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week of may 19th, 2024
these are written predominantly for the *rising* signs but they are also intuitively "channeled" enough that they should work for any dominant energy you have! (try your sun if you don't know rising, or more advanced readers can try moon, anywhere you have a stellium, etc and see what works best for you!)
aries: the increasing gemini vibes are a little more flirtatious and flippant than the preceding taurean vibes and this probably suits you well. just be careful that, with mars also in your sign, you're not getting too impulsive or wild.
taurus: that's about it for taurus season. the planets start to shuffle into neighboring gemini. but don't despair; the party is over but the material blessings continue to rain upon you, or they start if you haven't had them yet. it's like extra birthday gifts. jupiter there for the next long while blesses your finances too - assuming you're spending only responsibly. try not to overindulge.
gemini: the sun and the benefics light up your sign starting this week, in a parade of good vibes and good fortune. many wonderful things will come to you in the coming days and weeks, especially with jolly jupiter in the mix. just be advised that anything you've outgrown will leave forcefully if you don't part ways willingly.
cancerians: before a mass ingress into your 12th house there is a highly psychic, very dreamy jupiter-venus-neptune interaction at critical degrees. this can bless any travel you are planning, any long distance relationships, and your friendships overall. although neptune can be deceitful or at least illusive at times, the presence of the benefics make this a sort of magic that you can access easily and with mostly just good results. then prepare yourself to do some good shadow work once the 12th-house party starts!
leo: for everyone, the influx of gemini-ness is increased sociability and informational flow. for you especially, this is great for your networking and friendships. if you've been feeling a bit drab or lonely lately, this week brightens things up and puts you in places to be fawned over, if that's your thing, or at least appreciated if it's not so much.
virgo: a huge boost to your reputation can be intentionally kicked off from this week and then can coast on the momentum of jupiter in gemini for the next year or so. update your public image, get some nice photos done, shake the right people's hands... even if that makes your inner germophobe a bit squeamish. you can bring hand sanitizer.
libra: gemini season should be a blast for you and the social butterfly that you (at least sometimes) are. and jupiter in gemini for the next year-ish blesses any academic pursuits you wish to embark on, any long distance travel you've been dreaming of, and your spiritual life, if that's your cup of tea.
scorpio: a benevolent pileup in gemini is certainly one thing, possibly enhancing your intimate life or enriching any magical practice. but the overall tone of the week is underwritten by a pulsating, watery, psychic power. and you don't even have to really try to benefit from that. your natural charisma is just off the charts.
sagittarius: gemini season is always nice for you if you are the sort who can stand to be partnered up long-ish term. but starting from this week you have a good long jupiter transit of your 7th house as well. and this will bless such partnerships in really big ways. more temporary, venus there helps out too!
capricorn: if you're the type to do new year's resolutions it's a good time to take stock of how you've been doing regarding your routines, habits, and day-to-day life. honestly, even if you ignore the new year, this is a good time for it. and at any rate it's also a great time to rescue a pet !
aquarius: gemini season plus venus and jupiter in gemini is fun season for aquarians. jupiter in particular gives big fun, creative vibes to you for months to come. however, jupiter (and venus) in your 5th house can be *highly* fertile - you will be reaping what you sow, so it's a time to be a little bit careful what you wish for and also to have fun with some caution - otherwise it might go overboard in some way.
pisces: gemini season has most people feeling social and talky. for you it may be more of a homebody vibe. this is all well and good as long as you have made your home a sanctuary to rest and recharge in, and a place that you truly love.
#horoscopes#weekly horoscope#astrology#horoscope#weekly horoscopes#signs#zodiac#aries#taurus#gemini#cancer#leo#virgo#libra#scorpio#sagittarius#capricorn#aquarius#pisces
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X/Formerly known as Twitter user states: I was walking around Tokyo today and an old Japanese man was wearing a Palestine flag with "stop genocide in Gaza." He was handing out a newspaper article that called out Israel's occupation and how it's against humanitarian law. I took one and he asked if I understood Japanese…" [this person later clarifies in the next post that they do not, but they accepted it and they provided an image of this newspaper article they recieved, which I attached, with a Google translation of the document, which I will add English translations for that were provided by this user on X/Twitter: @ fumiyafilm
Newspaper article piece states (Google rough translation: Japanese to English):
Rather than making human rights and democracy a double standard, we should put "life and livelihood at the centre of politics." Gaza : no one stands above international humanitarian law for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.
As Israel's occupation and blockade of the Gaza Strip intensifies, an emergency special session of the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution co-sponsored by Jordan and others calling for "humanitarian" measures with 121 votes in favor and 1444 votes against [I believe the translation captured this incorrectly -I believe they mean 144?)] (Japan is). Canada's amendment did not recieve two-thirds majority required for adoption. The difference between the two resolutions is whether or not they specify resposibility for Hamas's terrorist acts. Jordan's proposal does not name Hamas, calling the increase in violence since the October 7th attack and "act of terrorism."
You could say that, Jordan's plan is supported not only by Middle Eastern countries but also countries in the so-called Global South, such as Brazil, Malaysia, and South Africa (India is in favor and France is in favor of the G7).
Protecting civillains does not mean ordering more than a million people to evacuate to a place with no shelter, food, water, medicine, or fuel. What we are seeing in Gaza is a clear intentional -This is a violation of humanitarian law, and I am deeply concerned about it. No party, no matter what, stands above international humanitarian law. As UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres asserts, international public opinion (cut off on document) "war," "Arab vs. Israel," Pro-Israel is not pro-Barres," but rather a international movement calling for (unsure part of this document here) "stop the humanitarian crisis…"
#feminist#feminism#israel is an apartheid state#palestine#social justice#freepalastine🇵🇸#free gaza#free palestine#israel is committing genocide#israel is a terrorist state#israeli propaganda#israeli apartheid#gazaunderfire#gaza strikes#gazaunderattack#from the river to the sea palestine will be free#ceasefire now#ceasefire#current events#japanese politics
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Old photo resolution is low? You can clear the image by adopting this method
Old photo resolution is low? You can clear the image by adopting this method
highlights
Adobe Photoshop is a good option for clearing old hedgehog sea images in better resolution.
Increase the brightness of the image slightly as soon as editing is opened, it can be increased from 0 to 22 or 25 points.
Resolution is measured in terms of PPI i.e. pixels per inch.
new Delhi. There was a time when whenever an old album came out from the cupboard during the Sunday cleaning, a…
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#adopting#clear#how to increase old photo resolution#image#method#old photo resolution#photo#resolution#ways to increase old photo resolution
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Goodbye Tumblr. You ruined it!
Hello followers!
We are sad to say that we are discontinuing Once Upon a Town.
We started this blog in August 2013 with the aim to find, research and show historical photos in high resolution formats. The main idea was to present history as documented through photography - from the very earliest to circa mid-1950s. The large format quality we favored for our blog was chosen for its immersive properties. We wanted the past to come alive and to show you all just how much has been lost with ever increasing development, historical erasure and plain carelessness, but also to show just how quirky and eccentric many of our immediate ancestors were. Where possible we have included explanations for the images and in the process we learned a great deal about very niche corners of our recent history - and just how little we generally know about people and life from just over 100 years ago. It has been an enriching journey and we hope people who have followed this blog feel a little closer to the Victorians and Edwardians and homesteaders and flappers and dogs and cats and places captured on camera so many years ago. Much now is gone and only exists in these old photos.
