#in which I just wanna put all my characters in fun cover art

[fallingtofar]

The Twin Stars

[literallyjusttoa]

Hey guys! I'm putting out a call for my commissions again for two big reasons: One, Emergencies have caused me to be low on funds when I wasn't expecting it, and that kind of sucks actually. Two, I have a project that I've been dreaming about for years but have actually been able to start working towards in the last couple of months, but to finish it I need to not be living paycheck to paycheck for like a month at the very least, which brings me back to point one :(. I will talk more about the big project under the cut, bc I think it's something you all might really enjoy!

But for now, I will link my commission sheet: Here (It's also my pinned post)

And my new Ko-fi!: Here for if you just want to donate, which would be literally incredible and I would owe you my soul actually.

Ok now for big Project Time!!!

I am in the process of editing and revising my first Youtube video! This has been an on and off dream of mine for like 7 years at this point, but I've finally taken the plunge and gotten to work on a channel. I wanna talk about all sorts of fandoms (including the riordanverse ofc) With videos ranging from plot and character analysis, to trends in fandom culture in general, to fun little ranking videos and speedpaints. All around, I just want the channel to be a fandom hive, where everyone can find something they enjoy.

I already have PNG's created of my sona to use as assets (And I have a sparkly new sona, the one in the pic above!) and I have two finished scripts, with the first one being fully recorded as well! One for my first video, which will be a retrospective on Gravity Falls, and one for a video about the Percy Jackson TV show, the inherent differences between TV and books as mediums, how I think the TV show could improve, and the things I think it got perfectly. I also have a bunch more ideas, such as:

BIG Trials of Apollo video essay, with a focus on how the books and the fandom have effected me over the years.

Ranking all of my favorite characters from all of the media I've been a fan of over the years (This would be over 70 characters)

Explaining the Iliad, but make it funny (with a side of Troy apologia)

Reading Lore Olympus and pointing out how it deviates from myth (the things I'm willing to do for you people /j)

Canon vs. Fanon, where I compare a characters canon characterization with their fanon counterpart and try to figure out how things turned out the way they did.

And more, but I don't want this post to be 5000 words long.

Now here's the big question. As I said in the part above, I'm struggling a bit now money-wise. And I really wanna make this project work, but there's also, you know. Tuition. Rent. Food. Stupid other adult stuff. So if anyone is amenable (and this is totally up to demand, I don't wanna pressure anyone into doing anything!) I was also thinking of maybe making a Patreon. Now, I'd have to do research for this, bc I wanna make sure anyone who signed up would get the right rewards and really get the bang for their buck. I'm pretty sure there's not gonna be much interest in this rn, cuz like, I'm not that big of a blog oof. But if anyone is interested! Here are some of the perks I would definitely be implementing! (sry it's another list)

Early access to videos, and behind the scenes looks at art assets and video creation

the ability to request topics for videos

Patrons names being shown in the videos. And higher tiered patrons getting custom chibis that will be shown in videos as well (and given to the patrons obv)

This ones a bit complicated, but I want to create a cover of a song that has to do with each video to play during their outros. So like, for the gravity falls video, I'm gonna record a quick cover of the Disco Girl song from the show. Only a small section of the song would be in each video, but patrons would get access to the full covers, and be able to request songs to be covered.

Discounts on commissions

A monthly speedpaint that would be exclusive to patreon. Patrons would be able to vote on what the drawing would be.

All of these ideas I'm 100% sure I want to add to a patreon if I make one, but obv there could be more that comes up later. I'm just gauging interest on this idea rn, so let me know if that's something you'd be down to sign up for! Maybe I'm jumping the gun here but I'm just really excited to create and give back to the community and aaahhhhh

Now, no matter what, I'm gonna have this first video out by mid-September at the latest. Because stupid money troubles are not gonna stop me from making this a thing dangit. So look out for that, I'll link the vid here when it releases! But I am just really stressed rn and any support would go a long way towards making this dream come true. And on that note, one more sappy real talk if I am allowed it?

If you've read this far, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. This community and fandom is truly incredible. My blog is about to reach 5 years old, and I've never seen a group of people so accepting and creative and just fun to be around. You guys have truly changed my life, and I wouldn't have the courage to try for this if I didn't have the support you've given me. I know this is super dramatic for just trying to make a youtube channel, but making a place where I could just talk about all the nerdy and overly specific things I care about and share them with the world is something I've wanted for my whole life. You guys gave me that with this blog, and if this channel works out, it'll be thanks to you, so you'll have given it to me twice. I don't have the words to express how much I love this community and all the incredible people in it. So even if you can't support, just know that being here for however long you have been, whether it's the whole five years or the last two days, has done more than you'll ever know. You guys are the best, thank you for everything <3

[novasolstarr]

Hello and Welcome to NovaSolStarr’s blog!

Come in come in, take a seat!! I don’t bite here {:

Welcome to my blog! Apologies for this lengthy post but I just wanna get down a few rules and regulations here before you venture any further friend!

This is not a required read but it may provide some helpful insight to you {;

Let’s get it started

INTRODUCTION

My name is NovaSolStarr, feel free to call me Nova or Dusty!

I go by They / Them and It / It’s but feel free to also use bun / buns and fae / fier {:

I’m a digital artist and traditional doodler, you’re gonna see a mixed batch of content from me!

My fandom interests vary greatly and you’re likely to see some jarring switch ups to say the least

I do primarily Fandom and personal OC content, but you are likely to see other things!

Art Trades are 🔒Closed to the public, friends can ask but I am busy

Commissions are 🔒Closed

Art request are 🔐Tentative, see more in “Ask Rules”

‼️ACCOUNT WARNINGS‼️

I make a variety of content, though all SFW please know that I may also;

Make fairly suggestive content

Curse a lot, I mean a lot [I promise I’m not an aggressive user

Make blood and gore related content

Make some horror related content

May touch on more sensitive topics [Drugs, Abuse, Alcohol, etc.]

I usually try to censor that which needs it but sometimes I forget to properly tag things, please be aware of this!!

This is a VERY important section and I want you all to listen!!

Please be kind and respectful here

I try to keep my space drama free, and yes this will apply to real world happenings as well. I’m sorry if this disappoints anyone but I want to keep things stress free here.

So if you have drama please take it somewhere else, maybe to an account that’s more attuned for that, this is not the space and will result in a block.

Also please do not be weird towards me, I have a wife, I love my wife, @cyanide-cafe you are my silliest :3

This is a safe space for most people, although there’s exceptions, which leads me to

Let’s get things cleared up right now

IF YOU APPLY UNDER ANY OF THESE, PLEASE UNFOLLOW ME or better yet block me

I welcome most anyone regardless of ethnicity, region, religion, political views, or whatever, however I will NOT tolerate;

Bigots of any form or fashion

Transphobia, Homophobia, LGBTQA+phobia in general

Racism

Body shaming of ANY kinda

Misogyny

Zoophiles

Pedophiles

Proshippers [People who romanticizes problematic or harmful things]

If more needs to be added I will, but so long as you are not one of these people I don’t care.

I had a smaller post related to this but I’ll go ahead and squeeze it into here as well!

My ask blog is completely open for any and all!! With that though here’s some rules to keep it fun for everyone!

