#problems on ratio and proportion

[dreams-and-honor]

@ my last comment about Xal being sexualized

if you draw her with hentai girl proportions; I do not fucking trust you

If you draw her looking like an actual animated corpse; step into my parlor

[lovelynim]

Tiny Problems

Honkai: Star Rail - Dr. Ratio x Aventurine

A/N: I just finished playing 2.1 and I needed to get this out of my head

Summary: While trying to figure out one of Sunday's puzzles, Aventurine starts to have a little too much fun at the sandpit.

Word count: 1373 words

Warnings: Minor spoilers from Honkai's 2.1 main quest!

Ratio rubbed the side of his head, closing his eyes as he hoped to make time pass a little faster. Yes, it shouldn’t take more than a couple of minutes for that pretentious gambler to find the missing pieces and they could move on.

What was missing on Ratio’s calculations, however, was how amused Aventurine would get with Sunday’s sandpit.

“Woah! Hahah, they even made tiny clothes for the stores around here!” Aventurine beamed with excitement, paying attention to every detail - except for the ones he actually should look for. “Look, doctor, don’t I look handsome in these? Do you think they have a regular-person’s size of these back in the Golden Hour?”

That futile, mundane idiot.

“I honestly think it’s impossible for me to care less about it, Aventurine. Did you happen to find any clue to where the missing piece is?” Ratio sighed, looking down at the sandpit as uninterested as he could be. 

His eyes could easily spot the shrinked blonde, running around like a little kid at some kind of amusement park. Was he really enjoying the sandpit that much?

“That man really outdid himself in these buildings, huh? But he could pay a little more attention to the NPCs…” Aventurine mumbled, clearly not paying any mind to Ratio’s concerns as he stopped by one of the food trucks. 

While the doctor complained about something that he promptly ignored, Aventurine walked around, trying to check if there was some sort of miniature food that he could try. “Hmm, is this thing hollow?” The gambler hummed, knocking on the truck’s window.

Maybe this was all part of the Family’s trial, Ratio thought while pinching the bridge of his nose and sighing in defeat. The key to the next room was just right there and, yet, Aventurine was refusing to collaborate. 

“How can you be having fun at a time like this?”

“How can you not have fun?” Aventurine snapped back in a cocky tone, looking up to see his giant coworker. “If anything, we can always tell that man about how hard we worked to get past his puzzles and meet him in person. Facing such hardships must be worth something, right?”

I gained nothing from dealing with a hardship like you, gambler,” Ratio groaned, crossing his arms in front of his chest while Aventurine resumed his little (pun intended) exploration. Was he talking to one of those NPCs he just complained about?

“Damn, these guys are so dull! I think they could use some of your teaching, doc!” Aventurine shouted with an audible chuckle, almost as if mocking Ratio’s growing frustration with his constant delays.

“Gambler,” Ratio called, his voice carrying his clear annoyance, “quit fooling around. Did your brain shrink beyond your body’s proportion? We have no time for playing around.”

Even with the size difference between them, just by Aventurine’s (small) body language, Ratio could tell the man was rolling his eyes. How utterly distasteful. “Come on, what’s the problem in having some fun while we are- w-wOAH!!”

Just as Aventurine was about to boast, Ratio reached out to the top of the miniature building where he was. The gambler could swear he had reached the limit of Ratio’s patience and he was about to get squashed like a bug… but, instead, Ratio carefully pinched the back of his coat and picked him up.

“You. You’re my problem,” Ratio said firmly, holding the other man in front of his eyes and watching him flail like a worm on the hook - a fitting metaphor for this situation, if you asked the doctor.

“H-hey, I could hear you just fine from the sandpit,” Aventurine giggled nervously, curling his legs and tugging at his coat, not really sure if Ratio would bother to catch him if he slipped past his grip. “But look at the bright side, doc, at least you only have a tiny problem, h-heheh…”

“...”

Aventurine gulped. Ratio’s angry face could be even scarier when he was a thousand times bigger, huh… “C-come on, don’t be angry! I was just trying to give you something to laugh about, you know? Have fun!”

“I’ll have plenty of things to ‘laugh about’ when we get back - after our work is done,” Ratio scolded, making Aventurine flinch in his grip, “but all you do is fool around. Are you understanding the issue here, gambler?” Ratio narrowed his eyes, scoping Aventurine’s body to allow him to sit on his palm.

Leaning against Ratio’s thumb, Aventurine remained in silence for a couple seconds while he looked around.

“Are you listening to me?” Ratio sighed, giving his best efforts to not squeeze the blonde like some sort of stress ball.

“Hmm…” Aventurine turned his attention back to Ratio’s face and, from that distance, his stupid (read: silly) smile was clear in the doctor’s sight. “Are you sure you don’t want to try to slip me in Sunday’s clothes? I think I’d even fit in his pocket like theEHe- h-hey!”

“You insufferable idiot,” Ratio groaned, poking Aventurine with his index finger, “are you even listening to me?!”

“H-hehey, doc! Thahat tihihickles!” Aventurine protested, using both his hands and all of his strength to try to stop Ratio’s finger from poking him. “C-cohome on! This ihihisn’t fair!”

“It tickles?” Ratio arched his eyebrow, resting his finger on top of Aventurine’s body while pondering about that new information. At his size, Ratio expected it to hurt, maybe even crush one of his ribs if he used too much strength… but tickle? Well, it was reasonable. Maybe with the right pressure and move, his touch could’ve - indeed - tickled. 

“You mean, like this?” Ratio grinned, gently wagging his finger against Aventurine’s small body.

“Y-yehes, stohop it!”

“Interesting,” Ratio mused out loud, leaning against the sandpit’s border. Swiping his thumb over Aventurine’s body, the doctor managed to push his arms out of the way and trap them between his own digits. “To think something like this would still work,” he continued, using his free index to rub Aventurine’s side.

“W-wahAHAhait, what ahahre you dohoing?” Aventurine laughed in confusion, bringing his knees up in a vain attempt to protect himself. It wasn’t rare for Ratio to overpower him, but having him doing it while he was in clear disadvantage was way worse! “DohOHOhoctor! Don’t ihihignore me!”

“I wish I could, but you’re too loud for that, gambler,” Ratio muttered and, despite his cold eyes, there was an amused smile on his lips. “As for your question, I’m doing as you suggested: seeking things to have fun.”

Ratio moved his finger against, poking Aventurine’s stomach as if he was some sort of toy. “You looked like a doll like this, gambler,” Ratio teased, watching the small man writhe in his palm, “you even make noise if I squeeze you like this.”

“AhAHAha, RahAHAhatio, stohop!” Aventurine whined, desperately trying to pull his arms down, but it was like his wrists were locked under boulders. All he could do was laugh and curse the moment he passed through that little gate - this was so unfair! “LehEHehet gohOHoh!!”

“Hm? Well, I could…” Ratio said, flicking his finger against Aventurine’s body and making him giggle some more, “if we went back to work and solved this puzzle. After all, how do you expect to meet Sunday when you look like a cheap toy?”

Deciding to show the gambler some mercy, Ratio lifted his finger and watched Aventurine’s little chest wave as he caught his breath. “I-I… ahah, damn, I’m not cheap, doctor!”

“...Is that the part that concerns you?”

“Of course, heh, my clothes are expensive and- waitwaitwait!!” Aventurine cried out, curling up into a ball in Ratio’s palm as he saw that evil finger approaching him again, “fine! Fine! I will work to solve the puzzle!”

Ratio huffed, turning around to put Aventurine back in the center of the sandpit, “very well. You do know how to make the smart choice sometimes.” As he stood back, Ratio watched the little gambler pat his clothes as if trying to fix them. 

Tsk, he was simply incorrigible.

“Gambler…”

“I know, I know! ~ Just hang in there, doc!” Aventurine chuckled, waving to his giant coworker as he resumed running around the sandpit. Time to get back to business!

[inspired-lesson-plans]

Math, grade 7, Ratios and Proportional Relationships 7.RP.A.3: Use proportional relationships to solve multistep ratio and percent problems. Examples: simple interest, tax, markups and markdowns, gratuities and commissions, fees, percent increase and decrease, percent error.

Essential Question: How can basic calculations of percent change influence major world events?

Do Now: Calculate the percent increase or decrease in each of the following equations. x = (28 - 17.9)/28 x = (41.5 - 57.7)/57.7

Class Discussion: Remind students about how to perform basic calculations of increase/decrease factors. Ask them whether this calculation would be more complicated if the quantities were dollars instead of just numbers (answer: no). Ask them whether this calculation would be more complicated if the quantities were billions of dollars instead of just dollars (answer: no). Show students that they just performed the exact same calculations that Donald Trump did in order to decide what tariffs should be put upon Indonesia and Thailand, respectively.

