#hopefully i can draw again soon because i do want this blog to be primarily art-based

[hesbianyaoi]

hello everyone i am still here

unfortunately my tablet has been busted beyond recognition and that led to me sorta forgetting i had tumblr HOWEVER. i am still here and i still fuck with the stray dogs

[nyctophobia-au]

Where I've Been

Okay, so, 'sup babygrills. This is going to be a bit of a lengthy post, but I feel like I should update followers on here as to where I've been because I haven't been active for, like, months.

If you don't care to read all of the stuff under the cut, that's fine. Here's my TL;DR: I've been having issues with mental illness, trauma, motivation, gender dysphoria (?), and have been busy with college and YouTube/social media stuff. However, luckily my HK special interest has returned and I plan on posting more often hopefully. (Mild cw for mental health mentions ig.)

Okay, so, to begin, I've been gone a lot due to responsibilities outside of making Nyctophobia content. So, up until recently, I've been working on graduating from college. I've been finishing up my final class this Summer, but last quarter in the Spring was really difficult for me time-wise and mental health-wise. I've had a lot of issues with depression and anxiety throughout my life, and being at college was torturous and sapped all of my energy. It did not help that, last quarter, I had to be there at the college for six hours of my day five days a week. It was not easy to make art for myself and my channel, much less for this blog.

Outside of college, and I've mentioned this before in passing, but I also make YouTube videos and, at the moment, YT is my income (alongside comms as well). I've been pretty focused on keeping my my schedule at least a little bit consistent, and that alone has been draining and tiring. It also affects the kind of art that I can create, as I have to draw certain things for certain videos. I've been really weary when it comes to making content as of late, and I really need to take a small break so that I can work on stuff I actually want to work on rather than being stuck drawing certain things for the sake of videos I'm not inspired to make.

Pivoting more into specifics about my mental health, I have been needing to see a therapist for a long while, but I haven't had the motivation or the funds to pursue that option up until recently. Hopefully, I will be attending therapy soon. Last year in, uhm, September I had a particularly bad mental health episode and I've come to realise that some events that happened during that time have left me with trauma that I'm still currently working past and healing from. I've had issues with self-harm, depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts, and self-perception for a long time, but in the Spring they were stifling and impossible to ignore. Lately, they have been better, though. So, that's nice. There hasn't been just the usual stuff lately (oh no, that's be too easy), but I've gotten jumpscared with gender issues (hooray, my favourite /s) during this time, and am struggling with my self-perception regarding my gender up to current day. (Hi, I currently go by Rot or Sexy Fictional Bug Enthusiast and my pronouns are they/them, but they may very well be they/he soon). Also, I had a bad identity crisis a couple of months ago and had to do this whole rebrand thing that was a lot of work and it kinda sucked away a lot of energy and time.

On top of all of that, ya boy's special interest metre has been focused primarily on OC stuff and other things outside of HK. It's pretty well-known that I have autism and Hollow Knight is one of my special interests. I'm unsure how it works for most people, but my fixations tend to come in waves and fluctuate (though super special meaningful ones stick for a long time). So, like, I had this whole issue with my mind always being fixated more on things outside of HK. It's been my OCs for a few months, but alongside that, I also suddenly became enraptured by The Owl House and my Digimon special interest sleeper agent returned for a hot second there. As of recently, I've been interested in HK again, but have been afraid to start/work on projects related to my AU because of me having to work on OC content for my channel and also for my friends who are invested.

As of right now, I have some more time on my hands to make the content I want to make, and my HK fixation is back (thank fuck). I've generally been doing a bit better in the mental health arena, but I will also be taking some time off of YT and posting videos regularly in favour of focusing on making stuff I want to make. So, like, expect me to be more active here for some time. I might be finishing a fic in the next month (hopefully) as well, and I have some general comic and art ideas. I just want to draw Auric again, god dammit. My beloved. <3

Anyways, thanks for reading if you did. Just figured I'd make a post about this for people who thought I died or something (and for the people who were once interested in my projects on here and are starving for content, lmao).

[ettawritesnstudies]

Etta’s big creative to do list for when I’m not drowning in final exams

(the rest are below the cut because this got LONG! I am putting this here so you have some idea of the stuff I’ll be posting about come Monday 5/11 and also so I can find it again instead of putting it in my notebook where it will inevitably get lost among my fluids practice and history essay jottings. if you’re curious about the fact that I am not yet done with my semester, yes, I am absolutely procrastinating an essay right now by writing this. don’t worry about it.)

FINISH STORGE!! I’m only like 3 chapters away from writing The End and I desperately want to do that this year so I can edit and start sharing snippets with alpha readers by this time next year at the latest :D

Outline the Laoche Chronicles

this includes the trilogy outline in broad strokes to make sure everything sets up the next points

a detailed outline for the first book which will need a name eventually

(my outlining process can be found here!)

