#so here you have a painting that's kinda me out of my prime

[caede9]

did you guys remember that i draw animal art? yeah me neither. this took way too long to do but tbh i'm surprised it came out so well despite that. this is blackpine, who belongs to a friend's friend, @togebos

[beautifulhigh]

Hi hi!! It's unfair of me to ask you to actually write the full essay on the rwrb red room kiss scene, but I saw your tags and am very interested in at least what the main thesis would be, if you feel like sharing!! No worries if not 😊 Have a good night/day/whatever time it is where you are!

The last few weeks have been, well. They've Been™ and I'm going to use this wonderful ask to dust off my overthinking tag and write a meta post on this movie, these boys, and then hope more than three people care what I have to say.

The Red Room kiss scene is Iconic™ and Important™ and in this essay I (really) will discuss agency, framing, and why it always had to be Alex to be the one to make the move.

While book!Alex takes book!Henry to the Red Room, here he's waiting. Bundle of nervous energy. He doesn't know what to do with himself, how to hold himself, how to present himself when Henry turns up. He's backlit in this (which is a theatre technique, I see you Matthew) but it also adds to the drama and tension of the scene.

The (in)famous painting of Hamilton, about to bear witness to things.

We jump cut between Alex trying to find... something. Here he is realising his shirt has come slightly undone and he wants to try and be somewhat presentable. At least for the moment. But it speaks to Alex's physicality in this scene because he is shifting and moving so much that his clothing is shifting. There's also an interpretation that this suit represents the formality of the situation - the Prime Minister's dinner, at which he (the First Son) and the boy he wants to kiss (the actual Prinec) are supposed to be front and centre and the picture of formality.

He's coming undone in this moment because he's the First Son and he's waiting for the Prince, but he's also Alex and he's waiting for Henry.

Ah, yes. The casual lean against the wall. Fancy seeing you here, your Royal Highness, what do you think of the menu? But there's grounding here too. When you're spiralling focusing on a physical point of contact between you and and something can help ground you.

It's also a defensive stance in a way. You shall not pass, I'm not moving. Alex is claiming space and territory and he's controlling it.

"How dare you fucking kiss me, run away, ghost me, then walk into the White House like nothing changed." This is closed off, defensive, protective - probably why it's the quickest of the poses to be dismissed. He's got his back against the wall like he's scared or ready to come out fighting. And, in a way, both of those are true.

Book!Alex is mid-crisis on his bisexuality and while he logically knows he is very much into Henry, he's not gotten to the point of turning theory into reality.

Movie!Alex is more chill about being into guys, but this attraction to Henry is confusing him. He hates the guy. He wants to punch him in the mouth. With his mouth.

(What? That's literally book canon: and if he weren’t already hell-bent on destroying Henry’s infuriating idiot face with his mouth right now, he would consider doing it with his fist.)

Casual lean against the table, less staged and jarring than the extended arm against the wall.

But then Henry walks in and Alex stands to attention and he is... rapt. He is calm and composed and he is focused. We're back to the back-lit position which helps frame him with a near-halo effect.

And you can see that he is relaxed. There's a slight drop in the jaw, his shoulders are sloped and rounded. Because none on what he was trying to convey before matters. Henry is here.

"Look" he starts with - he's expecting a fight. He's expecting Alex to go off on one for the kiss, for the liberty taken. Even if Alex is willing to forget that it ever happened, take Henry's secret to the grave, Henry gets one thing right in this.

"my behaviour was appalling"

Because it was. Look, Hen, I love you and I'm with Alex in the feeling that I will go to war for you to see you happy and safe. But you did kinda kiss him without consent (harsh reading) and you did ghost him without apology (soft reading) and for a boy raised in the Royal Household that... well... it's pretty much top items on the Very Bad Behaviour list. He did not act with decorum or dignity, he did not act in the way that his status and position demands.

(That's OK, Hen. Because the boy under the linden tree wasn't the Prince. It's OK to not be him, and Alex is going to spend the rest of his life loudly loving the man, not the prince.)

"Shut up, stop talking." // “Shut up, shut all the way up, oh my God,” Alex hisses

Because even though both versions of Alex said he wanted to talk to Henry, in the moment that's the last thing he wants to do. And actions speak louder than words, right?

Why it had to be Alex

Henry needed to make the first move, that New Year's kiss, because there needed to be something to make Alex realise that this thing he's feeling is very much reciprocated, and that Henry wants it too. If Alex had kissed Henry for the first time on New Year's Eve/Day then it would have been too much of a leap. Alex, at whatever stage of his bisexual journey, has no clear idea of Henry's orientation at that party. It's only with retrospective viewing that he realises that Henry was low-key flirting, and that the sharing of these deeply personal moments wasn't just a "two bros in a hot tub" thing.

So Henry had to kiss Alex first but then he had to run because there was no way that the mostly-closeted, private Prince could accept that a) he fucking kissed a boy, b) said boy is the one he's been dreaming of since Rio/Melbourne, and c) the boy kinda?? kissed him back?? Henry will have been having a low-grade anxiety attack all through January (and trying to reclaim some control with the date he went on in the book).

In this moment, Alex knows all the pieces. He's played this logic game to its conclusion and he knows all the facts. 1) Henry is gay. 2) Henry is into him. 3) He's into Henry. That last fact is something Henry isn't fully aware of (or at least can't bring himself to believe it to be true) and so it has to be Alex.

He doesn't want Henry to say something that would get in the way of this, doesn't want to hear any kind of pre-prepared speech of "yeah, we're better off as friends" that always happens when the couple get too close to getting together too early in the run time. Alex is full on shutting that down, shutting Henry up, and he gives as good as he got.

"Wait a minute" // Henry’s too shocked to respond, mouth falling open slackly in a way that’s more surprise than invitation, and for a horrified moment Alex thinks he calculated all wrong, but then Henry’s kissing him back, and it’s everything.

And this time it's both of them. Framed between Hamilton and the books. The American political trailblazer and the literary. In the space between? There's our boys.

Alex's hand is on the wall again and he's controlling the space but Henry is very much in it. He's protective but in a different way.

In one frantic motion, Alex knocks the candelabra off the table next to them and pushes Henry onto it so he’s sitting with his back against—Alex looks up and almost breaks into deranged laughter—a portrait of Alexander Hamilton. Henry’s legs fall open readily and Alex crowds up between them, wrenching Henry’s head back into another searing kiss. They’re really moving now, wrecking each other’s suits, Henry’s lip caught between Alex’s teeth, the portrait’s frame rattling against the wall when Henry’s head drops back and bangs into it. Alex is at his throat, and he’s somewhere between angry and giddy, caught up in the space between years of sworn hate and something else he’s begun to suspect has always been there. It’s white-hot, and he feels crazy with it, lit up from the inside. Henry gives as good as he gets, hooking one knee around the back of Alex’s thigh for leverage, delicate royal sensibilities nowhere in the cut of his teeth. Alex has been learning for a while Henry isn’t what he thought, but it’s something else to feel it this close up, the quiet burn in him, the pent-up person under the perfect veneer who tries and pushes and wants. He drops a hand onto Henry’s thigh, feeling the electrical pulse there, the smooth fabric over hard muscle. He pushes up, up, and Henry’s hand slams down over his, digging his nails in.

The sensibility of the suits is on its way out, they're not the First Son and the Prince. And Alex is taking the lead.

Agency

Henry is somewhat passive in this - although he is fully engaged - but it's Alex who set this in motion. Pun intended. Alex who pushed him against the wall. Alex who pushed him up onto the table and hiked his leg up around his hip, Alex who is driving in. Because Alex needs Henry to know that third fact. The one he's worked out, the one that Henry is just catching up with. This isn't payback, it's not some prank. Alex Wants™.

There's a scene I'm writing in my current FirstPrince WiP in which Alex and Henry have a charged moment. And Henry wants to act on it but those princely sensibilities get in the way and he can't let himself be led into doing something that could be used against him. If Henry made all the moves then the accusation of him taking advantage, of the inherant imbalance that comes with status and titles and positions of power. So in the scene, and here, Alex takes the lead. There's no way anyone could accuse Henry of forcing Alex into doing this.

(Good luck getting Alex to do ANYTHING he doesn't want to.)

So Alex gives and Henry takes and he gets the memo very quickly.

Fact number three. Alex wants this too.

Then Movie!Amy walks in on them (which IMO is way funnier than Book!Amy hissing through a crack in the door) and these idiots try to act like they weren't redefining International Relations a second ago. Alex is by the painting, Henry is by the books. They've gone back to their sides and they're playing at being interested in what they find there. But they're not, it's all for show, someone who gives a passing glance at this point sees this part of them, this side of them The First Son and the Prince: the politician and the literary.

They're both backlit, they're in line even if it doesn't look like it, Alex is no longer on Henry's right, and they're both trying to act like the people that others could see them as.

But we - and they - know better. 1) Henry is gay. 2) Henry is into Alex. 3) Alex is into Henry.

4) Everyone is on the same page now.

(Also I know Casey talked about seeing the Red Room on a White House tour and so that's why they included a scene in that room in their book, but I cannot ignore the fact that red = love and passion and danger and fire [the counter to the water motif] and it's a warm colour designed to excite.)

