#tumblr is the best with this and i’d be happy to go through and manually write them down on each individual site | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

joshslater · 2 years

Text

Delayed Graduation

Repost of an old story that was previously flagged as too risqué for tumblr. Similar stories and bonus material on my Patreon.

- We might have a solution of sorts for you.

I barely registered principal Johnston talking. My world had been shattered, without warning. It all felt unreal, and most of all unfair. I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong, but there were no witnesses, just my word against hers. She wouldn’t press charges, Johnston had explained. I was almost demanding that she did, so I could clear my name, but thought better of it. If it went to trial all outcomes would be bad, to varying degrees. This way I would just be expelled. I guess I could use the term “drop out” to soften it further. It’s not like the job market is stellar even if you have a degree, but this would firmly pigeon hole me as manual labor.

- What? - I said we might have an arrangement that could interest you.

He pulled out a stack of papers from his manila folder and placed them in front of me, and continued.

- We have a little trial project we would like to push ahead with, to see what the full potential is. Coach Andrews would personally take charge of your training to see how far he can take you in a year. Similar to what he managed to do for Shane O’Brian. Since you will be heavily supervised, fully scheduled and not share any classes with your former class mates, she has agreed to allow you complete your studies under these conditions. It’s not that many months until she graduates anyway. Your graduation obviously will have to wait until next year.

Shane of course was the star of the basket team. He was two years below me, so I didn’t know him, but I heard he had basically never touched a ball before he met coach. He must have been active in something else though, with that body. The girls were swooning like crazy. Some of the boys too, as rumor had it.

- Sir, I’m really grateful for this opportunity, but I’m not really made for sports. Just look at me. Tall and thin. Not much track and field around here. - We are not asking for any miracles. Just follow all instructions given and do your best. That’s all we’re asking.

I started to flip through the papers. I was bored just looking at the page numbers.

- Should I bring this home to my parents? - This is a bit time sensitive, so I’d prefer if you make your decision already today. You’re 18. You get to decide this on your own. Why don’t I leave you for a bit? You can have a read through, and then decide what you want to do.

As he left the room I started to go read through the contract properly. Why do they make things so complicated? The contract really just said that I assumed responsibility for the “infraction”, but the school would not disclose it to anyone unless the contract was breached. I would agree to participate in the athletic education study for one year. In return the school would allow me to graduate next year. But written over 26 pages.

I didn’t feel like I had many options. Initials on every page and signature on the last. Then repeated on the second copy of the contract. I was about to leave and find principal Johnston when he returned, followed by coach Andrews.

- Have you made up your mind, or would you like Mr. Andrews to explain it in more detail. - I’ve already signed the papers. - Oh, well then. I’m so happy we could work something out.

Coach Andrews opened the gym bag he was carrying and pulled out a blue singlet and ear guards, and held them for me to take.

- Let’s try this on right away. - Now? Here?

Johnston opened a door to a side room of his office.

- You can change in the conference room here. - But wrestling?! Have you seen me? - As I said, follow all instructions and do your best is all we ask.

It was the first time I even held a singlet in my hands. I’ve never even thought of how to put one on. It wasn’t hard, just step in them like some shorts and then pull the straps over your shoulders, but I never imagined doing it.

I looked ridiculous. I guess size isn’t as important when the fabric is stretchy, but this sure wasn’t my size. The taut straps pulled the fabric in the groin, while at the same time my thin legs didn’t fill out the legs of the singlet. What a mess. I walked back into the office, naked apart from this one single piece of clothing.

- Should I put on the ear guards as well. - No, that isn’t necessary. Here.

Coach opened a small, brown, glass bottle and poured its contents into a white plastic cup from the water cooler, and handed it to me.

- This is the time sensitive part. Drink up.

This day was going from horrendously bad to confusing to weird. I emptied the cup. The liquid tasted like cough syrup. Sickly sweet and with bitter herbs.

- What is.. *cough* *cough* - Here. Take a seat.

It felt like drinking really hot cocoa when you are frozen. It kind of spreads from the chest to the rest of the body. All of me was getting warm, and an uncomfortable feeling or pressure. Everything was off, like I was drunk, or high or something. It was over in a minute, though it is quite possible my mind was playing tricks and it really was longer than that.

- Stand up against the wall, so I can take a photo.

Bewildered, and with unsteady steps, I did as told. He snapped a few pictures with his phone, and then showed me one.

- Don’t tell me this isn’t a great starting point.

I couldn’t believe what I saw. It was definitely me in the photo, but it was like the aspect ratio was wrong. I must be several inches shorter, but everything, arms, legs, chest, shoulders, neck, was wider. Even my face was altered, if ever so slightly. Where just minutes before, or whatever, I was a lanky gamer, I now was a hunk of muscle.

- How is this... - Don’t worry about the details. We must work quickly now while you are fresh, to get the wrestling technique right. Meet me in my office tomorrow at 7 am.

With that he slapped me on the shoulder and left. Just as he was about to exit the office, he pulled out a pair of shoes from the bag and placed them at a table.

- Oh, I almost forgot these. Your new size. See you tomorrow!

My head was spinning. What had just happened to me, to my body? Starting point? Principal Johnston had his distinct “anything else?” look.

- What about my studies?

My voice was lower than before, I think.

- You’ll be placed in the athlete’s reduced curriculum class. We just need to retest your proficiency levels first. - Why? I don’t understand. - My point exactly.

He didn’t make any sense. I felt tired, slow and almost dizzy trying to understand him.

- What about this body? What happens when I graduate? - You graduate with the body you have, like everyone else. It’s not like we can change it by magic or anything.

He smiled and chuckled to himself.

- Take your old clothes with you as you leave. Something might still fit.

Nothing did.

799 notes · View notes

chorusfm · 9 months

Text

Rank It All! Or Did I Just Create a Monster?

If there’s one thing we like to do around here, it’s rank things. From our End of the Year lists to the countless albums/sports/food rankings in the forums, it’s just a tradition at this point. When the conversation dies down, break out a ranking. The other night, I was lying in bed thinking about the “bias sorter” going around Tumblr in 2018. It originated, I believe, as a way for people to rank their favorite K-pop bands. I’d been using it for the past few years to start my end of the year album rankings. It’s an excellent way to review a list and decide what you like more: A or B. But the problem is that it’s a pain to use. You need to enter each item individually, click enter, after each one, and then go through the ranking process. And after you’re done, there’s no good way to do it again without manually re-entering all those items. I started wondering if I could put something together that would let me input any size list of things I wanted, and then it could present them to me one at a time to pick from and give me a final ranking. I tossed together a proof of concept using a modified version of the original1 Tumblr code, and I pretty quickly had something that worked. I took my first draft and tossed it together with the basic Chorus bootstrap stylesheet. Then, because I wanted to see if it would work and didn’t have much time to dedicate to this project, I threw all the code at Chat-GPT and told it what I wanted to change and how I wanted it to work. After about an hour of fixing up the AI code, I had a viable prototype that did 95% of what I wanted it to do. It starts with a big text box; you put in your list of items you want to rank, you click rank, you rank, and then you get the results. I then wanted two other features. After you rank, I wanted a quick button to copy the ranking to your clipboard so you can share it. And then I wanted a share button that would share the list of items you just ranked so someone else could rank the same list as you. This took a little bit of extra work, but it makes this whole thing much more fun. Because now not only can you rank anything, but you can quickly rank: * Blink-182 albums * Yellowcard albums * Fall Out Boy albums * Taylor Swift albums * Butch Walker albums * Andrew McMahon albums * Jimmy Eat World albums * Thrice albums * Motion City Soundtrack albums * Bruce Springsteen albums * Green Day albums And that’s just a tiny sampling of what the community has created in the past few hours. What I like about this feature is how easy it is to spin up and share a new list. And then how fast you can go through even a relatively large number of items. (Pro-Tip: On a desktop computer, you can use the left and right arrow keys to make your choices faster without clicking the buttons.) The page is designed, like Chorus, to load as quickly as possible and be lightweight. And none of the information entered into the box is saved to any database. This is the first version, and I still have some bug fixes and other tweaks to make, but I wanted to share it with everyone to get more people using it and see if any issues pop up. Please let me know if you see or encounter any bugs in the comments. Happy ranking!2 The Main Screen Putting in Your List Making Your Picks The Results --- * Best I can find, I believe this is the original author.↩ * Funny aside: While I made this to help make ranking my end-of-the-year lists easier when I have a bunch of items to sort, after showing it to Hannah, she came up with another use: us deciding what we want to watch next. Toss in a list of options, we both rank what sounds best and compare. I bet it would help with dinner choices, too.↩ --- Please consider becoming a member so we can keep bringing you stories like this one. ◎ https://chorus.fm/features/articles/rank-it-all-or-did-i-just-create-a-monster/

0 notes

yesjejunus · 3 years

Note

I'm happy to see that you're back! I was honestly worried that whole experience would stifle your passion for creating art. It truly hurt my heart to think we had lost artists. I'm overjoyed to see you're still drawing, and are sharing your work again!

I hope people are kinder and/or more responsible for their personal online experience this time around.

Will you be re-uploading any of your art from before? Or are you moving forward with a clean slate?

Best wishes, happy new year!

You know, in the past I’ve wanted to downplay how much these callouts affect me, because I didn’t want to give perverse power to the people who have harassed me, but I decided that I’m going to be more honest moving forward, and letting down some of the walls I have. All posts even tangentially related to the drama will be tagged with Fallout Callout, for those of you who would like to blacklist that (although I would like to assure you right up front that I don’t plan for that to be a regular thing, as I DO prefer to focus on the positives in life, and keep my blog relatively light and centered on Fallout). So with that out of the way

Yeahhhh I won’t lie, the month following the last callout I basically just... laid in bed. I sincerely don’t even remember much of it. I felt weak for bailing out, I felt like I had “let them win”, I was angry at the entire situation, and I was still terrified of my personal information being leaked, even though I’d left. I watched my harassers fuckin cheer what they had done. I’ve seen people accuse me of faking the abuse and sexual trauma I’ve lived through, I’ve even seen people who straight up said that I deserved it (tumblr really loves to protect survivors, but only the good and pure ones they deem worthy of it!).

The worst part though was that I just didn’t want to draw or write at all. This is probably a poor way to announce that I have another novel length fic in the works, but it even put me off of working on that. I uninstalled the game, and even changed my phone bg because anything even related to fallout was this horrific reminder of how fucking cruel people are.

It took talking to someone else who had been the target of a major callout/cancelling to feel okay with it. To feel like I wasn’t alone. They encouraged me to keep writing and drawing, and so I made myself, and I am lucky, SO DAMN LUCKY that I still found joy in it. I thank that person from the bottom of my heart that they gave me that nudge forward, and told me that it was okay to hurt because of what happened to me. If you see this, thank you again, you will never know the absolutely measurable difference you had on my outlook on this entire situation and my ability to cope with it.

I’m sorry that probably got a little deeper than you were necessarily asking for, but it’s good to get this off my chest. I hope that people will be kinder this time as well. I wish for people to remember that I’m human, as are all of my friends and supporters.

To answer your question though, I am actually do plan to post my old works! Most of my friends have reblogged something of mine at least once or twice, so I’m digging through archives and making a queue of old art and discussions, and if any of you have links to something I haven’t posted, please feel free to send them to me! If I’m unable to track something down, then I’ll just manually reupload it.

Thank you very much for this ask, it means a lot to me, and I hope that you have a good year too anon!

#Fallout Callout #Anonymous

41 notes · View notes

annakie · 3 years

Text

Are we out of the woods yet?

Hey all, haven't been on tumblr in a few days!

I have been living through what so many other Texans have been living through, so I thought I’d write a bunch of words about it, for posterity. My story isn’t nearly as bad as so many others, but hey, it was still a fairly major historical event so... writing it for my own memories. :)

Post title because that particular Taylor Swift song was stuck in my head for most of the last few days, for obvious reasons.

So the last week has been an adventure! Last Friday I got my first Moderna Vaccine, and I posted about it a few times, but by Monday was feeling pretty good. Of course, it snowed overnight. I'd been so out of it all weekend I didn't realize quite how bad it was going to be, but when a friend who lives nearby told me his power was out I kinda went "uh oh", baked myself a box mix of orange cranberry bread, fortified some windows with blankets, and crossed my fingers. Also starting that morning I'd reduced the temperature in the house, and shut off and unplugged everything non-essential.

I was feeling pretty happy when the power stayed on all day. My friend's power came back that evening so I thought I was out of the woods.

And then at 10pm... plunged into darkness.

I threw some more blankets into areas where the cats hang out and my bed, let some friends know, and tried to go to bed, hoping for the best in the morning. Couldn't fall asleep for hours, worrying, as the temperature was plunging to the negatives for the first time in living memory in Texas. Finally fell into a restless sleep, and woke up a few hours later, no power.

The worst thing about no power is like, all the things you can't do. My phone started at 100% charge and I'd charged all my devices including my backup battery, but still tried to conserve power. The scary thing was hearing that this could last for days. And boy the news that day was bleak about the possibility of having power again anytime soon. The house, however, stayed at about 51 degrees the entire day. So, it was cold, but very bearable with a few layers and blankets. Whichever cats I was near were very cuddly though.

I was really glad to have the cranberry orange bread because it was tasty and easy to eat. Also had a sizeable amount of beef jerkey, and chips, and I'd bought about 48 bottles of water at the start of the pandemic that I never drank, so I had no worries about what to eat for the time, luckily. I figured, worst case, I'd figure out a way to do soup over a candle to have a hot meal eventually.

I’d been dripping the bathtub and checking the other faucets regularly. I’ve never had a burst pipe in the normal cold we have, and was hoping for the best this time as well. All seemed well the entire day.

I slept a lot when I wasn't scrolling twitter and nextdoor for information. And early afternoon there was a knock on the door. My mom literally called the cops to do a wellness check on me because I hadn't answered texts in a few hours, lol. I thanked him, and called my mom. Internet had been spotty and her calls weren't going through, nor notifications when I got texts. So that was... notable.