Finally, ask students whether important global trade decisions should be calculated with 7th grade math skills, or if perhaps this is insufficient given the severe consequences that could arise from such a dunning-kruger error.

Direct Instruction: Explain what a Dunning-Kruger error is, if for no other reason than to communicate how absolutely maddening has it is for legitimate experts who have dedicated their lives to nudging fiscal policy in the right direction and then watch as their president makes the worst decision possible on purpose.

Take a moment to explain the difference between an import and an export, so that students understand what these billions of dollars actually mean in the real world. Feel free to call out anyone who has ever questioned whether or not they would ever use this kind of math in the real world. Show them that it's happening right now, and make sure they understand how terrifying that is.

Acknowledge the variables: x: total exports from US to country i m: total imports to US from country i tau (τ): calculated % tariff on all imports to US from country i epsilon (ε): elasticity phi (φ): passthrough

Ask students what they think elasticity and passthrough mean, then show students this passage from ustr.gov:

Parameter Selection To calculate reciprocal tariffs, import and export data from the U.S. Census Bureau for 2024. Parameter values for ε and φ were selected. The price elasticity of import demand, ε, was set at 4. Recent evidence suggests the elasticity is near 2 in the long run (Boehm et al., 2023), but estimates of the elasticity vary. To be conservative, studies that find higher elasticities near 3-4 (e.g., Broda and Weinstein 2006; Simonovska and Waugh 2014; Soderbery 2018) were drawn on. The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25. The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021).

Ask students if this clarified anything about what elasticity and passthrough mean. Most will say "no", but if anyone points out that multiplying 4 by 0.25 cancels them both out, reward them. That student is correct, because elasticity and passthrough have been arbitrarily assigned so as to make this calculation so simple that even Donald Trump can understand it.

Modeled Learning: Show how to apply these tariffs to popular imports such as raw coffee beans. For example, the USDA report of coffee imports from 2024 (page 6) shows that the vast majority of raw coffee is imported from Brazil.

A simple search with Perplexity.ai tells us that in 2024, imports (m) = $42.3 billion and exports (x) = $49.7 billion, so the reciprocal tariff would be (x-m)/m = (49.7-42.3)/42.3 = 17.5%.

Thus, all coffee imports from Brazil will automatically be 17.5% more expensive.

Be sure to highlight that this is happening to every country in the world, even those with total populations less than 1000.

Higher Order Learning:

Students should consider the following facts:

There is very little territory within the United States that can grow coffee.

Almost all coffee in the world is grown within what is called "The Global South", where the climate is warm and the labor is cheap.

The US exports significantly more (sometimes vastly more) to countries in the Global South than we import from them.

Students should then answer the following questions:

What will this universal tariff calculation do to the price of coffee?

Is there any way that US coffee companies can import the same amount of coffee as before without passing on the cost to consumers? Why or why not?

Do you think this tariff program will equalize imports and exports between the US and other countries? What other impacts could it have, good or bad, across the world?

[pep-the-artemis]

Murder Drone Heights calculated with Maths

So previously I said Uzi was 127cm (4'2") and Doll was 132cm (4'4") but I realised while rewatching the show that i was really off.

Uzi is a lot shorter than that. So what is Uzi's and the rest of the casts height? Well we can first find a bunch of comparison shots with Uzi and other characters.

Lines have been drawn from the heels to the top of their heads. Using these images we can construct ratios of the characters heights relative to each other.

Doll : Lizzie = 7.94 : 8.29

Uzi : Doll : Lizzie = 3.87 : 4.82 : 4.33

Bully : Uzi = 9.17 : 7.04

Uzi : Kahn = 6.82:7.89

There is one problem, in all the shots the characters are standing next to each other except Uzi : Doll : Lizzie were they're standing different distances from the camera. Since distance from camera and scale factor are directly proportional, we can determine the distances Doll and Lizzie are from the camera which create the ratio 1 : 1.16 .

Now we have to determine how far Uzi is from the camera with respect to Doll but that's not easy since I was unable to accurately determine the vanishing point, we can only estimate fortunately that won't affect the final outcome that significantly. Comparing heels, Uzi is 2 times closer to Lizzie than she is Doll, so she is 1.11 from the camera with respect to Doll.

Using there apparent heights (3.87 : 4.82 : 4.33) and distances from the camera (1.11 : 1 : 1.16), we ca determine a ratio for there actual heights, 4.30 : 4.82 : 5.02 .

Using this information we can combine all there heights into a single ratio to get the ratio of heights of Uzi : Doll : Lizzie : Kahn : Bully as 1 : 1.12 : 1.17 : 1.16 : 1.30 but this isn't much use without a height of one of the characters.

From the missing posters, we can estimate most Worker Drones are around 132cm (4'4").

For reasons, I am determining that Lizzie is ~132cm (4"4'). Using this information we can determine the heights of all the characters.

Uzi - 112cm (4'0")

Doll - 126cm (4'2")

Lizzie - 132cm (4'4")

Kahn - 131cm (4'4")

Bully - 137cm (4'6")

If this post gets good numbers I will probably do this for the entire cast not just these 5 random few.

[damnfandomproblems]

Fandom Problem #8113:

Something specific to the Sims fandom:

I find it so hilarious how so many of the so called "alpha cc" fans always go on about how they do not like the art style of the game and want something that looks more realistic and thus use alpha cc. Which is completely fair.

But then they give their Sims, especially the female ones, the most insane and impossible body proportions that it puts Disney Pixar moms to shame with their breasts, to waist, to hips ratio. Like these characters certainly do many things, but they do not look realistic. They do not even look human any more.

Feel free to like the alpha artstyle, but please just admit that "realism" has nothing to do with it.

[tesseractrave]

as you know there's a live action Zelda movie coming along, if on the off chance the Happy Mask Salesman shows up even as a background/side character who do you think should play him?

ME

PUT ME IN THE MOVIE/j

(Just kidding, I'm a 5'2" woman.)

Thinking about his facial proportions and appearance,

the spectrum of actors I'd pick based on his features ranges from Gong Yoo to like... idfk Tobey Maguire or something.

They've got similar squareish-tapered facial proportions with the jaw/chin ratio and the spacing of the eyes. Managing to look mature while also looking cute. (Tom Holland fits in this category, but I'd cry if they did that)

It's hard because I love his color palette so much, and I'd really want a ginger actor because... well... he's ginger. I draw him with light freckles across his nose to emphasize that personal headcanon. The only problem is I can't find any red-headed actors I'd be happy with.

I would also accept Dwayne Johnson

(In all seriousness, though, I'd appreciate the vast reaches of the people of the internet to give some suggestions. I think it'd be cool to hear what others think about this.)

[hesperocyon-lesbian]

Ok I’m gonna keep this vague because I’ve published actual research in this field and I’d rather not have my actual real life name floating around on tumblr.

Basically, for those who don’t know, phylogenetics is the study of constructing family trees for organisms. We construct what are called characters, which are specific descriptors for different anatomical features of an organism, and score them with a number based on which state for that character they fit. Eg, a character would be “does this animal have a tail”, with 0 for no and 1 for yes. Character states aren’t necessarily binary either, so for our previous character we could instead formulate it as 0, no tail, 1, short tail, 2, long tail.

We formulate hundreds of characters for a dataset based on the anatomical features we’re trying to track the evolutionary history of, then score a dataset of species for those characters. Using this dataset, we run statistical analyses that determine which pattern of anatomical changes over time is most likely, or which path of speciation requires the fewest changes.

So, with that background, here’s my rant: a massive chunk of the researchers in this field don’t treat it like a science. Let’s return to our tail example. Determining whether a tail is long or short is incredibly subjective, and because animals change their overall size more easily than they change proportions, absolute measurements aren’t a useful metric. So we could reformulate our character by separating short and long tails into the ratio of their length to overall body size. Straightforward, right?

The problem is there aren’t really any formalized standards around this, so phylogenetics researchers will basically just make an arbitrary character, determine which character state to score a species for based on entirely subjective judgments, and then treat the results as objective. It’s a mess, and it just generally produces garbage results, but for some reason people have been treating those results as authoritative because the data is extensive and boring so sifting through it to determine its objectivity is a pain in the ass. Granted, it’s a pain in the ass that should be getting caught in peer review, but it straight up isn’t

[bodybeyondstories]

dicks keep growing around me - 8 (Miguel)

After Myron's growth spurt, Miguel takes him to his tailor for a wardrobe update. Late for work, and still pent up from their recent activities, Miguel finds a surprise piece of Myron's clothing in his bag, and just like Ty, he faces explosive consequences.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 (Previous) | 9 (Next)

male TF // growth // dick growth // pec growth // bubble butt // nsfw

4908 words

(I was inspired to play around with some pec growth by this ask a little while back. It was fun!)