Do Not post anything NSFW or explicit in there, this will result in a block

Do Not be asking personal information questions or otherwise potentially harmful things

Do Not be spamming it unnecessarily, I’m fine with lots of questions in one go but if you’re spamming the same thing or generally the same thing over and over I’m not gonna be happy

Do Not put anything hateful or cruel, again this will result in a block, I don’t put up with that shit and I will not feed it

Now we have that covered, let’s talk about what IS okay and what is acceptable {:

Questions related to OCs or AUs of canon characters, I have a lot of fun with it [:

Art requests between OCs and Canon, although I might use my own design for this so be warned! This interaction could be familiar, an introduction, angsty, shipping or whatever! So long as it’s SFW I don’t mind

Art requests of canon characters! Always happy to give new characters a spin

Questions related to me or any comments you might have, do note I might not always respond to comments cause sometimes I just..dunno how to outside of “WAAH THANK YOU {: >”

And that about wraps it all up!

That’s all I have for today! Please just be kind, respectful, and over all have fun here!! I like having a space for people to enjoy and have fun with {:

[luvtonique]

I just woke up and I chose violence let's go.

Look all I'm sayin' is

If you're gonna attack AI generative art

You should, for the same reason, attack Toby Fox.

The reason I've seen the most for people not liking AI is that it's not "Real art" and that it "Takes jobs from artists" and that it "Steals from other artists"

Well, then, let's talk about how Hopes and Dreams by Toby Fox uses fake Violins to mimic a symphony orchestra. Toby could have hired a real orchestra but he used a fake one and y'all came in your drawers over it.

Why'd nobody ever lift a finger to cover social media in how Toby Fox doesn't deserve to make money because his song "Undertale" uses a fake guitar that sounds just like a real one? He could have hired a musician to play guitar but he didn't! That cost a REAL guitar player a job, didn't it?

And how come when it was found out that Toby Fox stole entire lietmotifs from other games like Kirby n shit, y'all had like 600,000,000 excuses to defend him?

I don't dislike Toby I think he's amazing, like 100/10, one'a the brightest examples of a success story of all time and one of the nicest most pure-hearted people on earth who made two of my favorite games of all time and a ton of my favorite music. Spider Dance has been my ring tone for like 8 years.

I'm just saying, the literal same reasons I see people attacking AI gen art is shit that Toby does, all of it, and y'all worship Toby for it but attack artists.

And neither here nor there, but hear me out?

Y'all will say you're in defense of artists keeping their jobs and their livelihoods which is so very noble of you, but if an artist draws shortstacks that are just a little too short, or if an artist utilizes AI, or if an artist draws Rose Quartz skinny, or if an artist draws Sans and Frisk getting a little too Frisky, or if an artist votes for Trump, or if an artist says a dirty word you don't like, or if an artist draws a black person that looks just a little bit too stereotypical, or if an artist draws a lesbian character getting fucked, or if an artist doesn't believe in gender identities, or if an artist doesn't put trans characters in their graphic novel, or if an artist makes a sexy character with butt-jiggle the protagonist of their video game; Y'ALL ARE COMPLETELY OKAY WITH SAYING THAT ARTIST SHOULDN'T BE MAKING MONEY, AND BANDWAGONING A HATEMONGERING BRIGADE AGAINST THEM.

Or in the Sans and Frisk case: PUT SEWING NEEDLES INSIDE OF COOKIES AND GIVE THEM TO THE ARTIST WHO DREW IT, PUTTING THEM IN THE HOSPITAL.

Listen

Spare me this "We hate AI because we care about the jobs of artists" shit, you lying scoundrels. You don't care about my job! You've tried to cancel me like 500 goddamn times, got my Patreon frozen twice, got my PayPal frozen over 100 times even right in the middle of conventions, flooded my stream chat and spammed the N-word in chat trying to get my Twitch banned, flooded my Discord multiple times with links to CP trying to get my Discord banned, and you have entire Discord servers literally called things like "Jay is an asshole" and "The We Hate Jay Society" (YEAH I KNOW YOU FUCKERS EXIST, HI, HAVE FUN SCREENCAPPING THIS).

My artistic career has been under fire for the past 12 years because I draw things y'all disagree with, have opinions you don't like, and have family members who vote for politicians you think are the boogeyman that's the cause of all your problems (and haven't disowned those family members). With all due respect, when I hear "We hate AI because we believe in fair wages for artists and want to protect the jobs of artists" I just wanna strangle your lying ass.

You hate AI because it's popular to hate AI.

AI is like a prosthetic robot arm that helps you carry the groceries, and disabled people like myself (rheumatoid arthritis) benefit from its uses greatly (such as being able to draw backgrounds much easier which has greatly improved my art and INCREASED MY COMMISSION REVENUE DUE TO MY ART QUALITY IMPROVING [But y'all don't care that AI helps artists earn more money, you hate AI because you claim it's hurting artists' ability to earn money]), but you're so hung up on people using the robot arm instead of their real arms that you think you're some crusader against injustice.

You aren't.

You're just looking for reasons to attack people, it's what you do. I've been dealing with y'all looking for any goddamn reason to attack someone that you can muster for the last 12 years, hell even before that I dealt with you types. You just want to hate, you want to be prejudiced so fucking bad that you look for literally any reason you can possibly find to make some vaguepost about how much you hate an artist and post it to Reddit, and then when you get called out, get so surprised that I found your bitch ass that you start pretending you didn't mean any ill will, and start pretending that you're someone else in the most pathetic attempt to dodge blame I've ever seen.

[Context: The OP of this post accidentally revealed who they are on Tumblr, and then when I called them out on Tumblr, they pretended they were someone else because they were scared I was gonna out them on Tumblr and they tried pathetically to cover their ass, and even politely said "I never wanted to garner hate against you" when they literally posted "I hate the way he draws women" on r/mendrawingwomen and flooded the comment section (mostly now deleted) with how "disgusting of a person" I am, while I was in the comments politely giving context to the shit he was saying about me, and he started getting furious when other people were liking my art and agreeing with me instead of him. I have like 600 screencaps of all the cringe this guy spewed, but I'm not gonna post it all because it's tangential anyway. Case in point? This guy's blog is absolutely covered with how much he hates artists for drawing things he doesn't like, and he regularly posts about how AI is taking jobs from artists. Not gonna out his blog, but that's who he is. A shining example of exactly what I'm talking about. "I hate AI because it takes jobs from artists!" "THIS MAN-THING DRAWS WOMEN IN A WAY I DON'T LIKE AND HE'S A DISGUSTING PERSON, EVERYONE JOIN ME IN HATING HIM AND TRYING TO RUIN HIS REPUTATION AND THEN WE CAN CELEBRATE WHEN HE LOSES HIS JOB!!!"]

Like, y'all can sit there and act like you're defending me and artists like me all you want, you're liars. You're boldfaced fucking liars. You are disgusting. It's completely pathetic watching you attack a tool that can be used to improve our art, and claim it's in defense of the authenticity of our art and the continued financial stability of our artistic careers. Fucking give me a break.

You're looking for people who say positive things about AI art so you can attack them and feel justified because it's popular to attack them.

All while sitting there and gladly swallowing the cum of any musician who makes amazing music with synths, fake symphony instruments and autotune.

"We care about the jobs of artists."

Yeah.

Long as those artists fall in line with your opinions and only draw things that agree with said opinions, right?

Wouldn't wanna care about the jobs of "problematic" artists who draw "offensive" stuff or vote for politicians you don't like.