In order to post this high resolution photography, we have since 2013 used a customized theme that allows large format to show on our website main page, which we recommend is accessed through a browser on a computer for a more immersive viewing experience. But thanks to Tumblr’s discontinuation of the legacy editor, this is no longer possible. The new editor they have forced down everyone’s throats (over the complaints of many) arbitrarily crops new posts and ruins the overall look of the website page. In short, it messes up the entire concept of what we have come to regard as a visual archive of the late 19th century and early 20th century. And while it still looks the same in the Tumblr feed, it’s the website most people outside Tumblr access and link to. This is our front page.
Regrettably it seems to be a trend among social sites to force unpopular changes on the people who create the content. They have become big and arrogant and care little for what users want. They keep “fixing” what isn’t broken by breaking them more. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flickr, Deviant Art and now Tumblr have all gone through these self-destructive processes over the heads of their users and all have become worse platforms for it.
However, even though we will no longer post new material here - at least for as long as Tumblr maintains the discontinuation of the legacy editor - we will leave the site up for people to peruse at their leisure. Our old posts are, as of yet, not affected by Tumblr’s changes and we simply can’t get ourselves to delete ten years of collecting and research. We recommend you make good use of our archive and hashtags. There’s a bit of most of everything in the deep depths of this vast collection which counts thousands of images by now. And you might just stumble on something really weird that you didn’t know about.
At the time of writing this, Once Upon a Town has a total of 44,394 followers. We find that kinda impressive for a blog that doesn’t contain porn or manga. So here’s to all of you! We thank you for your interest and feedback over the years.
-OUAT
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Pacific Rim isn't anti-nuclear in the same way Kaiju movies usually are. The resolution is facilitated by the detonation of a nuclear warhead and a nuclear reactor power core. So........what's up with that?
I mean, it's deeply American, obviously, but what else? Why does it not feel particularly pro-war in the same way, say, a typical MCU does? What does it mean that the Kaiju are prompted by human activity (carbon pollution "practically terraformed" Earth for the invading aliens), but are ultimately not a true manifestation of Nature's Wrath (not even from Earth)?
What arguments is Pacific Rim making in the place of the typical kaiju movie anti-nuclear-pollution, wrath-of-nature fare?
I stream-of-consciousness rambled about this for multiple paragraphs and don't feel like cleaning it up much. Basically: I think Pacific Rim is a commentary on the myriad problems with political responses to climate change over the years.
•••
So, in the Great American Kaiju Movie, two nuclear blasts save the day rather than creating all the problems. Despite the fact that at least one of those nuclear blasts still probably did a lot of collateral.... I do wish Pacific Rim had focused a bit more on collateral, and the environmental damage caused by both the Kaiju and, inevitably, the Jaeger project AND Wall of Peace. Food rations are mentioned once-- but surely metal and construction equiptment rationing must also be in place to allow for wall construction! I want my environmental messages shoved violently down the audience's throat, damnit! But I digress
I think an important detail to consider in the Kaiju/Nuclear discussion is how Mako and Raleigh's Jaeger's nuclear power generator is what really allowed them to save the world, multiple times.
The history of politics around nuclear power plants vs nuclear warhead production is interesting, especially in the typical kaiju movie thematic context of man carelessly abusing nature. The argument in defense of nuclear power plants is that, despite the need for extremely rigerous and long-term nuclear waste disposal considerations, there is a lower volume of waste created by nuclear power plants in relation to the energy provided by them, when compared to other modern methods of energy generation like coal power. So, in theory, nuclear energy could be a beneficial power source for minimizing environmental impact.
In the Kaiju movies I've seen, nuclear power is only ever addressed as an extension of the inherently unnatural and harmful abomination of the invention of.the nuclear warhead. It's understandable, the environmental devastation caused by radioactive pollution is massive, and its something a nuclear power plant is very capable of doing if enough goes wrong.
So, what do the Jaegers represent within this conversation? what does the Wall of Peace represent? Here's my thought: they represent (more) active versus passive solutions to the growing threat of climate change. Jaegers represent the way that active work against climate change is only funded as far as it is beneficial to the image of the government.
Yes, the Rift was found to be impossible to blow up with nukes, but it's pretty clear that the world governmemts were putting more money into the publically popular and flashy Jaeger program than they were putting into researching the increase in Kaiju frequency and a permanent solution to the issue. Because of the complicity the world fell into once Kaiju and Jaegers were Rock Stars, the root of the issue with Kaiju goes unadressed for an entire generation, in favor of defeating each Kaiju in impressive and propogand-izable ways.
Only once the problem becomes too big for the propoganda-friendly Jaegers to manage do the world governments start looking for alternate solutions, and the Wall is immediately shown to be too little too late. As soon as it stops being useful for propoganda, the government loses interest in truly solving the problem, and begins investing in moving itself inland and leaving poor coastal populations to die.
The kaiju are only able to be defeated in Pacific Rim because a group of people separate from the government comes together and searches for a solution to the root of the issue-- the Rift being open in the Pacific at all.
Nuclear power is therefore not posed as a solution to war against fellow humans, but is used as a solution to a collective human effort to fight the exponentially speeding destruction of the Earth. The Jaeger pilots and everyone else working in the resistance HAVE to be willing to do anything, willing to take drastic active measures, in order to stop the destruction of the Earth's climate. Yay :)
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ai generated mushroom guides could get people killed
'i'm not going to link any of them here, for a variety of reasons, but please be aware of what is probably the deadliest AI scam i've ever heard of: plant and fungi foraging guide books. the authors are invented, their credentials are invented, and their species IDs will kill you"
"update: i keep getting annoyed that the QTs are like "if this is true, it's horrifying" ..but you're right, you don't know me from a hole in the ground and you SHOULD worry about the veracity of anything you find online."
thread source
so i went looking
the full description:
How to quickly become a confident mushroom forager without fear of misidentifying poisonous lookalikes!
Have you dreamt about becoming more self-sufficient and sourcing your own fresh, local ingredients?
Do you want to start sustainably foraging so you can become healthier and happier?
Have you thought about harvesting wild mushrooms but afraid you won’t be able to tell the edible and poisonous species apart?
Then this book is for you!
Save money and enjoy the delicacies that nature has to offer. Mushroom hunting is easier than you think, and less dangerous than everyone assumes.
Wild plant foraging is increasing in popularity with celebrity chefs and small cafes jumping on the bandwagon and using locally foraged produce in their food.
There are so many benefits of foraging to your health (physical and mental) and even the environment!
In Fearless Foraging in the Rocky Mountains, you’ll discover:
Over 40 species of mushroom you can harvest all year round
Complimentary access to the mobile-friendly Digital Field Guide that includes high-resolution photos and descriptions of all edible mushrooms and any toxic lookalikes so you don’t have to worry about misidentifying species
How to correctly create (and use) spore prints to help you figure out what’s what
An annual mushroom calendar so you can keep track of the mushrooms by season and make the most of each foraging season
Detailed descriptions of the anatomical properties of fungi - gain the essential knowledge you need to correctly identify species
Tips on sustainable foraging - and ways to increase the natural mushroom count for next time you visit!