I tried doing some reading, and playing on my Switch but to be honest, I was so anxious about everything that I couldn’t relax and keep my mind on anything but the lack of power and when it’d come back. I did take about four naps though. Considered bringing some of the cats into the car with me to warm up but realized I’d have to lift the garage door manually to run the car without, you know, dying, and instead just turned it on for less than a minute twice that day to keep the battery fresh...er... without carbon monoxide poisoning. (My garage door is solid wood. Even with good springs... it’s heavy.)

By the time it started to get dark, I started to worry about how much longer this would go on. I have a friend who has a 4-wheel drive... idk a land rover or something. He lives about 30 minutes away normally. It'd probably take well over an hour for him to get there now, especially since there was another storm coming that night. Since learning my power was out, he'd been asking if he could come get me, and they had steady rolling blackouts in their neighborhood, several other people I knew nearby were also saying their blackouts were rolling along.

I resisted, because I really didn't want to move the cats but I would never ever abandon my pets. But also it would be very difficult to move them. Patchy doesn't get along with any of them -- she stays in the master bedroom 100% of the time. There was a short period of time last year she would explore the house, but she got along with everyone else, especially Fry, so poorly that she decided she did not want to explore the house anymore. Fry sometimes wanders into the master bedroom and if they're both on the floor there's lots of hissing and yelling, and maybe swatting. She also has nothing but hissing for Pemily and Leela if she sees them. The master is her domain, the rest of the cats can have everything else.

Everyone else can be mean to Leela, though she gets along OK with Pemily most of the time.

But Fry is just... hoo boy he is nothing but a problem child I don’t want to subject on others. He’s a bully and an asshole and yells loudly when anything doesn’t go his way. He would really, really not take a new environment well. He hates the outside, and runs away when I even open a door. And getting him to the vet involves kitty sleeping pills, though he also still fights through it enough to freak out the entire time he’s in a carrier badly, yeowling the entire time and literally rips all his nails off trying to get out, still trying to dig his way out with bloody paws. It’s a nightmare. So the thought of getting all four of them into carriers at the same time, then putting them all in a car for well over an hour (and the entire trip would be nothing but all four of them crying the entire time with Fry being the worst), then bringing them into someone else’s house, and needing two separate rooms because I can’t put Patchy in the same room as the other three... and trying to keep them all calm in a whole new situation when none of them were used to any other environment than my house (aside from yearly trips to the vet) man... moving them was a last resort.

But around 10pm when I had been sitting in the dark for 24 hours, I texted him and said in the morning, if the power wasn't on, we'd talk about him coming to get me and the cats in the morning.

I fortified Leela’s bed with a blanket fort. (Pic above was from later, when I got power, and was way more open than I kept it when it was cold.) I couldn’t get her to move anywhere else... it actually worked pretty well.

I fortified the master bedroom with blankets over the sliding glass door on Monday and then put Patchy’s cat bed on the bed and fortified IT with more blankets. After she was settled in I managed to get her covered up. Then I went into the living room, which is the smallest room in the house and a room most would use as a bedroom, and snuggled into the couch with Fry and Pemily, the door cracked for ventilation, and four candles burning.

Fell asleep around 10:30.

Around midnight I was woken up by a terrifying sound... running water. Honestly thought I was dreaming for a moment, had to work to pull myself out of my dream, and my heart froze in terror that I may have a burst pipe. And then I heard a very, very good sound... the furnace turning on.

POWER! 26 hours later.. POWER. The running water sound was the cats’ water fountain.

Got out of bed, nuked myself a small frozen pizza, checked around the house for everything and everyone being OK, plugged in all my portable devices to recharge, and went back to sleep. Woke up around 4 and still had power. I thought... I really wanted a hot meal and should cook something that wouldn’t be bad as cold leftovers for lunch, as I’d finished the cranberry orange bread when I woke up at midnight. I didn’t want to use too much power so uh... I made Fettuccine Alfredo, and ate half of it... at 4am. What? It was good.

Also... I hadn’t seen the stray cat I’d been taking care of since Sunday night. He hadn’t even visited because there were no tracks in the snow. Checked the backyard randomly and he was there!!! So he got food and water. I was very happy.

THERE’S THE BOY! I call him Patchy’s Boyfriend. Taken through the blinds as to not scare him.

Animal tracks in the snow!! I was glad some birbs got some water, too!

Went back to bed in my own bed. Woke up a little later than normal for work with the power still on. Texted my folks to tell them the good news. Got up and went into the kitchen, started contemplating coffee and pancakes for a hot meal. Opened the fridge for the first time and checked the milk. Sadly, it didn’t survive, and realized I was a dumbass for not just.. putting the groceries... in the garage... where it was cold...

And just as I sighed and started to decide if I wanted coffee without milk... the power went back off. Aw, damn.

My spirits were lifted, though, at having power and a warm house overnight. I checked in with work and let them know I’d be out again unless the power came back, told my friends and said NOT to come get me, decided NOT to tell my mom the power was off again, because all that would do is make them worry about me all day again, checked on the cats and tucked them in, and went back to bed. Got some more sleep.

Relaxed more that day, with the house taking longer to cool down. Actually played some Switch, read the first couple of books in the Mass Effect Comic Collection. Had cold Alfredo and an apple with peanut butter for lunch. Scrolled twitter a lot more, not afraid to have to go to my backup battery if needed.

Right around the time I’d usually be knocking off for work... the power came on again.

And it didn’t shut off. Yay.

In total I was without power somewhere around 34 hours. It sucked.. but also... I didn’t have my pipes burst... they didn’t even freeze. The house never dipped below 50, thanks insulation! My water was always running, though for a few hours it was very low pressure, and always clean. My city government and congressman were both very involved and communicative, doing their best to help people and get the word out. City had two warming centers should I have needed them, one of which was pet friendly. I had plenty of food and water, enough for a week or more easily. I had friends willing to put themselves at risk and through inconvenience to make sure I was taken care of.

A lot of people had it much, much worse. So yeah. I don’t ever wanna do that again, but for me, it wasn’t all that bad.

Shoutouts to:

My nearby friend Eric, who would have let me stay at his place if needed.

My far-away friend Marcus for offering to come and get me, and suffer the inconvenience of my cats. Other friends would have if I’d asked, too.

My queen sized purple fleece blanket for being so warm and comforting.

My warm fuzzy bathrobe, messy bun beanie, and fuzzy slippers for making sure I was never all that cold.

My cats for weathering things well. They also learned that maybe they DO like being under covers now.

My LED Headlamp for providing hands-free light for hours and hours.

My mom for a bag of candles she gave me YEARS ago I always would see and want to throw out, but didn’t let myself just in case I needed them someday. I burned many of them and they kept me warm that second night.

Also my mom for... calling... the police... on me? I know she loves me. Also that cop for having a sense of humor about it and telling me to call my mom more often lol. ACAB and all, but I shoulda checked my texts.

My Switch and Mass Effect Comic Collection for being huge piles of entertainment when I could finally relax and read them.

My coworker Monica for suggesting I make something I could snack on easily in case we lost power. That cranberry orange bread was perfect.

Me for never throwing away a blanket. I should probably donate some, though. Between the cats and covering windows and me, though.. I used... a lot of blankets.

4am Fettuccine Alfredo.

My municipal utilities for already saying our bills wouldn’t be drastically higher from this month. Although, I take it back for being real bad at the “rolling” part of the “rolling” blackouts.

Also, one more thing... FUCK YOU TED CRUZ, YOU DESERTING PIECE OF SHIT. BETO O’ROURKE DOES YOUR JOB BETTER THAN YOU WITHOUT THE TITLE, POWER, OR PAYCHECK.

#personal post tag thingy #snowpocolypse2021

20 notes · View notes

cosplayinamerica · 3 years

Photo

COSPLAY THEME PAGE : ShareMyCosplay.com

Tell us about ShareMyCosplay, what was the genesis of the ShareMyCosplay?

Share My Cosplay has gone through quite the journey to get to what you see today. I can still remember the day that I came up with the idea that would eventually lead to Share My Cosplay. I was eating lunch with a few friends at my day job. A friend of mine showed me a cosplay of Jessica Nigri as Pikachu, and because I worked in IT, for some reason had an idea of doing a website related to cosplay. The actual website took a while to set up, but I started off slowly, with an initial launch on social media. We launched with Tumblr and Twitter, slowly building an audience. Then eventually a little bit later adding Facebook, and eventually much later introducing Instagram into the “family’. Eventually we added the website and have been going strong since then. We’ve of course made tons of adjustments over the years, and most recently started adding content on YouTube. It’s been a great ride so far, and hopefully it will continue.

What was your first experience with cosplay as well as the convention scene?

Like a lot of people who are into gaming and comic books, I was aware of cosplay, but didn’t really know much about it. It was only after looking into the idea of starting a site that I really got to know what goes on behind the scenes. It was meeting and talking to people in the scene that made me realize what an amazing community of people are involved. That is why I have continued the site for so long. As our social media following grew, I got to know more and more of the cosplayers, and was so happy I was able to use what I had created to help them gain more exposure. Share My Cosplay exists as a place where all cosplayers can have their work properly showcased.

As for conventions. While I live in the capital city of Canada, Ottawa is a relatively small city of one million people. Conventions have only really made it big in the last 5 years or so and before that were never a really big thing. I had travelled to other cities within Canada for some conventions, but those were mainly toy based conventions, so there would just be a handful of devoted cosplayers hanging out. It wasn’t until much later, when conventions started to take off, that our city got it’s own “Comic-con”. Then things exploded quickly. When our first Ottawa Comic-con launched, I was there day one, and the lineup was out of the building and wrapped around the whole building. I think it took a couple of hours to actually get into the convention floor. I could only assume it was similar to something like entering SDCC, but on a much smaller scale.

So while that has been a staple in our city for the last 10 years, I’ve also been traveling to Montreal Comic-con, which is a little bigger. Since there are maybe fewer conventions in Canada, people seem to come from great distances to show off the cosplays they had worked out. The dream has always been to try and get to SDCC, but that hasn’t happened yet. Travel is so expensive from Canada.

So for the short term I had set my sights on visiting NYCC, which is a “quick” drive from my area of Canada. However like all plans, they fell through. I had plans to go to NYCC and E3 in 2020, but of course those fell through because of what happened around the world. I miss conventions. One because they are such a great way to meet and interact with the cosplayers, and two, it’s one of the primary places we get content to share on our site and pages. So that has been lacking for us recently. Fingers crossed things will get back to normal soon.

How has cosplay changed over the years in your perspective?

Like everything you get to know, it evolves and grows over time. Being knee deep in cosplay all the time (my inbox once had 100+gb of cosplay submissions), I have certainly seen it change over the years. Obviously cosplays have become more elaborate in construction. Things like LEDs are so cheap now, I always find it amazing when people incorporate them into a costume. So the cosplay builds just get bigger and better every year. Also I find the resources on the internet have gotten better. Cosplayers are now able to find more detailed pictures of what they want to create, giving them a way better idea of what and how they will do it for a certain character.

Another thing that has changed, are the absolutely stunning Cosplay edits you’ll see on social media. So why the cosplay photographers have always been an integral part of the equation (we try hard to tag them when people include their details on submissions), the level that the editing on pictures has changed over the years is dramatic. You’ll often see the time-lapsed photo creations on Social, and they are just mesmerizing to watch. People put so much time into creating these worlds to help elevate the cosplay to the next level. That has certainly changed over the years. That being said, we still love regular shots of cosplay too, the amount of photographers that specialize in cosplay has jumped a lot too.

In general, it seems cosplay has evolved from a simple hobby where you could throw something together to wear to a weekend convention, to a full time gig where people spend months on at a time for each one of their creations.

How has ShareMyCosplay changed over the years?

In my eyes SMC has evolved greatly over the years. As the editor there have been two major changes, and I think it has improved the way we do things. The first thing would be, when we first started I used to go “collect” the cosplay that we shared. So I had to either go find it, or reach out to people. I spent a lot of time tracking down cosplay to share, that I personally thought was cool or very creative. As you can imagine this took a lot of time. So this has changed dramatically over the past 3 - 5 years. Now I’m happy to say that we are 99.9% based on submissions from users. So while there is less than 1% of content that we do go out and ask for, it is basically all based on what people send us to share. So that is why you see such a great variety of cosplay content on our pages. There is a downside to this in a way, as compared to some other pages out there that only feature certain types of cosplayers, some people enjoy that a bit more and those pages can have more of a following then we do. However we are really happy with the content we put out.

Then the second big change, that has certainly led to better content for our pages, is the introduction of automation. When SMC first started, I had to do everything manually. Like I would be on Twitter or my phone doing everything live, and sharing items. It took up a lot of my time, and greatly affected my personal life. At times I think I must have been crazy, as this is a free service that we provide, and I was putting hours into each day. Now of course things have changed and the Social Media aspect of SMC is way easier to manage. Facebook, Twitter and Instagram all have official tools available that allow you to schedule your posts. So you can easily take an hour or 2 and work on several days of a week at the same time, or if you were really organized, schedule the whole week. So I’ve learned to embrace this a bit more and learn the ins and outs of it. This leads to a more constant stream of content that our followers seem to enjoy. Which seems to lead to more engagement from our followers.

What’s the best part / worst part of running a cosplay theme page?

The best part has obviously been meeting & interacting with the community throughout the years. We do our best to present a positive place where everyone can share their cosplay creations. We’ve been invited to some really cool events over the years, and our team has been able to go to a lot of conventions all over the world. It’s been a fun ride.

The worst part for me personally, is that while our team has grown and shrank over the years, I do most of the work by myself. Sharemycosplay.com is run by a single person, me. Also for the most part there is a single person doing all of the social media. So I do my best to have content up all of the time, but sometimes life gets in the way. We’ve put a few calls out for people that might want to help with content creation for the site, but sometimes it’s hard to attract people interested in helping. Right now I’d love a few writers that could write articles that I could wrap around cosplay posts for the page. We will have to see how that turns out.

What future plans do you have for ShareMyCosplay?

