#my first like.. proper fanart in a while lol...

[shoot-me-with-a-crayon]

them✨💕

anyways do check out Marble Sky by @somerandomdudelmao it's a very good read so far i'm looking forward to see where it goes ^_^ !

[raptureshots]

[Redraw]

RIP Frank Fontaine you would've LOVED Chappell Roan (LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER)

[toastermuffles]

Hey guys welcome to my massive rant about q!Fit and how cc!Fit is incredibly talented and underrated. Since y'all kinda blew up my twitter post LOL.

There are SO many things I could touch on so it's probably gonna be scattered around a lot.

1) Fit had a great character set up from the beginning. From the very start many people knew Fits reputation as a 2b2t veteran, a place with a toxic environment and brutal people. He was no exception, he was closed off to relationships and was very cautious/closed off to many things. Not only that but his past made people distrust him in the beginning. I loved the suspense it brought with his character and the question of why he WAS actually here. Since the whole "vacation" thing was never very convincing. My favourite part was a lot of this was IMPLIED! He built on the character he portrayed in his YT videos and it worked so well, adding small comments about his character here and there (like when he said q!Fits hearing was bad BC of all the explosions he's experienced).

2) His RP skills were another level, not only was he in character almost the WHOLE time when he was live (even donos) when he first did lore he would tease elements of it by writing cryptic messages when others were live. SUCH a good idea when you have a smaller audience and want to create suspense. Not only that, he would have set dates and times for BIG lore stuff, this honestly made it so much easier to keep track of and engage in, not only alone but with friends too! His actual lore was very different from many others, it was cinematic and well planned, yet it still left room for sudden changes. The final result was a cohesive story line that the audience could interpret. I just loved how I could understand what was happening but also have questions/cliffhangers!

3) the fucking MUSIC. Throughout his lore and start of his streams I adored his choice of music, "Stranger in Paradise" being a personal favourite that was not only reoccurring in more than one language but fit SO WELL. I also think it was very clever how a lot of his music choices for his character didn't make sense until you understand the full story e.g. "Can't say goodbye to yesterday". All of this really added a new perspective on his character, almost through cc!Fits own eyes. Along with his music choice just being absolute bops OFC.

4) THE SYMBOLISM. My absolute favourite lore moment of his was at the end of the "Attachments" lore stream. Where the sun is setting over the mountain, slowly covering a patch of roses in darkness. ALL WHILE an instrumental Italian version of "Stanger in paradise" played. Roses of course being a symbol of not only his and Pac's relationship but love in general. His love for Ramon and his friends. The love he had to grow, just like a rose. While the darkness symbolizes his past catching up to him, more specifically his deadline. His time with his family and friends ending, his loves disappearing. Chefs kiss because it makes me cry everytime fr.

5) q!Fit's sexuality (gay). There is something so poetic about a gay guy from an extremely homophobic wasteland learning to come to terms with his own sexuality and love in general. Him slowly building a loving relationship with Ramon, Growing feelings for Pac, Nervously coming out to his son and then finally indulging in the first relationship and FAMILY he had ever had. Finally learning to love and to be loved in return. Even if he is scared about his mission, or taking things too fast. Just learning to live a normal life.

6) Fitmc is criminally underrated and overlooked. I still remember when Fit got his first proper piece of fanart in the museum. It was like... JULY? or something. And I think that says enough. People had no idea he was even doing lore at some points. Averaging at about 1-2k viewers in the beginning, until hideduo came into the mix. A lot but still compared to others very low. I think because his viewers consisted of his YT audience it didn't translate well. But I'm so glad he was able to build a loving community on twitch <3

Anyways it's 3am for me, I probably have more to talk about but this is basically what I meant when I posted that tweet. Feel free to reblog and add your own favourite observations or moments. I wanna hear them! ❤️

[crk-kr-to-en]

Now that I've read the KR text of the game and fully realized who Shamil and Pyuba are actually supposed to be, I think of how many artworks and fanfics probably wouldn't exist if those people knew, too, and I both shake my head in sorrow and feel this little sardonic giggle bubbling in my throat lol. Lovely art and beautifully written fiction proudly depicting the wrong people as wrongly as possible. Would trading them all away in exchange for proper understanding of the true story and characters be a trade any of us would be willing to make? Just something to think about, I suppose I wouldn't miss most of it tbh. ShadowVanilla has mostly devolved into regular horny yaoi slop anyway

On another note, a big reason I've been struggling a lot with writing a ShadowVanilla fic I've had in my drafts for 400 years is bc I keep worrying that I'm writing Shamil "wrong". I kept leaning away from the silly clownish behavior+dialogue bc I'm not used to writing characters who sound... like that (characters like that usually irritate tf out of me lol). But now I see that I've been writing Shamil correctly after all - I've unknowingly been writing the Korean one and not the English one! I feel infinitely less dumb and useless now, so thank you x1000 for showing me I was on the right path all along 🙏🙏🙏 (thank you for your hard work doing these translation in general, they've been very enlightening)

No problem! Its always pleasure doing translations.

Fr fr. I barely even took so much from En Shamil when I made analysis posts about him back in Ep 7 release because his character still felt so underwhelming that I had to resort looking into the plotline, the emotions found in his trailers or the character design. (And in terms of fanart, I lonly liked the more serious depictions of his character before translating the Kr version.)

I will never forgive En localization team for removing MOST of the clues about Shamil's self loathing in Ep 8 to become some silly marketable character (I can't even explain how many times there is). And how they took away Pyuba's "Jesusness" despite being literal Cookie Jesus by making him sound overly polite and gentle through his dialogue, contrasting Kr Pyuba's stern kindness and sincerity. And Pyuba's Awakening title as well. The quality of being Compassionate has ALWAYS been present for him through all of the story. His entrie plot line in ep 8 was UNDERSTANDING Shamil, not pity him. "Let me be your... friend." and "I want to be your friend." are NOT the same nor they feel similar in tone. The former sounding like he's sorry for him, while the latter is a DESIRE and an invitation Shamil couldn't escape PERFECTLY MIRRORING Shamil's intentions of wanting Pyuba to stay with him forever.

