#but i think that's above my current skill level

[queenlucythevaliant]

This seems kind of unlikely, but since a few of you have bookbinding experience I thought I'd toss it out there:

I'd like my next practice bind to be a favorite novel, but most of the novels whose full text is easily available are also easy to find as beautiful clothbounds, and thus I already own them. If I bound a favorite classic, my efforts would be redundant. This leaves me with (a) binding a B-tier favorite or (b) attempting to bind something outside the public domain. I'm trying to figure out how feasible (b) would be for me now.

Does anyone know of a method that could be used to harvest text from ebooks into Word or similar? Or can anyone even recommend some less legitimate resources for getting ahold of these texts with the formatting intact?

[suppenzeit]

rewatching spiderverse and had to draw my guy

[lawofnamesmedia]

Making progress on the suburban horror game!

[ibelievewhatyousaid]

The Sinner’s assigned Abnormalities in L. Corp are very intriguing to me, as not being a general “resonance,” that Limbus uses with its current day Ego. But! They were assigned that for a given reason, even if only on a meta level, so I’d like to put my two cents into it as I love the Lobcorp Abnos so much. These are simplified summaries of the Abnormalities and speculation on how they fit said Sinner.

Faust - Forsaken Murderer

I do not believe she has an Ego Gift adored to her except the one for this Abno, so we can focus in on this purely; all being of Forsaken Murderer. (On this note, although I am not talking about the realization Ruina Egos, Meursault has Ego for this Abno as well) Forsaken Murderer in his original logs was said to have been a murderer in federal prison to have been sentenced to death. Before that could take place, a bunch of researchers decided to experiment on him. They wanted to prove an innate “evil,” existed and on a further level, they wanted to “cure,” him, although unclear what it really was they wanted to cure. Their experiments twisted out all of his penitence for violence, turning him docile, until he came to this belief of ringing in his head, that his head itself had became metal, leading to self harm against himself. Eventually a fatal accident happens, the researchers jump the ship and decide to simply dissect his brain, until the end he muttered, “ends, begins, ends, begins, end.”

NOW, this is hard to shape into Faust’s story, given how little we know about her on a deeper level, but, I think there’s already (shallow-ish) connections we can make. Faust has a lot of implications of science experiment (Child in a Flask, Telepole) whether we take this ‘literally,’ it’s safe to say either way Faustcord keeps her on a tight leash as being an “experiment” of a Faust who is willing to take a gamble. A lot of Forsaken Murderer focuses on the fact he is chained and tied up but “free as any other man,” we could take this as Faust’s expectation of being a skilled scientist and genius who is bound by those around her, to fulfill that role, yet “free,” at the sake of being all knowing. Faust is “omnipresent,” yet she is just another in a chain of command. In TKT she mentions to Vergilius that both of them “know their place,” despite how great she is, how “free,” of knowing she is, she is just another chain, in both the City and Dante’s contract to the sinners. We can also go deeper with this concept of “inevitably,” of the city, given to her by a predestined plan of fates, in every mirror world, how it all will end has already been put into motion. To know of how tied you are to fate surely must be a token of freedom as well, can’t it? He also seems to have a bit of an ego, a Ruina line of his being, “Don’t look at me with those eyes. You’re the most pitiful one here.” Which, fits Faust’s need to be above others, such as “Faust is brilliant, smart, Yi Sang is a genius.” An implication that Yi Sang had a cap on how brilliant he can be, something he must’ve lucked into, Faust was born to be great. Even if she is regrettably pitiful in every other aspect. An inability to connect to others or form meaningful attachments, this especially rears its head in events were her intelligence creates gaps between her and others, all of MotWE or Dante’s brush off of her in Canto 6 when she cannot given them an answer, or, even earlier, Sinclair accusing Faust and Limbus using the Sinners as compasses to boughs. In all situations it leaves her isolated and awkward, unable to answer, creating a larger, pitiful wedge between her and others, despite how great she is. She is still a thing to be “studied,” whether from an actual scientist or to other versions of her, or those around her, she is a spectacle.

Outis - Der Freishütz / Bloodbath

The story of Der Freischütz in Lobcorp was of a marksman making a deal with the devil, the devil proposed that the gun could shoot anyone, on the last bullet it would pierce the person the marksman loved, in return, the devil would gain the marksman soul in hell. The marksman thus went through all his bullets, killing off all his loved ones. The marksman traveled, simply doing good and bad deeds in impulse, no sign of an actual moral code. Eventually, he realized that the devil had long since stopped following him. He realizes that the contract had long been fulfilled, since the very beginning of him giving up his loved ones, did he fall to hell. And so, now a devil as well, the marksman continued to shoot anyone he wanted, forever.

Again, another sinner we’re left out in the cold for. But, to tap into Outis’ source, The Odyssey, the story follows Odysseus’ desperation to finally reach home, to his family. As the stories play out the more Odysseus gives up his morals. To sacrificing his men to no mercy, a king who was once gentle and kind, gives up all people around him to succeed in arriving home. Of course, from the start, Odysseus had given up his family, a mother who died alone, a wife left waiting for over a decade, a son who had never known him. Odysseus also makes many deals with Gods around him, something he pays greatly later for. Of course, none of this is a one for one, but I think it is to mimic Odysseus, or here, Outis’ slower decent into someone who hurts those who she loves (or should’ve) by her cruelty, once Odysseus had set off to war was the moment he was bound to lose everything. Which, is very similar to how Der Freishütz is, he had lost his humanity the moment he made the deal.

Bloodbath is a Abno based overtly on Carmen, but, to ease it into a more general baseless story, the Abnormality represents: “the pain of all those who couldn’t take their sorrow in stride.” A huge focus on Bloodbath is the guilt of love, of unable to achieve success, using “scars” as marks of failure. The bath mocks the person peering in with hands reaching out desperately, as if begging to be saved, or joined, in this misery. It’s a sign of endless despair, unable to ever reach the climax of this, the only outcome is to accept this wave of despair and let yourself accept it.

So, arguably this fits Outis really well just on the bases of the line: “Many hands float in the bath. They are the hands of the people I once loved.” This once again, is more of a line of thinking born from her source, but a lot of Odysseus’ guilt is haunting to him, specifically that of Penelope, but overall, he gives up many men, including people very close to him, to never truly “succeed,” I feel like this one is easier to connect to, given what I said of the previous Abno to Outis, so.

Don Quixote - Meat Lantern / Void Dream / Fragment of the Universe

Meat Lantern is quite.. obtuse, in its logs, both in Lobcorp and LoR most is left obscure. Which is terribly fitting. Meat Lantern, by your guess, is obviously not a tiny little flower. The logs say that it is gigantic, underneath the entire facility, always waiting, it lures people in, in L. Corp’s lens, it lures in employees by being a lantern, something shiny, full of hope, they haven’t seen stuck underground for so long. Any nature, any lights, something that wasn’t horrific or artificial has long since been lost to everyone there. It’s easy to feel it calling to them, to reach out, to touch, but it’s all a ploy to devour and eat whoever trusts it.

So, Donqui’s Abnos are actually what made me originally want to write about them. I had written out my analysis of hers a few months before, but it was too hinged on my own reading of her that it felt easy to write off as me sounding insane. But! With the reveal of MotWE.. this seems, pretty obvious. (Glad to know I’m not too crazy) Don Quixote wears a mask, one of “hope” something born from really just being .. silly, of something rare in the City. Someone who genuinely believes in good? In hope? Here? As “Don Quixote” stands as an ideal, a concept, “too good to be true.” and beneath that is a “reality,” no one’s has “really ever seen.” (as the log says about the “real body” of Meat Lantern) and then “devours” people. Yeah. I bet.

Void Dream’s logs follow someone who has Void Dream eat all their nightmares, giving them the best dream they could have imagined, the person they love had returned, even working in such a horrible company that is L. Corp was good. Everything was so, so amazing, a perfect ideal world for the dreamer. When waking up, the person was crushed by reality, when forced to confront the truth they became despaired. They tried to find those dreams again, in an obsession, but, they never did come back. The employee comes to the realization that Void Dream’s deal was too good to be true, that from the start, the Abno had set them up. And they had lost, unable to enjoy either sides of reality or dreams, they find their way back to Void Dream and beg them to eat all their dreams. Stealing away all their dreams, nightmares, hopes and despairs, virtually leaving them empty. When Void Dream is accused of leading people on, it brushes off the person, insisting it just wishes the best for others. The line, “a demon must change its shape to deceive others.”

Originally, I had read this purely as Don Quixote being put into the victim’s prospective, someone who “wakes up” from a perfect dream to be crushed by reality. And, I don’t actually disagree, I think this still 100% fits. But I think her fitting “as” the Abnormality makes perfect sense, too. Obviously, the whole “deceiving others,” line fits. To change one’s shape, a “demon” a Bloodfiend, to deceive others into seeing it as innocent, pure, true to the ideals it preaches. But, and this is a bit speculation on what we know very little of, “Don Quixote,” was given, or is a dream herself that a Bloodfiend wishes to dream, that Bloodfiend must’ve spun this tale, this “perfect” dream is an “act of kindness,” despite not being kind at all. Despite giving out this dream, not only to herself, but to others around her, does it lead to destruction and a harsher fall to reality itself.

Fragment of the Universe.. actually isn’t an Abnormality. At least, not traditionally, if the logs are true. The log mentions how it let itself be caught and studied, and through studying they declared it “intelligent enough” to communicate via language, thus, it learned more and more of humans and humanity. It became endeared and loved people. It reflected what it saw, leading to it looking like a kid’s drawings of hearts. When asked why it had came to interact with humans, it said it wanted to spread messages. One being its song, a song of the universe that drove people crazy, but also let them “finally see the stars,” and also to inform everyone that “there are no coincidences in the universe.”

FotU is really intertwined to its love of humanity, even its design is rooted in this love for the species. Its aim to spread its song is to “relieve” people, as well, even if misguided or unable to be understood. I think Don Quixote, as a concept, is so terribly human. She’s overly emotional, she’s quick to action, strong morals, she’s clumsy and brave and fearful and determined. She is so very human that it backfires. Given Cassetti’s lines, “we are so, so hideous behind the mask.” and his dedication as well as other Bloodfiends to “run” from being monsters and Elena’s lines of her wondering if she was desperate enough to “chase after being an ordinary human again.” I think the Bloodfiend behind Don Quixote genuinely loves humans, and, most likely, wants to “be” one. And “reflects” what she sees, which is a habit Donqui has, mirroring Merusault in TKT, or wishing to “copy” other sinners from Outis’ wristwatch. Donqui also has a huge tie to stars, so, so many of her IDs have her mentioning them, not to mention her tagline. I think an Abno who knows far more than it lets on, powerful, letting itself into humanity, coming to love them, but never being one, is dreadfully fitting.

