them against each other. I heard a metallic DING before we disappeared right before the cockatrice’s sharp beak could penetrate us. We reappeared on top of a boulder on the other side of the floor.

“Thanks,” Alveria looked at Gyrfoyle, “That’s still quite a handy trick.”

Gyrfoyle shrugged, “Close-range translocation is my specialty.”

“So cool!” I interjected, “But more importantly, how are we going to deal with this cockatrice?”

“Your apprentice is right,” Gyrfoyle nodded up at me, “this cockatrice has notable intelligence. I’ve been stalking it around this dungeon for a week. It’s probably near the exit, waiting to catch us by surprise.”

“I didn’t think Cockatrices were native to this dungeon?” Alveria asked.

“They’re not. No one knows how it got here.”

“Hmm. I can probably take it down with a ninth level lighting spell,” Alveria said, “but if it’s as strong as you say, I’ll need to catch it by surprise.”

“Right,” Gyrfoyle turned his attention to me, “and what can you cast?”

“Only a perception enhancing spell, but I used to be a duelist,” I gestured to the sword at my hip.

“Then you can get it to charge at you, and Alveria can strike it head on from up here.”

“What? No!” Alveria failed to keep her voice down, “absolutely not!”

“Don’t worry. I’ll teleport in to grab him and then teleport us both out of the way in case the lightning doesn’t kill it.”

“Why don’t you be the bait then!?” She fumed.

“I wish I could,” Gyrfoyle grumbled, “I’ve tried to lure it into too many traps that way; the cockatrice recognizes me and refuses to charge me.”

“Ms. Alveria,” I met her gaze, “I can do this. I’ll be fine.”

“Please…” she grimaced, “I can’t watch another loved one die.”

“I know, Alveria,” Gyrfoyle reassured, “and I promise I won’t let your apprentice die.”

“And I promise I won’t die.” I added.

“Alright then,” tiny wisps of lighting crackled between Alveria’s fingers, “let’s do this.”

Gyrfoyle teleported me down to the bottom of the boulder before quickly returning to the top. I recast and poured as much mana into my Silver Mirror rune as I could manage; it would be good to have higher perception for this.

“Come get me, you big fat chicken,” I slammed the brunt of my broadsword against my chest plate to create a loud noise.

Sure enough, I heard the magical frequency of the cockatrice —which was also an ear splitting screech— before it charged at me. That still didn’t prepare me for the reality of a two-ton creature charging right at me. I was actually glad Alveria put me in a diaper now; it was probably —if not definitely— wet.

I heard the clang of Gyrfoyle’s mallets, and I quickly reappeared on top of the boulder just in time to see the most intense streak of electric blue lightning I’ve ever seen emanate from Alveria’s palms. I could feel the heat of the bolt from 6 feet away. The lighting bolt struck the cockatrice right in its chest and tore a smoking hole straight through the creature.

I couldn’t help but watch as the massive monster fell onto its side. It must have felt my eyes on it, because in one final act of petty resistance, it whipped its rooster head around. Before I realized it, it was too late. I was staring into the grotesque orange pupils of the creature.

I felt my body stiffen, starting in my toes but quickly making its way up the rest of my body. I couldn’t move; I had been petrified.

“No…” I somehow heard Alveria whimper through my petrificayion. “No… no no no no no!”

“Gyrfoyle!” She snapped to him, “I know you, always prepared. You wouldn’t hunt a coockatrice without a petrification antidote, right? Right!?”

“Yes,” Gyrfoyle nodded, “I have one.”

The gnome produced a small coin purse and stuck the entire length of his arm in it. It must’ve been magik. He rummaged around for awhile before pulling out a green vile.

Gyrfoyle held the vile out to Alveria, but in a split-second decision, he pulled it back to his chest before she could take it.

“G-Gyrfoyle?”

“Alveria,” he sighed, “I… I felt something in your apprentice’s aura when I shook their hand.”