SO MUCH in Ep 7 is so diluted as well and I hate it. The first translation I've actually seen was the part where En said "other half" when it's actually "lesser half" in Kr that I clocked that it's actually him thinking so highly of himself when he's clearly self-loathing (which perfectly fit into my favorite "Control Freak" character category paired with a "Hope Personified" character.)

People may like English Shamil's lore, but that's the DILUTED (and tumblr sexyfied™) version of him, meanwhile I come out of the Original Korean Shamil lore dragging myself across the floor covered in blood.

[duckieduccss]

💥Rodan Sketches!!💥

First ever attempt at drawing him (I've learned a bit from that). Kinda felt like a while since I last drew in my sketchbook but did most of what I could do & I feel it goes along well with the other previous pages I've shared before.

When it comes to Rodan, I found his wing shape to be interesting. From the references I looked at, it had this weird taper to it but unique nonetheless. The horns on his head took me a while to get a handle of them (for whatever reason it just turned into a challenge lol). In the end I think I did fine. Practice definitely does its magic over time. With this, I guess it means I might draw Rodan next with his proper fanart. We'll see on that ^^

[Genuinely what are your guys' thoughts on my progress so far with drawing kaiju?? I feel like I've been improving :) ]

[lilkikayart]

So this is what happens when I get carried away while doing studies and am tired of my own self inflicted Wangjue art drought LOL Please go to ao3 to see this in all it's glory

So basically, I read chapter 6 of "Come Down, O’ Child Of War" by @riikaa-chan and got super fired up! It's like she added more wood to my fire that was slowly dying out (due to art block/an art slump).

Anyway this was a study turned fanart inspired by content in chapter 6. Thus, I recommend reading the fic first because I feel like this has spoilers (?) even though it's not necessarily a 1:1 copy of what happens.

I look forward to making proper fanart in the future!

[skintyfiia]

How did/do you practice to get to this point in drawing skills? With details, please. I love the texture and lighting in your drawings and how you draw people in your own style while they still look similar ❤️❤️

one thing about me is that i’m stubborn as a mule and if it is humanly possible to do something then i will, in fact, attempt it with a firm belief that I am capable of success no matter my skill level lol

warning: this is going to be a long post ;___;

a little about my background: I’m a 22yo self-taught hobbyist. I didn’t go to art school, I never took any proper drawing classes. All I had since I was like a toddler barely holding a pencil was my drive to always be Better, shitty school art clubs and probably something undiagnosed too

I started digital art when I was around 13-14. My traditional skills were pretty solid (for a kid) at the time but stepping into digital really did feel like learning how to draw from scratch again. This is what some of my earliest work looked like, around one month after I had started… oh god

just a few months after that I switched to semi-realism stylistically as it was pretty close to what I was used to with traditional art. This is what we were dealing with around 1-2 years after those first pieces

I hate to say this because it’s such a useless piece of advice but most of my learning process was just me throwing random shit at the wall and seeing what sticks. Most of the time I was just picking up things from my favorite artists or experimenting. I just barely scratched the surface of fundamentals, only enough to grasp the super basic proportions for everything, some color theory and I would pretty much wing the rest (don’t do that, put in some actual effort, these things are important). I am lucky in the sense that a lot of those things do come to me intuitively, like I don’t know, color theory is very logical to me so I never felt the need to study it properly??

A lot of people mention my use of color and texture and I am going to be 100% real with you, that was born purely out of my laziness, I just sat down one evening, discovered what layer modes and curves do and how with some tweaks they make my art look like I put 12 hours more into it and my heart sang. And as for my bold strokes idk where that came from honestly. My primary school art teacher once told me I have a ‘confident hand’ and my confused 11yo ass sat there with my frozen elsa fanart like thanks??

However this approach only got me so far as I did hit a wall around 2023-2024 which is when I decided to you know… start doing actual Studies™ and learn the fundamentals properly (at least try to). Since Cillian Murphy was my main muse at the time, I sort of used him as a training ground for all kinds of techniques and stylistic choices, I even sat down one day to properly study his face in detail (for science obviously). I went to museums, I stared at actual paintings (AND sculptures!!!), picking them apart and deconstructing them in my head, noticing each brush stroke, really trying to find what makes the whole piece click. I tried master studies for the first time in my life which was mind-blowing, would 100% recommend it. The time I read about Leyendecker’s technique genuinely changed my life and I couldn’t stop thinking about it for days omg. And don’t get me wrong, I’m still winging the shit out of everything but I guess I’m doing it more mindfully now??

I can’t stress enough how much art is about not just seeing but OBSERVING and NOTICING reality, not just copying but interpreting it, capturing the essence, feeeeeeeling it. Who cares if you fucked up a single stroke 500 times, who cares if your base sketch looks disgusting? It really is about trusting the flow, trusting the process and focusing on the bigger picture. And if you flop you dust yourself off and try again, all there is to it. Practiceeeee practice practice and have fun, it’s never that deep

[fandom-trauma]

hi im not dead, i just dont use socials LMAO - a rambling update

FALLEN HERO FALLEN HERO!!!! I GOT BACK INTO THE BRAIN ROT!!!! Ive had the games on Steam for a while and FINALLY went to go make a proper bk1 save. When I first played the game, I really just randomly selected the customisations. Now, I have a proper Sidestep in my head and also what kinda villain I want, so maybe Ill be making fanart!! Who knows!!

ALSO! I um peeked into the code. Yeah, I learnt to codedive, what of it? /j ((I already had Notepad++ and used it to crossref the game files bc even tho we have guides.. some of the thresholds in the guides are wrong lol)) And EMKNDAFKJHS GUESS WHO IS SO STUPID! GUESS WHO IS A BIG DUMMY! ME! ME!!!

BECAUSE. WEI CHEN HAS A SEX SCENE? YOU'RE TELLING ME I DIDN'T KNOW THIS FOR 2 YEARS? BECAUSE I ALWAYS PICK TO GO TO HOLLOW GROUND AS MC? AND THEREFORE ALWAYS BREAK MY DAMN LEGS!? IDIOT!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH MY GOD!

...So, ahem, I will be gunning for that. Just because I can read it in the code doesnt mean I wont want to see it in game (even though it's still text based lmao). Though, peeking at the code, seems I wont be able to set up the Chentega poly and also have this scene.. so...

