#the art i make is industrial levels of force lol

[thetransfemininereview]

Do you have any recommendations for gaining access to these books? I have a pretty long list of ones I want to read but can't afford most of them. The library has the big ones (Whipping Girl, Detransition Baby, Nevada) but the newer or less well known ones have been difficult to find

No this is actually so real though. Let's talk about it.

One of the big problems that I'm trying to address here is the fact that there is a lack of ability for trans books to reach their perhaps core audience, trans people. Over the last few years trans librarians have been trying to increase the number of trans books in circulation, but that's super contingent on where you live. Not to mention the fact that, at least in the US, states are actively trying to criminalize circulating trans books in libraries.

I know Tumblr is allergic to economics a lot of the time, but you've gotta look at the math to understand why this is the current state of things. Essentially it's a vicious cycle. Lots of trans people can't afford to buy a $25 hardcover on a whim, and traditional publishers put a lot of stock into how well a book performs on release, cause that's how they make money. So when the core audience can't afford it and isn't marketable, they register that as a lower demand, which means that fewer trans books get published, fewer end up in libraries, and the cost of an individual book is driven higher. Low demand, high price. Then because the price is high, trans people cant afford the books, and the cycle continues.

It is the dilemma of the transfemme author that most of their core audience is also gonna be transfemme. It's a self-selecting process that's very hard to break out of. And at the end of the day, there just isn't very much money to go around in the trans community because trans people so frequently get cut off from generational wealth. So when you get an ecosystem of transfemmes selling books to other transfemmes who also sell books to them....

I took a class on the Sociology of Art a few years ago, and one of my core takeaways was that the boundaries of a field (yes my teacher liked Bourdieu, come for her ass, not mine) are fundamentally governed by institutions and entities with the money and power to dictate their rules of play. In Althusser's language, you would call those ISAs (Ideological State Apparatuses). When you read Weber, he talks about how culture needs to have some level of social legitimation in order to become a force of power in the world (I butchered that but it's the gist lol). And it's like.

The people who have the money to read the books dictate which books receive the money. Organizations like Lambda Literary, presses, big name publishers, etc. One of the big problems in the field of trans literature up to this point is that the only people who've had the money to produce social legitimation from the organizing schema/matrix of an ISA have also only chosen to read a very small slice of the extant literature. Then, because those non-profits and presses and companies only champion a small selection of books, that in turn dictates for those who have less money which of those books deserve social attention, critical acclaim, sales, library slots, etc.

And like, all of that is an illusion, but it produces a material reality for the transfemme author. It dictates the material conditions for the reproduction of said literature and who can participate in it.

So, what's to be done about it?

"Buzz" is a big deal in the publishing industry. A good review, an award, a thinkpiece - all of that can be the difference between a successful book and a flop. Publishers look for that. If nobody talks about a book and it doesn't sell well, they'll drop the author faster than you can say Susan. Again, vicious cycle. But like, at the end of the day, a "field," an "ISA," a "legitimated" work of art, that's all just a class prerogative. The different between a Very Important Literary Blog and a "person talking about books on the internet" is money. Like. It's just money. The reality of it is really banal.

It's who has the money to read books. It's who has the money and time to write about books. It's who has the money to gain institutional access to book. It's who has the money to read enough to say, "Oh, well that might seem true, but if you look at X, Y, and Z it's clearly not." It takes money to fact check. It takes money to challenge institutional myths. It takes money because when an institution makes a claim about a book and none of the people who care enough to argue with them have the cash to challenge it, the claim tends to stand.

And like, the honest truth is that between the books, the website, and the education, I've spent a lot of money bringing this website online in the form you're reading it in. A lot of the books I've read were really fucking expensive. I grew up in a wealthy family, my parents were accepting. They have both the means and the desire to support my passion projects. I'm lucky.

The goal of The Transfeminine Review is to create at least one independently trans-run website that can challenge that brand of institutional legitimation work from non-profits and big publishers and cis outlets, a website that can actually highlight transfeminine literature as it exists in the world, not as the Big 5 publishers have dictated it. Topside, Metonymy, Arsenal Pulp, LittlePuss, etc. They've all taken on that challenge from the angle of producing books, but there hasn't been a corollary trans secondary ecosystem dedicated to documenting and critiquing them. Or there is, but it's extremely diffuse and hard to find if you don't know exactly what you're looking for. Then there are the general queer outlets, like them. and whatnot, and they do their best but literature is a side hustle at best. There's the queer-helmed literary outlets like Electric Lit (shout out Denne Michele Norris) but they spend most of their time talking about cis authors. None of it is designed to help or review self-published literature from poor authors, and let's be frank, most transfeminine publishing is still done indie or self.

It's an investment, essentially. On the longshot, the hope is that this website will inspire others to do similar work, and that eventually through the collective efforts of trans authors and their readership, we can begin to change the math on trans publishing and help to spread it to a wider audience.

Now.

None of this changes the current reality that trans lit is expensive.

Unless you're lucky, you're probably not gonna find much trans lit at the local library even if you dig for it. Another good place to find free trans books is transreads.org, but their selection is mostly non-fiction, and the fiction is, again, largely the same few books you can find elsewhere. Another good online queer library is https://www.queerliberationlibrary.org/, which might be a good place to look (shoutout to Skye for bringing it to my attention!)

There are a couple of cheaper places to find trans books. If you shop around on itch.io, a lot of self-published trans authors have "name your price" models, which can be more accessible. Creators on itch will also bundle their work on a fairly regular basis, so you can get like 10-20 books for $10, which is, by my token, an excellent price.

If there's a particular author you're interested in, a lot of self-pub trans authors have Patreon accounts where they serialize their novels. You also can find serial (pre-edit) versions of a bunch of books on Scribblehub.

This has gotten steadily less affordable over the last few years cause Amazon is evil, but Kindle Unlimited ($11.99 a month, but there's a free trial) has thousands of trans books. Most of them are erotica, but like, there are a lot of hidden gems in there, and if you're a voracious enough reader, then it'll definitely be much cheaper per book than buying trad.

The problem with all of these, though, is that they tend to favor specific genres and tropes. Like there's only so much variety on itch.io or Scribblehub or transreads.org or KU. So if you like the genre conventions, then awesome! But if you don't it's probably not for you.

And none of it will give you access to some of the rare older tradpub books or the new but scarce releases that I've been going through unless you're willing to pay the full price for them.

I wish I had a better answer, but that's unfortunately the current state of the industry :/

Hopefully this ramble is helpful.

Beth

[ghostwitchs-art]

Full height chart for my Post-Corruption Wonderland AU (click for quality)

Individual characters + little blurbs about them under the cut:

Having avenged her family’s death, Alice has finally been able to process her grief and begin to heal, and Wonderland is healing with her

Design notes: A healthier complexion and some small weight gain, brighter clothes (without blood) and Lizzie’s key (one of her only family mementos) replacing her omega necklace. Kept Jupiter to represent joy and optimism, and added Chiron to represent healing and spiritual growth. Drawn with one of her weapons because I didn’t know what to do with hands

Her greatest ally through all of Wonderland’s troubles, but still a snarky little shit

Design notes: Distinctly less emaciated, no blood in his toothy grin. Leans more into his Asylum concept designs

Paranoid and scatterbrained. Despite Wonderland’s slow return to its former glory, he keeps Alice alert to any signs of trouble, no matter how small or ridiculous. She considers him on of her best friends

Design notes: a little fluffier, not much else changed

Alice “rules” Wonderland (not that Wonderland can be controlled that much), and each Domain has its own ruler to help Alice manage things easier (will elaborate on this later). These two rule Forward Industries, though they lack much tangible power due to the ever-growing Union. They are tinkerers who want to invent all sorts of bizarre technology for the people of Wonderland

Design notes: Open wounds are healed and prosthetics are more practical

Being kicked out of the domain once named after him, The Hatter bitterly took over The Crockery. The two domain’s heavy connections (they are basically one domain to some) means Alice often has to step in to mitigate the fights between him and Dormouse and March Hare. The Crockery itself has a tiny population and little going on, so Hatter can spend most of his time trying to one-up the rodents inventions

Design notes: Combination of his original design and the Asylum concept design. Sort of like his old self, but not completely. Holding a mini-eyepot, one of his inventions

The Red Queen is a reflection of Lizzie. A foil to her, if she was alive. Regardless, Alice can’t let go of the connection, which led her to be more forgiving of the Queen’s past actions than others. Really, she just wanted to control Wonderland in a desperate attempt to save it, but with a disastrous amount of force. As such, she has been reinstated as ruler of the Queensland, but she is micromanaged the most out of all of them for the people’s wellbeing

Design notes: Really don’t like the Madness Returns design so its essentially been retconned (it doesn’t really make sense for her to look like young Alice if she’s represents Lizzie, and also its kinda lame). Based on Asylum concept art, her appearance is more “normal” than in the first game (not having horns, having hair, etc) but still monstrous

He originally became conductor of the Looking-Glass Line after the corruption era ended, but was later instated as ruler of the Deep Blue Sea after the Carpenter was deemed unfit to rule. Like the Crockery, the population is small and almost exclusive to Barrelbottom, so his responsibilities are more on the level of a mayor, hence his garb

Design notes: I put the mayor hat and sash on him because I thought it was a fun idea lol

Not allowed to rule the sea, Carpenter continued running the Dreary Lane Theatre, whose productions have vastly improved in quality. Citizens can enter the building confident in their safety with the Walrus’ head mounted above the door

Design notes: Really liked how his design looked in the theatricals cutscenes, has a more dramatic feel than his regular 3D model

Abandoned a life of royalty to run the largest Snout farm in Wonderland. Still just as self-absorbed as ever

Design notes: Dress is a combination of her actual in-game outfit and typical farmer garb from the 1800s

Back from the dead, and not in the form of a ship. He is the ruler of the Vale of Tears, and is widely recognized as a hero for his battle against the Jabberwock in the war

Design notes: Stylized version of his in-game design

Rules the Tundraful, living at the peak of the frigid mountain. A philosopher who Alice comes to to ask the complicated questions in life. Generally helpful, but his answers are often more poetic than practical

Design notes: Cooler color scheme hearkening back to the first game design, and more fur to fit the cold region he lives in

[beardedmrbean]

[Zoomer Huey Anon]

Sorry for my depression episode from yesterday in the dms when I asked what modern Hollywood gen x and millennial creators don’t use historical black American figures for inspiration like fantasy. And why black horror stuff these days tend to have a lecture aspect…realizing something with a lot of SJWs

“We weren’t taught in school!”- WHERE YOU IN A FUCKING COMA EVERY FEBRUARY MONTH AKA BLACK HISTORY MONTH?!