And much more!
Foraging is a tradition upheld for centuries by indigenous people who used ancient, respectful principles to live off the land. Connect with that history by embracing the artful skills and knowledge to confidently collect food for your meals.
Even if you're still worried about toxic mushrooms, let this guide reassure you. Included are incredibly high-level descriptions and details to use so you don’t get it wrong.
NOTE: To keep it economically prices, our paperback version is printed in black and white. Premium color is available in our hardcover version. Both will provide the quality necessary to identify wild mushrooms and plants and both come with access to the full color, high-resolution Digital Field Guide.
If you want to learn the skillful art of foraging mushrooms and enjoy nature's nutritious bounties then scroll up and click the “Add to Cart” button now.
end description
wild harvest publications... no named author? i n t e r e s t i n g
"To keep it economically prices" hmm *the design is very human meme*
this book that promises highly detailed descriptions doesn't even have color images unless you pay a premium
"Mushroom hunting is easier than you think, and less dangerous than everyone assumes." hmm. hmmmmm. yeah the government definitely put out those 'if you don't know what it is don't put it in your mouth' PSAs for no reason
tldr don't buy foraging guides off amazon if you can't locate a human author and verify their credentials yourself
#mushrooms#fungi#fungus#ai#amazon#foraging#we live in the worst timeline#incorrect foraging guides is like something a hostile government would distribute to kill dissidents about to go into hiding in the woods#but no its idiots who want to make money#mushroom identification#mushrooming
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The concept of superfetation, a second conception during pregnancy, has been controversial for a long time. In this paper we use an experimental approach to demonstrate that female European brown hares (Lepus europaeus) frequently develop a second pregnancy while already pregnant and thereby increase their reproductive success. After a new, successful copulation, we confirmed additional ovulations before parturition in living, late-pregnant females by detecting a second set of fresh corpora lutea using high-resolution ultrasonography. The presence of early embryonic stages in the oviduct, demonstrated by oviduct flushing, next to fully developed fetuses in the uterus is best explained by passage of semen through the late-pregnant uterus; this was confirmed by paternity analysis using microsatellite profiling. Subsequent implantation occurred after parturition. This superfetation, categorized as superconception, significantly increased litter size and permitted females to produce up to 35.4% more offspring per breeding season. It is therefore most likely an evolutionary adaptation.
when i heard that rabbits can be double pregnant i thought for sure that had to be wrong because like. they only have one uterus. how do you get second pregnant in the same uterus. turns out you dont, you store the zygote in the oviduct until the uterus clears out and then you get a new pregnancy right after your old one! semen travels THROUGH the pregnant uterus (somehow??? do they not have an amniotic sac? or does it go...around?)
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Tidbit: The “Posterization” Effect of Panels Due to the Consequences of GIF Color Quantization (and Increased Contrast (And Also The Tangential Matter of Dithering))
There’s this misconception that the color banding and patterned dithering found in panels is an entirely deliberate, calculated effect Hussie manipulated the image into looking with some specific filter, but this isn’t the case, exactly. It wasn’t so much a conscious decision he took but rather an unavoidable consequence of the medium he partook in: digital art in an age where bandwidth and storage was at a premium.
Not to delve too deeply into the history and technicalities of it, but the long and the short of it is back in the early nineties to late aughts (and even a bit further into the 10s), transferring and storing data over the web was not as fast, plentiful, and affordable as it is now. Filesize was a much more important consideration than the fidelity of an image when displaying it on the web. Especially so when you’re a hobbyist on a budget and paying for your own webhosting, or using a free service with a modest upload limit (even per file!). Besides, what good would it be to post your images online if it takes ages to load them over people's dial-up Internet? Don't even get me STARTED on the meager memory and power the average iGPU had to work with, too.
The original comic strip's resolution was a little more than halved and saved as a GIF rather than a large PNG. That's about an 82.13% reduction in filesize!
So in the early days it was very common for people to take their scans, photographs, and digital drawings and scale them down and publish them as smaller lossily compressed JPEGs or lossless GIFs, the latter of which came at the cost of color range. But it had a wider range of browser support and the feature to be used for animations compared to its successor format, PNG ("PNG's not GIF").
You'd've been hard-pressed to find Hussie use any PNGs himself then. In fact, I think literally the only times he's ever personally employed them and not delegate the artwork to a member of the art team were some of the tiny shrunken down text of a character talking far in the distance and a few select little icons.
PNGs support semi-transparency unlike GIFs, which is why Hussie used them to preserve the anti-aliasing on the text without having to add an opaque background color.
While PNGs can utilize over 16 million colors in a single image, GIFs have a hard limit of 256 colors per frame. For reference, this small image alone has 604 colors:
For those who can't do the math, 256 is a pretty damn small number.
Smaller still were the palettes in a great deal of MSPA's panels early on in its run. Amazingly, a GIF such as this only uses 7 colors (8 if you count the alpha (which it is)).
Not that they were always strictly so low; occasionally some in the later acts of Homestuck had pretty high counts. This panel uses all 256 spots available, in fact.
If he had lowered the number any smaller, the quality would have been god-awful.
To the untrained eye, these bands of color below may seem to be the result of a posterization filter (an effect that reduces smooth areas of color into fewer harsh solid regions), but it's really because the image was exported as a GIF with no dithering applied.
Dithering, to the uninitiated, is how these colors are arranged together to compensate for the paltry palette, producing illusory additional colors. There are three algorithms in Photoshop for this: Diffusion, Pattern, and Noise.
Above is the original image and below is the image reduced to a completely binary 1-bit black and white color palette, to make the effect of each dithering algorithm more obvious.
Diffusion seemingly displaces the pixels around randomly, but it uses error diffusion to calculate what color each pixel should be. In other words, math bullshit. The Floyd-Steinberg algorithm is one such implementation of it, and is usually what this type of error diffusion dithering is called in other software, or some misnomer-ed variation thereof.
The usage of Pattern may hearken back to retro video game graphics for you, as older consoles also suffered from color palette limitations. Sometimes called Ordered dithering because of the orderly patterns it produces. At least, I assumed so. Its etymological roots probably stem from more math bullshit again.
True to its name, Noise is noisy. It’s visually similar to Diffusion dithering, except much more random looking. At least, when binarized like this. Truth be told, I can’t tell the difference between the two at all when using a fuller color table on an image with a lot of detail. It was mainly intended to be used when exporting individual slices of an image that was to be “stitched” back together on a webpage, to mitigate visible seams in the dithering around the edges.
To sate your curiosity, here's how the image looks with no dithering at all:
People easily confuse an undithered gif as being the result of posterization, and you couldn't fault them for thinking so. They look almost entirely the same!
Although I was already aware of this fact when I was much younger, I'm guilty of posterizing myself while editing images back then. Figured I may as well reduce the color count beforehand to help keep the exported GIF looking as intended. I view this as a complete waste of time now, though, and amateurish. Takes away a bit of the authenticity of MSPA art, how the colors and details are so variable between panels. As for WHY they were so variable to begin with, choosing the settings to save the image as requires a judicious examination on a case-by-case basis. In other words, just playing around with the settings until it looks decent.
