#In my edits or my writing

[prefixsstars]

“Mizuki, my dear, don’t ever disappear.”

Minori loved Mizuki dearly. For all their flaws and insecurities, no matter what, Minori simply adored them.

But at times like these, Minori couldn’t do anything but worry. Mizuki had currently locked the door to their room and wouldn’t leave.

Minori was sat outside of their door trying to get through to Mizuki. She had been sitting for at least an hour waiting and trying to get the door to open to no avail.

Minori knew that Mizuki struggled with something, she’s just not sure what that something is. She honestly felt like a failure, what girlfriend doesn’t notice that their partner is struggling.

All the different times that Minori had asked Mizuki how they were doing, Mizuki brushing her off saying that everything was alright, came back to her.

Minori could feel tears streaming down her face and quickly wiped them away. She’d have time to wallow in self pity later. What mattered was making sure Mizuki was okay.

She slowly stood up and turned to face the door.

“Mizuki, can I come in?”

Silence

Minori tried again

“Mizuki, I won’t pressure you to tell me what’s wrong, I just want you to tell me if you’re okay.”

Some light shuffling could be heard from behind the door. It opened just a crack so some of the inside could be seen.

Minori hurried inside the room and shut the door behind her. She quickly kneeled down in front of Mizuki.

Mizuki in all honestly felt like shit. Everything was off in every sense. They felt even worse for worrying Minori, that was the last thing Mizuki has ever wanted to do.

They were supposed to go on a date today, specifically to the park, and Mizuki just had to ruin it.

Minori was so much better than them, deserved someone better than them. Someone who doesn’t keep secrets, someone who doesn’t lie to the people around them.

Minori was a bright light meant to give people hope, inspire them, but here she was sitting here with someone like Mizuki.

Mizuki couldn’t help the tears that started streaming dow their face. Everything was too much.

Minori was panicking, she had never seen them so out of it. She wished Mizuki had talked to her sooner, she could’ve helped.

“Mizuki, can I hug you?”. Minori asked, not knowing what kind of state they were in.

Mizuki nodded slowly and that’s all Minori needed. She wrapped her arms around Mizuki and squeezed them tightly. Minori hummed one of More More Jump’s songs until Mizuki calmed down.

After Mizuki’s sniffles had died down Minori pulled away slowly from the hug. Not sure what to do.

“Do you feel any better?”

Mizuki thought for a moment before shaking their head no.

Minori smiled, “That’s alright!! Do you wanna talk about it?”

Mizuki shook their head no again

“That’s alright too, Is there anything you need from me?”

Mizuki nodded, “Could we stay here today, I’m sorry, i know we were supposed to go on a date today but-“

Minori grabbed their hands, “Of course we can!!! We can go on a date another day! We can stay here as long as you want!”

They smiled gratefully, “Thank you.”

Minori nodded, “No, thank you. I’ll be here for you whenever. No matter what.”

Mizuki pulled Minori into another hug, which Minori smiled into.

As long as Mizuki is still here, Minori thinks it’ll be fine.

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[lesbianjudasiscariot]

[the-blind-geisha]

Made this as a joke when bestie commented her writing fairy must have visited me to get me to pump out 3K words tonight.

[sabertoothwalrus]

tips for getting people to like your ocs

*disclaimer: this is based on what’s worked for me, aka an artist that likes to make comics/storyboards. so this advice is directed at people who do that

you can do things like this:

Which is fun! Character sheets like this are great, especially for personal reference! But frankly, I don’t think most people engage with this (at least I personally don’t). You could have the coolest character in the world, but it will be harder for most people to feel invested when they’re presented so neutrally like this.

My main piece of advice is: get better at writing.

That might sound harsh when said like that, but let me explain what I mean! (Not trying to imply you’re bad at writing either!)

What I tend to do is just throw characters into situations with as little handholding as I can. Give enough context that readers can follow along, but don’t feel like they’re being explained to.

what can you learn about the characters through their designs alone? (age, personality, economic status, occupation, etc)

what can you learn about the characters’ relationship though their interactions alone? (are they close? familial? romantic? is there hostility? are they tense/relaxed?)

what are the characters currently doing? what were they doing previously (how long have they been talking)? what are they going to do next? can you convey this without dialogue?

how do they feel about what they are doing? are they content? focused? over/understimulated? would they rather be doing something else?

where are they? does it matter? would establishing a setting in at least one panel clarify the scene? is there anything in the enviroment that could tell some of the story?

what time of day is it? what time of year is it? what is the weather like?

Now, with all this in mind, I'm going to give you another example. I'm going to use completely brand new characters for the sake of the experiment, so you won't have any bias (aka I can’t use Protagonist from above, since you already know all about him).

Did this get more of an emotional response from you than the first example? Why do you think so? Who are these characters? How do they know each other? What else can you infer about them? What happened? Who is "she"?

Now, you don't have to actually answer all those questions. But think about them! You can tell people a whole lot about your characters without ever showing them a list of their likes and dislikes.

Obviously, comics aren't the only way to get people invested in your original characters! But regardless, easily digestible formats will grab people's attention faster than huge blocks of text, and comics are a lot less work than doing wholeass storyboards.

Now go and share your ocs with the world!!!

[autumnillustration]

"Perhaps a lesser-known gift of Kenobi's was his ability to listen."

