#not enough for a fic but a lotta work for a drawing/comic

[candyunicornsateme]

idea where Kenny is desperately trying so hard to confess to Kyle and just say I love you but somehow every time they get interrupted by something or someone and Kenny is a man of very few words and its hard to get alone and eventually Kyle’s on the brink of insanity like “fucking SAY IT KENNY” and violently shakes Kenny so much he doesn’t even hear it clear the first time

[sometimeslapine]

It's not about quantity, it's about quality. Even if they arent the same scale, I'm sure I'm not alone in saying they would be appreciated.

And I'll be honest, engaging in a dialog about kink that is just ping ponging ideas back and forth sounds fun. Sometimes you don't need one massive work to lay out like a blanket to cover all the reasons and facets and quirks you like about a certain kink. Sometimes you don't even need a patch work quilt that you build upon. Sometimes you've earned the Worlds Worst Bonus from your job at the Cotton Ball Factory and you're just throwing little ball after ball at the topic, not caring where they land or if you've hit the same aspects again and again, and then you look back and see you've done a pretty good job covering the topic anyway.

Even if you aren't writing a novel, with your art you do a great job of making kink... I hesitate to say Feel Real but you make it Make Sense in a Real Way. Like of course if you lived in a world with Boob Growth Lotion, you can't just rub it in with your hands or else you'll get Boob Hands and that's Fun because Of Course that would happen. And I just kinda wanna see what you can cook up if you didn't have to find a way to visualize and show and make it look good.

bit of a delayed response to this one while turning over possible replies in my head... struggling to explain a few more conceptual blocks. writing's always been a weird subject matter for me, in one way or another. pls bear with me

so like. comparatively, inflation kink fics span back a good two decades, at least. there's an established pool of tropes, visual metaphors, ideal pacing or story beats to hit, tones or themes that set the mood, key phrases that really get at the brain, and points of finality that overall mesh really well for a good story. not to say there's no originalities to be had in this space anymore, but there's a lotta prior work to draw from, were i to need assistance filling a void in a sentence or two.

but the thing is, with the more nonsensical stuff like That Comic Thing You're Referring To, there isn't a lot of pre-existing stuff i can reference! i often find that i completely lack the language framework needed to put those weirder scenarios into words. i'm just making it up as i go, after all! and so drawing it out in some loose manner becomes infinitely easier than trying to capture all the nuances of it in a paragraph or two, because i get to lean a bit heavily on the storytelling mechanic of "Show, Don't Tell" as support.

though these scenarios being physically sketched-out-on-paper may end up leaving them a bit more concise than intended in their delivery, i'd like to think the concept i'm exploring's still getting conveyed effectively (even if i can't put the scenario to art in the way I'm /fully/ hoping to, whether due to the limits of my artistic skill, or just other general constraints of anatomy & form in a physical space) because ironically, despite a "concise" delivery, a drawing still remains open-ended enough to have its blanks filled in by the viewer's own preferences/themes/biases in enjoyment (in the same weird way the sketch of a piece can sometimes look more visually interesting & carry more emotion than that piece's finished lineart would) with the open-ended nature guiding one's thoughts to what potential fun lies outside the final panel. as you experience art, art experiences you, etc. etc. etc.

as for making it feel "real", honestly sometimes it's less about realism and more about exploring the fun and wild "consequences of over-indulgency" (said with as much love and appreciation as possible, just so we're clear!!); it's acknowledging the dangers of going wild with a Topical That Changes You without hesitation, it's of not thinking it through before leaping directly into in the path of that TF raygun beam, it's of playing with dangerous and ancient magicks because the spellbook had funny drawings that poked at the kinky parts of your psyche, it's of getting too lost in the sauce to have an escape plan.

consequences, for lack of any better word, can help ground fantasies into something more tangible! makes it feel more Real, despite very much being weird fantasy nonsense at its heart

anyway. run-on-sentences and streams of consciousness aside, i appreciate that my weird brand of nonsense is enjoyed all the same

[ladybuvelle]

// So yesterday I was in a horrible, horrible mood. I was stressed. Really stressed. And unfortunately that’s kinda common these days. But this ended up being a stress/depression mix where all I wanted to do was lay in bed and stare at the ceiling while rain sounds played on my computer, the lights were low, and I had a fan blowing on me. It was a bad time. I felt lethargic and on the verge of crying every other moment for no explainable reason.

