#I’ve also thought about just redoing the whole thing. so it’s more cohesive and things make sense yknow

[peapod20001]

mmgmgngngmgngggHbGGGRRRAAAAHH

Bro what if. What if I. What if. Hear me out, WHAT. if..... I made a mini choose your adventure sort of thing,, but used polls to let y’all pick options...

[20dimensionsoftangerine]

20 D20 Fanfics

My friend @remidyal ranked their fics once they had written 20 of them. I have just finished my 20th story so I’d figure I would do that too! Dice rules so 1 is the worst and 20 is the best

1. Drowning in the Ink

I had the thought ‘what if Rosamund and Gerard got caught when they went to find Elody’. I still think this is a good thought and want to re-explore it but my execution in this story wasn’t the best. Writing it before the finale was out meant I was working with half knowledge on a lot of characters that I think shows. Plus, I saw a lot of people on Tumblr saying the Princesses’ plan was actually good and I got annoyed at that and it definitely bled through in the story too much. I’ll probably redo and expand this one sometime in the future!

2. Old Habits

I often dislike my most recent creations. It’s got too much me on it still. I haven’t distanced myself from the art yet. So this one was me trying a few things outside of my comfort zone and I really don’t feel like any of them turned out as well as they could have. I can barely even speak of it at this point the emotions are too fresh!

3. Safety

Not much to say about this. Shortest thing I’ve ever written and I do like how it turned out but it’s definitely… short. I enjoy Gorgug and Adaine interacting, I enjoy Adaine scared, but nothing makes this little guy stand out.

4. Half Siblings are a Whole Deal

This one honestly isn’t even supposed to be good. It’s a direct retelling of canon featuring my OC, that premise isn’t going to win any Hugo awards! But it’s fun and I want to explore how Fig’s character would change if she wasn’t going through her family drama alone. If she had to be, heaven forbid, responsible. I do plan on continuing it! I’ve got some good ideas for the end that I’ve already set up.

5. Additions to the Beehive

I think this one is so low just because I didn’t really like the latest chapter I put out. Plus, I don’t really have a solid plan for this story. I have a few scenes I want to do, character beats and themes I want to flesh out, but exactly what’s going to happen is a mystery. The title’s really solid though.

6. Blight

Pains me to put this so low because Remidyal’s Poison series is so solid and Penelope Everpetal is so fun but I kinda stumbled through it. There’s a couple sections I straight up should have deleted and a couple more I should have added. I do think I got the right vibe down, though, and I really want to do more with Penelope in the future.

7. Sneaking In Sneaking Out

I’m going to be honest, I just wanted to write some scenes about sneaking into buildings. It was really fun and I felt clever writing it. I also liked making Aelwyn really really mean especially because Remidyal had posted Camp right before where she was pretty darn nice. Not much happening in this story but it was fun!

8. No Blood Relations

I dunno this one is fine. As stated before, exploring Fig having to go through her parents divorce with someone is very compelling. I also liked pitting Adaine and Fig against each other a little bit, it felt very real to how siblings of divorce act. Too real. I’m kind of blocking it out.

9. Tender Love and Care

I liked this one a lot. It’s supposed to be romance but I don’t think I really it comes through (because I’m bad with romance) but I really liked getting into a desperate Fabian’s head. I think I did well with the physical environment in this one too, something I usually struggle with. And the line at the end of Fabian’s section? Where it says ‘he prayed to the only god he ever believed in. “Kristen please.”’. I know I’m the one who wrote it but I think about it daily.

10. Ring a Bell

Right in the middle! I really like the chapters I have out for this one so far and I’m excited for the plan of where I’m taking it. Only time will tell if I can pull it off into being a good cohesive story but for now this bad boy has potential!

11. Please Wake Up, Please Don’t Sleep

My other Neverafter Fic! This one I am much more proud of. I think I really got the voices of all the characters down and managed to make an interesting little scene out of a relatively simple concept. Rosumand is just a teenager! Someone give her a hug I am begging.

12. For Want of Citizenship

I think this story is severely underrated honestly. I got Goldenhoard’s voice down pat and the pacing of the story flowed really well with nice details that I often forget to include to center the reader. Plus, it’s a ‘what if’ scenario that gnawed at me from the moment the pieces were in place and I was sad nothing ever came of it in canon. Patched a hole in my mind this story did.

13. Horrified Looks from Everyone in the Room

Ah, the story to start us off. My second highest kudos still. Which is wild. It’s a good fic for sure! I think Fabian’s and Riz’s sections both shone and it really started off my addiction of giving Adaine a Bad Time. Definitely things I would change about it if I had to do it again but overall I can see why it’s still so popular and I’m very proud of it!

14. Rule Number One

The other story to kick things off! Can’t believe the prompt ‘Riz lets Biz think they’re friends just a little longer’ started a whole expanded AU. I still think this one’s great! Sticking in Riz’s point of view so the reader couldn’t even tell Adaine was having a whole episode until she started sobbing mid sentence was wonderful. Riz’s guilt and justifications were so juicy. And! Everyone liked my weird Rule quirk I gave to Adaine which I had fun playing with. This one isn’t higher because I think some of the information about the changes in this AU could have been given out in a smoother way but overall one of my best.

15. Fabian’s Sister and Other Perks of Punching an Ambassador

Firstly, name’s bad. My worst titled fic. But it’d okay we love it anyway. I very much like what I’ve got going on with this story. Exploring Fabian and Adaine’s relationship in a unique light, fleshing out Bill and especially Hallariel, even fleshing out some of Fabian and Adaine’s insecurities! I’m nearing sort of the end of the fic (I’m at least half way through) and I’m excited where it’s going too! There are some things I wish I had spent more time on (the other bad kids, Cathilda, ect) but what I do have is solid and streamlined enough for me not to be too sad about that!

16. The Good Wizard Gorgug

My. Most. Underrated. Fic! This is such a solid story I adore it. Gorgug is my baby boy and it was so much fun exploring Adaine’s character through him. The steady climb of them becoming better and better friends, growing more confident and relaxed around each other, only for it to all come crashing down to be slowly built up once again. I love it! I love Wizard Gorgug! What a good good boy.

17. Babysitting a (High) Elf

This one was also fairly recent but I really liked how it turned out! There were things I wanted to explore with this, Gorthalax’s guilt about not being there for Fig all these years, Adaine’s complicated emotions about being abandoned, and I felt I pulled it off well. I also think I did a good job making it funny and writing high Adaine as silly while still noticeably herself. Until I sucker punched her at the end. I couldn’t resist though.

18. Mastermind Introductions

Everything I set out to do in this fic I did flawlessly. I wanted to rewrite Adaine’s introduction scene and hit a lot of the same ‘beats’ but with the special AU twist. Aelwyn and her fight in the beginning (where Adaine kind of started it and then very much failed to end it), stealing the book and then being embarrassed by Fig and Kristen’s help, stuff like that! I really felt like I pulled it off and introduced the other Bad Kids just as well as I did Adaine. If I would change anything it would just to tweak a few details to fit better in my new vision for the overall AU. But besides that it’s a flawless work!

19. The Young Oracle

Yes! I was really worried about this one because of all of the weird time jumps. But I couldn’t not have weird time jumps. It was a story about a very powerful diviner! It couldn’t have time be linear! And I think it wouldn’t have made sense if everything had been in order, funnily enough. But besides all that I really like the tone I set for the story, the details I put into the world, (how I managed it without ever watching SY), and I have been thinking about the expanded version of this AU excessively. Is it a perfect story? Nah, but I adore it perhaps the most of all my fics.

20. Property Of

In a move that caught even me by surprise, Property Of wins! It’s my first muti-chapter I’ve finished, it’s got a really solid character arc, and I feel like I let the tone slip from silly to wild and unnerving in a very smooth slide. Plus I just… had a lot of fun writing it. I couldn’t seem to put it down for a second and when I blinked I was over 10k words! It was supposed to be a one shot! How naive I was! So yeah, I’m proud of it, it was fun to write, and it’s fun to reread and think about the implications. Nat 20!

[buzzheadchick]

Hm. So here’s a thought. We know “boss monsters” are an established “type” of monster in Undertale and I supposed by extension, Deltarune. They all tend to have similar features, it’s a species thing, it makes sense. Humans, all the one’s we’ve seen in canon, tend to look similar too. It’s part of the whole Frisk/Chara confusion or just resemblance that happens in Undertale. For sure, Frisk is their own distinct person, but the striped shirt, medium hair length, ambiguous face all lend to a pattern. I mean, obviously not all humans have striped shirts, it’s not a genetic thing… But the vessel we created did. And the medium hair (with exception of the bald option). And an “ambiguous” face. And we got to choose the name for our vessel, we were even allowed to make it the same as an Undertale character. But we had to choose from features that we established we have seen in humans.

What if Ralsei is a vessel as well? I’ve seen some theories that he’s a puppet, or that he is there to appeal to the player. But the familiar “boss monster” features, like he was made in a “create your own boss monster!” game. The name being an anagram of Asriel, like a fan wanting to pay homage to a character they like. His never-ending kindness like a player wanting to 100% a mercy run. What if Ralsei wasn’t made to appeal to the player? What if Ralsei was made to appeal to their OWN controller? Perhaps someone with knowledge about the nature of both this world and Undertale. Perhaps someone supposed to be a “player 2” to the soul controlling Kris. That’s why the town is named the way it is, who it was supposed to be for.

Maybe they don’t even know about the fact that the light world has mirrors of Undertale characters, and that they are effectively an image of this character’s brother with an anagram name. Perhaps all they know is the mechanics. Or maybe they do know everything they’re doing, it’s hard to say. If it’s true, I’ve no idea for the moment what it would mean for our discarded vessel.

Also, here’s a mini-theory about if I’m actually wrong but close. Maybe there’s a second soul, yeah, and maybe their vessel also got discarded, so they control Ralsei. Who it could possibly be, if you’re so inclined: Chara. A stretch, but hear me out. “No one can choose who they are in this world.” Imagine if Chara made a vessel that got destroyed, and had their soul put into Ralsei instead. They may just destroy yours too out of spite. Not to mention, getting to control a character not unlike their brother, whose body did hold their soul once as they used it to carry their own body to the surface? Probably a lot of anger about not getting to choose that. As for the pacifism? I’d see two options; either this is Chara going and trying every “route” because they are still under the impression this is redo-able, or Chara doesn’t want to make the image of their brother into a monster like before. This whole mini-theory doesn’t hold much water, I realize, but it’s two in the morning and I’ve got deltarune on the brain. Maybe y’all can find something more cohesive than I can.

[ukulelewrites]

Con Amore

A/N: A full fledge fic from ukulelewrites??????? I’m shooketh yall. Sorry for the wait, I just fell in a major writer’s rut until very recently tagging @albdajirk bc she knows what’s up @ladynightmareii bc she deserves some “quality fics” @seungkwanslowqualityenglish for not yelling at me to sleep instead of write and the rest of @smols-n-tols

Pairing: Stray Kids’ Jisung x Reader

Genre: Fluff/Angst/shade thrown @ jyp/Trainee Reader!AU

Word Count: 7.5k

Con Amore: an Italian musical term designating the singer to sing the melody with love

The beat played in the background of the studio as Jisung stood in the recording booth, meticulously rapping his part for Stray Kids’ upcoming track. Suddenly, the back track stopped.

“Can you redo that last line?” you asked into the mic, “Your intonation sounds weird.” Chan nodded in agreement from next to you. “Also,” you leaned towards the mic again, “add more emphasis on the first syllable please.” Jisung gave you a thumbs up before going back and rapping his line again, now fixed with your suggestions. You smiled at him through the glass, even giving him a thumbs up when he finished.

“Amazing work, Jisung,” Chan said as his bandmate entered the studio.

“Couldn’t have done it without my favorite producer’s help,” Jisung replied as he ruffled your hair. You stuck your tongue out at him playfully

“I’m hurt,” Chan exclaimed dramatically, clutching his chest. You rolled your eyes at their banter.

“Wait, what time is it?” you asked both boys, already shoving some of your things into your bag.

“4:20pm,” Chan said after glancing at his watch.

“Oh shit,” you mumbled before scurrying towards the door. “I gotta go, guys. Monthly evaluations start in 10 minutes. See you tomorrow!”

Adrenaline pumped through your veins as you dropped to your knees and slid across the floor, bending yourself backwards, and watching as Sera flipped over you. As the song entered the next verse, you got up off of the floor and went straight into rapping, losing yourself to the beat you had produced just weeks prior. Sera quickly went into her rap verse, her energy bouncing off of you. Then the two of you got back into formation with the rest of the girls, moving along to the choreography Sera perfected just 3 days ago. The chorus came, and a girl named Haeun belted out your lyrics. When the climax of the song came, you and her stood in the center of the formation, going back and forth with high notes and ad libs. The music from the stereo stopped, and the entire group lined up in age order in front of the trainers.

“So the song is self-produced?” Ms. Kim, the vocal trainer asked. The group nodded. “Who produced the track?”

“I did, Ms. Kim,” you said politely, raising your hand, “I also composed the track and wrote the lyrics with Sera’s help.”

“And Sera choreographed the entire thing?” Mr. Park, the dance trainer asked.

“We worked together to come up with the big picture,” Sera stated.

