I did a sketch! On a panel! For a painting!!!

I am doing it!!!

On FFXIV and the Devs

Listen, I know I’ve been mostly blogging FFXIV for the past couple years--but technically speaking this is my general blog. Some of my followers rn are from Final Fantasy XIV specifically, others are from well before that. I’m very lucky to have friends from lots of places so this is kind of talking to both for a sec.

Some of my past fandoms I think legitimately wound up traumatizing me a bit. Not everyone in them of course, but like. What [INSERT UNSPECIFIED FANDOM] ended up becoming? I started seeing people commit and endorse violent crimes against others over fiction. It became controversial to say you sincerely loved a character as an individual, shaped by all the life experiences they’d had. Wanting to see more of an individual character’s story for who they were and not just what they’d suffered was something I saw people get harassed over. And I’ve seen creators for that fandom behave in ways that were anywhere from lazy to apathetic to downright hateful. There was no joy or love for the characters themselves--only a desire to control and manipulate readers in other aspects of their lives. Final Fantasy XIV fans, overall, love the developers. For the first iteration of this game (so 1.0) it almost got canceled entirely because the way it was presented didn’t work. The devs created a storyline that amounted to a near apocalypse, and when they took things offline to revise/reboot the game? They presented it as the heroes falling to that near-apocalypse.

When 2.0/A Realm Reborn (the current starting point for the game) got brought back--that was a huge show of faith. Everything was revamped in a huge way, and the developers have continued to pay close attention to fan experiences in order to innovate and create new ways to improve quality. The fact that the game HAS achieved huge success at this point is after having overcome tremendous challenges across its lifetime. One of the biggest obstacles that players cited, the length of the first story arc, was even addressed when the devs came back to cut and streamline non-essential elements to eliminate drag. And, as I’m obligated to say as a FFXIV fan, there is a free trial now that goes not only through the entirety of A Realm Reborn but Heavensward too--with Heavensward being the first expansion and considered to be the point where things start getting really good and spicy.

But it goes beyond that too. See, when this past expansion (Shadowbringers) came out, the developers had been given an ultimatum by higher ups. The next race added to the game would be the last. The developers wanted to add a more bestial race option in the Hrothgar, but knew that players were DYING to get tall-and-pretty bunny people with Viera. They worked their asses off against the clock to make sure they had playable options for both Hrothgar and Viera, despite them having very limited hair options, initially no helms that would display, and gender locks. By this, I mean you could only play a female Viera and male Hrothgar. FFXIV hasn’t had gender locked races since 1.0 if I remember right. People got angry, especially given the races didn’t seem finished. But 1) a bunch of developers took extra, unpaid time to add as many helm options as they could before the game released so that players wouldn’t be left with nothing. They did this specifically out of their own creative passion, desire for a quality game, and love for fans. I cannot stress enough how huge this is. They put in SO MUCH EXTRA WORK just because they care. 2) The developers spent the time before next expansion ADDING MALE VIERA SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE FANS WANTED IT SO BADLY. They used the extra time and resources to unlock that option! I wouldn’t be surprised at all if we find they’ve fleshed out the options/polished up existing character design for Viera and Hrothgar as well. We have additionally been promised, in no uncertain terms, that female Hrothgar are coming too. They aren’t being released with the male Viera because this time the devs wanted to be able to make everything as polished as they can for release. They basically used the ultimatum they had before as a way to get their foot in the door as it was closing. They are now able to add to Viera and Hrothgar BOTH, when they’d previously been told they wouldn’t be allowed any further additions. This was, again, a passion move. Natsuko Ishikawa, meanwhile, got to helm the writing for Shadowbringers. It was her first time being a main force in the main scenario plotline. She previously wrote bits for regional plots, as well as the very popular storylines for Dark Knights and Alchemists. She received a standing ovation from fans when she faced them post-Shadowbringers release, and the positive reception reduced her to tears of gratitude. The developers make jokes, and do interviews with fans, and directly answer fan questions with thought and care and playfulness. They are truly humble people who love what they do and are respectful to their audience. Players have had critiques for the game, as folks will have critiques for all media. When the developers learn of critiques, by and large there is always a sense that they listen, consider, and do what they can to improve to the best of their ability and within reason. It’s not indiscriminate and they don’t always know about everything (there are a lot of fans and not all criticism is legitimate) but again. The respect and good intent are absolutely there. I am unbelievably grateful for this game and for the team behind it. It’s restored a lot of faith in people and in creators. The story and its characters are powerfully done. It has a tremendous amount of heart and as a game, it’s a joy to play. I’d strongly encourage people to try it out if you haven’t already. It’s just not something I take for granted, and I think it’s important to remember how fortunate FFXIV and its base are.