[nights-nonsensical-ramblings]

Knuckles’ repeating phrase being “I don’t need the details, just tell me who to smash” has not been sitting right with me. It feels pulled right out of those portrayals that paint Knuckles as nothing more than the angry dumb, punchy guy.

And it’s especially weird when you consider the shatter verse versions of him.

Like to me Renegade Knucks feels like the regular Knuckles put through an urban an cynical filter. (This kinda makes him sit in the uncanny valley for me.) Yes, he does get angry, but all of them are at reasonable points and mostly tied to people breaking his and others trust, but we see he’s still willing to give sonic multiple chances and can be pretty chill (as chill as someone can be In an Eggman ruled dystopia)

I don’t have as much to say in Gnarly, but he can be taken as Knuckles’ the side of him that struggles with trusting others in a personal vulnerability sense and all the stress he must feel with the threat of people coming after the m.e turned up to the extreme.

And then there’s Dread. I could go on and on about how much I love Dread as a mirror self ‘this is who Knuckles is not’ He is introduced as someone overly cheerful with no sense of duty or responsibility. Completely the opposite to Knuckles who’s diligence to his role is one of his core characteristics and how it often leads to him being in a bad mood. Then Dread is shown to be a coward, and by Sonic’s reaction this is clearly meant to be a ‘this ain’t Knuckles’ moment. Then Dread goes and abandons the crew on a sinking boat, the group has multiple flyers, they definitely could have worked something out to get everyone to safety, but no. Dread is selfish and takes it for himself, and yet again in the scene this is called out as ‘not a Knuckles thing’ and once he comes back sonic has the line of ‘not abandoning his crew’ and Dread immediately contradicting that with the ‘not for his crew’ line with a sinister grin and a shot that lingers just long enough to feel off.

So then what’s with this line?

I am so hoping what I’m I’ve come up with is intentional and not me looking deeper than the writers did

So in Sonic prime Sonic’s thoughts on Knuckles are interesting. There the running gag of ‘I’ll even take Knuckles.’ Running joke playing to their rivalry? Yeah, maybe. But could also be to show that Sonic doesn’t know Knuckles that well. Plus when Sonic’s talking about his friends all he can say is “Knuckles and his… Knuckles.” When he even comes up for things for Rouge and then there’s there’s him going that ‘he’s even happy to see knuckles’ when in the ghosty place.

Here’s my thoughts. Those lines aren’t meant to be a representation on the characters, but instead they what Sonic’s perception of them is.

I have clearer thoughts on some of these, but others are a bit shaky 

“As long as I’m around you’ll always have a wingman” - To Sonic Tails is his little buddy, a sidekick, the way he interacts with Nine seems to support this.

“The forest is the most beautiful place on earth” - he sees Amy as someone who’s really sweet and kind

“You may not like the way I do things but I get things done.” - Him seeing Rouge being willing to steal

“No problem sonic” - a very npc line. How well does he really know Big

And that brings us back to Knuckles 

His line can fit really well if Sonic doesn’t really know him that well and hasn’t got a chance to get to know the side of Knuckles that he keeps yo himself.

Please please please let this be what’s going on here. They’ve been getting him so good elsewhere I’d hate for them to screw him up here.

[joycew-art]

Someone asked what my process was to make the Rickbot comic, so I thought I'd make a separate post to show it. The process was kinda all over the place and spread over many months from December 2022 up till June 2023, so I'll try my best to make it understandable. And if you have any questions feel free to ask them!

The idea

So it all started with the idea of; What if Rickbot came back? And then the idea immediately made me think of two things;

How would Rickbot react?

Why is he brought back?

Which ended up with these two scenarios in my mind;

A. Rickbot awakens and he's not happy B. Rick tells the reason he's activated again

These were the very first scenes that started it all.

So then the question became, how do I go from point A to point B?

I would take moments from the show as reference for how they would act in these scenarios. And I'd take inspiration from manga and other comics of how I wanted the dialogue to flow and what the comic layouts would look like. In this case I knew a lot of dialogue would be involved cause these guys talk a lot! But I also didn't want the panels to feel too crowded and rushed so I limited myself to the amount of dialogue per panel.

Right now I'm writing it down like it was very planned, but for me this was often a very subconscious thing I did. I just thought up scenarios while I was taking walks or daydreaming in the shower etc. And sometimes these very specific moments would pop up that I would write down or draw out later.

I would make mini thumbnails of how I wanted the pages to go and write the dialogue next to it. At this point I'm mainly thinking of what I want characters to say and how I want the story to flow. Sometimes I make multiple versions of the same scenario to see how it flows better.

At times I even only write down dialogue and then make the thumbnails for them later. I have a tiny a6 sketchbook for little thumbnails and ideas like this. These were often moments were I didn't know where I wanted to take the comic yet, so I would separate the two to keep it more organized for myself.

As you might have noticed, not everything is the same in the final comic. I always fine-tune or change stuff up as I go. Sometimes things don't flow as well as I thought they did or some dialogue feels awkward or unnecessary.

Sketching

Once all the pages were planned and I have a good idea of how the story would go I opened a new Clip Studio Paint file and used the comic feature to set that up.

I would then copy the thumbnails I made in the page files and exported a thumbnail draft of the whole comic and 'read' through it to see how it flowed.

After I was satisfied I finally started sketching the pages.

Most of the pages stayed the same from the thumbnail, aside from some poses or expressions here and there. But I would also change up stuff I wasn't satisfied with.

For example, initially the Prime panel looked like the left one, but I didn't like how the pose flowed with the text balloons. There was a lot of empty space as well. So I decided to redo it to the one on the right.

Even now for the final version I'm thinking of resizing Rick a bit more. These kind of changes just happen throughout the process.

The backgrounds

I knew the comic would only take place in the garage, so to save myself a lot of time I decided to make it in 3d.

First I decided to sketch out the four walls of the garage as planes;

Then I imported those in Blender. I did some simple 3d modeling to get the basic shapes for the counters and the cabinet et voila! 3d sketch version of the garage!

I know this is a very watered down explanation, but trying to explain how I did it would take a whole new tutorial. And there are many other ones out there that explain it much better than I could. I was lucky that I already have some Blender experience cause of past works I've done for school and stuff.

But if you got the time to delve into it I would recommend it! For this here you only need to know the basics. Also Blender is free to download :)

This has saved me a lotttt of time drawing the same backgrounds over and over again!

Cover

Lastly I did the cover. That one has also gone through multiple versions. I had a vague idea of what I wanted, but I wasn't happy with the execution so I redrew that one as well.

So that's the whole process so far. I do I wanna continue the comic once I got the energy to work on it again. Gonna do some test pages first to see what kind of rendering I wanna go for. Not sure if'll be in black and white, color or a combo...we'll see.

I hope this helps! And if you have any questions don't be afraid to ask them.

[vayshkarell]

How I Made my V2 Cosplay

Oh boy! This right here is about how I make my cosplay head of V2. Some of the stages don't have photos, but i'll do my best to explain what I did. I also have no WIPs of the gloves, but those were super straight forward. Some photos are very low quality due to my phone having a damaged camera at the time, and other photos were taken from my instagram story as they're the only photos I have from that stage. Please note that this is not a tutorial! This is more of a story of a disastrous (but ultimately successful) project done by someone with no idea what they were doing. Please find actual tutorials by more experienced people!

The Modeling Base

This right hear is a big chunk of upholstery foam! I own a ton of this stuff, so i decided the best way to start this was a foam blank. Well, this was a bad idea in retrospect, but hey it technically worked. Kinda. I started by drawing the basic shape, then cutting out thick sheets. From there, I glued them together and began shaping with scissors to get the desired shape. Honestly a 3D modeled blank may have been better, or a base made of foam board pieces used instead. Live and learn I suppose.

 After I got the shape to something i was happy with, I began the transition to EVA foam. To do this, I mummified the thing in duct tape and marked seam lines in sharpie. I then cut out these duct tape pieces, and stuck them to paper to act as a backing.

Foam Shell Construction

Once I had a pattern, I began making the actual head. To do this, I traced the pattern onto sheets of EVA foam (I believe 4mm or 6mm) and cut them out. Lots of these pieces needed bevels, some of which i had to dremel as shown below due to them not cutting correctly. Bevels are important as they make the foam crease as desired for angular shapes. I'm still pretty amateur with it though, and frequently got bevels wrong.

As I cut pieces, I began gluing them together with an awful gunk called contact cement. This stuff is a special glue that you let dry before sticking the pieces together, and it pretty cool. Unfortunately it's flammable and a carcinogen. As stated before, I'm pretty new to armor, so lots of the seams have weird gaps I had to fix farther down the line. After quite awhile, I had the basic shell assembled. However, the shell had numerous gaps and pieces that didn't fit correctly. Enter the foam clay.

Foam clay is a substance similar to model magic, and was honestly a life saver here. This thing has a second shell basically made of the stuff. I had to fill gaps primarily around the eye socket, but the entire thing honestly barely fit together.