“But Sera pulled together our ideas to form one cohesive choreography,” you chimed in. The trainers nodded at your statement but kept their eyes trained on the papers in front of them: the papers that outlined your age, talents, weights, and other info.

“You’ve been producing a lot haven’t you, Y/N?” Ms. Kim asked, eying your profile.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You assisted producing and composing for Twice’s latest album, GOT7’s sophomore album, and Stray Kids’ upcoming mini-album?”

“She also wrote most of 15&’s songs,” Sera chimed in this time.

“Who?” Ms. Kim asked. You chose to stay silent for her sake. After another beat of silence Ms. Kim spoke again, “Nice work on the song, Y/N.” You bowed gratefully at her compliment, hoping your curtain of hair hid your triumphant smile.

“Clean choreography as well, Sera,” Mr. Park said. Your best friend also bowed down a full 90 degrees. “No laggers this time,” he stated. You could see the two youngest trainees in your group let out a sigh of relief.

“Also amazing high note, Haeun. Good usage of the JYP technique,” Ms. Kim complimented. Haeun beamed and also bowed. You chewed at the inside of your cheek. Let’s say you weren’t exactly too fond of your agency’s infamous technique.

“Now, girls, I’m pretty sure you’ve heard the rumors by now,” Mr. Park started, “And I’m going to tell you that they’re true. We are looking at debuting a new girl group by the beginning of next year.” The excitement in the room grew tenfold. “No decisions are final yet, but we will let you know in the following week who will make the final group. You’re dismissed.”

The moment you exited the stuffy dance studio, you let out a giant sigh of relief. “Jesus, I really thought I was going to get cut this time,” you said, pulling your water bottle out of your duffel bag and chugging half its content.

“Shut up,” Sera replied, rolling her eyes, “you’ve been here for what? Eight years now? How could they possibly get rid of you? You produce half of their artists’ albums now. You’re a triple threat. Plus, you’re my best friend, and you know if they kick you out, JYP’s finna catch these hands.” You giggled at her comment before pulling her aside.

“They almost got me for my weight,” you whispered, “I was half a kilogram over.” Sera looked at you incredulously.

“But you’ve been dieting for the past month? Like, for a whole week you only ate an apple a day!”

“I just need to hit the gym a couple more times a week,” you sighed, “And cut down on the snacks.”

“But,” Sera dropped her voice even quieter when Haeun walked by, “they’re not gonna cut you from the debut group because of your weight, right? Like, they didn’t kick you out because of your weight, so why exclude you from the group?”

“They didn’t kick me out because everyone knows I’ve been here for years, and this is just a minor fluke. Ms. Kim even brushed it off saying it’s my time of the month.”

“So you won’t get excluded from the final group?”

“Probably not, but I just need to step up my game for now. Can’t be known as the girl who got cut from joining SIXTEEN and from debuting in any of the girl groups,” you said wryly.

“Chin up, buttercup. We’re debuting together, and that’s a fact!”

“Y/N, do you think you could rearrange this song for me?” Haeun asked you the following day.

“‘Honey’ by Kehlani? I feel like the acoustic guitar is really the identity of the-”

“But can you rearrange it?” she asked, this time a bit more impatiently.

“I can, but how do you want it rearranged?” you asked, plastering on a smile.

“More pop, dance music-esque. I need a beat added to it, and, well, I don’t know. You usually do that part for me!”

“Yeah, just give me a couple hours,” you said, already putting on your headphones. Haeun prances out of the practice room, only to be replaced by Sera.

“What did the princess want?” Sera asked.

“Just a rearrangement done,” you replied blandly, already focusing on the beat you were conjuring up.

“Ya know, I can’t hate her because she’s so talented, but god, she’s irritating.”

“She’s not that bad,” you said, already laying down the track, “She just doesn’t really understand what it means to be part of a team yet, which makes sense because she’s an only child and has only been a trainee for 6 months.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Sera said before looking at the clock, “Hey, Y/N?”

“Hm?”

“Aren’t you helping Chan oppa today?”

You nodded, not really looking up from your laptop.

“Shouldn’t you go now?” Sera insisted. You finally tore your attention away from your rearrangement to see that, yes, you should definitely head to the recording studio now.

“Sorry I’m late,” you exclaimed, bowing to the many people that filled the studio.

“It’s fine,” Chan said, “Just help us make an awesome song and you’re forgiven.”

“Sounds like a plan!” You looked down at the sheet in front of you, “So Felix is recording today?” The freckle-faced boy sent you a little salute before heading into the recording booth.

“Ah, Y/N, Jisung’s going to help you with recording today,” Chan said, “I still need to finish up the last two songs for the mini-album.”

“Yeah, that’s fine! Jisung’s fun to work with too.”

“See, hyung, Y/N likes me better,” Jisung said, cheekily sticking his tongue out too.

“Hey! Don’t go starting rumors about me now,” you said, laughing.

“Mhm, you owe me one, brat!” Chan’s voice rung out even after the door closed after him.

“Anyways…” Jisung stalled, “Let’s just get the rest of them done?”

“Okay, Felix,” you said into the mic.

“Yeah?”

“From your first line, okay?”

“I’m exhausted,” you exclaimed, slamming your head down on the table.

“Really? You’re usually fine after a session,” Jisung replied. He was the last member left in the recording studio; the rest had filed out of the room ages. “Want a snack? That usually brings your energy back up.” He starts digging around his bag.

“Nah, I can’t. I’m dieting.”

“Dieting? What for? You seem fit to me.”

“It’s just, well, there’s a lot going on right now,” you said.

“Really? Like what?” he asked, leaning forward.

“You really want to know?”

“C’mon, we’re close!”

So for the next two hours you found yourself curled up in a ball on the recording studio’s couch across from Jisung as you spilled out everything. He learned that you were up to be part of the next girl group, but nothing is certain. He empathized with you when you let out all of your concerns: your weight, your ancient trainee status, your seemingly plateauing skills. Heck, he even heard you slip out your slight dislike for a certain six-month old trainee. After speaking him for so long, your chest felt itself lighten from all the stressors that had buried you over time.

“So what now?” Jisung asked after your rant.

“I find out sometime this week if I’m in the final debut group or not,” you said, “I find out if my 10 years of training is really worth it.”

“But you’re one of the most talented people I know!” he exclaimed earnestly.

“Thanks,” you said shyly, “But it takes more than talent to debut.”

“And you have all of those things! I swear, Y/N, you’re talented, hilarious, passionate, beautiful-” his eyes widened at his last adjective. “Wait, I didn’t mean that! Wait, no, like, you are beautiful, but I meant that in a completely non-creepy-” He immediately closed his mouth when he felt your lips pressed on his cheek.

“Thank you, Jisung,” you said when you pulled away, “It means a lot hearing that from you.”

Beads of sweat trailed down your face as you amped up the speed of the treadmill just a hair faster. Your legs burned, but you kept at it; the looks of your trainers’ faces when they saw your weight fueled you.

“Tsk,” Ms. Kim only glanced at the scale before writing it down. Mr. Park tried to give you a reassuring shrug, but the extra pound glared right back at you.

“Can Mr. Park leave the room?” you asked, steadying your voice. The dance instructor didn’t utter a word as he left the room. You stripped yourself of your hoodie, jeans, and t-shirt. The number dropped a mere half pound; a sob almost escaped your lips.

“I’ll round down this time around, Y/N,” Ms. Kim said, already scribbling the goal weight down, “But don’t expect it next time around.”

“Thank you so much, Ms. Kim,” you exclaimed, giving her a full 90 degree bow when you got off the scale.

“Don’t let me down, kid. You’re probably the best vocal trainee we got in this company; I’d hate to let you go.”

Your limbs were screaming at this point, but you kept at your robotic pace, keeping your eyes trained on the clock on the opposite wall.

2:43am. You still had so much left to go.

“Yo, Y/N, you okay?” Sera asked the next morning. She had a hand on your arm, steadying you as you almost trip over your own two feet.

“Yeah, I just spent some extra time in the gym yesterday,” you tried waving her off.

“How much extra?”

Your silence gave it away.

“Did you spend all night in the gym?” she exclaimed, “Do you not remember what happened last time that happened? You were in the hospital for two whole days!”

You winced at her words. “I’m sorry, Sera. I just really need to make the debut group,” you sighed.

Your best friend engulfed you in a hug, “Don’t stress! We’re getting in together!”

A week has passed, and you were finally safe under the weight limit. The anxiety of possibly debuting was pushed aside as you spent your hours awake producing, arranging, and practicing music. You’ve been so caught up in work, you didn’t realize you were staring into space for a solid five minutes in the corner of the dance studio.

“Y/N?” Jisung called your name for the sixth time as he waved his hands in front of your face, “You good, fam?”

“Y-yeah, I just find out if I debut today or not,” you said, trying to shake the nervousness out of your voice, “Nothing major.” You cleared your throat, “Anyways, what are you doing here? Thought you were still working in the recording studio.”

Jisung sat down next to you, “I finished earlier than expected and wanted to check on you. Chan-hyung mentioned you were finding out if you debut today. Don’t be too nervous, Y/N!” He gave you a bright smile causing you to send him one right back. “There’s that pretty smile,” he said softly, “Don’t let it fade away, Y/N, things will work out for you.”

“Thanks, Jisung,” you replied, your voice barely over a whisper. The air shifted between the two of you. The loud banter usually exchanged between you two was replaced by a softness characterized by lingering looks and bashful smiles. “Um,” you broke the silence awkwardly, “I better head to the meeting room now.”

Jisung stood up first and held out his hand for you. Slowly, you extended your hand and allowed for him to help you up. “Good luck, Y/N,” Jisung said, his hand still clasped around yours.

“Thank you, Jisung,” you slipped your hand out of his after, “I’ll let you know what happens!”

“We’ll be announcing the girls debuting today,” Ms. Kim announced.

“Kim Sera, main dancer,” Mr. Park said. Your best friend burst into a wide grin, bowing and thanking the trainers profusely.

“Kwon Hyorin, main rapper, and Lee Suji, lead rapper,” Ms. Kim read off from the list. The two girls smiled and thanked the trainer.

“Lee Minju, lead dancer,” Mr. Park added, “You worked hard in this past year.” The young girl smiled in reply and softly thanked him.

“Lee Haeun, main vocal & visual,” Ms. Kim said. The girl beamed proudly and thanked the trainers also. “Those are the only girls debuting. Hopefully you all can pick a leader for yourself; we’ll inform you of the group name in a couple of days. Good work, girls.”

It was like the world came crashing down. You bowed respectively to the trainers as they left the room, but your feet wouldn’t budge from your spot. The whispers started around you as the girls eyed you strangely.

“How’d she not make it again?”

“Just look at her body? How could anyone looking like that debut?”

“God, it must suck to be her right now.”

“Y/N, you alright?” Sera asked. She was already ready to engulf you in a big hug. You allowed her to comfort you for a bit before pulling away.

“I have to go practice,” you muttered, “I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Did you hear?” Felix asked the guys scattered on the floor of the dance studio; their heavy breaths fogging up the mirror after hours of choreo practice.

“Hear what?” Seungmin asked.

“Y/N didn’t make the debut group.”

The sound of a water bottle crashing to the ground rung throughout the studio. The guys looked up to see Jisung standing in shock, a pool of water forming around his feet.

“What?” the rapper asked, “What do you mean she didn’t make it? She was practically leading the whole girl trainee group for the past five years!”

Felix just shrugged. “It’s JYP. When is he never a snake?”

The light guitar strums and snaps of “I Like Me Better” played over the speaker as you moved fluidly with the music. You kept your eyes trained on the mirror, making sure your expressions matched the tone of the song and that your limbs didn’t look too forced or stiff while you moved through the choreography.

“Y/N?”

You almost tripped over your own feet at Jisung’s voice.

“H-hey, what are you doing here so late?” you asked, scurrying over to the speaker to shut the music off.

“I wanted to check on you, and I figured you’d be in here.”

“Well, here I am,” you said with an awkward flourish.

“You alright?” Jisung approached apprehensively, stopping only a foot in front of you. You looked over at the stereo as you nodded in reply, but his eyes stayed in the same soft, worried way they had been since he’d entered the room.

“I got cut, Jisung.” Your voice was barely over a whisper, but he could still pick up on the little tremor at the end of his name.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he put his hand on your arm, “It’s alright, Y/N. C’mere.” He wrapped his arms around your shoulders and pulled you closer to him. You looped your arms around his waist and buried your face into his shoulder. Jisung’s words of comfort wafted through your ears, an absent-minded hum to the overwhelming feeling of weight pressing on your chest.

“I’ve just worked so hard,” you cried into his shoulder, “And I don’t know what else I can do.” Jisung tentatively lifted his hand to run them through your hair soothingly. “What if this is my best, and I’m never going to get good enough to debut?”

“Hey, Y/N,” he held you at arm’s length now, “I can 100% assure you that you are worth way more than what those trainers picked, okay?” A small grinned played on his lips. “I swear that I’m not lying to you when I say you’re the most talented trainee in this whole damn company. It’s just,” he paused, “Sometimes the opportunity we think we missed is just something that will open a door for us later on in life. Don’t beat yourself up over this, Y/N. Prove them wrong. Show them that you’re meant to debut.”

You let out a derisive scoff. “I think they made it obvious I’m not debuting.”

“Talk to Momo-sunbae, Felix, Minho-hyung, and maybe you’d get a different answer. Trust me, Y/N. I think you are perfectly awesome just the way you are, and I know most of your peers know that too.”