“W-what are you talking about? Give me the vile, Gyr.”

“Not until you answer my questions.”

“You’re being crazy,” Alveria reached for the vile, but Gyrfoyle easily dodged her hand.

“I know you, Alv, and I know there has to be a good reason you’re using forbidden magik.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she tried and failed to swipe the vile again.

“You can be truthful with me now,” Gyrfoyle insisted, “your apprentice can’t hear anything while petrified.”

That should have been true, but I could hear them. Maybe it was the Silver Mirror runes, still dangling from my ears and dripping in my mana even in my petrified state.

“Does your apprentice know?”

“Gyr… please,” Alveria fell to her knees, and she began to sob.

“Are you using ritual based magik? That would explain the pacifier clipped to your apprentice’s gear…”

“P-please,” Alveria whimpered pathetically on the ground. Despite Gyrfoyle’s accusations, I couldn’t bear to see her in such a pained state.

“I asked,” Gyrfoyle’s voice turned more firm, “does your apprentice know?”

“N-not yet.”

“Alveria… why?”

“Because!” She threw her head back with a wail, “Do you know how fucking hard it is!? I’m one of —if not the— most powerful mages in the realm, yet I’m forced to watch loved one after loved one die again and again and again. I can heal back limbs and cure diseases, but no matter what I try, I can’t out heal old age! I can’t take it anymore Gyrfoyle, I just can’t! I love my apprentice, and I can’t watch them die. I would break. But then I had an idea: what if my loved ones never got old in the first place?”

“And you turned to forbidden magik? Ritual magik at that. Alveria, you should know better.”

“I do!” Alveria heaved, “do you know how long I’ve studied to make this safe? To make this the best, least invasive magik possible? Because I do Gyrfoyle, and it’s been an excruciatingly long time, even by Elven standards.”

“Oh Alv,” Gyrfoyle sighed.

I didn’t know if I wanted to wrap Alveria in a comforting embrace of my own or punch her in the jaw. All I felt right now was… confusion.

“You should know better,” Gyrfoyle continued, “We fought together against the cultists in the Great Demon War all those years ago, and they used ritual magik. You should know better than anyone what it can do to people.”

“I do!” Alveria insisted, “Don’t think I’ve forgotten the war. I’m doing this because of what I’ve learned from it, not in spite of it.”

“You better hope the Department of Forbidden Magic doesn’t catch you,” Gyrfoyle grumbled.

“I’m not afraid of them.” Alveria stated, “I founded that department after the war, remember? I know better than anyone that magik itself has no evil or good moral alignment; it’s how you use it.”

“Regardless, you have to tell your apprentice,” Gyrfoyle said. “Let them decide whether or not they want to continue.”

“You’re right,” Alveria’s shoulders slumped. “I’ll tell them soon, and it will be their decision. I just… I just have to get ready first.”

My choice? I didn’t even really understand what Alveria was doing to me in the first place. A part of me loved her and hated to see her suffer, even if I didn’t fully understand how or why she was suffering. Another part of me was alight with rage at whatever she’d been doing to me. The only thing I really knew right now was that I wanted to go to bed.

“Good.” Gyrfoyle grunted, “And just so you know — if the Department of Forbidden Magik doesn’t check up on you, I will.”

“Is that a threat?” Alveria asked through watery yet piercing eyes.

“No. You’re a dear friend, and I’m worried about you. That’s all.”

“Okay,” Alveria softened, “Thank you, Gyrfoyle.”

Gyrfoyle nodded, “Now wipe your tears, so we can free your apprentice.”

“Right.”

Gyrfoyle poured the contents of the vile over me, and my stone shell began cracking until it all fell off of me and exploded into dust upon impact with the ground below. I almost burst with an arsenal of barely contained questions, accusations, and insults, but —ultimately— I decided it would be best to bide my time. Especially since I didn’t fully understand what was happening.

“Good work,” Alveria couldn’t meet my eyes, “Now let’s go home.”