Femslash and Finding Ourselves in Fiction

This post is part of Femslash Revolution’s I Am Femslash series, sharing voices of F/F creators from all walks of life. The views represented within are those of the author only.

Femslash ships aren’t usually the first choice of someone entering fandom for the first time. When I first wandered into the internet communities for book series like Harry Potter, twelve years and grateful for a few stolen hours on shoddy dial-up internet, I didn’t even know what a ship was. I was just there to share my poetry - verse after verse written from the perspective of Hermione Granger. I was ready to move behind the narrative (and narrator) of these stories and find the motivations and feelings of a heroine, complete with all her strengths and flaws. There was time and room enough to be sad that she wasn’t our main character from the start, but there was also the relief and comfort of filling the spaces left open with my own thoughts.

It took several more years of time on and offline to realize that I was attracted to girls. In fact, I remember my first reaction to finding F/F fic to be one of pointed discomfort. Living in the rural south of the US, it was upsetting enough to be noticing things that I hadn’t before about myself. My friendships, my adoration of particular celebrities and characters, and the growing gap between my own experience and those around me were beginning to be troubling. Stumbling into this world of people - mostly women and girls - writing, drawing, and simply discussing these ships seemed to cross a line that I’d drawn for myself in my everyday life. Over months, I grew from peeking meekly into femslash threads and tags to introducing myself to other fans who’d already been through the process I was navigating. For most of them, they felt that they were the only ones willing to make fan content that looked like their own life, or what they wished their life could be. They were giving all they could to show these established characters coming from their own perspective, because no one else seemed to care.

As femslash fans, all of us still feel the frustration over lack of content, both canon and fan-made. We’re almost always considered a niche demographic from the start in most popular fandoms, since so few of them focus on women and their relationships at all, much less through a lens that resonates for sapphic women. For years, I grasped at straws in the Supernatural fandom and other, similar corners of the web to find ships I could care about. Women were dying or being put on a bus left and right, at best relegated to plot points or a brief interest for one the main characters. Desperate, I scrounged pairings from the bottom of the barrel and clung to them. Some of them were women who had never shared the screen or page. Some of them were already dead or forgotten. All of them, though, were important to me, and I was learning the very necessary skill of piecing together the scraps that were given to me. Interesting, three-dimensional characters were being wasted, and through fandom I was learning to appreciate them in new and beautiful ways.

The rarity of F/F ships in fandom works against consumers and creators alike, but I don’t think being seen as a small in-group has proven to be all bad. What I’ve seen instead is that our creators are given more room to reach beyond what’s common to portray. If you’re already working within a tiny corner, mostly populated by like-minded people, why not explore other areas of real life that we don’t often see in media? The more I looked into femslash, barreling into new fandoms and making friends who wanted vibrant, varying content, the more I began to see things that fandom and media at large desperately need. Respectful, well-written racial and cultural diversity, transgender and nonbinary experiences, and an openness to non-traditional relationships may not dominate our content, but it’s plentiful enough to be seen and shared, to get our own gears turning on what to address in our own work. One trans girl headcanon turns into a handful of stories written by the people who saw and encouraged it; one gifset highlighting a neglected woman of color from canon stokes a dozen conversations about how she may have added to the story, or how she may have fared in a story that was her own. We find facets of ourselves and others that often go unseen inside the lines of someone else’s art. Femslash is opening doors in fandom that may have gone unnoticed.

As a queer, nonbinary writer, I’ve been increasingly pleased with seeing femslash fandoms - and when we’re lucky, the surrounding fandom with it - become more conscientious and inclusive. There are still, though, a lot of experiences falling by the wayside. Even when the text contains a disabled, chronically ill, neurodivergent, or mentally ill character, we rarely see these differences acknowledged and handled well, whether in canon or the resulting fan content. Women categorized by Western society as unattractive as a group - whether it be for age, weight, skin color, visible disability, or otherwise - are often neglected as well. Fandom makes some great efforts to fill these gaps, with focused events and prompts that lead us to consider and celebrate the breadth of experiences encompassed by womanhood and how it colors relationships with other women. I’d like to see even more of that atmosphere moving forward, embracing ships that challenge us, reflecting back not just ourselves but the full spectrum of women loving women, each in their own way.

Every femslash fan has their doors to open, if they want to. Keep showing us your hijabi girlfriends. Your lesbians growing old together. Fat women shooing strangers away from the service animals of their wives and partners. Genderqueer characters struggling to find where and how they fit into the community around them. Keep opening your doors and stepping through those opened to you. Femslash is a beautiful community that can continue to grow and thrive as long as we nurture it.