You went back into his arms for another hug. There was always something about Jisung that made you feel safe and sound. Maybe it was the warmth he emitted whenever he came in contact with you, arms snuggly wrapped around your figure. Maybe it was the way his voice made the back of your neck tingle just a bit when he lowered his voice to give you words only meant for your ears. Or maybe it was just him. Jisung. The guy that’s been by your side since he joined JYP.

“Thanks, Jisung,” you murmured, pulling yourself back just a bit. From this angle, you realized exactly how expressive his eyes were. It was as if he was pouring every single one of his thoughts into his gaze.

“No problem, Y/N.” Neither of you had let go yet. “Y/N?”

“Yeah?” Your voice was breathier than intended.

“You feeling better?” He was already leaning down.

“Yeah.” You decided to meet him halfway; your lips meeting in the middle. Was it awkward? Yes. But did you hate it? No. Jisung brought his hand up to cradle you cheek, trying to figure exactly what to do with his hands. Suddenly you pulled away. “What about the cameras?” you asked, wanting to kill yourself for pulling such a rookie mistake.

“Blind spot.” Jisung gestured to the cameras, “They don’t catch this corner for some reason.”

“Thank god,” you sighed, “So we can continue.”

“W-what?” Jisung’s eyes blew up comically.

“C’mon, Romeo, you’re the one that took advantage of an emotionally wrecked girl,” you teased.

“Hey, weren’t you the one that kissed me?”

You wrapped your arms around his neck. “Just shut up and kiss me before I get sad again,” you replied, laughter threatening to spill past your lips.

“Did you finish my arrangement?” Haeun questioned you one day in the hallway.

“Yeah, I sent it to you, like, 20 minutes ago?” you replied.

“Awesome! I’m planning on using it for the pre-debut showcase. They’re letting all of us have our own solo stages to showcase our individual talents!”

Ah yes, another twist in the knife already impaled in your heart. “Sounds great, Haeun,” you gritted.

“Plus, I’m going to the salon tomorrow. I heard they’re going to dye my hair blonde for debut! Do you think the managers will let me dye it another color?” Hauen pouted. “I heard all the visuals nowadays get natural hair colors while their members get weird ones.”

You were six steps away from throttling the poor girl.

“Haeun! Help Minju with her vocal warm-ups!” You had never been so glad to hear Sera’s voice.

“Thanks, Sera,” you uttered as Haeun pranced away from you.

“Anything to get rid of that brat,” Sera joked before looking at you with concern. “You okay, Y/N?”

“Yeah, I’m just getting some background work done. Ya know, arranging and producing and all that.”

“I heard you’re composing our debut track,” Sera said with a wry smile.

“Yeah, composing, writing, producing,” you counted them off on your fingers. “Make this debut lit, Sera. I’ve always wanted to swim in a pool of money from all my royalties,” you jested.

Your best friend hesitantly smiled right back. “I swear I will, Y/N. I’ll make you proud!”

“Again,” you demanded into the microphone. Haeun readjusted her headphones before belting out the bridge again. You winced at the strained quality of her voice. “It’s fine for now, next up is Sera.”

You were used to this already. In the weeks leading up to the showcase, you were tasked with ensuring the success of the girl group’s music. Funny how JYP could trust you with the future of his next big thing, but he couldn’t trust you to be in his next big thing. Time ticked away quickly as you settled into your zone. That was until an incessant cough kept snapping you out of it.

“Do you need water, Haeun?” you inquired.

“I’ve got some,” she said.

“Then drink it.” You returned your attention back to Minju standing in the recording booth. “We can’t have you getting sick when the showcase is next week.”

“I know,” Haeun replied matter-of-factly. “I’m going to rest my voice for the rest of the day,” she got up off of the couch, “Am I dismissed?”

You waved her off. “Don’t forget to drink warm water with honey and lemon, you brat!” The girl might be growing on you.

Hauen rolled her eyes at your advice.

Okay, maybe not.

Recording goes by smoothly, and you find yourself burning the midnight oil as you work on mixing all the components together. However, you kept on being pulled back to the bridge of the song, wrinkling your nose at how the audio sounded no matter how much you tweaked it. You were so engrossed in your work that you didn’t notice a certain someone sneak up behind you.

“Boo,” Jisung whispered, tapping on your shoulder. You jolted in surprise before turning around to see his grinning face.

“Not funny, Jisung.” You scowled at him.

“C’mon, Y/N, don’t give me that face.” He poked your cheek, but you continued to glare at him. “I won’t do it again?” he offered.

“Fine,” you sighed before turning back to your work. “What do you want?”

“Just wanted to see what you were up to at,” he turned to look at the clock, “1:34am.” You didn’t verbally reply, instead handing him the headphones you were wearing earlier. He placed them over his ears, and you played him the rough mix. Jisung bobbed his head along to the beat, smiling at a really cool switch up you did in the second chorus, and then wincing when he got to that part in the bridge.

“It’s bad isn’t it?” you grimaced, taking the headphones back from him after the song ended.

“No! The song is good! It’s just,” he paused, “whoever is singing the high note and adlibs during the bridge sounds really strained.”

“Yeah, the main vocal’s throat hasn’t been in the best shape, and the company wants the song to be pretty much perfect in two days, but I can’t get her to redo her recording of the bridge part because I really don’t want her to mess up her throat even more.” You slammed your head down on the table and let out a frustrated groan. “I don’t know what I should do.”

“Why don’t you just do the high note and adlib recording and mix it in?” Jisung inquired. His voice was so soft, you barely heard him say it.

“What?”

“Well, it’s just a high note and adlib, right? Your voice shouldn’t be too distinct? Plus, it’ll get the recording done just in time for the company’s deadline?”

You mulled over his words for a second. Maybe it’ll work? Your mind couldn’t pull up any other solutions, so you found yourself standing in the recording booth, belting out the notes with ease. Jisung manned the recording equipment, giving you a thumbs up whenever you hit a high note perfectly. For the first time since the debut group was announced, you were genuinely smiling. It felt so good to be able to sing out to your heart’s content, knowing that it’ll end up being heard by thousands of people.

“Was it good?” you asked Jisung once you stepped out of the booth.

“Good? That was the best I’ve heard you sing since you joined this company,” he teased.

“Gotta make sure the girls do well. Even if it means someone else taking credit for my work,” you stated. Jisung frowned at your words.

“What? No! Just let the company know that you sang the high notes and adlibs since the main vocal was sick. I’m sure they’ll give you credit.” He sounded extremely unsure on his last statement.

“And completely expose the main vocal for not doing the main vocal’s job?” you snorted. “It’s fine, Jisung. This is just a one time thing.”

You had lied to yourself that night. It was definitely not a one time thing. This was being proven to you just this second as the stylists fitted you in an outfit probably worth ten times more than you ever will. How exactly did you get to this moment?

“Haeun is sick,” Ms. Kim stated the Friday you presented the debut track to the board, “We just rushed her into the hospital last night.”

“What are we going to do?” Sera asked, stepping into her appointed leader position, “Our pre-debut showcase is Monday. How can we perform if our main vocal is sick? We didn’t even record the pre-recorded tracks yet for our stages!”

“We can always just delay the showcase? Cite that our main vocal had fallen ill due to overworking herself,” a board member proposed.

“How can we do that when the girl’s stricken with Mono?” Ms. Kim snapped, “She wasn’t even working that hard!”

“We also can’t delay it since our fans have been excited for this for weeks now,” Sera chimed in, “We might get a lot of backlash for this.”

“What do you propose we do then?” Mr. Park asked.

“Why don’t we just have a stand-in for Haeun?” Ms. Kim said in all seriousness, “Have some trainee do her part during the showcase; we’ll just have Haeun pre-record her introduction part or any other speaking parts for the showcase.”

“What trainee has the same vocal prowess as Haeun? Same build? You can use make-up all you want, but you can’t copy Haeun’s natural looks and talent,” a board member countered.

“If you throw a cap over anyone’s head, their face is 95% covered,” Minju threw in.

“But who can we use as a stand-in?”

“Why not, Y/N?” Ms. Kim inquired, gesturing towards you. “She is one of the strongest vocal trainees in our company, and she’s been extremely involved with the debut group’s production, so she knows all of the setlist in terms of music and choreography.”

“Aren’t their voices different?”

“If you thought the high note and adlibs in the debut track were Haeun, I’m here to inform you that you should retract your statement right this instant.” Her voice was strangely cold when she reprimanded that board member. It was weird to have the usually stoic teacher be by your side. “It’s settled then. Y/N will fill in for Haeun during the showcase.”

You stared at yourself in the mirror. It was strange to see yourself dolled up: your eyes smudged with peachy eye shadow and glitter, your lips tinted a pretty pink, and your hair slightly curled. It was also strange to see yourself wearing something other than a hoodie and training shorts; the peach blouse and high-waisted white shorts combo made you look way prettier than you could imagine. It was almost like you were going to debut. Almost.

“Ready?” Sera asked, handing you the white cap you’d be sporting during the showcase.

“To pass my voice off as Haeun’s? Ready as I’ll ever be.”

The showcase went without a hitch. You easily lip-synced along to Haeun’s pre-recorded talking segments, flowed along to the choreography, and belted out the lyrics to Haeun’s parts in all the songs. You were showered with the thunderous applause and cheers of the fans that had filled the theater. However, your smile faltered when you heard exactly what they were cheering.

“Haeun! Haeun! Haeun!”

That’s right. It wasn’t you they were cheering for. It’s the girl you’re pretending to be that they’re cheering for.

“Awesome work, Y/N,” Sera said, giving you a high five once the group filed off of the stage. You forced on a smile in return and handed your headset to the stagehand.

“Good work, everyone!” you said while bowing to each person respectively before ripping the white cap off of your head.

“Haeun is just sooooooo good!”

“Can we talk about Queen Haeun’s high note during her solo? Your fave could never!”

“Can’t wait for her debut!”

The fancams for the showcase had been released onto the internet, and the netizens were ready. You scrolled past comment after comment praising “Haeun’s” talent: proud that your voice brought about such a positive reaction, bitter that it was Haeun getting all the praise.

“Hey Y/N!” You didn’t even bother to look up.

“Hey, Jisung,” you mumbled. Your eyes were still glued to your phone screen, thumbs scrolling absentmindedly as you poured over the seemingly endless comments.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, brows furrowing together in concern. You just held out your phone for him. He plopped down next to you on the floor and took your phone from your hands. “I don’t see the problem? It looks like the public is excited for the girl group’s debut?”

“Play the video,” you deadpanned. At this point, you leaned your head against his shoulder. Jisung stiffened beneath the sudden contact but obliged.

It wasn’t even a minute in before he went, “Oh shit.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s you.”

“I know.” You readjusted your head on his shoulder and interlocked your fingers with his.

“Y/N, what are you doing?” he stuttered out. Cheeks flushing at the sudden amount of contact you were enacting with him.

“I’m upset, and you’re always here when I’m an emotional mess, so accept the fact you’re now my source of comfort,” you grumbled while snuggling into his side.

“I’m your source of comfort, huh?” Jisung asked with a stupidly cheeky smile.

“Don’t make me say it again, you fool. I’m upset right now, and you don’t want me to get more upset,” you warned.

“Yeah, I know.” He sat with you in silence for a good five minutes before saying something. “What are you going to do? With this whole ‘Haeun is getting all the credit for your work’ thing?”

“I don’t know,” you mumbled, “The company’s gonna kick me out if I say anything since I’d be slandering the upcoming group. Plus, this is a one time thing, so I guess I’ll be fine?”

“But you deserve to be in the debut group if they keep making you do all of her work!” Jisung countered. For once in your life, you heard Jisung sound angry.

“What do you expect me to do?” you cried. Your head was no longer on his shoulder.

“I don’t know, Y/N!” he shot back. His expression immediately softened when he realized you were tearing up.

“You don’t think I’ve already tried everything, Jisung,” you whimpered. “The board threatened to kick me out of the company if I say anything about this.”

“Hey, hey, hey.” He engulfed you in a hug. “I’m not angry at you, Y/N. I’m just angry at the company for treating you this way.” He could feel his shirt getting wet from the tears you were shedding. “It’s okay, Y/N. Just let it out. We’ll fix this.”

You didn’t know exactly what Jisung meant when he said those words until exactly two days later. You had awoken to your phone being bombarded with texts from Sera (she had not had her phone revoked just yet).

Sera - “Y/N CHECK WHAT’S TRENDING!!!!!!!!!”

You groggily rubbed your eyes before pulling up the link Sera just sent you. Suddenly you found yourself fully awake. You jolted upright, proceeding to bump your head against the ceiling, and scrolled through the article detailing the truth behind the pre-debut showcase.

“Hi everyone,

I don’t know where else I can put this, so I decided to put it here. So everyone know JYP is debuting a new girl group, and they had their first talent showcase recently. Well, I have some information to share. The main vocal debuting isn’t the main vocal that sang at the showcase. They used a different trainee to sing her part since the main vocal fell ill. I wanted to let everyone know that the main vocal can sing, but it hurts me to see her get credit for someone else’s work.

Everyone might be wondering how I know this. I’ve been working at JYP for a very long time now, and I personally know both girls involved in this situation. Thank you for reading my post; I just wanted to get it off of my chest.”