But I've also found out some other variables as well! And by that, I mean I found three different variables that outwardly look the exact same and idk if there's a difference lol

anyways aaaaaaa since there isnt a save system in the game yet bc Revelation needs to be near completion to have a save system in Retribution, Im playing on Steam bc there's a way to make saves >:) and also edit the variables which i wont be doing lol. Gonna set up a save for chentega, and then solo chargestep (theyre too cute) and then solo steelstep (theyre too cute) and then check out the argent and herald paths (theyre too cute) and and and--

now, since ive went codediving i have learnt a multitude of things, like how MC can still share about.. stuff.. even in the Unbroken Legs endings. Plus, with the Revelation demo, seeing how.. calm Hollow Ground can be.. I might just say "screw it" and visit him end-Retribution via my puppet. i mean someone's gonna end up in the hospital anyways.

uhhhhh ive decided to go with Heartbreak, bc i saw it gives Extra Special Stuff and im not that bold to go with Anathema and Sidestep lmfao. I really liked the original name of Puppetmaster that I got organically my first time playing, but ive always avoided the manipulation choices in bk2 bc im.. a wimp LMAO

YA so thats me for um actually just the past week. the past few months, Ive been busy with life stuff, work stuff, etc. Creativity and the willingness to play games is slowly coming back! Even started work on adapting an old project into a new program hehe.

[maddiebrj]

I FINALLY FINISHED MARIO AND LUIGI BROTHERSHIP.

It was very good! Like I said a while ago, this is my first mario and luigi game proper, and it left a great impression on me. ( I love the characters so much.)

This game had me on a choke hold for well over a month. I wasn't prepared for how long it was going to be. Lol But, I'd say it was worth it.

I can't wait to start making and seeing fanart for this game.

Here are some inked sketches I made around the first weeks of the game's release.

[tizeline]

Now that 2024 is coming to a close:

1) Of everything you've made this year, which ones are you the most proud of?

2) What are a few of your favorite things (art, comics, fics, etc) that someone else has made this past year?

Ooo fun ask!

1 - So in general I'm just really happy with how the entire Separated AU developed throughout the year! I created it almost exactly a year ago now (the anniversary is on the december 26th btw, might have something planned for that). And I've mentioned it before but I really wasn't planning on developing into a proper story originally, I thought of the basic concept one day and thought it was neat so I just wanted to put it out there. So I made a SINGULAR post and that was all I initially planned to do, but then I came up with more and more ideas and before I knew it the AU got fucking SECOND PLACE IN THE TMNT AU COMPETETION!? HELLO?? Yeah turns out people like my silly little AU, to this day I'm constantly blown away with all the positivity I recieve from this fandom and it means the world to me ueueueu 😭💕

I've made quite a few TSAU comics over the year, but the first TSAU comic I made that was longer than just a page or so was the Cell Talk comic and it still holds a special place in my heart for that reason. (Also it's where the whole bit about TSAU!Leo being a huge Shadow fanboy originated from so that's awesome)

There's also a certain project I've participated in and made art for that I'm really excited to show you guys, but I'm not really supposed to talk about that yet so uhhhhhh 🤫 you guys are just gonna have to wait for that one lol. Either way, I'm proud of myself for being being part of that :D

2 - OKAY ENOUGH ABOUT ME, time to give some other people the spotlight!!

First of all, special shout out to anyone who has made fanart of my AU, I love love LOVE you so much!!! 💕

The art that the other participants of the tmnt fashion competition made was also absolutely amazing, that event was so fun!! Kat especially, she totally deserved that win her art was so good!

I've been a fan of the Empyrean Weeping AU by cupcakeslushie for a while now, but it's just been getting better and better, the recent comics for the AU have really been absolutely fantastic, I adore the art and story!!

I've been absolutely obsessed with The Canary Continuity fic series by qolden recently it's driving me insane. Donnie is one of my favorite characters ever which means that of course like any normal person I love seeing him suffer! :D I was actually a bit worried that the story was gonna be a bit too angsty for me when I read the tags, but turns out it was just the right amount angst for me, and also it's gonna get a happy ending which is great, so yeah I'm having an absolute blast reading it!

[poliodeuces]

ive been drawing w a lot of red lately. more talking under the cut, like usual !

the first one was drawn at around the same time as the last BOP. i wasn't familiar w all the hysptage content, although i am familiar w the music, and, bc i have favouritism, the last cast they had for fling posse was perfect and i was super sad that we won't be seeing more of it anymore. this was partly inspired by that...i can't believe fling posse invented love. this could have been cleaner, but i liked how their bodies overlap in the sketch.

second image: otome and dice's relationship have a special place in my heart. i only wanted to draw otome as a this literal abstract figure of a mother that dice doesn't know how to understand or love in a way that matters to the both of them

third image: there were three things i wanted to achieve while sketching this, bc it's just one giant sketch that looks nice lol-- 1. bring back gentaro's boater hat 2. to pair w that inverness cape he's wearing in the block party 3. looking directly at the viewer. ���ンカン帽 (cancan hat) + トンビコート (tonbi coat), as they're called in japanese, really makes him feel like a scholar from the meiji/taisho era www except they would have worn black boater hats...the book he's holding is Ágota Kristóf's famous trilogy: The Notebook, The Proof, The Third Lie. fourth and fifth images are closeups.

sixth image: a long overdue fanart of the second gendice duet. i think it's really funny that the first time we're shown a work by gentaro in-universe w a major character based on dice, he made dice a murderer

seventh image: debt collection

eighth image: my real otp actually is gentaro x a lot of blood

ninth image: some vague idea abt hifugen and my favourite subject, bodies connecting together. i want these two to have a proper conversation in canon bc i wanna see them reacting to how similar they are to eo. also hifumi really needs gentaro's influence to fight hnbn w violence

[acaplaya-musings]

VoicePlay 2024 Recap

It's time for a recap of everything that VoicePlay has been up to over this year!