It was a quiet journey back to the penthouse.

————————————————————————

As Always, All Characters Depicted are 18+

Hi! I hope you enjoyed this chapter — it’s a bit of a departure from the usual more ABDL centric things I write, but don’t worry — more diapers and fantasy babying ahead. If you like this story, showing your support means a lot and encourages me to write more chapters faster — especially since my captions tend to get wayyyy more attention. Thanku ^^

[butterbrnttoast]

goodness gracious! i havent posted anything here in a while! update, tumblr markiplites: ive been on a job guy/p*rniplier kick lately, ive created a whole universe for them and its just been an odd little obsession recently so have my redesigns for them! oho!

you may know these guys as the p*rnipliers, but i like to call them the job guys..

(disclaimer: i know they're p*rn tropes im so very aware of that, i personally dont like them that way, they're insanely good vessels for comedy sketches and are just the things ever to me, so try not to get TOO bark-y i'd appreciate it, call them hot n stuff but erm, yeah 😁 im also just really proud of the 6 different poses and anatomy practice that got out of this anyways)

its my pleasure to introduce (in this order from left to right):

Matthew (Matt), Manfred (Manny), Milton, Mike, Martin and Marco!

[obsessive-valentine]

Yandere!Ballet-Teacher x GN!Student reader (HC’S)

Teacher is quite older than reader but reader is a consenting adult, to the relationship, not so much the yandere bit obvi bc they don’t know. Sorry I haven’t posed in a while, life’s crazy but requests are open and I’m getting to those who requested earlier this month I promise! ❤️

Who’s completely committed to this industry and creating flawless dancers and productions that he basically lives in the studio and hasn’t bothered making a family or life outside of it.

When you, a new student transferring from another company, enters and he’s enamoured by not only your cute face or abilities but also your polite and positive attitude. Something he lacks and failed to teach.

He gives you a lead role, saying it’s your chance to prove yourself to him but in all actually he’s using it as an excuse to have one-on-one lessons with you. And then they don’t stop even after you filled your role.

In fact they become frequent, and all these private’s push you to be the top of the class. His star student who he uses for demonstrations, who he pulls to the front gently by the arm and finds a way to keep touching you -either with his hand on your waist or arm sometimes even as bold as your face, puppeteering you into positions.

There’s a clear favouritism but no one expects or notices when you both begin to grow closer emotionally, because it’s behind closed doors of the office or empty studio.

Also because he’s strict with you during practice, as much as he is with the others or maybe even more, but it’s different with you it’s out of love and admiration, wanting to push you to your limits. But no one know that, they think it’s from him seeing another student with better potential (true in a way).

However after practice he loosens up, he wants to know more about you and how your brain works. What’s to try make sense of his emotional pull towards you. Sometimes your chatting ends up keeping you both late, when there’s no one left in the building but you two, not even the lady t the front desk is there.

Times like that he has to exercise restraint, bring the conversation to a end and send you on your way before it gets dark. But he still wants more, he thinks of you every hour of the evening, wondering what you’re doing in that lonely cramped apartment of yours that you’d complained about before. Or if your home safe after travelling on the late bus.

He begins offering you rides home after your late privates. “there’s been a robbery recently near your bus stop, it would really ease my mind if I could give you a ride back” he says watching you pack up before you can refuse he interrupts you “it’s dark out and dangerous, and I can’t loose my best dancer. I’ll take you home” this time his voice was firmer and seemingly made up his mind as he picked up his car keys and gestured you to follow, not waiting for a answer.

Car rides became frequent, everytime after a late private he’d drive you home. But now he’s worrying about other things, are you eating right? Ballet dancers are notorious for under eating. Are you sleeping enough? you looked a bit tired today.

He keeps a strict facade in-front of others, mastering a poker face and strong voice that makes anything he says sound like a fact or non-negotiable. And despite loosening up once your both alone or class is done he still exercises this authoritative tone to get you to answer his questions, like a loving interrogation.