After some filling and sanding, I made a test optic. And the head looked preeeety bad. There was something just incredibly off about it. This began the massive amounts of revising and reshaping I had to do. And fixing of awful symmetry. The head required a massive amount of sanding around the sides of the face and the chin. Between initial construction and when I began painting, I completely reshaped these areas. I made the chin significantly smaller, and added the indents or whatever (fins?) on the side of the head. However, doing all of this required me to fill in chunks of the interior with large wads of foam clay. If I hadn't done so, then I would've sanded through it in places. I also made the awful decision to gap fill with hot glue. If you've not dremeled hot glue, I don't recommend trying it. It melts the glue and sends globs of it flying, and those things are hot and really hurt.

After even more sanding, gap filling, and re-sanding, I finally got the shape to something i was happy with. Unfortunately I don't have any photos from just before painting.

Priming and Painting

The next step was for me to slather this thing in primer so it could be painted. I use Plastidip, as a tutorial i saw years ago said it was the best primer. Why does it need primed? I'm not actually entirely sure, but it's what I've heard needs done, so that's what I do.

Plastidip is a spray, so I of course did this outside. After a ton of coats, I was left with a shiny surface ready for the paint. Not much to say on primer.

Due to not currently having a functional airbrush, V2 is entirely hand painted. I coated this guy in red paint, and i mean coated the entire thing. Even areas I'd later paint black. Quick tip: Don't do that. It's a waste of paint. But i did it anyway cause I'm a dumbass. I also had issues when doing the black with getting it to stick, and when removing tape it caused some paint to peal off too. I originally had painted a barcode on the side of the head, but removing the tape took the black paint off too. Sooooo no bar code.

Once I got the shell painted, I did the optic. The test optic I used was marker on unicorn buckram, but that stuff is really hard to see through, the markers looked bad, and I couldn't pain it without clogging the mesh (due to not having an airbrush and having to do it by hand.) So, I got different mesh: a larger weave black mesh. This stuff I was actually able to hand paint, thus how I got the iris I did.

The Gloves

The gloves were, frankly, rushed. I bought a pair of cheap black costume gloves online, and then glued foam to em. For the gloves, I just used paper patterns to make the foam pieces. No fancy patterning here, just drawing shapes. After cutting the foam, I hot glued it, and then painted them. No priming on these, cause I was lazy and had a con coming up.

Conclusion

So that's about it! Thank you for reading this monster of a post! I'm hoping to eventually do a V1 head, so I'll be repatterning the V unit head soon. When I do, I'll probably make an actual tutorial. I dunno. We'll see.

[lvicevlk]

i wonder sometimes if people miss that when jiang cheng says "don't make me look bad" what he means is "not embarassing me in public is the only thing i have found that gets around how my mother has convinced you that you are disposable" except when he means "if the howling mob comes after you with torches and pitchforks i'll stand with you but honestly, bro, i don't like our odds."

It has taken me forever to get to this and I am so sorry. Real life was draining me and I’ve finally got some time off to recover. Thank you for your patience.

It is astonishing to me that so many people somehow fail to understand the importance of reputation in the story. It’s a damned central theme how reputation, how what people think of you or say about you directly impacts how they treat you. It’s a presiding factor in Wei Wuxian’s downfall at the end of his first life. He makes everyone scared of him and thinks that’s going to make them leave him alone, instead it terrifies people to the point that the Jin can use a base truth, that he doesn’t have much respect any authority or boundaries aside from his own, to paint him as an imminent threat to the world. He built himself a reputation as an uncontrollable and frankly heretical wildcard and it comes back to bite him in the ass when people respond accordingly.

Reputation matters hugely to the story and to the people in it. Jiang Cheng is not wrong for trying to impress this on Wei Wuxian.  Reputation is, among other things, a currency all it’s own and, if we’re focusing on the Yunmeng boys here, Jiang Cheng spends a lot of his life shelling out cash to try and cover Wei Wuxian’s debts.

When they’re kids, it’s one thing. It’s still very not good and look, for me personally, I would not chose to spend a whole lot of time with a guy who seemed to think that violating my boundaries and publicly humiliating me was prime entertainment but Jiang Cheng loves Wei Wuxian and Wei Wuxian loves him back, even if they do not express that in ways that are all that healthy. Wei Wuxian teases Jiang Cheng because he wants his overly serious baby brother to relax, to smile and laugh and have fun. That’s a wonderful impulse and there are times where it’s works. There are also times where it’s utterly inappropriate and Wei Wuxian is, I think often willfully, blind to that. And worse, he doesn’t listen when Jiang Cheng tells him so. I once saw someone claim that Wei Wuxian only acts like that in public so that Jiang Cheng can look good by reining him in, which would be an interesting take if it was at all supported by the text instead of being a blatant contradiction thereof. It would require that Wei Wuxian not only listen to Jiang Cheng but do as he is asked. Which he does not at any point ever. It’s kinda a massive plot point that Wei Wuxian Does What He Wants and no one can tell him otherwise.

When they get older the consequences of Wei Wuxian’s habit of dicking around and messing with Jiang Cheng go beyond pissing off Madam Yu and become a lot more pronounced. Madam Yu’s anger is understandable even if the way she expresses it is unconscionable. She knows that Wei Wuxian’s behavior is damaging both to the Sect and to Jiang Cheng’s reputations and that it will and does actively impede Jiang Cheng’s ability to stand on the political field with the other Sect Leaders. Because when they look at him they see his reputation: the less favored child, the lesser cultivator, the Sect Heir and then Leader whose own right hand constantly dismisses and undermines him. Why should they take him seriously?

[iowkey-ioki]

How i made xenos nails!!

Materials

-worbla

-2mm eva foam

-scissors

-heat gun

-soldering iron (technically optional but helps A LOT)

-gesso (i used regular gesso, but if you can id buy heavy body gesso)

-P400+P600 sand paper

-acyrlic paint (just silver is ok, but black will help)

-white gloves

-hot glue

PART 1- forming the base

This part is VERY hard to explain so hopefully the diagram helps- ill explain every step here

Finger tips

1. Cut out a piece of worbla thats double the length of the finger tip you want + a little extra.

2. Heat it slightly and fold that piece of worbla in half around your finger.

3. Form it slightly around your finger, leaving a little extra space for the glove material, then cut it out with good scissors. (NOTE- if you try to form it on your finger while wearing gloves, the worbla MAY stick to the gloves. Id recommend just doing it on your bare finger)

4. Heat it up again until its very soft and round out the shape, making sure the sides stick together. If its too small when you test fit it around the glove, try to push out the walls a bit more.

Nails

Watch this video before starting this part-

1. Find a good length for your nails- mine are approx. 3 inches. Make a template and then cut the shape out of eva foam.

2. Cut out TWO pieces of worbla a little bigger then the nail strip and heat one up, sticky side up (the sticky side is shiny). Put the eva foam strip in the middle. Heat up the second piece of worbla and put it on top, sandwiching the eva foam.

3. Score all around the eva strip then cut AS CLOSE as possible to the edge.

Attaching the pieces

1. Heat up the finger tip and half of the nail. Attach the nail to the finger tip while wearing it to make sure it doesnt cave in. Use a picture from the manga as reference while doing this part

2. Once again, using a manga reference, use scrap worbla to fill out the sides and smooth everything down. This is the part where you can use a soldering iron to smooth everything out- be careful though, because you can easily burn the worbla.

2.5. I forgot to make a diagram but dont forget to curve the nails! I used a little metal dome to get a consistent curve for all of them.

3. Make little worbla balls, flatten them with something flat, then attach them to the nails while still hot.

Now repeat ALL these steps for all 10 nails! Yay!

PART 2- priming

For priming i used regular gesso because I was impatient, but if you have plenty of time I recommend heavy body gesso. It took me 12 layers to get everything decently smooth, but if you used heavy body it would probably take 3-5 layers.

I also used floral foam, craft sticks, and sticky tack for my painting setup- if you can think of a better method without sticky tack id recommend trying something else- just because i had to pick out the sticky tack with tweezers, and it took forever lol

Two things to note about gesso-

1. It doesnt self level so you need to sand it smooth

2. DO NOT DRY SAND!! Always wet sand gesso

My exact steps were this-

4 layers of gesso -> sand with P400 -> 4 layers of gesso -> sand with P400 -> 4 layers of gesso -> sand with P600

This part is very time consuming if you use regular gesso, but its definitely worth it for the smooth finish.

PART 3- painting

Before adding silver, I threw down a quick matte black layer. It tends to make metals look much better and it wont take long to dry, so I highly recommend it.

For the silver, i used decoart extreme sheen in silver, which i highly recommend. Relatively cheap and can be found in any craft store

Id also recommend having all your brush strokes go vertically if you can- it looks much cleaner.

PART 4 (final part)- attachment

I used a pair of white gloves i bought a while back at spirit halloween, but you can make them or buy them- doesnt matter as long as you like them.

This part is kinda dumb but I genuinely dont know if theres a better method… i put hot glue in the nails, let it cool for a couple of seconds, then put them ON MY FINGERS while wearing the gloves. It gets you the best fit possible but also burns a little so watch out.

And thats it! Thats all there is to it. Let me know if you found this helpful, and if anything was confusing leave a comment and ill try to help you.