---

“Do these make my butt look big?”

I struggled for words. “I think we left ‘big’ behind a long time ago,” I said, watching Myron check himself out in the dressing room stall, clad in a pair of chinos with a cartoonishly oversized waist that still managed to strain against his cartoonishly oversized butt cheeks. His curvy form being reproduced three times in the tri-fold mirror lent itself to a funhouse effect, as if he could step out and instantly return to the sensible, pert bubble he once had. Not that I would ever want that to happen. Having his already ridiculous monster booty inflate in real time while I was inside him was one of the greatest things that’s ever happened to me personally. It took everything in my power to extricate myself from between those cheeks this morning and my dick jumped against its triple security confines at the thought of once again getting to bury my face in that posterior. I knew I was an ass man but even this was beyond my wildest dreams. I was addicted.

Myron wore his stretchiest–and really only–option out of the house, a pair of plaid leggings that didn’t so much hug his curves as fight for dear life against the beach ball buns spilling out of the waistband more and more with each step. He tied a light hoodie around his waist to at least hide the top of his pink bikini briefs, though it didn’t do much to mitigate his ass from being on display. He even had a minor struggle fitting into my car, adjusting and readjusting the passenger seat to accommodate his long legs, tree trunk thighs, and voluptuous bottom. Another potential problem to solve.

“I’m seeing a lot of elastic waistbands in your future,” said Val, studying Myron’s physique with a scientific eye. Val had been my go to tailor for years, long before these changes had made it nigh impossible to shop for pants at a normal department store. She ran what she called a ‘gender expansive menswear experience,’ always looked the definition of dapper, and specialized in catering to a plethora of unique body types. She was also very down to give us some special attention on this slow morning after I explained Myron’s situation. “Oh I love a challenge!” she had exclaimed over the phone.

And Myron was a challenge she jumped to as soon as we walked in. As he suffered through a stack of ill-fitting slacks, jeans, trunks, and at least one asymmetrical short skirt that worked surprisingly well, she vocalized an ongoing calculus of fabric amounts, hip to waist ratios, and design patterns that might emphasize or de-emphasize his wild proportions. She was in the zone, whipping around her tape measure with a professional flair and handling Myron’s body with a gentle, open intimacy that he seemed like he grew to appreciate.

As we left the store, with not exactly success, but at least some options–and a set of new tailoring projects for Val to dig into–I noticed more confidence in his walk. I couldn’t tell if it was the awkwardness of his sudden growth spurt or the weight of open stares from onlookers, but he had seemed deeply self conscious on our way in that was thankfully fading on our way out. Between his wildly upsized lower body and my freakish bulge, we were both letting go of the luxury of blending in. We held hands and rolled with it. 

We got back to his place with just enough time to make some coffee and get me into some professional clothes before running off to the office. I had barely shut the door before Myron spun around and planted his hands on the wall on either side of my head, looking hungrily down at me. It was weird seeing him from this new angle, his gentle, inquisitive gaze falling over me like a protective cloak. I was already liking this new dynamic. “Thanks again,” he said, and leaned down for an indulgent kiss. 

“It’s the least I could do with all the trouble I’ve caused,” I said, then returned the favor and pressed my lips against his. My hands rested on his hips like they were always meant to be there. I caressed the expanse of one ass cheek, still marveling at its sheer size, while he cupped one of my pecs and gave it a hearty squeeze. I moaned, louder than I meant to. They were so sensitive lately, and felt uncomfortable in my shirt. “But,” reluctantly breaking the kiss, “We’re both late for work. You want coffee?”

He waddled off in mock dejection as I slipped into his room to get dressed. I had a few versatile options stashed away in his wardrobe. Did my clothes really occupy an entire drawer? When did that happen? I was already running late, so I arranged something basic and reasonably business casual, though all my shirts felt a little tighter than I usually liked. I guess I wasn’t the only one making some gains in the gym.

By the time I returned to the kitchen to get beans grinding and the kettle on, Myron had whipped off everything except for his bikini briefs and proceeded to station himself at his standing desk and boot up his laptop. I envied whatever work from home contract gig he had most recently stumbled into and his resultant freedom from spending the rest of the day with multiple layers of constrictive fabric. But really my eyes rested longingly on the briefs stretched tight against his prodigious ass, my dick jumping in my sweats as he hinged his hips back and rested on his elbows.

“Just coffee?” he asked. “You’re not hungry?” We locked eyes and he gave his ass just enough of a shake to set off a tremor of jiggling cheek.

“...Well I’m already late.”

—

I moseyed into my office already dreaming of the next time I would have the privilege of eating the juiciest peach on the planet. I settled onto my exercise ball and opened my email, seeing if anything was on fire in my absence. 

A lazy knock on the door was followed by the shaggy auburn mane of Wes peeking in.

“Missed you earlier,” he said, with that easy smile. 

“Right, you were washing today! Yeah, I had kind of an emergency with my…” What were Myron and I? I don't think we'd had a chance to discuss it yet. “... with my, um–”

“Oh dude, don't worry about that,” he laughed. “That's not why I'm here. I actually just need your old key to the maintenance rooms in the basement. I'm updating the locks. I don't know if you saw my email.”

There it was on my screen, fourth from the top. I was one of the lucky few to be trusted with maintenance access, a responsibility I held sacred and never actually used.

“Of course, yeah yeah yeah,” I said, digging through my bag and pulling out not a key but a pair of very familiar crumpled underwear. I shoved them into a drawer before Wes could notice. How did those get in there? I continued digging until I finally produced the item in question.

“Thanks man.” He grabbed the key and gave me a fist bump. His knuckle tatts spelled out R-E-A-L. I wondered what the other hand said. “I'll, uh, see you out there,” he said, glancing towards the windows, then winked and slipped out the door.

These days, my dick turns into a faucet at the slightest hint of arousal, which truth be told is effectively all the time, so I usually pack a backup or two of my specially-fitted underwear to slip into so I don’t end up awkwardly cleaning precum off my desk chair. But I guess with all the weirdness that morning, I had accidentally grabbed Myron’s used briefs from yesterday’s incident at the gym. Which was weird because I didn’t remember rooting around in his hamper for this specific piece of clothing.

Just like I didn’t remember pulling them back out of my desk drawer and holding them just close enough to my face to catch a whiff of Myron’s compelling musk. Ty really did have a point, I couldn’t help but admit. My face had just been buried in Myron’s ass, but there was something magnetic about these residual pheromones. My dick jumped in anticipation.

Too early for this, I thought. I dropped his drawls in the bottom drawer, the one full of miscellaneous files with the janky handle, and closed it with finality, resolving to get through the rest of the day without distraction. I only had my one outfit to last me through the rest of the workday, and I wasn’t in the mood to sneak out with my pants soaked in my homemade lube (again). The realization that I missed my usual ��appointment’ with Wes came with the realization that after all the festivities last night and this morning, I still hadn't cum. As much as I enjoyed servicing Myron and the Giant Peach, I was pent up, and so used to my exhibitionist dynamic with Wes that I felt I couldn't clear the pipes unless he was out there washing the windows. I had missed that opportunity. My balls began to churn with overproduction, frustrated at being teased multiple times in the past twelve hours with no relief. My dick felt heavy. Heavier than usual.

My whole body felt pressurized. My crotch had grown hot and constricted, but my shirt had followed suit. It felt so tight across my chest, my extra sensitive nipples delighting in the increased friction. I got up to stretch and clear my hand, pacing around my office and taking in the view of the surrounding high rises reflecting a clear sky belied by herds of thunderclouds rolling across the landscape miles away. I looked down to check my phone and instead saw that I had Myron’s underwear twirling between my fingers, just inches from my nose. When had I pulled these out of the drawer? But I turned around to see it apparently untouched. I unconsciously brought them closer to my face. They had a scent that was magnetic and threatened to occupy all my sensory attention. I breathed deep, indulging in the smell of him, warmth resonating across my body as I fantasized about the next time I could bury my face between those cheeks.

I know. I should've seen this coming.