He notices you begin to form a crush on him after a few personal talks and times together. He encourages this and begins teasing these emotions, every action seems more intimate.

He’s your hot, grumpy, ballet teacher -who deep down has a heart of gold. Who you can rely on beyond class. Who’s office you can sit in and vent to him. Who makes you feel better during hard times and offers to buy food for you or encourage you to take a nap on his sofa in the office. Who buys you any equipment or shoes you need, in fact as soon as your shoes are looking dead he’s ordering a new pair buy the end of the day without you having to mention it.

[whumpthefuck]

Therapy & Whump

Foaming at the mouth, feverishly gnawing at the bars of my enclosure, completely rabid, loosing my mind thinking about therapy in whump.

Having practically grown up in therapy, there’s this odd sort of sterile one sided (for both parties oddly enough) intense intimacy in therapy that I think would be intoxicating in whump!

By sterile one sided intimacy, I mean that it’s all clinical, it’s still healthcare. Just because this healthcare looks different than getting a shot or an MRI, doesn’t mean it’s not healthcare. Therapy is still a medical setting, it’s professional, cold in a way.

When you’re the patient, there’s this stranger that knows about the worst days of your life, the things that keep you up at night. They know the things you’ll take to your grave. They’ve seen you in ways no one else may ever see you, know you in ways only someone trained in the ways of the brain can know you. Ways you might not even know yourself. And yet, despite how much they SEE you, you will only see in them what they want you to see. They know what you believed your last thoughts were when you attempted last summer on that boat, but you don’t even know if they’re married.

On the other side of this coin, you as a therapist, have this person who is here to emotionally eviscerate themselves in front of you, show their biggest fears and most ambitious goals. They will cry and break down in front of you, over things no one may ever know. But you’re supposed to keep this professional distance from them. You’ve seen them at their most raw and vulnerable state, and they know only of the professional, not the YOU behind that professional. It’s this weird mix of a sterile coldness and a melding of two people. Idk, If that’s not intimacy I don’t know what is.

Some ideas that have been rotting my brain as of recent.

-=-=-

1- Patient!Whumper x Therapist!Whumpee = Patient!Whumper uses Therapist!whumpee’s ego against them. Posing as the perfect case to prove themselves to their peers. Whumper uses whumpee’s lack of experience to worm their way into whumpee’s mind. Slowly getting Whumpee to open up to them, to bend and then break the rules and boundaries of what a therapist x patient relationship should look like. Maybe whumper’s goal is to get whumpee fired, or to get whumpee to self destruct. Or maybe whumper is hoping to get whumpee alone, stage a mental health crisis, get whumpee inside whumper’s house, where whumper can do whatever they please to poor whumpee, who only wanted to help.

2- Therapist!Whumper x Patient!Whumpee = Similar vibe to the first but whumpee is reaching out for help, whumper has personal intimate knowledge of whumpee. They know where whumpee works, where they spend their free time. Maybe whumper can sow the seeds of an alibi for when whumpee goes missing. Notes that date back, weeks, months or even years painting whumpee as someone who wished to get away from it all, who was planning on leaving everything behind for something new. So when whumpee disappears all whumper has to do is show the police their notes, and whumper can keep whumpee all to themselves with no one looking for them.

3- Good cop bad cop – Whumpee is being held captive by two whumpers. Whumper 1 loves to “play” with whumpee, electrocution, mock executions, starvation, they use whumpee as their personal toy to get some frustration out. Maybe they experiment on whumpee, trying to find the most effective forms of torture. Sometimes they just torture whumpee because they’re bored. Whumper 2 helps stitch whumpee up afterwards. They sit with Whumpee after the torture, comforting them, telling them it’s all going to be okay, that they’ll tell Whumper 1 to be more gentle, to give whumpee a break. Whumper 2 encourages whumpee to talk about what happened, to vent, and work through the trauma. Whumpee still knows whumper 2 isn’t their friend, but when faced with a sadist who’d be giddy with joy if they could shove whumpee into a wood-chipper feet first, and whumper 2, who if nothing else sits and listens to whumpee. Who bandages whumpee up, and gives them something to make the pain subside, whumpee doesn’t feel like they have the luxury of refusing any kindness they’re given. Even if they know deep down, that it’s all fake, and it’s going to be used against them later. All they want right now is someone who will listen and let them cry it out.

