#teach yourself first

[blakbonnet]

his earnest whimsy is everything

[shuploc]

Ai art?

Are you fucking joking?

Sorry, no, it is not and I find it so disrespectful you would even think to ask that. I have not and will NEVER touch anything AI related ever in my life, I think it's so utterly pointless and destructive and it frankly makes me wanna kill myself.

So no, it is not and never will be, and you can safely hold that to me for the rest of my existence. I really hope this is the last time someone asks me this.

[000marie198]

Kinda a hot take but adults get so caught up in their perspective of the world sometimes that they often simply forget that you can't teach children complex evils of the society and have to start at little things where their mind can pick it up.

They are kids, you try to teach them the complex philosophy of unfairness of something and they'll misunderstand. They shouldn't be forced to your level of thinking, you have to get down to theirs

[hand-face-chan]

I'm only halfway though Hbomberguy's new video and I dont know if this is a universal experience but my main horrified takeaway from hbomb's plagiarism video so far is that one of my highschools TAUGHT AN ENTIRE CLASS OF 13 YEAR OLDS TO PLAGIARISE. LIKE, ON PURPOSE.

I ended up moving to a much better highschool, but my first highschool essentially taught us to "write" essays by reading what someone else had written and then write what they said again but putting it "into your own words". Which in practice was teaching us to change, for example, "the works of Shakespeare were regarded by many as the first popular art form" to "Shakespeare's plays have been said by some to be the first example of popular media". One teacher actually told us that the process of writing an essay was "saying what the people you've researched have said, in a way where it sounds like you said it".

Like. The tactics that actual plagiarists use to hide the fact that they were stealing. An actual teacher tried to teach me to do that.

[chicago-geniza]

Wait so I was thinking about the restored Hans Holbein Anne of Cleves portrait on the train as one does and about how bright the blue background is and did he select that shade because it was associated with the Virgin Mary? Like I know blue was associated with her in the medieval and early modern periods but I've been looking at a lot of Renaissance art lately and it's precisely the same shade that, e.g., Fra Angelico uses for Mary's raiment

[uygfiug]

how do you people study through extreme exhaustion? bc thats what always gets me during the exams & i cannot keep doing this forever

[geee-three]

NEMONA NOLASTNAME YOU MAKE ME SICK.

[gayemeralds]

character arcs

optimus -> dies

mirage -> learns to like humans and overcomes his selfishness

moonracer -> literally perfect

jazz -> learns to speak up

hot rod -> matures into a leader

bumblebee -> learns to reconcile who he was and who he is

arcee -> gets worse

first aid -> already perfect

[absentlyabbie]

i've developed some interesting methods of handling having a relationship with my mother who made my childhood/teen years misery and committed more than a little abuse.

as an adult, we have a very different dynamic, her daughters (sister and i) have confronted her with a lot of her bullshit and the things she both did and enabled. for some she has been sorrowful and even sometimes apologetic. she's a better mother to me now than she ever was when i most needed one. so i'll never actually trust her again, and she'll never be much deeper than surface level in my life, but we have something mostly good now, and on my terms.

however, she is very definitely one of those "i don't remember it that way" and "i did the best i could" mothers in a lot of areas, and has also always been the type to (probably unconsciously) emotionally manipulate the people she's hurt into catering to her hurt feelings about it instead.

over the years i've learned to get really comfortable with just not indulging it.

is she having a bad day, seems sad and upset? i'll give her a hug, try to make her laugh. if she throws broad hints it's a surge of hurt feelings about having driven one of her children to cut her off? well i'm just gonna stand there and not acknowledge or entertain it.

"well, apparently i was a bad mother" or shit like that? i'm just gonna look at her for a second, and i might either shrug or even nod, but i'm not saying a damn thing. i'm not awkwardly, uncomfortably, painfully contorting to her guilt trip nonsense. i'm not apologizing or trying to soothe her or reassure her or minimize it.

like, yeah. you really were. you know it, glad to hear it. we've definitely had that talk.

best kindness, most generosity i can offer her in times like that is not maintaining eye contact to bluntly tell her "yeah, you were." she can go ahead and feel bad about it.

it's not on me to make her feel less bad. she should feel bad. and i am definitely not someone she gets to seek comfort from about it.

hopefully someday she'll inch past just "poor me, i'm so sad and angsty about it" towards, like, examining the whys and acknowledging what she actually did wrong and work actively to be be better. in a few places, some of that has happened.

but that's her work. her job and responsibility. she can do that shit on her own time.

i say all this to offer a shoulder of solidarity to others like me. if you maintain a complicated relationship as an adult with the parent who hurt you and did you wrong as a child, that is okay. you get to choose how and if to thread that needle.

but you don't have to accommodate emotional manipulation and guilt trip garbage. stonewall it. walk away if you need to. don't apologize. don't try to make it better. that's not on you and it doesn't have to be. it's okay.