Yi Sang - Funeral of the Dead Butterflies

FotDB is an Abnormality born from the pain and suffering of.. Lobotomy Corporation, actually! It’s a mourner who is rumored to wandering the halls of the facility with a coffin for those who are bound to be lost, an early mourning for those who are destined to die, and an incomplete sorrow for those already gone, the coffin too small to fit them all, unable to fall asleep or escape. The ending of the log decides that there is no escape, these butterflies are damned to wait, because there “must be an end to every world.”

I think, just like with Gregor’s case, although the original Abnormality is directly tied to L. Corp, in a more general definition, it is about the pain and sorrow of those inevitable deaths born from things such as K corp, or the Smoke War. Cases of people’s lives being thrown away and devalued, not given proper burials, no home to escape to, a fate to dying here, leaving the mourning to the others in the same situation who simply “lucked out.” In Yi Sang’s case, an “ending for every world,” feels very deliberate to the “world,” in which he was locked up in a cage, passively awaiting the days for it to end, one way or another, only to realize he was able to walk out, that the door was never locked. Yi Sang’s grief and attachment to the League of Nine, the only person who seems to grieve over those loses, alone, carrying that pain wherever he goes. In that sense, “an ending to every world,” could also be turned into a guaranteed ending of things he loved as well. There is more to be said, but this one seems very obvious.

Ryōshū - Spider Bud / One sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds / Scorched Girl / Bloodbath / Big and Will be Bad Wolf

(Oh my God girl. Do you need that many???)

Spider Bud is an Abno that is deeply protective of her babies, quite literally her alternative name being “brood mother,” she reacts negatively and violent if an Agent hurts or steps on her children

Ryōshū has gotten this Abno thrice now. It’s gotta be important, and yeah, it is! This is born purely from her Source, but Yoshihide’s tragedy is losing his daughter, Spider Bud’s entire gimmick is being peaceful (as an Abno can be) unless someone hurts her children, she stalks and watches and exacts revenge against those people. I didn’t want to bring in Uptie stories, but Ryōshū’s uncharacteristic gentleness to the spiderlings who nip at her is really.. striking. Once again, this one feels kind of.. duh, so I won’t go much deeper into it.

One Sin is an Abnormality with the purpose of being confessed to, to relieve one of their sins, it’s tied to religion to Hell’s screen gimmick of.. Hell.. feels, yes, but I feel as though this is more general and disingenuous from One Sin’s connection to Christianity while Hell’s screen is about Buddhism’s hell. Instead this felt more interlined to Parallel Gebura. A lot of people have jumped on this for power scaling fun, but! I think it’s important to realize why Carmen would’ve said “At least similar in this regard,” my take is that a huge aspect of Gebura’s woes in Lobcorp was her unable to protect those she loved. Given Yoshihide’s tragedy here, unable to protect his daughter. I think that is the aim that makes the most sense right now with how very little we have about Ryōshū.

Scorched Girl is another Abnormality she’s already gotten, all in all, SG lives on a sense of angered revenge and self destruction. Her logs depict her to be torn in two from her desire of affection to one of wishing harm on others.

Her attempt at hurting others involves hurting herself, which lines up with Yoshihide’s ending, of his natural self destructiveness, how he makes his art and his death. Her rage also lines up with Ryōshū’s, a want to have back warmth, love she’s lost, but only able to be a match of destruction.

Bloodbath, we already covered this in Outis’ section! I think Outis and Ryōshū naturally align similarly, (Hong Lu, Mr. “Horrific family” isn’t ever the one getting cold or aloof to mentions of family or parents or children, it’s only ever these two!) A guilt of unable to succeed despite how much you gave up and sacrificed, including others And to lose those you love, the hands in the water being everyone you’ve ever loved, by your own faults.

Finally, Big and Will be Bad Wolf! The Abnormality is about being set up from birth being one way. From the way society sees you, you will always be what they depict you as. The Abnormality doesn’t feel remorse over the violence it causes, because it was “inevitable” he’d turn out this way. Who is he to blame nature? Regardless of nurture.

This one is the most hard to really fit without going “well, just a hunch.” I think this could be in regards to Yoshihide’s further and further acts of violence and pain to others around him, but unable to feel that remorse (until it is too late) because he was born with this way. He was “born” an “artist.” Who is he to defy things sacrificed for art? He is unable to be anything but cruel and vindictive, and he doesn’t try to be.

Well, that’s everything I could remember off the top of my head! Apologies if it starts to get a little weaker by the end, I’ve been typing for hours. In general, there’s more I could say or conclude, but, because of how loose Abnos are in concept, as well as how most of these Sinners (everyone but Yi Sang…) haven’t had their cantos yet, it leaves a lot of assumptions built upon their sources and short behavior ticks we’ve seen them display. I won’t say these are confirmed or sure fire takes but more so a jumping off point in fathoming these choices.

[emilybeemartin]

Hey! Hey, would you like to be a park ranger?

USA Jobs just posted a bunch of national park ranger positions for summer 2024--everything from small historic sites to the big flagship parks like Yellowstone and Yosemite. These are seasonal positions specifically for interpretive rangers, which means you begin around May-ish and end around September-October-ish. Interpretation is the branch of the NPS that does educational programming and frontline visitor services, like working in the visitor centers, leading guided walks and talks, and just generally interacting with the public in a friendly, helpful way.

If you have a four-year college degree in just about any subject (honestly, I've worked with people with degrees ranging from theater to business to geoscience), or 12 months' relevant work experience (customer service, retail, education, camp counseling, etc), or a combination of the two, you're eligible to apply. All you need is a resume and transcripts if you're using education to qualify.

Just go to USAJobs.gov and search for "park ranger interpretation" in the search bar. The key things you're looking for in the results are listings from the National Park Service, the code GS 5 (which is the entry level for this position), and the phrase Not to Exceed 1039 hours (which indicates it's a seasonal position).

Some tips!

>Each application requires you to answer a questionnaire about your experience with things like customer service, preparing educational programs, researching scientific topics, etc. Be generous with yourself on these, because other folks will be. Even if you don't think you're an "expert" in something, consider your past work creatively. Have you presented research projects in class? Have you worked retail? Can you keep up a professional demeanor when somebody's upset? You have the qualifications. Rate yourself as such.

>Be thorough and specific in your resume. The NPS isn't a one-pager resume organization. They need to see evidence that you have the qualifications you say you do. The best way to ensure this is to copy, word for word, the phrases in the above questionnaire and insert them in the relevant places in your resume. So if the questionnaire says "Can you research, prepare, and present scientific information to a lay public," go to the appropriate place in your resume and write "I researched, prepared, and presented scientific information to my peers" or something similar. I kid you not, my current resume is ten pages long.

>Cover letters are optional but helpful! There are lots of templates online to help you write one; be sure to be professional. Mine is around 250 words and has three short paragraphs:

1- Position I'm applying for

2- Quick summary of most relevant work/education experience

3- Additional skills/rizz that makes me stand out (for me it's writing/illustrating, which helps me create visitor programs)

>Two things the NPS loves that will boost you are foreign language skills and being a US military veteran. Highlight these elements if you have them.

>Are you a schoolteacher? Check out the Teacher-Ranger-Teacher program.

>The big flashy parks are posted as standalone listings, but most of the others are bundled into "Multiple Locations" that are based on region. Consider applying for many of these smaller monuments and historic sites---they get far fewer applicants and are easier to secure. And many are absolutely beautiful. Want to work at Arches? Also apply to Natural Bridges. Want to work in Yellowstone? Also try Lassen Volcanic. Prefer history over science? You have dozens of amazing options from every facet of American history.

>Apply today! Apply now! Many of these parks cap their applicants because they get so many, and the rest will close after a week or so. A glance at the ones that were posted today and yesterday show them either closing on October 15 or 22. Some regions haven't posted yet, so keep checking the website in the next few weeks.

I love my work as a park ranger---it's such a rewarding way to spend a summer (or two, or ten), and it can open doors to other things. You won't get rich, but you will make great friends and great memories, add a killer section to your resume, and spend four months immersed with smart, passionate people in some of the coolest places in the US.

Plus you get a SICK HAT

[luckydoeslanguage]

🎏Immersion, its quirks, and tips for language learning this way!

its the 5th of May, so happy children's day! 🎏 I got a question in one of my posts asking for some advice on immersion learning! i thought it would be a good opportunity to talk about immersion in general, my current study(?) routine and perhaps give some useful advice! As the name suggests, Immersion language learning is done primarily by consuming media in your target language. Immersion can seem super intimidating to us learners, mostly cause we can't understand most of the stuff available to us. But! its not impossible to start out using immersion right out of the gate. i think people tend to get scared or go "I'll immerse when i get better at my TL!" But the truth of the matter is, your not going to get used to, or better at your target language unless you consume actual content. (in my opinion.)

Honestly, a lot of immersion learning is being able to tolerate that i probably wont understand everything right away. I will someday, but for now i have to be comfortable with not understanding a lot. which is okay! So, what is my current study routine?

right now, my routine consists of:

doing vocabulary cards on Anki from a premade anki deck.

playing about an hour of Animal crossing everyday

watching 1 - 3 episodes of an anime

watching Youtube videos

weekly (ish) grammar done by reading Imabi, and watching Cure Dolly videos on Youtube.

The bread and butter of my routine is learning vocab, and occasional grammar studies. I'm using the core2k/6k deck. which as the name implies, is an optimized vocab deck that contains the most common 6k JP vocabulary. i currently take 5 new vocab cards a day, and try to get my reviews in everyday. my anki deck has contributed a lot to me being able to immerse so early in my language journey. learning and then reviewing new words everyday lets me recognize words in my immersion. As time has gone on, i can recognize more and more words, and even some words I haven't encountered yet in my deck. Immersion, while still uncomfortable, (especially with complex media) is the other side of the coin. i try to spend double the time i spend on anki, immersing. Mostly because i enjoy what I'm immersing in, but also because i get more out of it the more time i spend immersing.

"that's all well and good Lucky, but what advice would you give to someone who wants to learn this way?"

Well! first of all, and this is very important:

Be comfortable with ambiguity. you may not be able to understand some, or maybe most of the thing you are immersing in. that's okay! Your brain is already looking for patterns to see in your TL, and is growing more accustomed to it. I got a lot of headaches in the beginning, i still do actually. but i know that's my brain working hard! (take a break if you get a headache!!)

Second, and probably just as important:

Follow your interests. make immersion fun! whats the point of immersing if its torturous?! I'm a lot more likely to continue immersing in something if i actually enjoy it. there are a lot of easier anime to immerse in, but if I'm not having fun, I'm not going to learn anything. you should do the same! even if its too difficult to understand. I'm currently watching someone on YouTube play a dating sim, and even though its waaaay above my skill level, I'm really enjoying myself watching it! I've even recognized some words i know. whole sentences, even.