As a bonus heres a picture that works very well for reference

[gggoldfinch]

brrrrrrr art dump for the tfp self insert oc my childhood self could only dream of 🤯 I drew these back in July but have been thinking about them again recently. This is so embarrassing but I'm so proud of how these character sheets came out, but I can't post them without context so here we goooooo (oc info at the bottom!!!!!!😭)

Embarrassing au & oc info time!!!!!! (tw for vague discussion of non-human self-harm in 10th bullet point):

Okay so basically to preface: in my wip fic (wip is a gross exaggeration), everything remains canonically accurate to TFP except for the fact I use my Magic Fanfic Writer Powers to incorporate ridiculous Cybertronian mysticism canon into it for the sole purpose of furthering my self indulgent plot armor via cyberforming (cyberforming being when organic material becomes that of Cybertronian-make through means of mysticism and/or science)

Marian (unabashed tradgoth self insert) starts off as human. She gets picked up by the Cons while smashed drunk one night bc they think she has info on the Bots (found her bc she was lurking on online forums asking too many questions about big robot aliens bc she once saw them brawling and wanted answers), then she just ends up being kept alive and kept around as a pet/team mascot/ emotional support human, because hey if the Bots have one then maybe humans can be of some use

After a while Marian ends up forming a bond with Starscream (and KO to a lesser extent) after they both end up treating each other with compassion and respect (wow! trauma-bonding!). She kinda definitely falls desperately in love with him (and thinks it's unrequited but jk!). Angst & hurt/comfort abound! Gratuitous usage of mass-displacement device for nsfw purposes! You didn't hear that from me...

She is accidentally killed during the Battle on Cybertron (ca. season 3) by being hit with a stray plasma blast.

Here is where AU material comes in lol!!!!!!!

With the Well of AllSparks alive once again, in an act of desperation SS leaves her body at the edge of the well and actually prays for once in his miserable life. Through a mystical act of pity or mercy or whatever, a fresh spark combines with her own approximation of a soul and cyberforms her corpse and resurrects/ reincarnates her. She's herself, with all her old memories— but also something new, with all-new potential. No one knows wtf is going on lol

She becomes the first mech created on "New" Cybertron. "Cyberform-forged" is the term used for her, making her something of a new race (in the same way the Terrans are a new race), and is more of a mystic anomaly than anything (largely because there is no opportunity to recreate the event).

She's formed with a Vosnian Seeker frame and Cybertronian alt mode. Her frame is weather resistant: built to tolerate and fly through high winds and dangerous weather (Cybertronian and Terran) and relies more on brute force than grace in aviation. This means she is bulky rather than slim and aerodynamic like SS. She's a revival of the (near?) extinct class (if we're going by Prime!canon then Starscream is the only confirmed Vosnian Seeker left). Why Primus decided that cranking out new Vosnians would be a good idea is beyond everyone; everyone is too busy wondering how tf cyberforming works and what the consequences of it are to really question it.

Physically, she's not overtly femme— more androgynous, which is on brand for her Vosnian build. She's top-heavy with large pauldrons, shoulders double the width of her hips. Her new frame reflects her old human body in a very rough, vague way— only enough to be noticeable to those who really knew her before. She applies face paint by hand like her old makeup, and paints one servo red to match how she used to wear her nail polish. She's shorter than SS, around 30-ish feet tall (whereas he pushes 35'). She doesn't have a very good grasp on how her wings emote, therefore anyone who can read Seeker body language can always tell exactly how she's feeling.

She suffers with severe ptsd, depression, and body dysmorphia/ dysphoria as a result of the cyberforming and her human death, and semi-often has moments of panic and distress wherein she self-harms in an attempt to undo what's been done. In a potent mix of lingering human neurodivergency & the jarring biological shift, she often gets overwhelmed by her new body, notably her biomechanical functions: her optics cause a significant amount of stress on a regular basis, to the point where visual "notifications" and all other miscellaneous visual obstructions have to be disabled in order for her to function. This means no scanning data, etc, without purposefully reactivating the internal procedures required for the task. She also has a lot of trouble coping with the lack of sexual dimorphism. Shortly after her "awakening," she brutalized herself due to severe confusion and psychological distress (see the second to last image :( ) and KO had to sedate and mend her.

Every who encounters her and knows her story kinda assumes she just "came back" with a processor malfunction (or if they don't know her story, think she was just traumatized by the war), which isn't totally wrong. Knockout is one of her major supporters thru this and professionally thinks she probably needs a mnemosurgeon to fix her, but can't find any to contact so soon post-war.

She's rather clumsy, and takes a while to acclimate to such a different body (it also doesn't help that Seekers tend to have disproportionally long limbs, as well as cumbersome wings). She smacks things and other mechs with her wings, crushes things in her servos, basically she severely underestimates her own strength and size

One perk to her new body is that she can stream music directly into her processor, which is a function she abuses often to drown everything else out. There are functions she couldn't even dream of before: she can disable pain processors, turn off sight and hearing like throwing a switch, disable various biomechanical functions. She doesn't need to breathe like a human, or expel waste. Energon tastes like battery acid and firecrackers, but hey, she can turn off "taste" processors too.

She's afraid of herself at times, and by extension is afraid of intimacy too. She's afraid she's too different now, in a foreign body she can't seem begin understanding. She feels burdened by expectations; she's not a real Vosnian Seeker, she's not even a real Cybertronian in the way that counts— she is a freakish amalgamation of human memories and a soul stuffed into a shell made new especially for her, despite her having had no say in the matter... Or, at least, that's what she thinks. Those closest to her think she's a miracle and are thrilled to still have her, indefinitely now. Before when she was human, SS had been frustrated and genuinely afraid of feeling anything remotely positive towards her, because of how tragically short human life spans are (and his fears had been proven valid when she was killed). Now he has Marian forever, and while coping with his own problems post-war, he cares for her and teaches her how to be a noble Seeker.

YIPPEEEEEEE

[bakerstmel]

Fall Favorite Fic Festival, Entry 4

I'm writing this in Memphis, TN, and I can't see any red trees from my hotel window. Too far south to have gotten started, maybe. It's been very overcast. I'm here for a professional meeting, and as is always the case, they've had the AC set to "violent" in the meeting rooms and I don't know that I'll ever be warm again. You know how if you've ever gotten a sunburn, the water in the shower is warmer when it hits your feet than when it comes out of the showerhead, because it's been heated by your skin? My showers here have been the complete opposite of that.

All that to say, I'm still feeling sad, still feeling lonely, definitely facing an anniversary reaction from my sister's passing, and still quite intentionally drowning my sorrows in fic.

I had the best, most angsty fic in mind for this entry, like, call and warn @221bjen level angst, but then one day, this manip came to mind, for no particular reason:

and oh, yeah, baby. I couldn't sign into AO3 fast enough. If you know, you know, and if you don't, you've got to read:

Whiteout, by SinceWhenDoYouCallMe_John

I will spare your TL by adding a cut here.

This is a fic I re-read fairly often for sheer pleasure, but that is not to say it's fluff. The author tries in the notes to make it sound like fluff, but it's Sherlock and John as part of an aerial rescue team at the freaking Matterhorn and there is ice and danger and multiple CPR events and Greg Lestrade speaking French and secrets and tears and all kinds of relationship drama and it's JUST NOT FLUFF, OK? However, it is written in a fun documentary style (Shane based it on a documentary he came across on Netflix) with mostly dialogue and camera direction and it is a quick, satisfying read.

I've had the pleasure of betaing for this author in the past, and so I've spent more than a little time thinking about his style. He is an extremely versatile writer, and I think this fic really highlights that. If you compare this style to, say, the highly descriptive and romantic (not just in the relationship way, but also in the world-painted-in-perfect-light-way) Gimme Shelter, you wouldn't necessarily know they were written by the same person within a fairly short block of time (8 months). This fic is crisp, well timed, and quickly paced, with perfectly set points of action, snappy dialogue, and not a lot of down time. Gimme Shelter moves well too, but it's a very different feeling, silky and gentle. It's like the difference between taking a shot of great tequila vs savoring a perfect Cabernet. And if that's not enough for you, please note that SWDYCMJ has also written Priestlock, a skiing OT3, a straight-ahead ghost story, Potterlock, and a Black Mirror crossover that kept me on my toes. Plus, of course, the beautiful Brokeback Mountain fusion that still breaks my heart in all the best ways.

I mentioned in my last entry how the artistry in this fandom continues to knock me out to this day, and Shane's collective work is another prime example.

I don't feel like I'm doing this fic justice, but it's kinda hard for me to talk about without ruining the surprise of it. Even discussing the structure is tricky. Just...go read it. You'll thank me later.

[somnambulic-thing]

This has been sitting in my drafts unfinished for MONTHS.

I don't have a large audience here but every single reblog can go a long way! So, if you, dearest reader, decide to indulge in one of those treasures I encourage you to give something back by spreading the goodness and/or giving some love and feedback to the authors!