Oh shit.

You scrolled through the thousands of comments on this post. A good portion were of netizens demanding proof or calling the OP a liar, but the majority of them seemed to have believed the OP, demanding JYP to release a statement. Your phone then buzzed, indicating you received another text.

Ms. Kim - “Come to the office now.”

You sat in front of the debut team’s board members, furiously gnawing on your lower lip.

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” the man sitting at the head of the table.

“I didn’t post it, sir,” you meekly replied, “I don’t know who did.” He simply scoffed at your reply, but Ms. Kim stepped in.

“We checked the IP address of where the post came from, and it was traced to an internet cafe. Y/N was in the practice room at the time of the post according to our security cameras,” she stated. She glanced over to you for a split second before turning back to the board member. “For now, we can deny all allegations. The post never gave verified evidence of them being part of JYP to back up their claim.” The board murmured amongst themselves for a couple minutes before agreeing and letting you go.

Once you exited the meeting room, you stormed towards the dance studio, knowing very well who’d be there.

“Y/N?” Jisung asked in surprise when he heard the door slam open.

“Why would you do something so stupid?” you retorted, stomping up to him. “I could’ve been kicked out of the agency because of what you did!”

“I-I’m sorry, Y/N, but I couldn’t just sit around while the company screws you over!”

“Why does it matter, Jisung? Why does it matter so much to you what happens to me?”

“Well, I don’t know, Y/N! If you hadn’t noticed from all the kissing and touching we do, I actually do care about you a lot, and I’m so sick and tired of you being treated like you don’t matter because, well, you do matter!” He turned away from you and lets out a resigned sigh. “You matter a hell of a lot to me,” he mumbled before brushing past you and leaving the room.

The mess died down in the following handful of days after JYP denied all allegations of a stand-in singer for upcoming debut group’s main vocal. You continued through your normal routine: practice in the morning, working with the debut group for the rest of your day, and more practice in the late nights. It was a numbing process really. Sera was so busy preparing for debut that you couldn’t pull her aside for a chat like you used to. Chan no longer needed your help with producing since he was in the final process of completing Stray Kids’ recording. And Jisung, well, Jisung’s been avoiding you since that day in the dance studio. Life was slowly reverting back to normal, until another storm came your way.

There was another post trending this time. Another accusation towards JYP for using a stand-in vocalist. However, this one was different. This one had proof.

“Hi everyone,

I’m a different OP from last time, but I felt like I had to share this. I’ve been working for JYP for a very long time now, and I’m disappointed to see them try to cover up something like this. Honestly, they used a stand-in vocalist, another trainee, for their debut group’s main vocalist, and I have proof.

Linked to this post is a video I compiled. It compares the voice of the girl at the showcase to the voice of the debut group’s main vocalists. You can easily hear the difference in timbre and how they hit the high notes. It then compares the voice of the girl at the showcase with the voice of the best vocal trainee in our company. Hear how their voices are identical? Hopefully this clears everything up, thank you for reading.

P.S. The comparison recordings are from their most recent monthly evaluation.”

You could barely believe your eyes once you scrolled down to the comments.

“Oh my god, I knew JYP was a snake, but I didn’t know he was this much of a snake.”

“#JYPISCANCELLED Can’t believe they’d do smth like this smh”

“Why won’t they debut the other girl??? She’s so good!!’

The last comment caused you to tear up, but the tears overflowed once you realized that person wasn’t the only one with those sentiments.

“Please debut mystery girl!”

“#mysterygirldebut”

“Just debut the other girl @snekyp”

“What are we going to do now?” the head board member asked, “Our stocks are decreasing, and the interest for the upcoming girl group is too! And it’s all because of her!” He pointed an accusatory finger at you.

“I didn’t do anything, sir,” you replied calmly.

“It’s true,” another board member chimed in, “The IP address doesn’t match Y/N’s location when the post was published.”

“She could’ve queued it!” someone else chimed it.

“This isn’t Tumblr. You can’t just queue posts.”

“Well then,” the head member grumbled, “what are we going to do?”

“Listen to the people of course,” Ms. Kim spoke up for the first time since the meeting had started, “Put her in the debut group.” You swear you could’ve heard a pin drop after her statement.

“What now?”

“Put her in the debut group,” Ms. Kim said matter-of-factly, “People want her to debut. If we debut her, we’d appease the public, and the debut group will get a good boost after this ‘publicity’ stunt.” The board looked as equally shocked as you did. “Am I wrong?”

“I don’t see how it could hurt…” the head member murmured, mulling over the proposal.

“According to my calculations, we’d have an 154% increase in interest from the general public if she debuts in the group. We could sell it off as an underdog story. ‘Rising up to the challenge when a friend falls ill,’” another board member chimed in. You cringed at the cheesy underdog story they were trying to give you, but you kept your mouth shut. You might actually get to debut.

“Well, I think we all know the answer here, gentlemen,” Ms. Kim said. She then turned to you. “Looks like you’ll be debuting, Y/N.”

“Jisung!” you exclaimed, barreling through the dance studio door. Unsurprisingly, he was there sitting on the floor next to the stereo.

“Y/N?” He got up onto his feet.

“You’re an idiot, I swear to god, Han Jisung,” you said, marching up to him. You stopped right in front of him, toe to toe. “But you’re an idiot with a giant heart that’s way too big for me to handle, and you do stupid things because you believe they’re the right thing to do, and I want to thank you so much for being my big idiot because I’m debuting!”

Jisung could only stare at you in shock as the words began to register in his brain. Suddenly, he breaks out into a grin and wraps his arms around your waist, lifting you up and twirling you around. “Hell yeah you’re debuting!” he cheered. You giggled at the excitement that paints the entirety of his face.

“I’m so sorry for being such a ass about the whole thing, Jisung,” you said once he placed you back onto the ground, “I was just so scared about what would happen to you if they found out.”

“Hey, I’m sorry I didn’t ask for your consent to post it first. I should’ve thought about what would happen to you once I post the truth.”

“Now that we’re done apologizing,” you paused to pull him down by the collar to your face-level, “I want to give you my thanks.” You pressed your lips against his softly. Jisung quickly threw away his shock and molded his lips with yours before breaking out into a small smile.

“Wait, what about the cameras?” he mumbled, pulling away slightly.

“Blind spot,” you replied cheekily, “Now are you going shut your mouth and kiss me?”

“Happily.”

After a good twenty minutes of making out with Jisung, you found yourself cuddled into his side whilst sprawled across the dance studio’s floor.

“Jisung?” you asked, breaking the comfortable silence.

“Hm?”

“How exactly did you get the footage from my monthly evaluation?”

The boy turned to give you a cheeky little grin. “Let’s just say I’m not the only person that really wanted you to debut,” he hinted.

“Oh really now?” You cocked an eyebrow at him.

“Yup. A certain Ms. Kim was very adamant about sharing the monthly evaluation videos with me for some odd reason.”

“Oh my god, you’re joking.”

“Dead serious. Now I think I need another thank you present for pulling that off,” he teased while puckering his lips.

“Shut up or else I’m never kissing you again,” you replied with an eye roll. Jisung’s hands find themselves on your torso, and they pull you towards him. Your eyes widened at the sudden movement. “Jisung!”

“Take it back,” he pouted.

“You’re such a baby!”

“Take it back!”

“Never!” you replied, trying very hard to hide your smile.

“Fine then, you leave me no choice.” Jisung pressed his lips against your neck. You freeze at the sudden contact, but instantly tried squirming away once he blew a raspberry against your skin.

“Jisung!” you screeched while futilely trying to escape his grasp.

“Take it back!” You could practically hear the laughter in his voice.

“Fine! Fine! I take it back!” The raspberries ceased, and he turned you to face him. Jisung looked at you expectantly. You only let out a sigh before leaning in and placing a kiss on his lips. “Happy now?”

“That my girl is debuting and just gave me a kiss? Definitely. I’m definitely happy.”

A/N: omfg that was so long lmao. Also sorry if it was more reader centric than romance with Jisung centric I guess? Idk I really liked writing this fic, so I hope you enjoyed!

[stealthpoptarts]

Random Long Writing Post Time

Okay so I don’t normally make these, but I’m both bored and procrastinating from. Actually working on my book. Which I’ve started over like five times. I think I finally got it right, so hopefully no redoing the entire plot and so on. 

Anyways, I’m a pretty weird person, and so I’m not sure if anybody else thinks like this. But here I go anyway. I’m going to talk about character development. NOT character development arcs in writing or other media, because I don’t feel qualified to write about it? And I have a bad habit of not finishing things? No, I’m gonna talk about all the developing and thought and detail that you put into your character before writing, drawing, etc them. The stuff that you might know, but that might never show up or even directly relate to their story.

This includes, for some examples, why they have the name they do, why they might wear their hair a certain way, how they drink their coffee, how they might react to hypothetical situations that have zero relevance to the book/story/whatever, that one time they got lost on the subway, that one person they met that one time who told them that one thing, why they get upset about xyz thing, why they disagree with x but not y, and so on and so on. All the research into whatever you need to research to be able to write accurately and correctly. Basically. A lot.

The way that I have always looked at it is that this information is already out there. All this stuff, knowledge, scenarios, the characters and their friends and families and loved ones, already exists somewhere out there in multiverse. Or maybe in this universe, although I hope not because several of them would punch my lights out if they could. But all of it is real somewhere, somehow, and I just need to find it somehow or another. 

That means a lot of my writing is instinct, does this feel right? Would they really act this way confronted with this? What about this? 

It also means that if anything, anything at all catches my attention and/or makes me think/reminds me very strongly of one, specific character... I pay attention. It usually stands out for a reason, and if I can figure out why and make myself accept the reason (whether I like what I’m thinking or not), then it saves a lot of trouble in the long run.

This is how I’ve developed almost every character, and half the time I’m not sure that I’m completely sane or that I’m making any sense or going about things the right way at all. A lot of it’s just random, spur of the moment thoughts and ideas.

Half the time I’ll start writing a scene with an idea in my head of how it will happen, who will say what, etc., and then actually sit down to write the scene only to find that the characters had an entirely different idea in mind. This happens more than I like to admit, and I almost always like “their” version better than what I thought of originally. But it happens less and less the more I write. I take that to mean I’m getting better at writing. I hope.

I seize on completely random things, objects, ideas, I make completely random off the cuff jokes. I reference one particular detail over and over again. And then, it just sticks. Like how one grain of sand inevitably changes, however minutely, the entire pile when it’s added, everything added to them changes my characters just a little bit. 

Why does Luke like to cook? I wrote a joke story during a class when I finished all my work early. He got high*, ate all his friends food, “borrowed” his car while he was sleeping, bought an air horn (with $5 he found in the car), and woke him up with it at exactly 12:00am on April first. What does that have to do with cooking? Well things got more and more complicated from there. With the first things I write, I sometimes end up with more questions than answers.

Why was he high? Because he smoked something or other (in this particular story, weed. I even had a friend check that it was accurate cause I do not have experience with being high on anything, nor do I want to). Why? Because he was bored, and he had some with him. Why did he have any to begin with, on a random sleepover? Why did he even start in the first place? He self-medicates, and a whole host of other reasons on top of that, not all of which he’s conscious of. So, being high on weed, he’d get the munchies. He also loves doing and making things for other people, but never has a lot of money or resources. And he wants an easier, better way to cope. What do all these lead to? Learning to cook when he was still in middle school. It turns into something he loves doing just to do it, regardless of anything else.

In other cases, it really is completely random and/or not entirely under my control. 

For example, Luke especially loves making pastries. And has an unusual love of poptarts. How did this happen? Well in the story mentioned above, he eats all his friend’s poptarts, and his friend (understandably, having had several unopened boxes at that time) was upset about this. My friends, who I had shown the story to, thought that the inclusion of this detail was especially funny. Luke stealing the poptarts anytime he was over there and eating every one became a running joke between me and my friends, in our roleplays, and eventually in other stories I wrote about these two characters. This also helped lead to the love of cooking I came up with later.

I wrote this story three or four years ago, and while other parts aren’t entirely accurate to the character(s) involved, these ones are. And stealing the poptarts is still a running, inside joke.

Sometimes it’s, loosely or more directly, based on a dream I had. Or something I doodled or drew because I was bored, and couldn’t think of anything else to draw.

For example, Ichiko’s pyromania. The very first time anything involving this character and fire was a strange dream I had, and it was strange for two reasons: one, it had actually had and followed a cohesive storyline, and two, my character(s) showed up in it. The second has only happened one other time that I remember. 

They, random dream-people, and me, and Luke, Ichiko, and Dyllan were also there, were stuck in a large underground maze. Think underground brick labyrinth, unused/abandoned mall/subway tunnels, old greenhouses, high school gyms and auditoriums, movie theaters and movie theater concessions stands, complete with mysterious, unspoiled food and drinks. Basically a hodge-podge of places stuck together.

I don’t remember any other part of this dream, and probably only remember this because I later drew it. But there was one point were Ichiko grew frustrated and punched the wall. I don’t know why I remembered that scene specifically, but I do. It may be part of why, later on, his character grew to have a short temper. Another time they were, I don’t know why, trying to get the sprinklers to come on. So they found a bottle of vodka or whiskey somewhere, and he blew fire at them. I drew the fire-breathing part later on, and my friends joked about him being a pyromaniac. And that, for some reason, stuck. 