Third:

Be Consistent! This is probably advice you've already heard, but it bears repeating! even if you do something small like listening to a song in your TL, that's immersion babyy :) consistency is key, above all.

Lastly: Track your Immersion. a problem with immersion is it can feel like you are going nowhere. tracking how much time you spend doing an activity, (watching videos, reading, etc) is a great way to make immersion more tangible. lots of people reccomend toggl, but i personally use polylogger. its built with language learners in mind, and is stupidly easy to use. i also keep personal logs in an online diary, as well as here on my blog to measure my progress. it helps!

alright, i think thats everything i have to say for now! if you've made it to the end of this long post, hello! and thank you <3 hope you've had a good day so far! I will leave you with some links to more reading on the subject under the cut, they go into more detail than i have here.

take care for now! またね！

this article by Refold about tolerating ambiguity:

The Moe ways guide to immersion:

Making the leap to Immersion, Video by Cure Dolly:

[thechekhov]

you mentioned in recent tags about a horror comic you drew- i understand not wanting to link publicly to it to avoid creating MORE misinterpretations, but i really like your storytelling and now i’m curious?? so if you could, that’d be great! no pressure either way!

(i’m sending this off anon so you have the choice to respond to it privately anyways) (love your art thanks) (and the dungeon meshi reacts)

Thanks for the kind message! And it's not a secret or anything, it's straight up this post:

I used language comparing humans and other animals as two separate things (for the sake of drawing the narrative conclusions I needed to, in order to make the concept understood in only a few pages), like this:

But because of this simplified language, people drew their OWN wild conclusions about me as a person.

For example, this guy on twitter:

I never actually said humans WEREN'T animals, never said humans were somehow 'above' biology...I was simply putting them into a separate category capable of a specific set of skills for the sake of the comparison I made in the last couple of pages as the punchline.

But they decided that it must "clearly" mean I believe X, Y and Z.

This has happened MORE than enough times!

Writing is difficult, and writing for varied audiences with different dialects, different levels of reading ability, and different attention spans is hard! Sometimes, people don't want to sit through 2 pages of 'well humans are animals but due to a specific evolutionary niche we fill our ability to use language and calculate mathematical equations to the degree that we do is really unique--'

Now, mind you... I STILL got grief for trying to be soft-boiled in my delivery. People (who don't have a linguistics degree) IMMEDIATELY also messaged me to tell me that chimps CAN learn language - and haven't I seen that one video with the gorilla, the dolphin, etc?

And that's it's own can of worms. (No, other animals cannot learn language the way humans can. Yes, they can communicate in complex ways. No, language is a very specific human thing as far as leading scientists are concerned, at least based on current data. Yes, I went to University for this. I have a degree. Please just trust me.)

It happens, I'm not actively mad about it... Humans tend to take whatever we read and run with it.

But we make this mistake often! I know I also make this mistake. We come conclusions based on scarce evidence! We jump to the worst case scenario! We presume that we know better than that person what they believe, based on minimal interaction with them.

It's yet another thing that's unique to humans thanks to... wait for it... language!

It's the price we pay for having memes.

[sirfrogsworth]

The Curse of Artistic Vision

I think being an artist comes down to developing an image in your head and then feeling compelled to manifest it. Sometimes you are able to improve upon that image in your head. Or you end up with something different that you like better.

But sometimes, for various reasons, you can't quite make that image a reality. And I don't know if other artists feel this way, but it feels like heartbreak every time. Not quite on the level of an incident of human decoupling, but it definitely sticks with you for a long time.

Sometimes I am limited by the current state of my skillset. I just haven't learned enough and gained enough experience to take a photo like the one in my brain.

And sometimes I am limited by my body, which puts huge restrictions on the amount of energy I can dedicate to crafting a photo.

I feel my knowledge and experience has never been at the level I am currently at. I think I have the *potential* to shoot just about anything I can imagine. Which is a cool feeling. I also feel like my image editing and manipulation skills are at the highest they have ever been. Which means anything I can't do in-camera, I can achieve in Lightroom and Photoshop.

But I just don't have a lot of energy to capture photos right now. And I am very limited by how much physical effort I can dedicate to the photographic process. Which is very frustrating. I'm hoping if I build a new studio in the house that will help a lot.

In the meantime, I have this library of images I took before 2017. Many of them I was not able to achieve my artistic vision.

But... I came close.

Which means on many of these old images I can use my editing skills of today to achieve what I could not back then.

And so I have started a huge re-edit project where I go back and realize my images as I wanted them to be.

I had this idea for an image of someone in the middle of a dark forest in an open field reading a book and the only illumination was a lamp that seemed to be plugged into nothing. It popped into my head and it just seemed like a cool photo to create.

In July of 2016, my friend Ryan was visiting and we decided to try it. We even rented a big fancy 50 megapixel camera for a few days. I had never used a professional level camera and it was my birthday and I wanted that experience.

I even had this cool idea to hide a flash in the lamp so it would look like it was illuminated.

The resulting image was not anything like I had in my head. And for some reason, I edited it super bright, and you can barely even notice the cool lampshade flash trick. If you lower the exposure of the RAW file there is a well-defined circle of light in the grass, but it is hard to see in the 2016 edit.

Where is the dark background? Why didn't I underexpose the background to make it look like night or sunset? I knew how to do that back then. I totally could have crafted the photo in my head at that time.

But then I noticed I only took like 8 photos of this scene. And I *always* overshoot. I took 300 photos of a bridge recently.

Then I remembered what happened. We moved a giant rocking chair, a lamp, and lighting equipment to the middle of my neighbor's yard and by the time I was ready to take the photo, I was about to pass out. I believe it was very hot as well.

And so the above was the best I could do under that circumstance. My body limited my artistic vision. And this has been bothering me for years. Sometimes I will think back on this photo and how cool it looked in my head and I will feel that heartbreak again.

When I look at the RAW file... it is actually much better than my edited image.

Which makes me curious why I made it so damn bright. My best theory is I had a monitor that was slowly dying and I didn't realize how dim it got because our eyes are so good at adjusting, and it's possible all of my images from that era were overly bright because I was overcompensating for a dying display.

That fancy camera (Canon 5DS R) was a dream to work with. And having so many extra megapixels to play with is such a joy. People say you don't need more megapixels these days, but when you are doing high level image manipulation, having as much information as possible makes it a lot easier. Especially when making complex selections.

So, I've got a good start. I have a lot of pixels to play with. I was almost certain I could manifest my vision with modern knowledge and tools.

I'll start with the baseline edit in Lightroom. I'm not going to worry about the sky, as that will need to be swapped for my nighttime aesthetic.

The circle of light was there! It was just hiding in my bright exposure. So that's neat. And when you lower the exposure of the background, the lampshade trick presents itself as well.

At this point I was getting excited because I could see the potential. I just had to find the right sky. This one looks perfect.

Okay, it is time for the big reveal.

Did I finally get this image out of my brain and into reality?

I DID!

I don't know if people will like this or find it artistically interesting, but Ryan and I were both very happy with the new version.

Also, I think Ryan's purple shoes really steal the show.

Though I had one idea that was never in my head originally.

Should I try it?

I still haven't decided on the fireflies yet, but Ryan and Katrina like them.

I can't state how nice it was to work on a 50 megapixel photo from a full frame sensor coming from a 10 year old camera with 4 stops less dynamic range and 24 megapixels.

This is zoomed in to 100%!

And the image doesn't even get soft at 300%.

Sorry, I got caught up in the megapixels.

And there is one detail you'll probably never notice unless I point it out, but I completely rebuilt the lampshade because I overexposed it.

I always say small details add up to big results. Plus I had to use some creative problem solving to figure out how to recreate a lampshade and I always enjoy that part of the process—where you don't know how to do something and then you figure it out. Very satisfying.

In any case, my brain feels better now. I feel like I was able to settle something that has been bothering me for ages. And I am grateful I was able to realize my artistic vision—even if it took 8 years.

Here is the before and after. It's fun to switch back and forth.

On to the next photo. And it may involve a furry little orange friend.

[archivistofnerddom]

Okay, but the idea of Omega having a high enough M-count that she could be vaguely Force sensitive got my brain churning.

Look, I’m not saying that she’ll necessarily be a Jedi with her M-count. I’m currently operating with the idea that she has enough of a count that she has low-level soft skills that don’t make her obviously a Jedi/Force wielded, but enough that she’s more in tune with the Force than the average person. It’s basically developing out qualities and abilities we’ve seen from her before. Things like:

Being able to read people well and using the info she gets from them. (Her figuring out who Cid was, building trust with Crosshair on Tantiss, etc.)

Being good with strategy. (See hustling at Cid’s bar to pay off the Batch’s debt to her in season 1, even as a pre-teen/early teenager with (at the time) limited exposure to the galaxy at large.)

Keeping up with the meditation techniques she learned from Gungi (to the point where she’s able to talk Crosshair through them).

Her inherent empathy, kindness, and desire to help anyone who needs it. (Hera, Gungi, Crosshair and the rest of her fellow clones, Batcher, etc.)

Maybe she’s not a Jedi, but Omega definitely has certain abilities that a low-level Force sensitivity could easily enhance.

Which leads me to my idea.

An adult Omega crosses paths with Din Djarin and Grogu and offers to share her knowledge with the kiddo. She can operate on the same level as Din. She has also been on the receiving end of having an overprotective parent(al figure), despite you actually being older than said parent(al figure). Omega could easily provide a path forward to Din about focusing Grogu’s Force abilities into something outside the Jedi and that is more aligned with how Din and Grogu live their lives.

I don’t know how long it would take for Din and Omega to reach a happy friendship medium, but they’d get there. She definitely gets taking care of your strange family while also making your way in the galaxy at large. With her own skills, Omega would certainly be a good ally and friend to the Clan of Two.

Plus, it’d be fun to see her stumble into “Crap, I’m looking after/training a precocious “child” who likes to do their own thing” territory. After all, in Star Wars, history often rhymes.

And, given that Din and Boba are on good terms, it’s not a huge logic leap that Omega tags along when Din and Grogu drop by Tatooine. (Peli is a much nicer sketchy aunt to Grogu than Cid was to Omega. Omega would love her.) But back to my main point. Can you imagine how chaotic it’d be to have Boba, Fennec, Omega, Din, and Grogu (and possibly Peli, if she’s on babysitting duty) in the same place at the same time? Yes, I want to see that happen.

Now imagine how nuts it would be to see Omega introduce Bad Batch tactics to the above-mentioned group? Fennec is (currently) the only one of that group with exposure to such things, and I think she would enjoy watching the chaos unfold.

Psst, Disney, make this happen! It’d be great.

