#i did put a bunch of names on a list and choose randomly btw

[ekat-fandom-blog]

It was a fact that the name or names that appeared on your arm was going to be either your worst enemy or your greatest ally. It was a fact that there was no way to discern if you had your enemy's or ally's name(s). It was a fact that the most a person could have is 10 names.

Sam Manson has 3 names: Danielle Phantom, Edward Nygma, and Barbara Gordon.

Danny has 7 names: Clockwork, Atrocitus, Bart Allen, Selena Kyle, Billy Batson, John Constantine, and Oswald Cobblepot.

Tucker has 3 names: Conner Kent, Guy Gardner, and Arthur Curry.

Jazz has 6: Swamp Thing, Saint Walker, Alfred Pennyworth, Bane, Tawky Tawny, and Diana Prince.

Dani has 4: Amazo, Hippolyta, Pamela Isley, and Ra's al Ghul.

[artsyhamsterdraws]

My first Artist alley experience

So I did it. I survived! Can I get a wahoo yeehaw boiiiiii

*cough*

Anyway I wanted to write a "lil" thing about it all, like how it went, what I learned and shit like that. So here we go~

The convention I've been going to for a while now (3 times if you count this one) is called Närcon summer, and it's a "bit of everything" convention in Linköping (sweden) that happens every summer, but they also have one in the winter and fall as well, tho I've never been to those. (I want to try and get to Närcon Winter this time if it's possible).

It's pretty big. Apparently this year they got about 12.500 visitors over the weekend, so I got to meet a lot of people!

So, how was it?

Well if I wanna be short and straight to the point, it was amazing. I had so much fun and I can't wait to return!

Long answer? Well this one will go through the whole experience from start to finish. So buckle up kiddos this might get boring.

So for me it started even before the convention opened it's gates. During it I had decided to try and sell sketchbook commissions for 50 sek (like 5 bucks), because (1): It meant I would have something to do and wouldn't just have to sit at my table and stare off into space, and (2): Seemed fun.

I then decided to try and start selling them before the convention started, so that some people could come and pick them up day 1 if they wanted to. This worked, way better than expected. In the end I had 5 drawings to make before I even got there.

Here also comes the first thing I learned!

If you sell it for cheap, some people will tip you once they see the final result!

Not everyone paid extra, but I had a couple do it and that seriously almost brought tears to my eyes :')

I had reasons for selling them for so little, but I know that it was way too cheap considering the amount of time I put into each of those drawings. I just felt that; since basically no one knows who I am and this is my first time having a table, this would be a good way to get my name and work out there.

I mean, it did work since I sold 13 of them in total? Over 3 days? (I've never drawn that many things in such a short amount of time ever before).

At first I thought I wouldn't be able to sell more commissions once I got there since I already had 5 of them to do (3 of which I managed to finish before I got there). But apparently I can be fast if I need to? Suddenly they were all just...done and I opened up the commissions again!

Here are a couple of them that I remembered to take pics of:

It was a mix of fanart, original things and OC´s! Some of them I actually wanna make digital versions of cause I think they would look cool...

Once I got there I had to face one of my fears...my neighbors...  I had no idea what so ever who I would be seated with so I was afraid these upcoming 3 days would be filled with awkward silence and avoiding eyecontact. BUT! And that's a huge but (hehe)! They were great. Literally first second I met them I was like "yeah this is going to be fine".

We had so much fun, and once it got late we would sing Abba songs, and today I feel sorry for the people that had to listen to us... :P

I hope to meet them again next närcon, but the gods probably won't put us as neighbors again. They're probable mad at us for the Abba thing...

Oh and, they're both very talented and y'all should check them out! Here are their instagrams!

Literalpleb Apeachiations

Both had a bunch of fire emblem stuff, and apeachiations had some real pretty steven universe prints I wish I could buy but I don't watch steven universe so :(

Oh and I was given amazing gifts from them!

Then I bought these 2 key..chains...rings...I can't remember the english word....

Anyway I saw the Kirby one and knew I had to get it, and then I was talked into gettin the other one (I love it and wanted it don't get me wrong. It's a joke). I have yet to play the new fire emblem because my pre-order is back home and I'm at my parents place for another couple of weeks so :(

(I bought stuff from other people as well but I'll show that at the end!)

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Setting up the table was fun! I decided to bring my bookmarks and a couple of prints, + like 8 stickers of my hamster logo. I gave 2 of them away tho to my neighbors .