If you somehow missed my recap post for Geoff's channel, you can find it HERE. This post will overall have the same format/structure, but of course I have more videos to talk about, so I'll try not to talk too much. I'll link relevant posts of mine just like in my Geoff recap, but I won't link any of the VoicePlay Visuals - just go to my masterpost here!

Okay, first let's give some love to the Minis! VP released 21 Minis to YouTube and other social media platforms this year, (though by the time the year is fully done, it may be 22 or 23, shhh), so I'm not gonna list them all, but some of my favourites were The Last Shanty (absolute earworm!), Pure Imagination (on my sleep playlist), Baby On Board (very cute and also catchy!), and Jump In The Line/Shake Senora (a bop, a banger, and super fun!). And we got cooking challenges too! (And you didn't hear this from me, but you might be getting a new one sooner or later - early January at latest).

Now time for video summaries! (Or my attempt at "summaries" at least, lol)

.

The Lion Sleeps Tonight - released January 19th

So when the video premiere schedule thing for this dropped on YouTube, I gotta say that I honestly wasn't sure what to expect! I guess you could say that I was still "settling into the Rabbit Hole", still working my way down, and so I was almost maybe a little uncertain about this song? Like I knew it wouldn't be bad, but I was like "eh well the original is fairly simple in composition and I don't really know what VoicePlay are gonna do with it", but anyway, Never Doubt VoicePlay Ever, because I really really enjoyed this! It's a warm hug in musical form, while also being a really fun/silly video, and it's the first of VP's 2024 stuff to hit a million views!

Favourite music moment: Getting to hear Layne on lead vocals, followed by a little bit of Geoff on lead, followed by that cool backing vocals "stack" of "tonight- tonight- tonight!" MAN it's so good!

Favourite visual moment: The appearance of Violayne! Totally took me by surprise the first time but it was totally delightful, and Layne looked so happy and pleased when playing his violin! <3

Sleeping In The Cold Below - released February 16th

Just like with Geoff's channel, I was keeping mental notes over this year about what VoicePlay release was my favourite of 2024, and just like with Geoff's solo stuff, it was VP's second release this year that easily jumped to First Place in my mind and stayed there for a good while!

Seriously I was not prepared for how freaking incredible this music video is! Every part of it! I've never heard the original song before, but I absolutely adore this cover (and so did the Warframe devs/creators themselves, apparently, but more on that further down). Also I ended up doing fanart of Geoff from this video (he looked hella good in this video let's be real), which you can find HERE!

Favourite music moment: That ending!!! The way Geoff descends on his "we're all bound down to the deep and we'll all be sleeping in the cold below" line while Eli, Omar, and Cesar take off into the rafters??? (Contrary motion is the proper technical term, apparently). Utter perfection! A shot of adrenaline right to the veins!

Favourite visual moment: The ending shot of them all back in the mask things and motionless is of course quite cool, but I also love the opening shots of each of them removing the face mask armour(?) things one-by-one (like the shot of Layne removing his as he stares right down the camera with those violet contacts while beatboxing? Dang!)

Black Hole Sun - released April 19th

From one kinda futuristic cyberpunk video to another!

I don't really have a ton to say about the video, but that's fine, this is gonna be a long post anyway - might as well embrace any chance to make it a little shorter!

Favourite music moment: Geoff casually dropping in a C#1 subharmonic like it's nothing on "wash away the R A I N N N N N" (also Layne doing snake sounds after the line "sometimes far too long for snakes")

Favourite visual moment: Not really a "moment", but respect to the set design! It's pretty cool how the set looks like they're singing on top of like an apartment building or something! (That short 'brick' wall (not real bricks) behind them was actually made by Eli, with the help of his wife and some other person whose name I don't recognize in the description)

Classical Chaos - released June 28th

This was the first video I got early access to after joining VoicePlay's Patreon! It had released there just a couple or so days before I joined, but for whatever reason it would be more or less a whole four weeks before this video hit YouTube!

Not only did this video make me go and finally watch VoicePlay's "In The Hall Of The Mountain King" video, but then this ended up being unexpectedly amazing? Like my brain was able to look past the initial "weirdness" of the costumes and really enjoy it! And in fact for this video I did a "running commentary" on my first watch, where I paused to type up thoughts as I went, and you can find the post for it HERE! Additionally, I ended up making a comparison post between the "Grundel" characters in Mountain King vs how they appear in Classical Chaos, which you can look at HERE.

Favourite music moment: The return of "In The Hall Of The Mountain King" but with that random syllabic chanting behind it, was honestly pretty epic. Also that kinda "EDM/club remix" of Fur Elise was fire ngl.

Favourite visual moment: All of it? The can-can bit, Geoff's eyeroll during the romance bit, the cool fire effects, that skull thing? Yeah there's a reason why I needed to split my VoicePlay Visuals into 2 posts for this!

The Way You Make Me Feel - released July 19th

To make up for the super long wait for Classical Chaos, this video released only three weeks later, instead of the average four!

Not a lot to say on this one - I feel like I don't know enough music theory to give it the full appreciation it deserves, but I know a lot of more music-knowledgeable people really loved it, and in fact it's become VoicePlay's second video of 2024 to hit a million views!

Favourite music moment: When the song is slowly building and then we get the vocal percussion and the song really kicks into gear for the final section. Love it!

Favourite visual moment: Layne and Cesar looking over at each other during their two-part harmony bit. It's cute!

Total Eclipse Of The Heart - released August 16th

Honestly this is an underrated VoicePlay song imo - released four months ago and hasn't even quite reached 200k views as I'm typing this? (EDIT: it is at 200k now as of the 19th, finally!) Bruh it's a well-known song! Was the algorithm just not on their side for this one?

I think I've gotten a little more "confident" with doing music thoughts/commentary posts, because had this released more recently, or last month or whatever, I probably would have made a post with at least a few notes on cool stuff I liked in the arrangement! And I'm kinda sad that I didn't do it for this one!

Favourite music moment: Does the entire Spanish section count? It's either that or the chorus right afterwards where the vocal percussion kicks in (like in TWYMMF kinda) and when Ashley starts going off with the vocals!