I was jolted back to reality by a short, staccato knock on the door. Not fully closed by my last visitor, it drifted open to allow Josh, our comms specialist, to lean in with one quick motion into a scene, not of me working at my desk, but meandering around my office with my nose in his former co-worker’s panties. In the half second I had available, I snatched them from my face, and, with no other immediate options, shoved them into my pants.

“The intern workshop is starting now, almost out of donuts,” he said with a wink. Intern workshop was an out of date misnomer from when Josh first started with us and was mistakenly referred to as the intern far too often. Largely because of a youthful, eager demeanor and the crime of being chronically online. Occasionally, we start our all-team meetings early with a social media, marketing, and PR update from him. He tells us what's trending that month and I bring my basket full memes that I need explained. I had forgotten that this was one of those days and relented at his insistence that I tag along with him to the conference room, following him into the hall with Myron’s briefs hidden in my pants, a light tingle beginning to spread across my groin.

Hindsight. 20/20.

“Dude,” he continued in the hallway. “You've got to tell me your routine, your chest is looking great. Wish I could fit a workout in before work.”

“Oh, I didn't make it to–” I self-consciously grabbed my right pec, “--the gym this morning…” It felt noticeably juicier. Like I had a good pump. A great pump.

I dutifully followed Josh's perky bottom to the conference room, eyes fixed on the swish of his hips in his fitted pants. Everyone in the office had an oddly nice ass, for reasons unknown to anyone but obvious for me, but Josh's tight, perfectly round posterior was always a sight to behold, and always showcased in expertly tailored pants that fit like a glove on his short, svelte frame. I've always wondered if he also frequented Val's doorstep.

Everyone was already settled in the conference room (they were out of donuts), and I grabbed the last seat around the table, toward the back, right near the door. Josh did his thing about the latest social media strategy and I tried to maintain some semblance of professional decorum, keeping my gaze on the slides on screen and not just the bubble butt flitting back and forth at the front of the room. But I was still pent up, my balls churning with stronger intensity and my dick feeling heavier and heavier in my pants, not like it was getting hard but just gaining a deeper, stronger presence. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, leaning forward and hinging my hips back to provide more space along my leg. My midsection began to cramp as the tingle in my crotch turned into a generalized heat. My chest felt packed against my shirt, my nipples sending little shocks of pleasure with the slightest movements against the fabric. I felt overstimulated, hit by a full body malaise with an undercurrent of sticky sweet pleasure.

Then it clicked. I had seen the clip of Ty's latest growth spurt and got to witness Myron’s incident up close and personal. My heart pounded with the realization that Myron’s powerful pheromones were likely incubating in the warmth between my thighs. I began to have anxious visions of what that meant, of what could happen in the chaos of having an episode in the middle of the office. I imagined myself bursting out of my clothes, my chair collapsing under me, the table being flipped by the force of a superhuman monster cock. 

The cramps got stronger as I became increasingly hot and uncomfortable in my own skin, fighting against every item of clothing constricting my body. I tried to wait it out, think peaceful thoughts, hold myself energetically together. I thought I could psychically wrestle my dick into stasis until the meeting ended and I could triage the situation. But what is Bruce Banner to the Hulk?

My dick lurched. Didn't get harder, just took up a bit more space. I bit down angrily on my pen to keep from letting out a moan as I felt, vividly, the head sliding against the fabric of the pouch. My pants felt like they were shrinking around my crotch. My body was so uncomfortably hot, eliciting shivers down my spine and along my limbs. And why was my shirt so tight? 

But Josh was rolling with his presentation (and that ass was keeping me enthralled). I reasoned that I could at least relieve some pressure for the time being. I reached up and undid the first button at my collar as casually as possible, only to find the second locked in place by the pull of the fabric. When did this shirt become so small?? I awkwardly finagled it while trying to put on my best active listener face, but right when I was finally about to succeed, it was simply gone. The relief from a slight decrease in pressure along my chest mixed with terror as I saw the button sail across the room and land in someone's coffee. 

I froze. Josh froze. Miraculously, no one else noticed. He continued with his presentation and I resolved to form an escape as quickly as possible. My mind was filled with visions of what had happened to Ty and Myron, and as hot as it is to see someone grow in real time, this situation truly was not safe for work. Something serious was brewing, and by the pressure building in my balls, it was going to be messy. I had to find a bathroom or risk a scandal.

I carefully closed my laptop, mentally rehearsing my graceful exit in which I stand up, surreptitiously cover my bulge with my computer, and moonwalk out of there to take care of business. As I rose to my feet, I came to the chilling realization that I had underestimated the sheer size of the appendage distending my pants, hurrying to cover as much as possible with my modestly sized laptop, but not before Josh’s eyes locked on.

“So I really think this target audience could make for a good pipeline to…um…a pipeline…a pipe…” he stammered, on the verge of speaking in tongues as his eyes widened in disbelief, coming dangerously close to bringing the attention of the rest of the conference room to my predicament.

“You’re doing great!” I exclaimed, cutting him off and turning smoothly toward the exit. “Can’t wait to discuss implementing all of this, soon as I get back.”

I sped through the door and down the hallway, stopping abruptly at the makeshift signs printed and taped to the bathroom doors. “Out of order,” I whispered, anxiety spiking as the crotch of my pants bulged outward a little more. 

Downstairs! I thought. The single stalls on the ground floor materialized in my mind. I whipped around to find the elevators and slipped through the doors with my laptop still awkwardly situated in front of my overpacked crotch. To my dismay, a gaggle of interns scrambled on one floor below. I squeezed as far as I could into the back corner, and pressed my laptop against the furious bulge that was steadily becoming impossible to hide. It had to be at least five degrees warmer in there from the heat radiating off my overexcited dick. It lurched again. My hair stood on edge, pecs strained against my shirt as I fought back a moan of arousal and dismay.

By the time they got off on the ground floor, I was too terrified to move, convinced that the slightest increase in friction could send me over the edge.

“You heading back up?” asked Larry, the bright eyed receptionist who appeared from around the doorframe.

“No, I, uh, need to go check something downstairs,” I lied. “We’ve been having some electrical hiccups in the office.”

“Oh that’s the worst,” he said, holding his hand against the elevator door frame as he continued to recount the building’s litany of outages and anomalies. He was effectively holding me hostage.

“Oooof,” I whispered as my dick surged forward yet again. I was heading towards a nuclear meltdown.

“Right, right, duty calls,” he said, finally relinquishing his hold and letting the doors close in front of him.

I nearly collapsed out of blessed solitude. I let one hand drift down to investigate the area, eliciting a groan of shock and pleasure. My dick felt big. I mean yes, it’s painfully obvious to myself and the general public that I’m packing something serious down there. But it felt bigger than it should. Bigger than it felt less than an hour ago. Like it was echoing the essence of bigness on some metaphysical plane, gathering energy around it across multiple dimensions to emerge like Godzilla from the ocean and lay waste to the–

What the fuck am I talking about? My blood circulation must be cut off. I needed to get out of those pants. The slow drop of the elevator seemed to go on and on, what felt like far beyond the actual height of the building. The walls were closing in, the metal box shrinking around me as it fell through space, the seams of my shirt straining against my chest as what felt like every bit of fabric shrunk with it.

The elevator doors opened on the brutalist liminal space of the basement. I was pretty sure there was a bathroom down here, likely one significantly, dearly private. The only person I knew of who had any reason to be down here was–

“Wes!” I exclaimed at the cloud of auburn hair that popped up seemingly out of nowhere, toolbox in hand.

“Funny running into you here,” he beamed, giving the scruff on his chin a scratch. “Welcome to my office!” He splayed his arms wide, gesturing warmly to the concrete and fluorescent lights.

“Happy to be here,” I managed, attempting a gracious smile as the beads of sweat on my forehead hinted at the crisis at hand.

“Where you headed?” He asked, sidling next to me and hovering one finger over the number pad.

“Look, Wes, I actually need to run to the bathroom, the ones upstairs were all–”

“Out of order, yeah. Whole building is. It’s the issue with the plumbing, did you read the rest of my email? Folks have been heading to the coffee shop next door, I think.”

“Aughh,” I whispered, bracing a hand against the wall. My dick lurched again. Angry and boiling hot, it was all I could think about. That and the feeling of my shirt having somehow shrunk several sizes too small. I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t breathe. I barely string words together. My nipples perked up in response to a cool sensation. I looked down to see two wet spots spreading slowly. Fuck, my chest was swollen, what was going on? I looked like I had the greatest pump of my life. What usually could pass for decently toned pecs were starting to resemble disproportionately juicy slabs of muscle. I could’ve sworn they were inflating slightly with each breath, each involuntarily twitch of muscle. But I didn’t have time to speculate further as my abs contracted hard and I doubled over in pain.