[ghost-1-y]

trust me - sanemi shinazugawa

Pairing: sanemi x afab!tsuguko!reader

!!PLEASE READ THE WARNINGS BEFORE CONTINUING!!

TW: major character death (reader), no happy ending (hurt/no comfort), mentions & descriptions of gore & injury, brief thoughts of self-harm (Sanemi - briefly mentioned, doesn’t actually happen), consensual sex (Sanemi and reader are 18+), penetrative sex, unprotected sex, handjob, oral (m! and f! receiving), creampie, Sanemi is pussy drunk in this lmao; spanking (happens once), slight manhandling, praise kink, spitting kink(?) (Sanemi spits in readers mouth), (very) slight olfactophilia, brief mention of vomit (again, doesn’t actually happen), mention of scars (Sanemi and reader) MINORS & AGELESS BLOGS DNI - I WILL BLOCK YOU

CW: fluff; general angst; arguments between Sanemi and reader; Sanemi is a bit of a meanie at times :/ (aka Sanemi being Sanemi); mentions of food/eating; descriptions of wound care; love confessions; Sanemi uses the following pet names for reader: “baby”, “pretty”, “beautiful”, and “sweetheart”

Word Count: ~6.2k

A/N: this is my first fic, so I hope that y’all enjoy it! I’m not gonna lie I was superrr nervous to post this lol so please be nice🥲🥲 I’ll probably do a fluffy comfort fic for Sanemi after this to make up for the pain lol; also wanted to let y’all know that this was half-inspired by the song “Fragile” by Laufey, so go give that a listen if you’d like!

Quiet. 

As the dewy drops of the morning mist came into contact with his bare hands, Sanemi noted the silence of the sunrise – one would believe that its light denoted respite, a time of peace – something beautiful to behold as its rays began to gently sweep across the grassy field. He could not yet hear the calls of the mourning dove, for it was too early for the birds to grace anyone’s ears with their softening sounds.

However, as Sanemi continued his way through the tall blades, his hands wet with the remnants of night, respite gave way to apprehension, and the misty air was filled with a sense of malaise.

For the mist that lowly hovered above the grass was red.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

One year ago.

“You can’t expect me to treat you differently from them.” Sanemi pointed his blade to the lower-ranked slayers on the sidelines of the training grounds, those who hadn’t passed out yet being completely keeled over or having nearly drowned themselves in water to stave off the summer heat. “If you want to handle stronger opponents, I need to ensure that you are trained well enough to do so.”

Having been at the point of near-exhaustion herself, Y/N could barely muster a reply. “I know, Shinazugawa-san,” she panted while looking up at him from her not-so-flattering position on the ground. “Why else do you think I’m here? ‘s not like I enjoy being trained half-to-death,” she replied sarcastically.

Sanemi’s glare met her. “You should consider yourself lucky that I was gracious enough to let you train under me. At the rate you’re going, I’d half expect you to move down a rank, rather than up one.” He walked towards her and, despite his cold nature, offered Y/N his scarred hand. “Get up. I’m not lettin’ you go until you can knock me down to my knees.”

A challenge she knew to be nearly impossible with the skill level she was currently at, Y/N wondered if her rank of Hinoto meant anything against the Wind Pillar himself. She took his roughened hand in hers and stood up, and, after a poor attempt at dusting the dirt off of her uniform, steeled herself once more for the upcoming attack from the man glaring across from her. 

Sanemi tightened his grip on the hilt of his sword and started lunging toward her.

–––––

Y/N continued to train under Sanemi’s watch, each day somehow more grueling than the last. She woke up at the god-awful hours of the morning and trained until midnight. This repeated day in and day out for weeks, with seemingly nothing to show for it except a bunch of creative insults that she’d managed to add to her arsenal after receiving them from Sanemi himself.

“You’re not using your sword correctly,” he pointed out. It was always something, she thought – her stance was wrong, her breathing wasn’t efficient enough, and now she apparently couldn’t even hold her sword correctly.

By the time she looked up at Sanemi, frustrated with her apparent inadequacies, he was no longer in front of her, having walked around so that her back faced him. He placed his hand on her forearm, “just– move your arms here…good, and your hands should be like this–” he spoke softly into her ear as he adjusted her grip to what he deemed satisfactory. Y/N was thankful that Sanemi stood behind her as she felt an intense warmth flood across her cheeks. By the time he was finished, Y/N noted the lightest blush on the tips of his ears as he returned to his original spot and took his own offensive stance, clearly not intending nor wanting to address the familiarity of his previous actions. 

“Now you don’t have any excuses to have such a shitty attack pattern,” he quipped, before engaging her in battle once more.

As months passed, the Wind Pillar slowly transitioned from insults to providing Y/N with actual guidance, and she was slowly reminded of why exactly she requested to become his Tsuguko in the first place. One day, while she was taking her thirty-minute lunch break at the wooden chabudai inside of the Wind Pillar’s estate, Sanemi sat next to her and started to eat his own meal. He refused to look at her, but the words he uttered from his mouth sent relief through her veins.

“You’ve gotten stronger.”

Unsure of how to respond, as compliments were rare coming from the usually rather hostile Pillar, Y/N simply nodded and whispered a “thank you,” continuing to pick at her food. Eventually, she looked over at him and noticed that he was frowning at the wooden chabudai before him, an internal conflict seemingly battling out in his mind.

“I have a mission I’ve been assigned to, I’d like you to come with me.”

His words were quiet, almost hesitant.

“You want me to assist you?” she asked, mainly because she didn’t believe Sanemi had trusted her enough to bring her on a mission assigned to a Hashira, much less himself.

Sanemi nodded in response. “Lower-ranked slayers have been going missing in one of the nearby mountains,” he sighed. “If it were up to me, I wouldn’t have named them slayers in the first place if they’re stupid enough to get caught by some demon.” He paused, and then finally looked at her. “I think that you’re capable enough to help me should things get out of hand,” he added quietly.

A sense of warmth flooded through her, and she smiled at him, grateful that he had finally acknowledged the hard work she’d put into all of her training. “Thank you, Shinazugawa-san. I promise that I will do my best.”

Sanemi thought to himself that he would like to see more of that smile.

“Don’t think that just ‘cause I’ve seen you improve that it means I’m gonna let you take it easy from here on out,” he said as he stood up. “Also, if you get into trouble on this mission, I want you to call for me immediately. Don’t get yourself into some shit you can’t handle,” he added, and his gaze upon her suddenly hardened as the words left his mouth. “Let me deal with it if things get too difficult.”

With that, he left to head back towards the training grounds.

–––––

That night, Y/N followed closely behind as Sanemi hiked up the mountain, with the bitter cold becoming more apparent as patches of snow were slowly augmented by the tiny flakes falling around them. Every once in a while, they’d find some blood splatter or human entrails, with such carnage becoming more frequent as they continued their trek. 

Eventually, Sanemi stopped – Y/N had learned to trust his instinct when he sensed that something was off. Sanemi brushed his hand over the hilt of his sword and gripped it tightly, his muscles tensing with anticipation, which caused Y/N to echo his actions and grab her own sword, holding it so that she was prepared for any possible enemy attack.

Or so she thought.

A blast of icy wind came from her right, forcing Y/N to close her eyes lest her corneas were to freeze from the frigid temperature. Sanemi, however, immediately chased after the source – his speed something frightening to behold. After a futile attempt to follow him, Y/N found herself swarmed by fifteen demons, all of whom were nearly identical to each other, as they all possessed the same pale blue skin and white hair. After a few attacks, Y/N also noted that their blood demon art was the same: one that would allow them to manipulate freezing winds and ice however they pleased.

Y/N was able to hear Sanemi in the distance, easily decapitating what seemed to be a larger swarm than what she was presently dealing with. Just how many of them are there? Y/N thought as she made her way through twelve of the demons, decapitating each one until an attack managed to hit her mid-air – causing a sharp ice fragment to deeply slice open her upper thigh. Gritting through the pain, she finished off the final three demons that she’d been fighting before slowly limping toward a nearby tree to assess the damage of her wound. It seemed as though Sanemi’s battle was also over, as Y/N could hear nothing but the howling of the mountainous winds as he walked back over to where they both had split up.

Once Sanemi caught sight of her, his shoulders seemed to relax. However, such relief was temporary once he eyed her bleeding thigh, and immediately began rushing over to her, pulling out some spare gauze that he had stored on his person and a wave of anger that she couldn’t describe filling the violet hues of his eyes.

“What did I fuckin’ tell you? To stay back and let me handle it, yet you’re so stupid that you can’t even obey direct orders,” Sanemi spat at her as he started bandaging the deep laceration on her thigh, taking careful consideration of the pressure and tightness of the gauze wrap he was using. Each time she winced, he would look up from her injury, and his violet eyes would meet hers. However, there was no malice of the words he spewed at her within his expanded pupils.

Y/N sharply inhaled before responding. “I’m sorry! But you’re the one who went on ahead and left me with them! I had to–”

“No. You didn’t have to, you fuckin’ dumbass. That’s where you’re wrong – you didn’t have to put yourself in danger just because I was off dealing with something else. Fuckin’ think next time and maybe I wouldn’t have to be cleaning you up like this,” he lightly choked on the last few words, yet continued wrapping up her wound, hands gentle and considerate of her pain. Y/N huffed at his impossible reasoning and looked down at him with a hardened stare.

He looked into her eyes once more, his grip on her uninjured leg tightening. “I don’t- I can’t fuckin’ lose someone else,” he stated, a rare glimpse of vulnerability from inside his tortured heart. At that, Y/N dropped her stare and hesitantly placed her hand upon his tensed one.

“I’m sorry, Shinazugawa-san, I promise that next time will be different. I’ll get stronger, so you won’t have to go to such lengths for me.” She gave him a reassuring smile, and his hand relaxed as he continued his work on her wounded leg. With the sun still rising over the horizon, she couldn’t make out the brimming of tears on his waterline before he blinked them away.

It was a side of Sanemi that Y/N hadn’t seen before – but before she could indulge herself to begin examining every crevice of emotion that the Wind Pillar had put on display for her, his attitude changed once again to one of apparent indifference.

“Don’t apologize – just listen to me next time,” he stated as he finished wrapping up her leg. Once a couple of hours passed and the Kakushi had arrived to clean up the aftermath, he stood up and grabbed Y/N’s arm to pull her up from her sitting position. Sanemi then took the same arm and put it around his shoulder, allowing her to use him as a crutch as they both walked to the wagon brought by one of the Kakushi in the aftermath of the battle.

