#this is the correct and final version of my drawing

[nerdsinc]

after 30 hours of work, i finally drew every single version of matoro, redesigned in my style! he's my favourite character of all time so i decided to put a ton of love into this drawing. theres lots of little cool details which ill go into more depth on under the cut!

(as always, PLEASE reblog so my art gets circulated!! it would be very, VERY appreciated! thank you, ily!!)

every version of him has a sad expression, though i tried to make it the most prominent in the last three. i think hes just tend to have a sad look in his eyes even when hes not actually that sad.

his 2nd matoran form has the gear part stylized to look like a tail, and i added a shorter version to the 1st matoran form to imply that it just 'grew' over time

his toa inika design has the same tail as the first two matoran forms, but its been broken, the gear no longer on it. it shares the same transparency as the other parts of his design, and is shaped like a lightning strike to call back to how he became a toa in the first place

the toa mahri design doesnt quite have a tail, instead having the tube broken, having the silhouette of a tail without actually being one.

the 2nd matoran design has a scarf, i like to imagine that he wore it almost constantly, but it was taken when he went to karzahni, and he never recovered it. kopaka later did, and ended up wearing it in memory of matoro

every design has the same hair-like mask (originally how i stylize the akaku), and has a asymetric design where one side is a bit longer. the mahri mask looks more like the akaku, however the iden looks less like it, with the ""hair"" being much longer and pulled back. this was to try and show how he didnt really feel like himself as a toa inika, and how that mask was very much so not him (as it was its own separate entity after all) but once he became a toa mahri he felt a bit more like himself again.

i tried to make it look like he was wearing winter gloves in most of the designs, though its most obvious in the 2nd matoran and mahri designs

i stylized the iden a bit so that it looked like he had horns, my thought process there was just kinda "karzahni = hell so i guess it makes sense"

each one has lines under their eyes, with the 2 matorans having ones similar to the markings on the akaku, toa inika having ones similar to the iden that also are meant to subtly look like tear streaks, and the mahri having ones that very subtly are meant to look like the lines on the ignika mask

more red accents on the mahri design, to call back to the red flag, and also to teridax/maxilos

while i didnt draw in most of their weapons, mahri kept the twin cutter and i just made it an attachment to his hand

the red axle piece in the mahri foot piece is actually a piece i thought was included in the set itself. i bought my mahri matoro second hand, and apparently along with him being in bad shape he also just had those parts added there for some reason? so i drew it in thinking that it was correct. just learnt today that that was false. but i like it so im keeping it

there mightve been more details i added, but thats all i remember right now!

[saeiken]

>.>

[a-s-levynn]

"Even if the sky cracks in mourning / And the heavens just won't open up for me" A Series of Small Offerings - II/12 - day20

[alaskasbignaturals]

ok so now that my computer screen is no longer very orange tinted, I'm coloring some mass and ny sketches i did yesterday so i can get their proper skin tones

this is so weird too bc like i think it might've been a windows update that made it more orange?? bc I've been using this computer for years and my art hasn't been that desaturated

so anyways the states will now have melanin and tans and all of that. i cannot believe I've been drawing them thinking they're carker when they arent to everyone else

[alfheimr]

My Favorite Cheap Art Trick: Gradient Maps and Blending Modes

i get questions on occasion regarding my coloring process, so i thought i would do a bit of a write up on my "secret technique." i don't think it really is that much of a secret, but i hope it can be helpful to someone. to that end:

this is one of my favorite tags ive ever gotten on my art. i think of it often. the pieces in question are all monochrome - sort of.

the left version is the final version, the right version is technically the original. in the final version, to me, the blues are pretty stark, while the greens and magentas are less so. there is some color theory thing going on here that i dont have a good cerebral understanding of and i wont pretend otherwise. i think i watched a youtube video on it once but it went in one ear and out the other. i just pick whatever colors look nicest based on whatever vibe im going for.

this one is more subtle, i think. can you tell the difference? there's nothing wrong with 100% greyscale art, but i like the depth that adding just a hint of color can bring.

i'll note that the examples i'll be using in this post all began as purely greyscale, but this is a process i use for just about every piece of art i make, including the full color ones. i'll use the recent mithrun art i made to demonstrate. additionally, i use clip studio paint, but the general concept should be transferable to other art programs.

for fun let's just start with Making The Picture. i've been thinking of making this writeup for a while and had it in mind while drawing this piece. beyond that, i didn't really have much of a plan for this outside of "mithrun looks down and hair goes woosh." i also really like all of the vertical lines in the canary uniform so i wanted to include those too but like. gone a little hog wild. that is the extent of my "concept." i do not remember why i had the thought of integrating a shattered mirror type of theme. i think i wanted to distract a bit from the awkward pose and cover it up some LOL but anyway. this lack of planning or thought will come into play later.

note 1: the textured marker brush i specifically use is the "bordered light marker" from daub. it is one of my favorite brushes in the history of forever and the daub mega brush pack is one of the best purchases ive ever made. highly recommend!!!

note 2: "what do you mean by exclusion and difference?" they are layer blending modes and not important to the overall lesson of this post but for transparency i wanted to say how i got these "effects." anyway!

with the background figured out, this is the point at which i generally merge all of my layers, duplicate said merged layer, and Then i begin experimenting with gradient maps. what are gradient maps?

the basic gist is that gradient maps replace the colors of an image based on their value.

so, with this particular gradient map, black will be replaced with that orangey red tone, white will be replaced with the seafoamy green tone, etc. this particular gradient map i'm using as an example is very bright and saturated, but the colors can be literally anything.

these two sets are the ones i use most. they can be downloaded for free here and here if you have csp. there are many gradient map sets out there. and you can make your own!

you can apply a gradient map directly onto a specific layer in csp by going to edit>tonal correction>gradient map. to apply one indirectly, you can use a correction layer through layer>new correction layer>gradient map. honestly, correction layers are probably the better way to go, because you can adjust your gradient map whenever you want after creating the layer, whereas if you directly apply a gradient map to a layer thats like. it. it's done. if you want to make changes to the applied gradient map, you have to undo it and then reapply it. i don't use correction layers because i am old and stuck in my ways, but it's good to know what your options are.

this is what a correction layer looks like. it sits on top and applies the gradient map to the layers underneath it, so you can also change the layers beneath however and whenever you want. you can adjust the gradient map by double clicking the layer. there are also correction layers for tone curves, brightness/contrast, etc. many such useful things in this program.

let's see how mithrun looks when we apply that first gradient map we looked at.

gadzooks. apologies for eyestrain. we have turned mithrun into a neon hellscape, which might work for some pieces, but not this one. we can fix that by changing the layer blending mode, aka this laundry list of words:

some of them are self explanatory, like darken and lighten, while some of them i genuinely don't understand how they are meant to work and couldn't explain them to you, even if i do use them. i'm sure someone out there has written out an explanation for each and every one of them, but i've learned primarily by clicking on them to see what they do.

for the topic of this post, the blending mode of interest is soft light. so let's take hotline miamithrun and change the layer blending mode to soft light.

here it is at 100% opacity. this is the point at which i'd like to explain why i like using textured brushes so much - it makes it very easy to get subtle color variation when i use this Secret Technique. look at the striation in the upper right background! so tasty. however, to me, these colors are still a bit "much." so let's lower the opacity.

i think thats a lot nicer to look at, personally, but i dont really like these colors together. how about we try some other ones?

i like both of these a lot more. the palettes give the piece different vibes, at which point i have to ask myself: What Are The Vibes, Actually? well, to be honest i didn't really have a great answer because again, i didn't plan this out very much at all. however. i knew in my heart that there was too much color contrast going on and it was detracting from the two other contrasts in here: the light and dark values and the sharp and soft shapes. i wanted mithrun's head to be the main focal point. for a different illustration, colors like this might work great, but this is not that hypothetical illustration, so let's bring the opacity down again.

yippee!! that's getting closer to what my heart wants. for fun, let's see what this looks like if we change the blending mode to color.

i do like how these look but in the end they do not align with my heart. oh well. fun to experiment with though! good to keep in mind for a different piece, maybe! i often change blending modes just to see what happens, and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. i very much cannot stress enough that much of my artistic process is clicking buttons i only sort of understand. for fun.

i ended up choosing the gradient map on the right because i liked that it was close to the actual canary uniform colors (sorta). it's at an even lower opacity though because there was Still too much color for my dear heart.

the actual process for this looks like me setting my merged layer to soft light at around 20% opacity and then clicking every single gradient map in my collection and seeing which one Works. sometimes i will do this multiple times and have multiple soft light and/or color layers combined.

typically at this point i merge everything again and do minor contrast adjustments using tone curves, which is another tool i find very fun to play around with. then for this piece in particular i did some finishing touches and decided that the white border was distracting so i cropped it. and then it's done!!! yay!!!!!

this process is a very simple and "fast" way to add more depth and visual interest to a piece without being overbearing. well, it's fast if you aren't indecisive like me, or if you are better at planning.

let's do another comparison. personally i feel that the hint of color on the left version makes mithrun look just a bit more unwell (this is a positive thing) and it makes the contrast on his arm a lot more pleasing to look at. someone who understands color theory better than i do might have more to say on the specifics, but that's honestly all i got.

just dont look at my layers too hard. ok?