Character profiles for all the new OCs

(this process can be found in this post!

worldbuilding write-up questionnaire for the new civilizations that’ll feature in the main trilogy and differ from Storge

Learn how to make edits for tumblr because graphic design and anything resembling Proper Authors Platform Branding continue to elude me

This won’t happen this month, but I need to do a cleanout of the social media’s I do have so I can put writing stuff there too and start a proper Author’s Internet Presence. If I do finish Storge this year, I’ll be looking for beta readers eventually and I need to have something to show for myself. This includes...

doing a mass edit of this blog and organizing my tags

teaching myself HTML/CSS and making a custom blog theme that works for my needs or commissioning someone to do this for me

making a Laoche Chronicles wip page

buying a domain and designing an actual authors website

making an #aesthetictrash book Instagram? I’m vaguely aware this is something people do but I only use insta for it’s chat feature with my college friends so I know not the first thing about how that works

I have a disasterous Pinterest that’s 100% private boards for my various bits of nonsense that needs to be turned into a place to showcase WIP aesthetics

I refuse to touch twitter nor facebook nor snapchat nor ticktock with a fifteen foot pole

if you couldn’t tell by now, I was that kid who had a brick trac-phone until 10th grade, and used my smartphone primarily as a music device until very recently

Write a considerable backlog for my Newsies fanfic so I don’t fall behind whenever I go to my internship in a month

Finish the intro for my Vampire Plague Doctor Buddy Cop story and the Chaotic SFF Academia idea that I started last month, and write a few one shots for those Maybe start posting them somewhere if I’m happy with how they turn out?

Make a proper quilt from the 10389238320923 old event t-shirts I have sitting in a pile in the basement so I can take it to college with me in the fall. (also maybe mockup a walking skirt out of an old sheet, so I at least have an idea of what to do whenever proper fabric stores open again)

It’s going to be below freezing tomorrow for SOME REASON despite being MID- MAY, but I need to plant my garden and make a compost pile at some point

Make a list of art skills to start practicing so I can tackle the concept of “learning to draw” in a logical manner like you would in a class, and start doing these drills

Also participate in the rest of MerMay

Read a few books! My current next list of TBR looks like this

Illthdar! I have been dying to get my hands on @illthdar‘s book but I didn’t want to start it during the school year and then have to inevitably put it down like two chapters in because I had boring real life obligations to attend to, so this is my first read for as soon as I’m done with the semester on Sunday.

Pride and Prejudice, which I've heard is excellent and regrettably not actually read yet (nor any of Austen, yes I’m a heretic I know, but I’m also an engineering student and 90% of my time is spent doing maths)

Storm of Fire and Blood - I have had this book for a year and put it down because of school which is a crying shame because I really love this series! For any religious/historical fiction fans I highly recommend the Sword and Serpent trilogy! It’s a retelling of the story of St. George and the Dragon long before he’s ever a saint. I think anyone could enjoy it, but if you’re Catholic or enjoy early Christian history, you’ll get a lot of the references and saint cameos and it’s just! A lot of fun!!

also my patron St. Katherine of Alexandria is a major character in the 2nd and 3rd books and she’s absolutely wonderful so I might be just a little bit biased

Make a few watercolor maps of the world of Laoche! Including detailed maps of the city of Maaren where Storge takes place, and Arga (one of the countries in the later trilogy)

update my bullet journal which has been languishing unused on my dresser since march when I moved home from college 

Carve new dulcimer hammers and teach myself a few songs. (also maybe try to make a longbow or new bridges for the dulcimer but that’s all probably a BIT of a stretch)

Brush up on my piano and guitar practice because I am very very rusty. I need to find some new songs to learn because I don’t really want to relearn Debussy or Chopin again, but I need to find some good ones first...

If you’re still reading this. Wow. Congratulations. That was a lot. and thank you! But yeah! This is what’s been knocking around in my head recently while I was supposed to be studying, but now that it is out of my head and into a post hopefully I will be able to focus again :P This is extremely ambitious and I 100000% will not be able to finish everything on this list, but! it is a plan! Wish me luck!

[iron--spider]

“oh calm down, we have ten seconds left”

this goes out to @irondadz, who was my randomly selected blog from the 3000 follower post I made!

~

The Iron Man suit is open about fifteen feet away from them, arms extended like a prolonged invitation to hug. Tony sits, hands gripping the chair he’s been placed in, and he keeps having the inclination to tap his foot. Not for any want of dancing. He’s not fucking drunk, and there’s no music. It’s nerves setting in, racing from the base of his skull down to the tips of his toes, fraying off into his close surroundings and gathering around Peter Parker’s working hands.

 Tony’s nerves aren’t for himself. Death is like his shadow, the possibility of it tapping him on the shoulder like little jokes in a high school hallway. He doesn’t want it, he doesn’t want to meet it, but he knows, for him, it could be looming around any corner. No, Tony’s nerves are for the kid. The kid trying to deactivate a bomb.

 And then the kid says shit and Tony’s nerves rocket sky high.

“What?” Tony asks, trying to peer around and look at the top of Peter’s head. He’s all bright blues and reds in here—here, which is sewer and dripping and black mold concrete. They’re in what looks like a World War II bunker if it was built into the subway line, except there’s what looks like an exit just behind the suit, standing there like that. If he could only fucking get to it.

 “Nothing,” Peter says. “Totally cool, we’re good.”

 “We’re not good,” Tony says, that inclination to start tapping his foot in a panic returning tenfold. But his limbs are asleep, legs worse than arms, and it’s pins and needles everywhere. He’s been sitting here for too long, and shit’s about to get real. “We’re fifty leagues from good. I’m strapped to a chair—”

 “—you are not strapped to a chair, you’re just sitting in a chair—”

 “—I am metaphorically strapped to a chair because I cannot get out of said chair without the goddamn bomb going—okay, I’m sitting in a chair with a bomb strapped to it, triggered to go off if I get up. Good? Better syntax for Spider Spell Check?”