About the Author

Ellis S. is a queer, genderfluid writer and witch with a stunning but grouchy cat and a wonderful girlfriend. Together, they run an exchange for polyamorous fanworks and cry about fandoms. Beyond femslash, Ellis spends their time cooking, consuming horror media, and competing in tournaments with their trivia team. They can be found at derekslaura or coyoteshunter on Tumblr and at rjosettes on Archive of Our Own.

Wishful Thinking

by Riddled

Prompts: Satin ribbon, Secret diary, Blue

Belle forgets about her dinner when her phone alerts her to the update of her favorite online story, right after she has seated herself at Granny's. Clicking on the link to A Lady's Secret Diary, she is immediately lost in the life of Lady Belle in the Enchanted Forest. She was rather surprised when Neal recommended this kind of story to her, but she's very glad that he did.

The heroine of the story is as adventurous and brave as Belle tries to be in her own life. They have the same first name and, coincidentally, have pale skin, dark hair and bright blue eyes. But yet more than her formidable characterization, she enjoys the character's relationship with Rumplestiltskin the most.

The imp courts Lady Belle like just about every other suitor in the realm. He may have reptilian eyes and skin, loathed by everyone, but because of his genuine affection and wit he's the one she wants to marry.

Now they're finally in the lady's chambers for the first time, just the two of them. Rumplestiltskin is as timid as ever, but eventually hands and mouths are wandering with almost tangible excitement and eagerness.

Still, just when it seems that the imp is finally going to give in to their mutual desire and toys with the satin ribbon in the lady's hair, Belle has reached the end of the chapter.

She sighs in disappointment and delight alike, immediately scrolling back to read the chapter again. Clenching her thighs, she sees herself in the place of the leading character who is like her in so many ways - except for the most enjoyable part.

Really, how wonderful it would be to have a friend and lover like Rumplestiltskin, all generous devotion, gentleness and passion.

Reaching the end of the chapter again, Belle shifts restlessly in her seat as she taps on the name of the author. His profile is as empty as it has always been, revealing nothing at all about the writer who arouses her more than someone in her real life ever has.

Finally getting started on her by now cold food, her eyes instinctively land on Mr. Gold. The solitary landlord physically obviously hardly resembles Rumplestiltskin, but she finds herself thinking that his lithe build, crooked nose and shoulder length hair, not to mention his snarky wit and old-fashioned manners, aren't all that much unlike the sorcerer.

Out of nowhere, Belle wonders what he would be like as a lover… what he would be like with her. Somehow, the mere thought of being with him just like the couple in the story affects her yet more than the fiction itself did.

She admires him when he gets up to leave the diner, his movements graceful and confident. His rear may not be clad in tight leather, but the sight of it is very pleasing nonetheless. She follows him with her eyes until he is out of sight.

Quickly finishing her meal, Belle is eager to get home, to the privacy of her bedroom to be exact. Her eyes glued to the screen of her phone, she imagines Mr. Gold and herself as the romantic couple when she reads the chapter for the third time.

When she reaches the stairs leading up to her apartment above the library, she bodily collides with someone in the dimly lit alley. She would have fallen if it weren't for two strong but gentle hands on her arms, keeping her steady. Her phone however goes flying.

Before she can reach for it, the other does so as well. A jolt almost like electricity going through her at the accidental touch, she quickly reaches for the item at her feet which the other must have dropped.

The item in question turns out to be a small, much used notebook. Her eyes widen when she reads the words which are neatly written on the front.

A Lady's Secret Diary.

Her gasp is mirrored by the person opposite her. Her heart beats rapidly in her chest as it dawns on Belle that she in all likelihood has found the author of one of her all time favorite stories, in her own town of all places… and that they still hold her phone displaying its latest chapter.

"I believe this is yours," a hoarse voice says, the person it belongs to handing her phone back to her.

"Thank you, yes, I…"

She falters when she looks up and finds that this person is none other than Mr. Gold. Finding out that he is the one who wrote the highly sensual fantasy of two characters resembling both of them closely, is yet stranger than if she would have encountered Rumplestiltskin himself here in Maine.

"You're writing this?" she asks, taking her phone from him to hold the display up for his inspection.

He tenses when he reads its contents only then, clearly recognizing it.

"You're reading this?!" he exclaims, looking rather pale all of a sudden.

"I am," she says softly, taking this chance to examine him now that she's closer to the distant landlord than she ever thought she would be.

"I… I'm awfully sorry for this, Miss French. I never intended for you to know… That's hardly an excuse, but please believe me that I had no malicious intent when…"

"What are you talking about?!" she asks, rather distracted by the elegant shape of his face and his delicious scent.