I wasn’t going to make it to the coffee shop. I wasn’t going to make it to the useless basement bathroom. I wasn’t going to make it off this elevator.

“Yeah, sorry dude. If it’s an emergency, maybe I can–oh…”

“It’s…it’s too late,” I eked out as my dick lurched even farther down my leg, the sound of stitches popping filling the space of Wes’s stunned silence and my heavy breathing. My shirt grew tighter and tighter with every heartbeat. I felt air against my midsection as it slowly revealed my treasure trail, heard the slow tearing of seams along my shoulders, the periodic ping of buttons flying off and hitting the metal walls. I gripped the door frame with inhuman force. “It’s happening.”

“Wh-what’s happening?” Wes had grown visibly concerned. “What can I do?”

“I can’t…hold it…” my face a contortion of pleasure and pain.

“Can’t hold what?? Should I call someone, or do something, or…” He stepped closer, his eyes entranced by the dark circles against my shirt. My pecs had swollen so large they were blocking the view of the baseball bat tearing apart the stitches of my pants. He held out his hands in support. “Maybe if I just–”

“Wait, don’t–” My head lolled back as the pressure along my leg finally became too much to bear and was suddenly replaced with lovely, catastrophic release. The seams gave way and my ungodly beast was freed from its cage, swinging up in a diagonal and catching Wes’s cheek with a mean left hook. He spun around like a ragdoll, landing unceremoniously against the wall.

My prodigious cock, furious and rock hard, bobbed in front of me at a distance that was hard to make sense of. I stared down in terror at a pipe that extended at least a few feet into the air, still managing a slight upward tilt despite its weight. It was too girthy to wrap both hands around. I felt my heart pounding through the massive vein that ran along the shaft. I briefly forgot about Wes lying unconscious on the floor as I gazed in shock at the tree trunk growing from my groin. With one final, monumental shudder, with the last dregs of my mental capacity, I wondered, Did I beat Ty? And came like a firehose.

The force of the first two blasts were enough to knock me off balance, my knees buckling as I fell on my ass. My hands gripped either side of my shaft as if I had any ability to mitigate the cum cannon bucking wildly from my crotch. I painted the ceiling as every muscle fiber of my body worked in unison to fire off each volley of jizz. I was dimly aware that my muscle tits jiggled with more and more heft as my body shook with every shot. I could feel the mass of them expanding across my torso, my sensitive nipples rubbing against what was left of my shirt before that too fell to tatters against my growing muscle tits. But I was gone in a deluge of orgasmic bliss, my brain burned hollow as some untapped reservoir of sexual energy sprung forth. As I lost any sort of mental coherence, I felt like my corporeal form might simply disintegrate into the pool of cum forming around me. I was moaning in sweet release and unrelenting ejaculation.

Countless ropes of cum painted the walls until my never ending orgasm finally let me go, and I collapsed next to Wes. After a minute, he came to, and turned to me with a dreamy smile on his face.

“Can we do that again?” He asked.

The elevator doors opened. And there was Josh.

—

“Hey Miguel, I was looking for…you…” he drifted off, taking in the scene. Me, sweaty and kneeling in my tattered pants, holding Wes’s shoulders to prop him up against the wall with what looked like a black eye on the way. I mused internally about how I should’ve reviewed the office first aid training materials for the exact protocol for a penis exploding so suddenly in size that it accidentally causes a potential concussion. I made a mental note to schedule a training for the entire office soon.

“Shit, uh, just wait outside for a sec?” I asked, putting on my best everything-is-totally-fine smile. It didn’t work.

“Woah, what happened?” asked Josh incredulously. ��Were you attacked? What is this on the floor? What is…that…” He seemed to be mentally connecting the dots as he gazed horror struck at the semi-hard, adrenaline fueled dick resting on the floor between my legs.

I could hear footsteps and voices approaching. We’re back on the ground floor! Without any other recourse, I pulled him into the elevator and started smashing the button for the basement. The doors closed just in time.

“I'm so fired, I'm so unbelievably fired, no one has ever been more fired,” I said, my fingertips pressing into my temples as if I could telepathically will all of this away as a weird, horny dream. I began to rock back and forth until I was halted by a firm clasp against my bicep. I looked up to see Wes's meaty forearm, his sparkling green and gold eyes. 

“Deep breath,” he said firmly. “In…” His eyes fluttered closed then looked into mine, imploring me to follow. I took a tentative breath in through my nose. “And hold.” He held. “And out.” I sighed through my mouth until my lungs felt deflated. “OK, again, you too,” he glances at Josh, who looked less terrified and more uncomfortable about the faux pas of stumbling into this intimate moment. “In.” Josh took large gulps through his mouth, chest heaving up. “And hold…and out. We'll work on your technique.”

He turned back to me. “I’ve seen weirder things, man. We'll get it sorted. And you,” looking pointedly at Josh, “can't tell anyone about this. Scout's honor.”

“H-hell yeah,” he said, flourishing an awkward salute. “Anything for the Window Wanker.”

“Did you just come up with that?” Wes chuckled. “That’s good.” Josh looked on in mild confusion. 

“The last thing I need right now is a nickname, but we can workshop it,” I offered, trying to make light of the situation.

“No, it's just that…” his brows furrowed. “That's you, right? Window Wanker. Online.”

My spidey senses tingled. My hair stood on edge.

“What do you mean ‘online?'” Wes inquired, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

“Like, it's one of my favorite accounts,” said Josh. “I usually don't go for fake hidden camera scenario type stuff, but I've been hooked.” He perked up in enthusiasm. “The fact that from across the street, you can see how huge that monster is…” His utterance of monster was barely a whisper as his eyes turned to the up close monster laying between my legs. “Respectfully,” he added with a shy smile.

“Across the street…” I repeated, just as Wes said “...fake hidden camera…”

“I mean,” Josh continued, “I could tell you were packing for a while, I have no idea how no one else is talking about it. But I didn't know you were Double W.”

“Okay,” I blurted, wincing at the hitch in my voice and letting the elevator settle into a heavy silence, interrupted by the steady smack of globs of cum falling from the ceiling. “Okay. I need to know all about this now.”

Window Wanker. Ty's gonna love this.

[a-m-w-worlds]

Scooby-Doo Analysis: Why Scrappy-Doo is a Poorly Executed Good Idea

 (Warning, many personal opinions ahead!)

Scrappy-Doo's tenure as a main character in the Scooby-Doo franchise is loved by some and hated by many. Personally, I'm not a big fan of most Scooby-Doo projects from the 80's (with the exception of Scooby-Doo! and the Ghoul School and A Pup Named Scooby-Doo!), but the thing that stands out to me about Scrappy in particular is that he's not a bad idea.

Honestly, I think Scrappy is a good idea on paper, the problem is just bad execution.

Giving Scooby a fearless and naïve nephew who genuinely thinks he can take the monsters in a fight and consistently needs to be rescued by Shaggy and Scooby, who know better, is actually a really fun concept. I think it's really endearing when Shag and Scoob have kids put in their care and they have to step up and be brave for them. You see this with the Grimwood Girls in the aforementioned Ghoul School and with the Secret Six puppies and the campers in Camp Comeoniwannascareya from What's New, Scooby-Doo?. I just find this kind of dynamic really fun to watch, it's cute, really stinkin' cute, ya know? And I wish that I got the same feeling from Scrappy.

This could be the subject of its own post, but my dream Scooby-Doo project is a remake of the 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo. If that ever happened, I would actually love to see Scrappy make a comeback in a revamped form!

So, let's try to figure out why Scrappy is so disliked and what can be done to fix it!

Design

Okay, honestly, I don't think this is that bad of a design./gen The problem is that it feels more like it belongs in cartoons with the likes of Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound, and Snagglepuss that are more heavily stylized and "cartoony" than in the semi-realistic world of Scooby-Doo. For reference, here's Scooby.

No, Scooby is not perfectly realistic, but his proportions are much closer to those of a real dog than Scrappy's. Scrappy almost feels like he exists in a different art style than the rest of the gang. The main offenders in his design being his huge head/tiny body, not very dog-like body, and the fact he typically walks upright. The few times he does walk on all fours he looks unbalanced because of the wonky head/body ratio. (I tried to find a picture of this rare phenomenon, but Scrappy's lawyer seems to have wiped all photographic evidence from the internet!/hj)

So, the first step in fixing Scrappy is just giving him better proportions and a slightly more dog-like body.

I think the Secret Six are a good example of how far a more dog-like body can go.