This is a collection of stories that stuck with me and that I keep coming back to and I'll tell you why as good as I can and without spoilering. (in no particular order.)

death and the maiden by @fairyysoup One of the first Eddie fics I read when I crashed into the fandom here on tumblr. It's immersive, it's creative, the lore is detailed but leaves enough mystery to hold tension. The insights into Eddie's inner world are written with so much care and humor; it's heartbreaking and adorable and there was not one dull minute of reading.

river monster Eddie by @courtingchaos This just grabbed me by the throat and pulled me under. It's so dreamy, so soft and still sharp. Meg's writing makes me smell the dirt, the mossy riverside, the minerals of the rocks we rest on. Our Monster Boi is mysterious, he has character that is shining through even the smallest actions: curious, playful, rough. I want to know everything about his life and what he does to pass the time.

this dreamy blurb by @chestylarouxx Em is the master of illuminating the beauty of the ordinary, of painting big pictures with few words and unleashing avalanches of emotions in subtle ways that will worm under your skin before you realise what's happening. I read this short piece more times than I can count. The intimacy, the softness that is never just sweet but goes even deeper because there is also the sour lurking around the edges. (Or vigorously slapping your face, but I like that, you know?)

the Store Manager Verse by @jo-harrington So this kinda hit me unexpectedly. I am usually not remotely interested in retail settings but I am invested in this! The setting is simple, but never dull! The sting of everyday struggles, everyday drama and the fact that you can't escape yourself, that you take your demons with you wherever you go is met with the beauty of caring for others, of making the best out of subpar situations, of making the most out of a little, of taking a leap of faith despite being scared shitless to fall. Eddie is a well-rounded character, no flawless dream boy but a little mess with a golden heart who's trying so hard. Too hard, sometimes. I love him dearly. Go read this.

last string to sever by @dr-aculaaa There is this quality to Dracs words: like when you enter someone's living space and the light, the shapes and colours, the smell just make sense. They invite you into something unique, something intimate, filled with nuance and dept that I have to take breaks sometimes to untangle everything I just experienced. This story is heavy, is brutal and mean and it stings but it's not just stepping down on you until you can't breathe anymore. Drac leaves cracks in the concrete and through those you can see a way ahead, a reason within. The care between the characters, the hands reaching even after they have been slapped away. The relationships are distinctive. And The Longing! Nothing I could write here would capture it all. This text is insufficient. Have your own taste.

it's been a long year by @myosotisa Again a prime example of painting big pictures with few words. The relationships in this run so deep that the scene unravelling before our eyes hits you like a freight train. It's visceral in exactly the right amount; the physical pain and not overshadowing the weight of lives cut short but accentuating it. It's so tender and soft and full of gutwrenching gratitude laced between the horror... I'm choking up writing this (not kidding).

I'm just a sucker (for you) by @bettyfrommars Betty, Betty, Betty. Highly imaginative, an impressive range and such a sense for detail and the small things that make the difference between a nice story and a story that will stay with you for a while. This short story had all my earthly senses engaged within seconds: Fall was everywhere, the smell of popcorn mingled with the earthy scent of the season. This is one of my favourite Eddie characterisations so far. He's so alive, so sweet and awkward and silly, daring but shy. You made him a complex, believable guy and all contained in so few words. I am kneeling before your greatness.

[charlieslowartsies]

Hey, so I'm not sure if someone has asked you yet, but I'm fascinated by how you use the Cybertronian language in your transformers fics. How does it work exactly?

This got long, and I’m sorry as always. Thank Primus for read mores.

For starters when I FIRST began working on Resonance and realized I wanted to try putting Cybertronian into it, I read the wiki page, more specifically the opening paragraph:

It should be little surprise, given a moment's thought, that distinct Cybertronian languages exist. The Transformers did not go about speaking English or any other known Earth language long ages ago on their distant metal world. Though the records of such conversations are frequently translated for us, we should not forget that these conversations originally flowed in odd electronic syllables past strange metallic lips, or were etched by alien hands long eons before the first humans painted muddy shapes upon dark cave stone.

‘Fuck.’ Was my first thought. ‘I’m about to try and work an ancient language into this damn fic about a human and an alien robot boning/becoming soul mates…and I want it to be believable.’

‘College linguistics comes back to haunt me.’ Was my second.

So I’ve mashed several continuities together, from the comics to the tv show to the Bay/Knight movies. That sort of gave me a big door way to wedge information through, winding it around plot, and Cade and Prime’s interactions. There’s also more than one alphabet, because of course there is.

I wanted Cade and the Reader to bond as much as Cade and Prime did learning, and Prime teaching him/us. While Cade’s spent a handful of years with the 2.0 team, any lessons would be sort of like Cybertronian 101, rough and dirty. I didn’t want him fluent, (because how?) and reliant on the bots to explain more than they assumed. (Taken shamelessly from my own background. My mom and Uncle speak fluent Spanish but I know broken bits and pieces. I can swear like a sailor though.)

I also leaned into sticking to verbal lessons and displays of the language in action, instead of ‘Cade read a book’ which I think helped make it more…interesting? Hopefully!

Things, phrases, and manners of speaking Cade would be interested in just to help him survive among the bots. The word for ‘I’m a medic, don’t shoot my ass, I can help you!’ is kinda more important than names for Cybertron’s dead Primes or famous landscapes/battles.

Cade can speak Cybertronian better than he can read it, and indeed in Resonance the language is dying among its own kind, sort of like in Atlantis: The Lost Empire. (Not as degraded/gone though.) A younger mech that hatched off Cybertron and grew up amongst the stars only knows what they’ve heard/read or if an older mech transferred the language to them.

I decided to lean into Transformer’s physiology and history and create a few rules to stick to. Here’s a few from my notes, subject to have changed but I don’t think I contradicted them??

1. Transformers do not have a word or specific phrase for ‘please’ in Cybertronian. Instead of ‘Please do/give/take/etc X’ it would simply be removed from the vernacular. You don’t really ask a lot, you demand/take/coerce/threaten.

2. Yes is ‘Affirmative’ and no is ‘Negative’ and used more frequently than yes/no in reply to someone.

4. Short, stilted, and cutting phrases should make up the language when being translated into English. Blunt, but inseparable.

5. Delicate, kind, or sweet terms when being soft or gentle with a treasured person, such as an offspring, friend or mate. Long, lyrical, almost poetic??

6. Repetition to increase intention. “This is very good!” becomes “Good-good-good!” and perhaps engines might be made to purr a little to indicate pleasure/enjoyment/contentment, or optics would be squeezed shut for trust blinks like cats lol!

7. Nonverbal vocalizations slip in and out around Cybertronian as much as English. Static might come across grating to us, but static to a Transformer could mean confusion, alarm, or merely mumbling to oneself. It might not indicate stress—humans hear static and would be troubled, but a mech might be confused if a human heard their staticy sounds and assumed something was wrong. (Reversal, soft and wet sounds are jarring and foreign to Transformers, or usually mean something malfunctioning to them. Whistling from our lips is a great trick, they would think.) Steam whistles, and metal whistles but organic creatures making the noise? Woah!

8. There ARE other dialects but not gunna parse into them deeply or I’ll go nuts and the fic will derail. EX: Vosian (Vos) Vilocitronian (Vilocitron), Kaonic (Kaon) etc. Combatron is a colony thank god,can get away with it dominantly Cybertronian if I need it.

9. Look into Dragon Langauge/Thu’um and study.

10. Cade and Prime are ‘You-and-I’ when talking to one another, their special designation for each other. ‘They-Who-Are-One’ means the same but used by third parties. Prime also uses ‘Light-of-my-Spark’ or Sparklight, and ‘Cade-Beloved’  

Those are old notes, dating back from Res’ early chapters in 2019.

Part of what helped me picture how I wanted the language to work was translating bot’s names into what I imagined their ‘true’ designations would be. It became kind of fun, actually. Especially seeing how short names could turn into long, almost lyrical titles. I wanted Cybertronian to sound harsh, heavy, and grating to humans in the fic, but also at its heart be flowing, connected and ever changing like the bot’s themselves.

Some were self explanatory to their ‘English’ version, some more esoteric. Starscream became ‘Screams-Like-Dying-Starlight.’ Terrifying but it paints a picture of what he does, what kind of fight he will give you, etc. As did ‘In-His-Crosshairs’ or ‘Drifts-Through-Darkest-Skies.’ Saying that 'Crosshairs and 'Drift' were what they were called on English seemed like a good way to show that we, as humans, are the aliens to them as much as they're alien to us?

Optimus Prime had other titles that both worked as nicknames or insults, depending on who said it their inflection. ‘He-Who-Reigns-War’ was meant to be heartbreaking as it was, well, kinda true. He doesn’t like it, Cade doesn’t like it. Many Autobots won’t use it.

Because I don’t study linguistics/zero time to study as much as I’d like, I have to absolutely work on rules and tweak them on the fly. I try to stick their speech being present, more than temporary.

‘Did you get hurt?’ would become ‘Hurting?’ and ‘I don’t like this at all, this is scary!’ becomes ‘Do-Not-Like! Scared!’

I wanted the Cybertronian dialect in Resonance to be emotive and rich in gestures, and firm statements. Abstract but ‘in the moment’ and very much still reliant on body language and tone versus tons of explanations or verbal hypothetical’s. There are noises and sounds humans cannot pronounce in this language, but there are work arounds within reason and, of course, a Cybertronian listening a human speak any Earth language can engage almost within minutes through learning and copying.  

I hope this answered your question DX Sorry for the rambling!! If you read this far 200 cookies for youuuu

[brella-boi]

Building Dango: Part 4

We're so far in and still have so fucking much to do. I am fearing I may not have this guy made in time. Which I'll have to stomach through clenched teeth.