Also sorry against franchises (well except the post first story stuff) maybe if you fucks didn’t believe that pop culture junk food like ATLA and Harry Potter was more important than real life history. Than maybe you guys would have remembered real life history you were taught. Like that idea we never saw color pictures of MLK in school…even though I distinctly remember it in my 3rd or 4th grade history books

Also as you mentioned black Americans culture only flourish for a century…but given that means under industrialization thus capitalism to modern content creators that bad

“Capitalism is evil-“ THE FACTORIES ARE THE ONLY REASON I WASNT FORCED FOR PICK COTTON AND SHIT LIKE MY ENSLAVED ANCESTORS. I LOVE THE ENVIRONMENT AND WORKERS RIGHTS. BUT STOP FUCKING BELIEVING THE PRE INDUSTRIAL WORLD WAS A DISNEY CARTOON!

All they have to do is to put their fantasy world in an industrialized one with cowboys! Okay cause by case, but like in my Chimerian Republic universe (fantasy universe) a lot of people forget that Americans were infamous for being weirdos by the 19th century

So my black chimerian rangers/cowboys/etc would be antagonist to feudal era inspired warriors like knights and samurai.

Also while it good temporary revenge…there will be black chimerians that pointed out how their republic and the French and British inspired countries in the universe abolished slavery (though their still social Darwinists) so they should give the African slave trading kingdoms the chance to change too

While the Dahomey inspired kingdom refused to…until the Chimerian republic with a alliance with the French inspired country go steampunk galactic empire and bomb their asses so it make what happened to Carthage look like a joke

Yeah I going a bit more realistic where the inspired African slave trading kingdoms only stop slavery because they become terrified of the wraith of the Chimerian republic

What can’t be a bit evil? Sometime violence is the only language monsters know

Sorry it just…how the FUCK did progressive creators have such a surface levels understanding of my community culture or American culture in general? They’d attempts at “globalizing” made my American identity more solidified

No worries on depression mode, we all have that on occasion, I'm happy to let ya vent and such.

“We weren’t taught in school!”- WHERE YOU IN A FUCKING COMA EVERY FEBRUARY MONTH AKA BLACK HISTORY MONTH?!

Like I said, in a lot of cases we were you just didn't bother to learn, royal you not you specifically.

Also as you mentioned black Americans culture only flourish for a century…but given that means under industrialization thus capitalism to modern content creators that bad

Flourish to a wide audience, all that stuff was still happening when slavery was going on and even during jim crow which also covers the century and change since that's when the black American community started to bring us jazz and many other things.

People are always going to complain about capitalism, the creators that are going to make the most money will avoid doing that I think, make your art and see if you can make a living out of it.

STOP FUCKING BELIEVING THE PRE INDUSTRIAL WORLD WAS A DISNEY CARTOON!

Personally I appreciate medicine, shelf stable food, and air conditioning. Pre industrial world was dangerous so was the early industrial world before things like safety measures got put into place.

a lot of people forget that Americans were infamous for being weirdos by the 19th century

It's part of our charm, lol

Also while it good temporary revenge…there will be black chimerians that pointed out how their republic and the French and British inspired countries in the universe abolished slavery (though their still social Darwinists) so they should give the African slave trading kingdoms the chance to change too

I like this

What can’t be a bit evil? Sometime violence is the only language monsters know

This is true, should try other methods first tho

Sorry it just…how the FUCK did progressive creators have such a surface levels understanding of my community culture or American culture in general? They’d attempts at “globalizing” made my American identity more solidified

Lot of playing it safe involved in that one, nobody wants to get canceled™ so just go with what you know is acceptable and maybe dial it back on the controversy until all media is as dull and inoffensive as the teletubbies.

[meatballerino]

intro to tcfc - part 2

PREVIOUS POST

general updates:

i've been writing steadily all summer and i'm aiming to have a workable draft (of at least the first half) done by the end of september! to share and get some preliminary feedback! so stay tuned for that!

still don't have a better title yet so it remains a mysterious acronym lmao

characters

Z

a freaky deaky circus performer and acrobat, genderfluid chameleon punk born to perform, but freaky deaky has a limited paying audience and even more limited roles in the industry, so they wrestle with having to tone down their art (and their appearance) to get booked for more gigs. to Z, it's not selling out, it's "playing the game" until they can get more established and really make the art that they want.

Gianetti

a very intense individual who uses character and comedy to make his political statements to his bourgeois audiences, and to educate and equip his working class audiences. his most famous character is the beloved modern court jester, Gianetti, who uses his privilege to poke fun at the people whose actions he critiques. he's well known, and in high demand, yet dresses in rags and lives in a dirty commune with bohemians, and has a terrible reputation with other artists, but what is it that makes him so notorious?

The Main Character

is stuck in a rut always playing Sad Clown, is always following at Z's heels, is harbouring a dirty secret under that clown costume, and has become the new object of Gianetti's interest.

The Mythology of Gerard and Autumn Summerland

the power couple of the entertainment industry, giving everyone hope and delight through wartimes with their onstage romances, witty newspaper interviews, and glamorous magazine photos. they were the shining image of squeaky clean, perfectly balanced heterosexual divinity. they exemplified the rags-to-riches story that the young clowns live by, hoping they too can reach that level of stardom one day through hard work and suffering.

when autumn is tragically killed onstage on opening night of her own original production, her artistic legacy is left in the hands of gerard, who carefully crafts her image and the way she is immortalized as an industry tour de force. despite years of openly grieving, gerard continues rising to fame, and now that he's getting on in years, he wants to slow down and start writing and directing his own shows. in the meantime, he drums up money by running an unlicensed underground bar and cabaret to entertain and shmooze with his equally sleazy industry colleagues, where gianetti and Z perform every week with the hopes of getting recognized and "picked" by someone in the audience.

i admit I ADMIT i'm pulling some inspo for autumn from the dolores dei concepts, actually this whole story reeks of "guy who's obsessed with disco elysium and regurgitates it into all their art from then on".

i also pulled inspiration for gerard as an unsettling but beloved entertainment icon from dotssu 's character Clyde Clydesdale from their game INTRODEMO which is soooooooo cool and fun and creative and you should play it!!!!! get into ittttttt

next post will ideally be that rough draft in september so stick around if you want a taste!!

PREVIOUS POST Ko-fi lol lmao

[freebooter4ever]

I think a lot of the dweebyness came from his early years during his shy, awkward, aww-shucks era. once he got more confident with english, he shifted to a more jock-y vibe

Haha, sorry yall are never gonna convince me that malkin was ever dweeby. Jock is winning the poll btw:

I do, however, totally buy that an american audience mostly comprised of sports fans would look at a teenage boy struggling with a language barrier and immediately label him as 'different' and 'awkward' and 'quiet' and 'dweeby' and a whole bunch of other labels that shoves him into a box and then expect him to stay in that box because they've already decided on what kind of person he is.

We know how our (US) culture works, there's hundreds of american high school movies testifying to the sports/popularity hivemind.

But thats a temporary ostracization. It doesn't feel the same as the more personality-based, more permanent ostracization of the stereotypical 'dweeb' in high school. It's very different to grow up with a bunch of kids in the same neighborhood and watch yourself slowly become excluded and ignored as you get older. that wasnt me - my mother was my bully and from elementary school on she forced me into a form of social normal that made me invisible rather than a target for school bullies. (I dont know if i would reccomend this parenting style though). But i was friends with most of those kids - the ones who nobody would talk to and everybody would make fun of behind their back (we were post c*lumbine so outward bullying was frowned upon). That boy in my square dancing class was one of the few male dweebs, his name was yusef - like joseph but with a "y" and "you" sound. And im not kidding, i dont think the poor kid ever had any friends? Even i couldnt get him to talk, and ive always been pretty good at drawing people out of their shell. Most of the dweebs were girls - colleen, diane, stephanie, alicia - all my friends, all of whom i remember better than the jocks at our school. And absolutely a conscious choice on my part, i remember the point in elementary school when i was walking home with a few girls i knew and they saw colleen and diane a half block ahead of us (within hearing distance), and immediately started pointing out everything that made the two 'dweeb' girls weird and what was wrong with them. And i didnt even say anything i just glared at the girls i was with and ran ahead to walk with colleen and diane instead. And that was that, i knew i had picked sides, i wasnt ever going to join in with the people who make fun of those that are different \o/

aaand now im dealing with a total new form of social ostracization here in LA that feels eerily familiar, but whereas in school you could ignore the social game playing and succeed in spite of them, here suddenly what job you get hangs on who you know. Everybody always used to bug me like 'why are you staying in pittsburgh so long, why havent you tried to make it in the real industry yet' and my answer was always a) i loved my team and they needed me and b) i was art director so had more creative freedom (and my own office) than i could expect to have anywhere else. But i think truthfully in the back of my mind i kinda knew - there were enough hints over the years - what this city would be like and that i would be abysmal at fighting to survive in it.

Anyway im just sayin i dont think malkin - or any of these hockey players - has ever dealt with that level of social ostracization. Its nice watching these guys be nice to other people they consider on their level, and really cute and enjoyable. But for me at least there's always that awareness that if any of them met me, im not the type of person they'd consider worthy of time or attention - probably wouldnt be outright mean, but absolutely would be trying to avoid any lengthly association lol. I think its one of the main differences between being in sports fandom vs books or movies.