[concededlesbian]

can you write hcs of lover girl ellie williams, fluff and smut if you’d like <3

Lover girl!Ellie Modern AU Headcannons

Creds to @angelgbc for the third pic (correct me if I'm wrong though)

Ellie Williams x Female Reader

Content: Fluff and Smut

Rating: Explicit

Proofread?: Could've been if my friend responded to my message (jk I love her)

A/n: The grammar and punctuation is probs really fucking shitty because this is literally me just ranting. This is also my second time ever writing a headcannons list. Also I didn't know if you wanted this to be set in a modern environment or the canon one. I can make another version set canon one tho.

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆｡･:*:･ﾟ★

SFW

Lover Girl!Ellie has craved a relationship since her first crush when she was fourteen.

Lover Girl!Ellie honestly thought she would never find love because she usually drove girls away due to her coming off as dry and uninterested.

That was until she met you.

Lover Girl!Ellie met you by sitting at a table with you in a crowded restaurant. She was waiting to pick up a to-go order and there were no empty tables to wait at. Ellie saw that your table was the most empty because you were the only one sitting there plus you also seemed to be waiting.

Ellie had approached you and asked if she could sit at your table and you smiled and nodded.

You guys sat in awkward silence for like 5 minutes before you broke it by complimenting her Savage Starlight shirt. She looked down at the faded shirt with the phrase "Endure and Survive" above an assortment of characters and groaned in embarrassment. "Oh yeah- I uh- got this shirt in high school it's so cringey."

You smiled at her response and responded with "Well, I think it looks cute on you."

Ellie immediately got flustered because, God, your smile was so pretty and you were complimenting her. Ellie replied with a "thank you?" She then immediately regretted how bitchy her questioning tone sounded.

Ellie mentally scrambled to save face when she saw how your smiley expression fell at her response.

"Sorry, I don't know why that came out that way. Thank you- like for real."

Ellie desperately wanted to make a good impression on you and was about to compliment your smile, but her words got stuck in her throat when her order was called out.

Ellie immediately got up to get her food, but before she walked away, she turned to you and asked if she could get your number. You looked a bit surprised at her question but nodded and took her phone to type your number in.

Lover Girl!Ellie excitedly texted Jesse and Dina that she successfully got a pretty girl's number.

Lover Girl!Ellie wrote about you in her journal for a week straight before you two started dating.

Lover Girl!Ellie found pictures of you from your social media (curtesy of Dina) and proceeded to draw you NONSTOP.

Lover Girl!Ellie finally texted you first and made small talk that somehow morphed into her explaining all her interests to you in depth.

Ellie literally thought she scared you away when she looked back at the paragraphs that she sent but was surprised when you asked her out on a date to the carnival.

Lover Girl!Ellie spent days planning for the date before it happened.

Lover Girl!Ellie who got you flowers on the day of the date.

Lover Girl!Ellie literally wanted to win you so many stuffed animals at the carnival.

She ended up getting you three

And you ended up getting her five

Lover Girl!Ellie playfully rolled her eyes and got defensive when you teased her about winning her more gifts.

Lover Girl!Ellie shut down your teasing by kissing you.

Lover Girl!Ellie asked you to be her girlfriend on the second date.

Lover Girl!Ellie as your girlfriend loves spending time with you.

Like she is all up in your personal space. Sometimes when you're laying on your stomach in bed she'll fully just lay on top of you.

"You're so warmmmm." She would sigh out every time.

Lover Girl!Ellie literally always wants you around.

She's taking a shower? She wants in the shower or in the bathroom with her.

Anytime Ellie's about to run an errand she ALWAYS asks if you can come with her.

"I'm going to the store. Can you come with me?" And all she has to do is pick up a jug a milk.

This girl would literally ask you to come with her to walk to the mailbox.

Don't even get me started on how she acts when YOU'RE going somewhere.

"Where are you going? Can I come with you?"

Cue her rushing to put on her converses and trailing behind you like you have her on a leash.

Lover Girl!Ellie is also a fien for physical touch

Her favorite thing to do is hug you from behind and rest her head on your shoulder while casually talking to you.

She also boops your nose repeatedly when she wants your attention.

Lover Girl!Ellie also "kiss taxes" you anytime she does you a small favor.

She always surprises you with it too.

Like, you'll ask her to peel an orange for you, and as she's handing it to you, she'll say "Kiss tax" and give you a quick peck on the cheek or lips before you can even think.

Lover Girl!Ellie loves kissing you

Lover Girl!Ellie that will buy things that that remind her of you.

"Ellie, why did you buy an ashtray? You don't even smoke."

"The design reminded me of you." She responds with the cutest smile ever.

You have to convince her to just send you pictures of things that are a reminder of you because you're honestly scared for her bank account.

Lover Girl!Ellie LOVES to bring you up in conversations.

Her favorite line is "That reminds of when my girlfriend..."

Lover Girl!Ellie insists on wearing little things that are yours just because she wants a reminder of you everywhere she goes.

Lover Girl!Ellie compliments you so much but gets so shy and awkward when you compliment her back.

Like she'll find anything to compliment you about but the minute you compliment her, she gets flustered and tells you to shut up (lovingly ofc).

"You look so pretty when you're cooking, Ellie." "Dude, shut up I'm literally just cutting vegetables."

Oh yeah, as much of a lover girl she is Ellie will still call you "dude" or "bro" even though you're her literally girlfriend, you are NOT an exception. Those words are ingrained in her vocabulary.

Also on the topic of nicknames...

Lover Girl!Ellie calls you over the top petnames to annoy the shit out of you.

"My pretty sugar plum princ-" "Ellie I swear to fucking God."

But when you give her a taste of her own medicine she gets SO flustered.

You once called her "pretty princess" and she was wide-eyed and speechless

Lover Girl!Ellie loves to share anything she enjoys with you.

If she likes a type of food, she'll want you to try at least one bite.

If she likes a show, she'll want to finish it with you.

Lover Girl!Ellie also writes sweet ass poems about you.

The type of poems that describe you as the joy in her life and compare you to the most pleasant things and experiences.

Lover Girl!Ellie keeps a list of your favorite things/interests in her journal.

Lover Girl!Ellie loves cuddling.

She doesn't care if she's the little or big spoon; she wants to cuddle.

Once again she loves being close to you.

Lover Girl!Ellie also values going on dates ever since she got with you.

Her favorite part about going on dates is planning them with you.

You once canceled a date last minute and Ellie was deadass mad at you for two days.

You made it up to her by taking her to a record store and paying for her vinyls.

Lover Girl!Ellie loves to show you off in public

Lover Girl!Ellie always looks at you with so much love and adoration in her eyes.

Because you're her girl

And, she is yours.

NSFW

Lover Girl!Ellie is obsessed with skin-to-skin contact.

She's so nasty about it too like she loves the feeling of your sweaty skin sticking to hers.

She prefers tribbing or scissoring over using strap-ons.

When she DOES use a strap, she prefers a missionary position because wants to wrap her arms around your body and whisper sweet words in your ear.

Like imagine her thrusting deep inside of you while calling you her favorite girl.

Lover Girl!Ellie is a dom switch in my eyes.

She's so soft though.

She rubs your thigh soothingly while grinding her clit against yours when you two are scissoring.

She runs her fingers through/strokes your hair when she has you on all fours and is thrusting from behind.

Lover Girl!Ellie loves dry-humping you.

It's like top-tier foreplay to her.

Like if things get heated while you two are kissing, she'll start rubbing her clothed pussy against yours.

There are numerous times when Ellie has either cum or made you cum in your pants while making out.

Remember when I said that Ellie will lay on you when you're laying on you're stomach...

Sometimes when she's horny, she lays on you, leans into your ear, and asks if she can use your ass to get off.

If you say yes, she practically fights her pants off and starts rolling her hips on your ass.

Even though you're not getting any stimulation, the sounds of her soft moans and the feeling of her thighs tightening around your hips as she gets closer to her orgasm leave you soaked.

It also doesn't help that Ellie will praise you like her life depends on it.

"Fuck you feel so good, Babe..." "You're such a good girl, wanting to help me cum."

When Ellie to cums, she fully falls forward, her tits pressed against your back, wraps her arms around your body, and moans and pants in your ear as she rides out her orgasm.