Favourite visual moment: The whole "B-roll footage" part of the video with Cesar and Ashley portraying a couple (each having memory flashbacks?) was a cool addition! Something a little bit novel that definitely worked! (Also I really do love the styling/'costuming' in this one)

Be Prepared - released September 27th

This dropped to Patreon at roughly 11:45PM for me on a Saturday night. I was actually in the middle of watching some YouTube video, and I just happened to check Discord (ADHD be like-), and saw someone had just posted about the Patreon notification and I was like hang on WHAT?

Honestly it took me a red hot minute to force myself to make it past even the first ten seconds of this video, like ohhhh my god. VoicePlay doing "Be Prepared", one of the best Disney Villain songs ever, with Geoff as Scar, having most of the vocals, with hair on point, that awesome jacket, and eyeliner?!!?!! I literally cannot be normal about this video (and yeah Sleeping In The Cold Below was my favourite of 2024, until this came along and overtook it without a second glance).

You can find my thoughts on the song/arrangement HERE, a visual comparison between this video and VP's Oogie Boogie's Song HERE, and a fanart I did of Geoff from this video HERE!

Favourite music moment: The mid-song dialogue part that got turned into a kind of rhythmic "rap" thing was utterly brilliant! Also every single thing that Geoff does in this video, obviously. <3

Favourite visual moment: Don't! Make! Me! Choose! I'm just gonna say I love all the stuff that got replicated from the original scene - the replication of "the lights are not all on upstairs", the thumb/digit across the neck for "take Certain Duties on board", the lighting changing at the same moments as in the original scene and being the same colours as well, it's all perfect!

Thriller - released October 11th

In terms of classic/iconic Halloween songs, VoicePlay have more or less done them all, and so of course they had to get around to doing this song sooner or later! In fact I had the idea myself earlier in the year (like May or June even?), and so did a lot of the other Patrons, as it turned out.

This is only sitting on 370K views as I type this (it deserves way more!) but this was a HIT with reactors! The VP Patreon Discord server has a thread for sharing reaction video links and I swear this video got so many people doing reactions for it! I won't say too much about my own thoughts, because you can read my thoughts/commentary on the song cover itself HERE, and you can go find my 2-part Voiceplay Visuals (again!) for this video via my Masterpost link at the top of this post! Oh and also I shared this picture of Geoff in the video as its own post and people really seemed to like it, so I might as well put that link here as well.

Favourite music moment: I mean like the arrangement is freaking amazing and everyone brought their A-game with the vocals, but like c'mon, I had one main hope for this cover, and they delivered! Geoff doing Vincent Price's spooky monologue is everything I wished for and more, and I love it.

Favourite visual moment: Again, this is a case where it's really hard to choose, but I think I'm just gonna have to hand the whole dang award to Geoff. The shot of him rising up (almost vampire-like) after the first transformation part, the shoulder movements during the monologue, the way he never blinks once after getting zombified, like he absolutely crushed it! Came, ate, left no crumbs!

Stand By Me - released November 15th

This one was filmed around the same time as Be Prepared was (like I think the following day or the day after that?), and honestly given the two super amazing full-production music videos we got for the previous two months, VoicePlay more than deserved to have their next video be a bit more "simple" and relaxed! Plus it's a gorgeous arrangement, with gorgeous vocals, and it deserves more views! (Seriously the portrait video format didn't seem to affect The Lion Sleeps Tonight in terms of getting noticed!) You can find my thoughts/commentary post about it HERE!

Favourite music moment: I mean Layne's lead vocal line was of course absolutely lovely (and followed by Geoff getting lead vocals no less!) but I did also enjoy Mykal's 'ad-libs' of "you don't have to do it alone, you don't have to stand up on your own!"

Favourite visual moment: Cesar smiling down at Mykal and Eli and then smiling up at Geoff and Layne during his main lead part early in the song <3

Zat You Santa Claus? - released December 6th

This is a song that I would've been totally unfamiliar with had I not gone and listened to all of VoicePlay's 2012 Peppermint Winter album like a week or two before this dropped to Patreon! And even then I wasn't really sure what to expect from this, because obviously the lineup is a little different here to what it was 12 years ago, and the arrangement of this is different to the album version as well! But I really loved this, it's so jazzy, and in case you missed my thoughts/commentary post about it, then you can find it HERE.

I also ended up making a post comparing the lyrics of VoicePlay's version to the lyrics of the original, which you can find HERE, and although I didn't make a proper Voiceplay Visuals for this one, I still ended up doing a mini "screenshot compilation", which you can find HERE.

Favourite music moment: Layne's lead vocal part was obviously very cool, but so was J's scatting, and the harmonies were great - it's just a fun awesome arrangement!

Favourite visual moment: The build-up on "he's coming to get yaaa...." with the quick switches of everyone leaning in "spookily" towards whoever was sitting in the middle was great, as well as J handing off the gift to Cesar (who accepted it delightedly and then used it like a shaker instrument), while Geoff and Eli were definitely looking uncertain/sus about it.

Party Of Your Lifetime - released December 13th

Man I did not see this one coming, but I certainly ain't complaining about it!

Yeah so the Warframe creators liked VoicePlay's cover of Sleeping In The Cold Below so much that they asked to do an official collaboration thing with the group, and the result is this freaking awesome video and freaking awesome song cover! Seriously between the makeup and costuming, and the dancing, and the whole 90s boy band energy (but with a sci fi twist!) it's honestly just a great time, as I knew it would be! (And if you haven't seen my thoughts on the vocals/music/song arrangement, go HERE!)

Favourite music moment: I mean imo it has to be the "join us embrace us, don't ever erase us" breakdown section, like the way it slowly builds, just starting with Geoff and then having Cesar come in, and then Eli and Layne and stuff, like it's just very cool (but I also enjoy the key change for the final chorus!)

Favourite visual moment: The whole video is great, and the dancing and jumping around looked very fun, but honestly I think I'm gonna have to also hand this one to the "join us embrace us..." section. Like maybe I'm suffering from a bit of recency bias and I might have a different answer if you were to ask me in like a month, but everything about that part was just *chefs kiss*

.

So yeah, there's my VoicePlay recap for 2024!

I know this post is already quite long, but if you'll just allow me to talk a little more, I just want to say thank you. When I started this blog in late January, I wasn't sure if there were any VoicePlay fans much active on Tumblr at all (or at least anymore). I got used to it - this blog was made for my own entertainment, not for trying to become popular or anything - but y'all came, and y'all found me! (Or maybe I found you!)