 “Way better and like, way more accurate,” Peter says. Tony looks down at him again just in time to see Peter grin up at him. The grin, somehow, sets off a few tripwires in Tony’s head, and he must have a wild, horrified expression on his face or something, because Peter balks. “What? Calm down. We still have ten seconds.”

 A heart attack. All the blood drained from his body. Ripped limb from limb. “We—we have—”

 “I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” Peter says, and looks away from him before Tony can breathe fire. “It’s still...it's still counting down. Three minutes and forty-eight seconds. I actually don’t think it’s triggered to go off immediately if you get up, I think—I think it might do a quick five second countdown before it blows up. Looks like it, from the way the numbers twitch when you move too much. So we’re good.”

 “You’re the worst,” Tony says. “Is this how you always do it? Is this how you embody Spider-Man from day to day? Pretending life-threatening situations are no big deal?”

 “Yeah,” Peter says. “Oh yeah. Like that time I almost got shot? I was just pretending I was playing this arcade game, Twist and Block—”

 “Oh my God,” Tony breathes.

 “I brought you there!” Peter exclaims, probably too loud for someone who is trying to disable a bomb. “Remember? You didn’t like all the neon lights. I think you played that game.”

 Tony sighs, closing his eyes tight. Peter could pull the wrong damn wire and kill himself. Tony knows the kid is smart, knows the kid deals with shit like this a lot, has probably seen a bomb before, but he doesn’t know if he’s ever had to disable one. They don’t know shit about the asshole that set this whole cat and mouse game up, and Tony opens his eyes again, looks at the suit. He knows it could withstand the blast.

 This is a damn game. Purposeful, chess pieces arranged just so.

 “You said they were all black, right? The wires?” Tony asks.

 Peter hums to himself. “Maybe a grayish color? Definitely more grayish.”

 “Semantics, Parker.”

 “I’ve seen a few devices like this before,” Peter says. “That lizard guy—”

 “Lizard Guy could not make something like this and knock both of us the hell out while setting his plan in motion,” Tony says.

 “He had a lot of passion,” Peter says. “You know, for his, uh, craft.”

 “Don’t describe the villains as passionate,” Tony says, shaking his head. He squeezes the arms of the chair and feels like such a goddamn idiot. He’s the reason why the kid is here. He’s only been working with Spider-Man publicly for a little while now, and people are already pegging the connection. Realizing that Peter will do anything to make sure Tony doesn’t die, consequences for himself be damned.

 Why are they both like that? Doesn’t it cancel out, in some way? Shouldn’t one override the other? Tony should be able to demand the kid go home, let him deal with it on his own. He’s older, he’s more experienced. He should be able to make those calls. But he knows it’s useless—Peter would just look at him, raise his eyebrows, and continue on with his own plans. Because that’s how Peter is. No Iron Asshole left behind.

 “I don’t think it’s possible to defuse it,” Tony says. “I think he made it that way on purpose. He knows us both, he knows we can do this kinda shit, and from what I’m hearing and what you’re seeing, this isn’t a normal bomb.”

 “What’s a normal bomb?”

 “Peter.”

 Peter sighs. “Yeah,” he says, drawing out the word. “Yeah, I...I think you’re right. Because I unplugged what should have been the power source and it’s still counting down.”

 Tony’s heart constricts. “Yeah? The thick wire?”

 “Yeah,” Peter says, and Tony can see him shift a little out of the corner of his eye. “The one in the middle should come next, should be like the proverbial red wire, but it—when I start to take it out, the numbers shift, kind of—looks like it might set it off right away. Like full tilt zero, boom.”

 Tony tries to think fast, tries to sift through viable options. “You said...if I get up, you think it’ll do a five second countdown?”

 “I think so,” Peter says. “When you moved too much earlier it did that quick twitch but reverted back as soon as you were back in place. Looked like five seconds on the clock.”

 The corner of Tony’s mouth twitches and he looks around, traces over all the details in the room. If this could be called a room. There’s no goddamn exit save for the one behind the suit, and five seconds—if Peter’s right about that, if they actually get five seconds and not instant, explody death, they still probably wouldn’t be able to make it to safety behind that wall.

 But the suit. Standing there, arms wide open.

 It feels ridiculously set up, down to the shitty ass bomb that clearly can’t be diffused, the suit ready for him to get in it.

 Or...someone. Ready for someone to get in it.

 “Okay, I’m gonna figure this out,” Peter says, and he moves, the first signs of nervousness rising up in his voice. The same nerves that have been plaguing Tony since all this bullshit started. Jumping from him to Peter like a virus. “Just, gimme a couple—well, okay, you’re not in charge of the timeframe here—”

 “I have an idea,” Tony says, trying to plan for their upcoming moments in crackling freeze frames in his head. Only the good scenarios. Only the ones where things turn up right in the end. He tries to swat the nerves away.

 “Awesome, we need one of those.”

 “I want you to go over to the suit and get inside of it,” Tony says. “You’re already coded to it—”

 “Wait, really?”

 “Yes,” Tony says, drawing out the word. “I need you to—”

 “No, I’m coded to the suit?” Peter asks. He’s looking up at Tony again, incredulously, brows furrowed like he doesn’t actually believe him.

 Tony doesn’t have time for embarrassment. “Yes, I—plan ahead, for when shit goes south, especially when shit goes south and you’re involved. Grill me later, yeah?”