Afterwards, Ellie will finger until you're creaming on her fingers because she knows this experience leaves you so fucking horny.

Lover Girl!Ellie loves when you eat her out.

The sight of your face buried in her pussy is one she'll cherish until she's on her death bed.

She loves to stroke your hair and tell you how good you're making her feel

Most of the time eating Ellie out ends with 69-ing because she always wants to make you feel as good as you're making her feel.

Lover Girl!Ellie also loves to plan dates with you when she knows she's fucking you stupid.

Like she's asking you if you want a restaurant date or an outdoor date while her strap is nestled deep inside of you.

When you don't answer her, she says "C'mon Babe, focus." with a cocky smirk plastered on her face.

Then she'll make the strap rub against your G-spot every time you try to answer.

"Mmm, I didn't get that baby."

Lover Girl!Ellie also has thing for overstimulation.

She loves the vulnerability and trust she feels when fucking you and wants to make the experience last as long as possible.

She wants to make love until you're both sore.

When you calm down from a previous orgasm, she rests her head on your stomach, looks up at you, and asks "Can you give me one more babe?"

Obviously, there's a safe word you can both use at any time.

But the look of adoration on Ellie's face as she pushes you to another orgasm is enough to motivate you for another round.

Lover Girl!Ellie always provides aftercare.

She holds you tight in her arms while whispering words of encouragement.

Then she gets cleaned up with you, puts on a comfort movie/show, and cuddles you until you fall asleep.

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆｡･:*:･ﾟ★

A/n: SORRY if this is shit! I literally finished this at 1 am and had a pounding headache. Also sorry for taking a decade to finish a fucking HCs list it's rough out here.

[pakhnokh]

Temple confession scene project behind the scenes - A comparison of the first and the final versions

A comparison of the panels from this comic. First version followed by the final one, so you can see them side by side. In some the changes are minor, and in the others more noticable.

The first version was drawn entirely last year, when I was suffering from postpartum depression and had a huge FOMO from not drawing and being active with my art. I was tired, depressed and stressed.

The second version is the fixing of the first one. It's rendering the lines and the shapes, perfecting the faces, making them less sharp and sketchy, fixing angles of face, changing facial features to fit my newer taste etc...

So I decided to share these, old and new version side by side so you can see the process and progress and notice the details I decided to render/change :)

Here (below), for example, I made a slight change to his features. Eyes smaller and nose a bit bigger

But most of the work was really just rendering the lines and darkening the hair

In the last panels starting from this one (below), it was really about working and perfecting their faces, anatomy, the folds of fabric, to give them more mass.

This panel (below) was about fixing the angel of their faces. In the first one wwx was looking a bit too high. In the newer version I also worked on lwj's face, mainly by making his bangs stand out to give more mass to his head.

About Lan Xichen here, I just didn't like how he turned out in general. Something seemed off about the shape of his head in the angle lol.

Again, changing of facial features, less sketchy-sharp, eyes smaller, angles of the noses fixed, the shape of their clothes on their bodies etc...

Mainly EVERYTHING fixed in this lmao. The shapes of their bodies, giving them more mass, the shape of heads, rendering and perfecting facial features, correcting their position so that they look more turning one towards the other (mainly wwx's shoulder and lwj's head angle)

That's it!

[syneilesis]

[fic] if only for a moment

if only for a moment

Love and Deepspace | Rafayel (Qi Yu) x Main-Character!Reader | T | 3.6k words | ao3 link (with correct formatting)

Rafayel waits. And waits. And waits.

A/N: Another LaD fic!! This time it's Rafayel. Several elements of this fic are inspired by and loosely based on his story anecdotes and bond story, plus that Deep Sea card line backdrop. So more spoilers in this one, I'm afraid. I think you need to be aware of them in order to follow the flow of the fic. But if not, here's what you need to know: basically Rafayel accepts a visiting professorship at the University of Linkon to reunite with the MC/you. And the prose poetry interspersed are loosely situated in the Deep Sea card lineup setting (you can search in YouTube for the scenes. This one is a brief glimpse of the scene). That princess/knight(??) dynamic is yum yum.

If possible, please read the version on AO3. I formatted the prose poems there as if they're really prose poetry, so I'd appreciate it if you check that out. (Though there isn't too much difference between the formatting here and there, I did make the effort of coding a little 🥺)

Anyhoo, hope you enjoy, and I am sO STOKED FOR THE OFFICIAL RELEASE. rip my wallet 💸😭

JUST LOOK AT THIS MAN AND BELIEVE

There’s a type of berry in a distant land that produces a rare shade of ink that matches the color of your eyes. It takes a hundred of them to create the right hue and volume for the art that he wants to make. It comes to him in a dream: endless desert, then fireworks of verdant sparks that coalesce into stem, leaf, and, finally, fruit. Rafayel remembers that land, so much different from the iridescent blue of ocean underwater, and the acrid gold of the barren desert. His mouth filled with the succulent sweetness of the dream, the lingering sandpaper roughness of the berries on his fingers. He already knows the name of the artwork even before he’s begun—Waiting, Missing. The ache in his bones gaining form, an intangible thing taking flesh.

+

Under the ocean surface, time is muted, a deafening thickness that surrounds you with its ambiguity. On land, however, it is linear, and fast, and in a matter of blinks, Rafayel’s visiting professorship nearly wraps up.

He’s only glimpsed you once or twice. Thrice at most. The university is big, but not big enough to warrant a dearth of fateful encounters. The first time he saw you it was at a coffee shop: walking along with your friends outside, your voice mellifluous and festive wafting through the trellis of the café entrance. You were talking about him—well, about Lemuria to be specific, but these days any talk of Lemuria inevitably draws in his name.

He’s committed your schedule to memory, and yet it just seems impossible to capture a moment with you. Even just a brush of shoulders, or of sleeves—an asymptote of contact. Just navigating around your orbit, but never truly meeting.

What would it be like—finally talking to you? You in front of him, face to face? Rafayel imagines the ache of waiting fading into the background until it’s completely gone. He yearns for that feeling, the release of it. A conclusion—or maybe even a beginning.

+

i. take my hand, he told you under the glow of the lustrous moon, the only source of light that contoured the secretive valleys of his face. i want to show your highness something. there was a country, he said, beyond the undulating monochrome of the desert, blanketed by lush trees and shrubberies and flowers that buildings were made in betwixt and around them—a nation of trailing and winding architecture, a marriage of the natural and the manmade. you wanted to ask why he’d planned on taking you there, and the only answer you got was a curt turn of his head and the profile of a masked man layered by shadows and distance. it would have been nice, you thought, if the moon poured light upon his hooded gaze.

+

Eventually he begins to frequent the café. Twice a week at first—he doesn’t want to come off strong right away, of course—and then making his way up until he’s hanging out there more than his own studio. He schedules his visits around your classes, always during the ones when the probability of you dropping by the café is high and he can ‘coincidentally’ be around the same area. It’s gotten to a point that Thomas calls him out on it, and nags at him to focus more on his painting. The next exhibit is immediately after his visiting professorship after all.

“From where I’m standing,” Thomas says, “you’re not painting at all.”

Rafayel ignores him.

Five minutes later, he says, “Not painting is part of the painting process.”

Thomas rolls his eyes, but he leaves him to it.

At the café, Rafayel attracts curious looks. A few attempt to approach him, but he pretends not to see them. They linger around the periphery, like moths to flame.

And then something happens: the entrance door chimes, and you swan into the coffee shop, earphones and denim overall skirt, the kind of rosy-cheeked image Rafayel finds on teen magazines, wide-eyed and earnest. You fall in line and order when it’s your turn, and your eyes sweep across the packed café searching for a vacant seat until they finally land on him.

Rafayel’s heart stumbles.

Up close, the baby fat on your cheeks still gives you the appearance of being younger than you actually look. You turn a polite smile his way, and his heart stutters again—but this time it is taken as a warning.

“Hi,” you say, tentative. Any hint of recognition absent. “Do you mind if I sit here?”

+

ii. you're counting the steps of your inevitable parting. you're at the edge of the desert, far away from your home and its familiar scents, oriented towards a direction that promised a future sad memory, the gentle warmth of his hand, the downward denial of his gaze. this longing that grew out of your bones, aching during cold, aching during heat, aching when he looked at you with such tenderness he had to hide it through the sharp tug of your joined hands, the long strides that opened up a lonely distance. intimacy was dangerous, knowing was dangerous, the bowels of his heart like a solitary flower on a high peak. what would you do to such loneliness?

+

Memory isn't always an infallible thing. The human brain cannot hang on to every moment of your life, though Rafayel wishes it were so. But still—to think that you would forget him, and it hasn’t even been a century. You were like a phantom thief stealing his heart in the night—no recourse, no resolution.