I’m always looking to expand Sharemycosplay.com with new content. During the pandemic I’ve been off my normal schedule so unfortunately updates have been a bit slow, but hoping to get back to things. With conventions off the table for now for the most part, I’m trying to move in different directions. I’ve recently tried to put more effort into YouTube, but even that has been impacted by the Pandemic, so I’ve leaned more on gaming content. That is going to change as I’ve started a new initiative that I just launched on our page a few days ago called “CosplaySELF''. Basically we are looking to have cosplayers interview themselves, and us edit the footage into the “episodes' ' featuring 3 cosplayers. Hopefully those will start to be live very soon. We are already into the editing phase and hope to have the first episode live soon, over on our YouTube page. Keep your eyes peeled. Hopefully, as long as people show interest, this is something we will continue to create and upload on a regular schedule.

Is there anything that wasn’t covered you like to talk about?

Lastly I want to thank you for taking the time to include Share My Cosplay in this interview. It really means a lot when someone else in the community that you respect, takes a moment out of their busy life to recognize the work you’ve done. There have been times in the past where I have considered possibly giving up doing SMC, but getting some recognition really helps put things in perspective and allows me to continue on. Hopefully Share My Cosplay will continue to grow over the coming years, and continue as a great tool for all cosplayers to use.

https://www.sharemycosplay.com/

#cosplay theme page #cosplay interview #cosplay page interview

4 notes · View notes

boymeetsmxm · 4 years

Text

JULY 2020 | #2

Every month, we ask our reader members to rec us some BTS works they’ve enjoyed. The works can come from any source (AO3, Tumblr, Twitter, Wattpad, etc.), can be either a fanfic or a SM AUs, and don’t have to be from our own writer members. We’ve compiled this month’s recs in this list; Happy browsing!

SFW | Fanfic

Better Left Untouched by themarmalade

sfw | fluff | pining | completed series

Summary: With a simple touch, Namjoon can hear thoughts. Jeongguk has a very good reason to never let him touch.

@galaxiejoon said: Namjoon can read thoughts and Jungkook has a crush, so he does his best not to touch him. This fic is so cute and sweet and makes you feel all warm and soft and want a good long cuddle at the end.

jung hoseok writes instruction manuals (while stupidly in love) by sugaretreat

sfw | super fluff | college au | series of 3 drabbles

@httpangelicjimin said: honestly, it had been a while since i read something so short but that made me feel so warm and cozy inside. it characterizes hoseok and yoongi in such a loving and caring way. i think the idea was really well put together - i mean - it's so simple and sooooo good! also, the mention of the rest of the bangtan makes everything a lot better and kinda comical. i'd recommend this for whenever someone is feeling kinda sad or moody, because it is guaranteed to make you feel all warm inside uwu

"One Step, Two Step" by 54daysormore

sfw | fluff | completed series

Summary: Nothing will ever get Yoongi to dance. Nope. Not even his kids. Okay, maybe them. But nothing will ever get Yoongi to like dancing. Nope. Not even Hoseok. Definitely not Hoseok…Yeah, definitely not Hoseok…

@hobiance said: i love love love love love love LOVE this series!! it made my heart uwu so many times while i was reading. i am so soft for sope, and this fic fed me SO WELL. i love the gradual development of hobi's relationship with yoongi, and the interactions with yoongi's lil kiddos are just so cute i literally just wanted to cry out of softness the entire time. the characterization is ~chefskiss~ and the fic overall is just,,,, a masterpiece. i binged all of it in one night and i highly recommend everyone else do the same :)

Serendipity by @justjeonday

sfw | angst | fluff | s2l | oneshot

Summary: By a slip of his finger, Jeongguk ends up meeting his neighbour on the rooftop of their apartment complex - and he finds himself wanting to stay in the moment forever.

@tigertaehyunq said: this oneshot is soo cute! i love the characterization of Jimin and Jungkook and the way the fic is written. It flows really well and explains their feelings for eachother perfectly, enough for me to even feel them by just reading a few words. The gradual rise to the scene where they confess is adorable and overall, it's just very sweet and beautiful!!

NSFW | Fanfic

Is That a Lob, Because I'm About to Smash You by Jonghyun

nsfw | fluff | crack| sports | oneshot

Summary: “You don’t know tennis,” Taehyung finally repeats slowly, staring at Hoseok. “But you do know tennis.”“Not to him,” Hoseok clarifies. “I’m someone who just... plays for fun, and isn’t good at it. Needs tutoring.”He can see all the gears in Taehyung’s head moving, piecing each part of Hoseok’s plan together, until the light bulb finally goes off. “You’re getting him to tutor you. You’re getting... He’s tutoring you in tennis. An Olympian?” Taehyung’s facade finally cracks. “You’re... You have a tennis tutor!” He cries out, slapping his knee in delight. “You’re flirting! By pretending to be bad at tennis! You!”

@galaxiejoon said: Hoseok is an Olympic-level tennis player recovering from an injury when he meets Namjoon at the gym. To spend more time with Namjoon, Hoseok pretends he needs tutoring in tennis and things go from there. Its really funny and honestly Hoseok is mad relatable in this lol.

Jammed by minverse

nsfw | smut | fluff | oneshot

Summary: The rational part of Jimin's brain screams at him to remember what his mother said about strangers and vans. But the rational part of his brain is no match for really bad whiskey and Kim Taehyung.((au where Jimin gets stuck on the interstate in the middle of a blizzard and Taehyung lives in a van))

@megahwn said: I'm reccing this work because it's honestly a really wholesome piece even though it's also ridiculous lol. Every time I think about it it makes me smile, and I love Jimin and Taehyung's banter with each other throughout the work.

leave you drowning (until you reach for my hand) by inkingbrushes

nsfw | college au | hurt/comfort | oneshot

Summary: Yoongi is on the brink of dropping everything when he takes up the offer of a new roommate who walks in with a smile that's too big and a laugh that's too loud.(Or: how yoongi can paint in the sunset with the sight of hoseok's smile, and colour in the rest of the world with the sound of his laughter.)

@j-sope said: I can't even put this fic into words. It's simply beautiful. Yoongi is a struggling art student who's on the brink of dropping out when Hoseok moves in and they just fall in love. It's so effortless, so wonderful, so comforting. Their relationship is just supportive, wonderful and healthy, nothing about it is angsty, it's just... you read about how they're falling in love and you feel like you're falling in love too. This fic is like a painting you could stare at for hours, your head full of thoughts, heart happy and warm. For a writer myself, I'm pretty terrible with words lmao but maybe there aren't words to describe this fic, only feelings.

Walking Through a World Gone Blind by annie_vi

nsfw | fluff | smut | angst | completed series

Summary: As a budding pre-law student, Jeon Jeongguk thought he had seen it all, until Park Jimin blindsides him in a bar and shows Jeongguk the world through his eyes.

@joopiterjoon said: Jungkook POVs where he is hopelessly in love are my favorite. This fic had me giggling and awing and wanting to cheer them on non-stop. On top of that, I learned so much. Jimin is blind, and you learn with Jungkook what life is like for Jimin and blind people. I have no blind acquaintaces, and honestly learning about what I think is a struggle versus the realities was quite the experience in itself. Jungkook and Jimin are so soft! But don't be fooled, there's some good smut here...!

SFW | SM AUS

None this month

NSFW | SM AUS

None this month

#readers reading list #official post

35 notes · View notes

surveys-at-your-service · 3 years

Text

Survey #359

“i’m only a crack in this castle of glass / hardly anything there for you to see”

Do you look better with your hair down or up? It's too short to go up. Has you mom ever directly told you that she favoured your other sibling(s) over you? Yeesh, no. Have you ever read The Outsiders? Seen the movie? Read the book, seen the movie. Adore both. What’s your favourite drink from Jamba Juice? I don't think we have those here. Can you stand eating the crusts of a slice of sandwich bread? I don't mind the crust at all. Do you do your homework at home or in class? Prior to college, I did my work right after getting home to get it out of the way. In college, I did it in-between classes or when waiting for Mom to finish class. Do you feel uncomfortable sharing drinks with other people? Yes, I never do it. Do you get jealous if your boyfriend hugs another girl? I'm single, but hypothetically, I wouldn't... It's just a hug. At least for me, it's just a friendly gesture. Is there something that happened in your past you hate talking about? A few things, yes. Is it hard for you to be “just friends” with the opposite sex? Nah. If you had to choose, what color is your favorite? Baby pink. How many times have you dated the person you’re with now? I’m single. Has anyone suspected you of being a different sexuality? Yes. Do you like chocolate or vanilla cake more? Chocolate. Does it bother you to have blood drawn or not so much? Nah. What color is your toothbrush? It's a white electric one. Do you normally fall asleep fast or slow? Ridiculously slow. Have you ever had a severe allergic reaction? No. What do you want to be for Halloween this year? I'd love to dress up as like a Ms. Oogie Boogie and take some cool pictures, but I highly doubt it'll actually happen. What color are your glasses, if applicable? Black. Do you still look in the toy aisle, or do you pass it by? I walk past it. What are your summer fashion essentials? I don't have fashion essentials for any season. Do you have your own website? For my photography, yeah. Do you think you would be a good salesperson? Ha, no. I worked in retail before and I fucking sucked. Do you like candy corn? NO. Just colored wax, ugh. Do you like to wear skirts? I don't wear anything that shows my legs. Were you happy as a kid? Yeah. That, talkative, and hyper. Favorite store to browse but not really buy anything? Haha, I LOVE going on MorphMarket now and again to browse the ball pythons especially, but boy if I had the cash and space would I buy like fifty of them at once. I don't really know about a store I like browsing but not buying from. Skittles or Sour Patch Kids? Both are great, but I guess Sour Patch Kids. BUT, if you throw SOUR Skittles in there... then it's a war lol. If tattoos were free, how many would you have? A HELL OF A LOT. I wanna be just about totally painted. Do you wear a retainer at night? Not anymore. I had one, but I stopped using it. Are you afraid of dolls, puppets, or clowns? I'm not a doll person, particularly porcelain ones. When you’re in your room, do you keep the door locked? No. It's not even closed. Do you think your face is mostly symmetrical? Actually no, and I'm self-conscious about it. Stupidest thing you have ever said out loud? OH Christ, I'm not retrospecting on this. What’s your least favourite ice-cream flavour? That I've actually tried, strawberry. It's disgusting. What was the last good news you heard? I got approved for TMS therapy! Who was the last person to comment on your Facebook status? My friend Lyndsey. How did you meet him/her? World of Warcraft. She's actually my guild master, and she is the sweetest damn person. Have you ever learned any self-defense? If not, would you be interested in learning? I haven't, but yeah, I'd like to. When was the last time you took a nap? How long was it? Yesterday. For some reason, I actually slept a LONG time, like at least three, but probably close to four, hours. I mean I was tired, but I didn't feel THAT tired. Do you like Gushers? YAAAAAAAAAAS What would you do if you could do anything without failing? Actually get a degree for SOMETHING. What is your native language? English. Do you have a younger brother or sister? A younger sister. If so do/did they really get on your nerves? No. We were very close as kids, but we've drifted apart. Now, she absolutely doesn't get on my nerves. I'm so proud of her. Name something that happened to you that was completely unexpected. Uhhh I dunno. Do you judge people that have multiple piercings? Lol wtf? No. Do you watch the Olympics? No. What did you have for breakfast this morning? I had Kix cereal. Do you like orange juice? Yes. So long as it doesn't have pulp in it. Do you think it’s cruel to keep an animal in a cage while you’re away? It depends on the size of the cage as well as how long you're away. Do you have a pet gecko? No, but I'd love a fat-tailed gecko. Are you scared of reptiles? Not at all, I adore them. Is your car messy? I don't have my own car. Mom's kinda is, though. It needs a wash badly, but because of her bumper literally being zip-tied on, she doesn't trust going into a car wash. And neither of us are about to do it manually, lol. Have you ever seen the show 16 and Pregnant? No, fuck that show. Do you buy expensive clothes? No. Does death scare you? Not really. What are your current goals? Conquer my social anxiety, get a job, lose weight, do something to strengthen my legs... Those are the four biggies. Do you clap or cheer when at a concert? I did both at the one I've been to. Do you drink coffee? What brand? No. Do you use a comb or brush? A comb. When you were younger, did you ever do that exclamation point that looked like an upside down triangle and had a really big dot? No. I loved the cutesy girl handwriting though, haha. I just could never do it. You’re locked in a room with the person you last dated, any problems? Well yeah, we're locked in a room lmao. What kind of relationship do you have with the last person you kissed? It's perfectly fine, we're best friends. Have you ever gotten burnt by a cigarette? No. Do you get mad when people smoke around you? Yes. Honestly, have you ever eaten raw cookie dough? Yeah, more than once. When was the last time you were on a city bus? Never. Do you have a garden? Does it have flowers, vegetables, or both? No. Where do you want to raise your kids? Who said I even want kids? Have you ever been to Cracker Barrel? Yessssss, good shit. Have you ever seen a ghost? I think I have. Have you ever burned an ant with a magnifying glass? No. Have you ever been to craigslist.com? Yes. Have you ever used Nair? Yes, on my legs. It works, I just have stupidly hairy legs that need so much to get it all. How many tabs do you have open and what are they? Two YouTube tabs and then Tumblr. What browser do you prefer to use? Chrome. What room are you in right now? My bedroom. Are you excited for anything this month? 1.) I get my tattoo on the 19th, and 2.) I start TMS next Wednesday. What language course did you take in school, if any? I barely survived one semester of Latin, then I did all four available German courses. What language would you most like to learn? I'd love to improve my German. What would you like to get a degree in? Photography. What book are you reading, what genre is it and do you like it so far? Wings of Fire: The Brightest Night. It's young adult fantasy, I think. Did you ever sometimes flip through your text books even when you didn’t need to? Yeah, mainly to just look at pictures because I was that bored in class, haha. What types of magazines do you read? None. Would you prefer to read a book, watch a movie or TV show, or play a video game? Play a video game. What’s your current relationship like with the person you lost your virginity to and do you wish it was different? We don't have any relationship anymore. I don't regret losing it to him, if that's what you're asking. If you mean our relationship stance, it'd be nice to still be in touch with him, but I know it wouldn't be healthy for me. Have you ever felt responsible for someone’s death? Pets, yes. No humans. What was the last book you recommended to someone? Idk. What’s the most difficult thing you and your current or last significant other have gone through? Distance was very hard. What’s your best memory with your ex? I'm going to assume this refers to "the ex." In which case, we were "play arguing," and I came storming into the kitchen after him to make a point, and I slid mid-sentence, and he caught me. We just held each other laughing our asses off. It's the simple things, man. Who was the last person that asked to hang out with you and what’s the story of how you met that person? Summer. My little sister and her were in pre-k together and became friends, but I gradually became closer to her than Nicole did when we were teens. Has anyone ever asked you out and you turned them down? Yes. Is there something you generally always ask for help with? Yeah. Like recently I've been having apples and peanut butter a lot, and I ask my mom to cut the apple because I'm terrified of knives. Do you feel comfortable telling people how much you weigh? NOPE. Have you looked at any old photos of yourself lately? No. In a relationship, have you ever been on and off with your partner? No. Do you consider cooking to be an art? Yes. Are you a fast or slow reader? I'd say I read at a moderate pace. Does it take a lot to gross you out? It depends on what it is, but I am actually more squeamish than I used to be.