The ride to the Butterfly Mansion was mostly quiet. Sanemi, despite not being injured himself, decided to stay with Y/N as she slept on the floor of the wagon. The cold of the early morning seemed to be permeating Y/N’s skin as she shivered in her sleep. Always aware of his surroundings, Sanemi looked at her with concern and took off his haori, feeling slightly flushed as he placed it on top of her as a makeshift blanket, blaming the warmth of his cheeks on the cold morning air. He sat down next to her, crossing his arms and closing his eyes to alleviate some of his own fatigue.

It didn’t help that in his dreams, his body was keeping her warm instead.

–––––

Once Y/N had woken up, she first noted the sanitary scent of the patient room assigned to her. Having awoken from the gentle knock on the door, she looked to see Aoi entering with some gauze and antibiotics.

Sanemi was nowhere in sight.

“I’m glad you’re awake. I’m here to perform some general wound care for you. I’ll be changing your dressings, alright?” Aoi looked at her, and once she received a nod from Y/N, she proceeded to unwrap the layers of gauze and started to inspect the wound.

“There is some slight inflammation,” she observed as she lightly pressed against the sides of the laceration with her gloved hands, which exhibited some redness and swelling. “I’m going to be prescribing you some antibiotics in order to prevent any potential infections.” She started applying some antibiotic ointment directly to the wound, and Y/N winced at the stinging pain that it caused. Once satisfied, Aoi carefully rewrapped the wound with a new set of gauze. “Your antibiotics will need to be taken orally with food and water once a day. Make sure you complete the entire course that I prescribe so that you don’t face any further complications down the line.” 

All Y/N could do was nod silently, and once Aoi determined that she would follow directions, she left the room.

–––––

Despite wanting to thank him for helping her in the aftermath of the battle, Y/N had not seen Sanemi even once during her recovery process. She wondered if he had gone back to his estate, but it still struck her as odd that he didn’t at least come by to berate her for the lack of judgment she possessed in the midst of the fight.

Maybe he got it all out of his system when he was wrapping up my wound, she thought to herself.

During her stay as a patient, Aoi mentioned to Y/N that due to the cut slicing through the muscle of her leg, it could take weeks or even months to recover. Since Y/N had not yet mastered Total Concentration Breathing: Constant, Aoi explained that it may take longer to heal compared to if a Hashira had such an injury.

Y/N wondered if Sanemi no longer trusted her skills as a slayer.

She wondered if Sanemi ever had any trust in her at all. 

The very thought caused bile to rise in her throat. She wanted him to be proud of her, to trust her – just as she did with him.

Y/N slowly got up from her bed and walked outside to sit on the engawa of the Butterfly Mansion. The moon’s rise was slow, and the soft chirp of crickets could be heard from the nearby trees. Once sat, she admired the garden owned by the Insect Pillar herself – with beautiful azaleas and hydrangea plants shaping pathways throughout the grounds. Y/N closed her eyes and basked in the moonlight rays that shone upon the estate – that is, until her ears heard the softest creak of wood coming from behind her.

“Shinazugawa-san?” She softly whispered once she turned to see who it was, as though the peace of the night would be disturbed should she speak any louder.

Sanemi said nothing, but then moved quietly to sit down next to her – if Y/N hadn’t known any better, she would’ve believed that he was solely there just to admire the moonlit garden as well. His eyes appeared a soft, yet dark hue of indigo in the cool moonlight – they bore none of the usual aggression that they carried when around others.

“The moon is beautiful, isn’t it?” Y/N asked him quietly, gaze fixed upon him, and he nodded. 

“Would be prettier if it didn’t cause so much needless death.”

She couldn’t argue at all. He was right – and would be until demons had been eradicated off the face of the earth, but that didn’t stop her from wishing that things were different.

Sanemi sighed and finally looked at her, and his eyes screamed ‘loss’. 

He was fragile. He wasn’t the roughened-up, aggressive, insolent slayer that others saw him as. Rather, it was his scars that held him together by threads, and it was his heart that silently called out to her – to “hold me, please.”

And so she did.

Y/N slowly slid her arms around him and had them reach up towards his nape. The sigh he emitted came from his chest, and Sanemi’s grip tightened around her as he buried his face in the crook of her neck. His eyes closed and brows furrowed, focused on nothing but the gentle touch of her skin against his. His mouth was slightly parted, lips pressed softly near her collarbone as he breathed against her.

His touch was warm.

She wished to feel more of it, to let it utterly consume her until all that she could feel was him. 

Once he parted from her, Y/N looked into his eyes and felt the need to speak. “I- uh, I wanted to thank you for helping me with my wound after the battle,” she admitted softly. In response, his eyes hardened again and looked down at her bandaged leg.

“Don’t mention it,” he replied shortly before getting up. Soon after, Y/N found herself alone on the engawa once again, although the peaceful silence of the night had been replaced with a feeling of despondency that she couldn’t quite place.

–––––

By the time she recovered from her injury, it seemed as though Sanemi had done the impossible by making Y/N’s training even more difficult. Not a day went by when she wasn’t completely collapsed on the ground by sunset. It only took a few days before dark shadows under her eyes became visible, and her muscles ached.

Gone too was Sanemi’s softer side. Instead, it seemed as though their relationship was right back where it started, sans the fact that he seemed to slightly tense every single time he caught a glimpse of her scarred leg.

The sun had set, and Sanemi was yelling at Y/N to complete one more series of reps before retiring for the night. The problem, however, was that Y/N’s legs had become gelatinous and were shaking beyond her control, and despite all the willpower that she had sustained within her, it wasn’t enough to pick herself up off the ground.

“Are you really that fuckin’ weak that you can’t even stand up by yourself?” he spat. “You should’ve never become a slayer – this shit is too dangerous for people like you. All you will ever be is demon fodder. Fuckin’ give up and leave the corps if that’s how you’re going to treat the training I give you.” His insults were never-ending, and given how exhausted she was, it took everything within her to not cry at his words.

“I’m fucking trying, Shinazugawa-san!” she choked out. “What the hell did I do for you to treat me this way? Have I not done enough already?” With tears brimming in her eyes, she musters up the courage to ask the question she’s been wondering since that night on the battlefield.

“Do you not have any trust in me at all?” she cried.

Sanemi scoffed and glared at her. “You need to earn my trust, and until you’re able to complete the training I give you without collapsing to the ground like some low-ranked slayer, then you won’t have it.”

Y/N’s stomach dropped and she ignored the tightening sensation in her throat as she resolved to bite back at the cruel man before her.

“Bullshit,” she spat. “You thought I was capable enough to assist you on the last mission. Don’t lie by saying I’ve never earned your trust before.”

Sanemi rolled his eyes. “So what? Maybe I did trust you – before the mission. But you fucking broke it by getting hurt!” he seethed, eyes wide as he looked down at her. 

“Maybe if you were capable enough to not get yourself wounded during the fight, then I might’ve still had some trust in you,” he admitted. “You think that I’m just gonna trust someone who gets their leg nearly sliced off to be able to handle themselves?”

“Is that what this is all about? ‘Cause I got some stupid cut on my leg? You can’t be serious–”

“Shut the fuck up. You know damn well it wasn’t just a cut. What if you had gotten slashed somewhere else? What if it had been more severe? What if you–” he didn’t wish to complete that sentence, lest he spoke the thought into existence.

It was the first time she’d seen Sanemi with tears in his eyes.

“It would’ve been my fault, Y/N! My fucking fault if something happened to you! I already told you, I can’t fucking lose someone else. I’ve already lost so many people, and I–” he watched as Y/N stood up, despite the obvious exhaustion in her legs, and walked towards him. “I can’t lose you, too,” he confessed, his voice softer than the wind that gently breezed through her hair. A tear had found its way down his cheek – just over the scar that was bestowed upon him by his own mother. As if by instinct, Y/N wiped it away with the pad of her thumb, but she did not part from his face. Instead, she proceeded to trace her thumb over the jagged scar, and he surprisingly leaned into the touch of her palm against his cheek, his eyes frantically searching her own. She smiled at him, and his breath caught in his throat.

“You have me, Sanemi.”

The groan that he voiced was soft, yet guttural – as though it came from deep within his chest, and he placed his hands on either side of her face, his eyes looking at her with utmost adoration and care, and his lips brushed softly against hers, and Y/N’s eyes were nearly sent reeling back before he closed the gap.

The pleasurable gasp that she emitted caused him to smile into the kiss, his lips slightly chapped, but gentle and loving with how they caressed hers, as though she would shatter under the slightest touch, or that she was a goddess and he a sinner seeking repentance by worshiping her.

“Fuck…wanted to do this for so long,” he breathed against her and his kisses became more needy – something fully welcomed by Y/N as she wrapped her arms around him and her fingers found purchase in his unruly hair. When he parted from her lips, a string of saliva connected his mouth to hers, which only broke as he went back to kiss her with his then swollen lips. He groaned once more before picking her up and carrying her over his shoulder, causing Y/N to yelp in surprise.

“Not letting you go anywhere, baby,” Sanemi grinned and smacked Y/N’s ass as he took her to his estate’s bedroom, which prompted her to roll her eyes at his antics. Yet, she couldn’t help but smile as he gently placed her on his futon and kissed her once more. “Can’t fuckin’ get enough of you, pretty,” he stated before moving down to her neck, where he licked and sucked until he found her pulse point, at which point Y/N moaned softly. “That’s right…feels good, doesn’t it?” he asked, knowing full well what her answer was even before she tried to nod her head.

“Sa- Sanemi…” she gasped, her hand cradling the back of his head as he left messy kisses up and down her neck.

“Sound so fuckin’ beautiful, keep saying my name like that, hm?” As he continued kissing her, his hands rose towards the top button of her uniform, a question of “Can I?” to which Y/N nodded. He unbuttoned her top, kissing down her chest and stomach until the clothing was fully removed. In return, Y/N helped remove the bindings that covered her breasts, letting them spill out in full view of Sanemi’s greedy irises. Sanemi wasted no time in latching his mouth to one of her tits, where he lavished her with his tongue whilst massaging and kneading the other with his roughened hand, rolling her nipple in between his fingers and playfully biting down on her breasts every so often solely to hear her whine.

“‘Nemi…need…need more please,” Y/N moaned and he chuckled. “Hm? What do you need, pretty?” Y/N only whined in response and he bit her breast again, causing her to jolt. “Need you to tell me what you want, beautiful,” he continued.

“Need your mouth…” she admitted, slightly embarrassed.

“Oh? Where do you need it?” he asked her before sucking her tit once more.

“Nngh… my– my pussy,” Y/N whined pathetically, to which Sanemi released his mouth from her breast with a lewd pop.

“Good girl,” he praised and started working towards her needy cunt, licking down her torso and leaving kisses and bites on her inner thighs. He took his time working towards her wet heat and ghosted his mouth over her panties, his hot breath permeating the cloth as she impatiently writhed underneath him. He selfishly inhaled her scent before pulling the garment to the side, and leaving a soft kiss against her core, leaving her to whimper when he pulled away to remove her panties, only for him to then lick a fat stripe up her slit. Sanemi moaned deeply and proceeded to pull Y/N towards him by her hips, ensuring that her sweetness was as close as possible to his greedy tongue.