To wait is to be in agony, the burn of yearning locked within the heart. Rafayel has been waiting for a long time, and the only memory scorched in his heart is fire, the blaze and its blinding, all-consuming want.

What would you do to such want?

+

You have a blurry childhood, Rafayel discovers. After the first Wanderer descended on Earth, the incident strummed your memories like a stringed instrument that tired of the same chord, over and over. It had bothered you at first—not being in control of your own memories—but eventually you had learned to live with it.

“Grandma and Caleb—my childhood friend—helped me through the process,” you tell him, stirring your iced mocha with its straw. “I owe them a lot.”

Eyes cast down, but still the melancholy shadows remain in your expression. Rafayel folds his arms on the table, and leans closer.

Around them only a few people occupy the coffee shop at this time. How fortunate for Rafayel to catch you during your break while every other student is trapped in class lectures.

“There’s no use in dwelling upon what's already happened. Even sharks have to give up when their prey escapes. When you remember, it will be all the more joyous, no?”

The smile you give him is crooked, disbelieving.

“If I remember.”

“You’ll remember.” Because there’s no other choice, for you and for him. Rafayel cannot bear being shelved in the history of your smile and happiness. Waiting can only be endurable if there’s an endpoint.

+

In his studio, Rafayel begins his next painting.

+

iii. the berries tasted sweet, with an edge of sourness that clung to the bottom of the tongue. it had the exact shade of your eyes, a detail that rafayel brought up the moment he plucked it from the shrub. raising it to align with your eyes, comparing them with his artist's meticulous gaze. maybe when this is all over, i'll go back here again to extract ink from these berries, and paint a portrait of your highness using these to color your eyes. he never showed you any of his paintings, merely mentioned them in passing, and you constructed a dream of him from the throwaway words that left his covered lips. i'm not used to sitting for so long, you reminded him, and he glanced at you, then at the berry between his fingers. my memory is enough, then handed you the fruit.

+

In the few weeks of meeting with you Rafayel forgets that his visiting professorship is ending soon and he has to give out his last lecture. Thomas had asked him what his topic would be. At that point Rafayel had no answer. But now he has.

“I’ve been hearing you talk about Lemuria every now and then with your friends.” He props his cheek on his hand, tilting his head slightly and giving you a charming smile. “Interested?”

You blink. “How did you know?”

“Oh, I’ve seen you a couple of times here, and I happened to hear your friends chat about my lecture. Your points were almost accurate, I’m in awe.”

“The visiting professor—that’s you?!”

Rafayel pauses, the slosh of his drink nearly spilling on his frozen hand.

“You didn’t know?”

Sheepish, you say, “Honestly, I didn’t make the connection. Is that why plenty of people have been glaring at me as of late?”

He releases a frustrated sigh, eyes rolling heavenward.

“In any case, my final lecture is on Friday next week. It’s titled “Memory and Meaning in Lemurian Art”. Why don’t you drop by and listen, and you can tell me what you think afterwards.”

You retrieve your bullet journal to check your schedule. It’s colorful, filled with stickers and doodles that Rafayel finds endearing. Then the excited moue on your face drops into a frown, and Rafayel can foresee the next words that will come out of your downturned lips.

“I’m sorry,” you say guiltily, “but I have a major test that day, and I need to get a high score in order to pass the course.”

Rafayel exhales, long and weary, but ultimately shrugs off the apology. “What a shame, but I forgive you. Just don’t fail your exam or else my magnanimity would be all for nothing.”

+

He calls Thomas that night.

“I’ll disappear for a while once the professorship is over.”

“Hey, wait, what do you me—”

“You’ll be happy to know that this is for my next painting.”

A beat. “Okay … but for how long?”

“That’s the question, isn’t it?”

Then he hangs up.

+

He’s trying, he really does. The lecture ends to a resounding applause, and it’s mechanical how he answers the questions posed by the audience. But he’s trying, he’s trying. There’s no specter of you in the sea of faces in the auditorium. You’re at the other end of the university compound, sweating your way through your exam. He genuinely hopes you’d pass, for your sake.

Thomas had booked his flight to another country, where he’ll traverse to a land that he’d visited many times in his dreams and had woken up with a filmy, sweet-sour tang at the roof of his mouth. He’ll leave the morning after the closing dinner party the faculty has prepared for him. There isn’t time to pack much, and no time to tell you goodbye.

Rafayel guesses that it’s only fair: how would you feel waiting for him at that café, the chair across you empty, only the sunlight pooling from the window as your companion?

+

iv. parting, somebody once said, is such a sweet sorrow. much like those berries in that ever-green nation, a lingering sourness remained underneath, the sting of it reminding you every now and then. he was already mourned for even before he left. tell me what it's like—the ocean. he was elusive, untouchable in his grief. you'd heard through whispers, the story of his migration, the drowning before the drying, the unwanted journey. grief brought him to you and grief would steal him away from you, you knew, down to the cells of your body and the hopelessness in your blood. —and yet. and yet you wanted to have a taste of it, anyway.

+

The ever-green land is no longer green, or lush, or alive. Time corroded it into memory, sepia-faded, wizened. Past. The berries he’s searching for don’t grow here anymore. Everything here is empty, barren, helplessly so.

Rafayel hasn’t accounted for such development, but he should have known. Disappointment stings at his chest, and bitterly he turns away and stays at the next town over. At a family-run restaurant situated near the outskirts, he looks over the wide windows, across the highway road, beyond the jagged horizon. The painting won’t be finished, then. Another tragedy, pressed flat next to the forgetting, to the waiting, and his home.

The chef personally serves him his order and, after a shuffle of hesitation, brings up a question.

“Young man, you came from the direction of the old country, yeah?”

Rafayel meets his inquisitive gaze. “Yes, why?”

“It’s been a while since we had someone visiting that place. There’s nothing in there anymore, it’s been that way for years. Why did you go there?”

Rafayel is reluctant to say, but at the guileless set of the older man’s face, he concedes.

“I was looking for berries. The ones native there. They produce a shade that I need for my painting.”

At the mention of the fruit, the chef’s expression lights up. “Oh! I see, I see. You’re in luck, son. We grow them here at the farm. Plenty of those for everyone. How about I give you some? It’s rare meeting someone who still remembers the old country, it’s almost fate. How many did you say you need?”

Fate. Just like the time of your first meeting, as if the universe had gifted you to him. Just like the time of your parting, of your forgetting, of his waiting. Fate as a connection from you to him, red and burning brightly.

He doesn’t want to seem eager, but he knows he’s failed from the way the chef toothily grins at him.

“A hundred or so.”

The chef falters at that, jerking slightly back. But he accepts it with a nod, an avuncular smile making its way across his kind, powdery features.

“That sure is a huge number, but I think we can work something out.”

+

His painting takes a month to complete, inclusive of the time spent making the ink from the acquired berries. Sometimes, Thomas watches him paint, quiet in the background. His stays usually don’t last—a quick flash that Rafayel nearly misses, or deliberately ignores. But during the final stages of the painting process, Thomas hands him the exhibit details.

“I’m just thankful you’re on time for this one.” He sighs, relieved, then leaves.

Alone, Rafayel creates. Brushstroke after careful brushstroke, each varying by pressure and angle. He lets each layer of paint dry before moving onto the next. The berry ink—the color of your eyes—the solely different element of this painting. Center, central. The focal point. The beating heart. The years and years of waiting and longing. The form and the flesh. Alive.

This, too, is an endpoint.

+

v. can i see your face, just this once? your hands grazed his mask like a ghost wanting to touch. rafayel stayed still beneath your desirous fingers, observing, waiting, his own fingers twitching towards his dagger. even in the parting he could not let go of this distance. hopeless, hopeless. your highness would get nothing out of seeing my face. he's wrong, his eyes never left your face, and he's wrong. he didn't stop you from your grasping of his mask, and him—finally—bare and beautiful yet a little sad. you're wrong, you said, tracing his slightly parted lips with a trembling finger, you're wrong. it is everything to me.

+

The gallery is packed. No surprise there. It’s almost boring, in a way. Waiting, Missing hangs at the farthest hall in the floor, special and intimate as it should be. Thomas knows him well; otherwise, Rafayel would have whined at him to hell and back just so he could be granted this demand that is in reality a mandate.

He’s hiding from the throngs of journalists and art critics alike and sequesters himself in a corner that has a clear view of the painting. Loosening his collar and tie, Rafayel breathes and closes his eyes, leans tiredly against the wall. A few more minutes, and he’ll slink out of the building, reputation be damned.

He melts into the shadows whenever somebody passes by. He has neither time nor energy interacting with people today. Watching them through half-mast eyes, Rafayel stays in his secret place and studies with weightless detachment the people looking at the painting.