#survey #surveys #questions #lyrics: ''castle of glass'' by linkin park

4 notes · View notes

readyforit · 4 years

Note

hiii abby!! can you post a tutorial for how you make edits like your latest one? the url edit fro taylorswifh? it’s so prettyyy

♡ edit tutorial for this edit, requested by anon ♡

hiii so! this is quite long, but that’s because I wanted to capture my whole entire process to hopefully help you! I used photoshop (2018) for this tutorial, and all the resources I used are listed here (everything except for photoshop is free)! I’ve sort of split this tutorial up into sections, by the different steps. thank you and have a lovely day!! ♡

so before I begin, I always think about the edit, like what I want the final outcome to look like (or if I don’t know what that’ll look like yet, what direction I want it to go in, the main themes/ideas/colour schemes that I have). I personally love using a minimalist range of colours, all of them being light and pastel (that’s just my personal liking though). I also consider the main themes or ideas that I want to translate through my edit. you also need to have the passion and desire to edit, I’ve learned that there’s nothing more draining than editing when you really don’t want to. so I think that you should think about all these things before starting!!

tip; put on some music, it gets your creativity and thinking flowing if you’re in a good mood ldkjkl

so! when creating the edit; first of all, I created a new document in photoshop - 540 x 300 pixels for this specific edit (just because that shows up as high quality on tumblr, but it doesn’t really matter!) when you click ‘create’, a white canvas should open up.

— creating the book

next! I used a book psd for my edit, which you can find and download here!! so I just opened that psd up (a psd is just a photoshop file that has like all the layers in place so it’s not just one photo);

when you open the file up, this is how it should look (well not really, because I’d edited it to look like this, but it should have this general layout);

now what you have to do is sort of literally drag the file out and then, drag all the layers from that file into your white canvas, like this;

— giffing

I just wanted to quickly mention that giffing is definitely an optional step. I do it in pretty much all of my edits, but I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re just beginning to edit, because giffing takes the most time and it can be really draining and messy if not done right ldkjd.

to create my gifs, I use youtube videos, which I download through 4k video downloader (it’s really simple with 4k, you just have to copy the youtube link and paste it into the app!). so to open up a video, go to ‘file’ then ‘import’ and finally ‘video frames to layers’;

once you’ve chosen the video you want to use, open that up (don’t know why that’s so blurry dlkjdlj but you get the idea);

now this should pop up! make sure it’s on ‘selected range only’ and then use the toggles at the bottom to select the specific part of the video that you want to use (I usually gif about 20 frames because it’s sooo much work for me to do more than that lkdjldj)

when you’re in the file, go to ‘window’ then ‘timeline’ for the gif to show up frame by frame;

now highlight the specific frames that you want by literally dragging across them with the timeline bar at the bottom. then click the three bars on the top right of the bar, and click ‘copy frames’;

now go back to your book psd file, and at the timeline bar at the bottom, click ‘create frame animation’;

click on the three bars on the top right of the timeline bar and paste the frames over the selection;

your file should now look something like this! to resize the gif, just press command + t and adjust it from there!

now to give it the effect that it’s a part of the book, you have to create a clipping mask (so it sort of clips onto the book layer like a paper clip). to do this, select all the layers of the gif, drag it right above the layer that you want to clip it onto (the page constraint layer in this case). then right click the gif layers and click ‘create clipping mask’;

as a result, your layers should now look like this. you can use command + t again to adjust the gif size;

tip; press command + g to group the layers together so they take up less space!

now, with your gif, this step is pretty tiring and takes forever dlkdjl, but for the layer to show up in every frame of the gif, you have to click on the box button on the left of each layer so that an eye shows up. you can also press the eye button at the top of the settings, in the unify bar, so that it stays visible throughout the entire gif. I don’t know if I’m explaining it properly dlkdjl but just go through every layer and press the box so an eye shows up.

sometimes the unify button doesn’t work for some reason, and you’ll have to manually go through every single frame just to click on the eye button. it’s excruciating, but it’s worth it in the end lkdjdl

this is how your edit should look now!

now what I do is apply a psd (sort of like a filter) so it looks softer and prettier! these days, all of the psds that I apply come from this lovely pack!

in the same way that you dragged your book psd in, drag the psd *folder* into your edit;

your edit should now look like this!

— adding the photo

now’s the fun part! you can add whatever you want to, but what I did in my edit was I cut out a photo of taylor. now what you can do if you’re running short of time is find a transparent photo of taylor on google or on deviantart, but if you want to take the time to actually crop the photo out like me (even though I’m horrible at it), here’s how I do it! first find the photo you’d like to crop out. I usually use taylorpictures, they have the most high quality photos of taylor!

so find the photo you want to use, copy it;

then just paste it into your edit;

use command + t again to adjust the size;

and now to crop it out, what I do is use the quick selection tool, which is this button right here;

in this mode, you can easily just select the part of taylor that you want to cut out (that sounds weird lkjd);

at the top, there should be a bar with a number of buttons, one of them being ‘select and mask’;

if you click on that, you should be taken to another page, similar to this;

now you can play with the settings on the right, then press ‘ok’ when you’re happy with it (the numbers change for each photo and your style, it entirely depends on how you want it to look);

now you should be back to your edit, click on the ‘add layer mask’ button on the bottom left of your page;

and taylor should now be cropped out from her background!

make sure all the layers are below the psd pack, including the photo of taylor that you just cropped out;

now for the colouring!! ‘selective colour’ is your best friend, and you can find that button here, in your adjustments (if you can’t find your adjustments, go to window > adjustments);

add a clipping mask (by right clicking the layer and clicking ‘create clipping mask’) of the selective colour onto the layer you want to colour, so that it only affects that one layer;

then on the selective colour panel, you can adjust the specific colours in that layer to your liking;

in addition, you can press command + u to change the whole colour scheme, saturation and lightness of the layer. make sure to press ‘ok’ when you’re done;

basically just play around with the colouring until you’re happy with it!

if you want it to look more realistic, you can also play around with the effects (I use layer effects all the time, they’re the best) on the layers bar, so the layer blends into the layers below it, like this;

— adding decoration

now you can decorate your little piece of work with whatever you’d like to, such as a background colour (layer > new fill layer > solid colour) ;

a texture (textures are honestly so amazing and you can find them all over tumblr and google; like you can search the word ‘texture’ up and then paste it into your edit);

I usually place my texture at the top of the edit, then use one of the effects to blend it into all the layers;

final embellishments!! this step is optional you can add anything else that you’d like to, such as pngs (you can search these up on google and paste them into your edit, or find psd packs on tumblr and drag them in). again, you can add selective colour and a layer effect to these layers;

tip; finding already transparent images saves sooo much time, so try doing that instead of cropping the image out.

text;

tip; use a new layer for each line!

and so on. the flowers that I used come from this pack and the wax seal stamp comes from this pack from the beautiful @newrcmantlcs!! my main advice is to just play around with everything till you’re happy with it. don’t be afraid of deleting something or starting over completely if you’re not.

— giffing again

now to control the speed of the gif, highlight all of the frames, then click on the tiny dropdown button and change the speed to however fast or slow you want each frame to be. I usually make mine 0.1 seconds, but it’s completely up to you (and worth testing it out to see what speed you prefer!)

when you’re happy with everything, it’s time to sharpen it! first, you have to convert the frames to a video timeline, and do this by clicking on the button on the bottom left of the timeline bar.

your timeline should now look like this. everyone’s process is different, like some people like to start off their whole edit with a video timeline, but I find it a lot easier to start with a frame animation then convert it when I’m done with everything.

now to sharpen (in this case at least, sometimes I add a grainy effect instead) it, highlight the layers that you want to sharpen;

then click filter > convert for smart filters. this will turn your layers into one layer.

tip; if you do something you don’t like, command + z!!

now go to filter > sharpen > sharpen;

and your gif should now be sharpened! you can simply go to filter > sharpen if you want to sharpen a layer that isn’t a gif. play around with your edit a bit more until you’re happy, and finally, add a watermark if you’re going to post it online!

finallyyyyy! to save, go to file > export > save for web, if it’s a gif. if it’s a static photo, just click ‘save as’!

and yayyyy, you just finished an edit!!!!!

ahhh so this was my tutorial on how I created this specific edit, I hope it helped! If you create something similar or follow this tutorial, I’d loveee to see it; so if you post it on tumblr, you can tag me with #tuserabigail, or you can just dm me!

my process usually isn’t this rigid or precise, I usually edit on a tangent and in cluttered daydreams, it’s never like “oh, I have to make a gif now” or “ahh it’s time to add a texture!” so really, it’s just about playing around with your edit until you like it! it’s definitely okay to skip some steps or do things in a different order, because like I said, everyone has a different process, and this was just mine for this one specific edit (my process changes all the time too ldkdljk)

anyway, I hope this helped, and thank you!! ♡

#anon #tutorial #letter left on my doorstep #<3 #tutorial*

125 notes · View notes

churchkey · 4 years

Note

18 from the kiss prompts with winnix

Kiss Prompt (Winnix ~1700 words)

Title: Nice Work if You Can Get It

Pairing: Winters/Nixon

Rating: Teen w/ some vaguely described sexy bits

Notes: Thank you lovely anon for the prompt. I’m placing this behind a cut because it’s long-ish and tagging the fabulous @anthrobrat for always listening to me when I’m on my obsessive Winnix bullshit. Inspired by that iconic photo (you know the one), which Tumblr won't let me post for reasons I don't understand.

18. kisses where one person is sitting in the other’s lap

By the time Dick joined them on the balcony, they’d been drinking for a solid seven hours and looked like it too. Speirs was slumped Lipton-ward on the settee, his body sprawled so languidly that Dick wondered how he kept from oozing down onto the stone floor. Harry was settled deep into the chair opposite Nix, his arms dangling over the sides and his head moving in constant, lopsided waves among all three of them, while Nix, well.

Nix was just his regal self. Same generous smile; same kind, dark eyes. Balancing a bottle of wine on his thigh and resting one boot on the opposite knee, he looked like he just belonged there, like a sovereign gazing proudly upon the vast beauty of his Alpine kingdom.

“Here you are,” Dick said as he approached them. “The neighbors have started to complain.”

Harry laughed. “What, this little tea party?”

“Some gang of officers behaving like rowdy sailors on shore leave,” Dick said. “I said, ‘that can’t be my staff’. Figured I’d better come see for myself.”

“Well si’down, since you’re here”, Ron slurred. “Stay awhile.”

The rest of the guys echoed him, a chorus of “Yeah” and “Come on”, oblivious of the fact that there was nowhere for him to sit. Dick’s eyes swept over the empty bottles strewn haphazardly across the table, the misty mountains in the distance, and landed on Nix, whose lips fluttered in the briefest smile as he sat up straighter in his chair and dropped his eyes to the armrest in invitation.

Their bodies slid together like magnets, Dick perched on the arm of Nix’s chair, Nix’s arm draped around the back. Though they weren’t actually touching, it struck him as deeply intimate and mundane at the same time, sharing a chair with Nix in the same way they’d shared everything else. Everything they had, everything they’d clawed and scrabbled for, every victory they’d won, it all belonged to both of them. There was no separation.

The guys laughed and drank, laughed and drank. Dick faded into the background, now and again turning his head toward Nix to murmur a question into his ear, which he’d answer under his breath in a voice reserved for Dick. “Is Lip drunk?” “Hard to say.” “Did Harry piss himself?” “No, that’s champagne”.

“Come on,” Harry was saying, holding a bottle in his outstretched arm. “Have a drink with us, Dick. Major. Major Dick.” He was so busy laughing at his own dumb joke that he didn’t react when Nix wrapped his arm around Dick’s waist and pulled him down to his lap.

“Who, this guy?” Nix said. “He’s been drinking all day. Look at him, he can’t even sit up straight.”

Dick was indeed struggling to regain his balance, trying in vain to keep some measure of distance between them. He figured he must look ridiculous, wedged between the chair’s arm and Lew’s right leg. And then he remembered that the war was over, and that everyone was drunk, and that Nix was his… Nix was his. For a little while longer. He gave up the fight and settled in, settling his arm around the back of the chair, his back against Lew’s chest. Lew’s hand on his hip. Lew’s voice in his head.

“Don’t you ever stop working?”

Everyone else was in the barn celebrating the success of Pegasus and doing their part to nurture the Special Relationship. As he’d listened to them from the attic of the farmhouse, Dick felt the anxiety slowly leave his body, felt the relief pour in on deep, full breaths of cool night air. But he knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep for hours yet, so he’d opened his Infantry Field Manual and begun reading it over again, committing its maneuvers and tactics to memory.