Final note: This isn't even an attack against any political opinions or activism or anything like that, but I'm being realistic here because these are the people I see brigading against AI art. It's not me saying those people are dumb for having their opinions or political standpoints or being activists for their beliefs, it's me saying those people are the ones who are constantly attacking AI art in "defense of artists," while in the same breath attacking artists for not sharing their political standpoints or also being activists for the same causes. If you truly, truly cared about the livelihood of artists, you'd stop attacking artists' livelihood for disagreeing with you. Or for that matter: Any reason. Stop attacking artists' livelihood, or stop pretending you care about it. Be consistent, at least.

[ssalballoon]

i wanna get better at art but dont know how to start ^^' whats a good way to get into studying anatomy and improving as an artist? tysm 💗 love your art soso much

more art converts 😼 yay!!

i think these asks were sent by different people but they're pretty related + a lot of my advice is the same! so i'll answer these together under the cut (it's so long oh gosh)

ok first of all i'm very flattered that people are asking me for art advice but i'm really not the most equipped person to ask TTOTT I've never been deliberately studious with my art so I feel bad offering advice when I've mostly gotten by with just drawing fanart and ocs a lot... my rate of improvement has therefore been slow, but I've still had an enjoyable learning experience so perhaps from that angle my input may help! i'll mainly refer you to external resources that have helped me

For anatomy + drawing humans:

1) I know I'm not diligent enough to sit down and study muscles, so instead I make it more enjoyable by drawing my favorite characters in a pose that targets the muscles I want to practice! (i default to drawing ppl naked because of this lol) This isn't the most efficient, but it serves as good motivation to get practice in. (honestly a lot of my general art advice has the undercurrent of becoming so obsessed with characters to drive your motivation to draw even when artblocked/ struggling with doubts!)

2) I want to refer you to Sinix's Anatomy playlist! Although Sinix focuses more on digital painting, he gives simplified anatomy breakdowns that include how muscles change shape under different movements/poses, which is crucial for natural human posing. the static anatomy diagrams from Google don't really help for that

3) What's just as important as anatomy is gestures! (especially important if you're used to drawing non-human objects I think!) Making figures look like they have flow to them will sell the "naturalness"(?) to your anatomy. If you have in person life drawing sessions accessible near you I'd recommend trying those out, or if you prefer trying it digitally there's this website!

This helps you not only get a sense of human proportions, but also natural posing! I'd limit the time taken to draw the poses from like 10 seconds to 1 minute(?) for quick gestures, and maybe 1 minute to 5mins(for now!! typically they go much longer) to study human proportions. I'd say don't spend a lot of time on them, repetition is more important!

4) I've also picked up on useful anatomy tidbits from artists online! Looking at how practiced/ professional artists stylize a body helps me focus on what the essential details are to convey a particular form (looking up "human muscles" and being hit with anatomy diagrams full of all the smallest details can be overwhelming! what do you even focus on?! so these educated simplifications really help me) Like Emilio Dekure's work! Look how simplified these figures are, and yet contain all the essential information to convey the sense of accurate form (even though it's highly exaggerated!)

(shamefully admits I've never studied from actual anatomy books so I can't recommend anything in that sense TTOTT)

For general improvement:

1) I highly recommend Sinix's Design Theory playlist and Paintover Pals! (+ his channel in general) You don't have to put them immediately into practice, but I think these are good fundamental lessons to just listen to and have them in the back of your mind to revisit another day. Plus these videos are just fun and very approachable! Design theory fundamentals are essential to creating appeal and directing a viewer's attention, and critiquing others' work/ seeing his suggestions are a good way to practice noticing areas of improvement+ solutions yourself!

2) If you prefer a more formal teaching resource, the Drawabox YouTube course covers all the basic fundamentals of drawing in short lessons. But honestly if I were starting out, this would be a little intimidating for me (and even now it still is! I haven't done all of them) But even if you don't watch them, the titles should give you an idea of the basic concepts that are valuable to pick up. I think it would be nice to keep in mind and revisit once in a while as you learn!

(One lesson I do encourage you to watch is the line control one! A confident continuous line conveys motion and flow much better compared to discontinuous frayed lines which I think is good to practice early by drawing from the wrist and shoulder)

3) As a universal piece of advice: Please please please use references! Use a reference for literally everything, observing is how we learn! You'll find that a lot of things you thought you knew what they looked like are inaccurate by memory alone. Also, trace! This is solely for your practice, tracing then freehanding has helped me grasp proportions when I was struggling! (of course don't post these online if you traced from art)

I've found that being able to compile references into easy to access boards has been very helpful in encouraging me to use references more. For PC, I think they use PureRef (free/pay what you want), and for iPad I use VizRef. VizRef is a one time purchase (which was definitely worth the $3.99 USD price imo)

4) On that note, try building up the habit to observe from media + real life and make purposeful comments about what you see! Like hey, when I bend my knee, the muscles/fat in my thighs and calves bulge outwards, I should draw that next time. Purposeful observation carries over to your overall visual library, and it's a little thing that adds up over time

5) For motivation, get into media you really enjoy, or make your own characters! The way I started art more seriously was by drawing fanart + OCs from anime that I liked ^^ For OCs it really encourages you to draw more because you're the primary creator of their art! Also you gotta see a lot of good art to make good art! Watching visually appealing media (like animation with appealing stylization/simplification) can passively help you learn just by observation.

ok wow I could go on but this is already a lot of information TTOTT my main aim for this reply is basically: don't let anything discourage you from learning to draw!! drawing is so fun and brings me a lot of joy ^^ practicing often will of course help you improve, and the way to incentivize that is by having fun with it! i hope this could help!💞

[sharb]

Sharb's SAGE 2023 recommendation list

SAGE is over and I've taken a look through some really good games this week. Wanted to shout out some of the ones I thought were really cute in no particular order.

With over 200 games I can't play through and recomend all of them so please if you're interested in any of these I recomend going to https://sagexpo.org/games.html andlooking at some of the other games available.

These are just the games I've played, if you don't see your game here that's not a comment on the game's quality, just what I had time to check out.

Remember to click the thumbnails to get access to the game's pages

I was immediately interested in B.U.D.D. for it's art and references to games like wonder boy, what really surprised me about it was the humor as it's actually funny in a cute way.

If you like wonder boy or classic sega adventure games I can't recommenced B.U.D.D. enough.

@cyanroxanne pitched this to me as a SHMUP for people that have trouble getting into SHMUP games, after playing the demo and taking a minute to figure out how the game works I actually had a lot of fun with it. I could definitely recommend this to people who wanna get started with the genre, really amazing art too feels like it's a treat just seeing what the next area looks like.

RPG games can be really hard to push on SAGE because of how many games there are to go through and how long they can take to complete, a lot of streamers tend to pass over them for the sake of time so they can cover more games.

So here's my RPG recomendation, Cubenen Gardens is a game being made by @thegamedawg who actually got me to play test his game months ago, the game's still in development but what I've got to mess with so far the game's strongest aspect is it's characters and world building as you help Micheal (the saddest sopping wet creature on the planet) navigate a mall trying to find a rare monster but gets wrapped in more and more conflict.

David gets keen is really short but it has a really strong gameflow to it, my only gripes with it is that the ability HUD could be given more clear graphics as your moves are represented by circles which can make it hard to figure out what they belong to without pressing their corresponding buttons.

Beyond that the grass stage is amazing, playing the level normally gives you a pretty average platformign game but when you start building up speed using your spin move on slopes you can get to insane speeds and just fly through the level skipping puzzles and enemies and clearing the level in seconds, it's really fun when you get the hang of it.