He’s made a bet with himself about the opinions of his followers and admirers. Who thinks what and why. It makes for great entertainment. The last time, a fresh-faced critic praised Rafayel’s technique as “innovative and a soul-rending reflection of the prodigy’s character.” He had laughed and laughed for hours until he couldn’t breathe any longer.

Another walks by, and before Rafayel retreats further into the corner, he glimpses a familiar gait and a familiar face.

His heartbeat races. He’s never told you that he’s holding an exhibit today. After the professorship Rafayel failed to maintain communication with you, convincing himself that it’s for the best that he protect you from afar that day onwards. It didn’t help that he had to leave as well. At the same time, you never made an effort of reaching out, and Rafayel thought that it was back to square one again, that waiting, that yearning.

But here you are right now, elegantly dressed, like someone gliding out of a dream. Rafayel swallows, his hands shake. You do not have someone else with you, and your eyes are brightly focused on Waiting, Missing, and for a fleeting moment your expression flickers into longing, strange and old and battered and sad, that it compels Rafayel to take a step forward—to you.

“Hey.”

The curious look vanishes; left no traces in your delighted face, as if it wasn’t there in the first place. “Rafayel!” you exclaim. “Long time no see! Congratulations on the exhibit; these are all beautiful.”

Outwardly he smirks, belying the torrential emotions he’s currently going through. He cants his head a little, works his charm on you. “Impressed? No need to hold back your compliments.”

Laughter, prismatic and crystalline. “Yes, yes. Especially this one—Waiting, Missing. What an interesting title. At the center, what paint did you use?”

Ah. Rafayel inhales before answering. “It’s actually ink. I had to make it from a hundred berries. It was a tedious process, but I wouldn’t use anything else. It has to be this, you see.”

“Whoa, no wonder you’d been radio silent all this time. You were creating this masterpiece.”

He hums, afraid that, if he speaks, he’d reveal too much.

“Well …” You throw a playful glance at him. “Shouldn’t we celebrate your success?”

His breath catches. “I—”

Before he manages to finish the sentence, a journalist calls out to him and that summons plenty more, swarming him with no chance of escape. It pushes you out of his peripheral vision, and Rafayel wants to shout your name, but you smile and gesture at him to entertain them first. You mouth, I’ll be back, and wander around other paintings some more.

When he finally succeeds in shaking the journalists off, he seeks you out and stumbles upon you near the exit, where there’s fewer people to pile on him.

“Excellent,” he says, sidling up beside you. You turn to him and smile, and there’s that lightning-flash of something again. For one unbelievably surreal instant, Rafayel thinks that despite your hazy memories, maybe you’d been waiting for him all this time, too.

And that thought emboldens him, moving closer and closer until your bodies almost touch. An asymptote of contact. But this time, he has mustered the courage to close that unbridgeable gap.

Rafayel offers you his hand. “Let’s get out of here?”

You stare at his hand then at his face, his eyes, and a meaningful moment stretches between you and him. But even before the idea of retracting enters his mind, you grab his hand joyfully, grinning ear to ear. His heart warms, full with everything.

You squeeze his hand, ready to go. “Lead the way, then!”

+

vi. a kiss is a greeting and a goodbye, and rafayel tasted of ferocious tides even if you'd seen them only in dreams. his eyes closed, as though savoring his last moments with you, guarded till the bitter end. would that i could ask you to stay—with me. but he shook his head—a final rejection. maybe in another life. there was nobody to watch you cry, in the after.

+

Rafayel is working on a new painting—a portrait this time. The model squirms on his couch, obvious about the discomfort of posing for too long. He huffs a laugh to himself, hidden by the canvas strategically placed between them.

“I heard that,” you grumble.

“Shush, you’re breaking my concentration.”

“If that already breaks your focus then I pity the rest of the art community.” A beat, then: “Is it done?”

“Patience, my dear muse. You need endure it a little more.”

“Hmph, fine. But after this you’re treating me to an all-you-can-eat buffet.”

“All right, all right.” He shakes his head, fond. “My muse, so demanding.”

Something sweet touches the edge of his tongue, succulent with a hint of tartness. Like longing. Except now, it’s layered with something new and exciting. Something like a new beginning.

In the far distance, the sea murmurs, lit fire by the setting sun.

[turnaboutfix]

Oh yes of course!!!

I meant specifically like her very early concept art (blue haired) and like, one of the first ones where she has short hair (but still with those 2 loose locks at the front)? I hope you know which one I'm talking about lolol

BUT if you wanna speak your thoughts on like. All of them. I want to hear 👂❓️

( @ellivcca asked what I thought about Maya's concept art and I replied in priv if they could be more specific)

Let's talk about Maya's designs! ✨

I will skip the blue-haired art for now, since I have more to say about her other early designs. They're in a few Japanese AA Guidebooks, but "逆転裁判2 真相解明マニュアル", or "Gyakuten Saiban 2: Fact-Finding Manual" has the most in one place. There are blurbs that discuss the designs, and I'll do my best to summarize them. My Japanese isn't amazing and I had to mostly rely on machine translation + cross referencing dictionaries, so it's possible I may be inaccurate. Also, I'm a novice at Japanese culture, so if I'm misrepresenting anything please bring this to my attention and I'll correct things accordingly!

The book acknowledges that Maya was intended to be of high-school age, hence the the sailor suit artwork. They seem to suggest that the loose socks was a hint at Maya's spunky personality.

When they began to explore her as a spirit medium (1), they wanted her to come from a wealthy, noble family. It looks like a lot of these explorations made it to Franziska's design, with some of the shapes of the shoulders and the jabot-looking neck wear, which is interesting!

As they kept exploring in the second round of sketches (2), they stressed traditional/folk dress as being an important part of her design. They noted they had her carrying something on her back at the time, which I think hints more to her "folksy" feel.

The beaded necklace she's wearing in (2) are drawn from Mala bead necklaces, which are prayer beads rooted in Hinduism and Buddhism and are said to help focus the mind during meditation. They seem present in a lot of spiritual figures in Japan.

Later (3), they explicitly comment drawing inspiration from the Matagi, a group of hunting clans in the northern Japanese mountains (be careful looking them up, they do bear hunting and there's a lot of explicit imagery, even on the wikipedia).

They comment on that this version of her early character might be very athletic. She also seems to be more stoic in these explorations.

Then, for (4) and (5), they evolved the design to make it look appear more feminine, giving her long hair, but making a note that her look isn't typical of modern people. The large orbs in (3), (4) and (5) I think are supposed be drawn from "Yuigesa"(結袈裟), or harnesses decorated with pom-poms worn by Shugendō practitioners, hermits who live in the mountains and practice asceticism.

Then in (6), they added the magatama and committed to her having black hair. They note shortening the hem of her costume from design (5).

The magatama addition is pretty significant! Magatama necklaces are used by noro priestesses of the Ryukyu Kingdom from the islands in the very south of Japan.

Their religion broadly speaking, involves ancestor worship and the relationships between the living and dead, gods and spirits. It seems to me like the culture in Kurain Village draws a lot from the Ryukyuan people--and you can even see this with the beads along with the magatamas.

But there seems to be a lot of generic imagery of Spirit Mediums that I've been able to find in Japanese media which have shared elements of design in Maya's final design. The most interesting of these to me is "ほんとにあった!霊媒先生", or "It Really Happened! Spirit Medium Teacher". The design similarities are striking (and make me wonder if Maya was an inspiration?)

So, to summarize it all up, it seems like the early designers (and there were only two! Kumiko Suekane and Tatsuro Iwamoto) wanted a character who was different, folksy, feminine and spunky that displayed unique spiritual power to aid in the narrative/game mechanics of the games, and they explored the different facets of their own culture--from the northern Matagi clans to the southern Ryukyuan people--Japanese iconography, and tastes into Maya's final design.

And I think that's Real Neat. :)

Thoughts about other designs (Blue-Haired/SoJ Maya) under the cut cuz oh my gosh this post is already huge.

Blue haired Maya!

What's interesting to me is that a lot of the design language on this early Maya art seems to have been carried over to Ema's design (glasses, boots, coat/skirt). She also has similar vibes to Lynne from Ghost Trick.

I definitely enjoy Maya's final design a lot better, but I like the triadic color harmony and spunk here!

And then her design update in Spirit of Justice! These concepts are from "逆転裁判6 公式ビジュアルブック", or "Gyakuten Saiban 6: Official Visual Book". :)

Takuro Fuse (the character designer) comments that he never drew Maya before when he took a stab at updating her, so he wanted to get that down first before tackling the designs. He wondered how she would change over the course of 11 years, and first experimented with a design, thinking about how Mia would look like as a spirit medium. He thought it would be interesting if Phoenix wouldn't be able to tell if Maya channeled Mia. (Me too tbh.)