It's the process of striking a fine balance between an acceptable file size and a "meh, good enough" visual quality that I mentioned earlier. How many colors can you take away until it starts to look shit? Which dithering algorithm helps make it look not as shit while not totally ruining the compression efficacy?
Take, for example, this panel from Problem Sleuth. It has 16 colors, an average amount for the comic, and uses Diffusion dithering. Filesize: 34.5 KB.
Then there's this panel right afterwards. It has 8 colors (again, technically 7 + alpha channel since it's an animated gif), and uses Noise dithering this time. Filesize: 34.0 KB.
The more colors and animation frames there are, and the more complicated dithering there is, the bigger the file size is going to be. Despite the second panel having half the color count of the first, the heavily noisy dithering alone was enough to inflate the file size back up. On top of that, there's extra image information layered in for the animation, leaving only a mere 0.5 kilobyte difference between the two panels.
So why would Hussie pick the algorithm that compresses worse than the other? The answer: diffusion causes the dithering to jitter around between frames of animation. Recall its description from before, how it functions on nerd shit like math calculations. The way it calculates what each pixel's color will be is decided by the pixels' colors surrounding it, to put it simply. Any difference in the placement of pixels will cause these cascading changes in the dithering like the butterfly effect.
Diffusion dithering, 16 colors. Filesize: 25.2 KB
This isn't the case with Noise or Pattern dithering, since their algorithms use either a texture or a definite array of numbers (more boring nerd shit).
Noise dithering, 16 colors. Filesize: 31.9 KB
Pattern dithering, 16 colors. Filesize: 23.1 KB
There's a lot more I'd like to talk about, like the different color reduction algorithms, which dither algorithms generally compress better in what cases, and the upward and downward trends of each one’s use over the course of a comic, but since this isn’t a deep dive on GIF optimization, I might save that for another time. This post is already reaching further past the original scope it was meant to cover, and less than 10 images can be uploaded before hitting the limit, which is NOWHERE near enough for me. I should really reevaluate my definition of the word “tidbit”… Anyway, just know that this post suffers from sample selection bias, so while the panels above came from an early section of Problem Sleuth that generally had static panels with diffusion dithering and animated panels with noise dithering, there certainly were animated panels with diffusion later on despite the dither-jittering.
Alright, time to shotgun through the rest of this post, screw segueing. Increasing the contrast almost entirely with “Use Legacy” enabled spreads the tones of the image out evenly, causing the shadows and highlights to clip into pure black and white. The midtones become purely saturated colors. Using the Levels adjustment filter instead, moving both shadow and highlight input level sliders towards the middle also accomplishes the same thing, because, you know, linear readjustment. I'm really resisting the urge to go off on another tangent about color channels and the RGB additive color model.
Anyway, there aren't any examples in MSPA that are quite this extreme (at least in color, but I'll save that for a later post), but an image sufficiently high in contrast can be mistaken for being posterized at a glance. Hence the Guy Fieri banner. In preparation for this post, I was attempting to make a pixel-perfect recreation of that panel but hit a wall trying to figure out which and how many filters were used and what each one's settings were, so I sought the wisdom of those in the official Photoshop Discord server. The very first suggestion I got was a posterization filter, by someone who was a supposed senior professional and server moderator, no less. Fucking dipshit, there's too much detail preserved for it to be posterization. Dude totally dissed me and my efforts too, so fuck that moron. I spit on his name and curse his children, and his children's children. The philistines I have to put up with...
In the end, the bloody Guy Fieri recreation proved to be too much for me to get right. I got sort of close at times, but no cigar. These were some of the closest I could manage:
You might be left befuddled after all this, struggling to remember what the point of the blogpost even was. I had meant for it to be a clarification of GIFs and an argument against using the posterization filter, thinking it was never used in MSPA, but while gathering reference images, I found a panel from the Felt intermission that actually WAS posterized! So I’ll eat crow on this one... Whatever, it’s literally the ONE TIME ever.
I can tell it's posterization and not gif color quantization because of the pattern dithering and decently preserved details on the bomb and bull penis cane. There would have had to have been no dithering and way fewer colors than the 32, most of which were allotted to the bomb and cane. You can't really selectively choose what gets dithered or more colors like this otherwise.
Thank you for reading if you've gotten this far. That all might have been a lot to take in at once, so if you're still unclear about something, please don't hesitate to leave a question! And as always, here are the PSDs used in this post that are free to peruse.
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So for clarification on pink flashing stuff
I've seen a masterpost by @dystopianam about pink flashing go around, and I feel it may need some clarification.
The conclusion drawn was largely "it's thumbnails" but well... It is not. Looking at a lot of thumbnails can be a factor, sure, but it is not the root cause.
So, allow me to illustrate:
Imagine you have a bucket. That's the texture memory. How big it is depends on both the game and your pc. Fact is: you have a bucket.
Now you start putting water in: it could be a tiny amount, it could be an entire pitcher. At some point, that bucket is gonna get full and if after that you add more water, it will overflow. This is your pink flashing.
Just as how adding large amounts of water, will make your bucket flood faster, so does loading in a large amount of (big) textures increase your game's chances of flashing pink.
A smaller texture takes up less space in your bucket, a large one will take up a lot of your space. This is why texture optimization can help quite a bit with pink flashing. It has nothing to do with hardware, it's just shrinking things down so your bucket fills up slower.
So, how does this relate to thumbnails? Well, thumbnails are indeed textures. Looking at a large amount of thumbnails, does fill up your bucket. But, here's the thing: thumbnails are generated. Generating a thumbnail of something with a large texture takes the game (and your pc) more effort than generating one for a lower resolution thing. Regenerating thumbnails can indeed cause crashing. The thumbnails themselves are tiny lil images. In the end, it still comes down to texture memory and how quickly you fill it up.
All the actions listed in the original post are ones that involve loading more textures into memory.
Tldr: thumbnails are not the issue. The issue is the amount and size of textures you're loading. Your texture memory can and will eventually get full and the game is not good at dealing with it.
If you'd like to know more about pink flashing, @anachronisims has been doing a lot of research on the topic and is working on a big report. Fascinating stuff, go check it out!
#sims 2#pink flashing#ts2#the sims 2#s2#resource#I feel like reducing pink flashing down to “it's thumbnails” is skipping over the main cause which is texture size#big textures need more memory so at some point the game just cannot handle it anymore#many games have some way to clear the texture memory of unused things but the sims 2 is... not great at it#it does its best but it is not prepared for modern hardware or the sheet size of some of the textures used today#1024x1024 should be the max texture size with perhaps a handful of textures up to 2048x2048 for *very* select things#the root cause of pink flashing is still texture memory
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Mantis… gif making tutorial when? I beg
Here you go, love! I recorded a quick video for how I record my gifs, as well as how I edit them.
I don’t really do anything special, and I also don’t know the best way to actually make gifs with photoshop still since it confuses me a lot still haha... but hopefully this is a bit helpful! There may be a better way though, so the way I do it may be a bit outdated lol.
Gifs will also look different on pc compared to mobile on tumblr due to how they compress the gif on each platform.
