#PAINTING about TRIBES

[demaparbat-hp]

Character design for Katara in Soundless.

[burinazar]

happy mother’s day

[so-i-did-this-thing]

Moving update:

With all luck to a completed closing finally happening next week, @crowtoed and I should be starting our drive out of Florida on November 7th. We celebrated pre-emptively with a goodbye to EPCOT, which included a truly befuddling pickle milkshake at the Food & Wine festival.

Thanks to everyone who has reached out offering a place to crash along our route north -- we have called ahead and found some cat-friendly hotels, and as much as I'd love to squish some of y'all's faces IRL, it'll be less stressful for the cats to have a large room where we're the only people.

We're not out of the woods just yet, but it's feeling more and more likely every day.

[cienie-isengardu]

[bamboorocket]

So uh... remember that Lancer crossover I was working on for Spookami? And how I put this tag on the original post?

Well that's actually happening for real now, because our GM is not only running a oneshot separate from our main campaign this weekend, but also very encouraging of letting us pull expy nonsense. Joke's on him if he think I'm not committing to the bit, though, so have the portrait I drew for the "Pilot" section of my character sheet.

Most refer to Waka in this AU by his callsign "Onmyōji". Those that don't usually just call him a pain in the ass.

[theoldandnewfirm]

WHAT IF TROLL SKIN WAS AN EXOSKELETON

Sorry, I got ten words into a fic that required a troll to encounter a caustic plant and had to stop and spend the next hour working through the logistics of troll skin.

[sun-lit-goth]

They can never make me hate you Wikipedia

[cicadaknight]

Rehashing a pain point with the Horizon franchise…

Why is there no mention of any real tribal nation in the game? No reference at all. The erasure of APOLLO didn’t remove the visions at the Grove, or any of the artifacts Aloy finds in her exploration. You’re telling me it makes narrative sense to have 30 minutes of Dutch artwork analysis and its historical significance, but not a single mention of any indigenous society? There are ZERO datapoints or ruins related to native people throughout the entire world that could have influenced Horizon-era culture?

😒 SIDE EYE 😒 It is that way because the devs made it so. Everything in a narrative is a choice.

[kururu]

honest hearts makes me soo sad always because it's the worst dlc in fnv, easily, it's such a travesty on all levels, but it has my FAVORITE intro in the whole game. entirely a personal preference thing. i just love the thought of the courier going on a caravan trip and getting stranded somewhere far away from vegas. it's just literally everything after that that sucks.

[anarkhebringer]

I should design Arkhe's new face paint he gets post-possession ahead of time...

[phantasmicfish]

So I saw Dune Part 2 yesterday and I was initially super crushed because of the deviation from book canon but the more I think about it the more I sorta like it…

So without further ado here’s a list of stuff I liked about Dune Part 2:

- all the scenes initially of Paul growing closer to the Fremen. You can clearly see that they become friends, accept him as a Feydakin, that they’re laughing, joking, hanging out. (And contrast that to the end of the movie, where Paul has no more Fremen friends, only followers. In the book, this is echoed, where Paul recognizes that he has lost his friends to the Muad’Dib religion. Take book Stilgar, who truly embodies this… by the end of the book, Paul says: “I have seen a friend [Stilgar] become a worshipper.”

- giving Chani explicit rejection of Paul’s messiah status was an interesting choice. Chani’s main thought over part 2 is that they don’t need religion to save them, that through Fremen power and desert power, the Fremen can save themselves. She recognizes that this fanatical worship can be a vehicle to control and enslave her people, and I sorta wish we saw Paul lean into that more… that they found a way to stay together and ‘fight’ the prophecy together based on Chani’s ideals…

- also, I love how engrained this rejection of religion and prophecy is in her character. Book Chani takes no issue with her Fremen name, Sihaya (desert spring), but movie Chani hates it “because it’s part of some prophecy.” Later, we see that despite her rejection of prophecy and religion, that the prophecy does indeed come to pass— the tears of desert spring save Him aka, Chani saving Paul after he drinks The Water of Life. (Interesting how Jessica has to force Chani to save Paul using the Voice… another example of Jessica explicitly forcing Paul to become the messiah).