I feel like this design has a bit too much going on, but I do like the longer cream colored sleeves!

Takuro talks more about how he was exploring all sorts of designs before landing on something more simple. He wanted her to have what he called a "traveling costume" and was very fond of the hat. These designs seem to pull from similar places I've discussed with Maya's early designs, as well as Japanese pilgrims.

As fun as the additions and changes to her design are, I think it was very smart to just add subtle changes: the longer robes, jacket, and the additional beads to her necklace. The shawl is a nice touch, too. This reflects how post-7yg Phoenix and Edgeworth also have subtle changes to their designs as well, which I love and I think were very smart moves from a design-perspective as well as personal taste. Their designs are very iconic and I think it was a service to maintain that iconography.

This was a very fun thing to explore! Thank you kindly @ellivcca for the ask!

[sanctus-ingenium]

Another one of these since i haven't done it in a while! Sketch -> finished illustration

Thoughts & process below the cut :>

Out of Bounds: i deleted the sketch of this off my ipad because i didn't like it, and for months it only existed as a screenshot on discord. finally in january of this year i was like Wait Actually and decided to keep working on it. I didn't achieve the look I was going for (kind of foggy and vague. It came out too sharp and high contrast) but it was fun to throw the kitchen sink at it for an afternoon and then call it done finally. I don't remember which horse this was originally supposed to be, I think Macha?

I reused the pose, you'll find the same one in my Pascal sketchbook from the section on gait studies. That's the cool thing about doing 30 sketches at once, you can finish them up any time you like for a different drawing

The Fool ft Islin: the original concept for this is from [takes a moment to decipher the american date system on discord] January 2022

It wasn't dynamic enough, but I've had this on the backburner for sooo long. I think I completed like 4 cards in between this sketch and the final version lol. But, for a bit of background, this is from my series of major arcana based in Inver, and in particular the events of the 1860s-era book series, Moth Viper Foal (a demo of the first book, Said The Black Horse, is available for free/pwyw in my shop). This scene is a companion to Said The Black Horse, depicting the aftermath of the traumatic fight that caused Islin to storm off. He had been working at the mill as a semiprofessional back alley surgeon when he received an offer to join the church and work as a trained surgeon in their hospital. But when he brought the good news back to his friends it was met with utter rejection, driving him to basically run away to join the church. while gay and trans. thus the card.

he didn't actually bring a bag with him when he ran out but for the sake of the card i drew him with one

Gryfon and Pantera: This is how 99% of holy beast drawings start out, even the super stylised ones. I struggle a lot to draw them in procreate so they start in sai and then i transfer them over. The story of this is already explained in the caption of the original post so I'll just talk about the process which was... honestly torturous. I actually don't like too much textures and effects on things (wild, I know) and this one and Out of Bounds are ones where I kind of preferred it pre-texturising.

The text on the side is the official in-universe report of the event, detailing the casualties, the valiant actions of Gryfon's knight before he died and so on. There's also spoilers in there :>

My main struggle with this art style is how it always ends up slightly TOO sharp and crisp in a way the just a blur filter never can correct. There's not a lot of immersion to break, to be fair, but I think this still does it a little. I need to get more comfortable doing the lines with larger and softer brushes, and allowing imperfections.

[tartsinarat]

Scary extremely old man jumpscare /j

I completely forgot to redesign Belos for the au and only just realised midway when I drew him for a scene redraw and I was like oh shit- as he doesn’t have a right arm in the au (in this post there a small explanation to why) and I completely forgot so I then had to design a badass prosthetic for him.

Designing the prosthetic was one of my favourite things to do because I designed it around how his cursed form has his muscles/ bones exposed which I tried to mimic and used a real prosthetic arm from the 16th century as a reference but made it more fantasy and extra.

The coolest thing about Belos’s prosthetic in this design is that it also meant to resemble an artificial magic staff because it is one! It works the same way and allows him to do magic without relying on the glyphs.

Ignoring the obvious mechanical prosthetic arm I really only did some small tweaks like colour or outfit for example but I did give him a chapstick to remove those dry ass lips because I just personally didn’t vibe with it lmao

Also i had the weirdest mandela effect as I for some reason remember Belos’s eyebrows being really thick but then I used a reference of him as a base for the redesign and they were so thin??? which is really funny because I made Pip have really thick eyebrows for some reason when originally designing him so I think after drawing Pip loads and not having properly watched toh in a hot minute I probably assumed Belos had them too… Ive finally corrected my mistake as Pip is meant to be an almost perfect replica of Belos and so now Belos has thick eyebrows too so they can be proper twinsies lmao

I wanted him to straight up look like a corpse so his eyes look really uncanny due to how saturated they are in comparison, the specific vibe I wanted for Belos was this specific image of Prince Philip who looks like he is just barely hanging on to the world of the living and seems like he’s having a “weekend at Bernie’s” type of moment

For reference, also sorry for the jump-scare I tried to make it less scary by getting a meme image version of prince Philip/hj

But yeah I’ll probably do a Philip redesign soon because he’s got a cool design already but you can tell that it was really simplified for animation :p and I’m probably going to do an au comic based on elsewhere and elsewhen soon because it’s one of my favourite episodes

[morebird]

Do you have any tips for how you draw faces so good? Besides just visual references? Do you ever free draw them? I've been trying to figure it out but it's been frustrating to try to find the write way to start I feel the more I practice the more complicated it gets

Is.... the way I draw faces that good? I feel like a lot of you see the final artwork and think that it looks this good from the very start, when actually my art with only the line art looks goofy af, at least for me.

I am going to bare you my soul anon, because I think all the lighting and shading makes everything look better than it actually is:

So here it is Mr. Priest himself in various stages of progress, as you can see the face with only the line art is nothing special, the lighting and shadows is what makes it great.

Now for the advice part. For me at least getting the right shape of everything helps. Forget it's a face, it's just pieces that have to fit together. Don't just look at the shape of each part, but also the space between each of them. I wish I had some examples but most of the times I delete that layer once I have a good sketch. But here is a simplified version of what I do:

So I guess this is an advice of how to properly use visual references. I don't draw without references, because I don't trust my brain, some things are fine to draw from memory but faces aren't one of those things. Also this is just me and how I do things, doesn't mean you cant learn and draw from memory.

Maybe your problem is not the same as mine, for me all the individual pieces are easy to draw but it's all of them together what messes with my brain, so with a rough rough sketch I have everything in its place and then I can work on making it "pretty"

This is without getting into perspective, because that's something that I don't know how to teach or explain and it takes some time to get it right. I have been drawing Destiny stuff for 3 years from all kinds of crazy perspective so after all of that practice drawing a face in a 3 point perspective is not that complicated. References help too 😅

I also would like to mention, I am not an expert or professional. I am still learning too, so maybe this is not the best way to approach things. I know that there are multiple more correct ways to draw faces, with all the circles and lines but that never worked for me. I tried to learn it like that, got frustrated and stopped. And then I started treating faces as robot parts that all have it's place and shape, and it worked.

[lunareiitic]

HSR 1.6 SPOILERS AHEAD BE WARNED

I saw a discussion on Reddit earlier where someone talked about how gracious Herta is to Ruan Mei and felt that the plot shows that Ruan Mei is taking advantage of her and I felt like... it's not a bad conclusion to draw from the text but. It feels not correct. Like yes, Herta essentially does let RM do whatever she wants, especially with regards to the space station, and RM doesn't seem to be very thankful for it. (Setting aside the fact that it isn't really Herta's space station. Asta's the one who bankrolls and manages it. It's just got Herta's name on it. Herta is just as uncaring to the researchers lmao) But to call RM a "passive manipulator" (yes, I saw this take too) of her and nothing more I think... overlooks both of their personalities? Taking into account that both of these characters are essentially confirmed autistic (go see the official post about the Genius Society, you can't make this up) their dynamic is a little tragic but very true-to-life.

Herta is loud, pushy, and bratty. She's like a cat- she doesn't take no for an answer and the moment you try to get her to do something she doesn't want to do she goes limp and useless. She admires Ruan Mei because she's nothing like her. And RM would never push Herta to do anything. RM doesn't push. She doesn't even really manipulate. The woman cannot lie to save her life. All she did was ask Herta if she could use part of the space station and Herta obliged, and it sounds like she'd been waiting for Ruan Mei to finally ask her for something. RM doesn't really have a malicious bone in her body. That's what makes her so terrifying. People are often just willing to do as she asks and she makes no pretenses or illusions about herself, her motives, or her life. The closest she gets to lying is just not answering when pressed. She is so socially inept she has to drug the trailblazer into silence so they'll help her. And I think this is... out of embarrassment? If it were me, an autistic bitch who cannot lie to save my life, I would want to do something similar. She knows she's gotten herself into a situation because she left the incubator on too long and then the space station got attacked, but admitting that to Herta would wound her pride and also cause friction between them. You can tell that she brought the Trailblazer into that Genius meeting because she was afraid Herta and Screwllum had caught on to her, and once she realizes that it's just them debating about (in her eyes) nothing, she lets the Trailblazer go. I've seen people call that "callous", as if she was dropping them as soon as they were not useful to her. But she says why she does it basically immediately- she thinks it would bore us and she has something else more important that she needs our help with.