4- Jekyll & Hyde = Whumper kidnaps whumpee, and tortures them. It’s grueling, hours in stress positions, being starved then force fed. Dealing with dehydration followed by being water boarded. When Whumper finally takes a break, they leave whumpee alone in their cell. A few hours pass before whumper returns, but instead of the sheer black they were wearing before, now whumper is wearing something more business casual, kakis with a nice button up shirt and a blazer. Whumpee can still see spots of their blood sprinkled across whumper’s skin. Whumper sits down and asks whumpee how they’re doing, how they feel. At first whumpee is furious, how dare they!? How dare this monster torture them and ravage their body cutting it open, tearing at skin, and then sit down to ask whumpee how he is like it’s just another Tuesday. Whumpee spits back some insults, and threats. Unlike mere hours before, whumper stays calm, they don’t yell or hit or threaten back. They just sit there, and listen. Whumper tries asking whumpee what’s bothering them, how they’re coping. All of these questions are either met with insults or silence.

Eventually whumper leaves, disappointing. The next time whumper enters whumpee’s cell he’s PISSED, the beatings are so bad whumpee begins to worry they won’t survive. Once again whumper leaves only to come back a few hours later dressed differently, acting differently. Whumpee doesn’t trust it, but it doesn’t take long for whumpee to figure out what whumper really wants, for whumpee to play along. Whumpee begins to use the opportunity to vent, to try and process the fear, anxiety, pain they’re feeling. In exchange, whumper, the bad version, is nicer. Whumper saves punishment for when whumpee disobeys or when they fail to meet whumper’s expectations.

Whumpee knows the information they’re giving therapist!whumper is being used against them, they know it’s all for whumper’s sick pleasure to hear whumpee relive the torture and explain in great detail exactly how they felt. But whumpee would be lying if they said they didn’t find some sick form of relief from their therapy sessions. It’s the only time they can tell whumper to their face how they feel without having to worry about the consequences.

-=-

I had some more ideas but idk how to explain them exactly, I just had to get at least SOME of my ideas out before they ate me alive.

[thefaiao]

Hi, firstly I just wanted to say that I love your art, especially with the way you use dynamism and angles in character sketches. It's really beautiful and I always look forward to seeing more black and white pieces from you.

I just wanted to ask, as a beginner artist whose been drawing on and off from 2017 onwards and hasn't seen much improvement, are there any resources or books you would recommend for someone still trying to grasp form and shape? Especially in creating 3d forms with line? I'd love to be able to draw characters in a similar way that you do but my cubes and cones never seem to come out correctly and humanoid shapes are even tougher. Thanks again for sharing your art.

Hello! Thank you very much for the compliments. Up until somewhat recently the B&W pieces were my favorite things to draw, so I get you. I did fall in love with coloring eventually though.

Alright, there are lots of things that can be done. I have had some classical training, and done human figure studies live, but honestly not nearly as much as I probably should have. You definitely should still do figure study as much as possible, especially in person. I'm just prefacing to say it may not get you to draw the way I draw I suppose, as its only part of what I've done to improve my drawing ability.

There are a few good resources to start with, notably the Loomis method, which a lot of artists use as a base. That's how you should use it too, ideally. It's not about copying his work exactly, it's about understanding just how the human body is proportioned, and adapting it from there. It doesn't have to define your thinking, it's just a good guideline. It's possible to structure a body quite differently than Loomis (and there are many many books for that), but the truth, which is, the proportions of the human body, is still there in all mindsets. Once you understand that, you can understand the reason for each approach, and even forego them to express something more unique, abstract and visceral.