- adding more depth to Fremen culture— the South being the more religious fundamentalist tribes vs the North being more secular. Early on, the movie paints this immediate divide between the tribes of Fremen who accept Paul and Jessica versus those who treat them as offworlders (who murdered Jamis). In the books everyone accepts Paul and Jessica after Paul bests Jamis and Jessica quotes some scripture, but I think it makes more logical sense that there’d be friction over these two random offworlders coming in

- I love love loved Paul speaking at the meeting of the Fremen tribe leaders in the South. He fully accepts his messiah status, exercises his power of the Voice + his prescience as a way to command all the Fremen under his name

- I’m a big fan of omitting the two-year time skip, so with that I’m glad Leto II was skipped over entirely. I always felt that Leto II was an unnecessary character addition to the book, especially when he just dies and everyone sort of goes “oh well” and moves on, so I’m glad it’s omitted.

- another interesting choice was to paint Jessica as a straight up villain in comparison to the way her book counterpart was not. The movie Jessica we see here is seemingly corrupted by the Water of Life: she walks around talking to herself (Alia) and scheming Paul’s ascent to Lisan-Al Gaib. She knows about the Holy War, which is the very thing Paul is trying to prevent, yet she expresses no concern about bringing it to fruition. (Probably because Jessica knows it’s impossible to prevent, but still.) The very last line of the movie, where Alia asks Jessica what’s going on and Jessica says “The Holy War has begun” is just total villain in my mind— explicit acceptance of the Holy War, like it’s just another stepping stone in her plan. Plus, the fact that Paul has visions of Jessica leading him into this period of great starvation totally cements her as a villian.

- going off of that, I like that we see Jessica undergoing actual agony when she takes The Water of Life. When book Jessica and Paul take The Water of Life they accept it calmly and without obvious pain (book Jessica was sitting with her eyes closed, as if sleeping), so this physical reaction that Jessica has to the poison adds to the idea that The Water of Life did change her in a negative way.

- I feel like so far we’ve been introduced to Alia as just a weird talking fetus who’s been consorting with Jessica, so Paul’s vision where Alia says “I love you” really strikes home, that she really does care for Paul which we might not have understood otherwise

[psychronia]

I've been rewatching Avatar: The Last Airbender because why not and I'm losing my mind at Zuko's proper introduction. I don't know if it's hindsight, shifting characterizations, or just me not watching this in a long time, but this was amazing.

We start off showing he's an impatient and very angry kid. Reasonable, and the sort of flaw we might expect to see in a villain. Kinda funny that he expects to go up against an adult and fully 4-Element realized Avatar, but the kid is desperate and Iroh clearly expects his nephew to get the banishment-denial kicked out of him.

What's important here, though, is Zuko's introduction to the Southern Water Tribe.

Here, we have a very intimidating entrance where his entire ship just sails through the ice right up to the village's front door. It's quite ominous and this is our first proper introduction to how the Fire Nation interacts with a foreign people.

Sokka charges, I'm assuming fully prepared to die, and Zuko casually knocks him out of the way. Okay, so clearly the Water Tribe are entirely outgunned.

He asks "Where are you hiding him?" and the people of the Water Tribe go silent. I assume they're either just too scared to talk or actually protecting Aang.

Whatever the case, it's important to note that the Southern Water Tribe know the terror the Fire Nation can inflict. We have a whole episode dedicated to tracking down a division of raiders. Sokka was able to not only identify the ash-mixed snow as signs of an incoming attack, but estimate how many ships the amount of ash measures to. These are a people who have experience being terrorized and are probably expecting something terrible to happen.

And then, after they don't answer, Zuko grabs Gran-Gran. There was a horror sting to it, and everything the tribe knows about the Fire Nation suggests that Zuko is about to threaten or straight up hurt her to get answers. Classic "terrorize the elderly" bad guy stuff.

And then...

He goes "He's (the Avatar) be about this age and is a master of all four elements!?" and lets her go.

And all of a sudden, the tension that was built up is shattered as Zuko went "I know, I'll give them a reference for the person I'm looking for because clearly they're confused and I wasn't specific enough."