At first he’d thought Nix was just stopping by for another refill from his dwindling stock, but he didn’t even glance toward Dick’s footlocker as he climbed the steps and slowly crossed the room.

“Don’t you ever stop working?” he’d asked, like he’d been sent on a special mission to distract Dick, disrupt his routine and impose a new world order on his life. Like he’d been doing since the day they’d met.

The protest Dick mounted was perfunctory at best, just rolling his eyes as Lew perched himself on the edge of the desk, knees wide, blocking access to his papers and books and every other trivial concern. But it was Dick who first made contact, sliding his palms up Lew’s thighs to take him by the hips and pull him down to his lap, and it was Dick who thrust his tongue into Lew’s mouth as vulgar images flashed through his mind, all the other places he would put his tongue if given the chance. The far reaches he’d touch, the depths he would plumb.

And as they began the mindless grind, the desperate rocking of their hips against the hardness swelling between them, it was Dick who finally broke away, breathless, to say they should stop now or they’d have a mess on their hands.

“Yeah,” Lew chuckled, his voice dark and low, scraping his teeth along the taut muscles of Dick’s throat. “That’s kind of the point, Valentino.”

“I know, but - “ Dick sat back in his chair and looked down at the wrinkled shirt tails he’d yanked from Lew’s trousers. “Not like this.”

The suddenness with which Lew stood and began righting himself, tucking in his shirt, finger-combing his hair, made Dick worry briefly if he’d done something to offend him.

“What’s going on?” he asked cautiously, but Lew just gave him a confused look, like he’d missed something very obvious.

“Well aren’t we going to your room?”

It was the first time they made love in a proper bed, the first time they undressed completely and felt the warmth and surprise of each other’s skin against cool cotton sheets. It was the first time it occurred to Dick to call what they did ‘making love’, and not just opening a release valve and blowing off a little steam. And it was the first time he dared consider that maybe he’d known all along that they were never going to be just friends, that while they were running up mountains and memorizing sand tables and jumping out of planes, maybe they were also falling in love.

When it was over and he was lying there with Lew sprawled heavily across his chest, tracing aimless designs across Lew’s shoulders with his fingertips, Dick couldn’t help but think:

A fellow could get used to this.

And then a fear gripped his heart, a warning so loud and insistent that he couldn’t ignore it, couldn’t shut it out. He knew that he couldn’t get used to it; that he mustn’t let himself. He spent the next week trying to forget what it felt like to hold Lew in his naked arms, to press his lips to the mark on his brow, faded now to a pale streak, white like the tail of a comet.

That felt like another lifetime now, with the sun setting behind the mountains and turning them black against the darkening sky. Time passed like wine flowing from the mouths of those bottles they kept tipping to their lips, drops spilling from the corners of their mouths, down their chins, wiping them away with the backs of their hands. Mirth rolling from their eyes and sweeping over him in warm waves, and Dick felt a little drunk on it himself, on their happiness and relief.

The night air grew chilly. Their laughter subsided to restful sighs and mumbled curses, and Dick felt a truth settle in. Looking around this circle, into the drowsy, grinning faces of his friends, he knew that he loved them in a way that he would never love anyone else.

“Alright Captain,” Lip said finally, struggling to pull Speirs to his feet. “Let’s get you to bed.”

“Captain. Carwood,” Ron mumbled, like the words were marbles rolling around in his mouth. Lip took his wrist and hooked his arm around his neck, wrapping his other arm around Ron’s waist.

“Oh Carwood, my Carwood,” Dick heard Ron saying, his face buried in Lip’s neck as Lip led him carefully across the balcony.

He looked at Nix, amused. “Are we that obvious?” he murmured. Nix just looked back at him, a smile spreading slowly across his face.

“Hey Harry,” he asked after a moment, his eyes still on Dick. “Think it’s time to call it a night?”

“And leave you two unchaperoned?” Harry sunk lower in his chair, stretching his legs across the table, boots crossed at his ankles. “Unlikely.”

Nix just shook his head faintly, raising his shoulders in a tiny shrug. Harry’s chin fell to his shoulder and his face went slack. Within a minute, his breathing had deepened to gentle snores.

“What about you,” Dick asked Nix. “How are you feeling?”

“How do I look?”

Dick’s eyes swept down his stubbled face, his rumpled collar. “Like you’ve been rode hard and put away wet.”

Lew chuckled at that, pulled Dick closer. “Well,” he began thoughtfully, taking a deep breath and sighing it out again. “I think I might have a few more laps in me yet.” His eyes were almost black in the dim light as he gazed into Dick’s. “Kiss me.”

Dick didn’t even check to see if Harry was still asleep. Cupping the back of Lew’s head, he dropped his chin, tipped his head to the side, and felt Lew’s mouth, firm and wet and sweet, pressed to his.

He could barely make out the jagged edges of the mountains against the sky as he moved in to kiss Lew again, and he didn’t chase it away this time, the thought he couldn’t help but think.

A fellow could get used to this.

#kiss prompts #winnix #the balcony photo #lap kissing #lewis nixon #dick winters #ron speirs #carwood lipton #harry welsh #band of brothers #band of brothers fic #by me

17 notes · View notes

lovemesomesurveys · 3 years

Text

1 - Were you glad to see the back of 2020? What were the best and worst parts of the year to you? I was really, really grateful for making it through the crazy, scary year that was 2020 and my family and I were okay. We weren’t affected in ways so many people were and my heart truly goes out to everyone who experienced loss of any kind or got sick. I was still dealing with my own ongoing issues, but so many people were experiencing so much worse.

2 - If you’ve purchased something you love from a small business, are you likely to leave a review or anything afterwards? Why/why not? No. I’m just not one who ever leaves reviews. Shoutout to those who do because they’re really helpful to me, but for some reason I never leave them myself. :X

3 - When was the last time you received some good news? Hmm. I don’t recall.

4 - Does wearing masks cause you to get acne or oily skin on your chin and around your nose? I haven’t had to wear one for a long enough amount of time at once or consecutively, so no. I only wear one for like a couple hours once a month when I leave the house for my doctor appointment.

5 - Do you prefer dogs or cats? Do you have a preferred breed as well? I’m a dog person. I’m definitely biased, but German Shepherds and Labs are pretty damn awesome.

6 - Do you have any plans for the next few days? Are these plans something you’re dreading or looking forward to? Just the same stuff I do everyday.

7 - Leggings, jeans, jeggings or sweatpants? Leggings all the way.

8 - How often do you meet new people? Is this something you’d like to change in any way? I don’t meet new people really at all anymore to be honest. As of now I’m okay with that.

9 - What time did you wake up this morning? Would you rather have slept in longer? I haven’t gone to bed, yet. It’s currently 7:20AM...

10 - What’s your favourite meal of the day? What’s your favourite thing to eat for that meal? Dinner and my late night bowl of ramen. For dinner my favorite meals are Wingstop, spaghetti and meatballs, or pizza from this local place.

11 - When was the last time you visited a zoo or aquarium? What are your favourite animals to see there? I went to the zoo a few years ago. I like to see the giraffes, of course.

12 - Have you ever bought or sold anything via Facebook? Nope.

13 - When was the last time you had to cross a railway line? Was it an automated crossing or a manual one? I don’t remember. It’s been quite awhile.

14 - What was the last thing you received as a gift? I received various Christmas presents from my family.

15 - Are you a fan of cheese? What are your favourite types? I love cheese, various kinds of it.

16 - What’s your “go-to” hairstyle when you’re feeling lazy or in a rush? My hair is always up in a messy bun because I don’t have the energy or motivation or care to do anything else.

17 - How do you travel to work or school? Would you rather get there in a different way if you had the choice? I’m done with school and I don’t have a job.

18 - What was the last activity you did that caused you to be out of breath? I don’t recall. I haven’t had to do anything that required much in awhile.

19 - When was the last time you changed your bedsheets? A few weeks ago.

20 - What household chore do you hate the most? Are there any you actually enjoy or find satisfying in any way? I don’t enjoy doing any chore. I’ve never been someone who actually enjoys cleaning or finds it relaxing or anything.

21 - How much money did you spend the last time you went to the supermarket? I haven’t been to the grocery store myself since March of last year. I used to always tag along with my mom for the grocery shopping trips and I’d sometimes get a few things of my own, but yeah not since the pandemic happened.

22 - How often do you buy fast food or takeaways? What’s your favourite place to get those foods from? A few times a week. My favorite is Wingstop.

23 - Do you prefer white, brown or granary bread? What other types of bread do you like to eat? I like white, wheat, and sourdough the best.

24 - Are you in any kind of pain right now? What’s causing it? I have chronic pain. My pain med helps, but there’s times where it doesn’t and I’m having a bad flareup. Thankfully, I’m not experiencing that at this moment.

25 - Can you hear anyone else in your house right now? What are they upto? No.

26 - Do you find farts funny or gross? I get it’s natural and all that, but it’s still gross.

27 - What are you wearing at the moment? Is anything you’re wearing new? Leggings and a long sleeve shirt that has the Maruchan (the ramen brand) logo and cute little cartoony ramen bowls and packets on it. It’s in my avatar pic, currently.

28 - Who was the last person you spoke to via social media? Is this a person you’re close to? My mom’s best friend’s daughter. No, not anymore. We were as kids because her mom babysat my brother and I back then so we spent a lot of time together. Then when that stopped we grew apart.

29 - Did you ever do surveys on a site other than Tumblr? Do you still take surveys anywhere else? Yeah, I go back to the Xanga days. I’ve taken them on Myspace as well. And no, I just take them on here.

30 - Are you overweight, underweight or a healthy weight for your height? Are you happy with that or would you like to change it? I’m too underweight and I’m not happy with that at all. It’s led to problems and I’m very self-conscious about it as well. This is no shade or anything to anyone else, it’s just how I see myself. I haven’t been able to put back on any weight the past few years because of some health issues and it’s just become an awful cycle of health issues from being underweight but not able to gain weight because of health issues.

#personal #text #survey #surveys

3 notes · View notes

barnesxplum-blog · 5 years

Text

Steve Rogers x FemaleReader

Summary: Steve Rogers is working as a builder on a construction site right outside of your apartment building, and causes you some *ahem*problems *ahem*

A/N: this is my first time writing anything on tumblr so pls be nice! Also I’d love any feedback! I’m still learning so much :)

Warnings: Smut (18+ only), catcalling, fluff(ish), swearing, unprotected sex.

Word Count: 4,119

Shoutout to @shxrirogers for the kind words and support in helping me start writing :)

(GIF not mine)

You don’t know if it was the rippling muscles, or the soft, semi-sexual grunts tumbling from his lips that made you do a double-take. Either way, you were in a whole world of trouble, purely because of your wandering eyes. Because your mouth hung open for just a second too long.

“Hi, sweetheart!”

The words alone made your hairs bristle and caused numbness to bloom in your chest.

Reluctantly, you slowed your gait and even dared to turn your head towards the construction site fully. It wasn’t your imagination. There he stood, his shirt was completely off, looking like he had just leaped out of one of those provocative calendars with half-naked men plastered across every month. His lack of clothing was unsurprising in this blistering heat, but all the same it a tugged at a cord somewhere deep inside of you. A cord that threatened to unravel and show no sign of stopping.

The shirt in question was stuffed carelessly in the back pocket of his utility trousers, which of course, he wore low slung, the tops of his briefs peeking out and taunting anyone who dared to look.

‘Surely this is a safety hazard’, you thought.

Below his hard hat were two cocked eyebrows, and even further below were a set of pink lips twisted into the most irritating yet beautiful grin you’d ever seen.

“You’re blushing,” he remarked, in an irritating sing-song voice, using the back of his hand to wipe away sweat from his forehead roughly.

“She’s blushing, guys” he called over his shoulder, rousing incoherent grunts from the other men.

“Can you blame her, Steve?” One whistled, crudely slapping his workmate’s butt before laughing loudly. Steve turned back, eyes following you closely as you moved slowly towards the door of your apartment complex.

‘Of course, I’m fucking blushing, you’re standing there, half-nude in front of me with...with those out’ You thought, your eyes roving over his abs, though you pleaded with them to stop looking.

You chose to look away and hurry inside and away from him. The inside was safe, at least. The only problem was, it was your building he and his crew were working on. It had only been a couple of days and you hadn’t had the guts to ask anyone how long they would be there for. All you knew is that they were there in the morning when you left for work and when you got back, they would be starting to pack up their equipment and head to whatever godforsaken bar they could hijack for the night.

You heaved a sigh out, dropping your bag next to the door and collapsing onto your worn futon.

“Rough day at work?”

You dared to open just one eye to greet your roommate and best friend.

“Not even, Bucky.” you sighed “not even...”

Work was fine. Being a nurse was great. All you had to concern yourself with was stopping people from dying, and making sure they were reasonably comfortable while you did so.

“So, why are you sulking?” He used his metal finger to prod at your cheek, the cool metal stunning you for a moment, causing you to gasp and twitch away from him. The sharp intake of breath caused your roommate to chuckle, and flop down beside you.

“Mmnot” You slurred, burying your head in the arm of the sofa, your new sanctuary away from prying roommates and hot-as-sin builders.

“Whatever,” he sighed and heaved himself up. “You so are”

You watched him saunter back into his room, but leave the door open. You knew he wanted you to talk to him, but he would never push you. Just like you did for him all those years ago. He stood a little past his doorway, so you could see his silhouette fixing his hair into a tight knot. Not a bun. Not a ponytail. Certainly not a man bun. He hated all of the above variants.

“Jesus, will those guys ever shut up?” Bucky muttered while gazing out of his window at the gaggle of construction workers making their way home for the night, as rowdy as a bunch of schoolboys. “When the hell are they gonna be done?” He mused to himself.

You gathered the strength to stand and stare out of the open living room window, which had the same view as from Bucky’s room. You could hear them quite easily from the cracked open window.

“Steve- Dude stop!”

“And if I don’t?”

You watched as the annoyingly hot construction worker finally released his colleague from a headlock, not before messing up his hair with his fist.