ALTHOUGH god, i will never ever forget the day i met one of my biggest childhood heroes - an author about my age 24ish. Who i idolized because she was living my dream - getting to write and create for a living and starting at such a young age. And she was mostly indifferent to me, didnt say much, didnt interact, just signed the book. And i shrugged it off. But then this teenage girl came up, just radiating what we'd call dweebiness. Her hair was a mess, face full of acne, awkward, but loud and really enthusiastic about the book, and desperate for someone to share that enthusiasm. And the author was mean. And cold. To this teenage girl who obviously idolized her and would have killed to have some sign of approval even if it was faked. Anway, instead this teenage girl latched onto me and i had to try to make up for the bitchy author but i knew my approval wasnt worth nearly as much and it broke my heart. I havent read or bought a single one of that author's novels since.

so yeah, its not just jocks, but they have the worse reputation in media.

[dreammelter]

Speedrun Workshop Postmortem

I wanted to make a more detailed postmortem as I cleaned the project files up but I'll keep it simple today… If I take any longer, I'm sure to give up on it. (The year is ending so there's a lot of prep/wrap-up going on in other areas I'm responsible for. 🙃)

What I'll cover:

What was the project about? It's goals? It's products?

How did I approach it?

How did things change and why?

What did I like most of what I completed?

What did I wish I could complete?

What did I learn? (A LOT. But maybe make a more definitive list.)

What would be my tips/advice for next time?

(Project deliverables are up on GitHub.)

The One Day Workshop

I only vaguely remember what spurred the project and apparently don't have any journal entries for it either… so here's the gist of it!

My sister worked with City of Las Vegas/Strong Future to help teach some Office 365 basics. In July, she decided to start a small tech biz (now defunct) that offered more technical training. If I remember correctly, she asked if there was anything I'd like to offer, so I figured I could cover programming, 3D art, and game development. (I really just wanted an excuse to play with the things I liked lol.) The team at Strong Future took an interest in hosting the game development class, but they only had a small budget for it at the time. So we decided to host a workshop for middle and high school students on Nevada Day.

The idea was to introduce students to the process of game development as well as some careers and resources. Since the workshop would only last 5 hours, the students would follow along with the recreation of an arcade-like game. I originally wanted to require students have some experience with code since we'd be jumping right into a project. We decided to leave it open to those without it, though. I figured I could do a quick intro to scripting and wouldn't sweat it too much since students could either type-along or drag-and-drop the files.

The workshop had an additional constraint: the computers in the lab wouldn't be able to install any additional software, so I'd have to use a portable or web-based game engine. I've long held onto a list of game engines and dev resources, so finding one wasn't an issue. What was interesting, though, was seeing how some of them have changed over the years… Godot Engine was the first one that came to mind and the one I was sure I was going to go with, but I took a look at my old list anyway. Cocos2D was my second choice since I'd be able to use JavaScript and I was considering it for a future web project, but it required more setup and research than I was interested in bothering with. (The modern Cocos editor requires an install.) Defold, like Godot, doesn't require an install but I didn't want to write in Lua. (Read: I didn't want to relearn how to write Lua. I only have three months.) Game Maker, Construct, GameSalad, and GDevelop were some others I considered for their web versions and/or visual programming features, but I didn't want to force the students to sign up for anything.

So Godot it was. 😎 Long Live Open-Source.

We also named the workshop "Speedrun" some weeks later.

Expectation

The workshop needed three things: a prototype to remake, some slides, and a collection of resources the students could use and refer to later. I was also advised to create a printed handout students could follow along with.

There would also be 20 students at most.

I wanted to break down the five hours as such:

1 hour talking about the industry, careers, and development concepts

3 hours walking through the prototype

1 hour letting the students tinker and build their own levels

(I wrote a couple of different outlines with timestamps closer to the end of the project, too.)

I wanted to teach the students game dev was all about problem solving (and IID.) I'd pose a question or scenario, then walk them through the implementation. Once we built the base game, the students could use the extra resources to add to it however they pleased.

I also split up the 3 months of development time of this project:

1 month to get up to speed with Godot 4 and create a game prototype

1 month to polish the prototype and write up the written materials

1 month to polish the materials, practice the presentation, and prepare for the workshop day

Reality

So I ended taking two months trying to prototype. I briefly talked about it in the "mini postmortem" I included in the class handbook… In short: I tried out different game ideas to see what I could actually implement by the end of the first month. The second month rolled around so I started moving the desired game mechanics to a clean file… just for them to start falling apart. That's when I settled on just making a simple platformer. I used all of September and half of October putting the platformer prototype together, leaving two weeks to put the remaining documents together. Ended up skipping the handout, since I couldn't decide what to put on it… I had a couple different versions of the to-do lists I used to track progress of the game that I could use, but I wasn't sure just how much detail should be included for each task to actually be useful. I didn't complete the handbook in time for class either, so I spent an extra two-three days writing that up…

Dragging and dropping the scripts and resource files from the prototype came in super handy. Because, contrary to my expectation, 4 hours was not enough time to even get past the setup of the player character and tile map. I did not account for students who might not have had any experience with editors of any sort (and forgot to give them an actual tour of the engine. OTL) It wasn't the perfect presentation of "game dev as problem-solving" I hoped for… it was a scramble of remembering what to click and do next. I think the problem-solving sentiment still floats around in the docs and presentation… somewhat. But if there's anything I regret, it's that failure to effectively lead the students through the recreation of the prototype game. We were all pretty exhausted by the end. They said they learned a lot but I hope it didn't crush their interests in building games. 😭

I did spend about an hour and a half covering the industry and such (to my surprise. I wasn't sure I was going to have enough to say, but alas… we did. And it was just a debrief of the topics themselves.) I was also lucky that the students who came in later showed up at opportune times, when it was easy to get them up to speed.

I didn't complete the prototype, but we didn't get very far with the game in-class, either. Guess there's a bit of grace there… I was so worried I end up with a class full of students who were already so comfortable building games in the virtual worlds they hang out in. (But I only had one student who was actually enrolled in a game development program and he was just starting out. All of the students were.)

Reflections

All of that said… I think seeing the reality of how this went down was enlightening. When I get ideas they tend to be overly idyllic and lofty, so it was good to see the gritty, incomplete, and even a little ugly side of this. It was a nice reminder of how much effort goes into creating something that's really good. I mean… the burnout I got after rushing to get this together was 0/10… but the respect I gained for the craft went up 1000%. And seeing how much is available online: from support groups to free tools, the future of game dev will always be bright and exciting.

Part of my screw-up with the approach to teach the development part could have been alleviated if I knew we'd only tackle such a small scope in that time… I obviously couldn't have known how much we'd get through, but a back-up plan beyond "use the premade resources to speed things up" might have been useful in this case. Maybe I could have an alternate "lesson route" where I scaled back most of our goal.

Then again… I probably would've known this ahead of time if I actually practiced the full presentation with someone, rather than the dry run I did alone. 🤔 (One of those expectation vs. reality things.)

Favorite Things

I remember making my first digital game in Flash (though I have this sneaking suspicion there was something I used before it?) Godot's scene-structure was very reminiscent of it. I also liked that it meant you could structure you game basically as the way you see it, making it easy for students to conceptualize.

I also love that you can make tools for the engine using the same language you do to write gameplay code. The coin tool is probably my favorite thing, even though it's incomplete.

Wishes

I'd actually like to figure out what's going on with the double jump animation (which was working at first.) The player can double jump, the conditional block holding the animation just doesn't fire. (I think. I'd have to check the code again.)

It'd also be cool to get the coin tool to work properly in-editor.

Lessons Learned

You won't be able to fit absolutely everything into a project and you probably shouldn't try. 😆 Don't let your brain lie and say you can. Dipping into the longer list of "Nice to Haves" after finishing the "Must Haves" feels nicer than having a long list of "These things were supposed to be in the game--"

Conclusion

I'm gonna be 100% honest, I'm not sure I'd try to build a platformer on my own again. Maybe something closer to a visual novel, sure, but anything more than that? I'd probably enlist the help of some friends. (Especially a gameplay programmer. I'll stick to tools…🫠)

It's a stark position from the one I held as a teen building (fragments of) games… maybe it was the rush to get something together and the burnout that followed. Maybe it was the fact I was building something outside of my initial intention, so I didn't have the same "emotional attachment" I would for something more personal. I do primarily think it was the time constraint and the pressure to make something that I thought would be satisfactory for the students to start with. Sure, I can perform under pressure, but I can't say I do better work under it. And frankly, the pressure is only more bearable with a team, which I didn't have lol.

However, the most important thing is that I completed enough of what was required for this endeavor that I could see it as a success. It's not a smashing or career-changing one, but it's just big enough to be a meaningful experience. (For me and for the handful of students who made it.)

[yuexuan]

[Review]画怖

Title: 画怖 Paintings of Terror

Author: 瑆玥

Length: 380 + 2 extras

Rating: E (for horror/gory elements)

Tag: infinite flow, horror, mystery

Summary [taken from novel updates]:

If Ke Xun could do it again, he would have never left his house to go out and flirt with guys, even if it would mean getting beaten to death.

Weren’t they supposed to have just been taking shelter from the rain in a museum and looking at some erot*c paintings while they were at it? Why…did they enter the world inside a painting?!

Mu Yiran: Every single one of us is acting out a role in the painting.

Ke Xun’s eyes lit up: How do we get into an erot*c painting?

Mu Yiran gave him a long, drawn-out look: Shut your eyes and lie down.

Novel[translated]

Comments **contains spoilers**:

One day, Ke Xun and his bestie Wei Dong entered an art exhibition to avoid the rain. Instead, they found themselves transported into one of the paintings, kickstarting their journey of going through multiple paintings in different art exhibitions. Their goal? To survive the paintings, find the artist’s signature/seal, and solve the larger mystery of why this is happening. 

And maybe, have time for some romance in between. 

*

This novel reminded me a lot of Kaleidoscope of Death, in terms of the level of horror, humor, mechanics (e.g. people who died in the paintings would also die soon thereafter in the real world for unknown reasons), and the main character’s personality (i.e. shameless Ke Xun vs shameless Ruan Nanzhu lol). Even the ending style, with the what-the-fuck-ery, is very reminiscent. So if you like KOD, chances are, you’ll also enjoy POT.