We're moving on to priming. And I'll be using Flexbond for this. I previously used a spray version, which fucking stinks. (If any of you guys remember the making of my kenku fursuit then you remember the horrors of gassing my family.)

This is odourless and I can slap quite thick bits of it on there.

It's water based and kinda smells like PVA glue (suspicious...) but honestly it worked wonders. I was hoping it would cover up the majority of roughness and imperfections, and with three coats, it did mostly that! Kudos to my friend for pointing me in the direction of this substance.

It took about 3-4 hours to dry on each coat, and I could safely do it inside. Unfortunately there are paintbrush streaks. But I can stomach that.

In between waiting for the coats to dry, I got to work on the eyes. I'm using this mesh as the base. It's nice and thick, does have a bend to it, and has fantastic view through the many holes in it. And since it's already black, I only need to paint the pupil. Though I have also painted a set of eyes for a friend that were fully painted and they looked fine too. Poking any clogged up holes IS a chore though, so to make sure there's as little of that as possible, you gotta water down your acrylic paint and slowly work your way up with coats. I haven't tried dried brushing it, mainly because that method is quite messy, and watered down colour worked better for me.

However, this didn't go without a tragedy. While trying to get the paint to dry faster, I often use a hairbrush. But. Well I was holding the mesh up in the air and drying it. And I guess I held the hairbrush too close and it bent the metal just enough to make dents from where my fingers held it. And. Unfortunately. Begudgingly. I could not restore the mesh back. So I had to paint the second eye all over again. So if you're drying with a hairbrush- do so on a flat surface.

For the JAW.

And here's where I start to realise I'm doing this backwards.

For the Jaw I will be using chicago screws. Originally I was going to use this hinge I got off etsy from a polish maker:

But Dango's head is already quite. Tight. And these would add another centimeter on each side of the head and there's just not enough space for that- nor do I think they would fit actually....

SO HERE WE ARE: CHICAGO SCREWS.

Chicago screws are originally used for leather work, and come in various sizes. The main body of the screw is sleek, so the jaw can freely move around on the middle part, while the actual tube is hollow with end being the 'screw' part. This screw part will be inside the jaw so I can freely unscrew it if I ever need to. While two pieces of my high density foam are about 2cm in thickness when smooshed together, I opted for 17mm thick screws instead. Which meant I head to drill holes, then indents into those holes, to make sure the screws fit in.

I did this because A: the flat part of the screw is going to poke through to the outer layer of the skull that will not have fabric covering it. It needs to be flush with the skull so that its not as easily seen. I made it sink into the foam by another 1-2mm so I could then cover it in sculpting foam and then.... prime it again. Like an egit. Anyway. And B: I didn't want the screws to poke me into my cheeks. Even though they're flat, Id rather drill into the foam and have it flush against it then poke out and be texture hell yanno?

Always test the drill bits on scraps though before you commit to the real deal! It took me a while to get the hang of the actual drill bit of my rotary carver, but in the end I was confident in actually drilling the mask.

ISN'T THIS CLEAN. God I'm so proud of it.

So I was drilling again after priming shit. I should've done this before the priming stage. But tbf they only arrived in the mail after I primed so. Whatever. (spoiler: this isnt the last time I pull out the fucking carver)

THE JAW IS HINGED.

And we continue working....

[crosseyedcricketart]

art tips

here's some traditional art tips from me:

acrylic painting:

different brands do different things with their paint and one of them has to do with pigment characteristics versus consistency. For example, most of Liquitex’s paints are the same texture and consistency because they adjust their formula to act as such, whereas Golden Acrylics doesn’t and the pigments characteristics are allowed to shine through. Learning about specific pigments can be a pain but it can also help you make sure your painting ends up how you wanted it to.

if you’re doing a layered painting “proper painting”- THIN LAYERS. THIN THIN LAYERS. acrylic loves to clump up on itself like nail Polish. Go slow and pay attention to how it dries.

acrylic paint appears lighter than how it will dry. If you’re planning a color scheme, get some paper or a sketch page and swatch your colors and let them completely dry. They will also appear a lot lighter if you dilute them with water.

one note of the characteristic of acrylic paint is that it doesn’t tend to have the depth or luminosity of oil paint. If you get the right paints, you can do it. Some paints are more transparent and they work great for this. Work in thin layers, layer and layer and layer, and add opaque paints to add definitive layers so once the painting is done, there is depth. Phthalo paints work great for this.

when mixing colors, the paint can start to look foggy, and a lot of times this is from air being whipped into the paint. If you’re worried that this foggy paint won’t look how you wanted it to, swatch it and let it dry. In my experience, it applies and dries fine.

oil painting:

this is for really people who had terrible instructors or self taught: fat over lean does matter. fat over lean is the concept that the oilier paint should be for the final layers while the thinned out paint, or lean paint, is for the first layers. this helps to prevent cracking on both traditional oils and water mixable oils. so your leanest paint is for your under painting while your fattest paint is your final layers. this isn’t really a “learn the rules to break them” concept, it’s more of a “you want your painting to survive more than 5 years” concept.

oil paint appears the same color it will dry as if it is at normal opacity. This gets effected by diluting or fattening the paint, however.

if you’re gonna paint on paper with oil paint, use thick paper. I mean at least 300g/140 lb paper. If you can, prime it with gesso. And it’ll work great.

Water mixable oil paints work the same as traditional oil paints without the need for solvents or mineral spirits.

watercolor & colored pencils:

colored pencils: treat these like newborns. gentle. the pigment can break easily, like pencil graphite can. use circles to blend and lay down a more opaque layer. sharpen them gently. i have a whole separate, manual sharpener for my colored pencils.

watercolor paintings: use cotton paper or paper with cotton in it. trust me it works better. the paper warps less and you can add more water than just normal paper. cotton paper is more expensive though. kinda like using wood board instead of canvas for an oil painting.

Watercolor: take care of your brushes like they are your one and only begotten son, okay? You can paint with a messed up brush in acrylic or oil but watercolor depends on the brush a lot of times.

general art tips:

Get a heavyweight paper sketchbook if you want to sketch out paintings or swatch paint and keep them for future reference.

Paint in general: PAY ATTENTION TO THE LIGHTFASTNESS ! This is very important if you ever intend to have your art in galleries or for sale. Lightfastness just means how long the pigments in your paint stay the same as when they were packaged as when they are on your painting. Improved lightfastness pigments are normally marked with “permanent” in their names, like “permanent alizarin crimson”.

General safety: PICK UP YOUR PAINT WATER OR SEAL IT IF YOU HAVE PETS!! Even if they won’t get fatally sick, it won’t make them feel good, and in my experience they don’t care if the water is bright red.

Painting: have a designated paint water cup. Do not drink Out of this cup. Learn it is a paint water cup. Then you will Not drink out of paint water cup.

GET SOME BRUSH SOAP!! Get it!! I promise you it makes a difference. If you can’t invest in any, use something like Dawn or Mrs. Meyers dish soap but keep an eye on how dry the brushes are if they are natural hair. The paint soap I use is the Masters brush cleaner and preserver and I got a massive tub of it for $20 at my local art store.

find a local art store if you are able! And I do not mean Michael’s or Hobby Lobby. I mean local. A lot of times they’re competing with these stores and they have cheaper prices and some even have student/professor discounts. The one I go to has a lot of stuff under MSRP and I get a discount. And they don’t sell any bad quality items.

if you’re struggling with a concept, find a book on it. Internet Archive as a library with a lot of art books, some stores sell art books. Art books are useful insight; even if you don’t agree with the author, it can help you realize what you’re trying to achieve. However, if you’re buying it, make sure to skim it and see if it’s actually useful for you. I have a lot of DK published art books.

if you feel stagnant in your art, look at art. I mean it. Look at photography, painting, fashion, sculpture, jewelry— look at things. This is how I ended up painting fish. And guess what? I freaking love painting fish. I again have a library of books just so I can look at them For inspiration.

General art: if you want to be able to travel with your supplies but don’t know how to do so, let me give you some tips in this tip: Get a massive bag. I mean a big ole canvas bag. I got one from Aldi for $8 that works great. If you already have one, even better. If you have a big enough backpack, you can use that too. Get a palette that can cover. You can DIY one, probably, or you can buy one. Then if you have any wet paint, you don’t have to throw it out or risk getting it everywhere. If this isn’t a concern of yours, no worries. Use a hair tie or scrunchie to bundle your brushes together. This keeps them from going everywhere. Situate your paints so they won’t be crushed if you’re taking tubes. Bring a small amount of brush cleaner with you. I reused a skincare jar for mine. Bring what you’re going to paint on.

General art: reuse jars. I mean it. I have some skincare jars that I’ve reused to hold paint oil and brush cleaner and I use old pasta sauce jars for brush cups. They work great.

here’s how to wash off different paints from your skin- oil paints— get a true soap. Dish soap works too. Acrylic paint— let it dry and you can brush it off with a nail brush or old toothbrush. watercolor paint- wipe it off with a wet wipe or a dampened paper towel/hand towel. If you’re going to use a hand towel, have a designated towel since it can stain.