I think the part of Ruan Mei's character that people are overlooking right now is that Ruan Mei does care. Look at the story bit for Genius' Repose, where she serves machine oil in a teacup for Screwllum and promises to send a box of homemade sweets to Herta's flesh-and-blood body. She's the kind of person who is actively thinking of her mother and her grandmother and their little home in the snow every time she eats something sweet. Her creations are literally desperate with love. Love, love, love, love. Love that feels alien to her, love that she can't put into words, love that her alexithymia won't let her ascertain and compartmentalize. Love that is as elusive and vexing and important as that spark of the divine soul she's been chasing all this time. She loves and she loves deeply, to the point of obsession. But she's in love with the past as much as Herta is- their signature light cones both have them reflecting on a past version of themselves that they know they cannot have back. She quite literally brought her mother back to life because she couldn't bear to break a promise to her late grandmother (who... somehow, is still waiting for her... somewhere). She's a deeply sentimental person. Haven't you ever looked at other people and felt, even for just a moment, that you are apart from them? That they have something you lack? What if you let that feeling consume you? Ruan Mei yearns for a world that she cannot touch because she's lost the trees in the greater forest of her mind. She feels the need to become god because she feels so utterly alienated from the world around her. But she can't escape herself, no matter how far she runs.

I guess what I'm trying to say, is that Herta and Ruan Mei are friends, even if Ruan Mei doesn't feel that she's capable of it. It makes a lot of sense that they're both ice too, element ruled primarily by The Remembrance. I wonder how they both feel about that?

[ellabsweet]

[*ੈ✩] 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐃𝐎𝐄𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐎𝐎𝐃 𝐆𝐎 • 𝐄𝐋𝐋𝐀𝐁𝐒

synopsis: you believe your girlfriend ellie has cheated on you and return home only to fall into tears when suddenly your dad’s best friend decides to cheer you up

pairing: dbf!abby anderson x reader x ellie williams

warning: problematic age gap (reader is 20 abby is in her mid 30s), mentions of cheating and the act thereof, sex so minors and men do not interact, somewhat angsty and perhaps a multiple part series if you guys want it!

Tears welled up in your eyes as you attempted to hold back sobs, hands gripping the steering wheel with all of its strength as though the mere thought of letting go would’ve made you shatter onto the ground, collapse. You bit down hard on your lips, a failed attempt to silence yourself and your phone still occasionally lit up with notifications from Ellie you’ve stopped yourself from reading a while ago.

Els <3: Babe please talk to me. You know there is nothing going on, please. Let me explain it, you’re the only one. You’re my girl.

Once the missed calls and texts died down in defeat you could finally gather your thoughts in a sigh, hands rubbing your eyes with an agression unneeded to dry tears, and it suddenly dawned on you the feeling of a stare piercing through your side that your brain has been ignoring the past couple minutes, a curse escaping your lips as you saw the flipped light of your neighbour who calmly approached the car with a concerned expression.

Overprotection was a word so familiar to you it must’ve attached itself to your family tree, and Abby Anderson was its version personified, you had moved out and even then the furthest you could’ve gotten from your parents was straight next door to your dad’s best friend. She would be sure to tell them about this and your fate would remain to be scolded and ostracised for not being able to care of yourself, alone at night crying in a driveway like the foolish child they had always claimed you to be, over a girl nevertheless. You wanted to disappear, melt into the leather seats and escape her gaze, though it was far too late, the blonde was fast knocking on your window.

“Hey petal, you okay?” She asked as you rolled down the glass, hiding a sniff on your sweater’s sleeve, swallowing tears.

“Hi Ms.Anderson”

“It’s just Abby, sweetheart” She corrects you nonchalantly before slowly opening the car door and slipping into the seat next to you “It’s almost two in the morning, why are you out here crying? Do you need me to call your dad-“

“No! God, no! Please it’s just, just stupid. I saw my girlfriend kissing someone else. Didn’t want to go into the house and see pictures of her spread around my room yet”

“That’s not stupid. Heartbreak is always awful, especially when you’re young, I’m so sorry” She says, and with the kindness you dissolve into your crying once again, a mess of sobs. It takes Abby a moment, but it still happens far too quick, her arms suddenly wrapped around your shaking body drawing circles over your back as to calm you down, she’s hushing you and placing your hair behind your ears and you are deeply embarrassed but so far gone to stop “Shhh, petal, look at me”

“I’m so sorry. You deserve so much more than that” Her voice is low, steady, there is something in it that tastes like yearning at the tip of your tongue and all your attempts to brush it off as incoherent dissipated under her intense gaze, staring at you quizzically in a silence so pure it left only heavy breathing to echo and you were scared at your close faces she’d be able to hear your heartbeat, understand what you yourself were struggling to in that moment when her eyes dropped from yours onto your lips.

“Ms.Anderson…” You breathed out hesitantly

“It’s Abby” She corrects you once again until her thumb finds its way to your cheek, gripping your face in her palm as though debating something internally while you melt into her strong touch, finding a stability within her hold that you had been craving for a long while now, too flustered in your thoughts to fully consider what it means when she took that same finger and brushed it against your lips toying with its plump softness into opening lightly for her, finger coming into your mouth to be wet by your tongue flipping around it in a suction movement. The blue in Abby’s eyes darken.

She leans forward once your eyes trace up doe looking at her, she removes her finger with a pop to press your lips together and there is an unexpected softness within the hunger, she takes her time exploring the insides of your mouth gripping your chin to steady in place. There is still time to stop, she thinks to herself, but then her grip lowers to your throat in a light chokehold and the moans you kept release inside your kiss and its muffled sound is enough to drive her past sensibility and even insanity.

“Let me show you how a real woman takes care of you, please” She’s begging and you’re blushing and nodding furiously, a whimper stuck to your throat which is not enough for her “Use your words, petal”

“Y-yes, please” You stutter out not missing the smirk growing on her face, Abby is quick to trail kisses down your neck so wet it distracts you from her hands by the clasp of your bra letting it fall onto the car’s floor, she lifts your shirt up in one swift movement and suddenly her mouth is by your breasts, hovering over your nipples until her warm breath sent them into goosebumps. You whimper impatient and she chuckles taking one into her hand and the other into her mouth, tracing circles over your sensitive area until you’re panting, knees pressing together in anticipation for her tongue elsewhere.

“Fuck, you’re so beautiful” Abby whispers into your skin before moving onto the neglected breast for its own sucking “I bet your little girlfriend didn’t even know what to do with you”

Your eyes flash sadness amongst the arousal and Abby takes none of it, hands quickly unbuttoning the pants you wore and forcing them down your thighs before pressing a slap against them that shakes your body and clears your mind “Gonna make you feel good, yeah? Forget all about her”

She has her fingers down your underwear in a second, muttering curses under her breath at the wetness that completely enveloped her hand, she watches you squirm under her from the lightest of pressure and proceeds to push one finger inside, circling motions hitting your clit continuously, you are a mess of moans when her free hand grabs at your waist and straightens you forwards into riding her hand, second finger added.

“Such a good girl fucking herself on my fingers, such a fucking good girl” She mutters watching you pick up your pace, she’s kissing on your exposed skin and digging her nails across your back, uses her strenght to carry you onto her lap which only digs her fingers deeper inside you, a scream lodged in your throat from the overstimulation “Does she get you all worked up and wet like this, does she even know how to treat this pretty little pussy?” She slaps it with the question and your answer gets lost midway out.

“Abby, I’m gonna-“

“No you’re not, gotta taste you first, pretty girl” Just like that she flips you over, head where you once sat on the driver’s seat and legs up in the air, her mouth quickly latches onto your dripping cunt and it practically slurps on it.

Cat: She didn’t kiss me back. Didn’t want to need to text you this shit but Ellie’s crying and I didn’t want this to happen, I just thought she liked me. Guess she’s too into you. I don’t get it either.