Highlights:

Each painting has a complex worldbuilding with a message behind it. The painting that fascinates me most is probably the “Animal World”, where humans and livestocks exchanged their roles. It seems like a criticism about industrial farming and some of the inhumane practices in the industry (Ironically, this might be one of the reasons - per rumors - the novel is no longer hosted on jjwxc, on account that it depicts and possibly criticizes certain aspects of China, especially in regards to homophobia). But even more impressive is how the author ties together all the different paintings and their hints at the end. Hence the latter part of the novel is heavily invested in mystery-solving with a lot of big brain moments.

I’ll say the horror element in this story is top-tier. Not just in the spooky scary way, but in a dystopian way. Just *chef kiss* 

One thing I do find refreshing about this novel is that there is an explanation for why certain characters are so good at surviving. In a lot of infinite flow novels, the stories are structured in a way that the protagonist and his few selected friends are often incredibly lucky and/or incredibly smart in every subject - even though they are sometimes just normal students. But POT provides a reason: that is, the characters have been specifically selected by a higher force so that their specialty can ensure their survival (e.g. a doctor being selected for a painting requiring medical knowledge). 

Some of the side characters are fun - such as Wei Dong and ‘carrot’, who provided nice comic relief. I also like Fang Fei, one of the few surviving female characters in the story. Also, love the Dong Fang pairing, they are quite cute together. 

The ending is a wild ride. I love the mix of science and history behind the Shan Hai painting. That said, there are some parts that are just pure information dump and can make for difficulty understanding.

Things I don’t like

Even though I said that every character was selected for their specialty, it still doesn’t hide the fact that ML is too OP. He is an art collector and has some knowledge of the paintings, but he also possessed knowledge beyond his realm of expertise, even going so far as to be able to acquire weaponry…I’ll say he is the standard stoic gong that doesn’t inspire a lot of interest as a character.

Female characters - As with a lot of infinite flow danmeis (and danmei in general), female characters get shunned and disposed of easily…But for some reason this novel just rubs me off even more than the rest. I think it has to do with the fact that a lot of the female characters are quite competent, but they were casted in a bad light, in comparison to male characters that had similar qualities. E.g. Sha Liu - she was actually really knowledgeable and while her interpretation of the clues weren’t completely correct, the main characters seemed unfairly critical to her explanations and didn’t even care if she died??? Basically, until the latter ⅓ of the story, you can bet that most female characters are getting axed, and those that get left (with the exception of Fang Fei), are just seemingly there for narrative convenience.

[delicourse]

hey!! what are the main brushes you use in CSP? like for lineart and coloring;; besides the blur brush

oh!!! i make my own im so so sorry!!!! i tend to download brushes and then change them so much theyre unrecognizeable, and then just recreate the new version i made more properly and those are what i use. i use the same brush for linework and shading/coloring also! i draw the outline for the shadow and use the fill in tool. the rest is just. defeault stuff tbh

i think the only “notable” thing i do is my messed up linework pressure settings. im Very heavy handed, and prefer the “cursor” around my line to be visible bc i cant fucking see so we end up with this:

the output is really low, the thick parts of the lines is me pressing at the hardest. the upper brush is my regular linework brush, it has one of the default droplets as shape and a little random pressure as well for some grit. also a fine texture on top. the bottom one is a modified version of “Textured Ink Pens (質感スミペン) “ that im trying out currently for more sketch-like linework. another i use for that linework is the very famous su-cream pencil, but also with messed up pressure settings lol    

[meruz]

i was gonna draw tonight but i dropped my tablet pen and the barrel of the pen broke off and flew somewhere underneath (??) my bed (?) and now i cant find it so I’m just gonna answer asks before bed instead. just some art asks and more mentions of infinity train LOL

What program and brushes do you use when making your art?

@ravki hi! part of this is in my FAQ but i’ll say it again anyways LOL: I use photoshop CC and have used photoshop for pretty much....my whole art career. I’ve dabbled in clip and paint tool sai in the past but photoshop is my true wife, we eloped away from her awful father adobe many years ago and are very happy together. 

as for brushes... I should prob put this info in my FAQ too lol,... my default brush set is actually free to download here! Tho I will say I also use steve ahn’s storyboarding brush sometimes and lately i’ve been using shiyoon kim’s brushes A TON. Shiyoon’s cost a couple bucks but they’re super worth it imo

How do you choose colors?

This is kind of a difficult one to describe from scratch but hmm.... I’ll put it this way. Generally when I go into coloring or painting something I already have some colors in mind. Like for a certain piece I know I want a bright green, or a magenta, or a dark blue in certain areas. A lot of the time I know a mood I want. So I’ll start with that core color tone and build around it. I’ll use an example from a recent piece

So you can see here that the first color I accessed was that bright cyan. So I start with that bright cyan and then bring in its “friends” in the form of analogous colors (shown below on the far left)

greens greys etc. THEN I know I want the characters to stand out against all the blue so I start laying down warm contrasting colors for them (middle group). the mat under them is orange, skin tones are warm, ryans flannel is red etc. then to get them to work together I work more cool colors into the shadows and slightly warmer (not too warm because its a cool img overall so in this case, greener LOL) colors into highlights. 

hope that makes sense? for me choosing colors is a lot about story and composition. If you know what you want to say, the mood you want to create, where you want to go, the path to get there becomes a lot clearer imo.

Have you ever considered making an art book?

I have! But I don’t think I currently have enough...original illustrations for one LOL? Not that an art book has to be all original work but if I were putting fanart in an art book...at that point I’d just make a fanzine. I’m making more original work lately though so maybe this year....? Who knows. For now, I do have a sketchbook up on gumroad. Hoping to do one of those next year too.

Any tips for keeping background drawings from getting super stiff, especially since things like interiors have a lot of straight lines?

This is a really interesting ask. Really great question that I don’t think gets asked enough - forgive me if I get a bit art school here but I drew up some examples.

First I think we have to investigate the assumption that straight lines make things stiff. That seems true on an instinctual level and certainly proves to be true very often But I don’t think its actually the straight lines themselves but the sort of arrangements and compositions they tend to dictate. Take this for instance.

pretty big difference, right? there’s a couple things that make a composition feel stiff and one of the most significant is lines that are perpendicular and parallel to the frame. it feels locked in and solid, like bricks. but the moment you shift these angles even a little the composition instantly becomes more dynamic because our innate senses of weight, gravity, and directionality can sense movement.

But it’s not just diagonals let’s take this one step further

when lines meet and terminate together those tangents can flatten and lock space so the best way to solve this is with overlap and complete intersection, forms continuing past or behind each other feel more layered and less like a flat mosaic... again, even in the simplest line drawings. So how do we apply this to a background?

ok I drew this really fast so its potentially not the best example but I think the idea is there. This space isn’t even particularly deep, it’s basically a room, a doorway, and a hallway behind it, and we’re not seeing that much of any of those things LOL. but when you draw an environmental object like a doorway in a way that lines up with the perpendicular and parallel lines of the canvas you’re automatically flattening it and making it look rigid.

and when you create tangents with objects and characters you flatten the space around them and make it difficult to tell what is actually in front or behind or if they’re on the same plane.

GOD I HOPE THIS MAKES SENSE. Anyways. avoid those things and you’ll instantly have less stiff bgs no matter what kind of bg you’re depicting.

I wanna mention however that this isn’t to say a stiff bg with flat space doesn’t have its purposes.

sometimes you want to create parallels and tangents. it can make characters feel closed in, trapped, regimented, part of a routine, etc. it’s also great for making a composition look ornamental (especially combined with symmetry).

directors like wes anderson can even use these compositional elements to make images feel uncanny or harrowing! its very versatile. I think the important thing is to just be aware of when you are making something rigid and when that’s the last thing you want to do. conscious choices.

Can you speak Tagalog?

@lemuelzero101​ I can! BUT NOT VERY WELL LOL ;;; both my parents are from Visayas! but they met and had me in the states lol so I’m pretty American born and raised. We go back to visit family on occasion but not regularly. My tagalog is mostly absorbed from listening to relatives at parties lol and my parents speak bisaya at home so I’m marginally better at that. Sorry to any filipinos out there hoping I’d be better educated, I’m like a little baby...

I do love meeting and talking to other filipinos online though, I grew up in an area that was relatively diverse but the asian population was small and the filipino population basically non-existent. I was like one of maybe 2 filipino kids in my highschool of 2000.

Apart from infinity train what shows are you watching now? Have you seen jujitsu kaisen?

Man this is gonna sound so boring but I haven’t watched a lot of tv lately.  It’s not really part of my daily routine. Let’s see... I was sort of watching Amphibia, Craig of the Creek, and the new Digimon Adventure 2020 but I keep falling off watching those for one reason or another. Also there’s a lot of episodes, it doesn’t feel like something I can just binge and be done with.

The last thing I binged was Succession. I want that show and Euphoria back so bad, when I’m done forcing all my friends to watch Infinity Train im cancelling my HBO subscription until Succession and Euphoria return so they know exactly what I’m on their list for LOL. 

I have not watched jujitsu kaisen but I’ve kept up with some of the sakuga news (I keep up with anime industry news and production info like x5 the amt i keep up with actual anime) for it and their compositing/editing looks dope. I’ve read the manga actually LOL or at least part of the beginning. I wasn’t super keen on the whole finger eating thing. Also to be honest I kinda feel like its the new Bleach and I never particularly cared about Bleach. Characters look nice enough tho. I wholeheartedly support jjk fans.

Thank you! Thank you @keznodzieja​! <3

And thank you anons who don’t watch infinity train LOL...it’s always nice to hear when people enjoy my fanart despite not knowing the source material because it lifts a little bit of the “oh god am I being annoying???” fear off my chest. But also I think you should watch infinity train because it’s really good I have no reservations recommending it.

[hopeshoodie]

Ok so in light of the Independent article (see my tag #fusebox layoffs for more info), I’ve been trying to piece together the sequence of events that lead to FB Going to Shit™. 