“I hope soon,” you whispered under your breath, but you couldn’t help but feel you truly wanted the opposite.

Thankfully, it wasn’t long before you were back on duty at the hospital. At least at work, your mind was occupied enough to forget the hot, humid night you spent trying to get the man out of your head manually and failing miserably at it, resorting to an evening alone with your right hand and your own vivid imagination.

You shuddered at the thought of him finding out just how much he had affected you. Your colleague, Matt bounded up to you and took your state in - Buried in paperwork but somehow still whistling and smiling.

“Y/N..?” He asked warily “is that really you?”

You laughed and smacked his arm.

“What? I can’t be happy?”

“By all means!” He chuckled “It’s just normally you kinda despise admin”

“Not today,” you winked cheerfully.

“Well, if you’re happy doing paperwork you’ll be even happier demonstrating some stitches for a student doctor, wouldn’t you?”

You picked up the stack of paper you were working through and tapped it on the table to straighten it out.

“That does sound more exciting than filling these out.” You muse, scratching your head.

He pulls out your chair with ease, making you yelp in surprise.

“Off you go Y/L/N, I’ll take this from here” he sighed as he gently pushed you towards the hospital ward.

You chuckled softly as you wandered towards the baffled looking student Matt had bestowed unto you. You introduced yourself to her and gave her some quick reassurance before whipping open the curtain separating yourself and the patient. You immediately picked up the chart and read aloud to the student.

“Patient’s name is Mr. Rogers, 38, sustained some minor puncture and laceration wounds from a fall at work... what do we do doctor?” You ask smiling up at the student before you

“Remove any debris, clean and suture?” She mumbles and you nod.

After sliding the chart back into its place, you look up to assess the extent of the injuries and find yourself plunged into the depths of a pair of icy blue eyes. You jump back as though you had been burned by a hot stove.

The exact same stomach-churning wave you had been feeling yesterday night washed over you, and your knees threatened to buckle and made you shift your weight from foot to foot nervously.

Why the fuck was Steve from the construction site outside of your apartment here?

The student threw a confused glance at the both of you, before sliding a stool to sit at Steve’s bedside. Thankfully, he looked just as surprised to see you and even had a flushed tinge to his otherwise pretty tan, uniform complexion. You cleared your throat and finally detached your eyes from his, gesturing for the student to begin.

“So, Mr. Rogers, how did this happen?” The student asked while she disinfected the wounds on Steve’s arms and torso.

“I was working,” he grunted, wincing at the sting “and I fell”

You caught the subtle eye-roll the student gave in response to his obvious answer and smirked.

It was as if you were saying the words before they even reached your brain for approval- “This would never have happened, though, if you were wearing a shirt and protective gear” You blurted, your eyes growing wider with every word you uttered.

By the end of the sentence, you were almost literally kicking yourself. Steve’s eyes snapped up at you, a grin now plastered across his face, not dissimilar to the one he flashed at you the day before.

“Then how the hell would I have gotten your attention” he squinted at your chest to read your name badge “Nurse Y/N...?”

Hearing your name tumble from his lips was enough to force you to squeeze your thighs together in an attempt to suppress the tingling feeling emanating from between your legs, and pretend as though you didn’t hear him.

Finally, your protégée was done with her clean up and switched places with you so you could show her how to suture up a wound properly.

“Now, you grip the needle just like this...” you began.

Absentmindedly, you placed a hand against Steve’s bare abdomen to steady yourself and instantly regretted it.

He was warm. Very warm, in fact. It was strange that this surprised you. It was hot outside, after all. It was probably something to do with his muscle bound body looking like something that had been carved out of a cold block of marble, and placed in a museum to be marvelled at. Nevertheless, you became more and more self-conscious of how you touched him, and even more aware of his eyes boring into you as you nimbly finished up the stitching.

“And...you’re all done.” You sighed, slightly disappointed. “Hope that helped,” you turned to your student.

“Thank you, Y/N. It did.” She smiled at you and rushed off to lunch.

“Yes, thank you Y/N.” Steve mimicked, now sitting up and smirking over at you. You raised an eyebrow at him as you fill out his chart.

“What, are you not gonna say thank you back?” He teased “I could see how much you enjoyed feeling me up.” You blushed but maintained your silence. He shook his head and laughed a little.

“I’m messing with you. You know that right?” He chuckled, but stopped quickly, as he noticed you only offered him a weak smile.

“But seriously, thank you.” He sighed. “I guess I can get out of here now?”

“You’re free to go, Sir” He gave you a meaningful look, and you could almost see his eyes darken a shade before he pulled on a dark grey Henley and strolled out of sight.

You hated to admit it, but you disliked seeing him leave, and it was almost devastating to see him put a shirt on. The only consolation being that his butt in those pants worked wonders for your mood.

“I’m telling you Y/N, don’t invite Sam if you want to have a quiet night in with no hijinks,” He grumbled

“I thought you were friends” you chuckled, flicking through yours and Bucky’s extensive DVD collection.

“We are ... but he’s a problem” he explained, slamming the microwave door on the popcorn he had just placed in it.

You rolled your eyes and raked a hand through your hair, before finally settling on a classic.

“We’re watching back to the future...again?” Bucky feigned annoyance, shoving the bowl of popcorn between the two of you and curling up underneath a blanket on the other side of the couch.

You could only see his eyes peering at you as he drew the blanket up above his nose, his legs stretched out and his ice block feet were planted on top of your thighs, draining their warmth.

“Don’t act like you don’t love it,” you retorted as the opening sequence began.

Much to both of your annoyance, a sharp knock at the door interrupted your movie just at both of your favourite part- the skateboard chase scene.

“Did you order in?” Bucky paused the movie and gave you a confused look You shook your head, equally confused, and drew your knees up to your chest as Bucky stood and walked over to the front door.

“This better be important.” he sighed as he pulled open the door forcefully.

“What the hell?” Bucky whispered, his voice dripping with incredulity. Bucky was not a man who was easily surprised, so you quickly upped your seat and padded over to the door to see what could have possibly unsettled your normally stoic best friend/roommate.

It was Steve. He wore a similar expression on his face to when he had seen you at the hospital early that morning. Only this time he had a shirt on and was clutching a bouquet of flowers.

“Bucky?” It looked like all of the life force had drained from Steve’s face. After a few seconds of staring and silence, you decided to break the awkward silence.

“I’m assuming you two know each other?” You chimed in.

Bucky shuffled back to include you in the conversation and nodded.

“Steve and I used to work together.” He explained, his eyes still fixated on Steve, who was now looking down at the ground.

“You mean, back when you were an a-“ Bucky flinched beside you. You had almost forgotten how much Bucky hated talking about that.

“Sorry,” you mumbled, briefly patting his tensed flesh arm.

“Well, it’s nice to see you again,” Bucky continued, still holding his gaze.

Steve looked up and offered Bucky a weak smile. “Yeah, it is,” he agreed.

After a pregnant silence, Steve’s eyes widened.

“Oh, you’re probably wondering why I’m here,” he chuckled nervously.

You raised an eyebrow. This was a new side of Steve you’d observed. Not to say that you knew the guy well, but from what you had seen, he seemed to be a confident, bordering on cocky kind of guy, who loved attention. To cut it short, you had him down as a womaniser, but the way he was scratching at the nape of his neck and shuffling anxiously before yourself and Bucky gave you doubts.

“I-I wanted to say thanks properly for today, Y/N” he tripped over his words a little as he thrust the bouquet towards you.

Bucky now looked at you with that all too common confused look.

“I did his stitches,” you explained, and thankfully that was enough for Bucky.

“I was just doing my job,” you took the flowers “but thank you, Steve, that’s really sweet”

“How did you know our door number?” Bucky asked, completely ignoring the heartwarming scene before him.

Again, Steve blushed and smiled. “Maybe you should’ve been a detective, Buck” he laughed, “I asked one of your neighbours. I guess I got lucky”

Bucky smirked at his comment and nodded, accepting the explanation. The conversation reached a natural end, and Bucky looked to you expectantly to bring it to its official close.

He tended to rely on you in certain social situations, and you had grown used to it. “Well, thank you again, Steve...” you began. And just then you had a thought.

“Why don’t you stay? We’re having a movie night.” Steve looked momentarily caught off guard and he stuffed his fists into his pockets.

“I wouldn’t want to intrude,” he admitted.

Bucky rolled his eyes and pulled Steve in by his wrist.

“It’s back to the future tonight,” he muttered and resumed his usual position on the couch, watching intently as Steve sat between yourself and him after you had found a vase to place his flowers into.

He could tell something was going on. Steve hadn’t acted like this since...forever ago.

Finally, the ending credits rolled, and you noticed Bucky was fighting to keep his eyes open, his eyelids drooping and his mouth hanging open slightly.

“Okay, I think we might have officially overtired the old man,” you remarked, chuckling as Bucky shot you a dirty look.

He rose from his reclining position and announced he was heading to bed, not before shooting a long, meaningful glance at yourself and Steve. You were alone. At night. With Steve. You blushed as memories of you needing to touch yourself to satiate your yearning for him crept into your mind at what felt like the worst possible moment. You crossed your legs quickly to try to counteract the spreading warmth from your core.

“Wanna watch something else?” You quickly offered.

Steve shifted in his seat so he was closer to you, his arm draped over the back of the couch, almost brushing at your hair. “Whatever you want,” he smiled lazily at you.

Though it was pretty dark in the living room you could see his pupils were blown, and were focused on your mouth.

“Uh...I think they’re showing some old films on channel-“ “

You’re nervous,” he sighed, cutting you off.

You shifted awkwardly in your seat, not knowing how to respond to his statement. Luckily for you, Steve seemed to have a plan of his own. Before you could properly react, he had brought his hand to your face, and tucked a piece of hair behind your ear before dragging a finger down your jawline to your chin, and resting it there. By now he was close enough for you to feel his body heat radiating from underneath his clothes.

“You’re real pretty, Y/N.” He whispered. His eyes were now scanning your whole face.

You felt your jaw drop and your mouth hang open, unsure of what was going to happen next. You couldn’t even summon the strength to say thank you. He was now firmly holding your chin between his thumb and forefinger and he gently brought it closer to his own face. You watched as his eyes fluttered closed and he pressed his lips to yours. His tongue darted playfully, asking for entrance, and you immediately moaned, granting him access. He brought his hands down to your waist, then your hips, and then squeezed at your ass. He smirked into the kiss.

You caught your breath as you finally pulled apart from him, but relentlessly he attached himself to your neck, nibbling and sucking at the sensitive skin there. “Steve...” you sighed, embedding your hands in his soft hair.

“Mm?” He hummed, his hands exploring your body.

“Steve, I need you” He quickly pulled away, and stared at you. You could barely see him now in the darkness, but you could make out his chest rising and falling due to laboured breaths.

“Say it again.” He demanded, his voice barely above a whisper.

“Steve I need you. I need you right now” you said, adding a whimper at the end for effect.

With a deep growl, he rose to his full height and picked you up bridal style as if you weighed nothing. Somehow, through your shocked state, you guided him through the dark apartment to your room. He tossed you onto the bed and started ravaging your body with his mouth, kissing every inch of bare skin with desperation. You felt his erection pressing against your thigh as he removed your top and fiddled with your bra strap. He ripped the bra from your body, and instantly attached his mouth to the peaks of your breast, rolling the other bud in his hand. This drew a primal moan from the depths of your body, and you clamped a hand over your mouth, knowing Bucky was sleeping nearby. You bit your lip as Steve continued to massage your breasts and flick his tongue against your nipple simultaneously. You started to palm him through his jeans.

From what you could feel, he was large. Your mouth watered and your pussy clenched at the thought of it. It seemed Steve noticed this and almost read your thoughts.

“Can’t wait to feel me inside you, Y/N?” He whispered, sitting up suddenly to remove his shirt, the outline of his ripped torso catching the dim light of your bedroom.

“Please, Steve,” you whined, rolling your hips against his leg.

“I’m gonna taste you first, darling” he muttered, pulling your sweatpants down and exposing your panties. He dragged two fingers over the material of your underwear and chuckled.

“You’re wet,” he mused, tugging the material to the side. He began by rubbing your clit slowly, causing you to lift your hips into the air jerkily, overcome by a wave of pleasure.

“Look at you,” he sighed so violently you could feel his hot breath against your pulsating opening

“You’re so pretty, coming undone for me, Y/N” And with that, he dove between your folds, lapping at your core enthusiastically. You tugged at his hair, steering him as he continued to eat you out. Your toes curled at every movement he made with his fingers and tongue, almost knocking the breath out of you.

“Cum for me” he murmured against your heat, noticing you getting close to your climax.

“Soak my face.” His dirty words alone sent you over the edge, a wave of euphoria crawling out over your body, leaving you a shivering wreck.

You didn’t have much time to recover from the first orgasm that Steve Rogers had so graciously given you, despite it being so intense. You had barely finished twitching when you looked up to find the man angling his sizeable cock at your entrance, his face flushed and his hair flopping into his face- a perfect picture of impatience.

The tip brushed frustratingly against your folds, teasing what was to come. You moaned and rutted your hips against him.

“You sure you want this, darlin’?” He whispered, his breath hot on your skin.

You couldn’t nod fast enough, and he grinned. He loved your eagerness. It was endearing, and something he hadn’t experienced in a while. He watched your mouth involuntarily fall open as he pushed himself into you so fast, that his balls slapped against your skin. Instinctively you reached out to grasp onto something, anything and squeezed your eyes shut as you stretched around his girth.

Steve continued to thrust into you, but took a more gentle rhythmic approach, allowing you to grow used to his size. Noticing your raised hand, he interlocked his fingers with yours, and gently rested your intertwined hands on the bedsheet above your heads, leaning down to kiss your forehead.

“F-fuck, Steve, you feel so good” you groaned as he picked up the pace.

“Yeah? You like it when I’m fucking your pretty little pussy hard?” He grunted, releasing one of your hands and running a finger along your bottom lip. You nodded, and licked at his fingers, before sucking on two of the long, calloused digits.