I was looking at one of my older mini comparison posts I did, between High And Dry and Wicked Game, and it currently has zero notes on it (as of me typing this). But if I were to post it now? I know it'd at least get a few likes, and maybe even a comment, and/or a reblog or two! Heck, I can post a 'random' picture of Geoff now and have it get 18 likes! And I take not a single one for granted!

I remember and recognize many of your usernames, and even if I have never talked to you or interacted with you or followed you, I still see you! If you have ever liked or reblogged or commented on any of my posts, I appreciate you so much! (But also to my beloved mutuals: I love you a whole lot, you know who you are <3). Thank you for making my fan creator experience extra fun and enjoyable, and see you all in 2025!

(But also see some of you tomorrow for more fic posting!)

[priintiisor]

uhh kinda forgot to post this for a few days but anyways- for the 2 people who care to read all of this

the struggles of making neglected space

part 2: somehow i didn t die making it

part 1

so, when i make animatics (or in this case a pmv, whatever), i usually have the idea for a while before i have the time and motivation to actually draw all of it, but i also have shit memory, so usually i make a little "storyboard", not really a proper storyboard, mostly just little extremly messy sketches (usually no one else can tell what s meant to be happening in them), not even to work out the composition, just so i won t forget what i wanted to go over which part of the song.

neglected space technically had a storyboard, from all the way back in october 2023 when i originally started working on it. i made it in ms paint one night and it s absolutely wonderful. you can see it but good luck making anything out

the colors mostly don t mean anything. i was losing my mind a little bit. the shots are numbered cuz i tried to count them to see how insane i d go drawing it

as you can probably tell from the previous attempts at making it, the idea for this pmv was always pretty similar to how it ended up looking (my composition ideas are and have always been boring), but a few shots had changed from how i d originally planned them out in that storyboard so i wanted to make a new one. i didn t have the energy for that however, so i made a sort of script instead. much like my so called storyboards, the script was mostly nonsense (it was just meant for me to not forget what idea i had). here s some of my favorite lines from it

(the things written in italics are the song s lyrics)

and my absolute favorite,

saint. just saint. that was the script for the whole part with saint in it (i just had the shots in my head and this was all i needed to remember what goes on this part. but still it s funny)

usually, i draw my animatics in the order in which the shots will actually appear in it (and either i edit everything at the end of edit every few shots as i finish them). however, i knew that i wanted to make this thing beautiful and fully rendered and it is 4 and a half minutes long, and that s a lot of work. in some of my other animatics (for example, i think it s really obvious in the fall) you can kind of tell at which parts i started to get bored of working on it, and i didn t want this to happen with this one. so what i did is i slip it into parts- exactly the way that maps work, each part was between 10 and 20 seconds long, there were 21 of them in total- and i did those in a random order. i don t remember the order i ended up doing them in, all i can tell you is i did the first part (the first 4 shots, up to the one with the title in it) last, because i had drawn those 4 times already and i was TIRED of them lol

you can still kind of tell on which parts i was tired (like, i m so mad, srs is in this thing for ONE SHOT and it turned out so bad, but oh well) but it s not a big section of it, so it s not as obvious

as for actually drawing it. there wasn t a lot of planning for how the style of this was meant to look. in fact it originally wasn t going to be this detailed- the first shot i did is the one with artificer in underhang (the "the air in here ages me ungracefully" bit) and i think you can tell that one is slightly simpler than the rest. i just wanted it to be really pretty and it got out of hand.

thing is. i m not actually that great at drawing backgrounds. half of the reason the backgrounds in this pmv are so good is because i VERY heavily refrenced from the game, because fuck it, this game is beautiful and it s my fanart i do what i want. but yeah, all the background were drawn constantly at a screenshot, all the colors in those backgrounds are directly colorpicked from the game. i m pretty sure you could figure out exactly which rooms i refrenced in each shot. you could play rain world geoguessr with this thing if you wanted to- the only exception is the shot with rivulet on "where doorways with no doors stage a ballet of leaves", that shot is meant to be happening in the remains of the gate to outer expanse (idk if you can tell in the final thing, but oh well), i stole the colors from the furthest point of subterannean that rivulet can go to but i just made up what it looked like (it s meant to be bits of broken metal because i m pretty sure it s implied the gate just collapsed into outer expanse?? idk i m not a lore nerd, i thought it looked cool)

i made this thing in clip studio paint and paint tool sai, i used 2 different programs because each one has one brush that i really like so yeah i just changed between them. mostly the characters were drawn in csp, the backgrounds in sai and then i did whatever fancy blurring i wanted to do in csp

and now, this is called the struggles of making this thing, so time for me to complain about very specific things no one cares about

for some reason i decided that i wanted to have the lineart be slightly blurry. how i achieved that is copying the lineart layer (sometimes making it a different color) and blurring it. do you know how annoying it is to do that to EVERY SINGLE DRAWING. especially the shots that were a little bit animated and had like 6 different frames.

the compositions in this are very basic, partially because the game is 2d so i usually imagine shots of it in 2d, mostly because i am incapable of drawing things in perspecitive. the one shot of the underhang gate with survivor and monk fucking tortured me i spent like 3 hours just figuring out how it should work. also i realised that shot doesn t actually make a lot of sense because realistically there would be a wall blocking your view from the angle but shhhh

speaking of my struggles with perspective FUCK iterator puppet rooms. it s literally a box with a grid on it. AND sloped edges, just to make it worse. sometimes you can kinda bullshit perspective but it s LITERALLY JUST  A FUCKING GRID. fuck that. shoutouts to my sibling who did the lines on some of the shots for me cuz i was struggling. but at least i now have the funniest answer to "what is you least favorite room in rain world". the "save me the ache of slow decay" shot turned out really cool tho. idk what possesed me when i drew that one (it s one of my favorite lines of the song when it comes to how well it fits rw so i wanted that shot to look really cool, so i m glad it worked out)