“You taste so fucking good,” he groaned before proceeding to stuff his face full of her pussy once more. The tip of his nose nudged her swollen clit as he gathered her wetness into his mouth by licking into her tight hole and fucking her with his tongue, moaning against her pussy in the process. Y/N began bucking her hips in response, only for him to pin them down with one arm as he used his other hand to start fingering her after moving his mouth to suck on her clit. She moaned with abandon as he began curling his fingers inside of her heat, sucking voraciously on her swollen nub.

“F-Fuck, ‘Nemi! I- I’m gonna cum!” Y/N attempted to writhe underneath him, despite being held back by Sanemi’s arm pinning her down. Her admission only turned Sanemi more eager, causing him to rut against the mattress as he began quickening his fingers inside her and sucking harder on her clit. Y/N’s eyes rolled back and her mouth went agape, screaming and shaking uncontrollably as she came into his awaiting mouth. He licked up every drop that she gave him, using his fingers to coax more of her release onto his tongue, not wanting to waste any of her precious gift.

Y/N sat up and clambered onto him as soon as she came down from her orgasm, and kissed him deeply, tasting herself on his lips and tongue. “Wanna return the favor, ‘Nemi,” she whispered and he flushed red at the thought. “Yeah? Show me, pretty.” Standing up, he tilted her chin with one hand so that she was forced to look up at him from her knees. Using his other hand, he unbuckled his belt and removed it along with his hakama. His cock was thick, with pretty veins traveling all across it, making her nearly drool at the sight. Y/N brought one hand up and collected the precum from the tip of his cock with her thumb, before licking it off. Sanemi groaned, encouraging her to begin stroking his fat dick despite her hand being unable to fully reach around it. She took a curious first lick at his pretty, bulbous head, causing him to shudder, before wrapping her lips around it and sucking as she moved her hand along his thick length.

“Fuck, baby,” Sanemi groaned. Y/N moved her hand to fondle his balls and began taking on more of his length into her mouth, bobbing her head back and forth, a combination of saliva and precum coating his dick. “S-shit– you’re so good at that… fuck,” he groaned.

It took everything within Sanemi to not start fucking her throat at that moment – not wanting to hurt her as she pleasured him. He compromised by grabbing her hair and gently guiding her mouth along his cock, so that he could have some semblance of control over her movements and hence, his orgasm. Before he could cum, he removed her from his length and put his hand underneath her chin, tilting her head up towards his face – a wave of arousal shooting straight through his dick as he saw her swollen, spit-covered lips. “Open,” he commanded, and proceeded to spit into Y/N’s mouth before seeking her lips on his, demanding that she swallow. “Such a good girl for me, I’m gonna fill you up and make you feel perfect, baby,” he promised. 

Sanemi pushed her down onto the bed, spreading her legs apart with his. He stroked his cock a few times before lining it up with Y/N’s sopping pussy, selfishly rubbing it up and down her slick folds a few times. He looked into her eyes, seeing her smiling up at him before leaning down and giving a soft kiss to her lips. Y/N moaned softly — unable to wait any longer as she gently wrapped her fingers around his cock, pushing the tip into her tight cunt.

He slowly entered her heat, his shaft stretching open her spongy walls, and he let out a low moan. He lowered himself so that his chest was pressed up against her and his head was in the crook of her neck, and he took Y/N’s hands in his as he started to fuck slowly into her.

“Shit, you’re so perfect for me. You feel so good, baby,” Sanemi moaned and kissed her neck sweetly. Y/N whined as he slowly pulled out just to push his cock back in again – hitting the area that made her see stars. He chuckled, “your pussy just keeps sucking me back in, sweetheart – it’s like she doesn’t want me to leave.” Y/N responded by babbling incoherently, and he looked up at her only to see tears brimming her eyes from the pure pleasure he so graciously gave, and instinctively kissed them away. “Taking my cock so well, such a good girl,” he said before his mouth reached hers, tongue darting between her parted lips before caressing her tongue with his.

His thrusts started to become more desperate, nearly grinding into her – incidentally rubbing against her clit in the process. She moaned against his mouth, her kisses sloppy against his swollen lips. “So good, ‘Nemi…” she whimpered, allowing herself to get lost in the pleasure and heat that he was providing her. He choked on a moan as he continued to rut into her, the squelching sounds of her pussy driving him nearly insane, “gonna cum, pretty. Where– where do you want it?” he asked, surprised he even had the coherency to form words as his mind was half gone from pleasure.

“Inside,” she whined, and his eyes widened, the building tension in his gut rising. “Are you sure?” he asked, and she nodded, writhing underneath him. 

“Need it inside…please,” she begged him, and who was he to deny her? His thrusts became sloppier, and he let go of one of her hands to reach down and rub her clit. The pleasure was immense, and Y/N couldn’t think about anything but him as she clenched around his cock as her orgasm flooded through her body – which consequently brought Sanemi over the edge as well, as he all but exploded inside of her hot cunt, groaning deeply as his cum flooded into her womb in thick ropes – causing her to moan and babble incoherently. “Fuck! Fuck– Y/N, I fucking love you,” he confessed in his state of euphoria, and Y/N only fully grasped what he said once he had collapsed on top of her – having just enough energy to pull him up towards her lips to kiss him once more – his lips hot and wet and swollen as they pressed against hers. “I love you too, ‘Nemi. So much,” she confessed, and he looked at her, slightly embarrassed by his own impromptu confession, but beyond elated that she felt the same way. 

He slid off of her, his softening cock slipping out of her pussy and he reached his arms around her – wanting nothing more than to hold her close to him as they both lay there on his futon. She smiled lazily in his arms and he kissed her cheek softly. “Not gonna let you go, baby, I swear. I won’t let anything bad happen to you – not anymore,” he said as he gently brushed his rough fingers against her newly formed scar. 

“I know, ‘Nemi. I promise I’m not going anywhere,” she whispered softly, and he smiled, thinking that he’d finally found someone to share himself with – someone whom he could shatter into should he feel like breaking, someone who could piece him back together so he could remain strong for the sake of others.

“I know, I trust you.”

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Oh, how wrong he was.

He swore to himself that he was only parted from her for a second as his pace and heart quickened – traversing through the blood-slicked greenery. Sanemi was plagued by loss – his siblings, his mother, his first love – but the feeling that it would happen yet again never lessened the blow nor the curdling acidity that coursed through his gut. 

He frantically searched each corpse along the battlefield, hoping, praying, that he wouldn’t find her among them. Sanemi never considered himself religious – he would rather not believe in any god than believe that an almighty being could allow such devastation to course through his life – through others' lives. However, while mustering the waning strength of his muscles to keep him from collapsing, he called out to the universe – selfishly pleading with it to allow him to keep even a single shred of happiness within his life, swearing that he would give anything to ensure her safety, to secure her life as part of his own.

But the universe turned its back on him once again, as he saw a glimpse of her hair – but it wasn’t her hair. No, Sanemi knew that her hair shined in the morning sunlight, it was beautiful and soft as he would feel it between his fingers – it was never bloodied like it was now. 

As he rushed over to Y/N, he nearly puked upon setting his eyes on her. There was a deep gash that cut through her torso – one that couldn’t have been caused by anything but the claws of a demon. He could see her entrails spewing out of it, and as his eyes traveled up towards her face, it was obvious that he was far too late. Her eyes – the ones he loved to get lost in, were lifeless; her lips – the ones that were so soft and loving when he kissed her, were parted in what seemed to be remnants of fear from the last moments of her life.

Sanemi couldn’t take it – and, as though pushed by an invisible force, he was knocked down to his knees.

A wretched sob escaped him as he reached towards her, uncaring of the blood and gore that stained his clothing, and he held her close to him. He sobbed out her name, wishing this was some horrible trick – some fucked up nightmare that he was subjected to, but the longer Sanemi held Y/N in his arms, the more he realized that this was real and that he had broken his promise once again – the promise to protect those close to him.

He picked her up and carried her to a clearing away from the battlefield – where a sole willow tree stood, and resolved to bury her there. As he placed Y/N into the ground, Sanemi wished to carve her name amongst the many scars on his body, so that maybe the blood spilled in her honor would somehow tether his soul to hers, so that he may permanently have her in a way that life itself could not provide.

Hours passed, and he finally managed to stand up once more, his heart hardened once again, and it took everything within him to not look back as he walked away from her gravesite. And, despite not wishing to look upon her grave again, Sanemi committed himself to continue living and fighting in her memory as Y/N slowly returned to dust underneath the lone willow.

And so he did — until his very last breath.

[zeravmeta]

It's kind of intersting where you are saying this is a wake up call to recgonizing fgo's subpar gameplay because on my side it's very much just "we don't like servant coins" for the most part. Heck the fact that nobody has gotten to point of realizing you can do all this with three stars which lasengle active making five stars worse is another werid development. I've only seen only a few comments talking about if you're f2p these things aren't really relevant. Not that I don't agree fgo biggest weakness is that once you get burn out on the gameplay outside of few boss battles you aren't getting any enthuism back imo. And currently the only thing lasenagle does it just repeatedly buffing units through different ways rather than introduce unique gameplay meachnics that go against the normal grind set like Eli quest and Grailfront(In my personal opinion I think the greatest issuse is the fact that doing these things would equlivant of having a consistent ongoing event that need to be updated and I think you need a whole team for that for speicifcally that.) But the fact people angry more express that they care enough about the gameplay to get angry about the lack of acess to it because of basically a pay wall or well I haven't seen many people connect the dots to the gameplay itself being at fault. Also i couldn't tell from reblog what did they backpeddle again? It seems like they were already planing to revise the servant coin distrabustion and the fact they are expressing they openly said going to give the coins back and with eases adds more to the idea than takes away imo.

I kind of wanna address these points a bit just to make a larger point abt why this anniversary and the servant coins thing rings hollow and sour for a bunch:

I wouldn't say 'wake up call' is the right words, but rather 'this was the straw that broke the camels back'. As broken as FGOs gameplay is, something i will begrudgingly credit it for is that all content IS clearable even by low rarity units. Even the hardest challenge quests from things like fest events or certain story fights can be cleared from a full 3* and lower + 5* friend support comp. So of course, then begs the question: If gameplay isn't the main reason to summon (unless you're a tierlist slave for efficient farm comps for Some Reason), why summon at all?

Well, for your faves, of course. FGO gives you a ton of resources and shiny buttons and knobs to make numbers on your blorbo higher, meaning that the whole point of these extra resources is just to sink into a favorite character and get to experience the story with this talking png on hand to be your friend/lover/hater/slash/etc.