[spaceacerat]

Don't know why I've been feeling compelled to write this but. Something some people don't realize is how weird delusions can be. How for some people, they're just There and you live with it and no one knows about it unless they're really paying attention or you mention it.

So here's a little insight into a long held delusion. Putting it under a read more so people that want to not see it don't have to.

CW - delusions, surveillance, persecutory

Like. Imagine this. You are 3-5 years old, hanging out in your bedroom. Basically one of your first memories, right?

Anyways, your guardian calls out "hey, almost time for bed! Go ahead and change." You get your clothes, go to change. Then you look around and you get really tense and know you Can't, because you realize the toys and photographs with eyes are all facing your direction.

Why does that mean you can't? Because somehow, even before you could remember, you were completely and utterly convinced basically anything with eyes had little cameras that were spying on you. The most advanced piece of hardware you'd ever seen was your parents bulky VHS camera. No computers, webcams, cellphones. Nothing that could reasonably spy on you like tech these days does. You have no concept of Big Brother or the Truman show, very little understanding of the government, but you Just Know it is happening.

Then, after you get everything turned around or covered, and you feel ready to change, but then your pet walks in. You look at them and immediately know you have to get them out of the room too. Your brain goes in two directions as to why. One side is convinced that the pet also has cameras in their eyes, sent to spy on you. The other is convinced it's a human that got turned into an animal, once more to spy on you and report back. Which one doesn't matter, because obviously one is true, and thus you must take the necessary precautions. You shoo the pet out. You feel safe and ready to change clothes now.

Then imagine this thought follows you into adulthood. You've gone your entire life thinking you have eyes on you from all angles. Eventually, it grows into recorders, bugs (the mic-type), microphones, webcams, phone cameras. Your idea on who is recording you changes on the life situation (friends, family, neighbors, some secret organization, cops, the government), but you've never wavered from this idea even though sometimes people can rationalize you out of it briefly. But it's Still There. Medication doesn't even stop it.

Sometimes it's after someone you know leaves your place, and you're convinced they bugged the house. Sometimes it's that a family member has put cameras up to catch you off guard. Sometimes it's that the neighbors are recording you through the walls, or from your open window, or outside your house. But most of the time, it's just this vague 'Other' that is watching through these imaginary cameras. Waiting. You don't know why or what for. You. Just. Know.

However, after so long of living like that, you've learned how to deal with it. It's just a part of your day to day. You believe it at all times, to some degree, some days more strongly than others. It's worse as technology gets more invasive, but it's rarely the technology you worry about. That can be unplugged, covered, seen, avoided. You can control what information that has access to, to some degree. But you can't control the things you can't see. The things you cherish that you would have to tear apart just to see if it's real, things you want to be able to look at because it still brings joy so you keep it in your room.

You live with it so you don't have to expend constant energy trying to keep it from happening, even if it makes it hard to speak or act freely in the places that are meant to be safest. You learn to change turned away from the things in your spaces. You try not to do anything embarrassing or talk about illegal things too often or too loudly. Who knows what this information will be used for, but sometimes when you think it's neighbors, you think they're going to report you for Something.

It confuses the people you mention it to, they try to reassure you, but it only helps temporarily. Nothing fixes it. Nothing makes it go away. But that's okay.

That's just your life. In your mind it has been there, and might always be.

[kazamajun]

Underrated Kazuya detail is that he's actually a good boss. Like I don't think we've seen him ever mistreat his underlings (which is something very atypical for a villain) and he also does stuff like tell them to not bother fighting Akuma as they're no match for him, when most wouldn't show any level of care for their lives. And there's even Jack's t7 ending where Kazuya gives him a paycheck and carte blanche on expenses beyond even the approved ones - which, while this ending is played for laughs, it's still kind of incredible that in any scenario Kaz is willing to pay his robots.