I avoided writing about or considering that aspect of his character until later, though. One because it really had started as just a joke. And, later, two, because I was uncomfortable thinking about the ramifications and problems that arise with an unhealthy obsession with fire. And why he might’ve developed or had such an obsession. 

A lot of what I think up or decide or discover about my characters boils down to one question, though, and that’s why. And the answer I give, or even that they give, could be very, very simple. But that’s only on the surface. It’s always, always more complicated than that. 

There are also always contradictions. Two characters remember the same event differently, or believe and struggle with two contradicting ideas. Two aspects of their personality are at conflict with each other, and this causes problems. Nothing is ever as simple as A + B = C. 

Delarin is obsessed with control, but he is at the same time wildly unpredictable and chaotic. He wants as much control over any given situation, his surroundings, events, and even other people, as possible, but he can’t even really control himself.

Dyllan believes that he is a normal, even (mostly) functional person. He doesn’t believe or doesn’t want to believe that he has any problems. He doesn’t want to acknowledge it, and its what he tells himself everyday. But at the same time, he struggles with addiction and he knows this. He knows he should quit, or at least try and cut back, but that would be an admission of there being a problem in the first place. He hates crowds, he hates the feeling that someone, anyone, is watching what he’s doing. But he can’t stand to be alone, it is terrifying to him. He wants to pretend certain things haven’t really happened, or if they did, that they don’t affect him, but he still needs to have at least one light on. He can’t work in his apartment, it’s too empty, he always ends up in a busy, crowded, public space.

Another thing that I’ve learned is that I can’t avoid certain aspects of a character’s personality just because they make me uncomfortable. The character always ends up losing dimension and focus, and I have more and more trouble writing about them until I confront what I’ve been avoiding. There aren’t any shortcuts, or loopholes. Either I consider and include everything when deciding or figuring out a character’s actions, or I don’t write anything at all. 

In conclusion, cause this is getting way too long, here are the basics. The TL;DR I guess. 

Consider everything, big or small, important or not, that shapes a character. Everything has an effect on them as a person, and therefore an effect on what their actions or reactions will be in any given scenario.

Everything is complicated and complex in real life, so if you want realistic characters, everything has to be just as complicated and messy. If the answer to any “why?” you might ask is only a sentence or two long, you may (or maybe not, this is just how I do things. I don’t judge) have some more thinking to do. 

Names are important, and, if you have to change it, think carefully about how changing the name will end up changing your character also. 

Don’t avoid aspects or parts of a character or characters’ personality just because they make you uncomfortable. If you’d rather not write while keeping every piece of them in mind, maybe write a different character. 

This probably won’t work for you, or maybe it will, or maybe you already do things the exact same way that I do. I don’t know. I think of characters almost as real people. Not literally, but in the sense that they teach me as much about themselves as I come up with on my own, if not more. I’ll sit down to write, and they’ll (figuratively speaking) go, ‘hey, by the way...’ I can’t change this, I’ve tried. I know there is at least one or two published authors who do the same. So I thought that maybe I’d write this in case there’s anyone out there who feels awkward or weird or as though they’re doing things wrong, just in case. Because with writing, and just art in general, there really is no right or wrong way of doing things, no matter what some people might tell you. 

[wingsofninewheels]

When I made my capsule wardrobe custom folder, I mostly just put a bunch of things in it that I think I would own and would work well together, in the hopes that the more outfits I make, the more I’ll be able to see how cohesive the collection is, and be able to prune out anything that just isn’t versatile for me.

But I’m finding that the folder functions are convoluted and difficult to navigate unless you keep a written list of the names of the exact items you want to add/remove, and cherrypick them with the wardrobe search one at a time. It’s relatively easy (if not time consuming) to do the initial selection, but it’s a whole other process altogether to edit that selection later on--even adding pieces of the Interplay of Light and Shadow after I got it was a headache, because the item listing is only somewhat chronological.

I want to figure out an easier way to organize my thoughts, because there’s a LOT of items to sort through. And the only thing I can think of is to make a second NI account and cherrypick the items that I *want* in the folder and add them? But I still feel like I’m going to have to redo from scratch periodically.

Anyone else get a lot of mileage from the folders function, that can offer advice for maintaining one?

--------------------------

Additionally, while I’m seeking advice, I figure I could ask about this as well: Does anybody know if there’s a way to sort NI where the score results show more than top 20? I would expect something similar in the way one can manipulate the Tag Search--for example, I just recently learned you can search for posed items with it!

I like to style my scores, and if an item has close to the same values that I like more--for example, a recolor vs. the base color--I tend to prefer it even if it docks me a couple hundred points. But I’ve noticed in the Stylist Arena in particular, that sometimes all 20 items in the results have the same value, and I’m under the impression that there’s more than 20 items that also have the same value. So if I can use pieces from suits I went out of my way to get instead of using Carrot Bag Rare for everything... Well, you know.

I suppose the simpler question is, are there any other sites besides NI that have the ability to sort by values? There was an app a while back but it only went up to V1Ch9 iirc, but it sorted the entire wardrobe listing by its relevance to the level in question. Cupcake does an immeasurable service to the LN community with NI, but I’m sure there are other unsung heroes out there as well, whose sites likely have a different range of functions.

(Yes, I know I’m extra. Organizing presets and sorting my wardrobe is a major source of enjoyment for me with this game, though.)

[alexbrockart]

Gargoyle Process

This painting started from a sketch in 2015 that I didn't touch for a bout a year, then came back to after ruminating on it on and off over that lapse. It's loosely centered around this legend of the walled city of Agartha, and the guarding demons and djinn that would keep the unworthy from entering. 

Here I sketched out the environment surrounding the figure and arranged the composition a bit. I wanted the environment to have a sort of Mediterranean feel to it, almost classical ancient Greek/Roman with a little hint of tropical. I ended up changing the perspective quite a bit because I wanted to paint in a lot of texture in the landscape of the background, and also wanted to drive home a feeling of the figure standing on a really high wall far above the ground below. So I raised the horizon line almost to the top of the canvas and redid a lot of the figure to fit in with a more top down perspective.

Here you can see the new perspective and wings, and my attempt at dumping colors all over the place that I felt gave off the feeling I wanted for the piece, which was a sort of bright and sunny warm day in the afternoon, soon approaching the golden hour.

Here's some images that I felt captured the mood and lighting I wanted to portray

Let the render fest begin! As I was painting the torso my power supply for my computer started crapping out and it was pretty terrifying to paint for fear of losing work. I had finished just about the entire torso and arms when it crashed when I tried to save it, and had to do it over, about 5 hours of work. The second version definitely came out better though. I threw in a crazy weird mandala-lever-table-mechanism I thought would be interesting but ended up chucking it for the sake of time and it threw off the composition a bit. It's inspired by this talk I listened to about the physicist Wolfgang Pauli and his therapy sessions with C. G. Jung. From what I remember, through deep trance or in a dream, Pauli saw this mandala that represented perfect rationality and other dimensions or concepts like increments of time integrated into each other. The idea was to sort of have the Gargoyle in control of one of the levers, hinting that your perception of reality may be manipulated or something along those lines. I mostly wanted an excuse to make a shiny 3D object and render it so that I could have perfect shiny reflection in the painting. I got my jollies in that regard with the mace that I replaced this mandala with. 

Here's the talk and a picture of the mandala: 

Here's some of the references for the skin and torso. In the old master painting with the man pointing toward the sky I really liked the way their skin looked really pale in some parts and very tan or oily/dirty in others and tried to replicate that effect on the figure with a sort of red-grayish green and a more yellow green. I imagine there being less callous spots that would be lighter and more "juicy" like when the skin is stretched it'll lighten up in those areas, kind of like when some plastic bends it gets lighter in those spots that are really stretched out. It's sort of an effect or look that produces a sensation that I wanted to portray and think looks cool and not much more. 

Here's about where I had gotten before I lost my file to the dark lords of psd corruption. Lots of rendering and minute fiddling, pulling and pushing forms and moving around muscles underneath the skin. Reference is a lifesaver when it comes to anatomy, or anything really, but especially anatomy because of how complex it is and how easy it is for people (who all have bodies) to recognize when something is off. I remember this is where I really felt like I was going somewhere with the painting and it had some potential. 

Got the rest of the human parts nailed down. I almost went fully Egyptian with his undergarments but decided against it. I found out the name for this type of clothing though, "shendyt" if you ever need to know that. Lots of challenging but enjoyable intricacies worked out here. If I could give a tip on picking color it would be to learn how to really feel it out. If you try to do this with only your intellect and calculate every aspect of surface color and lighting and reflection you mostly end up getting in your own way (not that this isn't important). If you can grab a color that feels ok and run with it you're better off than being indecisive and worrying that the color isn't perfectly accurate.  Make a choice and observe the result. What happens when you lay that color next to the others, how does it feel deep down in your gut and heart. What does it need more of? It's like tasting pudding, when you put it on your tongue and smack it around in your mouth how does it taste? What would make it taste more like the most perfect pudding you can imagine? You also have to have good taste to make things that taste good. 

Focused heavily on the wings and tree here. I took a big leap with the dappled lighting and just went for it. I knew it would be really hard to make it look realistic and it kind of became abstracted, but I learned a lot. After having finished it I've seen multiple images that would have been much better reference for the dappled lighting than what I used, but such is life. In place of accurate lighting effects I had fun making cool shapes and swirlies. I tried to create an effect similar to some sort of vectoring of light blobs where their outer edge sort of merges with the nearby blobs, similar to when you squint your eyes and look at lights out of focus. On the upper/outer edges of the wings I tried to pull of the effect of something being in shadow on a sunny day and heavily reflecting the blue of the sky. Since that surface isn't being blown out by sunlight you can really see other ambient light sources reflecting on it. 

I darkened the shindyt loin cloth by plopping a multiply layer over it and touching it up a bit. I though the lightness of the previous color was attracting a little too much attention and contrast. But when I look at it now I almost like it better.

I also tried to get down some of the awesome patterning on eucalyptus trees that I see here around town. They're some of the coolest looking trees in my opinion and really wanted to capture that dramatic contrast of values and colors they have on them along with the smooth swirly lumps. This tree was extremely difficult and I redid it at least once. I still don't think I pulled off the look I was going for with it but I like it in it's own right. 

Here's the bottom before and after the redo. I really wanted to pull off a section of surface that's lit evenly but has two different values/surface materials and have it look cohesive. This was a pain but I'm starting to come around to the idea of doing stuff over even if it's really close to what you want or it feels like too much work. It almost always comes out better.

I also had a friend help out and do a paintover to try and tie up the values which explains the darkened corner on the ground. Much more moody and dramatic. He also taught me this technique to strategically adjust the levels with brush strokes using a mask.

Create a levels adjustment layer. Depending on how you want to adjust the levels (lights, darks or midtones) move the sliders around to a spot you like, and this is the awesome part is it doesn't have to affect the whole image, so you can pick an area you want to change the levels of, adjust accordingly, and target that spot. To do this click on the blank white square (red X) and paint bucket it fully black, then go back to the levels adjustments (click on the layer name or graph square) and start painting or lassoing in white in the spot that you wanted changed. This helps a TON.

More progress! I started experiment with texture in the background by making some brushes and messing with them. I was really inspired by the way Craig Mullins can pull off seemingly intricate detail with abstract shapes and textures and wanted to try something similar. Maybe next time lol. I was also inspired by Dean Cornwell and looking at his work for the texture on the ground, trying to make nice big juicy blobs of paint that almost look like clumps of mud or stones. I also really had fun with trying to make a compelling pattern that was still in perspective. For the background I was looking at the Walter Everett painting above a lot, trying to get a beautiful harmony of really light values and colors, having forms be defined with only hue and not much value change at all. It's really hard to pull off. 

I went nuts on the background. I replaced the original idea of a golden glittering canyon with a more earthy and gradient filled landscape. I also tweaked the values much brighter, which I think I darkened back down later. I was heavily inspired by Whit Brachna and had at least one of his paintings open the entire time I was working on the background. 

These are some of my all time favorite paintings. Just look at them, gotdang. 

3D mace! Mostly inspired by spiky black metal aesthetic. I made a very rough (but that's really all I needed) model of the mace in Cinema 4D. The most tedious part was obviously all the spikes. There's probably a way you could pull them out of the sphere in 2 seconds but I'm not versed enough to avoid tediously scooting each individual spike one at a time. I then took it into ZBrush and just scrubbed it over with a cool texture brush that gave it a bunch of amazing details that you can't even see in the painting. I tried to set up a scenario in C4D that was as close to the painting as I could muster to get the lighting right. I copied a bunch of disc tubes to try and replicate leaves and branches. Since the figures hand, and most of his upper body was cast in shadow I tried to strategically place some "leaves" over the top half of the mace. 

I messed with a bunch of different surface materials and render settings and ended up going with the shiniest one, heh. 

Here it is before and after being painted on, very minute adjustments. 

I'd say the rest is pretty straightforward and can't really think of any extraordinary advice except maybe doing more quick studies of your weak spots. I'm realizing I could get a lot of benefit from doing a higher quantity of less elaborate stuff to really improve more. 

  I really hoped this helped and if there's anything you'd like me to elaborate on or that you felt was left out please don't hesitate to ask!