This went from a show of villainy to a show of Zuko being totally socially awkward and misreading the situation entirely. Not helping is that when he does try to menace them a moment later, his fire is slow and angled quite safely.

It still worked on the Water Tribe because they're understandably scared, but all I could think of is that this was the equivalent of a playground bully trying to make someone flinch with that fake-out lunge thing.

Because the fact-and something we'll come to learn-is that Zuko is TERRIBLE at being a Fire Nation oppressor. He's capable of doing morally dubious things and is a competent fighter. But he's lousy at terrorizing people and cruelty-that's kind of the point of his banishment.

And while we can see the story paint this picture of Zuko's true character as the story goes on with hints of good and conflicting loyalties, here we get to see just how bad he is at being "the bad guys". He's still unambiguously being the villain of this scene, and it makes no real difference to the oppressed themselves, but there is a comical gap between where Zuko thinks he is, where he actually is, and somehow it still puts him on the same page as his victims just because of how terrible the Fire Nation's influence is on everyone involved.

[dead-end-draws]

Tribe Banner concept art:

Folks seemed to enjoy my WOF WIPS, so here’s more concept art for y’all! My favorite thing about WOF is the potential for world building. I thought it’d be cool to see a tribe emblem represented on a banner/flag of sorts:

Read below for some of the thought process / headcannons behind the design choices: 👇

Skywing Banner:

Skywings pride themselves on 3 things; treasure, fire, & their enormous, soaring wingspan which steals the sky.

As such, portrayed on the banner, the fabric (often made with dyed cow or goat leathers) resembles draped dragon wings. Two Skywings embrace a goblet, which is spewing golden fire.

The banner is often held aloft with iron or gold poles, signifying to other tribes their wealth and pride.

Mudwing banner:

These banners are fashioned with leather hides from cow or crocodile skin, held aloft with bamboo, and painted with a Talon-print & Reed crest.

The talonprint symbolizes community and the strength of Mudwing sibling bonds. The reed border unifies all Mudwings regardless of their relationship to home; the swamp. Bigwings are often seen carrying these into battle, signifing their status and making it easier for a sib to locate them in the flurry of a fight.

Sandwing Banner:

Sandwing flags are made with camel skins and dyed cactus leather.

A crest shows a Sandwing coiled around a beaming sun, a reminder that despite the revered 3 moons, Sandwings are born to thrive in sunlight.

The fabric is cut in a way to mimic the swooping dunes of Sandwing territory. And the poles of the flags are equally intricate, with scorpion tails and golden ropes which frame the banner.

These flags make prominent appearances in parades, festivals, and markets, and even miniature version are often displayed in homes or as tapestries/carpets.

Seawing banner:

These banners are often seen displayed in royal quarters or councils, or above land to mark territory.

A nautilus shell crest on front echoes the swirl-pattern associated with royal Seawings: The banner’s borders resemble waves and a dragon swimming beneath their surface.

These are crafted with rich materials, strung with seashells, pearls, silver dollars, and deep oceanic color fabric. There is severe penalty for Seawings found plucking treasure from the banners, as they are a direct symbol of royalty.

Nightwing Banner:

These banners emphasize the Nightwings’ relationship to the moon, their source of power and praise. The material, a contrast of white stitching against purple velvet showcases moonlight and night, black scales against stars, magic and mystery.

They are seen decorated with 3 moons at the top and a centered dragon reaching up into the night sky.

These banners were often used during the war as secret code by spies to deliver to other tribes. Prophecy scrolls often came attached, delivering cryptic messages or secrets in the night. These banners all helped add to the secrecy of the Dragonet Prophecy, and kept tribes on their toes around Nightwings.

Rainwing banner:

Rainwing banners are not used for battle purposes like other tribes, most are mere decoration, location indicators, and have no unified design.

However, It is said back when Rainwings left the rainforest to trade pre-war, this particular banner design was often raised above Rainwing merchant tables, and showcases the coiled tail of a Rainwing with leaves, vines, and other sights from the rainforest adorning a bamboo pole. Bright color combinations accentuated the flag to entice curious customers.

Now, only one tattered version of the original Rainwing banner remains, displayed proudly in Queen Glory’s quarters, a reminder that building the Rainwings’ community is their most important goal.