[gender-euphowrya]

i seriously don't get how any country can call itself a democracy without having classes dedicated to teaching how politics work in its schools

[bimsha]

does it ever hits you, out of nowhere, what it would be like if you actually love yourself? ive always feared those who have the confidence to conquer their demons and face the world with ragged scars still burning against their skin, and sometimes it does make me wonder, what if i start to love the girl i see in the mirror and embrace everything i am? what if, instead of thinking of death i start thinking about what i will make for dinner? what if i actually try all the things ive been wanting to do? what if i shed the burdens off my shoulder and take the day as it comes? what if i do it all? try doing it all? slowly, gradually, what if i get better? what if i start liking the stories i write? what if i accept compliments without discarding them as people being fake to my face? what if i actually reach out for help without wallowing in my own self regrets? for a moment all these what ifs seemed achievable and im convinced i can somehow go there and then im back there again, doom scrolling through instagram. im back there again, piling pills under my bed, searching toxins in the internet. im back there and im hating myself again, im thinking of death as its my second nature. and my wholehearted beliefs that i could be better crumbles to dust, my veins are burning with the desire to leave, to end it all but lords have mercy i would like to see the other side through these mountains of regret, sometimes i look at another person and the questions echo back from my soul, but why don't they teach us this in school, why don't they just tell us, to love yourself is the greatest virtue.

[indi-glo-archive]

ppl who only conditionally care about child abuse based on whether the victim makes them uncomfy while they're being abused contribute to a real life child's abuse by sending hate asks regularly, attempting to gaslight them, calling them terrible names, accusing them of terrible things, telling them directly how much they hate the characters the child relates to and enjoys talking about, and being generally racist and ableist in a way that seriously might have scarred me for life, making a literal teenager hate their hobbies, favorite shows, and the people who enjoy those things, and ultimately cyberbullying a child out of multiple fandoms because they don't want to think critically or acknowledge their own faults, all while being 35 and really embarrassing themselves because someone half their age has a better grasp on the concept of nuance than them: more at 6

but noooo, y'all "love neurodivergent/disabled people," have "racists/ableists DNI" in your bios, and don't say slurs, which is all you have to do to not be racist/ableist, so *I'm* some psycho black bitch and you're a wittle angel like the fictional character you infantilize

(P.S. I swear to fucking god if people respond to this post with "but he sexually assaulted someone" and ignore literally every other personality trait/experience he had that could've been relatable to a child abuse survivor and the way people mistreated me, a real human being, which Charlie is not by the way, I will start doing the things you wanted to do to Ben)

[curiosity-killed]

She woke to a shaft of golden light tickling her cheek and blinked against its glare drowsily. Without the ever-present crash of the sea in the distance, the quiet was deeper than she was used to and she was briefly suspended in a kind of languorous haze, placeless and peaceful. Then— Callebero’s wrist still caught in the ring of her hand; the earthy scent of vetiver from her bath; the glitter of gilt off the ceiling.

--

The fun thing about this scene is that Sirion fully walked into these two napping like they'd been loosely shaken out of a burlap sack and went "yeah that's fine"

[ALT ID: A digital illustration of two people loosely flopped on a bed taking a nap while a third sits in a chair nearby watching the door.]

[creaturefeaster]

Your animations are so awesome and smooth, what steps did you take to get to the skill level ur at now? If that makes sense ^^

Aw!! Well thank you. I wish I had more time & focus to... well, actually finish them! They'd look a lot better fully animated, lol.

As for steps... I guess I just immersed myself in a lot of animation from a very young age at first? I used to spend a lot of time on Newgrounds, I watched a lot of youtuber animations... Filmcow & Egoraptor were big inspos for me as a kid. Eddsworld and Happy Tree Friends too. I think digesting material that inspires you is essential.

Studying life and how things move, function, look, and work are also important. I really like to make emotions and actions feel as real as they can while still giving that extra flare that animation allows for. I've always been a listener more than a talker in real life, and as such I think it gives me more time to focus on how people look and act while they're busy communicating, or doing whatever else.

I also think letting yourself experiment with your own techniques is very important. Taking inspiration from favored animations is one thing, that is how you can learn, but also trying out & constructing your own methods is also important for workflow. Also, sometimes a chosen method you use just becomes uniquely yours, and becomes better with time the more you work at it. I feel like I have a pretty specific way of animating body language & movement. I'd call it theatrical to an extent. It's something I always wished I could see more of in animation so I've spent a lot of time trying to get it right.

I also started from a very young age, like 8 or 9? Maybe older or younger, I can't quite remember. But most importantly it just takes time to teach yourself. Research always, and know that time will pass no matter what, so you might as well start learning now if you want to make something great one day! I'm still working towards that myself.