The biggest thing you should do though, is always be observing the world around you, both online and offline. Figure studies are nice but they remove one of the most important things, and that is context. I find that people who will use those large libraries from people who pose professionally with bows and swords and the like will often draw technically impressive images, but they still feel like a fake pose. It doesn't feel like the person is holding onto the weapon like their life depended on it, or like they have a relationship with the object, that they pose and move in a certain way that reflects their personality. Live study with strangers helps rectify this somewhat.

Online you should also be following lots and lots of different artists! Don't limit yourself, pay attention to how they construct their drawings, how they go about things. It's important you follow a lot of people, see how they evolve. They are not only a point in time, they are also learning and evolving just like you. It's especially good if you can have artists friends to draw and share stuff with. I have a deep-seated belief that we draw art for others, to express ourselves to them, so they need to see it.

It may sound weird for me to say if you want to draw like me try to draw unlike me, but I'm just saying what I've done. I follow a lot of people and draw from a lot of places. Ultimately the main appeal of my forms is their dynamism and volume as you've said, but it's good to be versatile so you can always explore new avenues!

Now, you've done all these things, you are practicing them constantly. Now is the most important part. Keep drawing!!! Just keep drawing no matter what, no matter how bad you think it looks. You have to believe you have something to say, to express, no matter what. You say you haven't improved, but I don't believe you! Maybe you are faster, maybe your technique is better, maybe you have better habits, maybe you are a little more patient. There are a million ways to improve which don't even appear in the image. You have to keep drawing, NO MATTER WHAT!!! You have to believe you were born to do this and you will do it well, don't worry about what others think.

I can only draw such dynamic forms because I have kept drawing and masticating and elaborating this idea that is called my style. When you are drawing you are developing your own little language, and only when you are fluent you can start writing good books with it. Being fluent will take many years, you must accept that. If you take breaks, take breaks so you can keep drawing later. Take care of your health so you can keep drawing. You will only get to see your drawings become beautiful if you live long. To live a long and healthy life is to keep drawing.

That is my ultimate advice really, let that frustration build up, but keep drawing anyway. You will force yourself to find solutions to release that frustration as you do so, and improve. Maybe it's simple, but it's the only thing that is true no matter what. Don't worry about AI or whatever, none of that matters. Just keep drawing!

[mariacallous]

Canada Day is usually no big deal. The country takes off July 1 for the same reason that Americans take off July 4. There are fireworks, and maybe a parade, but you certainly don’t have to show up for either. The established ritual for commemorating Canada’s founding is to drive to the quietest place you can near a body of water and drink beer while staring at it.

This year, though, Canada Day is not quiet. It is not peaceful. This year, Canada is trying to make sure there’s a Canada Day next year.

By now, the shock of American betrayal has worn off. Donald Trump’s threats of annexation by means of economic debilitation are no longer surprising. Unlike many Americans, Canadians have no option but to take these threats seriously. That’s why two months ago, in the most extraordinary election of my lifetime, Canadians chose Mark Carney to lead them away from America.

“The system of open global trade anchored by the United States, a system that Canada has relied on since the Second World War—a system that, while not perfect, has helped deliver prosperity to our country for decades—is over,” Carney said in his victory speech. He has not backed down since his election. “A new imperialism threatens,” he said recently. “Middle powers must compete for interests and attention, knowing that if they’re not at the table, they’re on the menu.” Canada is still figuring out how to stay off the menu.

Trump has caused an extraordinary surge in Canadian nationalism. This nationalism is also new in kind. In the 1960s, Canada’s nationalists feared America’s power—its military strength, yes, but also its cultural cohesion—and wanted to form a corresponding Canadian identity. They started a movement that posed foundational political questions and ultimately resulted in the “patriation” of the country’s constitution (transferring legislative authority from Britain’s Parliament to Canada’s) and the signing of a charter of rights and freedoms in 1982. Today’s Canadian nationalism, by contrast, arises from darker and more practical concerns. The United States is declining into authoritarianism and threatening Canada’s sovereignty. How can Canada ensure that its political, military, and economic institutions survive?