Servant Coins were a broken whale mechanic on inception due to being strictly gacha dependent, not only in how you acquire servant coins but in how little return there is for getting said servants. Summoning for a 5* is already infamously terrible, but not only do you need them for grailing above Level 100, but also for append skills? Realistically, the only reason to go for these resource sinks *is* for faves, and in fairness some dedicated players/whales save a whole bunch of sq just for their one/two favorite guys (regardless of if they actually get them lol, you can save over 1K+ and still not even get a single rate up servant). It's very likely that some of these people Did save all their sq to then have all the necessary servant coins to ultimate max their favorite guy.

but to then ask even more from them, to sink even more into the most infamous gacha in all gachas just to maybe have a chance to marginally improve them? That was just a slap in the face. Mind you, a lot of people talk about how these latest appends are actually the most gameplay defining in how they can lower skill cool downs, which is def a huge buff compared to other appends/stat buffs and even skill buffs, but that type of discussion misses the point that this was one of the greediest changes ever done, especially for a game whose base gameplay hasn't really been improved, optimized, or significantly changed in any way.

You can tell even the devs knew that Servant coins were a broken greed mechanic from inception, since they had retroactive refunds for 4-5* servants (but not 3*s. grr) and from the outcry of this anni they walked back some of the changes and even gave out a second overall refund of servant coins, but ultimately this is another bandaid solution to the core issue: FGOs gameplay just isnt fun.

People put up with FGOs gameplay to get to read FGOs story, and we're just at the point where it's not getting to be worth it anymore. The visual novel masquerading as a gacha is being killed by its own status as a gacha.

The truly frustrating thing is that there *are* legitimate ways of playing FGO which CAN be fun, specifically challenge quests and Grail Fronts. Those are the two types of play that actually make FGO's gameplay work to an extent, and yet these types of changes are just never made in any permanent way. Past boss fights are locked forever, previously cleared challenge quests are lost forever, they just do not repeat these gameplay opportunities, and this goes hand in hand with another issue, one which I would say is the true root of all FGO's problems:

They fucking lock past story content

When me and other mutuals are heeing and haawing about having event reruns/a compendium, it's not just to talk about FGOs story being good, because it is! It's to make it so that newbies aren't fucking locked out of the MAIN GODDAMN REASON TO EVEN PLAY THIS GAME. IMPORTANT STORY CRITICAL EVENTS LIKE THE KNK COLLAB, GUDAGUDA EVENTS AND MORE ARE JUST LOST FOREVER TO YOUTUBE STORY COMPILATIONS BECAUSE THE BASE GAME DOES NOT HAVE ANY SORT OF COMPENDIUM FOR THESE PAST EVENTS.

Event Archives just WORK. You can look at so many modern gachas these days and see that they all have event compendiums for events they will not rerun, and the reason is simple: FGO popularized the idea of using a gacha to tell a story, so gachas put more stonks into their writing and dont limit that Very Critical Component Of Why People Would Play Their Game To Begin With.

But for some fucking reason, FGO just does not. Really think about this for a moment: People have put up with a near decade of terrible gameplay and corporate gacha greed just to read FGO's story. It's fucking good! But that's just not gonna be enough anymore when Type Moon is now using their fucking Das Rheingold of gacha money to make new/remake vns. For all that people talk about FGO story burnout, I flat out disagree: People do want more FGO story, Samurai Remnant is a huge fucking testament to that and a major component of why I want an FGO console release, to be FREE from its gacha ball and chain.

People just don't want to have to put up with a terrible gacha system anymore to experience that good story.

[tendermiasma]

Hi! Have you ever struggled with comparing your own progress to progress of other artists? Or do you have any tips how to avoid that? What I mean is - most of the time I feel inspired and motivated by progress of other artists, but sometimes when I see someone else achieving unimaginable level of great skill in, let's say, only 3 years or less, I feel like I failed as an artist and like I should just give up, despite knowing all of my hardships along the way, and that we all have our own pace.

Would no longer creating art make you happier in life? Would you find another passion and join that community and end up comparing yourself to someone else all over again? It's human nature to compare ourselves but it's what we do with those feelings that matter. I see three categories: People that become motivated and become better artists, those that fall into toxicity and tear down other artists, and those that fall away from art. You're definitely in the first category since by and large you spend your time putting those feelings to good use. It seems you know the healthy and productive way to think but once in a while it just sort of sucks to not be as good as you want to. That's actually okay because it sounds like it hasn't ever stopped you from continuing to make art. We will never be free from self-criticism and that's what pushes us forward. As someone who's been doing art for a long time, it's not completely avoidable because we're human, but I get wanting to handle it better in the moment and not ruin your day. Remember that just because your art and other people's art exist in the same space doesn't mean that viewers only want to see the other guy's art.

I think it's helpful to pinpoint exactly what said artist is doing that makes you discredit yourself and whether it actually relates to you at all (it never does). You say it's because they progressed so quickly in a short amount of time. If you put that person's piece next to someone else's who reached that in a longer time than them, you wouldn't know unless you were specifically told. Art can't convey that and (once again) as an artist who has been drawing for a long time, I literally do not care about how long someone else's art took. It's the most useless metric and doesn't tell you whether the actual piece is good. What's good has no bearing on the length of time.

There are things we cannot separate ourselves from because we are the creator of our art. We don't have the ability to view it as a neutral third party like we do for this other artist who became awesome in 3 years. There's a good chance they're looking at another artist and are as frustrated as you are. I learn this about artists I look up to all the time. You're self-critical, which is often very good like I mentioned above, but the key to happily coexisting with it is becoming very lucid about the fact that your goalpost will always be moving because that's just the way perfection is designed. It's fine to chase it as long as we keep in mind that it's an ideal and not a destination. If you can't find fault with your current art, it's "oh, well someone else got this good in LESS TIME, etc," like you can watch yourself take the thing out of the ground and stick it farther down the field in real time. I think it's a loss to deny yourself the art you could be creating in several years because you failed to obtain perfection, just like every other artist. It sounds like you know what to do but you're at that point where the change has to come from within since it's impossible to never compare ourselves to our peers.

[qqueenofhades]

coming from one of those "born in mid 2000s and is now suddenly an adult, making everyone feel old," people, do you have any resources to learn how to bullshit your way through getting a job with zero experience. cause i cant even put like "babysitting" or anything since covid prevented literally any teenage-typical jobs and i kinda dont know what to put on a resume beyond the university im currently attending and the high school i graduated from. and they still dont teach you this in school even though we've complained for years 😭

Okay my chilluns, listen up. This is how to bullshit your way into a basic 1-page resume even if you think you have absolutely dum-dum-diddlysquat to put on it. I completely feel you, as it's hard as hell to get a job even in the ordinary course of things, and especially when everything seems to want 10 years of experience and a bachelor's degree (and still pays like shit). But you gotta be persistent anyway. So here follows the step-by-step guide of How To Resume:

Open a new Word (or other word-processing software of your choice) document.

Pick a nice, professional-looking font (for the love of God, no Comic Sans). Times New Roman is fine; you don't have to overthink it. My own CV is currently in Perpetua, because it's a nice serif that looks crisp and a little different, but it is still clean and readable. Garamond or Cambria or other starter typefaces are fine too. Make sure it is the right size, usually around 12pt.

Put your full name at the top, centered, in BOLD CAPITALS. Increase the typeface size a few more points on this, to make it stand out and to make it take up space.

Underneath this, in regular-sized text, put your contact information: mailing address if you're comfortable sharing it, or if not, at least your phone number and email address. Use a school email if you have it, and not some weird/in-jokey personal email.

Start a new paragraph. In a slightly smaller font (italic if you want to make it look classy) write a few words about yourself. This should be something like I am a [Major] student at [University] looking for a part-time, entry-level position in [sales, retail, office, etc]. A [year] graduate of [High School] in [City, State], I am [prompt, reliable, detail-oriented, mature, friendly, etc] and a hard worker who is eager to gain experience and positively contribute to your business.

Start a new paragraph. Change the alignment from Center to Left. Create a new heading in bold underline labeled Education.

Under this, fill in your education (college first, followed by high school). Include the institution name, city, and state, the year you graduated or expect to graduate, any honors or awards, any extracurriculars, any grade-point averages if they're good (i.e. 3.0 and above), and your expected major in college.

Start a new paragraph. Create another heading: Experience.

This is where you put absolutely anything you can think of (in chronological order, most recent first and counting backward). Did you volunteer for something ever in your life? Put it down! (Title of work, dates, location, brief description of work). Did you do yard work for someone for a weekend? Put it down! Were you (or are you) part of a student club or organization in high school or university? Have you organized or taken part in any local initiatives in your community or neighborhood? Put it down! Basically, absolutely any kind of work, paid or unpaid, that might be relevant, regardless of how long it was or when it took place.

Under that, put the new heading/paragraph Skills and Interests.

Have you worked with Microsoft Word, Outlook, PowerPoint, Adobe, Photoshop? Put it down! People love that shit! Do you use social media and/or know how to work it better than the average grandma? Put 'er down! You get the idea. Think of anything in your daily life that can be put in Job Language and then see if you can do that. You are in university; do you have any projects, papers, or other things that you're proud of? Have you successfully managed a (gasp) group project? Do you make any kind of art? Are you a registered voter who has taken part in civic/political organizations, drives, or events? (If not, REGISTER TO VOTE! This is your angry grandmother speaking). All of that can go down. Even if it's not job experience per se, it's life experience and shows that you are someone who is engaged with the world and working to gain more.

Last paragraph and heading: References. Ask a few trusted adults who know you well and aren't related to you, such as a favorite high school teacher or a university faculty member/degree advisor, if they'd be willing to serve as referees. Put down their full names, titles/place of work, email addresses, and phone numbers.

Voila! You have a full page resume, probably even a little more if you're lucky. Proofread, make sure the spacing is even and the alignment is right, it doesn't look weird, the text is a consistent size, it's all the same color, there are no glaring typos or grammatical errors, etc. etc. Save it as a PDF.

Boom. Done. You are now a Job Hunting Maestro.

If you get an interview, you don't need to pretend that you have tons of experience or that you're something you're not, but you can present what you ARE in a positive light anyway. Don't apologize for yourself or play yourself down pre-emptively; be confident about yourself and what you can offer. You're a college kid looking for your first part-time job, COVID prevented you from a lot of normal teenage work experience, you're willing to work hard and learn new things. Here's your resume. What would be a good time to talk again.

Good luck! I believe in you.

[genericpuff]

LO Art Analysis (or: A Real Example of Why You Shouldn't Use Multiply for Everything)

I've obviously been spending a lot of time recreating LO art and in that time, I think I've really cracked open some of modern LO's problems with its art. This is a lengthy post so turn on some lo-fi, grab some popcorn and strap in.