(AU where post-banishment Ahsoka gets zapped back to TPM, strapped with a fundamental distrust of the Jedi, an apocalyptic vision of the future, and a mandate to help Anakin Skywalker. So, in all this, it's nice to have a confidant.)

edit: link to the fic

[castielsprostate]

having talented friends is so wild!!!!!! like. YOU!!!!!!!!!! YOU made THAT. YOU DID THAT?!?!?!?! YOU created!!!! THAT!!!!!!!!!!! WOAH!!!!!! praise!!!!!!!! praise for one thousand years!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[lgbtlunaverse]

There's a version of the "don't go grocery shopping while hungry" rule specifically for writers where you should never under any circumstances be allowed to touch your draft within 3 hours of reading a really good story. Because sometimes when you read something great your head goes "fuck this is so much better than my stuff I should make that more like THIS instead!" Look at me. That's the devil talking and you should close the document NOW.

[ruhlare]

from "i know you by heart"

[zhukzucraft]

nuclear family as described by Iskall

[inkskinned]

at some point it's just like. do they even fucking like the thing they're asking AI to make? "oh we'll just use AI for all the scripts" "we'll just use AI for art" "no worries AI can write this book" "oh, AI could easily design this"

like... it's so clear they've never stood in the middle of an art museum and felt like crying, looking at a piece that somehow cuts into your marrow even though the artist and you are separated by space and time. they've never looked at a poem - once, twice, three times - just because the words feel like a fired gun, something too-close, clanging behind your eyes. they've never gotten to the end of the movie and had to arrive, blinking, back into their body, laughing a little because they were holding their breath without realizing.

"oh AI can mimic style" "AI can mimic emotion" "AI can mimic you and your job is almost gone, kid."

... how do i explain to you - you can make AI that does a perfect job of imitating me. you could disseminate it through the entire world and make so much money, using my works and my ideas and my everything.

and i'd still keep writing.

i don't know there's a word for it. in high school, we become aware that the way we feel about our artform is a cliche - it's like breathing. over and over, artists all feel the same thing. "i write because i need to" and "my music is how i speak" and "i make art because it's either that or i stop existing." it is such a common experience, the violence and immediacy we mean behind it is like breathing to me - comes out like a useless understatement. it's a cliche because we all feel it, not because the experience isn't actually persistent. so many of us have this ... fluttering urgency behind our ribs.

i'm not doing it for the money. for a star on the ground in some city i've never visited. i am doing it because when i was seven i started taking notebooks with me on walks. i am doing it because in second grade i wrote a poem and stood up in front of my whole class to read it out while i shook with nerves. i am doing it because i spent high school scribbling all my feelings down. i am doing it for the 16 year old me and the 18 year old me and the today-me, how we can never put the pen down. you can take me down to a subatomic layer, eviscerate me - and never find the source of it; it is of me. when i was 19 i named this blog inkskinned because i was dramatic and lonely and it felt like the only thing that was actually permanently-true about me was that this is what is inside of me, that the words come up over everything, coat everything, bloom their little twilight arias into every nook and corner and alley

"we're gonna replace you". that is okay. you think that i am writing to fill a space. that someone said JOB OPENING: Writer Needed, and i wrote to answer. you think one raindrop replaces another, and i think they're both just falling. you think art has a place, that is simply arrives on walls when it is needed, that is only ever on demand, perfect, easily requested. you see "audience spending" and "marketability" and "multi-line merch opportunity"

and i see a kid drowning. i am writing to make her a boat. i am writing because what used to be a river raft has long become a fully-rigged ship. i am writing because you can fucking rip this out of my cold dead clammy hands and i will still come back as a ghost and i will still be penning poems about it.

it isn't even love. the word we use the most i think is "passion". devotion, obsession, necessity. my favorite little fact about the magic of artists - "abracadabra" means i create as i speak. we make because it sluices out of us. because we look down and our hands are somehow already busy. because it was the first thing we knew and it is our backbone and heartbreak and everything. because we have given up well-paying jobs and a "real life" and the approval of our parents. we create because - the cliche again. it's like breathing. we create because we must.

you create because you're greedy.

[crispyliza]

I've got you all figured out fanartists

[inky-here]

i'm a sucker for that one trope in cartoons where a character sees the younger version of their loved one (bonus points if they also interact with it because that's just *chefs kiss*)

please please PLEASE do more of this

[kaibascorpse]

some of you people are so obsessed with having an acceptable group to ‘punch up’ at that you would rather pretend a marginalized group are Basically The Oppressors™ than listen to their valid criticisms about the fact that ‘punching up’ very rarely hits the intended target, and the majority of the actual damage of that act is suffered by fellow marginalized people in your own community. there is a significant difference between venting frustrations about privileged groups and just outright attacking anyone who (you assume) experiences that axis of privilege regardless of - and in many cases outright denying - their actual lived experiences. it goes far beyond just ‘venting frustrations’ when what you’re really doing is trying to find a moral justification to bully people you don’t like, and when your own desire for catharsis and moral superiority leads to ignoring the voices of the vulnerable people you hurt. you’re not ‘punching up’ - you just like punching people for the sake of punching.

[alectology-archive]

most annoying breed of author is actually someone who doesn’t respect a genre and sets out to subvert it.