"I… you… you read that, didn't you? So you must know…"

"Must know what?" she inquires when he falters, gesturing at her phone helplessly.

"The characters in the story, they're obviously…"

"They're us."

"Again, I'm so sorry that you read that, Miss French. I can only hope… I hope that it doesn't make you feel uncomfortable. I'll obviously take the story offline and destroy the physical copy."

He reaches for the notebook she's still holding, but she keeps it out of his reach, cradling it almost protectively against her chest.

"No, please, don't! There really is no need for that. I didn't make me feel uncomfortable; in fact, I really, really like it. I'm glad that you wrote this, and I'm glad that I read it."

"You… you are?"

"Yes! Although I wonder why you wrote it if you yourself are uncomfortable with it?"

"You don't want to know that, Miss French."

"I very much do, Mr. Gold."

"It's because… this is the only way I can ever be with you - in a work of fantasy fiction."

He lowers his head, his beautiful features shielded by his hair. He doesn't see that her mouth falls open - before forming a broad smile - when he all but professes his love for her.

"My son encouraged me to publish the story online when saw me writing so often," the landlord continues quickly, as if to tell her everything now that he has found the courage. "He obviously didn't know what I was writing about. I didn't think you'd ever read it, otherwise I would never have put it on the internet."

Belle almost burst into laughter at how wrong he is in thinking his son doesn't know about what - whom - he is writing… and how grateful she is to Neal for recommending the story to her after persuading his father to make it available online.

Still, the landlord avoids her gaze, even when she questioningly rests her hand on his lower arm. Belatedly, she realizes why he's so embarrassed: Mr. Gold doesn't see Rumplestiltskin's unique look and character as something to be intrigued by, to desire, but as a metaphor for a wholly unlovable person.

"Did it never occur to you that I might like you very much as well? That this story made me see that I want to get to know you much better… that I want to be with you?"

He looks up after all, but his expression is one of complete confusion and disbelief. No matter how good he is with written words, he doesn't seem to be very accomplished at listening to them.

Sensing that the only way forward is to show him how she feels about him, Belle steps closer towards him and tentatively cups his cheeks in her hands. When she leans in, he does the same.

The brush of his lips against hers is hesitant at first, but soon he's kissing her back in a way which even puts Rumplestiltskin's somewhat clumsy but very enthusiastic and enjoyable kisses to shame.

"I very much like to think that non-fictional people can have a happy ending too," she says after they break away eventually. "Why don't we go somewhere more comfortable? I'd love to hear your thoughts for the next chapter of the story."

He nods eagerly, offering her his arm. Knowing Rumplestiltskin and by extension Mr. Gold, there'll hardly be a consummation anytime soon. But both impossible men doubtlessly have other very enjoyable ideas which they can't wait to share and try with their Belles.

First new painting

Beginning with the general theme of play in digital spaces that I identified as having been the main undercurrent of most of my work this year, I sat down to draw up some ideas through working spontaneously onto some paper and a canvas panel. I knew only that I wanted to explore the general imagery of interfaces of digital communication in combination with the digital textures of virtual forms and spaces, such as objects from video games. I have been considering how different forms of communication on different social media relate to their respective online cultures, and how each form of digital communication might have its own space and intangible atmosphere. I wanted to try and realise my own perceptions of each of these interfaces into tangible spaces that real people shape and colour with their collective behaviour; this is a fairly abstract goal that I feel will underpin my exploration of the subject of dangerous play online through painting. For this reason I picked out heavily textural media – focusing on oil paint and pastels - to begin recreating digital scenes with. This is an element of my work which I have been tentatively experimenting with in ways that I have found to be quite successful. I have so far received feedback from a handful of crit sessions that my experimentation with mixed media such as photo transfers, layering of semi-transparent surfaces for paint or drawing, and use of gloss have helped in the past to draw the viewer into the tiny images I have been creating by appealing to the sense of touch. I have started to consider these very tactile imaginary worlds I have been building as potential mirror-image versions of the screens many of us virtually build our second lives into. By producing images framed by surfaces on a consistently small scale, I am working with a kind of visual that is familiar to me through its similarity to the imaginary spaces – behind phone screens, computer screens, or game console screens -  I have potentially spent a thousand or more hours on in the last year alone – considering that I spend around 3 hours a day online, which is seemingly a fairly average figure for people my age. If I were to continue to make reference to the huge amount of digital imagery I surround myself with on a daily basis while responding to it in a way that is viscerally textural, I feel I might be able to explore the idea of online and offline communication about the common anxieties created by and the needs for nuanced human connection that may not be met by online communication.