Stretched canvas; if you’ve damaged or pierced your canvas, you can probably fix it with gesso and acrylic paint, or just acrylic paint. You can also sew the canvas back if you really want to save it.

Here’s some art stuff I like and use but you don’t need it:

Masterson oil palette

Pentalic Nature Sketch 25% cotton sketchbook

Winsor & Newton Artisan Water Mixable oil Colour

Golden Professional acrylic heavy body paints

The Masters Brush cleanser and preserver

Liquitex palette knives

[doomed-era]

hey so this may be. A Question. but how would gaffen + widget + maybe the champions react to undertale/deltarunes characters. sorry for undertaling you </3 . also anything on the champions descendants?

OKAY here i go. finally. im gonna limit it to gaffen/widget unless I can think of a funny interaction between undertale characters and the champions I think solely bc there are a lot of them...these are gonna be fairly superficial and based on first impressions don't think too hard about them </3 cause theyre kinda bad

honestly they'd collectively be very weirded out by monsters that can actually speak to them. widget and daruk would definitely try to work things out and yknow. not try to kill anyone while given the first sign of violence gaffen might start attacking everyone. so my first thought is. they are probably better off sticking together in this scenario because of gaffen. and tbf it's not like widget wouldn't be suspicious either, she would be less than friendly at first, especially if she learned how monsters got into the underground. she'd immediately start wondering why and paint humans as the victims who must have had a good reason to do such a thing. idk i'll go in the order of a neutral route

flowey: i'll be honest they would not like flowey...which is HORRIBLE ik. I imagined them trying to beat him up and them him resetting which!!! I do not blame him. if they knew more about him I don't think gaffen would be sympathetic and urbosa would just be pissed. however. mipha probably would reconsider. widget would be all like DONT LOSE HOPE THERE MUST BE ANOTHER WAY!!! revali going "tch I would do cooler things if I could reset everyone" would be funny i admit but smhhh

toriel: ok I admit I think urbosa would be like "shes such a soft mom geez." (baka.) if gaffen wasnt in work mode he'd want to make puns with her and eat her pies....in the meantime he will stare soulfully at her. if toriel read widget facts about snails then widget would be fascinated im ngl she would stay in the ruins with toriel if this was an actual undertale route. however I think they are just taking a tour so whagever

sans: widget would be a bit startled by his jokes! also I think sans would realize that shes like, a PRIME target for them. gaffen and sans would get into a staring contest and gaffen would lose because sans has no eyelids. or does he

explain this toby fox!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

papyrus: oh you bet widget and papyrus would get along. immediate best buds. gaffen would look at papyrus like he was insane (his eyes are bloodshot from skeleton staring contest) revali being all are you AWARE of how GULLIBLE you both ARE would be funny and mipha immediately jumping to widget and papyrus's defenses would be super funny

undyne: urbosa being like UM. I am FAR less of a show off than you are. you must serve your kingdom with grace. and then they get into a suplexing contest. daruk also joins but he's like oh haha i'm doing this for fun :) while undyne and urbosa are giving it their all. widget is cheering for urbosa obviously and gaffen is a last-minute contestant. widget cheers even harder for urbosa. im not sure who would win but it's not gaffen. also urbosa thinks it was super funny. also mipha would be fascinated by the echo flowers + have a lot of fun swimming around in waterfall. heartbroken by onion-san and tells her all about zora's domain </3

alphys: im going off my immediate first thought so honestly widget asking what anime is and alphys freaking out about it at first and widget being like OH NO WHAT DO I DO. mipha being like...tell me about this...anime...also widget would think mettaton is really cool. revali might like it but he would not express interest at first. and then he would criticize the sequel to mew mew kissy cutie along with alphys really passionately (iirc??? I forgot which one she didnt like) gaffen is eating instant ramen noodles straight out of the package when no one is looking. also if widget knew about the true lab she'd be like well um its fine ??? you did what you could ig wouldnt think of it as bad at all. which. erm. widget. urbosa would complain that her and daruk cant fit in the elevators and criticize asgore's city planning

asgore: yeah speaking of him. idk I think theyd like him. especially if they've heard a lot of good things on their way over. im imagining them all sitting down for tea...widget might be a little skeptical. and would also definitely figure out that him and toriel are divorced and ask intrusive questions about it. if this was deltarun id say asgore might be a little more interested in talking to gaffen I think he would see a bit of resemblance between gaffen and kris, mostly just quiet + weird + :| face I think. gaffen would just be quietly intimidated I think

OKAY. i'll do deltarune ones cos im kinda enjoying this

kris: ok honestly I cant even imagine kris would want to interact with them. widget would track them down and kris would just leeeeaaave

susie: widget immediately thinking susie is horrible and awful and susie responding in kind by being susie-er is funny to me. she would think widgets relationship with the champions and gaffen is super weird I think, but would she say this? idk.

berdly: ...yeah this is one of the reasons I wanted to answer this ask. I just. revali and berdly...I dont think theyd get along at all I think they'd see the worst aspects of themselves in each other and hate each other </3

uhh I think that is enough for me. for Now. but. yea

champions descendants is fairly complicated so uh if you wanted to send me another ask abt it so I could answer it separately...pleas...

[keef-a-corn]

Dat’s right, People, it’s time for ‘Keef watches TFP and you just get the notes!’

This is for season 1, episode 11: Speed Metal.

I write down the timestamps, but I watch Transformers Prime on Stan (an Australian streaming service) so they may be slightly off.