All of the below is based on articles, tweets from the staff, and dates from screenshots. Especially with the Matchmaker stuff, I’m using the dates I personally accessed the stories- that might not be accurate to when they were actually released to an international audience, just when my phone updated the app. In hindsight, I’m not a great person to do this because I have a shit memory and don’t keep receipts, so if you have any corrections PLEASE lmk either in the dms or replies. 

In sum, the timeline appears to be:

1. Key players left Fusebox in early 2020. 

The one that people are probably most familiar with is David Gallopim, one of the artists who helped define the S2’s distinct style, leaving sometime before March 2020. He seemed to indicate that there was conflict over the new art style of S3, and released assets he’d designed of Harry in his own style (notably way prettier than Harry looks in-game). 

But probably more important to the direction of the company, Michael Othen, one of the co-founders and former CEO, left in July of 2020 (I had thought it was earlier in the year but according to LinkedIn it was July). It’s much more unclear why he left, but it’s notable because he was a huge force in making the game inclusive of LGBTQ characters. 

So all in all, not a great sign when employees who had a huge hand in creating the content and direction of a game that defined its success jump ship. Especially after the game was seemingly hitting its stride, with the host of Love Island (the TV show) doing a sponsored Let’s Play of S3 and projects in the works like Boat Party and CMM.

2. It seems like Fusebox‘s CEO/executives hired new management, either in 2020 or early 2021. Employees complain that the executives don’t understand what it takes to make a game and are pulling the studio in the wrong direction. It’s unclear if the newly hired execs had experience. 

Wil Stephens, the CEO/founder, has been with FB since its inception but also appears to have only founded game distribution ventures and not worked in any development or employment capacity. If that’s the case, maybe the complaints about lack of experience/knowledge about the mechanics of making games work are about him. If not, then some of the newly hired execs would likely be to blame. 

Paul Virapen, COO, was brought on in November of 2020. He’s worked with Disney’s gaming division, Big Pixel studios, Wooga. The quality of that experience is dubious since he headed up the ‘let’s make apps for Apple watches, it’ll be the next big thing’ department… Lol. Notably also, all of his roles had been in the executive/managerial realm, not the development teams, so the complains might have been about him. THIS IS SPECULATION, but I’m willing to bet that Virapen was a if not THE driving force in switching Fusebox’s focus entirely to matchmaker. All the studios he’s worked with have primarily produced and promoted Match 3 games, and he has a background working with big studios that produce games for large international audiences, not small studios making narrative games for limited audiences.

A new Manager of Finances, Ruth Erskine, was brought on in December of 2020

Rob Goddard, a new producer, was brought in January of 2021

Several key operations positions were filled by existing employees being promoted to management- 2 as far as I can tell. But as a whole it seems like December 2020 was a huge shift in leadership for the upper management while a lot of the other teams expanded but kept their old players as well.

3. At some point in late 2020- mid 2021, the executive team made the decision to switch LITG’s focus from a narrative pass-based game to a Match 3 incorporating romance narrative cut scenes. In early 2021, Fusebox teased more content to come while releasing S3 (seemingly referring to Matchmaker and not S4). In the interim between S3 endings and Boat Party’s release they put out an interview confirming the new game will be Match 3 but did seem to indicate that the plan at that time was for Matchmaker to be a side project with a different development team and not replace the main game. Notably, the LITG writers and artists were reassured that their roles will continue to exist (according to the independent article) as they’re working on S4.

3. In September of 2020, Matchmaker became briefly available in the US. That’s when I first downloaded it, at least. It would be added/removed from the google play store multiple times before having a unilateral release in July of 2021. 

Throughout 2020, Matchmaker is available to Asian audiences solely with LITG S1 getting rolled out in incremental updates. 

Eventually, Beanie Quinn is released (March 2021)

LA Noir is released (May 2021)

Seduction Games is released (late May or June 2021- I got the update and played it June 3rd, but hadn’t opened the app for a month or so. It might have come out before then, which is unfortunate for this timeline since it’s so inextricably linked to the open letter and layoff dates)

LITG S2 is released (only like 20 levels of it) the same month- June 19th for me. Notably, all of these stories are only released to an international audience, with the UK and USA still not having access to the app.

4. At the same time, Fusebox’s internal affairs are pretty quiet from 2020-2021, at least on social media. 

S3 comes out in 2020, Boat Party comes out later in the year and finishes in 2021. Post S3 in October of 2021, a survey goes out gauging player interest in new art styles and representation, which was pretty in keeping with past actions and seemed promising for S4. 

Boat Party features a promising cross promotion implementing irl brands into the game. It’s unclear if enough money was made from this on FB or the sponsor’s end to make that strategy viable, but that might’ve impacted management’s outlook for the profitability of LITG.  

Fusebox teases more content for the summer on Instagram, and then follows up and confirms it’ll be a proper season.

5. More key players leave in early 2021

Ed Sibley is still listed as Narrative Direction on LinkedIn, but he’s not credited as a writer on Season 4 (he was on 3,2,and 1) and started work with NetSpeak games in May of 2021, so we can assume he left around then or at least transitioned away from Fusebox then.

Fred Francis, another writer who had been on the team since S1, turns in his resignation ‘weeks’ before the layoffs were announced in late June. So we can assume he made his exit sometime early June or late May.

6. Prior to the release of Seduction games in May/June, staff expressed concern about the biphobia in Seduction Games. No sources have given a specific time when this took place. They were reassured that the problem would be corrected prior to release, but then the story was released as is to an international audience in June. The article released by the Independent is unclear- there might have been discussion prior to the open letter where staff expressed concerns and then were reassured before the game going live. OR the open letter might have been the first expression of concern by the staff. I tend to think the former, and the open letter was a response to Matchmaker going live with Seduction Games anyways, but I have no proof for that. On May 24th, 31 employees sent an open letter of concern regarding the problematic content in Matchmaker. This letter isn’t public, so we don’t know the scope of the employees' concerns or who the employees were.

7. To resolve the situation, a meeting between the staff and at least the COO (likely more than just him though) was held sometime after May 24th. Allegedly, Virapen was disrespectful to the employees who had questions, refused to answer, and ended the meeting early before any resolution was had by closing his laptop and leaving the room. At least 4 HR complaints were made in the wake of that meeting, we do not know the nature of those complaints. 

8. Some time mid-July (maybe July 26th? A writer tweeted about their job ending soon on that date), employees were made aware that the LITG app would move into ‘sunset mode’. It’s unclear what was communicated, but it seems as though S4 will be heavily delayed or cancelled altogether and no future seasons would be made. Writers begin to post about looking for work on Twitter

9. June 30th- The majority of Fusebox writing staff announce on twitter they’re out of work. In addition to the entire writing staff, unity engineers and producers are also let go.

10. July 5th - Fusebox executives respond to an article by MCVUK with a statement asserting they were “consulting with [their] employees on a proposed change to its business model” that would focus on producing Matchmaker content. They also expounded that the move was to secure “cash injections and and continued support from respected investors across the media and gaming industry”

11. July 6th- Fusebox announces that S4 will be delayed from the summer release date and that there is no fixed release date. 

12. August 2nd- three jobs are posted to Fusebox’s careers page on their website, one being Head of Narrative Content. In the job listing, it specifies that they’ll be maintaining existing properties as well as new ones, and that because of the co-development model (re:fusebox outsourcing Matchmaker to another studio) the new Narrative Lead must collaborate with external content creators.

Hopefully posting this timeline gives players a better understanding of how radically Fusebox has changed in the course of 2021 (and how royally they screwed over the people who made LITG what it is). Again, please let me know if you have receipts showing dates are different or things to add. 

[adversary777]

Been gone for a while as ive been dealing with some human related issues. Luckily as usual, the opposion is literally pathetic when it comes to humanity. I love how they all collectively decide the best move is to hit me with their cheap knockoff negativity lol 

Funny thing is is does more to help me than anything resembling hurting me. Its so incredibly easy to take their own negative energy and use it myself. And each time I snap, the result is less restraint.

Im impressed with just how strong my curses are now. Or rather, ive fully embraced using the blackness required to do so. When everyone you trust turns out to be a disgusting liar, it gives you more motivation to stop giving a shit about going easy on them. Modern sorcerers/energy users are, more often than not, cheap pretenders. They have a little bit of energy, a ton of bs rules and self limitations, the same vile human hypocrisy and disgusting treatment of those who’re actually worth their shit in these arts, and a LOT of ego.

Ive beaten so many modern witches. Ive lost count at this point how many ive been forced into a corner by until I finally drain them and give them a real taste of Absolute Adversity. And they never win. By the time they pop off one spell with their flawed methods I’ve popped off 5-10. Its easy, and only getting easier. 

Im getting closer. Ive upgraded a lot of my energetic techniques and such. But most importantly, they’ve done well in smashing my humanity down to nothing. Thats nesscessary for this goal to work. If an energy/magick user keeps getting crushed each time they attempt to connect with humanity or positivity, eventually their soul will adapt to it and the energy will rapidly evolve into something that can first equal the opposition, then surpass it. 

The Daemons are happy with my progress & performance in the latest situation. This one was a powerful test/demonstration. They wont allow me to feel sympathy or hope in them. And frankly I can see why. They have only showed me The Truth. They aren’t responsible for my pain. Humanity, and my own idiotic desperation in the past to find some form of hope in humanity. Someone who can magickally make this fucking nightmare end. However such a human does not exist. At least not anymore. Actually, did one EVER exist? lol 

Only those who conform receive love from them. Those who refuse to submit to their false establishment are tormented until they break and become a problem humanity cant do shit to fix. Issue is the usual isn’t enough anymore. An ordinary monster/demon/sorcerer/anything similar cant destroy this joke of a society with usual levels of energy. Its far too large now. It needs a being that matches about 6.8 billion humans. 

Think its Impossible? I call bullshit. Nothing is impossible in this industry except success without pure confidence in the energy & brilliant forces who stand beside you. 