The have similar big head/small body proportions to Scrappy but have much bigger paws and are generally more "dog-shaped", which helps a lot!

Likewise, Scooby's design in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo! is a great example of improved proportions.

He's much less realistic than his adult counterpart but his head/body ratio is much more well-balanced than Scrappy. (And this design is just much cuter in opinion, is that just me?)

Voice, Dialogue, and Behavior

This is the section where I think a lot of the Scrappy hate comes from. (Quick disclaimer, I have not watched the entirety of the Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo Show and most of what I have seen past season one I have not seen in many, many, many years. Even as a small child I hated how unstructured and nonsensical it was, yes, I was pretentious, no, nothing has changed!/lh/t But the point is, my memory is probably a little fuzzy, so keep that in mind!)

If Scrappy was brought back in a new series or movie one of the first changes I would make would be having him be voiced by an actual child. Adults often voice kids in long-running series for the sake of keeping the voice consistent and they usually do a good job, but I honestly think Scrappy would benefit from being voiced by a real kid. I think that would bring a lot of sincerity that Scrappy typically lacks.

Dialogue and behavior are a little trickier. If you remember "Uncle Scooby", "PUPPY POWER!", "let me at 'em!", and "I'm gonna splat 'em!", then you remember half of all Scrappy-Doo dialogue. Now, none of Scrappy's little catchphrases are inherently bad. They actually have the potential to be really cute, especially if said by that theoretical child actor, the problem is just that they get overused. Variations of these same few lines get used again and again and become annoying. I think moderation is the solution to this one!

Now, to the meat of my issue with Scrappy-Doo as a character; why does he act like a mini adult? This frustrates me to no end! Every time he gets in trouble, he uses the excuse "I'm just a puppy!" Really, Scrappy? Really? You're smart enough to think up elaborate "Scrappy Traps", keep Shaggy and Scooby on track, and run whole freaking con jobs with Flim-Flam, but you're not smart enough to realize you can't take the monster in a fist fight? Really?

The rest of you see the discrepancy, right? It's not all in my head?

I genuinely love that Scrappy is literally scrappy. It's great that this little guy™ truly believes he can beat all the big scary monsters in a fight and that his globe-trotting, mystery-solving uncle is a fearless and heroic role model. These are great attributes for a little kid character, but most of the time Scrappy is not filling a little kid role.

Shaggy and Scooby need a "straight man" to bounce off of and once Fred, Velma, and Daphne were dropped from the series, Scrappy is the only one left to fill that role. This is such wasted potential. The point of bringing in a child for Scooby and Shaggy to look after should be to force them to step up, be the adults in a way they normally don't have to, and engage with the story in ways they typically would avoid. But Scrappy only does this part of the time because the rest of the time he's filling in for other characters. For some reason this still continues even after Daphne is reintroduced, with her and Scrappy becoming co-holders of the sacred brain cell. Why? This decision is baffling to me.

Also, he doesn't just act like a mini adult, he acts like a mini human adult. Admittedly, this is a criticism that can be leveled at the Doo family in its entirety. Scooby, I think is mostly okay in that regard, but many of his relatives lean way to close to the human side of the spectrum for it to be funny or comfortable, like, they're fully in Pinkie Cooper territory!

So, if I was going to reinvent Scrappy, I'd put a lot of focus on letting him be a child, not a mini adult, and more specifically making him be more of a puppy. Puppies are adorable, destructive, certified land piranhas. How endearing would it be if Scrappy actually acted like that? What if instead of trying to fist fight all the ghoulies he bit and chewed them instead? Imagine how cute it would be to watch him try to chew a zombie's shoe or latch onto a vampire's cape and through a mouthful of fabric gleefully shout, "I got 'em!"

It would be cute, right?

Overuse

The final problem is just that when he's there, he's always there. For the majority of the 80's Scrappy was a permanent member of the character roster, a status not even Fred or Velma had. The result was just an oversaturation of Scrappy.

If he was ever to be brought back, I think he should be used much more sparingly, just being a recurring character in a few episodes here or there, more like Scooby-Dum is in The Scooby-Doo Show. This makes it less likely that fans will get sick of him and also potentially solve the final problem that's been bugging me about Scrappy; where is his mom?

Ruby-Doo, Scooby's sister and Scrappy's mom, only appeared in a single episode of the Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo series and that was a flashback episode, which begs the questions, Ruby-Doo, Where are You?

Why did she ship off her only child to her brother and let him go on life-threatening adventures? I've pondered this question for many years and so far haven't come up with an answer that isn't weirdly dark for Scooby-Doo. If Scrappy was just around occasionally though it would be a lot easier to say he's visiting Uncle Scooby for the weekend or Shaggy and Scooby are babysitting for a couple of days. Ruby would also be a recurring character in this scenario, and we could see her actually being a part of her son's and brother's lives, which, at this point, is kind of a novel concept!/lh

So, there you go! Those are my thoughts on Scrappy-Doo! I hope you found this an enjoyable read and if you made it this far, thank you!/gen

[fipindustries]

not a question but basically any time i remember your art exists im looking it up and down and trying to take inspiration from it. your expression work is always top notch, and the way you depict faces is the perfect balance between cartoony and well defined

oh my god this is such an amazing compliment! thank you so much!

you know, i think this has been a long time coming. im going to take this as a chance to go in depth about how my style works, why i do what i do and how i do it. do keep in mind that none of this is me saying "this is the objectively correct way of doing art" but rather just how my own process works, what I like to see in my own art.

that balance that you speak of comes from a commitment to underlying structures. what im going to call the stylization sandwich

i start with a clear, well defined solid structure, i add whatever wacky cartoony features i want on top of it (none the less strongly tied and guided by the underlying structure) and then i refine by adding as many more realistic, grounding details i want, although you can go too far with it so i gotta be careful or ill end up with those shitty "cartoon character IRL would look scary!" clickbait drawings.

(quick aside, this trend fucking sucks, its obvious the artist went out of their way to make the drawing creepy, this pretension that "actually the character would look scary irl" deliberatly misundertands the principles of stylization, its as creatively bankrupt as jokes about mario eating mushrooms)

getting back on topic, the point is that, as long as the underlying structures are solid you can build whatever you want on top of them and it will make sense

a key tool here is internalizing the way the proportions on the face work. and i say internalize because obviously i dont actually have the golden ratio memorized inside my head nor do i stop and measure and calculate all the proportions in the features. i just read a lot about drawing, i drew a lot, i tried to always keep a critical eye to what im drawing and see if it "feels" disproportionate. once you get an eye for it then you know how far you can push things before they complitely break

let me give you another example of what i feel is a botched execution of this.

if you look closely at the face on the left there are a lot of things that dont make sense. the corners of the eyebrows dip down into the eyes when usually the eyes are enveloped by the eyebrows, the way the beard grows around the nose is just not how facial hair is distributed, the mouth is too big, etc. on the left i used photoshop to reorganize the factions into something that makes a bit more sense to me

(another quick aside, the real big problem at the heart of the original drawing were not so much the proportions but the tangents, when different lines touch each other like this that is usually a big no no but that is a topic for another day)

also a lot of it is just me cheating. yeah i cheat. you ever heard how people say there is no innate talent and its all practisce and hard work. well, yeah, that is mostly true, but is also true that some people are born with inherent advantages. either taller or more predisposed to being thin or with better facial structures or better innate hand-eye coordination. i was born with an uncanny capacity to visualize stuff. i have whatever the opposite of aphantasia is. i can borderline hallucinate things if i want to. and that goes coupled with the visual intuitions i developed through practisce and training.

so first come the learned wisdom, and then comes the innate talent that helps me exploit that learned wisdom to its full potential

on top of that is corporeality, i try to draw in such a way that it conveys depth and weight to the things im drawing, certain kinds of stylizations dont care about that and choose instead to have their drawing look flat, a classic one is the UPA style

is a very fun style! very cute, very dynamic, very expressive in its simplicity. it became very popular in the 60's and 70's. personally i choose to go in a different direction. i draw in such a way that if one were to turn my drawings into 3d models not a lot would get lost in the process.

whereas other artists....

...not so much

but yeah, ultimatly it all goes back to underlying structure. any drawing can work

as long as you have a strong foundation underneath.

PS: if you like my style i cannot reccomend enough the art of @rezuaq i feel they follow a lot of the same principles i talked about here but i could be wrong.

they have been my biggest inspiration as of the last 4 years, i shamelssly stole the design of one of their characters for jennyffer. go to their blog and give them a like

[bivht]

If Your First Name Has These Letters…

Prominent letters: check the first letter, second letter, first vowel, last letter, most frequently occurring type of letters

Note: you relate to these characteristics if TWO letters out of the prominent letters are of the same following group or if a certain type (3 groups) of letter has the highest ratio, does that make sense?