He raised an eyebrow at you, growled, and quickly flipped you over so you were riding on top of him.

Now you could see his body clearly. You couldn’t help but run your fingers up and down his toned chest, now coated in a sheen of sweat, all while grinding against him teasingly.

You stuck your chest out so your breasts bounced just that little bit more, and it seemed to do the trick. He pulled you down forcefully by the arms and buried his head in your cleavage and his thrusts became sloppy and erratic.

“I’m gonna...Y/N I’m gonna cum right now...” he warned you. Quickly, you slid off of his length and pushed your tits together in front of his tip.

“Cum for me, Steve,” you whined, looking up at him through thick lashes. This, was enough to push him over the edge. His mouth contorted into a crooked “O” shape and his eyes rolled backwards slightly.

White, hot streams of cum shot out at you, coating your breasts thickly. You smirked, maintaining eye contact with him whilst scooping up some of his seed and sucking it clean off of your finger. His eyes widened and a pink hue rose at his cheeks once more, surprised at how dirty you could be.

“I’m sorry I didn’t get to give you another one,” he mumbled sheepishly, as you cleaned yourself up. You shook your head and slid between the covers beside him again.

“Steve, I’ve never cum that hard in my life. Don’t worry about it.” He smirked, and reached out under the thick covers to wrap his hands around your wrists and pull you until your chest was flush against his, and you could feel his heart beating through the warm skin of his chest. All was silent until you heard feet on the floorboards outside of your room.

“Thank fuck that’s over,” you heard Bucky grumble petulantly before hearing his door slam shut once more.

#steve rogers #captain america #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers imagine #chris evans x reader #chris evans x you #bucky x reader #bucky barnes #sebastian stan #the winter soldier #steve rogers smut #steve rogers and reader #steve rogers au #steve rogers and bucky barnes

463 notes · View notes

go-events · 4 years

Photo

GO Rom Com Spotlight: @wyvernquill

The amazing @wyvernquill (also WyvernQuill on AO3) has claimed Ruby Sparks to adapt for Good Omens in the Good Omens Rom Com Event.

For reference, here’s a little background about the source material!

About Ruby Sparks: Young author Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano), once a literary darling, is having trouble composing his next novel. Following a therapist's advice, Calvin pulls out an old manual typewriter and creates a vivacious, flame-haired woman he dubs Ruby Sparks (Zoe Kazan). Overnight, Ruby leaps from the page into Calvin's home as a real flesh-and-blood woman. And, what's more, she's unaware that she's actually a fictional character and that her actions and feelings are dictated by whatever Calvin writes.

We spent some time chatting about how the adaptation is coming so far, as well as future plans for it! Now, get to know @wyvernquill a little better!

* * *

goromcom: Let’s begin with what Tumblr can tell me about you. You know how if you open a Tumblr chat with someone you haven't chatted to before, Tumblr tells you two things they post about? I wanted to tell you that yours reports that you post "about #fanart and #illustration". I really admire people who can draw *and* write. Do you enjoy one more than the other?

wyvernquill: Oh, don't ask me to choose between my brain-children! I love both for different reasons, and find some ideas are easier to express in writing, others through drawing; though I also love to combine the two by illustrating my fics or writing something based on some random thing I sketched during class. (I'm also a very quick artist, while my fics tend to balloon out of proportion - so "doing a quick illustration in an hour" and "writing a 102k epic" are two very different and really rather incomparable experiences!)

goromcom: Oh goodness, yes. Two very different creative outlets! But for now, let’s talk about writing. You chose to adapt Ruby Sparks as your rom com. Has this movie been a favorite of yours, or is there some other reason you chose it?

wyvernquill: Cards on the table? I never heard of this movie before. I got very close to writing the fic without having seen it once, and only watched it a week or so ago. (And even then... it's not a *bad* movie, but, personally, I didn't grow attached to the characters at all. Just didn't really appeal to my tastes, I guess.) So, why Ruby Sparks?

Well, I made a List, capital L for significance. In the 12 hours before claims, I researched the plots of every single movie up for claiming - most of which I never heard of, clearly I don't watch enough romcoms - and categorised them into "absolutely not" "mmmmmaybe?" and "possibly", making my way through IMDB short descriptions and Wikipedia pages until the List was down to the top 10; most of which were movies I'd seen or at least heard of - except Ruby Sparks, which I chose for the simple reason that I'd ALREADY written an "accidental" AU of it.

The premise was exactly the same as roughly 3k of unfinished Doctor Who fic I scribbled together and never published, even though I was quite fond of it. I figured I could re-use my favourite elements of that fic, work off the base premise rather than the movie itself, and see where writing takes me.

goromcom: That is quite a ride! I’m a big proponent of re-introducing or recycling ideas or material that you find compelling but weren’t quite able to use before! It’s like, eco-awareness for your mind. :)

Given your history with this movie, this might be an odd question, but: What's your favorite moment of your movie, and are you looking forward to presenting it in your adaptation? Any loose plans for that scene that you can share?

wyvernquill: For reasons already outlined above, this isn't really based directly on any scene of the movie, but I think Aziraphale writing his idea of a "perfect husband" (and a progressively more thinly-veiled self-insert as the main character) will be a delight!

I greatly enjoy having the subjective perception of POV characters and objective reality be comically different - "I'm an excellent cook," he said, scraping the burned remnants of what could really no longer be called an omelette onto a plate - so I think I'll have some fun there. Maybe Aziraphale will defend his Artistic Vision (And Not Wish Fulfillment At All Shut Up) to someone? I'm not sure yet.

goromcom: I have a feeling I know the answer, but let me ask it anyway. Do you plan to stick very closely to the beats of the original story, or make bigger changes?

wyvernquill: Bigger changes, definitely. I might pluck an idea or two from the movie - and, surprisingly, the rough progression of events was pretty close to what I planned anyway - but it'll be rather different. (See next answer - I might well take more from Mary Shelley than from Ruby Sparks!)

Also, I'm still a bit undecided on this, but I might actually have Aziraphale publish some of his writing about Crowley from the start, something which doesn't happen in the movie until the very end.

goromcom: What's an interesting decision you've made in your planning so far--a notable casting decision, a changing of venue, or some other plan you have to paint Good Omens all over your rom com?

wyvernquill: Well, the moral of the movie was more or less that Writer Guy--no, I don't even remember his name!--has to overcome his controlling half-neurotic nature so he can be happy both among his more easy-going family and with the freespirited Ruby. Instead, I intend to have Aziraphale struggling a la Modern Prometheus (what does it mean to create life, to play God, to have a Creature that thinks for itself?), creating a subplot that is more overtly philosophical and thought-provoking, with a hint of religiosity - the essence of what GO is to me.(Meaning the final conflict will not be Writer Guy warping Ruby into a helpless parody of herself, but instead Aziraphale growing afraid of Crowley, who's beginning to show traits he never wrote for him, attempting to "erase" him again before he loses control entirely... but it all ends happily, don't worry! ;))

goromcom: Those are some pretty interesting ideas you’re playing with! I’m looking forward to reading it. But let’s not give too much away, and move on to my last question. I am blatantly stealing this from The Good Place: The Podcast, but here goes: Tell me something "good". It can be something big or small. It can be a charity you think is doing good work, or you can talk about how great your pet is.

wyvernquill: Oh, the temptation to talk about my four darling cats is Real(tm)... but instead, I want to give a little shout-out to the absolutely fantasticamazingbrilliant teacher at my university who offered a course on fanfic and fandom studies this past term, and who is letting me write my term paper on the Ineffable Fandom!!!

She's the best, lots of fun to discuss with, and research for the paper - deadline in two weeks, I've not yet started writing it, let's hope I get it finished speedily! - is an absolute delight.

(The only difficulty will be staying within the page limit... there's just so much to write about with this wonderful fandom.)

Her course was the highlight of my week, and fan studies (unsurprisingly!) turned out to be a field that really interests me. So thank you so much, Ms Fanfic Teacher, I'm very grateful for... just about everything!!! ^-^ <3

goromcom: That sounds like a fantastic class and an even better teacher. You have to admire the people who go that extra mile to inspire and lift up their students, and get them actually excited about learning.

And you know what else is going to be fantastic? The GO adaptation of Ruby Sparks, coming soon!

#goromcom #goromcom spotlight #good omens #wyvernquill #ruby sparks

21 notes · View notes

scripting-life · 4 years

Text

FFVII: returning to my first love

*peeks out of the corner of my lurking spot*

Hello? Anybody out there? It’s only been, oh you know, four-ish years since the last time I’ve posted anything here. I apologize in advance for anybody who’s still following me from my Castle days. If you couldn’t tell from my extended absence, I’ve mostly moved on. Castle and Beckett were fantastic characters that let me to play with some deep-dive analyses, and Castle will always hold a special place in my heart as my comfort show and my first real and extended experience with online fandom. I’ll always be grateful to the community I’ve had the joy of interacting with (or, the community with which I’ve had the joy of interacting, as Castle would correct me my dangling preposition).

I honestly didn’t think I would ever have reason to come back to Tumblr after Castle ended. But the FF7 Remake has returned me to my very first love--when I was young and innocent and before I knew anything about OTPs or ship wars. I’ve been back lurking for several months now and seeing all the fanart/fanfics and fun theories and analyses has reignited my enthusiasm for the FF7 franchise. It’s also fun coming back to this franchise with a more mature understanding of the themes/concepts that completely flew over my head as a young preteen.

(This ended up being super long, so the rest is below the cut to spare everyone the pain of scrolling. Apparently, my rambling tendencies have not changed at all. lol.)

When FF7R was officially announced (five freaking years ago!), I was filled with apprehension. FF7 was my first taste of a “grown-up” game. I was 11 and played my brother’s copy of the OG on PC in 1-2 hours spurts on the weekends when I visited his apartment. It took me months, if not years, to finish the game (I ended up stealing his copy to play on our computer at home...lol), and I was so blown away by it. I remember the exact moment I finished it and how I was literally shaking as I watched the ending FMV.

Later, when I found out my brother had a copy of FF8 (my poor brother was so accommodating to his annoying little sister...haha), I was so excited to play, in large part because I thought it would continue the story of FF7. Young, naive me didn’t understand the numbering conventions of Final Fantasy titles. I was madly theorizing and breaking my brain trying to find connections between the two games’ plots and had literally played through more than half the game before I finally realized the storyline of FF8 had absolutely nothing to do with FF7. I was sorely disappointed, and I think that has somewhat tainted my appreciation of future titles. Not to say I haven’t enjoyed the subsequent FF titles, but I think a little part of me is always comparing them to that first experience of wonder and awe that I had with FF7.

I discovered fanfiction in my teens and starting writing FF7/Cloti fics in college. Aside from interacting with a few fic writers at the time, I was not involved in any online communities, so I kept myself pretty free of any ship war drama and the like. When I did research for my fics, I’d sometimes see shipping sites and theories where I didn’t always understand the logic of how certain conclusions were reached, but frankly, I didn’t much care and didn’t realize that Clerith vs. Cloti was such a touchy subject. I was peripherally aware that some sort great LTD war was waging, of course, but it didn’t really touch me. I stayed in my Cloti shipping/fic-writing lane and was probably a lot happier for it. And, to be honest, based on FFN’s listings for FF7, I felt like I always saw a bunch of Sephiroth/Cloud fics and thought that was just as popular as the more conventional ships.

Graduating college and entering “real life” pretty much ended my FF7 fanfic-writing journey. In the intervening years between college and the release of FF7R, I haven’t gone back to the OG too much. I’ve played almost all the Final Fantasy games since then, and I always enjoy getting my FF7 crew fix when I play the non-canon mobile games or the Kingdom Hearts franchise. But FF7 was a happy part of my teenage years, and I was content to think on it with sweet nostalgia.

Remakes, in recent experience (*cough cough* Disney, why?), have been hit or miss, with a lot of misses. It’s hard to strike a good balance between catering to nostalgia and delivering a fresh product, never mind the change in social mores through the decades. I was so afraid FF7R would screw up my memories, especially since I wasn’t the biggest fan of Advent Children. The graphics were great and the action scenes were fun, but the story felt like a let-down. Cloud, in particular, felt so different (and yes, moody) from where we left him after the OG. I understand now that a lot of his character motivation was better explained in the On The Way to a Smile novels, but back then, I just felt like AC came out of nowhere.

Btw, because I see this question a lot on other blogs when I’m lurking, I’ve ALWAYS thought that it was very clear in AC--even without reading anything else--that the reason for Cloud’s depression was due to guilt and not because he was pining for Aerith. The only reason I didn’t like his characterization in AC was because it felt like it came out of nowhere since AC is set 2 years after OG and by the end of the OG, he seemed to be in a pretty decent place mentally and emotionally. That being said, I can absolutely understand why some traumas resurface years after the originating incident and how times of peace might actually be worse because he is no longer solely focused on saving the world, but I was just surprised and a little bummed that this was the direction the devs chose to take AC at the time. Now that I’m older, I do better appreciate the complexities of Cloud’s mental state and the fact that they depicted a hero with lingering mental health issues is actually pretty awesome. I’m drawn to characters that have flaws--sometimes serious ones--but try their best anyway. Hence, why why Tifa Lockhart and Kate Beckett are some of my all-time favorites.

Anyhow, that didn’t stop me from pre-ordering FF7R, of course. I avoided reading any reviews as I didn’t want my first impressions to be swayed, and boy, was I happy that I went in mostly blind. That sense of awe really almost felt like playing the OG for the first time again, but somehow more. The combat system is incredibly fun and the world-building is nothing short of incredible. The variety and abundance of NPCs gives the game so much flavor and the locations have been rendered so well. As I’m going through areas like the Sector 7 train station and Wall Market and Aerith’s house, I can almost superimpose the layout from the OG in my head, but now it’s in 3D and so rich and full. It’s obvious that a lot of attention was paid to details, and I love all the head-nods and homages to the OG.

And oh, the characters!