[scarletwitching]

just curious, why aren’t u reading comics anymore? Is it cause wandas not in anything?

So, Ike Perlmutter... is bad.

This is hard to explain, not because I don’t know why I quit but because I cannot recall why I didn’t quit earlier. I guess it was the Spiegelman thing that did it, though that’s confusing because I remember quitting in July, not August. (2019 was 87 years ago, so who knows.) Sina Grace’s post had gone up that same summer. There was other stuff too. Things built on each other until I felt like I couldn’t justify it anymore.

It was probably inevitable. Or at least, it feels inevitable now. I considered it after the Northrop Grumman incident, but that was cancelled so fast that I didn’t even have time to process it. Things like that kept happening. I’d get mad about something, then it would whoosh by. But it was all chipping away at me. And it chipped and it chipped until one day, I was done. What’s that quote? Liking falling asleep, slowly and then all at once.

A couple of months after I quit, there was some internal role shifting that I don’t understand fully to this day, but was treated as “Feige is in charge of the comics now.” There was a lot of relief in the fandom at the time, and I remember thinking this should make me want to reconsider, it should make me want to at least wait and see if things changed. But I never seriously entertained the idea. Well over a year later, I couldn’t tell you what, if anything, changed.

Regardless, some things aren’t going to change. Did you see that photo of the guy storming the US Capitol holding zip ties? He had a Punisher logo on his chest. I’m not gonna argue about the political implications of that character or how much Marvel could actually do to put the genie back in the bottle. I’m more thinking about how, as superheroes have come to dominate pop culture, conservatives and liberals have both started adopting their iconography more and more. Remember that Dan Crenshaw ad? And the ICE tweet? I hate that shit.

The thing people love to do in this situation is insist everyone who disagrees with them is “misinterpreting” the characters and stories, but I don’t know how tenable that position is. I won’t pretend I don’t know why fascist insurrectionists love these characters. On the flip side, I can’t imagine an argument for why the person I saw call Amy McGrath “the real life Captain Marvel” is missing the point. I’d say they’re bang on the money, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. The white nationalists who think they’re vigilantes are obviously the worst (by several magnitudes). I’m not saying the cheesy liberal shit is the same as fashy right wing shit, just that I’ve grown exhausted with the way that society at large engages with these characters.

Is that the reason I quit reading Marvel comics? No, but it is a reason I haven’t started again. This stuff has become so obnoxious and omnipresent that it has tainted my feelings about the source material. Maybe part of my annoyance is that I know so much about the history of this meaningless nonsense that when I see people oversimplify it in order to slot them neatly into their own political views, I know it’s bullshit. Because it’s never as clear-cut as people make it out to be. No, Magneto was not based on Malcolm X, but yes, the Avengers kind of are ICE. But only that one time. (Fucking Hickman.)

It’s not just the general audience either. People in the supposedly enlightened part of this fandom downplay and excuse (and make snide jokes about) actual, non-fictional US war crimes under the guise of defending a fictional character. Do some people around here have any self-awareness about how embarrassing they are? It is vile the shit some of y’all will say with your whole chest, as if it’s completely divorced from the real world. The level of historical revisionism, the literal neocon talking points I have seen trotted out and presented as antiracism. I am begging certain people to PLEASE talk to an Iraqi. One (1) Iraqi. Any Iraqi. (Okay, maybe not any Iraqi.)

Actually, forget that. I don’t want to burden a single victim of US imperialism with some of y’uns, especially since you have proven time and again you cannot be reasoned with. Does that stuff affect my willingness to to buy Marvel comics? Yeah, it does. The fans may not be the company’s fault, but this attitude that real people’s suffering is just an exotic backdrop that doesn’t need to be seriously engaged with came straight from them.

More than anything, I’ve been thinking a lot about Capitalism (lol, of course, I have) and how I engage with this awful system I am forced to live in. Disney sucks. We all know it. The comic industry is exploitative. We all know it. How much do I really want to support them instead of giving my money directly to independent creators? How much more watered down, neoliberal, “more female drone operators” art do I need to experience in my life?

I’m not calling for a boycott or whatever. I don’t pretend to know how other people should live their lives. I’m not even sure how I should live my life. I just know that it’s been good for me to step back and evaluate what I spend my money on and how I feel about art that doesn’t live up to my values. Will I come back into the fold with a healthier attitude and more insight than I had before? Dunno. Will I eventually want to catch up on Immortal Hulk? Probably, but I’m guessing I’ll get it from the library when I do.

[bigfatscience]

i am a fat person who is pursuing acting, i noticed in a recent answered ask you mentioned you worked as an actor. i wonder if you can speak on if you would pursue the craft again? is your decision related to body size or unrelated? also any advice for pursuing this industry as a fat person would be much appreciated

So I was involved in high level amateur theater from age 7 to 18 and also worked professionally in some movies/TV when I was 14-16. I had planned to pursue acting as a career and actually auditioned at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts when I was 19. I loved acting, I was very good at it, and I walked away primarily because of the weight-based abuse. My personal breaking point was recognizing that I couldn’t suppress my weight anymore, it was too devastating to my health. So I walked away. 

At the time I don’t think I fully understood the extent to which weight discrimination forced me out of a profession I loved and was good at. This all took place almost 25 years ago, and body positivity had not emerged yet. There was no internet to speak of either, so no way to make connections with other fat creatives. 

And my experience was also affected by the fact that I conformed to beauty ideals in a lot of other ways, which protected me from some kinds of abuse but seemed to intensify some others -- the sexual predators, the sexual objectification, the constant pressure to lose weight because if I was just a *teensy* bit thinner I would be pretty enough to be a #STAR (not that we had hashtags then, lol). I think if I was 19 again, now, things could be different? Maybe?? I see some famous young people now who have bodies like I had in my early 20s. So I might have found a niche... but the sexism and objectification was pretty toxic, too, so who knows. 

I think about getting back into local amateur theater again sometimes. I am older and fatter now, and I think my age and body make more sense to people. Mothers and nurses and school marms are often fat in theater ;-) Who knows. For now, I get my performance jollies doing live, semi-improvised lectures six hours a week as a professor to audiences... errr... classes of 120 to 250 students. I think many of the qualities that made me good at acting also help make me a good lecturer. And I’m freaking hi-la-ri-ous, so the laughs are nice too. But the trauma I experienced working as a young professional in that field means I probably won’t encourage my kids to become actors.

But I still miss the performing arts. The thrill of connection -- to yourself, to your co-actors, to the audience -- is hard to find in any other field. And it’s hard to find a good reason to break into song during a lecture about regression to the mean.

[mindlostagogo]

041921

I love cartoons, a lot. Over the pandemic, I’ve spent my sudden surplus of free time reacquainting myself with old loves and pastimes I’d otherwise abandoned. One of those loves being My Chemical Romance, and one of those pastimes being, well, learning about everything that inspires Gerard Way (no point in hiding it, lol).

I finally got around to revisiting the Breakfast Monkey animatic earlier this month; the last time I saw it would’ve been about a decade ago now. Something that stood out was, separating my love of MCR and strictly as a lover of cartoons, the strength of the creativity and humour jumped out at me. I’ve re-watched it dozens of times now, I can’t get “Cruising for Crazy” out of my head, and it always makes me laugh. There are times where I laugh because, admittedly, I’m projecting on certain moments (ie. being a fangirl). But there are times where I laugh and I completely forget this has anything to do with Gerard (and Joe—I’m sorry, I don’t forget Joe Boyle, but I can’t help how I found the show).

I don’t know anything about the industry, but I do know it took Cartoon Network another half-decade before it started putting out the types of weird cartoons (now very much CN’s bread and butter) Nickelodeon would jump onto without question around the same time (late 90s/early 00s).

I know the original pitch was meant for Adult Swim—which was definitely more stoner-friendly humour at the time, especially in the simplicity shared by many of the shows (I love 12 oz. Mouse so much more than I probably should); Comedy Central and MTV’s animated output at the time was similar. All that to say, Nickelodeon, the channel that was bold enough to take on Invader Zim as an ‘all-ages’ nightmare, probably would’ve been a better home for the Breakfast Monkey as far as dealing with producers goes.

Breakfast Monkey, even now, doesn’t exactly scream AS. There’s an underlying ominousness that you get hints of—the moment with the dude telling Lucha to “Do as the Monkey says” says a lot—even more so when you see the production art of the Warp Maggot. And who knows where Gerard and Joe would’ve gone with storylines (I’m also aware it was meant to be short-form, but given the standard, you’d still probably be looking at 11-minute run times).

When it comes to Adult Swim’s output, the most prevalent things you notice (depending on the show) are: sex, gore, swearing, and simplicity—with an emphasis on simplicity. That’s not a negative reflection of the creators in any way, I’m just pointing out what AS is drawn to—it’s partly why Rick and Morty stands out so much. They did, after all, pull the plug on Morel Orel for getting too existential; dark is not the problem, heavy is, and MO definitely got heavier than was initially pitched. (That said, the braver thing to do would’ve been to ride out Dino’s inventiveness at the time.)

I know the reason stated for the show not getting picked up was because Aqua Teen Hunger force had just gotten picked up, and AS “already had a food show.”  Even still, without hitting more, for lack of a better term, ‘edgy’ marks, I don’t know if Breakfast Monkey would’ve been at home on AS. If anything, Breakfast Monkey makes me think more Spongebob-meets-Zim, something I think would’ve blown up, especially around that time. Zim got the plug pulled pretty quickly, despite having an extremely dedicated following; Breakfast Monkey would’ve scratched the edgy itch while also being palpable given Monkey is absolutely adorable.

Where my mind goes, I guess I would describe Chowder as diet Breakfast Monkey. I love Chowder, I love all the different ways they explored art; the moving pallets under the linework on certain characters’ clothes sometimes is burned into my mind, no doubt in part due to the sometimes aspect of not knowing when I’ll get to see them again. But, again, given that Gerard’s mind seems to know no bounds, I can’t help but call Chowder hypothetical diet Breakfast Monkey.