GIF RECORDING + EDITING TUTORIAL (youtube w/timestamps)
CAM TOOLS + other info
my in-game settings and PC specs available here
ALSO FORGOT TO NOTE IN THE VIDEO, my exporting settings Image size and percent will always vary depending on the original resolution and file size of your clip. I have tried transparency on//off and it doesn't seem to make a huge difference, turning it off will increase file size.
background audio (+ my own recorded in-game ambience)
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We want to wish everyone a happy 1 month anniversary since the Stožice concert! 🥰💗
This is a translation of an online article published today, 6.11.2023, by Suzy magazine, a subsidiary of the Slovenian newspaper Slovenske novice. The author of the article is Polona Bohorič.
Audio version by IG Gboleyn123 can be also listened on Spotify, iTunes, and other podcast platforms.
ODE TO JOKER OUT
What do these guys have that is lacking in the world?
Respect. To everyone. To their roots. To the world. Compassion. The desire to be human. Playfulness. That inexhaustible companion of creativity.
[Photo caption: They give off the feeling of an old, well-rehearsed rock band. PHOTO: Mediaspeed]
Fever
I actually don't even remember when and how I got the Joker Out fever. What attracted me? The lyrics for sure, words have always been a sacred tie for me, a fundamental element. Rhythms and melodies were not far behind. Likeable. Enough to awaken my attention, followed by curiosity and then the excitement of discovery.
Charisma, honesty, open-mindedness. The incredibly complementary collection of members, both in personality and in their image, works as if they had been put together by some giant professional American or English production company. But they have built themselves. Step by step, as it seems, since childhood... With resolution. With learning. With a freshness of their own which is brimming in them, and which they are showering over people far and wide... Material that is good enough to set one small country on fire. And this fever knows no bounds and it is spreading.
In a world where we are all the media, it's not that hard to create one hit. But keeping and stacking the material to maintain and even increase the temperature is a task that many have already undertaken. Only few succeed.
The first time I heard the song "Novi Val", which is becoming the anthem of a whole generation, I was as struck as if I had opened a textbook with instructions on how to exist and at the same time embrace life. Youth is always finding it's own way, circumstances are constantly changing. The rebellion of yesterday is not the same as the rebellion of today. However, the inner strength that drives the world forward is the same.
[Photo caption: What do these boys have that is lacking in the world? Surely something profound, something that every young heart naturally longs for. PHOTO: Mediaspeed]
Authenticity
There are five of them. Five points of a star.
Their roles in the five-pointed community are so natural. It doesn't matter who occupies which place, when or why, but more importantly that they blend in with the others- just as the points in a star blend together. What matters is that everyone enjoys it. Playing, complementing. And growing. I perceive them as coexisting in total acceptance of one another.
If they have made their way to the stage by by walking the road laid before them by their role models, this influence has brought them to a point where they seem to have found not just each other, but their own star.
One role stands out despite their unity. This role is not called frontman for nothing. He is simply in the foreground. Born for the stage, regardless where or with whom, but at the same time a sensitive soul and a perfectionist. I was struck by how subtly he slowly turned the stage spotlights onto his friends in the band, so that they all came out of their shells or got rid of their reservations. The wisdom of a leader, hats off.
Mastery
The boys are precise and skilled in their work, although (or maybe because of it) their performances in smaller clubs seem casual, as if they had just dropped in on their way. Their mileage of being onstage is noticeable. They give off the feeling of an old, well-rehearsed rock band. But the magic happens when the audience feels that the pleasure is theirs. The wave that lights up on the stage ripples in both directions.
[Photo caption: Bojan Cvjetićanin, born for the stage, regardless where or with whom, but at the same time a sensitive soul and a perfectionist. FOTO: Mediaspeed]
A crowd of a few hundred or a few thousand - there is no great difference in the response - is spellbound from the first to the last chord. This desire to move with everyone on and below the stage is more than the individual bras, bracelets and glasses, which are already becoming a collection. It is a powerful force of invisibly woven feelings, emotions, memories and visions. It is the enthusiasm of youth, regardless of age.
Who is part of the generation of love and hope? The Stožice stadium gave me the answers.
A six-year-old girl, sitting calmly cross-legged on a slightly raised technical prop in the arena, silently moves her lips with each word in the song, and as the boys leave the stage, she wisely observes, "It's not over yet. Carpe diem is still missing."
Her father, who looks at her with wide-eyed pride.
Thirteen-year-old best friends, accompanied by one of their mothers, experiencing the ecstasy of each song individually? Their own experience follows the band and the stage, and with the obligatory recording on the phone, they sing to each other, confessing and commanding each verse, with the full conviction that it is theirs.
The mother is stoically tolerating what is happening, obviously aware of the importance of this moment for her daughter.
In the stands, the seats are not filled because all the ticket holders are on their feet, dancing, singing. And they undulate. Fans and admirers in a crowded fan pit, who have been preparing for this moment of unity for six, eight, ten months.
Friends and colleagues of the five guys, scattered all over the arena, keeping a watchful eye on every move.
Two ladies in their fifties, standing next to a fence, dancing and reliving their youth.
[Photo: Mediaspeed]
Slovenia, Europe, the world. Twenty-seven countries are present in one space and united in one chorus. An ode to youth, rebellion, trust and determination. It lasts for two hours in this place, but lives in the heart in each moment, pulsating in a single beat.
No, it is not hypnosis, it is a wave of hope and trust. A belief that youth can do anything. This youth is not really defined by numbers.
Values
What do these guys have that is lacking in the world? Surely something deep, something that every young heart naturally longs for. When it merges into the same river with them, that deepness can be drunk in long draughts.
Respect. To everyone. To their roots. To the world.
Compassion. The desire to be human.
Playfulness. That inexhaustible companion of creativity.
Cooperation and cohesion. Powerful weapons to prevent the ego from growing like a wild weed.
The ability to maintain distance without arrogance. The ability to accept without becoming greedy.
Gratitude and modesty. These two keep your feet firmly on the ground.
[Photo: Mediaspeed]
Courage and hope. Two invincible forces that help to spur and tame even the wildest horses and lift them up to the unknown, the incredible, the dreamlike.
I perceive their strong mindsets through their gestures, words, concerts, interviews. Although it is quite clear how responsibly and professionally they have embarked on their journey, I hope that the weight of what they have already experienced does not press them into too much deliberation about the way forward. I sincerely wish them to remain in tune with their authenticity: childishly mischievous, youthfully seductive and juicily mature.
This world is already all theirs ...
-~-~-~
Translation by @kurooscoffee. DO NOT REPOST!
#joker out#jokeroutsubs#JOSpodcasts#bojan cvjeticanin#kris gustin#jan peteh#jure macek#nace jordan#bojan cvjetićanin#jure maček#kris guštin
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Computer q. For otherwise identical monitors, is a 4000:1 contrast ratio noticeably better from 1000:1? I don't mean for fancy art but like if I'm watching a movie, could I see the difference in a dark scene? I looked into oled's, but those are expensive and I think the way I use my stuff would cause burn in.
I hope you don't mind, but I got carried away and answered pretty much every computer monitor question anyone has ever had. And since this turned into a whole thing, I thought I'd share it for everyone to benefit.
For a computer monitor I would say the most important aspect is actually the viewing angle. This is how far off-axis you can look at the monitor before the image degrades.