I find this idea very engaging, probably because it pertains to my own sense of identity, which I have cultivated in part from immersing myself in communities online made up of people for whom real-life communication is inconvenient – such as for people facing social stigma, like closeted gay women or for mentally ill people - or impossible due to distance. I am not at all certain of my specific subject matter yet, but I am very occupied with my own fears about the impermanence of digital spaces of safety that people have built, and know that I want to “play” with this fear using mixed media. I intend to refine this idea into something physical – imagery that validates this digital sense of safety that is projected up at us through screens by translating it into unique and hand-made marks that cannot be switched out of existence with the blink of a light or the failure of some obscure electrical component thousands of miles away, as a line of text or a photograph or a person’s entire presence online potentially could be.

I had not fully considered this idea of digital transience when I sat down to work, and had brought mixed media to the studio only with the idea of channelling my own appreciation for the ability to share a childlike openness to play – such as through sharing absurd memes borrowing artwork from 1990s kids’ cartoons, or playing videogames with friends, which are both sometimes seen as embarrassing and time-wasting activities – that can come with online freedom to observe and communicate anonymously. I wanted to use cheap or cheap-looking materials like crayons or magazine cutouts or lumps of brightly coloured polymer clay to recreate peaceful recognizably digital scenes in a slightly loose and naïve way, referencing the physical and emotional experiences of navigating online spaces. To counteract the fact that these experiences are completely coldly immaterial, I began to draw the words from a text from a friend I met online and communicate with almost exclusively in this way. I began with the colours of the hugely popular messaging interface – Whatsapp - that we maintain our friendship through, and tried especially to reference the exact shade of green that all Whatsapp users are familiar with as the background colour for texts sent from their own device.

However, I found did not want to include the ‘bubble’ shape of a normal text message; I wanted to try and remove this frame for communication and produce an image that makes reference to this unreal depthless interface while also clearly presenting a re-imagining of it as an actual plane of some sort, through use of bulky forms and perspective. To imply in an implausible and slightly ridiculous but symbolically obvious way that this space is a homely and inviting one that friends might share, I included the forms of a chair, a table and a picnic blanket in a rounded and pixelated ‘low polygon’ style by grating a pastel at an angle against the panel board surface so that raised grains of canvas would be coloured while blank canvas would show through where my pastel had not touched. I thought that this looked almost like a digital texture glitch. I worked around this, smoothing areas of pastel colour with white spirit to imply some depth, marking out the ‘glitched’ areas as a kind of negative space and drawing on the idea of digital objects clipping in and out of existence. I tried to give a slightly eerie atmosphere to the image by creating a seemingly huge space in sickly colours with no discernable boundaries –emphasising this by drawing a recognizable picket fence around the objects in the foreground, but using few other signifiers of depth or landscape forms - but with some kind of energy of its own, adding clouds blowing across its sky at a sharp angle.

I produced this painting fairly intuitively, and was intrigued by the outcome. Overall, I think I find the image to be oddly humourous. The forms standing in a neatly fenced grassy field are almost like crude farm animals in a child’s peaceful drawing; this is contrasted with the fact that they are slightly grotesque as written letters made bulky and highly textured, that they are almost threatening as things that may or may not be implied to be alive, since they are the only forms around to be interacting with the people’s furniture in the foreground, and that they are in an ominous-feeling environment in rich but unappealing colours. I find this a fairly accurate representation of the way I think about digital spaces for communication; they can be extremely comforting as places to maintain contact with others without any of the stress of leaving the house or being seen, and places where any kind of media is made accessible and there can be a great deal of creative energy and play. However, this is also a form of communication where some of the participants’ identities are inevitably lost or poorly translated through a lack of physical presence, and where language as a result seems literally disembodied in an alarming way. The lumpy word-forms and strange colours and hay painting technique I used here seem quite fitting to me for this reason.

However, without first hearing my explanation in words of my process arriving at this image, I’m not sure what a viewer might be able to draw from it. By giving a fair amount of definition to the letter forms, I believe I may have made it too difficult to tell that these are actually the characters ‘w’ and ‘h’, and the clue of the blues and greens in the background probably isn’t enough on its own to make it clear that this is a response to digital imagery. For this reason I don’t think that this is necessarily a good piece of work, since it probably wouldn’t encourage any kind of conversation about the topics I wanted to draw into it. However, as a first test of scale and mixed media, I found this to be very useful; the combination of a small surface and the dense and easily blendable paints and pastels allowed me to immediately get stuck into making painted images about painting. I could see this kind of painting method being used to explore the ways we respond differently to painted work seen in person in relation to the ways we respond to art that is based online, such as video streamed performance or interactive digital images.