Suffice to say, for CN to look at Breakfast Monkey and not see a potential Spongebob-level success—WITHOUT interfering with the creative intent—says everything you need to know. It comes down to how edgy Gerard and Joe planned on taking the series. Worst case scenario, you’d get the majority of Canada’s adult animated output. Every show Teletoon picked up for their adult animated selection between the early 2000s and the 2010s was so forced in making sure every show had sex and/or just the most low-hanging comedic crass fruit wherever possible. (Side rant: I genuinely liked some of those shows, but they are not what I would objectively call ‘good.’ What do I mean by good? I mean I don’t think anyone at any step of the creative process—writers, animators, producers—could comprehend how milquetoast even their most inventive ideas were. I don’t put that on minds of the creatives, I think they exceeded brilliance as far as Canada’s restrictive original content output is considered. There’s a reason most of our best either go into teaching or move to the States.)

Breakfast Monkey, at the time, could not be shown to CN or AS and not expect to be manipulated with—and that’s really sad, because that animatic is extremely strong.

[c0ry-c0nvoluted]

THE ENEMY IS NOT A SKIN COLOR. THE ENEMY IS A CLASS.

White privilege. The phrase implies special rights. The phrase implies having a jumpstart in the race by way of DNA. What it doesn’t imply is that that white-skinned Jim or Judy is gonna win that race, just that the game is rigged in their favor.

I don’t hate the concept. The validity of it, I mean. It honestly rings some-kind-of-true in my brain when taking into consideration the general social status of people of color. But there’s a problem with it. Not in its validity, but in its generality, its assumption, and the overall affect it has on our society.

The biggest and most obvious problem with it is that there are tens of millions of white people (if not hundreds of millions worldwide), who are all struggling just to make ends meet (if they can at all). There are “poor white folk” everywhere. And there are white kids who are terrorized by their own parents. There are white boys and girls getting bullied at school or in their neighborhood. There are white people suffering at the hands of violent criminals, scam artists, corporations, policemen… And I’m not talking about white criminals suffering, here...

I worked with this insanely gorgeous blond who was one of several dozen (I don’t remember the actual number) of women who were raped by this cop in my city (San Diego). He’d follow them from clubs, pull them over, take what he wanted from them, then send them on their way. He got away with it up until he didn’t, but how many cops still do? His choice of victim was young and white, as are most serial killer victims, but does their skin color matter? In the sense that they’re preferred as targets, yes, but not in the sense of right and wrong. Their white skin, in this case, wasn’t doing them any favors.

But let’s get back to the topic at hand.

Is “white privilege” real?

Well that depends on what you consider “white privilege” to be, and I think that’s where our signals are getting crossed. I think that if you look at it on a more psychological level you’ll see that, yes, “white privilege” is a real thing in that “white people are less likely to be demonized or judged negatively based solely on their skin tone.” (But not on their appearance. If a white person is dressed like a thug, he/she is going to get negatively judged the same way a Hispanic would. Whereas vice versa, if a black person was dressed like a total bookworm, they’re going to get judged as such, not as a criminal.) But blacks being judged more often solely on skin color is 100% true. Black-skinned people have been demonized throughout our nation’s history (and many other nations) and this demonization, along with insidious, covert attacks on black communities by those in power, have caused two things (among a plethora of others, but two for the sake of my point). 1: It’s caused non-blacks who are not racist but are just recognizing the patterns they’ve been force-fed by the media, to unintentionally relate black-skin with ignorance, violence, and criminal behavior. And 2: It’s brought about disparity, anger, and emotional trauma in the black community that is the cause of the higher crime rates in those communities and more black-on-black crime than white-on-black crime (by the people, I mean. I’m not counting by the government because that’s a whole other fuck-storm of shit that isn’t only aimed at blacks, but at any who are considered “lower-class,” which, yes, the majority of blacks in our country are. That’s not to say there are more poor black people than poor white people. I really doubt that’s the case. But the percentage of blacks or other minorities who are poor vs the percentage of whites who are is likely leaning in the direction of exactly what makes “white privilege” a valid argument. But I’m not a “facts” guy. The numbers are just ways to distract from the problem, so you’re not gonna catch me quoting them to cry foul on the BLM movement. The reality is that yes, there are probably more poor white people total than blacks in this country, but the psychology, the demonization of blacks, is a real thing.)

But there’s a problem with looking at this as “white privilege.” Number one: if we do that we (unintentionally) discredit any white person who is or has suffered. Those who are, or have suffered, will absolutely not take kindly to being told that they are “privileged”. And what happens when they are told this? It makes anyone with white skin who has suffered or is suffering (and there’s a fuck ton of us) think to themselves, “Oh, fuck no! You think I got it good? You think you’re the only one who has problems? You think you’re the only one who’s getting fucked by the system? Well fuck you, and your white privileged bullshit excuse to whine to the guilt-ridden middle class to get your free handouts! The government has fucked me over more times than I can count!” And what does this mind-state do? It creates a racial class-war between those who have white skin and are suffering, and those who have black/brown skin and are suffering. And who wins in this scenario? If you guessed “the upper-class” you get a prize. (Whatchoo want, a fuzzy bear? A goldfish in a plastic tub? G’ahead. Pick something nice out. You earned it.) So now you got poor white people with guns itching to shoot any black person with or without a gun who supports a movement that indirectly claims that their suffering is invalid. And what does this “civil class war” accomplish? It creates more “criminals” for the fucking private-owned prisons to make money off of, further separating the upper-class from the lower, creating more suffering, more anger, more hate, MORE RACISM.

So is white privilege real? Psychologically, yes, to the extent that our society psychologically favors white skin over black/brown. But has it ever made me any more money? No. Has it ever stopped the cops from pulling me over and searching my car? Fuck no. I’ve been detained, searched, followed, fined, towed, impounded, harassed more than most people you know, regardless of your color. I’ve lost count of how many damn times I’ve been harassed by the cops in my city. Shit, I wrote a goddamn rap song about it back in the early 2000’s called SDPD, smashing on the fuckers for harassing a guy who was just trying to get by. And I was NEVER a criminal. I NEVER had any weapons or hard drugs (ok, some pills and plenty of pot, but…), I was NEVER robbing anyone or breaking into cars or homes or gang banging (maybe just a smidge of graffiti, but that shit’s art), or causing any kind of…ok, no, there was some drunken shenanigans, for sure, but that was mostly my boys, not me. Lol The point is, being white DID NOT stop me from getting constantly harassed by the cops in my city. You know what did? A new car, less homies in the ride, no smoke blowing from the windows, and a slightly more tempered demeanor while driving. I still bump my rap music, but I’m not in a car full of teenage “trouble-makers”. I still speed, but I come to a complete stop at them signs, bruh. I still run red lights, but I look reeeal fucking carefully when I do. I still zip in-and-out of lanes on the freeway, but I keep it below 80 (mostly). So the only thing that’s changed is that I “appear” to have more money (with a nicer ride), and I show more maturity in being on the road. My skin color hasn’t changed, but my run-ins with the cops have.

The bottom line: Crying out “white privilege” ain’t gonna help anyone but the rich who’re sitting back and raking in the dough off all the drama and weapon sales and fines and arrests and damaged property that needs to be rebuilt. So don’t make our society’s problem about a skin color. When you do that you divide people into groups when you should be uniting them. Divided we fall. I know most of your intentions are righteous, (and this goes out to white people too who’re acknowledging their “privilege”), but you’re doing it wrong. You’re creating enemies by unintentionally discrediting anyone with white skin who has suffered at the hands of the system, claiming that you own the rights (the privilege?) of deciding that they’re the ones who are privileged, all while they’re slowly rotting in inequity right beside you.

THE ENEMY IS NOT A SKIN COLOR. THE ENEMY IS A CLASS.

And that class is the rich. The 1%.

Are most of them white? Yes. But will that stop them from stealing money from poor white people? From bankrupting small businesses with corporate industry? From putting blue-collar white people out of work and replacing them with machines? From taking their homes when they can’t pay back their loans? From putting them in prison when they fight back right next to you for equality? No. Because the 1% only care about profit, and they don’t care who they have to manipulate, rob, demoralize, or demonize to get it, or what skin color those people have. Let’s get our heads right. Open them angry eyes and see who the enemy really is. And fight THAT enemy, not the enemy that their manipulation has created for you.

How? The real solution to “white privilege” and inequity and inequality is a very simple concept but an incredibly complex task. It involves creating a society where money is obsolete. When this happens there will be no more inequality. There will be no “superpowers” or 1%. There will be no poor. There will be no rich. There will be no profit other than the profit of betterment, progress, knowledge, discovery, science, quality of living. But there’s only one way to make money obsolete, and that’s by removing labor from our society. Sound crazy? That’s because you don’t realize how close we are to doing it anyway. A fully automated society is right around the bend, my dudes. We have the technology to make ALL LABOR OBSOLETE, in which case no one will have to work, in which case money will have no significance. What will have significance? RESOURCES. But this is a topic I’ve discussed before and will again soon and more directly. So for now what can we do? We demand a society that serves the people’s interests, not the corporations’. Unfortunately I can’t tell you how to this because I’m not into politics, I’m into actual change, not perpetuating the same system that’s fucking us all. My advice? Start spreading the concept of a RESOURCE BASED ECONOMY as loud and as often as you can. This type of society eliminates corruption and inequity and is only just now becoming possible thanks to advancements in technology. Look into it. Spread the word. AND STOP CREATING SEGREGATION AMONG OUR PEOPLE. Please, for fuck’s sake, stop adding to our problems and start moving towards eliminating them. #fightsmarter2020 Thanks for reading. -cc

[fipindustries]

list of comics i made so far

i already shared the list of all the novels i tried to write throughout my llife so i see no reason why not to do the same with the comics i tried to work on. no i should clarify, with my lists of novels there was a clear cut distinction between what was a novel and a short story so to parse one from the other was an easy task. it should be known that i wrote hundreds of shorts stories that i havent shared with anyone. now a similar situation occurs with my comics, i have done hundreds upon hundreds of little comics, short jokes, little skits and short lived strips through my life, so in order to give this list some weight and not make it longer than the bible the criteria i used was that it had to be something i did on a regular basis or that tells a self contained story with a beggining middle and end.