Here's some meaty juice for you. I made a 2000px tall resolution gif of all the process images which is included in the .zip, containing over 30 of the aforementioned 2000px res process pics, some full resolution (8000px) crops of the final image, and a few other random in progress shots. And finally here's the full resolution (8000px) final .jpg, the final .psd file (2000px), and my brush presets. Enjoy!

I'm not sure how to export your presets as new brushes and you may already need the .abr file for the presets to work, so if you have any tips on that let me know. Most of the brushes I use are straight from other sets or slightly tweaked and saved as a preset. 

Anyway, I think this will conclude this massive post. I truly hope it's helpful, or at the very least mildly interesting. Thanks for reading!

[ctrl-shift-esc]

Home Surgery

House renovations not only feel like a bomb went off in your home but a bomb went off in your head too. It’s like the Hunger Games in a relationship. Good luck, may the strongest couple win… 

Hello fam,

long time no talk (unless you’ve been following along on the ol’insta stories).
Even then, I haven’t been keeping up as often as I used to (Sorry bout it?). So let me bring you up to date on everything and all that is Veronica & her shenanigans…

We moved into our home last April which is now, 7 months ago! We’re still knee deep in renovations. Surprised? I’m not! Who am I kidding…yes I am… I mean I was hoping we would’ve been done by now (epic wishful thinking on my part). Things have moved slowly since April.

It’s to be expected I suppose, I hadn’t really spent any consecutive time at home before June. Once I got back, I was exhausted and didn’t feel like taking on any huge projects. I’d worked full time on set for over 10 months followed by months on end of travelling. I was craving some stand-still time. I wanted to enjoy my summer and not be a slave to home renovations. In lieu of my laziness we chipped away at projects only on weekends. At first, my boyfriend was the one trying to kick me in the ass to buckle down and get the work done. Fast forward 4 months later – here I am, getting impatient so I’m doing the kicking of the ass…

Going into this, I kept saying that I’d be fine gutting a place to its bones – that I’d done this kind of thing before and the mess didn’t scare me. Which is fact, but what I’d ignored was my need to have a home – a sanctuary – a safe haven. I didn’t realize a gutted house meant a gutted sanctuary. Going into this, I also kept saying ; I need a place to call home. So I’m not sure what I was expecting… maybe I expected things to magically get done on their own, or somehow still have a livable space in the midst of dust and chaos?! How could I’ve missed this? I am not sure…

Everything happened so fast, we’d been casually house hunting for a few months when we discovered what would be our future home. We didn’t think too much of it until the idea of owning it slowly crept in. In fact, at first the house gave me a weird vibe. Something didn’t flow but I was determined to find out what… We agreed to go for a second viewing, at this point we were already talking about our demolition plans. Next thing you know; we put in an offer, we negotiated and closed — It’s ours!

We knew right away we wanted to update the two upstairs bathrooms (they haven’t been touched since the 70′s). Painting was a non-negotiable. We also played with the idea of blowing out the entrance wall to open the space up. Also, the mudroom slash laundry room could use a face-lift. The master bedroom lacked closet space and bathroom space. Needless to say, we had to get creative with the designs to maximize every inch of this place and I’d be lying if I said we had it all figured out. You get the point; the list of projects is never ending.

We tackled the main living areas first. While I was away my boyfriend started by removing the popcorn ceiling in the main living room. This was our first setback. It took weeks to properly remove it all, then, weeks to properly sand & paint. Soon after we decided to demolish the entrance wall (best decision ever). Later we painted the whole main floor… Never underestimate how much painting can do to a space – also, never underestimate how long painting with a roller can take…

Now that we were knee deep in our reno’s, we decided to make our lives even harder by redoing the floors in all main living spaces; main living room, kitchen and TV room. 

The current floor is acacia hardwood flooring. A color that is now outdated, with plank sizes that are also outdated. The lower TV room is covered in a light beige carpet but also has a backyard access. Oh & the hardwood? Scratched to shit. There isn’t one ounce of flooring that isn’t damaged. So here were my thoughts; Why have carpet in a room where you’d be accessing the outside from? If our floors are already damaged & outdated how would that affect us in the long run, for resale value? So first, I tried to match the TV room floor to the acacia wood… Once we started digging to find a matching floor we quickly realized we were most likely never going to be able to match it. Like a salesman once told me “you’re chasing a leprechaun”. Cool cool cool cool…So cool. It would never be a perfect match, in other words — it would be noticeably different. Uh, No. I’m not okay with that. There’s nothing more frustrating and disorienting than walking into a home that lacks cohesiveness. We toyed with the idea of sanding and restaining, until we found out it would cost more than replacing the whole floor.

Thanks to my Design firm, I’ve got access to flooring I otherwise wouldn’t have found on my own. I was suggested an alternative type of flooring that is in theory a Vinyl plank, but in reality, is its own type called SPC flooring (stone plastic composite). It looks and feels like wood. It has no expansion or contraction since its made of stone & plastic. It’s waterproof and highly scratch resistant. This sounds like the perfect floor for a home that would resell to a young family with tons of kids and dogs that may ruin a beautiful hardwood. Want proof? come over and look at ours.

The tricky thing about this flooring is that the planks are quite thin. It offers little to no flexibility, so your subfloor needs to be leveled near perfect to prevent any cracking… In a high-rise or newer house this is easier to accomplish. In a 70′s home where the foundation can and most probably is uneven, not so much. Our challenge was to find the right installer who knew this floor, who’s worked with it before and who understands the leveling specs. We interviewed 3 or 4 installers, one of which was convinced he could not only match our existing floor (ya! right!) but could also sand and restain it a different color. Which fyi, I’d been repeatedly told would be close to impossible to do with acacia…?!… A risk I wasn’t necessarily willing to take. Especially if it’d cost more than installing a brand new – scratch resistant – waterproof flooring! The other installers came in really confident about having worked with the floor before until I started asking questions… Slowly they started hesitating & pulled back from wanting to level our floor. I lost interest in hiring them 1- I couldn’t understand the words that were coming out of their mouths and 2- if there was any chance that they were talking themselves up only to make a quick buck, when in reality they know jack squat about this floor & risk damaging it – That’s gonna be a hard no from me… At this point I was losing interest in the whole ordeal. Let’s keep our damaged floors and move on! Losing hope over here! Just let me buy a couch already!

Let’s back up for a second… All the while this is happening, keep in mind, our house is not furnished. Decorations (the ones we have) are put away. Walls are bare, clothes aren’t put away. It’s a total dissaray. Well maybe dissaray isn’t the right word, but it’s a tiny shit show & it’s getting old.

We couldn’t do anything else until the floor situation was dealt with. Finishing the second coat of paint is now on hold, since installing the floors might damage the walls, we might have to repaint everything anyway. You wouldn’t catch me repainting 1200 sq ft with rollers A THIRD TIME! No way Jose.

Since everything else was on hold. I wanted to start the master bedroom project right away instead of waiting until spring like we’d originally planned. Let’s at least get one room over with, my gosh! So we decided to take the closet project head on and not look back. Our plan was to finish it the weekend we started. Wrong! say hello to our second setback. We are now 3 weeks later and we’re still working on the bedroom. Don’t get me wrong, we got 75% done on that weekend, but we encountered technical difficulties that have lingered since then, including the purge of my closet and organizing it all… this is a project in itself. One that may or may not take just as long as painting a whole house by hand…

The room is essentially done, I’m hoping we can officially wipe our hands clean from the renovations of this bedroom by this weekend and get started on the decorations! 

They say you find what you’re looking for when you stop looking — once we stopped looking for floor installers, we finally got a hold of the supplier who’d recommended someone they’d worked with before. Hallelujah! He was easy to communicate with & he agreed to come over that weekend to give us an estimate. I tried not to get my hopes up, for all I knew we may have invited an overrated installer into our house just to tease ourselves…

Once we met, it was clear we all got along great. He’s clearly worked with the floor before and I knew this because he answered questions I didn’t even get a chance to ask. He knew the specs and explained the process without being dodgy. That’s our guy, I don’t care how much he costs hire the guy! We all know my boyfriend put a stop to that real quick — we stick to the budget, he said. So here I was, crossing my fingers to death. He sent us his estimate the next day and it was within our budget!

YUUSSSSS!!! We finally found our guy, This is so exciting! We have a bit of prep work to do before they come to install, but for the first time in months it feels like the work we’re doing is going somewhere! Floors will be installed by the first week of December!

The best news of all; phase 1 is almost complete! That’s right, we decided to do our renovations in phases. Because we need a break y’all! We will hibernate through winter and get back to it in spring…We will focus on the fun stuff over the winter, like beautifying our home. The rest of the renovations like the mudroom and bathrooms can thankfully be quarantined so we don’t have to look or live in a hot mess for months on end! Home stretch folks! One more month and we can relax for a while.

We have a few fun trips planned over the holidays. We booked a mini getaway in a cabin on Galiano Island, at Bodega Cove, at the end of December (board games for days!). Saying we’re excited is an understatement. We will be hosting a House warming holiday cocktail party right before new years, then, we will head to Victoria to ring in the new year in style! We’ve got a good few months ahead & I’m damn well looking forward to it!

We shed blood, sweat & tears over the last 7 months. I’m not lying when I say it’s been a process, (now that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel) I can finally start to appreciate the journey! 

I’ll keep you posted on all the progress, dontcha worry!

Notes to remember from a fellow renovator to you:

* If you’re doing major renovations or are thinking of renovating - try to do it before you move in. Renovations are stressful enough as it is, there’s no need to add stress by living in the mess. So if you can avoid it, I recommend it.

* Renovating can and most probably will stress you out – healthy lifestyle habits like eating properly, exercising and proper sleep patterns will do wonders. Don’t give up on yourself.

* Try to remember that it’s temporary and keep in mind things will get worse before they get better (yes you read that right... It’s something I somehow didn’t realize). It’s only part of the process. Keep your eye on the prize! If you’re having trouble visualizing it with the walls gutted, create a vision board and put it up in a space where you can see it clearly and daily.

* If things get too intense, walk away from it and go do something that will reward you emotionally. Self-Care is knowing when to walk away. 

* When taking on a renovation project as a couple, it’s an added pressure to the relationship. Relationships are already a lot of work as it is; worrying about work - day to day responsibilities - and having to take care of your family life (if you have kids). Adding renovations to the mix can make you feel overwhelmed. Your schedules will be overflowing with To Do lists – but remember that romance also needs to be a priority. Date nights & relationship time needs to be allocated. Set aside some time to focus on watering the relationship. You’ll need it. Don’t let the To Do lists come between you two. The lists will always be there, time together is precious.

* most of all – try and have fun! (taking my own advice on this one!)

Until then Ctrl+Shift+ ESCAPE but Stay tuned for a closet reveal :)

[meredithrucker-blog]

Mastery Journal: Professional Practice

 1. Mastery: This course has helped me develop the confidence to continue pursuing my “life’s task.” It has also helped me see the pitfalls to avoid and how to deal with those who may not understand my journey. Finally, Mastery has given me tips on how to further develop my strengths and weaknesses so that I can be sound in mind, body, and spirit. It helped me develop my thesis presentation by building a strong foundation for my mastery journey. In doing the thesis presentation site I was able to look back over everything I learned, refine my best work and defend it with the proper research.

2. Defining Client Needs: This course helped me develop a new flow for my creative process. Learning about and developing mind maps was a critical turning point for me. I was finally able to visualize the paths to new innovative ideas. I was stretched during the sketching exercise. Now, I’ve learned that every design project needs to start with pencil and paper. The first ideas aren’t always the best ideas. We have to push our imaginations to arrive at the best possible solution for our clients. For my thesis presentation, this course helped me to show more of the process behind my work instead of just the finished work. I may not have sketched as many logo drafts as my peers, but I went from sketching 1or 2 logo designs to at least 25.

3. Brand Development: This course gave me a more detailed understanding of the logo design process and all of its moving parts - consideration of color palettes, typography, styling and other assets that complement the brand. It really took my passion for branding to another level. I’ve always loved the little details that no one else cared about, x-heights, the space around the logo, proper placement. It was because of this class that I wanted to go back to the drawing board and redevelop the Marrakech brand for my final project. My biggest accomplishment was creating 3 logos that were completely different from each other. Usually one stands out as the winner, but they were all solid.

4. Effective Copywriting: This course helped me sharpen my writing skills and learn how to create persuasive content for my design projects. I really enjoyed creating an ad campaign for the Lupus Research Alliance. I had never created a whole ad campaign from scratch before. Much of my inspiration comes from words, so it was fun to think of a brand as a person and develop the brand’s persona. I used my work from this class as part of the thesis presentation because I felt that I created a strong campaign for Lupus awareness based on the many voices in the Lupus community.

5. Design Research: This course helped me not dread web design as much. For some reason, me and web design just didn’t mix. After learning that even web design starts as a sketch, it helped me transition my ideas to the computer once I had a clear idea in place. Originally, I would have gone straight into Photoshop to “start” the layout only to end up spinning my wheels. This course helped me to break web design down into actionable steps so that I could produce a cohesive website for the sea turtle charity concert. Once again, this course helped me to focus more on the design process than the finished product.

6. Organizational Structures: This course is where it got real! I already had traumatic memories of Flash class from my undergrad degree. I wasn’t looking forward to learning AfterEffects on my own or creating motion graphics. Sketching storyboards for the motion graphic and the commercial helped ease my trepidation again. I made a plan to keep things simple and manageable. I actually had fun creating the motion graphic and the commercial! I used this project for my thesis site because I am proud of the work. Motion graphics were something that I never thought I’d be able to do.