Oh and I put one of my cosplay rifles on the table as well because I decided it would be too much work carrying 2 around. x'D

It started out slow. Most people just stopped by and looked and then moved on. I sold maybe 1 print and 2 bookmarks the first day? I didn't expect much anyway since it was my first time there. Honestly I'm surprised one of my prints even got sold ^^' So I wasn't that put down by the first day...

But then it was Friday, the second day, and things started picking up! I sold out one of my prints! Someone even decided to buy that damn rifle I randomly threw on there, which was amazing. I still can't believe it?

Friday was also the day my friend and I decided to do our cosplay. I missed a couple of hours in the alley because of that, since we had to get back to the hotel and change and all. Tho we did it during the evening so that it would get colder outside and we wouldn't miss THAT much time.

The alley closed around 10pm so we left around 3 to change, got back at 7 and spent those last hours there. Once it closed we also stayed way later at the convention, just walking around and actually looking at things!

Ok back to artist alley!

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The last day I entered the building, and then only went outside once to buy a drink. Other than that I literally sat there a whole day. 10-10. (Don't worry I had a friend with me that came and went with drinks/snacks).

This day was by far the busiest! I had figured out already that most people wait until the last day before they buy a lot, which makes sense since you want to scope out the whole place before deciding on anything. Saturday (the last day) was also probably one of the days most one-day goers chose? I don't have evidence but that's the day I would choose if I only went 1 day at least...

I decided I would have sales on the last day. For example you got a discount if you bought a whole set of bookmarks. The commissions stayed the same price tho since it was already so cheap. ^^'

In the end I sold 45 bookmarks, the rifle, all my stickers, 13 commissions and all prints except for the 2 with the woman laying in flowers :/ My poor Selma (oc). Might put those on my etsy? I still have bookmarks there btw! Even though I sold a lot those did not sell out. xD

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Now, the last day was also the day I bought stuff from others. I decided not to buy anything from the big shops in the other building, and only spent my money on food and artist alley stuff!  Gotta support em fellow artists ya know!

I already listed the things I bought from my neighbors, but I went outside of our little hidden away corner too (I did not pay extra for like a good seat heh...).

I had table 74 (in the upper right corner)...so yeah we were very hidden. Considering the bad spot my table did very well!

Anyway, Here's the cool shit I bought!

The artists' Instagrams:

Linn Standal (Cinnapai)

Emma Lupine

Linda Lithén

I also picked up a bunch of business cards from people I couldn't buy from this time...

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So then. What did I learn for next time? Weeeeell...let's make a list I guess!

If you sell commissions for cheap, some people will tip you once they see the final result! (These people are very kind)

The first day is slow. Don't panic!

You always need to bring more business cards than you think. I thought I had enough but nope, they were gone halfway past the second day :/

Next time I'll bring more prints. (Only brought 2 of each, except for the spirited away one. Of that I had 4)

People make cute sounds when they see something they like :'D

Hhhh people are so kind!

Take pictures of your damn commissions!

Bring more drawing paper. (I had to buy a new sketchbook the last day cause I had like...one empty page left)

Leave a sketchbook on the table for people to look through

You're not as bad as you think you are.

People are very kind

Put the commission sign in the middle where it's easy to see it. A lot of people didn't see mine before I moved it.

Putting a sign saying "only one left" on an almost sold out item is good.

Keep track of which prints get the most people to stop. Make note of this and order more of them for next time.

Also take notes whenever someone buys something, so you know how much you sold!

Find something you can hang your prints on so you don't have to lay them on the table. There's not as much space as you think there is.

EAT!!! FFS!!!

Write down your instagram on your business card! (I forgot I had one xD)

Aaaand I think that's that?

Like I said, I had an amazing time and I really hope to do something like this again very soon! Hopefully I'll have time and money to get to Närcon winter. I'll at least try and grab myself a table just in case, and sell it if I can't go in the end. I probably won't cosplay there tho and only focus on artist alley. ^^'

Well, how the fck did you read all this? Impressive. I am impressed. Here's a picture of my cat as a price!

Bye!

[ponyregrets]

So what are your thoughts on S4 overall? I know you didn't care about the last season very much

my good friend @tlaloc�� asked for spoilers/if she should catch up on the show so I ended up writing a very long email with a summary of every episode in the season and my feelings on whether or not she should watch each one, so I’m just going to use that email as my answer here, anon!