We sit very close to our displays and at that distance, even a change in height in your chair can affect the image. Move a little bit left or right and a cheap display could completely wash out and look terrible. And if you get a display that is 27" or above, even if you sit dead center, the edges of the screen will appear dark and washed out with a bad viewing angle.
The two best display technologies to get a good viewing angle are IPS (in-plane switching) and OLED. If you are interested in a display without these technologies, be sure it has a decent viewing angle. You can read more about viewing angles here and here.
IPS has very little concern for burn-in, but it is still a concern with OLED. In recent years OLED has greatly improved and image retention and burn-in can be avoided with regular maintenance. Displays will have pixel shift features and noise modes that work out all the pixels evenly. You can run these features every once in a while to prevent burn-in. You can also play special anti-burn-in videos on YouTube (full screen) to exercise the pixels to uniformity.
So if you don't mind the hassle, you can manage an OLED with low risk.
That said, OLED was almost exclusively for TVs and has only recently been introduced for computer displays. The current options are quite large and fairly expensive, as you alluded to. So if you are trying to stay within a budget, it might be best to seek out an IPS display.
Another consideration is resolution. Everyone is obsessed with everything being 4K now. But I think increasing the resolution brings diminishing returns with regard to increased detail you can actually notice. So if you don't mind going with a 1440p monitor (about 2.5K), you can save some money on resolution and get higher quality in more noticeable areas. Personally, I feel 1440p gives you a nice, noticeable bump in detail over 1080p. Whereas going from 1440p to 4K (2160p) is less noticeable unless you have very good vision.
Another benefit to 1440p is that video games are much easier to run on high quality settings with a reasonable GPU. And you can use technologies like super sampling (Nvidia calls this DLSS) to increase the detail you may lose from not going 4K.
The only concern I'd have with not going 4K is if you edit 4K video. It will be difficult to do a pixel level analysis of your footage otherwise. But other than that, you can still watch 4K content on a 1440p monitor and because it is being downsampled, you will still notice a nice bump in detail.
So if you don't have a reason to get a 4K display, I think 1440p is worth considering.
The next concern would be color. Or color gamut. This is how many colors the display can accurately reproduce. If you don't do any art or video color grading, you'll at least want something that does 95 to 100% of sRGB. That is the color space the entire internet uses. And if you are going to be watching HDR movies, you might want a display with a decent percentage of the P3 color space as well. Doesn't need to be 100%, but the higher the better. And for those who do art, a good percentage of Adobe RGB is recommended.
Also, many manufacturers offer displays that come pre-calibrated from the factory. If color accuracy is important, I would seek out one of these displays with a Delta E rating of 3 or less (lower is better).
A newer factor in displays is peak brightness. This is measured in "nits." In standard dynamic range (SDR), video only needed to reach 100 nits. Most HDR content is mastered to reach 1000 nits. In the future, that number will be 4000. And if micro LED technology ever becomes affordable, we may go up to 10,000 nits. But almost everything is around 1000 at the moment, so that is a good number to shoot for.
HOWEVER, because HDR is tone mapped (the brightness of your display is factored in and the content is adjusted accordingly), you can still get some benefits of HDR, even if you cannot do the full 1000 nits.
All monitors can do 100 nits for SDR content. But with more things being displayed in HDR, having more nits will give you a better experience. This does not mean your display will blind you. Usually bright stuff only takes up a small portion of the screen. But having more nits allows highlights to really pop and feel immersive. A lightsaber might actually feel hot and dangerous on a bright enough screen.
Computer displays are often rated as HDR400 or HDR600 or HDR1000 based on their nits. The HDR400 isn't great for HDR content. If you can do 600 or above within your budget, you'll get a better experience. If you are going to watch movies, this may be a feature you prioritize.
I know you mentioned contrast ratio, but I'm afraid that is a little complicated to answer. It can depend on other aspects of the monitor and the viewing environment. So I'll try to give you the info you need to figure out if the display you select will suit your needs.
Manufacturers can use tricks to fudge their contrast ratio in product descriptions, so it is best to go to an independent review website like RTINGS to see what they measured. (They do good TV and monitor reviews too.) You'll see that OLED displays are said to have "infinite" contrast ratio, due to being able to turn off pixels completely. Which means it is probably time to move to a new metric because that gives very little info on the dynamic range of the display (the difference between the darkest and brightest thing it can show).
You definitely want a decent contrast ratio for your display, but this can be subjective. If you have a nice bright screen, your brain may feel the contrast is fantastic, even if the actual darkest black point of the monitor isn't great. If something is really bright, then dark things will *seem* darker by comparison. And if you are viewing in a dark environment, the contrast will look even better. So this is where seeking out a professional reviewer's experience of the monitor can be helpful. One monitor's 4000:1 ratio might be a different experience than another with the same measurement.
Because TVs are generally larger and can have more backlighting zones, they can get decent black levels without OLED. But smaller computer displays have more difficulty in reasonable price ranges. So manage your black level expectations if you go with an affordable IPS display. They can get bright, but they aren't great at blacks like OLED. I'm afraid that is just a limitation of the tech. In fact, getting a brighter display might be preferable to a better contrast ratio. And it will be easier to see if you are in a bright environment.
Most IPS displays are going to be between 1000:1 and 5000:1 and while it does make a difference, if you sit it next to an old plasma or an OLED, you're going to be disappointed. So I would not make contrast ratio a super high priority with IPS, because non-OLED computer displays just aren't going to give you inky blacks. I would say 2000:1 or better is going to give you a decent experience. But, again, I would seek out reviews rather than trust the official product specs when it comes to the quality of the blacks.
And one final consideration you may want to factor in is the refresh rate. This is mostly for gaming. Most displays will give you at least 60 Hz or 60 "refreshes" per second. Gamers tend to like 120 Hz or higher. This won't affect movie watching very much as nearly everything except Gemini Man is 24 fps.
TLDR overview...
Get an IPS or OLED display for a good viewing angle. I personally feel this is the most important feature.
Choose a resolution. 1440p can allow you to increase quality in other areas to maximize your budget. Only get 4K if you have a legit reason or you have fighter pilot vision.
Color gamut or number of colors. Try to get 100% of sRGB for web content, 90% or above of Adobe RGB for art/photography, and 90% or above of P3 for HDR movies and video editing.
If color accuracy is important, look for pre-calibrated displays that have a Delta E of 3 or less. (Lower is better)
HDR brightness. If you want to experience good HDR, you'll want the brightest screen possible (measured in nits). HDR600 or HDR1000 are great. If you don't care about HDR, then don't worry about the rating.
Contrast ratio and black levels. It's going to be meh on pretty much anything but OLED. 2000:1 or better is a good goal to shoot for, but be sure to check independent reviews for the subjective experience of the black levels. Dark viewing environments help too.
Refresh rate. 60 Hz is fine for most things. Gamers prefer 120 Hz or faster. And if you are a competitive gamer, you may want to seek out more info on "variable refresh rate" and "pixel response time."
Pick the variables above that seem most important to you and then seek out a display that does those things decently within your budget.
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The DPI Issue
Okay, I keep seeing and hearing folks talk about DPI and how important it is to set your digital canvas to 300 DPI without actually giving the full information.
Why am I qualified to talk about this?