 Peter nods at him, seemingly biting back a smile, and he doesn’t say anything else. He turns, sits on the ground, one hand resting on the arm of the chair close to Tony’s elbow.

 “Now, I’m banking on the fact that we’re gonna have five seconds,” Tony says. He locks eyes with Peter, tries to ignore the slow but still too fast clicking on the bomb. “How sure are you?”

 “Pretty sure,” Peter says. “From what I saw, yeah.”

 Tony swallows hard, listening to the waver of the kid’s voice. He’s not sure, and Tony can’t really expect him to be sure, and he prays, God, he prays that some low level lunatic isn’t the one to send him to his grave. But nothing’s gonna happen to Peter. That he’s gonna make sure of.

 “Okay,” he says, building a monument to five seconds in his head and hoping that’s enough to make it true. “Okay, you’re gonna get in the suit. You’re gonna come over here, we’re gonna do our own little countdown, then you’re gonna grab me, and fly us both to safety right over there behind that wall. Hopefully it’s a way out.”

 Tony motions to it with his head, then meets Peter’s eyes again. “Boot repulsors have a real kick—pardon the pun, focus up, Parker—and Friday’s definitely still active with the suit like that, she’s probably already mapped out our trajectory from the chair to our spot behind the wall over there. I think—these walls can withstand a blast. Suit definitely can.”

 “So I just need to cover you,” Peter says, his throat bobbing. “And...move really fast.”

 Tony tries to read his mind. “I don’t want to put too much on you—”

 “Mr. Stark, I do more dangerous things in gym class—”

 “God, I need to call that school—”

 “No, I mean. I can do it. I can.”

 Tony looks at him for what feels like a long moment. “Suit is primarily for your safety, because I know you won’t leave and let me try to get into it on my own.”

 Peter’s eyes flash angry, and he stands up, looking down at Tony. “You’d never make it.”

 “Never say never.”

 “No,” Peter says. “Me in the suit is better. Me in the suit makes more sense.” He walks over towards it, and looks back at Tony. “Of course I wouldn’t leave. You’re crazy.”

 “You’re stubborn.”

 “You’re crazy and stubborn.”

 Tony sighs. “Okay, let’s do it before I lose all feeling in my legs.”

 Peter points over to him. “Another reason why you can’t do it on your own. Pins and needles, remember that time you collapsed moving from the couch to the—”

 “Okay, spiderling, memory lane’s too long when a bomb’s involved,” Tony says, clearing his throat.

 He tries not to think about their plan too hard. Peter will be safe. He’ll be safe. That’s what really matters here.

 Peter backs up towards the suit, a mix of excitement and trepidation on his face. “What do I do?” he asks. “Just put my arms out?”

 “And step up,” Tony says, watching him.

 “Okay,” Peter says, tentatively. He looks down at his feet, holds his arms out, overextending his fingers like some warped version of jazz hands. Tony doesn’t laugh at him, because he promises himself he’ll be able to laugh about it later.

 Peter watches as he steps up with his right foot, then his left, and once he’s clear, the suit closes around him. The last thing Tony sees is Peter’s surprised eyes, and then the faceplate closes. And the suit stands stagnant.

 Tony waits. He narrows his eyes. Waits some more.

 “Uh, Peter?” Tony asks. “You in there? Did the suit consume you?”

 Another brief silence, and then a loud gasp. The suit stumbles forward a little bit, arms falling down to a more normal position. “Oh my God, Mr. Stark,” Peter’s voice says. He turns his hands over, looks at them. “Wow. Okay.”

 “You good?” Tony asks.

 “Yeah, yeah, okay,” Peter says. The suit stands on uneasy feet. “Okay.”

 “Friday know what to do?” Tony asks. He tries to ignore the way his heart speeds up, worry pumping in his blood. Nerves like electric shocks.

 “Yeah, she’s got it,” Peter says.

 His voice sounds weird coming from the suit, but Tony doesn’t comment on it, because he knows they need to get this done. He nods, and Peter walks over, stops right in front of him. Iron Man stares down at Tony Stark and yeah, it’s one hundred percent weird whenever someone else is in the suit, absolutely. Peter Parker is now a member of an exclusive club. Something else to tell him later.

 “Tony,” Peter says.

 Tony isn’t really used to Peter using his first name. It definitely amps up the nerves, even though he’s sure Peter intended for it to have the opposite effect.

 The kid keeps talking. “It’s gonna be okay. We’re gonna—it’s gonna be fine.”

 Tony nods at him, manages a smile. “Definitely,” he says. “No doubts, not here, not me.”

 “Okay,” Peter says. He leans over, and hooks his arms under Tony’s, and Tony braces his hands on the suit’s shoulders. “Okay, uh—you count,” Peter says.

 “Okay,” Tony says, hoping to God this isn’t it. Isn’t that moment where his heart stops, where he’s ripped to shreds, languishing in death throes that’ll traumatize the kid for life.

 He makes himself squash those thoughts, and puts his trust in Peter Parker. The kid is gonna get him home.

 “Okay, ready?” Tony asks.

 “Yeah, yeah.”

 “Okay,” Tony says, not thinking of the bomb, of the danger, of that shadow hanging around his throat. He only thinks of the future. “Okay, one. Two. Three.”

 He feels Peter lift him up out of the chair, the pins and needles racing up and down his legs. He grimaces, holding onto the suit for dear life, and hears the bomb let out a high pitched sound. Peter activates the repulsors as the beeping speeds up, gets louder, and they shoot forward, crashing down behind the wall just as the blast goes off.