Icewing Banner:

These banners reflect the same standards Icewings hold themselves to.

Like a visual of the rankings themselves, each banner is cut perfectly from an Icewing’s trained, serrated claws to resemble icicles, and crafted with fine blue stitching.

Flags are often held aloft with perfectly polished narwhal horn or bone, and can be inlaid with sapphires or diamond.

Icewing soldiers are often gifted these during ceremonies, and perform training exercises with the flags to test their stance/attentiveness. The crest showcases the swift sharpness of ice through a flying dragon, and a snowflake toward the bottom reminding Icewings that even minuscule snowflakes, small things, should be perfect in form.

[reasonsforhope]

"Growing up, Mackenzee Thompson always wanted a deeper connection with her tribe and culture.

The 26-year-old member of the Choctaw Nation said she grew up outside of her tribe’s reservation and wasn’t sure what her place within the Indigenous community would be.

Through a first-of-its-kind program, Thompson said she’s now figured out how she can best serve her people — as a doctor.

Thompson is graduating as part of the inaugural class from Oklahoma State University’s College of Osteopathic Medicine at the Cherokee Nation. It’s the first physician training program on a Native American reservation and in affiliation with a tribal government, according to school and tribal officials.

“I couldn’t even have dreamed this up,” she said. “To be able to serve my people and learn more about my culture is so exciting. I have learned so much already.”

Thompson is one of nine Native graduates, who make up more than 20 percent of the class of 46 students, said Dr. Natasha Bray, the school’s dean. There are an additional 15 Native students graduating from the school’s Tulsa campus.

The OSU-COM graduates include students from 14 different tribes, including Cherokee, Choctaw, Muscogee, Seminole, Chickasaw, Alaska Native, Caddo, and Osage.

Bray said OSU partnered with the Cherokee Nation to open the school in 2020 to help erase the shortage of Indigenous doctors nationwide. There are about 841,000 active physicians practicing in the United States. Of those, nearly 2,500 — or 0.3 percent — are Native American, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges.

When American Indian and Alaska Native people visit Indian Health Service clinics, there aren’t enough doctors or nurses to provide “quality and timely health care,” according to a 2018 report from the Government Accountability Office. On average, a quarter of IHS provider positions — from physicians to nurses and other care positions –are vacant.

“These students here are going to make a generational impact,” Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. told the students days before graduation. “There is such a need in this state and in this region for physicians and this school was created out of a concern about the pipeline of doctors into our health system.”

The Cherokee Nation spent $40 million to build the college in its capital of Tahlequah. The walls of the campus feature artifacts of Cherokee culture as well as paintings to remember important figures from Cherokee history. An oath of commitment on the wall is written in both English and Cherokee.

The physician training program was launched in the first year of the pandemic.

Bray said OSU and Cherokee leadership felt it was important to have the school in the heart of the Cherokee Nation, home to more than 141,000 people, because students would be able to get experience treating Indigenous patients. In Tahlequah, students live and study in a small town about an hour east of Tulsa with a population of less than 24,000 people.

“While many students learn about the problems facing these rural communities,” Bray said. “Our students are getting to see them firsthand and learn from those experiences.”

While students from the college are free to choose where to complete their residency after graduation, an emphasis is placed on serving rural and Indigenous areas of the country.

There’s also a severe lack of physicians in rural America, a shortage that existed before the COVID-19 pandemic. The Association of American Medical Colleges has projected that rural counties could see a shortage between 37,800 and 124,000 physicians by 2034. An additional 180,000 doctors would be needed in rural counties and other underserved populations to make up the difference.

Bray said OSU saw an opportunity to not only help correct the underrepresentation of Native physicians but also fill a workforce need to help serve and improve health care outcomes in rural populations.

“We knew we’d need to identify students who had a desire to serve these communities and also stay in these communities,” she said.

Osteopathic doctors, or DOs, have the same qualifications and training as allopathic doctors, or MDs, but the two types of doctors attend different schools. While MDs learn from traditional programs, DOs take on additional training at osteopathic schools that focus on holistic medicine, like how to reduce patient discomfort by physically manipulating muscles and bones. DOs are more likely to work in primary care and rural areas to help combat the health care shortages in those areas.