This is the Cloud I’ve been wanting to see in glorious HD and the Cloud I remember from the original game: all awkward, dorky trying to be cool, socially inept, mentally unstable, abrasive-at-times, reluctant to act depending on who’s asking, wannabe hard-ass who’s actually a big softie inside Cloud. I remember reading an article a few years back about how the devs basically redid Cloud for the Remake because they wanted him to go back to his dorky roots--which ends up making him closest to his personality in the OG than his appearances in other franchises--and I was SOOOO incredibly happy to hear that. I was so sick of the way Cloud was constantly depicted as this cool, broody McBrood in his cameos when he was a pretty big dork in the OG. (Anybody remember him doing squats in the Highwind when Tifa says it’ll be lonely with just the two of them and Cloud responds that he’ll make enough noise to make up for it? Like I said: cute, but a dork.)

I WAS surprised by how comfortable and sweet and touchy (so very very touchy) the devs made him with Tifa from the beginning. That initial scene of Cloud being such a smooth operator giving Tifa the flower had my jaw-dropping and every single flirty interaction after that (and there are many) had my Cloti heart overflowing in shock and bliss. Throughout most of my years as a Cloti shipper, even though I believed Cloti was supported by canon and pretty clearly together, I was also under the impression--mistakenly or not--that Cloti was the minority ship. So for Square Enix to make it so blatantly obvious that Cloud is really into Tifa at such an early stage has been an unexpected gift.

Also, they’re just really hot together. (Clotiscrew tunnel--be still my heart!)

As for Tifa...oh, what wonderful character development we’ve already gotten for Tifa. Tifa has always been one of my all-time favorite characters ever since reading her character blurb in the OG game manual. Initially, as a child, it was because I saw so much of myself in her. She was outwardly bright and optimistic, but tended to hide all of her stronger feelings inside. She fought with her fists, and for someone who was a tomboy growing up who liked playing contact sports with the boys, I connected with her in a way that I had never been able to connect with other female protagonists who were primarily back-row specialists. (I also aspired to grow to her listed height of 5′4″, which alas, did not happen...lol).

I love how the Remake delves into more of Tifa’s moral conflict between the destruction that she causes as part of Avalanche and needing to do something to stop Shinra, and yes, even seeking revenge. They touched on this in the OG lightly, but the Remake really hammers it home. She’s perhaps the most conflicted character in terms of motivation in Part 1. That scene with the Shinra manager on the train is actually one of my favorite scenes of her because it highlights that tension. The elevator scene, if you opted for it instead of the stairs (or if you did one, saved, and reloaded to do the other one, like me), is also underrated in terms of how much it reveals about Tifa’s inner struggle.

On this point, I also appreciate that the Remake has the characters reflecting on the damage they’ve both indirectly and directly inflicted--the Avalanche team all do this to a certain degree. In particular, Jessie’s constant inability to figure out what she’d done wrong with the bomb to cause such a massive explosion and her remaining feelings of guilt during her death scene (”they were my victims” ouch!) were heart-breaking.

Aerith’s depiction was another pleasant surprise. I’ll be honest; I didn’t much like her in the OG. She was too pushy and willfully oblivious to the point of being mean at times. In the Remake, much of her sometimes too in-your-face playfulness was kept--perhaps still a little too much--but I appreciate the nuance that they gave her. The train graveyard scene tells the player that she didn’t have friends growing up, and I think that partially contributes to her lack of social tact at times. The other factor that gives her personality more nuance is the hint of special knowledge that affects how she interacts with the rest of the group. It gives her additional hidden motivation and adds to her mystery for new players while simultaneously pulling at the heartstrings for old players who get the impression that Aerith is somehow aware--to a certain, unknown extent--of her own fate.

I also appreciate that Aerith is more grounded as a real person than as some sort of revered being. I do blame AC for some of that. When you have the power to cure a fatal disease from the afterlife and send the dead back to life, it gets into some godlike territory. Maybe it’s a fair depiction of her powers as a Cetra, but I just get the feeling that Aerith herself wouldn’t really appreciate being made into this goddess-like figure. Remember that her character blurb in the original game manual implied that she was more interested in earthly things (i.e. the love triangle) than in exploring her own powers. I personally think that Aerith used the “love triangle” in the OG as a form of escapism from the weight of her burdens rather than genuine interest, and I just think she’d want to be thought of as a person rather than as a god. One of my favorite scenes for Aerith is when she and Cloud are traversing the rooftops and she slips on the ladder, letting out a simple, “Shit.” It humanizes her in a way that combats some of the ways she’s sort of been deified in the last 23 years. Also, Aerith wielding a folding chair like it’s WWE never fails to make me laugh. Overall, she just comes off as a more reasonably flawed and--as a result, to me--a more likeable character in the Remake, and I do very much like her now.

Barret is pretty much the exact larger than life character I imagined in my head, only somehow even better, and I really love how expressive and emotional his eyes and facial expressions are. His scenes with Marlene are truly the cutest thing ever. Red XIII is a big, furry ball of sass, and I need so much more of him in the coming parts (Cosmo Canyon still wrecks me to this day). The interactions between the Wedge, Biggs, and Jessie are incredible, and they really feel like people who’ve been friends and basically each other’s family for years. The Turks and Rufus are pretty much as cool as I imagined them in the OG.

There’s still so much more I haven’t even started touching on about the Remake, and I think that’s why I’m finally posting this now. I just can’t contain my love for this game any more, and I really really need a place to express myself. I don’t know if anybody is still reading, but I appreciate having the opportunity to finally gush about this game and franchise that I’ve loved so much for pretty much two-thirds of my life.

#ff7r #final fantasy 7: remake #cloti #cloud x tifa #cloud strife #tifa lockhart #final fantasy vii #final fantasy 7 #ff7 #aerith gainsborough #jessie rasberry #barret wallace #red xiii #for the love of the game #personal experience #not sure i'm ready to wade back into fandom life #but i really needed to gush #oh man i forgot to mention the cats #how could i forget the cats?!?!?

5 notes · View notes

whichstiel · 5 years

Photo

I made this art for the 2019 Dean/Cas Tropefest. (HUGE thanks to the mods, Jojo and Muse, for being amazing!) As soon as I read through the summaries, I knew I needed to try to grab the DRAGON STORY right away. I just...really love dragons, okay? This story is delightful and unexpected, with lovely world-building, rich side characters, and a beautiful romance between Dean and Cas. I really enjoyed reading it and working with zaphodsgirl! You can read Shadow & Storm by zaphodsgirl now! You’ll love it. <3

Here’s the summary:

One night, a mysterious visitor appears in young Prince Dean's bedroom, and he suddenly finds himself transported to an abandoned replica of his home in an unknown land. He learns quickly that the borders are finite, and none may leave without incurring the wrath of the guardian: a dragon the people call Storm.

Left with no choice, Dean adapts to life as the others have, tending to the animals and working the land to survive. As he grows up, the life he knew as a prince seems more and more distant, until a new person arrives that he remembers from his childhood. Shaken by this arrival, Dean’s desire to escape returns anew, and he discovers more than he wanted to know about the Shadowlands and its occupants -- especially about the mysterious guardian of the castle, Castiel.

Continue reading for some insight into the process and drafts behind the art.

Reading this story, I was struck by its lovely fairy tale vibe, which inspired me to make some kind of story-book art. I’ve always enjoyed pop-up books, so that seemed like a fun thing to try. My first step was to learn more about pop-ups. I turned to the internet for ideas, and found recommendations for: Pop-up design and paper mechanics, by Duncan Birmingham. This was a really useful book (I got it from the library - and you can too!) It gave me some basic structures and some general rules of thumb for how things fold and work when opened. I stuck with the simpler forms, given the short time period before posting.

Tools & supplies:

Cardstock paper

Watercolor paper (for the folding pages/backdrops and some stand-ups)

Watercolors, colored pencil, sharpie markers

Glue (I really like this scrapbooker’s glue pen for paperwork. Dries FAST and mostly doesn’t warp.)

Scissors, precision knife, ruler, protractor

Bone folder for pressing seams

Once I had some broad ideas of some of the rules of pop-up creation, I started to sketch out some quick ideas. I always like to start with the cover image, since that’s the main image people see when they’re browsing a story list. I did a few basic sketches on paper, but I decided the easiest way to develop these pop-up pieces would be to do what Birmingham called “paper sketching.” With paper sketching, you just...eyeball the pieces, attach it to a folded piece of paper, and cut away whatever paper you don’t want. It’s sort of like working with negative space in that way. Paper sketching was invaluable for helping me figure out things like: how tall should the mountains be? How high are the wings? What can fold together to lay flat? (Because I wanted this to be a functional book.) How long can I make that flame spout? (Not long, as it turned out.)

Here are some paper sketches I made of the cover image. A few of these were before I re-read the story and realized that the castle was built INTO the mountain. Oops. Building drafts helped me to realize that the concept was possible. Once I had some general structures under my belt, I could start to do the finer work of cutting out the final pieces. Draft work was typically done with sketchbook paper or cheap cardstock from Walgreens.

(Left: first draft; Right: Oh my god maybe this will actually work)

I wanted the cover to convey the full expanse of the lands surrounding the castle. I made my author draw me an actual map and diagram of all the agricultural lands. Thanks, zaphodsgirl! I chose black paper for the cover for REASONS you will discover when you read the story.

(Left: background watercolor progress with marker details; Right: taping in a quick test sketch to see if it will fit with the dragon and to test the angle)

Behind the scenes

For each design, I started by painting a watercolor backdrop, making note of the center where I’d need to fold the page. Watercolor paper was a pretty good choice because it’s thick and you can really crease the hell out of that middle joint - and the page stays strong. The cover is the most detailed. For the others, I went with more imprecise watercolor washes - mostly in the interest of time.

Finding a good backdrop is always a challenge when photographing art, and was a big issue for the cover since that dragon really gets lost if there’s too much in the background. I decided to go “Maria from Sound of Music” and pull down one of my curtains as a backdrop. That, plus desk lamps for light made a pretty good set.

This piece features Castiel fading into the dragon. I suffered from proportion control for this project but chose to forge on ahead, anyway. Sometimes the dragon is huge, sometimes it’s small. Oooooh well, it’s a dragon, anyway. :D The little Dean torso is intended to be a manually-opened inset, more to show his reaction than anything else. The dragon is 5 pieces - tail, head and forepaw, wings, and body. Castiel is a single piece; his fold is attached to the dragon and there’s a little paper accordion behind his head to keep him upright.

(Top left: I hate concept sketches; Top right: Cas coming together. I made him too tall! Oh well, I’m gonna roll with it)

Behind the scenes

This next piece was actually the second one I did, because it was the most complex and I wanted to get it finished so I wouldn’t fret over it. The red light is from a bicycle tail-light that I’m holding in the air with one hand while taking a photo with the other. I just really liked that little shadow claw on the ground!

This dragon was somewhat inspired by a Game of Thrones popup my author shared with me. My dragon isn’t as complex, but it still opens wide and closes flat, so I’m happy. It’s basically built as an upside down triangle, cut into a folded piece of paper. The fold is on the bottom. You can draw a line from the fold in its snout to a fold on its torso. The spines were cut out and glued on after the fact because I completely forgot to add them!!!

I was having some trouble with the wings attaching properly, so my test models had the dragon at various stages of height or angles from the ground. Too high and it would pop beyond the book pages. Too low and it might as well be sitting on the page completely. The dragon body has built-in tabs to which the wings are glued and the forest cutouts have this as well, for max strength. This is one of those cards where I went through enough drafts that I resorted to tape as a quick-hold option to figure out things like height and angle and how much dragon could fit in the folded pages. I ended up using an actual tool with (gasp) measurements to finally get the angle of the forest inserts right. Folding the test dragon into the card, I actually just sliced off the excess wing and tail that peeked out from the edges, then used that space when I was cutting out my final dragon.

For each of these, it’s best to get your pattern pieces as close as possible and then use that to cut your final pieces. The angles and length of everything needs to be fairly precise or what worked in your draft won’t fold well in the final version.

(Top left: So many draft pieces, so little time; Top right: Use math, kids!; Bottom: Dragon open and closed)

Behind the scenes

The last piece is modeled after a simple folding animal style. Its feet are glued symmetrically over the fold.

It’s essentially a folded piece of cardstock with an animal cut out of it. The head is attached separately, as are the wings and Amara. I had a star hole punch, which made it easy to add some stars to Amara’s gown as well as on the page. I’d wanted to do a big fold-out window arch here, but realized that it wouldn’t fit over the dragon or the Dean/Cas fold. Ah well. Please imagine it, instead.

(Top left: concept sketch; Top right: Paper sketching is a great reality check; Bottom: Amara astride Storm)

Behind the scenes

The final step was to turn this into some kind of book. At first, I planned to stitch the pages together. I’d never bound a book before, and I was cursing myself for putting down all those layers of pop-up inserts if I was going to have to stitch through each page. Then I looked at some pop-up books and realized that often just the edges of the pages are glued, leaving the middle to float as necessary. This was good, because it was a way easier option! (Also the dragon in the forest came out a little tight, so the float was very helpful there.)

I glued the page edges and, since they were a little curly from the watercolor and popup designs pulling at them, I weighted them with books to dry for a while.

I found an old book cover that would work (from a very outdated technology textbook). I sliced out the original pages, recovered the book with black paper, and glued in my new book pages on the front and back. It was a perfect fit!

I finished with time to spare, so I added a little watercolor and paper cut-out picture and frame to the front and back to add some flair. Please enjoy my terrible glue job. (I forgot to smooth the paper.)

I used a hair tie cut in half to hold the pages down for photographs (or display). I clipped two wedge-shaped bag clips to the underside of each tie to weigh down each side, and hold the book open at a slight angle.

This was a fun and challenging project to work on, and I’m so grateful to zaphodsgirl for all her effusive words and gifs of encouragement. You’re going to love this sweet story. Go read it now! Shadow & Storm on AO3.

(And if you feeling like tossing a comment my way, I’d love to hear from you here on Tumblr or on my art post on AO3.)

#deancas tropefest #my art #dragons #popup book #papercutting art

169 notes · View notes