 It’s a wave of gargantuan sound and energy, and pieces of the chair fly every which way.

 Tony feels the reverberations as they hit the wall, and he hears a new leak spring somewhere, a spray of water. Rocks tumbling, falling, and for a second he worries the whole damn place is gonna cave in. Peter is completely covering him, cold metal everywhere, and Tony pops one eye open once all the noise and movement stops.

 His hearing is muted, but he can hear Peter’s voice calling to him.

 “Tony! Are you okay?” Peter asks. “Are you okay?”

 “Uh, seems that way,” Tony says. He can still barely feel his legs, but he can’t discern any major injuries. No bleeding. He’s just a little dizzy.

 “Friday,” Peter says. “Uh—stats on the—surroundings, can we—can we get out? Are we good to move?”

 He’s quiet, listening to Friday’s response. “Okay,” Peter says, finally. He moves back, and the faceplate flips open. “Can you walk? You were sitting for like, a really long time. And we just evaded an explosion, so...there’s that.”

 They did it. They did it. Tony’s elation covers up his nerves, softens their edges.

 “Sure I can, Iron Man,” Tony says, grinning at him.

 “Um, please.”

 Peter helps him to his feet, and the walls are still crackling, dust and debris falling.

 “Okay,” Tony says, flexing his toes in his shoes. “Stay in the suit for now, just in case. Let’s get the hell out of here and find this asshole. Though, how we’re gonna do that, I’ve got no goddamn clue.”

 Peter keeps one metal arm around Tony’s waist, the faceplate snapping back down. “Oh, I totally snapped a tracker on that guy before he knocked us out, I just gotta give Friday the codes.”

 Tony’s heart does a little leap, and he beams at Peter. Well, Iron Man Peter. “Yeah, you’re—you make a pretty good partner, kid. Gonna give Rhodey a run for his money.”

 “Ah, I’m definitely telling him that,” Peter says, as they turn a corner.

 “I’ll deny it.”

 “I’m totally recording everything right now.”

 Tony snorts. “Typical,” he says. “Okay, let’s go get the dickhead who trapped me in a goddamn bomb chair.”

 “Yes,” Peter says. “And on the way you can tell me what other tech I’m coded to. Jets? Oh! Do I have a special lab somewhere I can get into?”

 “You’re just gonna have to see,” Tony says. “Process of elimination.”

 The kid groans, and they follow the trickling water out of wherever the hell they are.

[martincooneyart]

The Truth About Search Engines is that, unlike the good old days, when merit ruled the internet FIRST PAGE RESULTS ARE NOW ROUTINELY BOUGHT

by the highest bidder

~ ~ ~

There was a time not so long ago that, within certain brackets pertaining to the contents of my website, I took up virtual residence upon many relevant google first pages. Whether it be in google image, with photos of my sculpture, or on the information pages with my articles on Yule marble and its quarry, so many were the pictures and posts strewn all over Google’s vaunted first pages – particularly of my own unique Curvilinear Marble Sculpture – that in fact I scarcely gave the matter much of a thought. But that was then and this is now, and nowerdays it’s simply a matter of pay up or disappear.

In the old days for instance, whether the subject centered around Colorado Yule Marble, the quarry itself, its long history and present day revival, or my contemporary sculpture – or any one of a number of topics – my posts would cluster around the first few pages of a google search like proverbial sheep upon a lush green meadow. But alas those days are now gone and unlikely to return any time soon.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

Discover for yourself the Gorgeous Crystal River Valley along the Aspen Marble Detour ONLY at martincooney.com

Hardly a day goes by whereby I do not receive at least one determined pitch encouraging me to get back to where my website belongs by paying them to ‘make it so‘. Meaning of course that there was no need for my removal from the top of the search other than I have refused to cough up the dough to keep me there, while others, although hopefully not all, presumably pay a goodly sum to buy their way in. Which ones pay and which ones don’t, well, their used to be a separate category drawing attention to paid insertions so as to draw a distinction between merit and money, but not any more. Its been this way since about 2017 when google changed their algorithms, whatever that really means, and so I don’t expect anything to change any time soon.

But that’s OK, I’m not really sure that I want the full weight of an increasingly cynical  internet careening through my website as they click away at the first page they see, for ever since my first tentative post way back in the spring of 2013 it has been my intention for martincooney.com to avoid the hullabaloo on-line these days and instead relay my point of view from the perspective of a stone carver living in today’s lightening paced 3D printed world rather than to paint some sort of a personal portrait of who I am behind the scenes, draw a following and all.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

2003 saw the fourth dramatic transatlantic move of my life, this time from verdant Frome, Somerset, England, to alpine Woody Creek, Colorado, USA.

In the beginning martincooney.com’s platform was to get the word out and tell my story; that I learned to carve stone by attaining my NVQ Level 2 at the City of Bath College and most importantly worked in two banker masonry shops, Phoenix Masonry and Bath Stone, in the surrounding villages. Shortly after which Kris and I sold our home in town of Frome, England and left for Woody Creek, 8 rural miles north of Aspen, in autumn of 2003.

But a full ten years would transpire before I would begin cataloging events here on martincooney. Much work and many projects went entirely undocumented during this period and so scant few photos or reminders remain of those rather heady times, but a lot of work transpired, I can assure you.