I am a trained, certified photographer who trained with a school that specialises in printing and have been working in the field for 16 years. I am the designated digital file wrangler and printer at the studio I work for.
This is my job.
And I can tell you with pretty decent authority that most of the advice about the 300 DPI thing you have heard is barely half of what you need to know to use your DPI settings effectively.
I'm not blaming anyone giving the incomplete info because they probably don't know either, but LET'S DO THIS.
Let's start with clarifying what DPI is.
DPI stands for Dots Per Inch. That refers to the dots the printer makes per inch of paper. So 300 DPI makes 300 tiny lil ink dots per inch printed. So in a square inch we have 90.000 dots of ink. Thats a lot and definitely more than 5.184 you get at a print resolution of 72, right? Makes sense why the 300 would look better? I thought so.
Now, most printers will print at 300 DPI (a lot of higher quality professional printers even print at 360 DPI) regardless, but the software will try to upscale the image to 300 DPI (or 360 DPI, but upscaling from 300 to 360 isn't as big of a deal as from 72 to 300) and upscaling is always a bit of guesstimation and will most likely result in blurry or pixelated images.
Which is WHY everyone tells you to set your DPI to 300.
What they very often don't add is that THAT ONLY MATTERS IF YOU ALSO SET A PHYSICAL DIMENSION.
For example: 8 by 12 inches at 300 DPI.
That results in a canvas that is 2400 by 3600 pixels.
Because DPI is not actually a setting, per se. It is a conversion rate.
It is a number that tells you how to translate your pixels (dots) to physical dimensions (inches).
Changing the DPI to a higher number when you set a canvas size in pixels WILL NOT RESULT IN BETTER PRINT QUALITY.
If you set your canvas to 600 by 900 pixels no amount of setting your DPI to 300 will make this print at a higher quality. You can SET your DPI to 300, but if we were to print this canvas at 8 by 12 inches, you'd still only have a print resolution of about 75 DPI.
At 300 DPI that canvas only prints at 2 by 3 inches.
I will repeat again: DPI IS A CONVERSION RATE NOT A QUALITY SETTING!
If you always set your canvas size in pixels you can use the DPI as a way to calculate how big you can print your pieces without sacrificing quality, but setting a higher DPI won't increase print quality.
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Mermaid's Guide to the Stars: Astrological Predictions for April 2023
April Calendar
April 3rd to June 11th - Mercury in Taurus
April 21st to May 15th - Mercury Rx in Taurus
April 6th - Libra Full Moon
April 11th to May 07th - Venus in Gemini
April 11th - Sun and Jupiter conjunction in Aries
April 13th - Waning moon in Capricorn
April 20th - Solar Eclipse/ New Moon in Aries
April 20th to May 21st - Sun in Taurus
April 27th - Waxing Moon in Leo
You can understand the basics of how to read astrological transits here (it's being updated little by little)
Aries Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! The predictions for April 2023 are pretty intense and will bring about some significant changes in various areas of your life. After possibly feeling a bit down in March, you'll find your energy and strength increasing, putting you in top form for the month. Your focus will shift to material and financial matters as Mercury moves these issues around for almost two months until June 11th. However, be careful of financial fraud from April 21st to May 15th as it's a prime time for cloning, loss, or confusion with credit cards.
In April, you'll have some time to reflect on your values, both personal and material, and Mercury might even help you come up with some new ideas for increasing your income. Take this time to think about your financial path so far and brainstorm ways to boost your income.
On April 7th, the Full Moon in Libra will bring some containment and clarity to your relationships, business, and work. If you're married, you may have discussed a big change or step with your partner recently. However, one of you might be hesitant about this expansion. If you have a business partner, they may also be resisting progress or starting a partnership.
April 11th will be a special day for all signs as Jupiter and the Sun are in conjunction in Aries, bringing some unexpected and positive events. For your sign, it'll feel like a crown has been placed on your head. Use this day to decide how you want your life to change and make it happen!
On April 20th, a Solar Eclipse will occur in Aries, bringing a window of opportunity that will transport you to a new reality of life. This eclipse will highlight your career and self-image, and you'll be thinking about the direction your life has taken so far and what you need to do to continue growing. This eclipse may also reset your self-image, leading to changes in your appearance, name, or relationship status. Pay attention to the week before and after the eclipse date, as it can bring significant changes to your love and work life. Also, keep an eye out for events on March 20th and May 20th, as they may reveal themselves as related to eclipses and may require adjustments and changes for the next 6 months.
On April 20th, the Sun will also begin its annual passage through Taurus, emphasizing your focus on material and financial matters. Be prepared for May to be just as busy as April.
Taurus Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! So, in April, your energy levels might be low which can affect your immunity. To avoid getting sick, make sure not to overwork or pack your schedule too tightly. Mercury moves into Taurus on April 3rd, which means it's a good time to focus on your health and self-care. However, during the retrograde period from April 21st to May 15th, it's better to reflect and analyze rather than making any drastic changes to your appearance or personal style. Keep an eye out for any old health problems that might resurface, and take care of them right away.
Don't go buying new clothes or changing your appearance during this time, as you might regret it later on. Remember, Mercury's stay in Taurus isn't all negative - it's an opportunity to reflect on your health and well-being. You'll start to realize how important taking care of yourself is, and that you can't ignore it. It's time to review any unhealthy habits and behaviors.
The Full Moon in Libra on April 7th might bring some resolution, but it could also hold you back from any promotions or advancements in your career. If you're planning to retire, you might need to wait a bit longer. But, this moon can also bring some stability, which is always a good thing.
The Sun-Jupiter conjunction on April 11th is going to be the luckiest day of the year! This day will bring unexpected and positive events, and it's a great time to start something new or put in some extra effort towards your goals. The Universe will take care of the rest.
The Solar Eclipse on April 20th could bring some major changes to your lifestyle and personal beliefs. It's important to pay attention one week before and one week after this date, as it might reveal some important events. This eclipse falls in the most secretive part of your chart, so there's a chance that you might uncover a secret someone has been keeping from you. But don't worry, eclipses usually work to protect us. It's also possible that this eclipse will help you see things in a new light, and make some changes to your beliefs and philosophies.
On the same day as the eclipse, the Sun moves into Taurus, which is great news for your health! You'll start to feel stronger and more energetic. Don't worry if you felt a bit low in April - things will start to pick up again in May.
Gemini Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! April is going to be an exciting month for you! You'll be receiving invitations to events, parties and making new friends. You may feel a strong desire to be more active socially and embrace new experiences. However, you may also find that you want to focus on your mental health and wellbeing. Mercury enters Taurus on April 3rd and stays there until June 11th. During its stay, it will be in retrograde from April 21st to May 15th. This could be a great time to evaluate your emotional and psychological health and research available therapies, but avoid starting any new therapies during this period. Instead, Mercury can help you become more intuitive and creative.
On April 7th, the Full Moon will be in Libra and may bring about a containment accompanied by a definition. Venus enters Gemini on April 11th and stays there until May 7th. This will be a great time to improve your image and appearance, but avoid any aggressive cosmetic procedures after April 21st, as Mercury will be in retrograde.