ALSO! I try my best to note points for every character, but tend to get a little caught up by Bee (although I think I do a pretty good job with the notes regardless) so do be warned.

~~~~Transition~~~~

00:03 - starting off strong with a pretty scene

00:21 - it feels like this should’ve been Knockout’s premiering episode. Does him a lot more justice.

00:39 - Knockout proving to be smarter than the autobots because his windows have an insanely heavy tint.

00:46 - My bro really that jealous that he felt a need to scratch up a custom paint job.

00:53 - Ya know what? Valid reaction.

01:18 - attempting murder.

01:37 - … So attempted onscreen vehicular murder

~intro~

02:46 - Why does Vince wait until AFTER Jack decides to leave to taunt him? Why not do it while he has to be there?

02:50 - and Jack leans into it. *sigh*

03:07 - That’s all you have to say, Arcee?

03:35 - so many reasons, Sierra. You don’t have a helmet, you’re still holding books, it’s really rude to ask someone for something like that if they weren’t actively asking you or if you don’t setup a scheduled time in advanced.

03:49 - Hang on… Where TF did Vince get a muscle car from in the fairest place??

03:59 - suck an egg, Sierra.

04:11 -here we have a Jack, forgetting that his ride is sentient so regardless of if it was a rule or not, if she says no, it’s a no.

04:20 - I thought the first rule was keep a low profile.

04:41 - that shot is ugly.

05:24 - it took him forever to get start, Jack could’ve gone already!

05:30 - they had an hour between the end of school and the race, yet chose now to put their books away?

07:08 - shoutout to Knockout’s VA. They do a really good job.

07:17 - *sniff sniff* smells like a lie.

07:26 - I like how Knockout isn’t phased at all.

07:36 - ‘Buff this!’

07:39 - Zoom. (Yes, that is the only comment I will make about this shot)

07:47 - this is one of those shots that make you realise that these bots are huge.

08:04 - how?? It had been like 20 minutes since the race and there were no witnesses to who had won. Even if the information had gone around that quick, I doubt that Vince would’ve been honest about loosing.

08:08 - how the line was delivered, it made it sound like Raf was calling Jack Vince. 

08:21 - didn’t Jack say they shared a class together? How hard was she looking?

08:48 - I don’t understand how it’s a secret if high school students know about it.

09:19 - Imma be honest, I thought that was a vehicon.

09:27 - okay, but that sky-

09:37 - who is Raf playing against?

09:42 - These kinda of shots make it hard to remember that the boys are huge compared to the kids.

09:45 - …Why exactly does he ask Raf like that?? He knows Bee’s sentient.

09:46 - my head tells me he is saying ‘an hour? To go racing??’ My heart is telling me ‘Why are you asking Raf? He’s not in charge of me.’

09:52 - then he would be mildly annoyed.. Raf I don’t think you’re aware of just how calm Optimus actually is.

09:53 - With confidence I’m declaring that Bee said ‘Oh, right.’

09:58 - AroAce Raf hc.

10:04 - still completely ignoring that it’s actually Bee’s decision on if Jack can take him out racing.

10:14 - It’s a bit clearer in this timestamp but Jack Clones (courtesy @stefani-rebel)

10:16 - Bee’s numberplate is ‘936 SOH’… I know what my future numberplate will be(e)

10:26 - That does NOT explain how or why Jack owns a muscle car.

10:35 - THAT IS SO DANGEROUS. SIERRA’S STILL A CHILD.

11:00 - *dies* Knockout saying ‘Bumblebee’. I think I just like how deep voices say such an innocent word.

11:08 - ‘what was that Bee?’ As if he could understand Bee if he repeated himself.

11:09 - I’d just like to add, I really enjoy that Bee’s interior is lined with luminescent blue. It’s probably from that being one of the ways energon can look, so do you think that if Bee’s energon was drained out, all the blue would just turn black? …That went dark rq.

11:13 -why was Jack holding the wheel? I think I raised this question in convoy, but would the bots find it uncomfortable when someone touches their steering wheel/interior?

11:14 - this plays further into my ‘Is it uncomfortable for them’ question because we can tell the bots can control their steering wheels and require that control to drive.

11:40 - this reminds me so much of TF 2007

11:44 - it’s in character for Knockout to chase Bee, but wouldn’t it have been so funny if he instead focused on winning the race?

12:11 - Miko’s a trash liar.

12:16 - She only asked for Jack, how TF did she know Bee was with him??

12:20 - I now understand why Miko’s so bad.

12:46 - is that oil?? I feel like it would be a bodily fluid that shouldn’t be released that easily.

13:03 - and here we witness smart thinking from Bumblebee.

13:29 - Does anyone else wanna push Vince down the stairs? + all things considered, glad that there was an actual third party that’s actions affected the safety of the protags, rather than just excusing Knockout finding them to ‘of course he did’

13:36 - TFP stepping up with the ‘Naturally Knockout, an antagonist actively searching for the protags, noticed light behind him’

13:48 - accidental misgendering. Ask your car their preferred pronouns/lh

13:55 - what a lovely reminder that the bots are fragging huge.

14:04 - I too, when having an unknown pointy object put right in front of me, stare directly at it and lean closer.

14:34 - well timed an acceptable pun. But then again, I can’t talk, every time I write ‘be’ I put an extra ‘e’ in brackets.

14:44 - I’ve always seen the angst potential in this moment. (‘I can’t understand you!’) Because it’s an unfortunate way of life for Bee.

14:51 - Despite clear instructions, Bee honks three times. But because there’s a slight pause between the second and third honk, Bee pretty much said ‘Good and Bad news’. I know a lot of people have probably noticed it, but I thought it was a nice touch.

14:57 - they look like a band

14:58 - there eyes are glowing so harshly. It’s probably got to do with the fact that in vehicle mode they had their headlights on. + Bulkhead and Bee look at each other because they know they’re in huge trouble too. (I unfortunately didn’t manage to catch that in the screenshot tho)

15:04 - Maybe being in bot form for longer than a minute, turns off the headlights.

15:08 - How the frag would he know that?? Like maybe it would be my second or third guess, but certainly not my first. (First would’ve been ‘He probably saw a potential hostage’)

15:15 - I may have laughed way too loudly at that

15:27 - Harsh light’s back, on Bee specifically.

15:35 - Okay, that’s cute and so in character. Raf being concerned about Bee and Miko being absolutely certain that Bulkhead will be okay and protect everyone.

15:44 - that establishes that they had originally told Optimus a lie, but the hadn’t.

16:00 - I get why Raf’s a bad liar, but why is Miko??

16:02 - you KNOW Optimus is done with their BS.

16:03 - Look at him! L O O K . (Also ‘My father senses are going off. Why bother lying to me?.’)

16:06 - not suspicious at all.

16:11 - z o o m . How did they not see him?

16:19 - gotta be honest, I enjoy when antagonists use a protagonist’s name. Just makes it feel more respectful.

16:39 - You can see Knockout at the back.

16:57 - Bee walking backwards with ease makes me think a common technique the bots practice is walking backwards. That would be hilarious, all the bots going into a forest walking around backwards for like an hour.

16:58 - after a second glance I realised that Bee’s pedes/feet never left the ground. He was moonwalking.

17:07 - Bee can do a backhand spring.

17:10 - if Bee did what he usually does, he wouldn’t have been hit. He would usually duck the first few swings, but decided to try get the first hit against Breakdown. Makes no sense why he would considering that Breakdown’s build in a similar way to Bulkhead.

17:18 - Breakdown stumbles forward slightly when Bee hits him. NGL it’s kinda cute.

17:21 - See? Bee dodged the attacks, rather than getting the first punch!

17:24 - It’s implied this is Knockout’s vision and I hate it.

17:31 - Bee playing possum while Arcee rides Knockout like a skateboard.

17:34 - Rq, Bee’s fighting got significantly better once Arcee joined the fight. He feels more confident with her and I love that. (They’re family, your honour.)

17:35 - when he got them titanium legs- Why doesn’t Bee kick more though? He’s clearly got strong legs.

17:37 - Breakdown ran right into that one.

17:40 - surfs up, dude.

17:42 - one thing to note is that whenever a bot gets knocked off course they will quickly transform into the other mode to prevent damage.

17:46 - That’s a weird thing to say, Jack.

17:50 - Bee’s reaction time decreased significantly. Also how much damage can doorwings sustain?

17:57 - his face when he realised his hubby ran off.

18:05 - Bulkhead only now decides to do that?? Yes. Of course he does because he realised that Bee was down and about to get very hurt.

18:26 - yay! Optimus!

18:52 - Optimus just threw him like he was nothing.

18:58 - Makes me wonder, if the car parts were removed, would they be restored by a new alt mode?

19:27 - FRAG. I WANTED TO SEE BEE’S REACTION TO DISAPPOINTING OPTIMUS.

19:30 - he holds Vince the way you’d hold a sausage.

19:49 - like the con’s name

20:10 - moments like those make me wish the bots were allowed to punch humans.

20:28 - Starscream’s shaking

20:30 - Knockout looks like he’s wearing a hoodie

20:36 - he looks like a pigeon!

20:47 - Breakdown looks genuinely scared and that makes me sad.

20:52 - WE DON’T EVEN GET THE OUTCOME?! I WANTED TO KNOW THE AFTERMATH OF DISAPOTIMUS

20:56 - go suck an egg, Sierra.

———————

And that was Speed Metal.

I find this episode’s really good and would’ve been a much better introduction to Knockout and Breakdown. Well.. mainly Knockout. Although I wish we had gotten some time with the bots getting in trouble.

I genuinely believe this episode did Knockout and Breakdown a lot more justice though, better conveying that Knockout considers his looks very important and will run off when the odds start to change, while Breakdown will fight until he can’t continue.

[bigskydreaming]

Okay, having a rare high spoons and no specific plans day, so want to try working through some Logic Snarls in one of my original projects by the time-tested method of Babbling at People About Them Until It Makes Sense In My Head. Anyone who remembers me talking about one of these before (and even if you don't), ask away to Unleash the Babbles. It'll be helpful to me, and possibly interesting for you? That's what Management said anyway. Idk, I just work here

Changelings (modern urban fantasy, check my #changelings 'verse tag for more details)

2. Waveriders (one of the focal planets in my big space opera universe, this one's about a bunch of people living on a gas giant in floating cities with sky pirates, cyborg ghost dragons and chaos angels. Title comes from people being born with the ability to mentally hack one of nine different kinds of wavelengths/energy....think like how ATLA has airbenders, firebenders, etc.....this universe - well, planet - has echoriders, who can hack or manipulate sound wavelengths with their minds, brightriders, who can hack light wavelengths, shockriders manipulate electricity, boomriders kinetic energy, etc. There's no One Avatar To Rule Them All though, nobody can hack all nine kinds of energy, its not ACTUALLY Avatar, that was just the closest association) - more here

3. Patron and Muse (from the same space opera universe as the above, just a different solar system, its a closed solar system that's kinda like the mysterious Bermuda Triangle of space....none of the other civilizations know what's in there cuz their ships vanish into it and pop out the other side without ever crossing the space in between, and meanwhile all the people on the planets inside the solar system have never left their bubble even though they travel between their planets & have no idea what goes on outside their system. Title comes from mysterious god-like psychic entities the people in-system call 'patrons' who are assumed to be a species that transcended their physicality eons ago and are only stirred to show interest in the affairs of mortal beings when art - or more accurately the emotions & thoughts that inspire it, and that it inspires in turn - attract their curiosity. There's a kind of symbiotic relationship between patrons and muses - artists who attract the attention of a patron - as art is the lever that can literally move planets in this system.....as muses can inspire patrons to invest the art that interests them with supernatural qualities or powers. Paintings can act as portals that transport between worlds, songs can heal, dances can show the future, sculptures can be brought to life, architecture can warp space and time, etc).

4. Me being a cheater who cheats and saying 'eh anything related to my Citadel shared fantasy universe, as though that isn't an umbrella covering multiple projects, like so and also so and also so so.' (The Citadel is a high fantasy universe based on the premise that a pantheon of gods with their own unique attributes all had a civil war, were banished from the One Prime World and scattered across the void that was the as yet unmade rest of the universe and all created their own worlds, peoples and magic systems utilizing just their own divine nature. So there's a world and magic created by the God of Time, a radically different water world created by the God of Dreams, a physics-defying one created by the Goddess of the Forge, etc, etc. The God of Memory created his world out of his memories of the old one but its a chaotic, half-formed place of unreality due to the fact that he's a narcissist who only remembers the stuff he bothered to pay attention to, so his world is full of holes in reality and natural laws that don't make sense because he doesn't remember how things are supposed to work and lacked the imagination - or failed to prioritize - bothering to fill in the gaps himself. The Goddess of Vengeance created a moving planet that drifts through the universe stalking her prey, the other gods who betrayed her in their civil war and sends her legions of followers forth to sow chaos on the other gods' worlds whenever her planet drifts within reach of one of theirs, eclipsing their suns. Etc, etc)