At first my only objective in firing up martincooney.com was to simply learn the ropes of merely blogging the world around me, but then certain topics, centering around the astonishing recreational activities we enjoy here in the Roaring Fork Valley, began to surface as a category all of their own, Then the Colorado Rock Mountain Sculpture Garden as I called it then, later to morph into Birdhaven Studio Sculpture Garden, became the focus of my attention, and so it went, with each article teaching me how better to tell an on line story utilizing blocks of words interspersed with large format pictures, sort of like this post, if you see what I mean.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

The Ice Palace, January 8 to March 5 2013, ‘Birdhaven’, The Colorado Rocky Mountain Sculpture Garden, Woody Creek, Colorado

Day 16 January 23

I just love these sorts of days

In our own back yard.

The days of wine and lupine.

Pretty soon Mother Nature has her paint brush out and…..

Of course, the good old  North West Tuscan Way continues to pick up views with an annual spring surge prompted by Europeans and Americans planning their own Tuscan Adventure no doubt. But whatever the topic, location or situation I always showcase the local stonework, statuary and architecture in a way that perhaps only a stone carver might. For once mastered, the art, science and technique of stone carving forbids one from ever quite seeing a block of stone the same way again.

In fact, once you notice the amount of stone featured all over this site – either in its raw mountainous form, cut and trimmed into buildings or exquisitely sculpted into fine art – be warned, you may never see it quite in the same way again. For as  I have chimed in many many times by now here on martincooney.com: stone carvers did indeed shape our world – or at least the best bits of it.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

Take a Trip Along The North West Tuscan Way ONLY at martincooney.com or by actually going to Italy yourself.

Which leads me to the question of why people do indeed click on martincooney, who they are and what they appear to be looking for. My guess is that they are looking for certain information regarding stone related searches, but also I think many people, perhaps including you, who simply like to look and wander around an attractive and interesting site that carries no advertising and presents such big format pictures – of course, there is always that.

But most people are here because they have put quite some effort into seeking what it is that I offer. For once here I see a high degree of engagement, with the average visitor clicking 3 to five times on the various topics, with some people occasionally spending a considerable amount of time, often reaching clicks into the dozens.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

The three Cooneys: Kris, Martin and Joseph are The KMJ Cooney Studio Gallery

Ironically perhaps, for a site called martincooney.com, few articles attend to matters of a personal nature. Kris – my wife, and  Joseph – my son, at times do hover in and out of the picture, but in general, as with my own personal life, little is divulged here, and that is the way I like it.  I prefer instead to point the lens away from me and onto this great big beautiful world of ours, and the long-standing influence stone has had on us wee human beings, right down to the very stone we hew from quarries and carve into the individual block with which we build our gorgeous public and civic buildings, homes and practically cities in some parts of the planet. In fact, once you begin to notice just how much carved stone there is strewn across many of the larger cities, even here in America, then you can never quite not see it the same way again.

But, yes of course, I readily admit it: martincooney.com is primarily a shop window for my sculpture, so please do check it out before you leave by clicking on some of the tabs located in the banner at the top of the page and see for yourself why it is that I love the whole topic of marble so very much.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

Courtesy of Marble Museum, Colorado

photo Ron Bailey

I like to think that martincooney.com as a nice cozy place on the internet whereby you  may drop in at any time and wander around at will – there’s lots to discover. And who knows? You may even find yourself planning a trip along The North West Tuscan Way some day.

Or from my point of view, better still, you can begin planning your visit trip here to the gorgeous Roaring Fork Valley for a lovely and memorable spell somewhere along the Aspen Marble Detour. Including of course a scheduled visit to our sculpture gallery: The KMJ Cooney Studio Gallery, which (conveniently) faces Aspen Airport and fronts Highway 82, with off street parking for added convenience.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

Inspired by the interest it has gathered on the internet martincooney.com has now grown into a vast labyrinth of a site, with topics, videos and photographs dealing with a wide range of subjects, but thankfully over the course of seven years I have learned how to assemble and display the various tabs and categories in a way that works more smoothly than ever.

My articles are usually quite long and in depth, such as my many pieces written about the complex and in depth subject of the Colorado Yule Marble Quarry and its storied and oft time cruel history – and I like it that way, long and involved.

Please Click On A Photo To Enlarge

Light, Portable and Carved For Full Immersion in the Real World – That’s my Signature Unique Colorado Yule Marble Collection Series Sculpture. Check it out today!

But yes, I very much would like to sell more of my light, portable and revolutionary Curvilinear Marble Sculpture, and so please pass on martincooney.com to whoever you suspect might appreciate the link.  I’ve worked very hard to get my ‘on-line magazine and sculpture gallery’ to this point and my aim is to make it better and better as the years go by.

I’ll let you go now – but thank you very much indeed for taking the time to read all of this. While perhaps not one of my more constructive posts, it really feels good to let you know of the true situation as to why I don’t appear on “Google first pages?”  and at last get the whole sordid subject behind me and off my chest.

~ ~ ~

Search Engine “GOOGLE FIRST PAGES” and why you’ll seldom find me there these days

~ ~ ~

The Truth About Search Engines is that, unlike the good old days, when merit ruled the internet

FIRST PAGE RESULTS ARE NOW ROUTINELY BOUGHT

by the highest bidder

~ ~ ~

thanks for visiting martincooney.com

~ ~ ~

⌈∨⌉@®ℑÎ∩

•  ⌋ ~

√

Search Engine “GOOGLE FIRST PAGES” and why you’ll seldom find me there these days The Truth About Search Engines is that, unlike the good old days, when merit ruled the internet FIRST PAGE RESULTS ARE NOW ROUTINELY BOUGHT…

[sikegames-blog]

Iteration, iteration, iteration...