401: The apocalypse is back, in pog form! They call the upcoming badness THE DEATH WAVE and it is literally a wave of fire we see it consuming some Egyptian grounders at the end of this episode so that's cool. Anyway this is a solid intro episode, kind of weird camera angles, but we set up Roan in charge, Clarke wants to save the world, Bellamy is attractive, etc. etc. I like this one.Watch: Yes

402: This episode is really weird because the big plot is about how they are gonna turn the Ark into a bunker to survive the upcoming DEATH WAVE and Bellamy takes a rag-tag bunch of misfits to some Ice Nation place to get a part they need, but then they discover they have SLAVES and Bellamy has to decide whether to get the part and leave the slaves or blow up the part to save the slaves. This was clearly meant to make Bellamy sympathetic again after the whole massacre thing, but by saving the slaves he reduced the savior capacity of the Ark from 500 people to 100 people so anyone who was still mad at Bellamy remained mad at Bellamy. Also Octavia starts murdering people, that's cool.Watch: Follow your heart

403: Bellamy and Clarke go on a road trip with Jaha because he found a new cult to be into on his iPad. Clarke has to make a list of 100 people who will survive the upcoming apocalypse. She cries about putting her own name on so Bellamy writes it for her. I don't care about anything else that happened. OH WAIT radiation is coming Luna shows up like dying of radiation but DOESN'T DIE dun dun dunWatch: I've seen this episode like eight times

404: OKAY NOW WE ARE GETTING INTO THE SHITTY MIDDLE OF THIS SEASON WHERE THE POINTS ARE MADE UP AND THE SCORES DON'T MATTER goddd anyway Monty and Jasper (oh btw Jasper was gonna kill himself before but found out that the world is ending anyway and was like COOL I CAN JUST WAIT so yeah) find the list and are like CLARKE THIS IS FUCKED UP YOU ARE NOT GOD Roan kidnaps Bellamy and finds out they are planning to keep the Ark just for themselves, Octavia gets shoved off a cliff, Bellamy gets told she's dead and is FUCKING HEART BREAKING and then all the tension is lost because they immediately reveal that she's alive, this will be a patternWatch: Eh

405: THIS EPISODE IS SUCH A GIANT WASTE like did you ever read the last twilight book where they are about to have a huge confrontation but then one of them can see the future and she sees how the fight would go so she's like nah we out? that's this episode. Bellamy figures out immediately that his sister is alive so they do nothing with ROCK BOTTOM GRIEF and then he has to talk this rando dude everyone acts like we care about (no seriously he is one of the slaves they saved in 402 and everyone is like YAY IT'S RILEY and makes a big deal and he is just a non-entity) out of murdering Roan and he does but it's a shitty speech also Echo is there being weird Echo is so weird this season I think they just want to have her around to date Bellamy if they chicken out of Bellarke ANYWAY Clarke and Roan agree that they will share the 100 spaces in the Ark, but then Ilian, the grounder who brought Octavia back, decides to set fire to the entire Ark and it burns up in a fiery explosion while Bellamy holds Octavia and and Clarke holds both of them and they're all like OUR HOME IS GONEWatch: Probably not

406: The Ark appears undamaged everyone is still hanging out living there it's SO WEIRD Clarke gets laid and stares at a picture of Lexa, Octavia tells Bellamy she hates him for killing Lincoln, which is the first we've heard of it since the season began, BUT THEN Clarke and Bellamy go on a pretty great roadtrip with Roan so Clarke can go to science island, where Raven and her mom are using Luna's blood to try to save people, bc nightbloods are immune to radiation. Also they need to go to space and are bringing rocket fuel. Bellamy definitely tries to tell Clarke he loves her on a river bank.Watch: Sure

407: OH this one is pretty great actually! Emori is a fucking badass on science island, Clarke is good, Bellamy has a GREAT storyline and also takes off his shirt. It's relatively plot light--black rain is coming and burning people, they need someone to test nightblood on probably--but a nicely done self-contained episode. This is also FINALLY when they start realizing what they need to do with Bellamy, which is shut up about the massacre and actually let him do good things.Watch: Yes!