A, D, G, J, M, P, S, V, Y: honest, can be easily confused, seen as aggressive, difficulties comforting people, noticeable body proportions especially their biceps and ass 🔥 flaunt it!, can be seen as happy, selfish, can have difficulties finding people that truly understand or relate to them, expect too much of people, accidentally coming across as rude and standoffish, people thinking you’re not the friendliest, can give off happy vibes, having basic common sense, generally reliable

Prominent examples: Sarah, Mark, Maddie, Maddison, Gabby, Yana, Vanessa, Jamie

B, E, H, K, N, Q, T, W, Z: can get along with everyone, has no problems being friends with any gender, has a keen understanding of science, commerce, and mathematics, efficient because they always figure out a way to execute a task with the lowest energy required 💪, sooooo intelligent, their way with words and style are on point, creative thinkings, unconventional/abstract thinkers, quick to learn, a lack of these letters may mean bad at/slow to learn math or quite bad at simple mental maths especially addition/subtraction, can be unreliable, prone to being an initiator/victim of gossip

Prominent examples: Ben, Teagan, Henry, Bella, Bethany, Neo, Weasley

C, F, I, L, O, R, U, X: emotional intelligence, can easily convey emotions, very emotional, making people feel comfortable, people magnet, everyone getting along with you but you feel like you only get along with a handle of people, may have difficulties with academics, excellent at comforting people, high levels of empathy, interactive with their surroundings, knowing how to have a good time at a party, bad at lying, easy to be friends with, easy to stay friends with

Prominent examples: Olivia, Lola, Coco, Ruby, Chris, Xiao-, Fiona, Lily

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved in our archive

By Stephanie Soucheray, MA

Two new studies offer fresh insights into long COVID, with the first noting a greater neurological, cognitive, and fatigue impact compared with long-term symptoms after similar respiratory diseases, and the second demonstrating that a fourth of young Marines who contracted COVID-19 went on to develop long COVID.

Seven symptoms more common with long COVID

In the first study, published today in JAMA Network Open, researchers used data from the UK Biobank to compared postacute infection syndromes (PAIS) among patients with COVID-19 to other lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs). They showed that long-COVID patients have an increased risk of seven specific symptoms.

A total of 191,710 eligible participants identified since March 1, 2020, were included in the study. Of those, 1,153 were hospitalized with COVID-19, 1,304 were hospitalized with other LRTIs, and 189,253 uninfected patients were used as a reference group.

Patients hospitalized with COVID-19 were much more likely to report PAIS symptoms including loss of taste (odds ratio [OR], 2.27; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.87 to 2.75) and severe fatigue (OR, 2.18; 95% CI, 1.70 to 2.81) compared to the reference group. Overall, COVID patents were more likely to report 23 of 45 symptoms compared to the controls.

Compared to patients hospitalized for other LRTIs, COVID patients were more at risk for seven particular symptoms, including loss of smell (OR, 1.80; 95% CI, 1.34 to 2.42), loss of taste (OR, 1.52; 95% CI, 1.13 to 2.03), rapid heart rate upon standing (OR, 1.60; 95% CI, 1.12 to 2.29), problems with thinking (OR, 1.36; 95% CI, 1.14 to 1.62), bone pain (OR, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.06 to 1.67), mild fatigue (OR, 1.19; 95% CI, 1.01 to 1.40), and severe fatigue (OR, 1.49; 95% CI, 1.02 to 2.17).

Patients with LRTIs were more likely to report a lingering persistent cough than were COVID patients.

"Compared with other LRTIs, COVID-19 appeared to impose an extra burden of neurological, cognitive, and fatigue symptoms,” the authors concluded.

25% of Marines developed long COVID The second study, published in The Lancet Regional Health Americas, describes how 25% of previously healthy US Marines showed signs of long COVID following even mild or asymptomatic COVID-19.

In the study, 899 Marines (91.7% male) who tested positive for COVID-19 by polymerase chain reaction testing were followed up for almost a year to determine risk factors for developing long COVID, which the authors defined as persistent symptoms at least 4 weeks after symptom onset or diagnosis. The authors found a 24.7% prevalence of long COVID.

The Marines were young (median age, 18) and healthy, having passed a number of Marine physical fitness tests prior to study enrollment. The participants were asked to complete a survey about COVID infection and symptoms. Overall, 197 Marines (24.7%) developed persistent symptoms after COVID infection.

The most prevalent symptoms reported by Marines were loss of taste and/or smell (41.6%), shortness of breath (37.6%), and cough (22.8%). When compared with a pre-COVID cohort of Marines, the authors found the Marines reporting persistent COVID symptoms had slower running times on fitness tests.

The authors said their findings are important in considering the implications of long COVID on a young and previously healthy workforce. Long COVID could "decrease work productivity and increase healthcare costs," they wrote.

A total of 307 participants (34.1%) had an asymptomatic infection. Among the 195 who described the severity of their infection, 77.4% reported a predominately mild illness, 20.0% reported moderate disease, and 2.6% reported severe illness.

"The risk of long-term sequelae secondary to acute SARS-CoV-2 infection varies across studies; however, even in young healthy populations with very mild acute illness a proportion of infected individuals develop long-lasting symptoms," the authors wrote.

Study links: 1. jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2825348 2. www.thelancet.com/journals/lanam/article/PIIS2667-193X(24)00236-9/fulltext

[bossymarmalade]

Okay, here's the thing about the Netflix live action Avatar: the Last Airbender series --

Is it as complex and near-perfect in pace and characterization and message and narrative as the cartoon? No. Nothing could be. Sometimes a piece of media hits right the first time, and all you can do is make a different version of it.

Does it deserve to be watched anyhow? Absolutely yes. And you know why? I've watched white-focused media that was on the same level in terms of satisfactory adaptation (Sandman, seeing as I was reading the comics thirty years ago and am fond of it) and also media that's been way worse, and still enjoyed it for what it was.

You have to enjoy it for what it is, not that it's not the A:TLA cartoon. The story's condensed but it's not as wretched as all these reviews make it out to be. The problem with Katara's feminism/Sokka's misogyny not being satisfactorily represented is blown out of proportion imo. It's not a 1:1 ratio to the cartoon. The live action has to handle it in a slightly different way.

Honestly I'm enjoying it and I'll tell you why: it looks EXACTLY like the cartoon. Because it's people of colour in those costumes, in that world, using those items. Every episode produces some Asian actor I've known and loved in some new role and it's enough to get me teary-eyed because even if it's not a perfect and flawlessly-rendered version of ATLA, we're there and we're represented as real people. The voice actors for the cartoon were wonderful and mostly white. This is us in the LIVING FLESH.

Maybe it's a sign of my age that I'm more willing to go easy on this show and not hold it to the super-stringent standards that anything made by poc gets held to, I dunno. That's entirely possible. But I truly don't think it deserves the bad press it's been getting.

[aa-aaronsautism]

The problem of changes

(in this case changes of ingredients and packaging of safe foods)

Yesterday we went to grocery store to get the juice which I was able to drink the last months. i need this juice to drink anything at all. drinking water is hard for me and I have big issues to stay hydrated.

I was glad to have that juice because it was perfect. It was cheap (that’s important because I need much juice per week and we can not effort other juice), it has a low caloric ratio, it was easy to get in every city in my country so I don’t have trouble to carry many packs with me when I travel or have appointments in other citys, the taste was perfect to me, the consistency was perfect (not to watery, not to juicy), the packaging, the size of the opening for drinking.

In short this juice is a important piece of my daily life and a routine.

So yesterday I went to the drink section in grocery store and go to the place where the juice stands normally. But it wasn’t there. I directly became frustrated, because I need to buy this juice to be able to drink something the next three days.

I panicked a little bit and looked at other possible places where the juice could be.

Than I saw the bottle from the picture.

In the first moment I was glad because I thought this is a good alternative. But no no. I got it. They changed the package from my juice to this bottle. Same picture as on my juice, same name, everything the same except the packaging. That’s what I thought in that moment. But the change of the packaging stressed me out directly. Because I don’t understand the change. But I was able to calm me down a little bit because I could tell my brain that my juice in a new packaging is better than no juice.

With these mixture of happiness to can drink at all, and frustration and stress because of changes we went home.

At home I try the juice directly because I was very thirsty. Haven’t had drink the whole day.