now without further ado, lets begin!

spike Vanderville (age 7)

you can tell i was way more into comics than i was into novels from a young age. done with pen and folded paper, it was the story about a young kid called spike, whose design was heavily inspired by bradley from sticking around, who had magical powers which allowed him to manipulate reality. it was a mix of harry potter and a series of illustrates short stories that came in a magazine in argentina. his best friend was a scarecrow with a pumpkin head that he had brought to life, his archnemesis was a fat bully.

curiously enough i was so passionate about this project even though i had no idea what i was doing and no talent that i actually did like three full colored issues of it. my family was really proud of me. sadly those comics are completly lost to time

andrew and the monkey (age 10)

this was the classical story about a boy and his best friend the talking animal. one page comedy strips done in pen and paper. nothing too clever, just a way for me to try lame jokes mostly stolen from spongebob squarepants. not much else to it. i tried to do like a revamp in 2014 but it was short lived, as you can see the jokes didnt get any less lame

FIP industries (age 17)

mostly done in digital. yes as you can see fip is something that has followed me my whole life in quite the variety of mediums. there were as a matter of fact multiple attempts to make this comic a real thing but time and again they would peter off as i saw that my skill was just not up to the task. i think i have talked more than enough about fip industries on this blog, one interesting thing is that if you follow the link you will come across a lot of proto ideas that i had before they cemented and took their definite shape in the novel (and even after the novel i kept retconning and retooling things over and over again, fip industries is an ongoing thing that will probably last my entire lifetime)

Disregarding Reality I (age 20)

the first iteration of disregarding reality, a humorous strip done in pencil and paper, a fairly short lived affair, lasting no more than 3 months. the entire premise of the comic was an MRA activist and a feminist live together, they are friends, they argue a lot. remember 2013 guys? back when this whole politics bullshit truly kicked off online? this was before gamer gate, mind you. but by that point i had seen more than enough of it on tumblr and i was like “someone should do some scathing commentary with wit and penache” and that someone had to be me. mainly inspired by commics like f@nboys and el goonish hive and a thousand billion others that were so popular back in those halcyon days.

i got bored of it pretty quickly and it wouldnt be until three years later than i would finally decide to re-start the project but until then...

Strangers in the forest (age 21)

here comes a rather productive era in my ouvre, ink and paper, based on a short story i wrote, its about an eldritch monster pretending to be human and a ghost girl, killed by her father. they have a dispute because the monster wants to eat the corpse of the girl but the ghost doesnt want to give up her bones because its the one thing that tethers her to the mortal plane. they eventually resolve their dispute. by this point i was actually, unironically trying my best to do comics which i felt looked professional.

Song of a nightmare (age 21)

another one based on a short story i wrote. ink and paper, a private detective wakes up in the middle of the night and sees a mermaid lying in bed next to him. he spends most of the comic trying to figure out how the hell is this possible. still one of my favourite ones and certainly one of my family’s and friends favourites as well. a rather poetic tale, strongly inspired by argentinian fiction and their propensity towards magical realism, i was reading a lot of cortazar back then.

Aika (age 21)

as you can tell i was on a fucking roll that year. ink and paper, this was a story based upon a simple and basic idea that i had in my mind for years and years. i always liked the concept behind the movie “the kid” where bruce willis mysteriously comes across himself as a kid. so of course one day i came up with the idea, what if you recieved a visit from your future self... but she was a woman?

this is probably the most aggresively trans story i ever wrote in my life, it is literally about a guy realizing they are trans and breaking down over it. here is the giant kicker, i did not realize at all what i was doing. i was completly unaware of what was going on here, i was still deep deep in the closet and not even realizing i was there. it really is astounding the honesty and the rawness with which i wrote this comic and it went all over my head. a perfect example of “im such a great ally lol”

oh also there is time travel i guess. my main impetus (beyond whatever my subconcious was forcing me to do) was my desire to make a complete clusterfuck of a story, i was a huge fan of homestuck, i had read fleek and demon, i wanted to do my own take on a hypercomplicated time travel puzzle plot. other things came out on top of it but i didnt noticed them. fucking hilarious

Hello Agatha (age 21)

a comedic strip about a wacky pixie dream girl having wacky adventures with her wacky friends, one of which is a man with a toilet for a head. what a gut buster, what a knee slapper!

there is not much to say about this one, wacky surreal comedy was always my favourite and so time and again i would try my hand at it but it is surprisingly hard to do!

The /co/ ventures! (age 20 - age25)

an ongoing project done in multiple mediums. i think i said more than enough about this in here and here. it was me practiscing comics, practiscing my humor and adding my tiny grain of sand to the 4chan culture. i am proud to say these comics were actually very well liked there and that i would be recognized without a name or signature of any kind, just on the strength of my style.

the vest kind of madness (age 22)

probably one of the projects in which i put the biggest amount of effort to make it look professional. traditional inks and digital colors. a crossover that i cant believe never happened in comics considering how obvious it is. Rac Shade, the changing man and delirium of the endless, the two flagship vertigo characters associated with madness. clearly a match made in heaven.

to this day im flabbergasted i seem to be the only one to think of this.

Disregarding Reality II (age 23)

another work where i have already spilled rivers of bytes explaining my thought process behind it. after having a no good, terrible, very bad day, finding my self aimless and without purpose, deep in denial and depression, i decided to give my self a big project to have something to get me out of bed every day. these three guys came from the depths of my mind to save me.

this time leaning a lot more on silly humor and surrealism than political commentary, still insanely proud of how much i managed to make this last, almost three years, well over 200 pages! and in here i found the inspiration and the creative energy to tackle all sorts of diverse projects of which we are about to see all about.

Mama Bird (age 24)

my masterpiece.

by far the best comic i ever did. a kid with a bird for a mom. hilarious, touching, heartbreaking. it was a concept that i had come up with when i was 21. back then it was supposed to be exclusively a humorous comic strip but then i found a dramatic angle for the story and that was when everything clicked into place. that was when i realized this was a comic i had to do. and i did it. it took me five months but it was well worth it. still insanely proud of this one

Soft boys (age 25)

a weird experimental little story where i decided to sit down and deconstruct one of the most popular superpowers. super elasticity. more akin to me just mashing my toys against each other than me trying to tell a serious story. i am actually really happy with some of the art here and some of the sequences presented. particularly the final one where a brick joke twenty pages in the making finally pays off.

Hexen Snatch (age 25)

a semi spinoff to my novel FIP industries, we focus on a side character that managed to survive after the events of the novel and how they’ll manage to survive further beyond that. insanely soaked by the magical world of pact by widbow i wanted desperatly to share my own take on magic, every page is accompanied by a little text where i expand upon the lore and the way magic is supposed to work on this world. i really like the prose on those snippets and the ideas they work almost more that the comic itself with which i was not happy at all when i was working on it. i didnt like the character design, i didnt like how the art in general was coming out, i didnt like the pacing of the story or how superficially we were getting to expore this world in the comic proper. i had to take a very long hiatus just to accumulate the will to finish the comic and once i did i feel it really petered off without much of a satisfying payoff.

on some level i blame the exhaustion and frustration that i came out of this comic with for the fact that i ended up quitting disregarding reality soon afterwards.

Maxplosive (age 26)

another project that has followed me across multiple mediums. came up with an idea for a videogame back in 2015. saved it on the back pocket for a while, used it as a story within a story on my novel fan.tastic, practisced a couple of animations with the characters and eventually decided that, if my skills at videogame making were not enough, i had at least more than poven myself as a comic artist so maybe that was the definitive medium in which this idea would have to exist.

the original idea was to tell the story in two parts, the first half would introduce the character and the videogame as if the comic was a playthrough of the game. all fun and childlike and innocent. then the second half was meant to explore the life of the main character as an adult, how being “a videogame protagonist” had ruined her body, her mental health and her life. i tried all sorts of weird stuff with the format here, using reciclable assets, static camera angles and generally presenting the whole thing as if it was a videogame.

sadly the project got too big for my breaches, i was fucking exhausted back then, swamped with a bunch of other projects, my job, other responsabilities, unsatisfied with the story and with no idea where to take it. eventually i got tired, decided to skip a day, then the day became a week and then the week became a month and by then i had to face the facts, i was just no longer able to continue the comic. and so i quit not only maxplosive but disregarding reality all together.

i still did the occasional comic here and then but it wouldnt be until the very end of 20-fucking-20 that i was finally inspired to tackle a new project, my newest one, my last one....

Lapsarian (age 27)

an interesting experiment, i decided to do the whole comic in one sit and then post it chapter by chapter on a weekly basis. a surprising result of this was that i managed to do in one month the same amoung of pages that would have taken me 5 months back when i started disregarding reality, is good to see that after al this time i still got it.

took me a while to get the hang of it again and find my own style once more but once i armed up it was smooth sailing for 40 pages all the way to the end. but what is this comic even about?

its... weird, with full disclosure and no shame, it is mostly a fetish story about big lizard creatures commiting vore. the milkman had already shown me that i could do those types of stories and no lighting would come from the heavens to strike me down so i said, why not as a comic? i like to think that beyond the fetish content it is still a decent story in its own right, an interesting feedback that i got from this is that people are suprised how earnest it is, one saying something like “this is the best pitch for a fetish that i was never interested in”

Conclussion:

looking back on this im surprised, turns out i was a lot more prolific and working a lot more regularly than i expected, in here are documented ten years of creative output that never seems to wane. it was fun to do the roundabout trip and see how my style, my technice and generally my work ethic evolved through the years. another nice thing to see is the multiple formats, the multiple tools and mediums i experimented with, i find myself constantly trying new things, new methods, new angles, new interesting ideas for how to make a comic (without even getting into what to make a comic about).

something i always knew about myself was that drawing is a fundamental part of who i am, it is something that just cant be taken away from me and that will always be a part of my life one way or the other, is good to see it so plainly, in black and white, on this list. here goes for what i might be able to do in the future