@wootinaboot

Meander land is a really small game by @whiskerfjords game's really fun to play casually, I thought the story and characters were really cute and I'm actually really excited to see what Whisker makes next.

Out-class Hunter from @7hrone returns again with a brand new level to check out, it's a return to Doom style third persons games, specifically SRB2, it's been fun following the development of this game and watching it improve each demo.

Lemme know if you can find the cool cactus, you'll know which one I'm talking about if you follow my games ;)

Prototype N is just a really really solid action platformer game from @arriettylunaris each level has a lot of thought put into it's design and the weapon combinations can be a lot of fun to mess with, I really can't recomend Prototype N enough.

I can't get over how much character personality this game oozes, feels like around every door I'm going to run into something new I like either being a character or a game mechanic that's just fun to mess with, each character brings their own moves and their levels take advantage of a lot of their movements.

I'd compare this to those old 90's Disney game adaptations but this game easily out does them in terms of design as the designs look like they were ripped right out of an old 1940's cartoon shorts.

Peak meme aside, I actually had a lot of fun playing this, Super Freaks is a fun lil platformer game with references to a tonne of other works, you probably saw this game referenced countless times this Sage but it is just really goofy fun, tho I would really recommend playing this with friends if you can, game feels like it was designed around the kind of multiplayer chaos, if you saw the stream I was part of you can see why.

Sorry to all my friends who have heard me talking about this game all week non stop and seeing me reverse engineer SMBX 2 to [redacted] but this was easily my favorite game this SAGE if not the most replay-able, I keep booting this up just to try and make it thought the level as quick as I can.

So if you're like me you've probably been seeing @punkitt-is-here s pony comics or more specifically, the Susan Tax payer comic and the charm, humor and personalities of all of them absolutely coats this game.

It requires a bit of set up, you have to download SMBX2.0 separately in order to play this and SMBX has it's own set of issues that kinda bleed over into some of the issues in the game that need to be ironed out but beyond that this is a really fun demo to play and I absolutely can't wait to see where this goes.

Techpack currently is one Namco inspired arcade game, Tech has put a tonne of time and research into how to nail the old arcade style. The only thing holding it back right now is that the only game available is really simple and short, but man I'd be kicking myself if I didn't mention the presentation on it alone is enough for me to recommend checking this out, really reminds me of the old Namco collection games on playstation.

Now put my rabbit in as one of the cameos :gun_emoji:

Ok that's all the indies I could cover, some honerable mentions that I've been wanting to check out include

kid bubblegame JLFJ 2 Veggocalypse Mekanikko

As for the fangames I've played

Here's a game I wasn't expecting I'd be recommending, Mushroom Kingdom Fusion has been in development for over 15 years and always felt to me about quantity over quality but this new demo really impressed me.

The game is starting to take shape and there's actual structure to everything where as before it was just an open sand pit for them to figure out what to do with.

There's still a lot to be done but what's here is just a blast to mess around with. something really satisfying about struggling with a level, switching over to Samus and just blasting all the enemies and bosses away, tho I assume these characters will be unlocked in the final game as most of them are completely over powered.

This does bring me to one complaint though, Mario needs a buff. Mario is by far the hardest as he has few defense options and a lack of a health bar that almost everyone else have a huge advantage over him, and Mario having a health bar isn't too far removed from games like SMB2 and the modern 3D games.

But regardless I never thought I'd play this game and actually try to beat levels so I could see more, secret hunting is finally rewarding and expanding and finding more of the world is really fun. The game's length is absolutely HUGE, one world is about the size of an average Mario game which is insane.

And I'm really happy to see that loading has been optimized tho I don't know if that's because I'm running a machine that's not made 15 years ago.

@velacosmos has been working hard on creating a new Demo for SAGE and this one actually surprised me.

Taking influence from mario maker 2, Shang Mu Architect is a Freedom planet challenge level maker. which is quite impressive on it's own but has a tonne of extras.

Namely now there's actually a story mode to go along with the game, truth be told I'm not too big into freedom planet's cast to really know how well this game captures their personality but I still think it's really cool to actually have something that doubles as a proper freedom planet fangame since as far as I'm aware we're yet to see an actual game that actually follows the original games style.

Your mileage is definitely going to depend on how much you enjoyed the original freedom planet but I definitely think this is worth checking out.

Of the top of my head way back when stealth was pitching a mobile port of sonic 3, I swear I remember one of the ideas was expanding the match stages into full fledged level.

Sonic 3 Chronicles is an interesting "what if" scenerio where after angel island instead of falling into Hydrocity Sonic and co continue past the cutscene area and into the endless mine from match making.

I never really thought of those match stages as being connected to the main stages but this does a rpetty decent job of introducing new gimmicks and mechanics to go along with those stages.

The game is definitely rough around the edges and needs a lot of tightening up but what's here is a cute game that does it's best to follow sonic 3.

Also Mighty is here... I don't know why but thank you.

Gatoslip is a hack of Sonic the hedgehog created by @vadapega a very small demo with a tonne of personality put into it.

Yes, this is a hack, you're going to need an emulator in order to play it. Now which emulator do I recommend?

Probably the steam workshop if you still have your copy of sonic 1 before SEGA took it off the store page.

Vada's always been an inspiration for my art and it's great to see him finally go for something that really expresses his personality. The writing's great, the battles are really cute and I love the strategies for defeating enemies. Game's filled to the brim with visual gags with one gag in particular giving a lot of "replay value" (you'll know what I mean when you beat it)

can't wait to see where this ends up.

Again check out

https://sagexpo.org/games.html if you haven't yet, this just scratches the surface of what's available and there's a tonne of great games I looked over in this list.

[dyemelikeasunset]

Hello sorry to bother but today I went through the mor and dom tag and I can’t help but notice how good you are at designing tattoos! Both for Dylan and Mor, there’s just so much detail there!

I was wondering if you have any tips on your process for designing them? I have a lot of ocs I think would look good with some but just don’t know how to go abt it. Love your art and again sorry for bothering and have a good day!! :]

Oh thank you so much!!

I've had experience designing tattoos for friends and commissioners before, so I think that helps me a lot. But here's some advice off the top of my head:

Research tattoo styles! There are so many types out there, from blackout tats, to classic nautical styles, watercolor, quotes and number tattoos etc. the world of tattoos is HUGE and there are constantly new styles being created by artists. Finding the specific style that fits your character is really helpful

Understand the tattooing process. This is important if you want your ocs' tats to look more realistic. Everything from pain threshold and placement, to how much certain colors or styles need upkeep, to how realistic specific details would be on specific areas of the body-- these can help a lot with choosing design elements as well as learning where to put the tattoos on the character's body. (My biggest advice for this on the drawing/design side: always prioritize the black ink first! Figure out areas where you can have the negative space/underlying skin be part of the design)

Placement, then design! I think of tattoos for OCs in two steps: 1) where and 2) what. I usually figure out placement first, and draw blocks of color on the body parts I want tattooed. Then I'll isolate the shapes and work on each design until I'm satisfied. As you've seen in my characters, I often make a tattoo sheet for them (which I'll copy and paste onto them as needed)

Personality! For characters, it really comes down to what the tattoos say about them. This doesn't necessarily mean all the tats need to be loaded with meaning, bc there are definitely people who get things for fun or for cheap. It's all about reflecting what your character is all about: are they the type to get really meaningful tattoos and only have a couple that are very symbolic for them? Are they the type to wanna be covered head to toe? Maybe to a character like that, each tattoo meaning isn't as important as filling in the space! Maybe it's a character with one really important tattoo but a lot of other random ones. Does one character have to have them in discreet areas for work? Tats that do mean something to your OC will probably say something important about them, while the visual style of the casual tattoos will say a lot about their style or fashion sense

[meeks-just-wants-to-scroll]

Asking asking askiiiing...