I got more frustrated, the feeling of the bottle is a other feeling than the Pack before. It’s cold and slippy, the stability is bad - so wobbly. The feeling of the opening on my lips is different. The opening is much wider than from the pack. I even got more and more frustrated because I realized that this bottle was now a daily struggle to me.

I was in massive overload. But I needed to drink, I was so thirsty.

I took a sip… an hell no. The taste is so different. I got a meltdown because I couldn’t handle the changes.

After a time I could think straight again and tried to tell myself that it is only the bottle. That it’s only the bottle that causes the different taste. And that I should got over it and don’t act like a little child.

But no no. It’s not just the bottle that changes the taste for my brain.

They also changed the ingredients composition of the juice. The proportion of the ingredients are different. They changed the proportion of carrot juice down from 8% to 5%. I don’t imagining that the taste is different. The taste IS different.

But it’s pain and suffering.

Now I have a problem. What should I drink? What if I’m not able to get used to the changes? I need to drink. I normally drink not enough. And now I have even bigger issues to drink enough.

Why did they change it. I can’t understand.

I try to think rationally. But my brain steps back to frustration and stress only if I see the bottle.

Changes of safe things like food, drinks or items are enormous stress for autistic people.

Changes are so much. Changes are too much!

[jswatson]

you know about musical tuning right? harmonics? equal temperament? pythagoras shit? of course you do (big big nerd post coming)

(i really dont know if people follow me for anything in particular but im pretty sure its mostly not this)

most of modern western music is built around the 12-EDO (12 equal divisions of the octave, the 12 tone equal temperament), where we divide the octave in 12 exactly equal steps (this means that there are 12 piano keys per octave). we perceive frequency geometrically and not arithmetically, as in that "steps" correspond to multiplying the frequency by a constant amount and not by adding to the frequency

an octave is a doubling of the frequency, so a step in 12-EDO is a factor of a 12th root of 2. idk the exact reason why we use 12-EDO, but two good reasons why 12 is a good number of steps are that

12 is a nice number of notes: not too small, not too big (its also generally a very nice number in mathematics)

the division in 12 steps makes for fairly good approximations of the harmonics

reason 2 is a bit more complex than reason 1. harmonics are a naturally occurring phenomena where a sound makes sound at the multiples of its base frequency. how loud each harmonic (each multiple) is is pretty much half of what defines the timbre of the sound

we also say the first harmonics sound "good" or "consonant" in comparison to that base frequency or first harmonic. this is kinda what pythagoras discovered when he realized "simple" ratios between frequencies make nice sounds

the history of tuning systems has revolved around these harmonics and trying to find a nice system that is as close to them while also avoiding a bunch of other problems that make it "impossible" to have a "perfect tuning". for the last centuries, we have landed on 12 tone equal temperament, which is now the norm in western music

any EDO system will perfectly include the first and second harmonics, but thats not impressive at all. any harmonic that is not a power of 2 is mathematically impossible to match by EDO systems. this means that NONE of the intervals in our music are "perfect" or "true" (except for the octave). theyre only approximations. and 12 steps make for fairly close approximations of the 3rd harmonic (5ths and 4ths), the 5th harmonic (3rds and 6ths) and some more.

for example, the 5th is at a distance of 7 semitones, so its 12-EDO ratio is 2^(7/12) ~= 1.4983, while a perfect 5th would be at 3/2=1.5 (a third harmonic reduced by one octave to get it in the first octave range), so a 12-EDO fifth sounds pretty "good" to us

using only 12-EDO is limiting ourselves. using only EDO is limiting ourselves. go out of your way, challenge yourself and go listen to play and write some music outside of this norm

but lets look at other EDO systems, or n-EDO systems. how can we measure how nicely they approximate the harmonics? the answer is probably that there is no one right way to do it

one way we could do it is by looking at the first k harmonics and measuring how far they are to the closest note in n-EDO. one way to measure this distance for the rth harmonic is this:

adding up this distance for the first k harmonics we get this sequence of measures:

(this desmos graph plots this formula as a function of n for k=20, which seems like a fair amount of harmonics to check)

the smallest this measure, the "best" the n-EDO approximates these k harmonics. we can already see that 12 seems to be a "good" candidate for n since it has that small dip in the graph, while n=8 would be a pretty"bad" one. we can also see that n=7 is a "good" one too. 7-EDO is a relatively commonly used system

now, we might want to penalize bigger values of n, since a keyboard with 1000 notes per octave would be pretty awful to play, so we can multiply this measure by n. playing around with the value k we see that this measure grows in direct proportion to k, so we could divide by k too to keep things "normalized":

plotting again, we get this

we can see some other "good" candidates are 24, 31, 41 and 53, which are all also relatively commonly used systems (i say relatively because they arent nearly as used as 12-EDO by far)

increasing k we notice something pretty interesting

(these are the same plots as before but with k=500 and k=4000)

the graph seems to flatten, and around 0.25 or 1/4. this is kinda to be expected, since this method is, in a very weird way, measuring how far a particular sequence of k values is from the extremes of an interval and taking the average of those distances. turns out that the expected distance that a random value is from the extremes of an interval it is in is 1/4 of the interval's length, so this is not that surprising. still cool tho

this way, we can define a more-or-less normalized measure of the goodness of EDO tuning systems:

(plot of this formula for k=20)

this score s_k(n) will hover around 1 and will give lower scores to the "best" n-EDO systems. we could also use instead 1-s_k(n), which will hover around zero and the best systems will have higher scores

my conclusion: i dont fucking now. this was complete crankery. i was surprised the candidates for n this method finds actually match the reality of EDO systems that are actually used

idk go read a bit about john cage and realize that music is just as subjective as any art should be. go out there and fuck around. "music being a thing to mathematically study to its limits" and "music being a meaningless blob of noise and shit" and everything in between and beyond are perfectly compatible stances. dont be afraid to make bad music cause bad music rules

most importantly, make YOUR music

[chimeride]

how do you avoid making a creature that's too similar to another?

Excellant question, because it’s a perfect occasion for me to discuss about diversity, a central theme in this serie, and how to illustrate it !!

The first method is creature design in its purest form : what does my creature looks like ? And then breakdown every aspect of what makes a monster. For anatomy i see 2 main parameters :

architecture : how many limbs ? heads ? and where to put them ? For example you can see “gryphons” as a kind of structure, with 4 legs, 2 wings and a beak (roughly) and play around with this structure

proportions : the same chimera with different proportions makes very different monsters ! You can play with the head/body ratio, make some limbs vestigial, or big wingspan to make them impressive, etc. For chimeras, this is the main difference between drawing and taxidermy !

Another aspect for my case with chimeras is which species i’m using. Unless i have a precise idea in mind i always make some quick research :

for example if i need a flamingo i check all the different kinds of flamingoes on wikipedia ; sometimes i go back up the phylogenic trees to see similar animals but slightly different

if i’m illustrating a monster from a precise geographic location i try to look for local species too, to make it more consistent

sometimes the design is based around a particular specie of animal i find interesting

i guess it goes with species, but you can obviously change patterns (on fur, wings etc) or colors (not my problem tho).

For example, lately i’m drawing Lemures where i combine bodies of lemurs with heads of larvae : the architecture is always the same but the possibilities are endless !

Second method is more concept-driven :

it’s how can i challenge definitions and concepts (whats is a dragon ?? seriously ???), try to explore it and cover all the range of the definitions and push them at their limits (ok now i have no idea what a dragon is anymore)

it can also start with a theme (what if i combine all the animals behind the symbols of the Seven Deadly Sins to make a chimeric representation?? what if that beach i went once 2 years ago were full of creatures ???), and it could be something very abstract (what if that music is actually about a monster ??)

you can also mix concepts together (metachimeras) !!

I also start from prompts (through asks, challenges and shittycryptids, mostly), because there are many ways to interprete them : sometimes i try to channel different inspirations by previous interpretations into one design, sometimes i just give what people wanted to see, but i have more fun when i respond exactly to the prompt in the most unpredictable way.

All of these methods bring a lot of diversity, and i will never run out of ideas ! The possibilities for chimeras are endless, and these are some methods i’ve got to find them. If you have other methods please share them !! And if you are interested by the methodologic aspect, i’ve done a masterpost that explain the tags for different categories and links to check the chimeras behind.

And also, most importantly maybe, but i try to leave some space for intuition : if something works or comes in my mind and it looks good i just go with it ! I always have a sketchbook for when i’ve got random ideas coming to me. Intellectualizing the process is fun, but creation isnt only about methodology.