7. Design Strategies and Motivation: This course helped me to develop a project timeline for my final project. I tried my best to stick to the calendar, but there were areas where I got stuck and had to go back to the drawing board. I decided to redo the Marrakech brand from the cities project. I discovered that Marrakech was known for winter sports, so I decided to create a brand that attracted a new audience through athletics and created a sense of unity in a culturally diverse environment. I used this project for the bulk of my thesis presentation because I was able to achieve the goal of not only creating a brand guide but also a design system with a set of icons.

8. Design Integration: This course is where the road became extremely rough. I had to retake this class three times due to personal external factors that affected my performance. I’m used to being an honors student, so being put on academic probation really sent me into a state of depression. They say that the third time is the charm. I hunkered down and focused so that I could pass the class. I bounced back from a low point and have had steady rise in my grades since then. The bright point during this course, what receiving advice and inspiration from my instructor. The focus of his work in media design was in developing design systems. He gave me tips on how to get started and pushed me to further with my project by developing a design system for the brand.

9. Multi-Platform Delivery: During this course, I developed the icons for the Marrakech brand. I studied Olympic design systems and how the icons were developed to be simple and universally recognizable. I also took a close look at how design systems unify design teams. I want the brand guide to be a resource that anyone could easily pick up and gain an understanding of the Marrakech brand and execute it with clarity. My biggest accomplishment was the development of an icon set. This portion was also highlighted on my thesis site.

10. Measuring Design Effectiveness: This course showed us how to develop surveys to test the effectiveness of our final projects before making the final tweaks and going public. I learned how to ask the right questions so that my respondents could provide the feedback needed to gauge the project’s success. The majority of the responses were positive and gave the direction I needed to focus on the Marrakech brand message. My biggest accomplishment was seeing that all the research and design work I put towards the brand was on the right track.

11. Presentation of Design Solution: This scared me a little. We were finally near the end of degree and now it was time show and back up what we’d learned over the past year. I saw how my work had grown and also how my research and analysis skills had developed in critiquing my peers’ work. I’ll definitely take the ability to give and receive constructive criticism with me. Again, the web design process gave me anxiety but I was able to execute it quickly since we used the same methods from design research to construct our thesis sites.

[930club]

ART BLANCHE: Malibu

The metaphor practically writes itself. Anderson .Paak’s music fuses together different genres and influences into one swirling, beautiful concoction. The end result: a sonic collage.

So says even the man himself.

Dewey Saunders, meanwhile, frequents in more literal forms of collage, preferring paper and scissors (and occasionally Photoshop) to Anderson’s microphone.

As collaborators, they have brought together the metaphorical and the literal, with Dewey’s compositions adorning the covers of Anderson’s records.

Anderson .Paak - Malibu (Courtesy of Dewey Saunders)

“I’ve actually been working with Anderson for a couple of years now. I did his Venice album cover… in 2013, and was doing stuff for him even before that,” Dewey explained. “It’s funny because I used to listen to him when he was Breezy Lovejoy still. I was first a fan and then we got connected when I started doing these rapper portraits and posting them on Instagram, he wanted one so I did it and it eventually turned into like this poster series. That was when he first released his single ‘Drugs’ so I did the single cover for that and then Venice came out that year.”

“I’ve actually been working with Anderson for a couple of years now. I did his Venice album cover… in 2013, and was doing stuff for him even before that,” Dewey explained. “It’s funny because I used to listen to him when he was Breezy Lovejoy still. I was first a fan and then we got connected when I started doing these rapper portraits and posting them on Instagram, he wanted one so I did it and it eventually turned into like this poster series. That was when he first released his single ‘Drugs’ so I did the single cover for that and then Venice came out that year.”

Most recently, Dewey created the artwork on Anderson’s critically lauded record Malibu. Just like the album, Dewey’s art has also earned a deal of critical acclaim. But for Dewey, the process of working on Malibu was different than past collaborations with Anderson. 

“So Malibu came around and that was different than Venice because he had gotten this art director named Cory Gomberg and Cory basically art directed the whole campaign for Malibu,” Dewey said. “It was a pretty long process of back-and-forth even though there was... a pretty hard deadline we had to meet. And it just, we dialed it in so precisely... working with Cory made my work get tighter and just added a level of polish, I think, just by having so many edits and having everybody look at it and critique it and everything. So it was definitely a group effort.”

Anderson .Paak - Venice (Courtesy of Dewey Saunders)

In total, Dewey worked with Anderson and Cory to put together art for Malibu’s cover, gatefold, singles, and various other associated pieces. Strangely enough, Dewey’s work on the project didn’t start with the album or singles, but with the European tour poster.

“I actually had done the poster and then Cory came onto the project and we redid it and [then] did all the singles for Malibu,” he explained.

Redoing the poster allowed Dewey and Cory to build a cohesive aesthetic for the art that matched Cory’s vision for the record cover, which they would then use as a blueprint for the rest of the artwork as well.

“Cory’s initial inspiration that we were kind of looking at was this 10cc cover from the 70s I guess. It was this diver with a diving helmet and he was carrying this girl out of the water… That just kinda sparked the idea [that] we wanted it to have it this 70s classic LP feel to it. So that was the jumping off point as far as the composition.”

10cc - Deceptive Bends (Via discogs)

Originally, they used a photo of Anderson merging from the water, carrying a woman, just like on the 10cc record, but a last minute decision -- due to the photo being, as Anderson put it, “a little too Fabio-ish” -- had them change the image to Anderson at the piano instead.

Looking back, it “was [a good decision] in retrospect but at the time was a big change for the cover,” Dewey said.

Surrounding Anderson on the cover are a myriad of images that relate back to the record’s lyrics. As Dewey and Cory were initially working on the artwork, they would listen to the album, digging into the music for imagery to pull out. Dewey would then look through old and rare books and magazines for material to use, scanning them into his computer and compiling the piece together digitally.

Some of the images they used were overt: the car, the suffer, the “Cali-beach feel”; but many of the things they pulled out were hidden deep within the art, ready to be discovered by those willing to hunt for them.

Anderson .Paak - The Season (Courtesy of Dewey Saunders)

“The picture of Anderson in the top hat is really surreal and absurd in a way, so we added all these other elements that go with it, but also are kind of popping out: the ship and the whale and everything happening at once is just this epic scene that would never really happen but it’s this alternate universe. That’s what’s so great about collage is that you can make this semi-believable thing happen, this magical moment.” 

“A lot of thought went into the imagery. So everything was very specifically placed and there for a reason,” Dewey said. “And a lot of little elements that are there for the people that are really looking, especially if you get the printed versions of the record -- a lot of little, hidden little elements.”

To match the cover art, Dewey and Cory then worked on the record’s gatefold, which they would also use for a poster that accompanied some of the physical releases.

Anderson .Paak - Malibu gatefold (Courtesy of Dewey Saunders)

“That’s a scene with Anderson underwater on the piano again with all the naked girls surrounding him and there’s all the divers and fish swimming around -- so it’s a pretty complex scenario,” Dewey said. “So the whole concept was very beach-y and then going into the underwater, very psychadelic as well and just having the collage elements made this a very surreal atmosphere.”

Key to art was Dewey and Cory’s ability to capture Anderson’s aesthetic and create visuals that felt authentic to his unique musical voice.

“It was an interesting process because I wasn’t really used to working with such close art direction and we were just able to spitball and brainstorm and create really specific feels of imagery that [feels] cohesive with the music… [We made] this psychedelic landscape that was for Anderson that was kinda a unique aesthetic that [matched] his,” Dewey said. 

“I think that’s a thing that I kinda pushed [for, and] that Cory kind of pushed me to do, to really create this perspective and depth through so many layers and so many different things happening. ... it elevated my collage game, I would say.”

 -Dylan Singleton

[andrewuttaro]

2020 State of Star Wars

The State of Star Wars in 2020 is counterintuitive. After perhaps the most anticipated movie of this relatively young century in “The Force Awakens” released in 2015 the following installments in the mainline series were divisive at best and roundly reviled at worst. With that backdrop, non-traditional Star Wars content has become shockingly good comparatively. Save for a botched video game launch everything beyond the movies has met a level of quality tantamount to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in my opinion.

From comic books and visual dictionaries to TV shows and background narratives, the State of Star Wars is actually incredibly good beyond the films. The consumption of entertainment media is always a subjective art, but one doesn’t need to look to hard to see a consensus cultural opinion in the Post-Sequel trilogy Star Wars world: disappointed interest. Our world at large is polarized as ever right now so of course every declarative statement on anything is a big fight but on this 2020 Star Wars Day I thought I’d take a whack at the big picture.

I’ll get my opinions out of the way right now. The “Last Jedi” (2017) was intentionally difficult. It grew on me in its own right (and got me interested in Rian Johnson’s filmography) but the impact it had on the whole continuity was damaging at best. I should have seen it coming but there was really no coming back from it for a Director like JJ Abrams. I found “Rise of Skywalker” (2019) borderline unwatchable. The first two acts were cringy fan festivals followed by a conclusion I found insulting to science fiction fans the world over to be honest with you. Repeat viewing did not help. I’m one of those nerds who salivated at the Duel of Fates synopsis. With that out of the way I want to take a stab at the 2020 State of Star Wars in a way that at least attempts to be objective.

Star Wars for All

Star Wars was always supposed to be the Superman of space operas: a story for everyone. Forgive the platitude but we live in a time of increasingly segmented media. Memes are big deal for us because they’re the rare shared piece of culture almost everyone enjoys sharing in. Star Wars had uphill battle with the mainline movies trying to be for everyone in this world today where nothing if for everyone except death and taxes. Perhaps this is one reason we were heading for sequel trilogy disappointment even if Disney had a cohesive plan for it.

“Force Awakens” accomplished close to universal appeal by redoing “A New Hope”. Box Office returns at the very least shows they did a good job. Leaving the more toxic elements of the Star Wars fanbase out of the equation the “Last Jedi” aggressively threw out the sacred elements of the universe for the sake of subversiveness that ultimately did accomplish something I applaud as the Democratization of Star Wars. That is to say the force is for everyone now. In spite of all its flaws that movie did something Star Wars has always been about at a basic level.

That said, the way that was executed fundamentally damaged the continuity going into the trilogy, and Skywalker Saga, finale. I liked the Colin Trevorrow script because it picked up on some loose ends of “Force Awakens” while also not ignoring “Last Jedi”. I realize that’s just a script though and it probably would’ve had a certain level of disappointment as well. Whoever directed the final installment was going to struggle no matter what. There is an irony here in that the finale of “Rise of Skywalker” is this giant fleet of essentially everyone coming to save the day in the ultimate Star-Wars-for-everyone moment.

Nobody is at fault for liking any Star Wars film or any piece of Star Wars content. I understand a certain segment of the fanbase was overjoyed to see Rey and Kylo have what was later called a kiss of gratitude. The film wasn’t even made well enough to fully satisfy that segment. In attempting so hard to be for everyone JJ Abrams made a Star Wars finale that was for almost nobody. The level of narrative shorthand it takes to write “All the jedi now reside in you” as a central plot conceit is unbelievable if it didn’t precede a Dragonball Z style energy fight. Star Wars isn’t dead, it’s alive and well. But I’d argue a solid 70% of people who consider themselves Star Wars fans would say that is in spite of the Sequel Trilogy and not to its credit.

As for the anthology films we might have two ends of the spectrum in “Rogue One” and “Solo”. “Rogue One” was a great movie that had an unnecessary premise while “Solo” was a mediocre movie with an interesting premise. “Solo” may have done better and been viewed differently had it not followed “Last Jedi”. The sad reality of it’s box office returns is Disney may not be interested in more movies about the Star Wars Universe’s criminal underworld. That’s a shame. “Rogue One” on the other hand should be proof positive of something most Star Wars fans have been clamoring for: more story in this universe separate from the Skywalkers. What made that movie great was compelling, efficient character development. If announced projects are any true indication it looks like we may have a good chance of getting that.

The Future of Star Wars

I follow this twitter account called “Star Wars Stuff”. I’m a visual learner so the tendency toward photos and concept art is fun for me. The account often posts screen grabs with captions like “The Best Story ever told” and “Reylo is Canon now”. I don’t think there is any inherent opinion of this poster other than… well… “Star Wars Stuff”. I think this is an interesting way to look at the future of Star Wars. If the Skywalker Saga is truly over than everything from here on out is just Stuff. As I said before that’s a good thing, but it poses some interesting questions about what we think of this fabulous fictious universe.

Is Star Wars truly for everyone? Yes. The toxic minority of the fanbase was turned off by the “Last Jedi” and unsuccessfully pandered to in “Rise of Skywalker”. Announcements of more diversity oriented projects like this “female-centered” series in the works signals to them that nerd culture is truly pop culture now. If you can’t handle diversity in your content then Star Wars is not for you anymore. You can’t be included in everyone if you don’t think everyone is deserving of being in Star Wars. I’ll be honest, Oscar Isaac and Daisey Ridley expressing no desire to be involved in Star Wars again gives me pause but I think the property as a whole is still intact enough to attract diverse enough talent.