One thing in particular that I'm very eager to talk about (and go off about) is Rachel's use of color language and shading.

THERE WILL BE BRIEF FASTPASS PANELS AHEAD IN THIS ANALYSIS. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

One of the key things that most people seem to agree on when it comes to LO's current art quality is the lack of color language. Back in S1, we had colors that seemed to jump off the page, with gorgeous rendering that created panels that were vast and beautiful to take in. It didn't matter if the anatomy was wonky or if the backgrounds were translated directly from Google Sketchup, the color and compositions made up for its flaws and created unique vignettes that individually contributed to what we found so special about LO back in those days.

That last one especially is still hands-down one of the most well-known and influential LO panels out of the entire series. Many a phone background its graced (my own included, I've literally had this as my phone background for like 3 years now) and it serves as a beautiful standalone example of the mood and emotions LO used to convey. You don't need to know the context of the scene, you don't need to know the characters, the mere posing and color choice alone is enough to invoke a reaction from the viewer. It doesn't even have a lot of shading or final rendering, the composition and texturing is all it needs.

So why does a simple panel like that work, but panels like these don't?

I have such beef with this panel because it does the complete opposite of what the famous Tower 4 panel achieves - it puts on full display everything wrong with LO's current art style, from its character posing to its color language aaaall the way to its final rendering.

First off, the character posing and framing. I finally figured out what RS' male characters have been suffering from lately, and it's a phenomenon that I'm sure many of you will be able to recognize right away.

Seth Macfarlane Syndrome.

You might not watch Family Guy, you might not watch American Dad, or the Cleveland Show, but you'll know exactly what I mean when I talk about Seth MacFarlane Syndrome. It's the stiffness, the lack of movement or bend in joints, the boring posing of characters standing with their arms flatly at their sides and their entire body facing the same direction, eyes unblinking - and when they speak, heads slightly tilting, mouths always being conformed to the same default shapes, while the arms do something random and unrelated to create the illusion of natural movement.

This has been an issue in LO for a while now, incredibly flat posing that lacks any sort of dynamic curvature to it, but it's best exemplified by that Ares panel above because holy shit does he ever look like Stan Smith in it. Boxy shoulders with arms that appear to be WAY too short hanging off the side, elbows flattened, hands straightened out, no natural shaping whatsoever.

But that's not the crux of the issue I want to touch on today.

No, the worst offense of this panel is that it indirectly proves what I've been suspicious of for a while now.

To explain real quick for context, there's this thing in digital art called Blend Modes. It's essentially a basic function in digital art that allows you to change the properties of layers for the purpose of shading, rendering, whatever have you. Most of these Blend Modes are the same across all digital art programs, things like Multiply, Screen, Color Dodge, etc. are all fairly basic tools in the digital artist's toolkit but all have an INCREDIBLY high ceiling of mastery - meaning, blend modes are easy to use on a basic level, but require a lot of skill and understanding of color language to utilize to their full potential. Using them right can transform a passable piece of work into a great one - on the flipside, using them wrong can take a passable piece of work and piss all over it.

The one I want to focus on in this post is Multiply. I use this blend mode myself quite often, it basically 'multiplies' the properties of the layers below it, taking whatever colors are below and 'doubling' them to create darker tones. This makes it a go-to for shading.

But the issue with Multiply is that it often ends up being used when it's not supposed to be. Or rather, people starting out will often use it as a substitute for shading when you'd be better off using your own hand-picked colors. I've got characters with skin tones that I can shade with the same color set to Multiply, zero issues, because the base tone is one that doubles well, it creates a nice rich tone on top that's perfect for shading.

But do you know the one color that DOESN'T multiply well?

Yellow.

Yellow is NOT a color you can just multiply, not without the final result looking flat and almost putrid. Most people will thus recommend you shade yellow with other colors along the same side of the color wheel, including oranges and reds. This is precisely why knowing color theory is such an important skill even in digital art, because using Blend Modes improperly can create flat tones that can ruin a final composition.

Going back to that Ares panel...

Again, I've had this suspicion for a while, especially when looking at panels of Persephone (*pink is ALSO a color that doesn't multiply well)

So I put it to the test. I took the original panel, sampled the yellow, and overlaid it with Multiply to see what I'd get.

Fam.

That putrid deep yellow that I mixed above is literally NEXT DOOR NEIGHBORS WITH WHAT I EYEDROPPED FROM THE PANEL. Copy and paste that and eyedrop it yourself if you want to see it with your own eyes. It's pretty obvious she did the same thing with Hera as well, you can tell her skin tone has been set to multiply and repainted with the same color, same as with her jacket.

They are using Multiply layers for everything as the default. This is not how Multiply is intended to be used - it's lazy shortcutting that's resulting in flat, boring, ugly compositions.

RS has stated herself that she 'changed' how LO is drawn to help 'streamline' the process for her assistants. This isn't streamlining. This is cutting corners.

Streamlining would be having color palettes to refer to during the coloring and shading process. I use them myself for characters that I CAN'T multiply-shade, I literally have characters whose skin tones are too light and yellow-toned for it - using Multiply would wash out their tones and make them look flat and sickly so I have to use a separate color from a different part of the color wheel to shade them (usually a darker tone of red/orange).

Rachel, babe, this isn't streamlining, this is just taking shortcuts to the point of sabotaging your own work. You can't sit there and tell me THAT looks good and is worth the 'streamlining' when panels like THESE used to exist:

Turn off the Multiply layers and color your characters for once, please, I'm begging you. This is such a rookie move for someone who claims to be a professional (and regularly brags about the awards she's won); not to mention a tragic fall from grace because we know Rachel can and has produced better work than this in the past. She knows color language, she knows how to paint, so why is she resorting to shortcuts like this? She has an entire team of people and yet she's still consistently behind enough in her buffer - or just doesn't care enough anymore - that she's resorting to lazy amateur tactics like using Multiply for everything.

And on the off chance that she ever sees this, Rachel, it's not even that hard to use proper colors. You've done it before, you should already have the color palettes available to you.

(P.S. One handy-dandy experiment to tell if your Multiply layers are failing you is the desaturation test. You'll notice that drawings being made primarily with Multiply layers will look a lot 'flatter' when desaturated, because the shading is just the same color on top of itself and 'doubled', there isn't any actual value or depth in the shading itself. These are the exact same panels I showed before, RS' on the left and mine on the right, they've just been desaturated to show the difference that proper color choice can make when defining values and tones in shading!)

[redphlox]

Do you think it's possible that we may see the new Todoroki house in the end? I really hope so, although I have a small fear that Hori may have tossed that idea out.

That was one of the very few aspects of Endeavor's atonement arc I actually enjoyed. Him building a new home for them to live in without all the horrible memories from the old home. It would have been a place for them to heal and be a family together. It felt like it was foreshadowing the family being together and whole again. I always loved and look forward to seeing the new Todoroki home in the end, especially since it seemed like it heavily foreshadowed a healthy ending for the Todoroki family.

Although, with what we have currently in canon, I am a little afraid Horikoshi may have flip-flopped a little too much and forgot about the new Todoroki home.

As it stands now, Endeavor can't live alone in the old home because he's going to need a caretaker. Chapter 426 it looks like Rei is going to be his caretaker now. Touya will need to stay in the hospital due to his condition.

I do think it's still possible we'll see the new Todoroki family house in the end. After all, Endeavor had it built with the idea that the family could be together and heal apart from him, and he's still of this mindset. The house imagery has been a common motif throughout the story - look at Tenko and Toga's backstories. Tenko's home is destroyed, Toga's home is destroyed, and their families are gone because they either died and can't come back or don't want anything to do with their kid. But here sits this new, shiny, trauma-free house for the Todorokis who haven't abandoned their villain son Touya and WANT him in their lives despite the hell of it all. The new Todoroki house is there for a reason, narratively. As for Rei being a caretaker - there are many cultural elements at play regarding forgiveness, disability, and the duty of caring for a spouse. However, I personally, absolutely loathe the idea of Rei having to care for her abuser on multiple levels - morally, in terms of justice for abuse survivors, gender roles and stereotypes, and through a disability perspective. It's appalling that she lost ten years of being with her children, only to have to care for the person who took her away from them, especially since one of their children doesn't want to be near Endeavor. Also, not to mention the fact that the caretaker doesn't HAVE to be Rei. Expecting her to be his caretaker negates the guilt he feels about pushing her into a psychosis. "Hey, sorry about abusing you to the point that you threw scalding water on our son because he reminded you of me. Now you have to be my 24-hour helper and look at me all the time, though." It falls flat. He could hire someone. But above all else, if we're talking realistically, I disagree that Endeavor can't live alone and that he'd need a caregiver. My career is literally just this - rehabilitating people from injury and illness, etc. If Endeavor were my patient, I'd say he would be a great candidate for prosthetics and could learn different adaptations, techniques, and skills to become independent. He could even still be independent at wheelchair level, and would require less help than what other manga readers are imagining. There's even an example of this through Miruko, who also has two amputations, just like Endeavor, but now has prosthetics. And even if he needed help (which is completely fine - no one is morally obligated to become independent), he could hire someone to help. Lol. I want to type a much longer, more nuanced discussion about how BNHA frames disability, but that's for another post. This discussion is a lot more complex than what I just stated and I want to touch on many aspects, including how disability is portrayed in the general media and specifics in BNHA. Anyway… I went on a little tangent - but yes, I think the Todoroki house could come up again. I'm hopeful. Hori set these things up for a reason and I'm expecting he follows through. Endeavor and Dabi losing their arms also has set up to bring back a certain gag from the Stain arc.

[girlballs]

wait i just realized. in spite of my recent posting about invasions and co-op balance and difficulty, lesser beast is not going to be Hard for the sake of Being Hard, like. just wanna make that clear that it's not gonna be targeted at like the annoying shitheads who thought sekiro having an easier mode would be a grave offense to the sanctity of gaming as an art form

the goal for stuff that's required to beat the game will generally be like. i'll trust the player to seek out and utilize things that lessen the difficulty if they think they need it (specific boss weaknesses, alternate playstyles with more room for error, things that can directly increase your effective power beyond the "intended" progression) or to challenge themselves More if they feel like their own skill is a little above the current challenge level (think like, the Demon Bell from Sekiro or Covenant of Champions from DS2 for some overt examples), whereas completely optional stuff will be generally tougher and might lean more heavily towards specific ways of engaging with it (e.g. bosses that Expect you to parry & deflect, and heavily punish dodge-focused and ranged builds)

also respeccing is gonna be cheap and accessible so you can't as easily like fuck yourself over early with a weird build you don't like, or if you want to see if a different build might help (or hinder!) you for a specific boss/area/etc