also at some point my sibling asked me if i want them to do some of the backgrounds for me because, and i qoute, "i m pretty sure you are going to die otherwise" (they didn t, btw, i was almost done eith it at that point and just went naaahhh i got this)

i also really like how the shots for the part with saint turned out (if you couldn t tell by the fact i have one of them as my banner thing on tumblr lol). idk, the snow was fun to draw

when i was figuring out which shots go where in the final version i realised that i had every scug in it except gourmand, and i love gourmand, we couldn t not have them, so i put them in the weird black bg white lines flashback sequence

what i did NOT realise however, is that srs is in this for one shot and sos is in this for one shot and nsh isn t. (not counting inv and nightcat cuz they re not real) nsh is the only character that isn t in this. and i just think that s kind of funny. next animatic s gonna be about them to make up for it :] (unless i give up on that animatic. hopefully not. we will see)

i never got so burnt out while making this thing that i gave up on it (again, i was kinda doing it so detailed just because fuck it i can) but after i finished it i was like I AM NEVER DRAWING A BACKGROUND AGAIN.

also. i drew these little guys. so fuckin cute. like i m sorry to be admiring my own drawings but fr i was editing this thing a few months after i d drawn it and looking at my drawing of pebbles like why are you so small. who let you be so small.

and yeah i worked a lot on this thing. as i said i basically spent my entire summer drawing this. the rule was that i need to do 2 shots per day (i did some math at some point that if i did that i d have time to finish it. i m not that bad at math, but still kinda surprising it actually worked), and mostly i stuck to that. i really wanted to make this thing. i think there were like 3 weeks in total where i didn t do anything. i think a shot took me on average about 3 hours, counting breaks? so yeah this is truly what i did this summer

and then there is editing! which i definitely didn t put off for 2 months- ok to be fair in october i was working on the terrible things animatic cuz i wanted to get it done for halloween but still.

i actually quite enjoy editing. i use a free program called kdenlive that sometimes just decides it doesn t want to let you use an effect and sometimes refuses to render things properly but it s mostly pretty good

i recently discovered how to use blur and. the blur abuse in this one was real. the blur abuse shall continue into the future.

also, sometimes i edit entire animatics on a single file. but neglected space is 4 mimutes long and there s a lot of moving parts, and i don t trust either my laptop or my editing program to not crash, so i edited it in parts, rendered those, and then edited them together. it was kind of a pain, but probably less of a pain than if it had crashed like 20 times and messed up the rendering

also!! the subtitles. god the subtitles. so i wanted to have subtitles because this song s words are kinda hard to hear sometimes and they fit rain world so well and i wanted people to appreciate my artistic genius- but also because in my head it was meant to be that some characters are saying some of the lines. and. i can t really make that obvious because these fuckers don t have mouths (insert ihnmaims reference). but they do have canonical colors that they speak in!! so i can use that, that s cool!! (side tangent btw it kinda makes me mad that people sometimes use colors to represent the iterators but they use pink for pebbles and blue for moon, like 

i know that s more obvious and the blue might be confusing otherwise but please!!!! they have canonical colors!!! that they speak in in the broadcasts and it s the color of their overseers and the funny lights come on guys!! use them!!!) (side side tangent fun fact pebbles has like 3 different shades of blue, there s the overseer color, and then the broadcast color is weirdly a lot more greenish, and arguably the rot might also blue cuz that s his color but it s a lot darker for some reason. and then there s also purple rot cuz why not. i just think it s funny)

anyways so subtitles- now, my editing program technically can do subtitles (i used it for the terrible things animatic), but.. it doesn t let me make them fade out and overlap and stuff.. we can t have this, i need my subtitles to be cool.. so what did i do? i wrote them out in csp and i saved each and every line of those subtitles as a png and put it in. there are 111 pngs just for the subtitles.

if there s any typos in the subtitles that s not on me, that s on my 3 friends who got to see it a few days before i posted it for not telling me

i maaaaayyyyy or may not have slightly changed some of the lyrics of the song in the subtitles- listen. from what i ve seen no one can agree on what the words in this song are. maybe there s official lyrics somewhere and i didn t look in the right places but istg there are just some lines where everyone says it s something different. mostly i just went with what i first thought it said

one notable thing however is that there is a line in the song that goes "slithers of wistful window gazes glint in borrowed light". i, for (probably obvious) reasons, first thought it said slivers, and i was like ah, works perfectly, it s sliver of straw. in my defense tho- i looked up what the word slither means in this context and.

so yeah i think i m allowed to change that one

so as i said i have a kind of stupid way of making animatics, i draw everything, then i save the parts as pngs and then i edit them together. there s probably better ways to do it but anyways. here is some numbers for you

unless i am failing at counting (very possible) in total this ended up having 85 shots. and other than the subtitles there are 443 pngs

the name of the folder where i kept all the files for this is called "another attempt at neglected space". obviously i had very high hopes i d actually finish it. other folder names include: "wooo", "kill me", "pngs (kill me p2)", "the wonderful world of pngs", "ruffles your whiskers are killing me", "kill me p3 (wait no saint don t-)", "for the last time, pngs", "yes" and the complementary "no", and "editing (god help me)"

so uhh.. i think that is all. thank you for reading my unhinged ramblings.

also this thing has like 5000 views on youtube now. that s insane. it s gotten recommended to me on my other account which i think is really funny. i was fully prepared for it to get like 20 views. i m so glad the people like it. every comment telling me about how it made them cry brings me indescribable joy, like yeah me too. i m just so happy people see the vision :')

as i said to my friends when they saw it,

also. i recorded almost the entire process of drawing this pmv. why did i do this? idk, i m insane, i thought we d established that. i want to speed it up and make it one giant speedpaint at some point. if i ever actually get around to doing that i might link it here. idk if anyone cares to see but i think it would be cool

[gentlelass]

*yeets fanart*

This is technically a rough sketch but okay-

The siamese guy in the left is Stephen Sable! His Wick's older twin and quite the opposite.

The reason why I did this because I feel like these two would either get along well or passive-aggressive bonding. (Even though Stephen hates Marigold and Lackadaisy lol.)

Stephen personality is stern and a refined gentleman, a man of law. But underneath is very thorny.

(Imagine their duo name is elegancethorns-)

Okay have a good day/Night!