The problem with Canadian nationalism is that Canada is very new. Before 1982, Canada Day was called “Dominion Day” and celebrated the country’s status upgrade to a dominion, rather than a possession, of the British empire. Canada was a product of international and colonial systems before it possessed its own independence. Until it confederated in 1867, it was a series of colonies. After confederation, Canada strove to be the most British dominion in the British empire. Both parties, Liberal and Conservative, have sought to integrate Canada with international trade and security systems. Canada has always lived by the global rules-based order, whichever global rules-based order happened to be around.

Because Canada has relied so much on other countries’ systems, it didn’t fully develop its own. Our military was constructed to complement America’s, not to protect Canada. (Peacekeeping is the kind of military engagement we’re most comfortable with. In fact, we practically invented it.) Thanks to the oceans on either side of us, the frozen wasteland to the north, and a gentle behemoth to the south, no one thought much about having to defend our borders. Now the north is melting. So is the south.

As the rules-based order ebbs, Canada has discovered the extent of its own vulnerability. Canadians need answers to questions they’ve never had to ask, and fast. How do you fight a trade war with an economy that’s more than 10 times the size of your own? What kind of military would Canada need to survive, or even to resist, an American annexation? Should the country become a nuclear power? Recently, I’ve been asking some of those questions as part of an audio series called Gloves Off and have been shocked by just how unprepared Canadians are to address them. Our country’s security services are small and domestically focused. Our economic infrastructure is largely designed to get natural resources to American manufacturers. This is the result of naivete: Who would want to hurt little old us? Nobody needs to imagine anymore.

Now Canada is increasing its defense spending and re-arming with Europe, not America. Trump didn’t give us much choice. In March, he announced the next generation of American fighter jets, which Canada has long purchased, by noting that he would sell an inferior version to other countries: “We like to tone them down about 10 percent, which probably makes sense because someday maybe they’re not our allies, right?” The idea that the American military would turn against Canada once seemed absurd. But the absurd has become almost predictable at this point. If the U.S. Marines are coming for American citizens, surely they could come for Canada too.

Fewer Canadians are traveling to the United States than in the past. Official data from April show that the number of Canadians driving across the border had dropped 35 percent from the previous year. Air travel fell 20 percent. Some are boycotting their southern neighbor, but for others, avoiding it is just a matter of common sense. Why put yourself in the position of being a foreigner in Trump’s America? The Canadian government issued a travel advisory in March, but many Canadians already understood the risk. Similarly, even before our government pulled U.S. products from liquor stores, many Canadians had stopped buying American. Some even turned U.S. brands upside down on supermarket shelves so that others would know not to purchase them.

The U.S. ambassador to Canada, Pete Hoekstra, has called the product bans “outrageous” and an “insult” to America. “We have not done anything like that,” Hoekstra told one interviewer in May, neglecting to mention that the U.S. had just launched a trade war.Canada has made some necessary adjustments in response to Trump’s tariffs, by the way: In March, Canadian exports to the United States declined 6.6 percent compared with the month before but rose in the rest of the world to 25 percent, making up nearly the entire difference. By April, though, the figures were more dire. Exports to America fell a staggering 16 percent and increased elsewhere by only 2.9 percent.

If recent months are any indication, the debate that most Canadians will have this July 1—between fireworks, beside the water—won’t be about Canada. It will be about the United States: Is Trump the one driving America off the cliff, or is it the American people? The more hopeful among us will argue that it’s Trump, and that at some point in the future, the alliance between our two countries might return to some semblance of normalcy. But for now, Canada has to figure out what to do with its terrible new freedom. We must make ourselves into something, or disappear.