I was like that all day more-or-less. I wanted to draw but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I wanted to hang out with people but I just felt like if I did I’d exhaust myself more. Then the evening came and I was sad I’d done a whole lotta nothing all day.

Then, for no real reason at all, I randomly thought to look up Sona x Yasuo stuff. I do that now and then, since (if you’ve known me long enough) I really like the idea of the ship. I’ve drawn it and written for it a bit, but it’s not a “mainstream” ship so sometimes it feels like I’m the one who owns the tag on Tumblr. But sometimes, sometimes, I’ll find artwork or writing of these two. It’s so, so rare, and often not the “best”, but I still always appreciate seeing it and it never fails to cheer me up when I happen to stumble on something I haven’t seen before.

Last night, I found a fic I’d never seen before. And it changed my fucking life.

I present to you: The Mute and the Wanderer by CarrotFarmer.

From the very first opening line I knew I was in for something special. I laughed for the first time all day. I laughed until I fucking cried. And it only got BETTER the more I read! I was in a call with @communistofzaun at that point and my god we were both gasping for air over certain parts.

And I want to say this upfront; I unironically love it. I love it so much. It’s so silly but so sincere and it’s obvious the author probably isn’t the best or most experienced writer, but god dammit they still tried. They still wrote the story they wanted to write. Some people, professional people, struggle with even that sometimes! I’m only sad that they seem to have forgotten about it because the story’s over a year old now, but god damn does it leave on the strangest cliffhanger.

Favorite highlights include:

Draven banging on Sona’s apartment door begging her to take him back (they were in a relationship months ago but he cheated on her with Miss Fortune. Scandalous!)

Sona finds Yasuo laying face-down on the ground passed out. He gets up and assures her he’s ok. Why he was just laying on the ground like that is never lead up to or explained. I think the author just wanted an excuse for Sona to cry and hug him. It’s adorable.

Zed shows up, goes all Darth Vader on Yasuo and is like “Join me!”, Yasuo says no, Zed kidnaps Sona for no reason.

Yasuo casually rocks up to Syndra’s place, she’s like “Sup? Heard you got a girlfriend!”, Yasuo’s like “lol no but Zed took Sona”, and Syndra proceeds to brow-beat a cowering Zed into giving Sona back. This whole sequence is, again, not explained as to why it happens.

Yasuo’s weird and inconsistent way of speaking. He calls Draven “sir” ffs.

Sona is perfect and beautiful and innocent and can do no wrong and cries at everything (whoa, am I sure I didn’t write this fic?).

Shen constantly showing up and going Batman on Yasuo like “WHERE IS SHE?!”. He stabs Yas at one point.

Yasuo KNOCKING SONA UNCONSCIOUS WITH A PILLOW during an impromptu pillow fight (that passive tho).

This fic gave me life when I was fucking dead. It’s so quotable to me now even after only a day. Just the OPENING LINES ALONE make me laugh so, so much, so I’m going to share them with you:

“When she first met him, she didn’t know what to think. She probably thought he was some kind of drag-queen, because of his ponytail, but then she saw how masculine he was.”

I just want to make a mad-libs version of those two sentences because god damn I was substituting so many words there for other people, and I just... I’m so happy I found this fic.

I was gunna do some sort of meme thing about it, but the more I thought about it the more that seemed disrespectful. The original author was probably trying their best and, as I said, writing the story they wanted to write regardless of what other people thought. I’ve always admired people that do things, even if they aren’t the best of the best at it. You’ll never get better if you don’t try, right? I often browse amateur comics and I’m amazed at the amount of effort I see in a lot of them even when most people would just say “That’s a bad drawing” or “That’s bad writing”. They still put in that effort. They still saw it through. And someday, someone’s bound to stumble on their work and be inspired or have their spirits lifted.

Yeah it’s a silly fanfic, but I happened to find it precisely when I needed it most. And if the writer had never written it I never would have found it. My night could have gone any other way, Maybe I would have found something else to cheer me up. Maybe not. But this is what happened, and I’m still smiling about it the next day.

So if you’re feeling bad about your writing, your artwork, your creative projects - don’t. Just do it. Even if you think it’s bad, just do it. Put it out there. Even if it’s embarrassing or silly or you think it’s dumb, be brave. You will never know just how you’ve changed the world around you, but you will have. And that’s amazing.