Micah: 5, 9

Javier: 7, 8

Pearson: 14, 26 (Freebie: What would his favorite food be to make, if he didn't have to cook outdoors and in bulk? i.e. not being stuck with stew.)

Micah

5: What's the first song that comes to mind when you think about them?

At the moment I have I Want It All by Lana Del Rey stuck in my head so I am a bit biased… at the moment. (Such a cunty song for him).😁

For serious songs I associate with him, Frontier Psychiatrist by The Avalanches is spot on. It is fun, it is chaotic, it sounds like a collection of disconnected memories and audio clips, it focuses on the unwell mental state of a person, so on…

I know some people tie metal music into Micah. Maybe it is me not liking metal music, but I’ve always associated Micah with wind instrument band music. American Venom or various songs from the RDR1 and RDR2 sound track capture the power of Micah to me; he carries the name of his past kin and wields it like his duel revolvers. He is feared and it only feels right a triumphant band of trumpets and electric guitar accompany him.

9: Could you be roommates with this character?

Haha NOOOOOO. Regardless of if it is canon Micah or a modern AU Micah, I think he would be a pain to deal with. Micah mainly does his own thing so maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. I don’t wanna dwell and put TOO much thought into this, but I feel like Micah would be a cruddy roommate whenever he is inside the house, but the majority of the time he is out of the house doing something illegal or morally dubious.

Javier

7: What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

Tough, not because there isn’t a lot I love but because there is a lot that I love. The fandom has been pretty good to Javier in my opinion. Maybe too good and excuse him of his faults but that is not the focus of the question.

I do like when the fandom sheds light on Javier’s past, his family, his flaws, and his struggles. Idk if I have seen any art or fan fiction about Javier and his sister, but I want to. Idk if I have seen anything even about Javier in Mexico prior to the VDL gang. The small crumbs that are talked about by the fandom, I reaaaaally appreciate.

8: What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

I am not sure because the fandom is usually respectful about Javier. There isn’t anything I despise, at most I roll my eyes.

I was going to say I felt the constant use of google translate Spanish in fan fiction felt ooc but I realized over time that Javier just does that and interchangeably uses English and Spanish in-game. Plus there is no one right way to right a character. Even if it was ooc that would be fine.

I think people (once again) infantilizing and excusing Javier of his flaws is an annoyance. That and steam rolling his rough edges and flaws to make him this suave guy who gets all the ladies. This man returns to camp smelling like fish and with dirt covered hands from worm collecting. He may have good clothing and hygiene but this man is also unsexy in his own ways. He is unconventionally sexy. You don’t need to replace parts of him to make him “better”. He is already a good character, you just gotta appreciate what’s there.

Pearson

14: Assign a fashion aesthetic to this character.

D: oh no. I was not ready for Pearson headcanon time.

I feel like much of what Pearson already wears (minus the top hat and a few others) would fit into modern day as some sort of thrifted aesthetic, assuming the clothes are cleaned and not blood stained.

I especially like his sweater outfit which makes me think he would enjoy nice big sweaters the girls find on social media and then buy for him. They’re almost all muted colors and patterns. He especially likes the ones depicting nature like this one.

26: favorite food to make with no restrictions.

I don’t have a solid idea for this one so excuse me as I take this in a unserious route: BURGER!

I can just imagine Pearson in a modern AU being a grill dude. He just wants to BBQ and feel good with a beer in his hands on a spring/summer afternoon. He isn’t obligated to provide food for the gang anymore, but he is happy to be invited over by Dutch to talk and grill.

Pearson is a man of varied cuisine so burgers aren’t his only thing. He does others. Burgers are just a crowd pleaser, not too difficult to make, and easy to customize. He might’ve even tried making those new fangled vegan burger black bean things for the gang members who don’t eat meat anymore (cough cough, Mary-Beth).

[spmcomic]

What made you wanna create your comic?

to be honest, it was a combination of things!

the reason i made the first scene is because it had been a long time since i worked on an art piece, and i wanted to spend a school break creating designs for blumiere and timpani and draw a short comic with the two of them interacting. i already had everything i needed with memory 1, so i drew a few drafts of the characters, a few one- or two-panel sketches of the pair and the father character, a few thumbnails, and then put together the three-page scene.

one of my friends commented on the post on deviantart and said "great work, can't wait for the next one!" at which point i said "oh this was just a one-off, i'm not going to draw more."

we can see where that got me.

by next week, i had a notebook full of doodles, concepts for the rest of the gang, more interactions, and little plot lines. some of the mini comics were five pages long and covered the characters discussing their relationships, their backstories… stuff that looks very different in the final comic.

i guess i just ended up having a lot to say! a month later, i had a basic plot outline- a list of questions and their answers. three months later (during arc 3-ish), i had the first draft of a complete script with all the moments i wanted to include, and i committed to pursuing that plot line. six months later (during arc 4), i had an idea that i REALLY needed to share, and i rewrote all of my notes and put all of my ideas in a defined order with a set number of scenes (about 300) to make sure i could take every step necessary to get there.

i'm excited to draw every scene along the way. every page has something i love in it. this comic is a joy to create and i want to show you guys what i've been thinking about. it's been with me through a lot of rough patches in my life. it's my favorite thing that i've made, and even after six and a half years i still feel really good about the direction we're going to go in. i have a complete third draft of the script with about 276 scenes and i'm happy with it.

i found other fan works i've read over the years very inspiring… i think two major fics that found their way into my work were blue sky (portal 2) (webcomic here!!) and handplates (undertale). when i read that stuff, i think to myself "i want to make something that good and satisfying, i want to make more things like this." so i work my hardest to make stories like those.

anyway, if you got this far, thank you for hearing me out. i'm glad that the comic has resonated with a few people. your kind comments and interesting and fun questions help keep me going when i get discouraged. i know my story doesn't have much shipping in it or anything, but i wanted to tell this exact story with these exact characters and that's what i'm gonna do. i'm grateful to have anyone along for the ride, and i'm so happy that i've gotten to meet everyone i've met, and make friends along the way.

[fffrost]

Hihi hi!!!! So I think I should make an intro post for myself even though I’ve had this account for a while- specifically I’m gonna cover my stance on nsfw asks and messages because I’ve started getting more varying asks!

Hello! My name is Frost, I go by she/they pronouns. As you may see I’m an artist and I enjoy sharing my art!! I’m an enjoyer of multiple fandoms! Prominently: The Locked Tomb, Mortal Kombat, Star Wars, and a few more! I love talking and interacting with people who enjoy the same things I do ! Feel free to slide into my ask box or dms whenever :)

About using my art:

For phone backgrounds: no credit needed! Have fun (please show me it would make me so happy to see) and go wild- if you’re gonna edit it and put filters and such over it that’s fine!!

For pfps/banners/profiles: fine by me! Please credit me somewhere though!