************************************************************************************************

         !!! PART 1!!! :D ************************************************************************************************

Hey there, this is Mike. I've been wanting to do a blog post for a while buuut I get distracted and things come up constantly from numerous different sources.

Being a generalist on a game makes things really tough, it's one of the hardest things I've ever had to try and manage in my life. I've invested time into learning to draw, paint, model, (horribly) rig and animate, compose and play music, arrange video clips, design a 3D UI, learn basic physics, learn basic linear algebra and programming, the scripting kind as well as the lower level/messier kind.

I've learned so many different software packages that it drives me nuts how I can't ever become accustomed to any single one any more like I used to. Back in the good ol' days when things were so much simpler being content with just having to improve my drawing and painting ability. I had the luxury of developing a sweet set of custom hotkeys for photoshop that I could just memorize nearly every operation I would ever have to EVER operate, and I would just play with those hotkeys switching them around every few months trying to figure out the perfect combination.

NO LONGER!!!

Sounds like a fantasy land nowadays.It's hard for me to imagine the feeling of how I used to live, practicing one thing over and over and over and over and over and over and over again every day. Ironically I don't really do much drawing any more, but I always remember the fundamental lessons it has taught me, and that is.

You never. get. it. perfect.

ITERATION!!!!!!!!

Key ingredient to anything sweet and savory in the games business and most component parts that make up great games. It takes time, oof, it takes effort, owieee, and most of all it takes persistence!

So, what is this post really about? Well let's talk about it.

Part 1, we've already completed, I wanted to create a little intro about myself so I can never talk about it again on here.

Part 2, the meat and potatoes, I want to provide some value to anyone who might do the same stupid things that I did over and over and over when I was initially learning how to program games!

so, on to part 2!!!(... of part 1 of the article series.... don't worry about it)

************************************************************************************************           !!!PART 2!!!D: ************************************************************************************************ This post is primarily geared towards programmers using the Unity game engine. If you are not a programmer, or you are an experienced one, I do not think you will get much out of this post. This is all about me going from a total noob to a somewhat less of a noob. BUT if my assertion is incorrect and you do in fact find something of use, then GREAT, i'd love to hear about it.

So, what do I mean about iteration anyways?

Such a broad topic, applies to everything, so lets narrow it down.

The first alpha version of super nut ball I thought I had done a pretty decent job. It wasn't the very first thing I had ever programmed, but it was the first real serious attempt at trying to create a piece of software I could feel proud of. It was fun, I enjoyed it, but towards the end of the first cycle I had felt a bit stressed whenever I had tried to tackle any changes to the codebase. It was a total fucking mess and I was delusional. I really believed I had done something pretty good and it was a very good thing I hadn't shown that code to anyone who I'd wanted to impress!

People played the game, gave a positive reaction in general and I was happy, they were happy. Who cares if the code is messy?! The game is fun!!!

WRONG

This is a horrible way to perceive a project as the developer of it, especially one that has no real deadline. Ideally I would like to think that I always do the best I can and give myself credit for trying to do the right thing and make the best possible decisions given what I know at the time. Buuuuuut, for some reason that's just not how things seem to work. So let's look at some code.

(This is making my skin crawl just as I break open the dusty old windows folders)

Here's the link to a tiny github repository I created for this post:

https://github.com/SGMike/SuperNutBallBlog_01 We're going to be taking a gander at the PlayerController.cs script.

I'll take some code snippets and post them here as well.

Please keep in mind that while the newer one is updated and much improved, this is an honest-open look into the development of our game in it's current raw state. I didn't want to clean it up beforehand to give a false impression of, 'look how great and clean and super tight Mike's code is!, what a jerk!' Unfortunately no, even with a lack of tight deadlines there is still way too much to get perfect and I am constantly iterating on this as I go and hopefully one day it will be perfect!

But if I would have waited until I made this script perfect to create this blog post then this post would have never existed, so I had to just commit myself to finally get to it.

So lets start our journey inside of PlayerController_OLD inside of void FixedUpdate() on line 83. This is the gist of what is going on in there....

if (pressThing) {                                                                                                    if (thing2Happend || thing4IsHappening  && (!thing6MightHappen)) {             moving = false;                                                                                                 flying = true;                                                                                                  }                                                                                                                            else if (thing5HasYetToHappen) {                                                                           DoThing32();                                                                                                     turnOffMe = false;                                                                                         if (otherSuperFunThing == !true && playerStunned) {                                              moving = true;                                                                                                  flying = false;                                                                                             }                                                                                                                             CountDownTimer66();                                                                                              }             }

JESUS CHRIST. What kind of squirrel crack was I smoking when I wrote that. I honestly have no idea, it's pretty horrible and a perfect example of what no developer should ever EVER EVER do. It saddens me to still see, to this day, some of my fellow classmates create code that looks similar to this and even worse in some cases.

I would like to think that this is a typical programmer noob mistake so that I am not alone, I feel like I have seen it quite a few times and that is:

Failing to understand the concept of encapsulation. IE. sticking freaking everything into Update.

If you ever can help it, at any place possible, abstract code that is related to one single task into a single function. Ideally the function called Attack() contains every piece of logic necessary to carry out an attack. Now, realistically this is just not feasible, functions are very limited on their own, but utilized in combination with classes they can be extremely powerful and flexible. We will get to that later though, back on topic.