What is the central organizing plot of Star Wars if the Skywalkers aren’t it anymore? I think I’ve looked at the prequel trilogy with a fresh set of eyes after these recent movies. In spite of all their camp they were compelling in the way they built up to what we knew was already coming: the Fall of Anakin Skywalker. I don’t have the answer to this question, but I think the details of the projects that have been announced offer some anecdotal thoughts: Star Wars will continue to be the socio-political opera of our modern society. Every integral piece of content in this universe, especially since the Disney purchase, has provided commentary on everything from twentieth century politics and the War on Terror to family structure and what love truly means. I believe Disney is capable of continuing to execute on this fundamental premise of Star Wars media.

What does it mean to escape to a Long Time ago in a Galaxy far, far away? When the scope and design of media from Video Games to Streaming is evermore self-aware and intentional in the worlds and narratives they create Star Wars really does offer something unique. I’m a sucker for good science fiction like James S.A. Corey’s “The Expanse” and I love to escape to that world. However very few fictional universes have roots in the 1970s. Yes, books and concepts being made into newer media forms have roots in content as old as Greek mythology. But very few science fiction properties, perhaps only Star Trek in a disjointed way, have two-three generations of cultural commentary built in. Star Wars, as long as new content comes, will be the broadest share science fiction universe out there.

Thanks for reading.

[eternally-embarassed-blog]

Episode 1

It’s my birthday! I’m twenty now. A quarter of a century, as I’ve been proudly saying. Most people have been asking me how it feels to be twenty five, and it feels good! I never thought I would live this long, to be honest.

When I was a kid I was, in a way, content where life was- especially during my high school years. Life was good, my parents were starting to be nice to me, and I was actually starting to have experiences that kids my age were having. I still did some pretty stupid shit, but I knew what I was doing wasn’t smart, but for the first time life was pretty awesome for me.

The thing is, I was really scared of the future (Ironic I know- every 16 year old worries about the future) but I was worried because after a lifetime of abuse up until recent history, my parents were making up for lost time of my childhood, and that was absolutely wonderful, but I didn’t exactly have enough time to make up for an entire childhood lost, and prepare for adulthood.

Adulthood scared me more than anything (Still does, and I’m just now getting to the point where I feel like my wife and I are hovering between stable and semi-stable) and I wasn’t getting the knowledge I needed from my parents that I desperately needed to succeed.

Now, 7 years after graduating high school (holy hell is that a story in and of itself) I find myself a much more mature, grown and successful person than I ever imagined I could be. I guess the true feeling of being twenty five is incredibly empowering. All week I’ve felt like the universe has been giving me an opportunity to set myself on the right course, and I’ve been trying my hardest to beat back the anxiety and do what I can to put myself on that path.

Unfortunately, I’ve been stricken with a truly terrible sinus infection for the last seven days and It’s made it incredibly hard to do anything, much less put myself on the success train. Maybe I just smoke too much, or maybe the sinus infection is also a sign from the universe. A metaphor if you will, for a few things.

Exactly a month prior to the first symptoms of my current sinus infection, I had recovered from a similar, though less severe sinus infection. After getting this horribly sick I decided that maybe it was really time to take a serious look at my physical health, instead of obsessing over my mental.

I looked back and tracked my last few colds and sinus infections and found there was actually a pattern correlating between my stress levels at work, and the time between my illnesses. It started about 8 months ago, so for the last 8 months I’ve been living with a chronic sinus infection that’s been getting worse and worse as my stress levels fluctuate so rapidly.

This comes straight off the heals of two solid weeks of moderate dieting and extremely consistent exercise. I had honestly thought that I was starting to become addicted to exercise and I was actually starting to get comments from my co workers. It kills me that I might be losing any potential progress, but I definetly think this is a wake up call, and I need to look deeper into my health before excessive exercise.

The second lesson I believe I am suppose to take away from this misery week, is to start one small step at a time. Going into this week I had grandiose plans of redoing my resume and immediately beginning the job search, and the week would culminate in my birthday! A fine plan, if I say so myself, but as soon as I woke up the first morning I realized I was far in over my head. Not only was a drastically under prepared, but I was also far more sick than I had initially realized. For the first three days of this week I couldn’t do much but moan and groan and try to read as much as I could and sleep as much as I could. The pressure in my head was un believable and indescribable. After a couple more days I was able to look at a computer screen, and decided that if I couldn’t make progress with my exercise, I would try to make progress in other ways before my inevitable return to work.

After being inspired by my wife’s success and social media, I decided to take the plunge and fight my own anxieties along with her, and start the social media outlets I’d always dreamed of having for myself! It really helps knowing that my wife’s moderate success has actually given her a support network, and her growth means that we need to get things to improve her content quality- things that I myself will have access to and be helping with. I get to learn, have quality content too! Yay!

I’ve finally over the last year and a half or so acquired the various things I need to start dipping my toes into the hobbies I’m interested in, and it’s incredibly exciting. It was truly exhilarating for me to take the time to create a quality edit, and capture a moment as perfectly as I could. Doing things this way is allowing me to go through life with a completely different point of view, and I’m seeing things in a way I never imagined.

Today after getting a wild hair up my ass, my girlfriend and I spent a few hours cleaning, organizing and rearranging our room/office space and putting it together in such a way that it works perfectly for both of us to help each other create content! I feel so proud of us for working together so seamlessly, and I even took apart an old ratty couch I’d promised her a year ago (yikes) that I would take apart and throw away.

I’d been putting that off for literally a year, and I couldn’t explain the lazy anxiety that gripped me, but it was so freeing to just do that and know that when all was said and done, there would be more room, and I would finally be more comfortable. I would finally have a desk to sit at, and we would finally have a table to eat dinner at. No more eating dinner in bed! No more constant crumbs making my ass cheeks itch!

It’s awful! We have so many irritate bumps on our asses and legs and hips from damn food crumbs, and I’m just so sick of it! We had such a beautiful dinner together after we put the finishing touches on our desk set up. It felt so good to be successful with her again, for the first time in far too long.

I also just feel so abundantly creative after accomplishing that, and I can’t wait to actually start putting my content together! I’m moderately frustrated (mostly because I’m sick) but the internet is acting up and I wanted to spend the last hour or so getting some photos from my phone onto the computer so I could start setting up some web pages- instead I’m here!

Which arguably is a good thing, I’ve had fun writing this. Even if no one reads it, or after a time if I can a following and someone becomes curious enough to track this down and read it, I had fun writing with it and talking to no one, even if that no one felt like an old comforting friend.

It’s time to go take a shower and wash off all the dirt and gunk and stuff that accumulated all over me during this whole process. I’m thrilled that I was able to get so many of my thoughts down in a single sitting, and that they are so cohesive. Either that or I’m just too high to realize I’m rambling needlessly hehe.

I’m gonna go take a shower and then keep putting my ‘battle station’ together. It’s making my heart sing with joy, honestly.

[rieshon]

Fall 2016 Power Rankings

I thought this was going to be a fat season, but somehow I ended up not finishing very many shows... Alas.

1. Occultic;Nine: In what is surely one of the biggest upsets in recent memory, not only did a semicolon anime turn out to be good, and not fall apart halfway through, it was actually one of the best shows to air this season. I say "one of" because it was really a dead heat with Flip Flappers, but Occultic;Nine takes it by a fraction due to having an actually satisfying ending. The show probably benefits from being based on a novel rather than a videogame, and its multithreaded plot is convoluted but never so much that you get lost among its nine separate major actors. The way the story's central mystery is slowly woven from this disparate threads is captivating, not least of all because of the show's always-up-to-11 pacing which puts you in danger of missing something important if you so much as blink. The result is a truly absorbing anime, and my show of the season.

2. Flip Flappers: Speaking of absorbing, for about six to eight weeks I was ready to call Flip Flappers one of the best anime ever made. The opening act of this series is some of the most creative and daring storytelling I've seen on TV, a masterclass of both short-form narrative construction and visual art. Five of the first six episodes are conceptually rich enough that they could have formed the basis for an entire series on their own, and Flip Flappers keeps coming at you with one after another. Unfortunately, after six episodes Ayana Yuniko left the show and it turned into a bog-standard adventure anime, complete with overly evil antagonist and copious flashbacks. Still a good one, but hardly "one of the best ever made."

3. Hibike! Euphonium 2: The sequel to my AOTY of the previous year didn't disappoint, for once. Eupho continues to be an emotionally rich and satisfying coming-of-age story. There were some missteps for sure, namely the story arc about Touyama Nao's character and the fact that Kumiko and Reina never had gay sex (actually their relationship is unfortunately kind of neglected in this second series) but it was overall an enjoyable conclusion. Not least of all, Kurosawa Tomoyo's performance as Kumiko continues to be some of my favorite voice work ever; her range here is the dramatic fulcrum on which the entire show pivots.

4. Girlish Number: You had to know an anime about seiyuu would be up here for me. Sore ga Seiyuu! was good, but let's be honest: much like Shirobako, its view of the industry it tries to depict is very rose-tinted. Watari Wataru's depiction of the seiyuu industry, he being an outsider looking in, is -- well, it's still rose-tinted, but it has a cynical undercurrent that is very appropriate. A self-interested egomaniac like Chitose really seems like the appropriate lens by which to view the anime industry in 2016.

5. Shuumatsu no Izetta: I didn't expect this to be the better fantasy World War II anime this season, but we'll get to that later. Izetta starts stronger than it ends, which is unfortunately a common theme with anime lately, but it never really goes "full spaghetti" and has a satisfying ending if you ignore the last 50 seconds or so. The concept, a pseudo-historical WW2 where one of the small countries Nazi Germany invades discovers magic and uses it to change the tide of the war, is actually interestingly utilized rather than just window-dressing, although the political chicanery stretches the limits of believability towards the end. The action (especially in episode 3) is fantastic and the soundtrack is one of the best of the year, plus there's some nice yuri subtext (how long has it been since I wrote that phrase in a review) between Izetta and Fine to round things out. Oh, also erotic evil Ten-chan voice.

6. Stella no Mahou: One day there will be a game design anime where the characters make something other than shitty visual novels. This is not that day. That bit of whining aside, Stella is one of the better examples of this type of show recently (certainly better than Shoujotachi wa Kouya wo Mezasu, which you probably forgot about already) featuring an endearing cast of characters that genuinely grow on you as the series progresses. Yep, this cute girls doing cute things anime actually has character development, and it's satisfying watching Honda-san going from a shy dweeb with no confidence in her art to leading her own game project.

7. Bubuki Buranki Hoshi no Kyojin: Bubuki is a hard one to review because it was a little bit of everything. It has a huge cast of characters and goes from hot-blooded battle anime, to harem comedy, to horror-tragedy, to mystery... Surprisingly, it's still a cohesive whole. The whole framing story about the Burankis is a little out there, but if you focus on the characters, its a satisfying adventure. I probably mentioned this when I reviewed its first cours, but it also deserves special commendation for being some of the best-executed fully CG anime out there.

8. Keijo!!!!!!: The rump zone taken to the next level. For as much as this was decried as the most heinous thing ever put to film, Keijo isn't even much of a fanservice anime. Yes, there are titties and ass everywhere, but it's entirely in service of the shounen-style power-level-and-hissatsu-waza-driven sports anime that it really is. I love lewd anime, but I wouldn't even really consider Keijo a lewd anime. What it is is a great over-the-top sports anime that will if nothing else make you laugh your ass off at the absurdity of it all.

9. Shakunetsu no Takkyuu Musume: Speaking of sports anime, this show is almost literally Saki but with ping-pong. As a sports anime it's serviceable, and there's some great animation in the table tennis action sequences, but ultimately the characters fall a little flat, possibly because despite it being a sports anime there are no real stakes throughout the series. The story culminates in... a practice match... so it's hard to get excited about much besides the top-notch animation. Oh, and the gay, because the yuri is up to Saki levels in this series as well.

10. Okusama wa Seitokaichou!+!: They put straight up porn on TV now. I watched an anime man jizz in his pants. In close-up.

11. Brave Witches: There have been a lot of disappointing anime in the last several years, especially of the sequel variety, but Brave Witches just might be the worst of all of them. The original Strike Witches series, especially the second season, is one of my favorite anime of all time. It has everything I love: cute girls doing badass things with crazy technology and out-there sci-fi plots. Brave Witches ostensibly has all that too, but it's done on a shoestring budget which just lets the air out of the balloon far too often. The action sequences were one of the main highlights of the original series, and here I found myself wishing they would just get them over with and move back to the character stuff because the copiously utilized 3DCG was just so bad. Apparently they're redoing some of the worst CG cuts as hand-drawn for the BD release, which might make the show more enjoyable, but ultimately Brave Witches as it aired on TV was a letdown. The story starts out extremely weak but comes together alright at the end, and some of the characters (Nipa, Sasha, and Naoe) are very enjoyable, so it's a shame because this show could have been alright.

12. Lostorage incited WIXOSS: This is a disappointment too, but it's one I saw coming. With a different director and writer on board, I never expected Lostorage to capture the magic that made selector one of my favorite anime of 2014, and indeed, it failed. It pays lip service to the dark and brooding tone of the original, but the plot is completely asinine, based around a completely worthless antagonist who has no motivation other than "is evil." This is creative writing 101 level garbage. The nods toward continuity with the original series were probably what I enjoyed the most, purely on a nostalgic level. Well, that and Iguchi Yuka's angry voice.