As part of the curriculum, the school invited Native elders and healers to help teach students about Indigenous science and practices...

Thompson said she was able to bring those experiences into her appointments. Instead of asking only standard doctor questions, she’s been getting curious and asking about her patient’s diets, and if they are taking any natural remedies.

“It’s our mission to be as culturally competent as we can,” she said. “Learning this is making me not only a better doctor but helping patients trust me more.”

-via PBS NewsHour, May 23, 2024

[originalwinnerfanfish]

Well, it was a big piece of work, hah

I took a break from RW and decided to draw something nostalgic

Actually I've been stuck with this idea for two years now and I'm glad I finally found the strength to do something about it. Thanks for inspiration from one good man)

Long story short

In this AU autobots and deceptions are two unions of different tribes: mudwings, seawings and sandwings for the firsts and icewings, nightwings, rainwings and Pantala tribes for seconds. Skywings doesn’t exist anymore (because we need someone who takes place of predacons).

People are just people or scavenger if you prefer. And instead of whole cosmos it’s just two mainlands.

- Optimus Prime - I kinda like tfp Optimus. So formidable, powerful and mysterious but really gentle at the same time. And mud/sea combo works here in the best way. As the representation of two main tribes union and strong father/brother figure for team members.

I also think he might be an animus (but don’t use his magic often, especially for killing someone)

- Ultra Magnus - Pure Icewing already will be great for him, but I gave him part of seawing so he could be more like an Optimus. But instead of being softer and warmer, Magnus is more cold and pragmatic version of him. A character who sees other dragons not as close allies and friends but as ordinary soldiers.

- Ratchet - Yeah, the seawing would fit him better, but i just don’t know how to make the colors work here sooo… he’s a weak-fire mudwing. Like a skywing, but mudwing. Why not. Make sense with his lack of guns in origin. I think he’s design can be better, and maybe I’ll remake it.

I love his arc of recognizing people as equals and especially his interactions with Raphael. I think Ratchet often read him scrolls about history and magical artifacts.

- Bulkhead - No surprises here - mudwing fit him perfectly. I think that the Wreckers could been a big and strong mudwing troops, and Bulkhead was a bigwings in such a one. He is lost a lot of his siblings during the war, and therefore tries with all his might to protect the new members of his family. I absolutely adore his relationship with Miko and Jackie, so for me he’s one of the cutest character, and I tried to make his forms round and soft.

- Bumblebee - I know that majority draw him as a hivewing, but in that case the most logical for him will be a night/sandwing. Literally, autobots get their own Sunny)

I think in this version with his lack of a voice he could communicate using sign language or some variation of aquatic.

- Arcee - Also nothing special - she is a seawing. I originally wanted to give her a helmet but it was too hard to draw. Just like Sunny she was born pretty small and now even younger dragons can be bigger than her. I’m pretty sure she is old enough to have seen Bumblebee when he was a dragonet, so she's literally like an older sister to him.

Actually she really gives me a Queen Glory vibes with her sarcasm and dangerous beauty, so rainwing might fit her as well.

- Smokescreen - I used to think he was just a cringe, but now I realize he's a pretty interesting and realistic character. Like Ultra Magnus, I wanted to make him look like Optimus, only this time Smoke is more of a younger and much more irresponsible version of him. I think in this version (being part rainwing) he's trying to mimic Optimus's coloring using same red, blue and pale-gray shades.

- Wheeljack - The scruffy boy! I think in this version he could be Bulkhead's "adopted sibling", so they are really close to each other. And, because he spent most of his life with Bulkhead, it's harder for him to get close to other tribes and dragons.

Painting scales to keep canonical colors is kinda cheating, but for this dude it totally works. He should have a pretty bright appearance with all those scars and bright spots.

Cliffjumper - Ohoh… this poor guy. I didn't even think of putting him here, but I like his smug face too much. Even making his scales darker than the original, it's still too brightly colored for mudwing. He probably jokes about it a lot, saying that his ancestors were skywings.

I really like his dynamic with Arcee, and it's a shame we haven't seen much of their relationship. I think I need to do something cute about that.

[panopti-cunt]

.