For edits (musical, video edits or such): if you do this I’ll kiss you. Credit me please still and TAG ME TAG ME I WANNA SEE WHAT YOU MAKE

For edits (editing my art): erm, so long as you don’t draw over like any existing features or whitewash or do weird shit you’re fine. Doodle over them, color my sketches (once again, tag me if you do I’ll cry happy tears) put filters on them make memes- if you reshare my art in any way credit me please!!

Reposting: I’m ok with reposting as long as you credit me!!!

Using: it should be obvious but don’t make any profit off my art. It’s mine, not yours to sell.

That’s all for that!!

Stance for nsfw content is under the cut so I don’t make this too long :)

So recently I’ve gotten some NSFW stuff in my asks which while it’s ok since I’m an adult I just wanna clear things up.

1: do not share your personal experiences with me. I am a stranger online. I don’t know you. Stay safe!!!!! I don’t want to see that stuff, I don’t want to know about your wet dreams!!!

2: if you come into my DMs with nsfw hcs or talking about NSFW content prepare to be blocked. Once again. I’m a stranger. I don’t know you. If we have had conversations and they’ve lead that way it’s ok, but please. Don’t go right off the bat into that.

3: asks. This one is iffy. I’m not a NSFW account but I’m not strictly SFW, I’ll repost suggestive things, I’ll draw suggestive art, but not full on porn. (If you want that you have to go to twitter. Where I don’t post anymore. Or become a close friend on discord.) please don’t send me NSFW asks talking about characters, ships, or any hcs or art. I’m aware I have a large following of varying ages and I want to keep my account safe.

4: regarding if I DO end up posting or reblogging any sort of NSFW content, I will tag it! So filter that out!! If I am posting suggestive art I will label it as such accordingly. If it is NSFW I will put it under a cut with warnings and tags.

I am not mad or upset at any people who asked things with NSFW content- I get it! But please if you want to talk about it so badly with me just DM me- and ask first.

Thank you!!

[bluberimufim]

Writer Q&A Tag Game

Hello. I got tagged for this by @squarebracket-trick on this post and I thought it sounded super fun. So, here we are!

1. What motivates you to write?

I started out as an artist, but I began writing once I realized that visual art as a medium wasn't enough to tell the stories I wanted to tell - it had no way of codifying lore, defining character traits, or even just easily telling a long story. I think it's still largely that, in a way. I come up with all these stories and I "get them out" through writing because I sure as hell can't keep them inside my brain for eternity.

2. A line/short snippet of your writing that you are most proud/happy of. If not maybe share a line of someone else's work you love (just please credit them)

This one is pretty recent, from a few chapters ago in DoS, but I'm really proud of it. I just feel like it emphasizes how much Seth's experience with souls connects with the body, which is the Goddess of Time's domain. A lot of metaphors in this story centre around bodies and physicality because of this. Here's the snippet:

And yet, there was Theo, with her soul so unwound there was no fixing it anymore. The most she could do was keep healing and healing, covering the cracks of the bowl with her own hands in the hope that they'd go back to normal. Keep filling the ocean so that, no matter how many holes lined its bed, it would never be empty. [...] She held her so tight she thought her hands would fuse to her skin. As if she could cover the cracks of her soul with her own body.

Idk, I just vibe with it.

5. What part of writing do you think you are the best at? (Yes stroke your own ego it's okay)

(what happened to 3 and 4? where did they go?)

I'd say back-and-forth banter, probably because of my time in theatre, but also horror description. It creeps up on me. I keep writing horror on accident. And I always really like it. Just something about describing something weird and spooky.

6. What do you enjoy most about the Writeblr community?

Mostly the fact that there's all these other writers who have cool stuff and also wanna see my cool stuff. I already loved writing on my own, but knowing that there are people Out There who also care about my stories just feels amazing.

And also, the casual friendship between people. You interact with someone's blog, they interact with yours, and you suddenly feel like you're friends, kinda. I can only compare it to making quick friends with someone on the playground as a kid. I like it <3

7. A writing tool/device you use that helps you with writing? (It could be speech-to-text, a writing program etc)

I am a very ✨analogue✨ person, so my best writing advice in this scenario is always: put that shit on paper.

Feel unsure about a scene? Put that shit on paper. It's like a 0.5th (hehe "halfth") draft that you will copy onto your document and you will always improve it with that second look.

Worried about perfectionism? Put that shit on paper. Even pencil, at least to me, feels hard to erase. It's mostly about living with the stuff you've written and not looking back - erasing is such a pain in the ass that you might as well just keep going forward.

Wanna write secretly during class/lectures/whatever where you're not allowed to have a device? Wadda ya know, the answer is also paper.

Wanna edit? Printing stuff out helps you get some distance from your own writing and it also makes you see it more as a book than as just something you've made.

It also generally makes you feel less bad about changing stuff later in the document, because you have a solid, physical record of what you've written before.

Put that shit on paper. It works well.

(sorry for the rant sbdhagjk)

8. A piece of worldbuilding that you like in your own story? (It could be the magic system, a particular place in the story, a law etc)

I once made a post about the art movements in the world of the dystopia WIP (yes, seriously) but I can't find it anymore. I'm not gonna explain it again, it was stupidly long the first time around.

I guess, outside the dystopia WIP, I'm pretty proud of the whole Three Sister Goddesses thing from DoS. I have drawn designs, but I'll make another post sometime. I'm also proud of the relationship between the Goddesses tho.

They're at war with each other, but they're just doing it for entertainment. They kiiiinda hate each other but not as much as their desire to have fun. Like, they will send their daughters to decimate each other's armies, but they'll also hang out together in the Plane of the Gods. The war is kind of like a decades-long game of Monopoly they're having at the family function. And I just think it's cool. Goes into that whole thing about mortals being like ants to uncaring gods that I like.

9. What piece of advice would you say to encourage others to write if they are having a rough patch?

Kinda cliché, but I'd say this: it happens to everyone, dude (gender neutral). Everyone has periods of time when they feel bad and can't write. Or where they feel like their writing is terrible. Doesn't make you less of a writer.

Even if you're not as productive as other people: who cares, honestly? As long as you're having a good time and doing something you love, it doesn't matter how much time you need or don't need to finish something. Even if you never finish anything. And if you feel like you're not as good as other people: who cares either, you know? Everybody starts somewhere. And everybody has different strengths. You'll get better. You always do.

At the end of the day, we're all just doing this because we love it. Don't force yourself. The time will pass anyway.

Ooooookay that last one was a bit more serious than the rest. Anyway, I wanna tag, no pressure, @fleurtygurl @stesierra @cheeto-flavoured-pasta and @sarandipitywrites

[viveela]

your art is ❤ I wanna squeeze them to death (affectionate) also do you read sp fanfiction? if so do you have recs? 🙈

Ah thank you sm!! I'm so glad people enjoy my fanarts, I honestly didn't think my whole shift to south park posting would go this well lol I'm very glad to be proven otherwise!!

As for sp fics ...this is gonna be a long post lol.

So I have been reading some, buuut I guess I'm kinda picky...I am kind of particular about fics in general honestly. If I love something I want to see it portrayed authentically, that goes for every fandom I've been in. I know aus are fun but I want to be able to mainly consume canon compliant content, rarely do I read anything else oops. Unfortunately I've found that to be kinda hard since aging them up and doing all sorts of aus is heavily the vast majority with the sp fandom so I don't really have too many fics I personally have to recommend; just a handful that stood out to me, but I will happily share some!! They're all style and creek tho as I haven't found any I like that aren't yet, but I hope to find some for other pairs or nonromantic ones soon.