AHHHH ok omg first of all THANK YOU for the unexpected fanart, I really like your style and to be frank what you call a “rough sketch” in my domain classifies as a masterwork already— seriously, it’s very neat and the ocs are so very well characterised already! Also to drop the earnest critique act and delve into my more natural hysterics MARGO LOOKS SOOO CUTEEE AHHHHHHHH. I can hear her, softly whistling an annoying melody while absolutely playing dumb and staring straight into the void while he looks sideways over her, trying to read and analyse her and wondering whether she’s just as much of a ditz as she’s making herself look or if she’s playing elaborate tricks on him (spoiler, it’s the latter).

I immediately went to your profile to stalk you about Stephen and LORD HOW WOULD THEY CLASH. Given that Stephen is a man of law enforcement and Marjorie a criminal she’d be cautious of him, mind you, but given also her anarchist mindset she would NOT respect him, his values and his profession at all and subtly mock and tease him at any given chance, with that sweet smile of hers that makes it impossible to retort without making oneself look awful in front of anyone else - how could a proper gentleman snap at such a delicate, lovely little thing? Margo would also be provoked to just make his life difficult also because with the whole ‘refined gentleman’ thing he has going on, he reminds her of the type of company she was used to orbit around during her time as a successful ballerina. The kind that just ignites her desperate need to prove she’s better than them at all costs.

[xxiamrainxx]

Day 6 of trying to get back into digital art!

Our first work in progress of the series, let's go! I definitely meant to have this finished today, but it's taken about as much time as yesterday's drawing already, and I still need to figure out the color palette and add all the finishing touches. So, to make sure I actually post something for day 6, I present you with the lineart.

(I do have the shading done already, but you don't get to see that until I post the finished piece.)

This time, I decided to do a drawing of an OC of mine! I want to make a proper reference sheet for her sometime soon, but I don't think I'm quite comfortable enough with digital art for all that just yet. I'll get there eventually, and this bust shot works as some design work in the meantime.

She's about two years old now, so I have some older designs to work with (that I will not be sharing), and I've done some fairly recent traditional sketches of her, so I have a pretty clear idea of what I want her outfit to look like. Her hair I was way less sure about, but I'm happy to say that I think I've settled on something I like! Now I just gotta figure out her color palette and make some minor tweaks, and her design is finished! (until I decide to redesign her again, lol).

I'm super excited to finally show off an OC to you all, because while I do love making fanart very very much (and that will still likely be what most of my art is), I also like having silly little guys (gender neutral) who are mine and that I made, even if I don't use them for anything and they just kind of... Exist. I really hope you all love her as much as I do, and let's hope I can show off some more OCs in the near or distant future <3

Finally, here's the drawing for today. The finished piece should be up soon- either later today, or sometime tomorrow, depending on when I finish it.

For now, enjoy this little sneak peek<3

[valeriianz]

Would you ever write a.....Fairytale adventure type AU (ﾉ*･ω･)ﾉ? (idk how to explain it ajbdkjvakdv)

(Kinda like...maybe Ghibli movie vibes....ABDHBAHCBKAC)

HYPER HUGS

ahhhh always a privilege to see you in my inbox, Mere 😻

(this post gets long, pls bear with me lol)

fairy tail itself, no. im really not into fantasy or fairy tails, sadly (which sucks cos like, that's half of dreamling AUs right there lol).

but ooh i do love some adventure! especially Ghibli-style! i know that's kinda fantastical but i'd be very into it.

my mind immediately went to a Princess Mononoke AU, a film i havent seen in ages, but Hob and Dream in that scene??

Dream: "I'll cut your throat! That'll shut you up!" Hob: "You're beautiful."

or, OR! have you seen that Castle in the Sky AU??

so, in short... yeah, probably haha.

OH SNAP! i just remembered i have a Little Red Riding Hood au that i had been attempting like, in early 2023 after THAT fanart but i could not figure out how to write it, and i got so frustrated with it that i just gave up. below the cut is what i'd written so far, starting with some ramblings to myself before some "proper" writing... i'll never finish it ;_; sorry.

Hob is still a Red Riding Hood/Hunter type character and he is the only one "brave" enough to visit the witch in the woods, aka Johanna when his village requires medicine/care. The whole village is deeply superstitious and so Johanna stays out of the village for her own safety and it's taken a lot of convincing from Hob (who is one of the only capable hunters so he is Important) that she is fine and won't curse the whole village. The only time Johanna forbids Hob from coming to see her is on the night of the full moon.

But then EMERGENCY happens and Hob sets out for Johanna's on a full moon and runs into Dream. Cue fanart scene. Hob fights Dream and somehow manages to hold his own. Maybe they bang here, maybe Dream gets Hob to open up about why he's out during the full moon and then lets him go. Because Hob has zero survival instincts he goes out again on a full moon just to see Dream. Johanna thinks he's an idiot.

-----------------------------------

There is a witch in the woods; the villagers know this and remain wary of her provocation. She is all powerful but she is also a hermit– quiet and bloodless, when ignored. Many elders in the village have spun up stories, history between them and her. Though it seems all unfounded, Hob had never been anything but curious, growing up with these tales of offering sacrificial goats in place of the children they believed her to steal, before moving on to setting up traps on the edge of the woods where their small hamlet lay.

Hob had also heard stories, though not many, of how she’d been run out, that there may be more of her kind hiding in secret within the community. This too, Hob doesn’t allow to bother him. He is surrounded by superstition and pays no mind to any of it.

Which is all to say, he’s encountered the witch on several occasions. 

And whatever tales Hob had grown up hearing of her comes to a screeching halt the day he first met her.

“What the ever loving fuck are you doing out here?”

Snapping up to attention, Hob had regarded the woman. He’d been a boy of 15 the first time they’d met, and had the notion of fright abandon him by watching his mother die in childbirth to what was supposed to be his little brother, as well as his father being robbed and beaten to death by bandits while he cowed away behind a tree. 

Hob would never be that cowardly again. And he made up for it by going out into the woods nearly every night, despite the warnings from his neighbors. His friends would egg him on but then chicken out the closer they got to the edge of the clearing, lined by dense forest and rustling leaves.