Els<3: I’m kcmhng ovrr to ur hojse so we can talkkd okay pls wait fofr me i loeve you sos much baby

[uva124]

So yeah, I finished the drawing of Asha's redesign from Wish :D, maybe I'll make some changes in the future, but I'm happy to have finished it, it should be noted that I haven't seen the movie. , so I can't give my opinion on it yet, but I found it very interesting that their fandom is mainly made up of people who rewrote or made their own version of the movie, they are all very creative and it got me out of an artistic block. that I had a few months ago, but above all I found the rewriting of @annymation which is the one I have been most hooked on, so I wanted to do some redesigns of the characters coming out of its rewriting, that's why everything that has to do with the story of this version of Asha, as well as her personality and her world on which I base my drawing are the ideas and work of this account: @annymation

I'm just making a drawing of her character and how I would design her as well as sharing part of the process I had to do to draw her because, why not?

BOARD:

The first thing I had to do was put together a table full of references that reminded me of the character and things that I would like to add to her design, so I used milanote to do it:

-Looked for some Asha's concept art and save the ones I liked the most, and add the main colors that I used in the design. -I also created notes to write down the personality of the character and some of his data to have a better guide, I did a little research and found publications that talked a lot about Asha's discarded designs and how Disney workers had put that she had tribe ancestry Amazigh on his mother's side and since his father was from the Iberian Peninsula, that's why the next thing I wanted to do is research more about their culture. -I am not an expert on this topic, nor do I belong to the cultures from which Asha has ancestry, so you can comment on any correction regarding this topic, I wanted to implement details of this culture to her design and I would really like to give a correct representation :)

HAIRSTYLE

Continuing with the theme, I saw that the hairstyles in the Amazigh culture mostly had this type of colorful decorations on their braids and dreadlocks, that's why I also posted these reference photos for Asha's hairstyle.

-Finally I decided that Asha would not have all her hair full of braids or dreadlocks, but only a few accompanied by these decorations with a great variation of colors, although it was fun to sketch the many hairstyle options that I had in mind based on these concept art and other photos that I had saved

TATTOOS:

-Another detail that I liked was giving Asha some tattoos with designs from the Amazigh culture, because I saw that it was quite common for women to get them, the tattoo on her forehead is a symbol of protection against bad influences, that's why the The middle symbol is responsible for deflecting it in the 4 directions, I also added a similar one in Asha's right hand.

ASTROLOGY AND THE SPACE:

-An important part of Asha's rewrite is her knowledge of astronomy inherited from her father, especially with the stars for obvious reasons xd, so in addition to adding constellations to her dresses, research the meaning (or something like that) of the planets. Only 3 really reminded me of the character, which were: -Mars: Symbolization of the internal conquering function of moving forward, independent, self-determined, enduring failures with new energy, courage and energy to fight for your desires. -Saturn: Maturity, effort to solidly build realistic criteria, frustrations are transformed into objectives to continue growing, critical and realistic, far from getting frustrated when an objective does not work, you strive to move forward and obtain even more resistant and solid achievements, perseverance , and tenacity (I feel like yhis it the most similar to Asha :D) -Moon: protective role, feeling very vulnerable outside your known areas, feeling of security with your ties, importance of family ties. The one that reminded me the most of Asha was Saturn, that's why I drew those Saturn-shaped earrings :).

SUITS:

I looked for references and placed some on milanote, I noticed that the concept art was mainly divided into whether the dresses have lilac colors or warm colors, I decided to draw 2 models based on the discarded designs, although at first I thought of using only one color palette lilac and bluish, I realized that the reddish colors of her dress reminded me of Mars which has certain meanings that in my opinion coincide with Asha's personality. In the end I didn't decide what wardrobe she would primarily have 😅, but I like to think that in this version of Wish, Asha would have wardrobe and hairstyle changes like in some older Disney movies.

-These are some of the concepts that I mainly used for my version of the dresses

FINAL COMMENTS:

I am satisfied with the result, it was fun to make all this, although what I researched mostly seems little, it actually cost me several hours and I did it at night, so as a funny fact the next day I was explaining all this information to my mother and I felt like I looked like that:

(Make this drawing was so funny LMAO)

(Apologies if there are errors in my writing, English is not my first language and my writing is very basic)

[scoatneyhall]

WILD. Was anyone else aware that the Ted Lasso team has gone in and made post-production edits on season 3 episodes, sometime in the last year?

I've been rewatching the finale in advance of the one year anniversary of it airing, and straight off, I noticed that the points total on the graphic looked different to how I remembered it - a much closer race. It stuck out because I remembered being annoyed that they didn't celebrate the moment Richmond got confirmed for the Champions League, as the gap was big enough for it to have happened a while ago, offscreen. I still have a screencap from when the episode aired:

However, the current copy on Apple has an updated graphic, making the post-production graphic in line with the numbers on the actual physical whiteboard prop and the script mentioning the win streak. See here:

The corrected copy makes Richmond's points match the whiteboard, but it also puts the teams in 3rd to 5th place much closer to them points-total wise, meaning that now, in the current version of the episode, Richmond only qualified for the UCL in "Mom City," making it make more sense that the start of 3.12 is the first time it gets discussed. Would have been nice to mention that stake in the City match commentary during 3.11, but I genuinely am shocked that they went back in and edited the already-published episodes to clean up the post-production errors. For the record, here's the whiteboard as of 3.08: W10, D9, L6.

Just in case anyone cares, the order of those results was - 1 draw against Chelsea, 6 wins with Zava, 1 loss against West Ham, the rest of the draws and losses occurring between 3.05 and the loss against Arsenal in 3.07, and then the 4 wins mentioned at the start of 3.08. By the start of 3.12, it's mentioned they are on a 16 game win streak, so that's 22 wins overall, 9 draws, 6 losses, going into the final weekend, hence the updated graphic.

I like that they went in and fixed it - no idea when in the past 12 months that occured - but I also kind of can't believe they bothered? Then again, I can't believe the mistake was made in the first place, as they were so specific with details in the prior seasons, so maybe they couldn't live with it being wrong.

I know there were rumours about a ton of issues in terms of getting these episodes posted in time - right down to the wire, still fixing the edit on the airdate - and it's clear that these details were not checked and confirmed by the poor people in post who were not working off the show bible that lives in the writers heads. I don't blame them at all, I blame the people who got the edit to them late, but it did annoy me during the season a LOT. The maths wasn't mathing, and as we know this is a show that has been careful with dates and timelines and stuff like that.

Anyway! The point is, a) this post about my UCL qualification fantasies is now moot, and b) I went back and checked another post production error that had REALLY pissed me off, which was the dates of texts in Ted's phone in 3.04. Phone dates have always given us the timeline quite strictly before - it's how @belmottetower and I started the timeline in our primer, with Ted arriving in London on January 6, 2020 and then following the football seasons from there to place the season 3 finale in May 2022 - but in 3.04, all the cute texts we see to all the characters in his phone were badly misdated, placing the timeline further in the future. This caused arguments or misunderstandings, at the time about the actual timeline of the show, but it seems this was another detail the producers really wanted to fix and tighten up, as they've gone back and had it edited.

It's weird, because the texts Ted was actually going back to - the messages from Doctor Jacob - were dated correctly as late 2019, and there's even a little easter egg in the form of a US rideshare notification picking him up to go to the airport in America, on 5 January 2020. (Even the area code, 316, is apparently correct to Kansas.) That's all correct even in the original version of the episode, but somehow we then skip a year and place his most recent texts, as of 3.04, in late October 2022, when they should only be in late September or early October 2021. (I found this post on Reddit that screenshotted his phone at the time.) Examples:

I had to go back and check this, and sure enough, it's been edited to reflect the established timeline - they didn't just redate the year on each message, they also changed a bunch of the chats to be more recent - so rather than dates, his most recent chats with Henry, the Coaches, etc are from "Yesterday," then the first dated texts are in very late September 2021. This matches up pretty perfectly with where they are in a typical Premier League season - they REALLY cleaned it up. Further back, they do just switch the years on the dates, so he still got a picture from Sassy last Valentines Day, and his last one-on-one contact with Jamie is still set before the events of Wembley in 2.08 (FA Cup semi finals are in April, so a few weeks after the March 2021 date on Jamie's chat.)

My brain is itching because I swear there was a screen of Nate and Ted's text chat at some point too? With Ted reaching out about his new job, on a date that deeply did not work with the timeline? But maybe I imagined it. There's no record of Nate's number in his phone at all now, and the texts date back to before Nate left, so I guess in this version of events, Ted deleted Nate's number and message history.

Anyway, I'm aware that basically no one is going to care about this, but I suspect that the three people who will actually care will REALLY FUCKING CARE. Has anyone else noticed it? Does anyone know when it may have happened? Does anyone know what else might have been changed or fixed? I love details and I love the fact that there is no longer conflicting data about what football seasons the show is covering - it's mid 19/20 to the end of 21/22, end of story - but what a fucking mess the production of season 3 must have been, to end up at this point!