Stan x Kyle: A Ballad of True Hearts It's ongoing but really good so far! I really enjoy it, I'm a huge sucker for the fantasy look from the show/game and when it comes to aus this is like the only one I really indulge in. I really like how they're characterized and the tense dynamic they have that reflects the one seen in the current state of the series. The underlying plot has me very intrigued too! Sign of Devotion Adorable canon feeling story where their fantasy world is rarely portrayed as in the show with them simply playing pretend (which is my fav way to see it done). I loved this one to pieces and idk I just really like the idea of some feelings arising between them from trying to stay in character!! To Be More Than My Daydream I really enjoyed this one because it really nailed down how comfortable the two boys have gotten with each other's presence. I enjoy the idea of Stan taking a while to realize how his feelings changed over time and the way awareness of this slowly comes to light. It's written so tenderly and sweet it's really cute, I love the way they are here. Say it and mean it (for both our sakes) Such an awesome fic covering the distance that has grown between the two and how they're both happier when close to one another. They are both wanting and missing what they once had before but so bad at communicating this to each other until now. It was just perfect, loved it. Tweek x Craig:

Signs Point to Yes Incredibly fun fic, super in character, felt like an actual episode. The call back to the fortune teller is great. It was just such an enjoyable fic that really captured their dynamic and the struggle to save a relationship they didn't even ask for but now want. Super cute!

A Stripe of Love This fic was made before there was that much info on Stripe I believe, but it is very cute and I enjoyed it a lot. I am also always a fan for people bringing in Tweek's unofficial/official parrot into the mix, even if briefly. Overall, it's just a really sweet read.

Baby steps

Really cute exploration of how the two would feel about the awkward transition from faking to actually putting real feelings into their actions and being a little more vocal about it. Tweek's nerves are captured really nicely too.

That's all of them, hopefully my tastes in fics overlap at least a little with yours and you gain a nice read out of this!

I also plan to write some fics myself so maybe keep an eye out for that...?

[brahkest-fr]

do you have any tips on making fandragons? yours are really good in a way i cant quite quantify

oh why thank you! I love my dumb fandergs so much kldjkldd

I'm not sure if I have tips per se, but I can explain how my thought process works when I do make fandergs so maybe that can be helpful 👀

when it comes to making them, the way I do it is first deciding what breed to make em. I consider what details I want to bring out of the fandom character so for example, I made my Johnny Bravo dragon a pearlcatcher cuz I wanted the dragon to have hair but not so much like a tundra. I also had an outfit in mind (to match Johnny's t shirt and jeans) so that ruled out ancients since you can't dress em and I didn't feel like making a skin lol.

and behold: a man™. when I drew him, I thought it'd be funny to actually match the style of the show so he's all angular and disproportionate. I only included features that I wanted from the pearlcatcher like the horn, ears, and tail and tbh he looks like a rhino lol but I decided stuff like the hair tufts on the face and limbs was too much for my taste.

same thing went for my Samurai Jack dragon. however, this guy's actual dragon sprite is a lot more complex just cuz I felt like making him fancy and giving him armor.

but when I drew him, he's just very much like Jack in the show, including the style. and I'm not saying fandergs have to match the style of whatever, I just think it's a fun nod. you can also notice here I didn't draw the smoke gene on him. that's just a personal decision I wanted to keep only on the sprite, in reference to Japanese ink paintings.

my design philosophy in general is "how would x person look like if they were a dragon." but if it's like an animal/creature fanderg (like for example my bazelgeuse derg from monster hunter) then I just kinda combine both elements together.

so for Tasha here, laced and edged look like chonky scales which for me was close enough to the egg-like scales of bazel and I got a skin for the fire theming. no clothes cuz I didn't wanna cover up the skin so sometimes I don't even dress em up if I prefer seeing their bodies.

when I drew her, you can see the combined bits of both the monster and wildclaw - bazel's wings, the chonk claws, egg scales, facial features - wc tail feathers, the multigaze, feather hair. there's a lot of "use your imagination" in my designs so like, I don't usually take things at immediate face value. so some people might see laced/edged as just flat scales or maybe even feathers but my brain went oh those are fat fuck egg bombs kjldfkldkl.

sometimes my fandergs are just inspired from colors like Baja who's a taco bell fan dragon lol. I saw this hat and was like yeah I can do something with that. another example of a derg I didn't really dress cuz I wanna see the baja blast™ capsule. Baja would prolly be one of the more thematically standard flight rising dergs of my fandom ones cuz she's just a spiral without anything fancy pancy going on like the previous ones.

and sometimes it's just fun to make things kinda funky. for my Jacket fanderg, I was like, what if the chicken mask was literally a part of him and badabing it worked out really well with scales. his other colors are like red and white cuz I wanted a sort of basic bitch rooster color scheme. most of the fandom bits come from the skin I made him so he's a bit more involved on the artsy side of things. the art of him afterwards became a literal interpretation of the sprite.

I have a lot more fandergs of course but that's more or less my thought process on designing them! I don't usually have any sort of standard for designs, it really ends up being how much I feel like putting in and how much do I directly want to interpret from a fandom source. sometimes it's very literal and other times it's like a lil nod or so. tbh, you can really make a fanderg out of anything since what you wanna see is entirely up to you. I personally think it's pretty fun to see how close I can get with just what the site has to offer.

I have two more fandergs I'm actually working on rn and am very excited to share when I get to it hohohehe

[snowangeldotmp3]

Can you just…ramble about romy ronance and explain everything? I know absolutely nothing about X-men but I’m seeing the art and I know your ronance ideas are always killer so I am confused yet invested at the same time

of course anon!! i’ll have to admit this one isn’t very well thought out and all in good fun, but the idea of romy ronance is so intriguing to me

so! romy is the ship between rogue and gambit in the marvel comics. rogue and gambit are both mutants. rogue's mutant power is that she can absorb someone else's powers and memories through touch alone. she once held on too long to captain marvel (carol danvers) and permanently absorbed her powers of flight, super strength, and near invulnerability. when rogue absorbs memories and whatnot it's basically like. that person living inside her head. rogue put her first boyfriend in a coma (accidentally!!) when her mutant powers manifested. rogue is also known for calling everyone "sugar" bc shes a Southern Gal(tm) from mississippi! in the comics tho it's often written as "sugah" bc they wanna make sure people know it's a southern accent lolol

gambit's powers are related to kinetic energy manipulation. he can charge inanimate objects and essentially make them into bombs. he can also resist telepathic attacks (which is. very useful in the xmen universe.) he also has like, a hypnotic charm as part of his abilities but that's just like, a cherry on top thing. he's also cajun, and a former member of the thieves guild, but you don't need to know any of the thieves guild stuff for romy ronance

anyway. rogue and gambit have a very sweet relationship. they genuinely care for each other and they really do love each other. just so much. it's already frustrating enough for rogue to not be able to touch anyone (hence the gloves and why she often covers gambit's mouth with her hand and then kisses the back of her hand--and why she's always covered up!) and with gambit it's just a touch more frustrating bc she wants to kiss him!! but she can't!!! she has to be so careful and so methodical to ensure the fact that she does NOT make skin to skin contact with anyone--that includes just a brush of skin. like bumping into someone.

but rogue and gambit have very fun pet names for each other. gambit's favorite is "chère." my personal favorite that rogue uses is "swamp rat" (lovingly).

there's a lot of things im not going into here just because we'd literally be here all day if i continued any more rogue and gambit lore.

now onto the ronance stuff:

nancy as rogue to me makes the most sense just because. trauma. and also the meticulous attention to things. but mostly trauma (and you knowwww it's barb related, babey!)

im not gonna lie. gambit robin came to me just because robin knows french (and spanish and italian etc etc) but i got the mental image of robin calling nancy "chère" and thus, romy ronance was born. plus i've been like. neck deep in xmen stuff since i finished watching xmen '97 a few months ago (which is a phenomenal show, btw. definitely recommend) other than that i can't really explain it. ronance is just so romy coded... to me. rogue and gambit are both very like. ride or die. which is another ronance quality. and rogue specifically is like. i don't know how to explain it. but there's just a overlapping nancy quality there somewhere...

obviously i don't think nancy is exactly like rogue and i don't think robin is exactly like gambit, but there are some parts of those characters that really do just. make sense for the two.

anyway, i hope this was helpful and if you have any more questions anon, feel free to ask!!