408: This one is pretty meh. They spend the whole episode with Clarke having a moral crisis about using Emori to test nightblood, which is annoying because the moral stakes are fucked. Clarke ends up taking the nightblood herself at the last minute, which is theoretically fine, but they wanted it to be a twist ending so everyone kind of makes no sense up until then to make it happen. Also Abby immediately destroys the radiation chamber that they're gonna use to test if the nightblood really protects them from radiation so it doesn't matter anyway. Bellamy and Jasper go on a quick roadtrip to get drugs and then Bellamy gets drunk and probably laid, so good for you, buddy. Watch: Eh

409: This one was pretty boring IIRC? Mostly I remember that at the end Clarke tries to become commander and Roan shuts her down and decides they're gonna battle royale instead, and it was annoying on like every level. OH Jaha and Kane and Monty found a bunker by Polis where 1200 people can survive so they're taking all their people there, but Jasper and (randomly and stupidly) Harper and some other people decide they want to stay behind to die instead. Monty stays with them for friendship, but is planning to get to the bunker. The battle royale is one champion from each clan fighting, and the winning clan gets the bunker. That's their plan. It's not a great plan. Octavia's been off randomly having sex with Ilian and failing to be a farmer and she shows back up again to fight for skaikru. Her arc this season is a mess, but this is when it starts turning around. Unfortunately, it has nothing to do with anything else she did this season. It just starts going in a better but ultimately random direction.Watch: Eh

410: THIS ONE IS GREAT I was so ready to hate it but they do a good job with the battle royale. Luna shows up to be like IF I WIN YOU ALL DIE bc she's mad at basically everyone, which they don't quite sell, but it spooks Clarke bc Luna is an amazing fighter. Bellamy's like, listen Octavia you are not actually a baller you need to hide until most people are killed, and they follow through on that. Ilian saves her (and dies, you were v pointless, Ilian), and then Roan rethinks Clarke's "we should form an alliance" and forms an alliance with her. Bellamy has to stop Echo cheating and has a GREAT scene with Roan. Octavia eventually does win and I actually believed it, and she says they'll share the bunker equally, which was kind of annoying bc it was literally what Clarke wanted to do, but then it turns out Clarke and Jaha STOLE THE FUCKING BUNKER and also knocked Bellamy out to get him inside before they sealed it. which was SUCH A GREAT TWIST and I was so pumped but unfortunately, next episodeWatch: YES

411: OKAY so like this episode had a lot of individually good parts, but REALLY refused to pick a fucking lane with Clarke, to its detriment. There was great Blake sibling stuff, good Bellamy stuff, but Clarke was just kinda like "eh idk what to do" and really wishy-washy because they wanted this dramatic moment of her pointing a gun at Bellamy, which was fine, but then they had zero follow-up on that. BUT there was a great Raven subplot (Raven is dying of an ALIE brain tumor, I forgot to mention) where she talks to ghost Sinclair in her head and chooses life and I love it. But unfortunately there is ALSO the Jasper subplot where he gets all the kids but Monty and Harper to commit mass suicide and it was majorly triggering for a friend of mine. So, uh, yeah. Anyway in the end Bellamy unseals the bunker and lets the grounders in and O takes charge and tells them they have to pick 100 people for their slots and everyone else dies.Watch: ????????

412: MOST PEOPLE LIKED THIS EPISODE MORE THAN I DID I found the main plot pretty boring it was just Jaha being THE WORST and being like WE FOUND THIS BUNKER WE SHOULD GET SLOTS FOR ALL OUR PEOPLE and stirring shit as they tried to perform a lottery to pick slots. Eventually Kane talks him down and they gas all their own people and just use Clarke's list of 100 people to survive from 403 to pick. Whomp whomp. Meanwhile Clarke and Bellamy are kinda awks but it doesn't last long and he flirts so hard with her he commits vehicular manslaughter, which is hilarious, but Clarke's arc is such a fucking mess this season. ANYWAY they're on a road trip to get Raven that (of course) goes wrong, they end up with eight people on science island who have to go BACK TO SPACE to surviveWatch: Probably yeah

413: COUNTDOWN TO DEATH WAVE this was a good one, tight, single-plot with the kids at science island trying to get the spaceship working. Bellamy and Clarke were A LOT but they also made sure Bellamy had some shiptease stuff with Raven and Echo, I assume in case they decide not to go Bellarke. Clarke ends up having to stay behind on earth to get everyone else out, but because of her nightblood she survives. Bellamy thinks he left her to die on earth and is super sad. Then we get SIX YEAR TIME JUMP Clarke has a cute haircut and adopted a grounder and has been calling Bellamy EVERY DAY even though he can't hear her she just talks to him anyway and she SPOTS A SHIP and thinks it's them but of course it's a MYSTERIOUS OTHER SHIP DUN DUN DUNWatch: For sure

And that's what you missed on Glee! Overall I think S4 was better than S3 but the pacing was AWFUL and they kept just setting shit up and botching the delivery. I'm honestly pretty excited about the timeskip for S5 and I am looking forward to a hiatus full of angsty BELLAMY THINKS CLARKE IS DEAD fic like damn