Digging through my memory I believe that I ended up with this because when I had started to create the game I had placed a few items inside of update, you know, general stuff when starting out like. When I press left, move left, when I press right, move right. It's just 4 if statements right? What's so bad about that? I hear this kind of thinking CONSTANTLY it's bad bad bad.

Get in the habit of doing the right thing, even if you think a change will be really quick

If you're more experienced writing code, then this is obvious when it's okay to futz around and do some quick stuff. But in almost every situation, I end up having to rewrite the crap code I put down because I soon get excited at the possibilities and start to chip away again at this growing tangled hairball of logic.

Looking at both scripts, you might notice that in the new version I managed to encapsulate the logic to the point where I do not even need an Update() function. This is me striving for a more event-based approach to the design. Most game logic is event based. You have on key pressed, on key removed, on player stunned, on player jumped, on player landed. You can really break everything down to simple to understand events, everything else is simply a simulation.

I do have a few things inside of FixedUpdate for slightly more efficient updating.

//  Update Particles  // UpdateParticles();

//  Update Movement  // MoveHorizontal(m_controlAxes.x);

//  Update Recently Stunned Timer  // UpdateRecentlyStunnedTimer();

Looking at it now, I probably don't even need the last function in there. I'm sure there was some constraint that led me to use FixedUpdate() instead of a coroutine, which in simple cases is often the right choice for handling timers.

Earlier this year I did a near complete refactor of the entire game, because the game overall is pretty small this took about a week of not doing much else other than rewriting the game. The resulting code is what you see here. Overall things are far more encapsulated, clean, super simple to understand, and the total amount of code is less than it was before(Not in this particular script however). There are a lot of changes and things I'd love to talk about in depth but I am already going much farther than I had originally planned which is why I have broken this post into multiple parts. I'll probably find some images to spice up the article as well.

The code from before was a massive pain to work with, I would literally get anxiety when I would think about making changes to it and feel my heartrate increase. Not a great way to have fun creating a game designed to be fun. Now, the code is awesome, I love working in it because it's so simple and straightforward and iteration is lightning fast compared to how it used to be.

If Sophie tells me something like, You shouldn't be able to dash when you're holding the nut, literally all I have to do is go to this script,

hit Ctrl+F,

type 'dash(' and I am immediately there.

I add a piece of code that says

if (m_nutGrabber.IsHoldingNut())     return;

FREAKING AMAZING!!!

Just take a look at FixedUpdate() from the old script and imagine how much of a huuuuge pain it was trying to sort through that mess, can you imagine why I used to get anxiety from it!?

Now this is all well and good but, what is going on outside of this script?!?! Surely there is an Update() call SOMEWHERE, otherwise how am I getting input?

And you are absolutely correct, the big major difference is that ALL of the update logic is handled in one encapsulated script I have called InputController which handles all of the logic for the player whether that is through a controller or mouse/keyboard. It is important to note that while yes, this does take more setup up front, but once it is set up, you have a nice system in place for handling these things and it makes further iteration a breeze.

Now let's say you actually want to write some test code, just throw it into a private function and call that function from Update. This way you'll get the same instant gratification from doing quick and messy test code but you'll still retain the ability to quickly sort through the test code and the code you still want to actually keep working from before. The danger here is that you end up writing a second private function called from within the first and you start to build up this heap of private functions. If you ever find yourself starting to follow this pattern it means that what you're doing is probably going to actually be implemented to some kind of significant degree and is no longer test code. If this is the case, then it should be designed and encapsulated properly. In this situation I would remove that function call from Update() and stick it into InputController's Update(). Simple, it only took a few seconds and it maintains a consistent and clean architecture that we've built up. Take the time to do things right, you will almost always be thankful you did later. This is especially true when programming a game in pure C++.

Unity shields people from a lot of the real messy work that is involved when rolling your own tech and having to deal with software architecture. They provide a framework with these nice functions like OnTriggerEntered(), Awake(), Update() and FixedUpdate(). Functions like Start() and Awake() in particular can be really nasty traps awaiting nooby programmers who don't plan ahead. Unity also utilizes C# which has Delegates and Events built into the language, as well as garbage collection built into the VM. These tools are massive boons that free you as the developer from having to worry about hardcore and messy architecture design that is undoubtedly contained within Unity's engine code. These things are great but this convenience comes at a cost, and that cost is missing out on understanding how to properly structure code, which can be an extremely difficult skill to cultivate.

The ability to architect a good solid codebase is a fundamental skill of computer science and one that you can refine for the entirety of your lifetime. The issues related to good architecture are extremely difficult to solve, the best option is almost always unclear and fundamentally difficult to figure out because the best solutions are those that are contextual. In almost every single situation you do not know beforehand the best architecture because you haven't attempted to build it yet. It's after you have failed that you realize what the proper approach should have been, and even then it's not always clear.

Well, it's nearly 4AM again and I've been writing for a while, in the future I'm planning on creating more posts that go further in depth on these kinds of topics. I've barely scratched the surface of what I really wanted to talk about and I want to get to some more theory on what I believe makes for a good architecture. This will include a discussion on the kinds of issues that have cropped up while working on Super Nut Ball and how the game's components are architected and composed.

If you made it this far thanks for reading, I hope you got something out of this first messy post and drop us a line to let you know you exist!

-Mike