[naumin]

2022 in review

in an effort to blog about art on my art blog more i will be writing a post covering my work in 2022 and maybe some aspirations going forward into 2023

2022 was the year of learning to paint! at the beginning i was really frustrated, a lot of my pieces were very hit or miss and i couldnt tell why some sucked and some fuckd. i nibbled at some online courses for fundamentals, James Gurney’s Color & Light book and Marco Bucci’s painting videos, and was looking for a mentor at one point but i think i stopped cuz i broke my thumb briefly lol

a piece from december 2021 that is just a bit random and i think representative of my stabbing in the dark

studying...

in June i split a schoolism sub with emma and it was an amazing decision. i think if you have limited time to practice drawing or dont know where to go the best thing is to take a course, and ive taken cheap or free courses online but the tutors on schoolism are top of the industry and the quality of their teaching is stellar imo. literally felt my brain explode with knowledge they are the best of the best. i finished the painting workout course with wouter tulp and ive dipped in and out of numerous others since then. its cool bcus u can study at your own pace.

July was artfight, i did talk about it here so not gonna repeat myself heh

then i was really busy with my MA, its been so fun and so exhausting. a year is so short and i want to try all the printing techniques and ceramics and everything cry. but hey now i know indesign and can make my own zines and stuff which is amazing. i also tabled at my first market :) i did really like it and would love to do more, dont want to put pressure on myself to do that this year but at least wanna visit them and scope out the audiences and stuff.

school really is making me appreciate traditional art again, tbh it is nothing like digital. you just cant get that chaos or physical resistance from your materials in digital, everything is very deliberate and constructed and almost predictable. ive started to incorporate more traditional work into my pieces where i can, especially photobashing. i can use photos i offhandedly took years ago and it feels really nice to get to repurpose them.

a spread from my school project, a book about one of my passions (i chose the story of how i got into elden ring!!!) i made it from paper cutting, photobashing, and digital. (im going to sell pdf and physical copies in the new year)

so circling back to the start of the year, i think you can see marked progress in my illustrations that ive posted here. i think i learned a lot about techniques within a painting but i want to learn more about pictorial composition bcus my default tends to be 3:4, portrait, charas centre, and i want to break that habit and tell more effective stories :)

over the past 2 years ive been incorporating more realism into the characters i draw and trying to be really deliberate with what features, proportions etc they have.

a 2021 isa and a 2022 isa

i think i want to maintain this level of detail because its descriptive enough for my needs but i want to push it to be more dynamic and stylised. i really admire the way disney animators like jin kim do it. its because im not confident enough with structure and anatomy to really play with it.

on the other hand with life drawing i really want to do more realism and capture exactly whats in front of me because i think i rely on style as a crutch too much hahaha.

from december. proud of these!!!

thats whats on my mind really. again really dont want to put any undue pressure on myself and i am going to be really busy until october at least. i am seriously proud of my progress in 2022. and im really looking forward to playing bloodborne x

[spiderman616]

i need to know your favorite parts of archie. i wanna hear you talk about this so bad. er. read your thoughts about this so bad. zonic is obvious but what else (leaning toward you with chin in hands)

hmmm well if im going chronologically mecha madness is an easy one to put in. people talk about it all the time as being hype as fuck but it is. its hype as fuck idk what to say. a less discussed one is super sonic vs hyper knuckles. that was ALSO hype as fuck but had less stakes than mecha madness it was a lot more light hearted. sonic quest is also a fun little thing related to the classic games but its pretty entrenched in the current comics plot. and then after robotnik died the politics stuff is very hit or miss but it was pretty convoluted sometimes. however the whole sonic+tails world tour/fighting ixis naugus went pretty hard. not good 100% of the time but its really fun stuff. archie knuckles has some fun stuff too once in a while but not enough to reccomend full bits of it. if anything i would reccomend reading the arc where elias is recovered from angel island since it concludes a side plot from the sonic series. sonic vs knuckles battle royale is also good. the return of robo robotnik is built up really well, as well as the issue where sonic gets his adventure design via shenanigans with the super emerald. the adventure adaptation is slept on honestly, it plays very by the books in terms of adaptations because of behind the scenes reasons, but its still quite enjoyable to see the game's story put into the terms of archie AND how those developments affect the plot later down the line, and this is the last and in my opinion best full game adaptation in preboot. the rest are either omitted or only cover the beginning or abridge them into side stories. honestly ALL the stuff with mammoth mogul is a blast to read because he brings a very unique villain archetype to sonic that eggman doesnt, where eggman lacks foresight and patience mammoth mogul is literally immortal and concocts very elaborate plans and schemes. the plot about the source of all/sword of acorns is pretty good too, although that may be only when compared to everything else of its time so your mileage may vary. sonic adventure 2.5/tossed in space is a MUST READ though. even if you don't know archie that is really just top notch stuff. return to angel island also really nice especially if you want knuckles moments. jon grays art really does help a lot in this case. and of course the extended anonymous saga is awesome too, especially if youre a long term reader since it brings in a lot of stuff from previous stories. house of cards is dogged on a LOT which i dont think is quite fair. its a pretty compelling read. the scourge stuff could get grating depending on your opinions, but it has its moments. hedgehog havoc being a highlight of those moments too. the entire iron dominion saga is a good one too, (including journey to the east of course.) and its nice seeing it shake up the status quo with more game elements incorporated. the new mobotropolis thing is pretty short but its fun. extended chaotix being in knothole/the city leads to some fun moments as well since angel island is in a bit of a complication. of course that leads to the whole knuxerjak thing, which is quite honestly really awesome stuff if not resolved in a pretty lame way. the sonic universe series as a whole is really fun but highlights include the silver saga tails adventure and chaotix quest. and to cap it all off the whole mecha sally arc (coupled with silvers whole. gestures) is nice although again. the ending is pretty cheap which is a big problem with a lot of archie sonic arcs as a whole.

Now in terms of smaller MOMENTS. I mean. damn thats pretty hard to pick out since there are so many characters and interactions. but general rule of thumb if character pairings are out of left field that almost always means they'll be fun to witness if not only for a little since most stories are sonic centric. expected character pairings are also nice to see sometimes if only to deepen established relationships. in terms of set pieces it really depends on the artist, but action scenes are usually done well when there is low amounts of punching and high amounts of slapstick/cartoony violence