Also on April 11th there will be the Great Conjunction of the Sun and Jupiter in the sign of Aries. Being in the sign of Aries, this period is more than perfect to start something new in your life, start on that day the lifestyle you want to live in the future because the blessings of it working out are much greater.
A Solar eclipse occurs on April 20th in Aries, coinciding with a New Moon. This may represent a window of opportunity for you to open a new chapter in your life, particularly related to your groups and friendships. The eclipse may also bring about changes to your social circle, allowing you to make new friends that align more with your lifestyle. Eclipses are always powerful events, and you should pay attention to the week before and after that date, as well as the events that occur on March 20th and May 20th.
Finally, on April 20th, the Sun begins its annual passage through Taurus, where it will remain until May 21st. This is a great time to focus on your emotional and psychological health, and allow yourself to withdraw when needed.
Cancer Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! This month is all about celebrating your success in your career and work life. March was a blast with all the training, courses, advertising and even work or study trips. You must have felt like a total superstar in your career, but now it's time to switch gears and focus on having some fun and socializing.
For the next 2 months until June 11th, Mercury is going to be all about helping you make new friends and strengthening your existing relationships. It's possible that you've been so busy with your career that you've forgotten the importance of having a good time with your buddies. This period might be the perfect time to catch up with old friends and even make new ones. Who knows, you might even bump into an old friend you haven't seen in ages and feel a wave of nostalgia and joy.
The Full Moon in Libra on April 6th is going to bring a major decision regarding your home and family, like maybe moving or buying some real estate. If there was any family drama in March, don't worry, it will all be sorted out this month. Maybe your folks need your help moving, or they're considering a big change in their lives. Whatever it is, it's going to be important and it might even have a significant impact on your future.
When Venus enters Gemini on April 11th, it's going to be all about self-care and enjoying your alone time. You might feel like taking a break from your routine and spending some time meditating or reflecting on life. You might even start to appreciate your own company more than ever and find peace in being alone.
On April 11th, the Sun and Jupiter are going to be in conjunction in Aries, which is going to bring some exciting opportunities for all signs and ascendants. This day is going to be like hitting the jackpot, with unexpected and positive events happening all around you. It's the luckiest day of the year, so don't waste it! If you're looking for a new job or want to start a new project, this would be the perfect day to do it.
The solar eclipse in Aries on April 20th marks a new beginning in your career, but it might require some sacrifice. This eclipse is asking you to give up something in order to achieve something bigger and better for your career. You might have to quit your current job or take on more responsibility, but it's all for the greater good. Keep an eye out for events related to eclipses in the week before and after the eclipse date, as they could have significant consequences.
The Sun in Taurus from April 20th to May 21st is going to highlight the importance of having fun, socializing, and making a difference in the world. This is the time to enjoy life and focus on making a positive impact in the world. So go out there and have some fun while making a difference!
Leo Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! March may have been about travel and studying, but April is about putting what you've learned into practice and achieving your professional goals. Mercury enters Taurus on April 03rd and will remain in this position for almost 2 months, which means that it's an excellent time to reflect on your career trajectory and create new solutions for your professional life.
However, from April 21st to May 15th, it's essential to be careful when signing any work-related document and avoid making presentations or attending interviews. This period isn't suitable for new beginnings, so it's better to steer clear of it. Also, ensure that you have understood everything you are reading before signing any document, and by all means, don't sign anything without reading it.
Despite these precautions, Mercury's long stay in Taurus can help you reflect on your career path and create new solutions for your professional life. During this time, you can think of new ways to use your skills in the world and make progress in your career. It's a time of deep review of your vocation and purpose in the world, and Mercury can even help you plan a career realignment.
On April 7th, the full moon in Libra may bring some setbacks to your plans to study or move to another city or country, but it's not an obstacle. The restraint indicated by the moon can ask you to slow down or delay some accomplishments, perhaps to resolve an issue involving contracts or documentation.
On April 11th, Jupiter and the Sun will be in conjunction in the sign of Aries, bringing unexpected and positive events that reveal situations that for many would be impossible to happen. This day will be special for all signs and ascendants and will shed light on foreign people and places. Even amidst setbacks, like those brought by the full moon, you may be on your way to the trip of your dreams or at least buying it. You're likely to come across a travel offer or package that you won't want to miss.
The Eclipse on April 20th will arrive in Aries, come close to Jupiter, and tense for Pluto and will probably touch on issues such as long-distance travel, immigration, citizenship, and foreign residency, as well as college and postgraduate opportunities and legal processes. If you were discussing a legal issue or in a judicial process, you will likely receive news about the case that benefits you in some way. If you were waiting for some foreign document or even the ideal date to move to another state or country, then the path to that change will open up now.
Starting on April 20th, the Sun is gonna cruise through Taurus until May 21st, which means something important! This month, you've been getting a nudge to pay attention to your career and work life, and this is gonna crank that up a notch. Take a minute to think about what your heart truly desires, and where you wanna go with your professional goals. It's a time to really reflect and get clear on what you want.
Virgo Rising/ Sun
Hey siren!So, in April, you're gonna be all about the cash, money, and material things, especially after dealing with all those fees, taxes, financing, and debts in March. But don't worry, those worries will start to go away in April, and you can finally focus on getting your finances all sorted out and secure for the future.
As for your thoughts, they're gonna turn to travel and long-distance relationships, because Mercury is entering Taurus on April 3rd and it's gonna stick around there for almost 2 months. However, it's gonna be retrograde for the entire time from April 21st to May 15th, so don't plan any trips or vacations during that time, 'cause it could mess everything up. Instead, use that time to reflect on your life and maybe learn something new, like a new language or something cool about yourself.
On April 7th, the Full Moon in Libra might mark the end of a business partnership or a source of income. It might be a stressful time, but sometimes things have to end for new things to start.
On April 11th, Jupiter and the Sun are gonna be in conjunction, and that means unexpected and positive things are gonna happen related to money and material things. It's a super rare event, and all signs and ascendants are gonna feel its effects. Money might even fall from the sky that day, bringing good news about loans, credit, insurance, and even inheritances or property. Just be careful though,if you're thinking about quitting your job, make sure you've got other sources of income to support yourself.
On April 20th, there's gonna be a solar eclipse in Aries, and that's gonna bring some rewards your way, like a good chunk of money or something else valuable related to your past. It might be related to something you've been working on for a long time, and now you're finally gonna see the payoff. But be careful, because this eclipse is gonna be tense for Pluto, and that might bring up some tough feelings or require you to let go of something.
The month ends with you dreaming about vacation and travel, with the Sun moving into Taurus on April 20th. This is gonna keep reinforcing the trend from the rest of the month, and you can start planning a nice, relaxing trip.
Libra Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! In April, you might be feeling a bit exhausted and emotionally drained after putting a lot of effort into dealing with other people in March, especially when it comes to marriage, work partnerships, and business. But don't worry, these things will still be important in April, and you'll start to see them as a resolution to live by.
The first few weeks of April will focus on debt, spending, and all things money-related. Mercury will be in Taurus from April 3rd to June 11th, which is a pretty long time! Just keep in mind that from April 21st to May 15th, Mercury will be retrograde. So, be careful when closing contracts, especially those that involve money. If you take on a debt during this time, you might be surprised by additional fees and charges. It's best to wait until the second half of May to make any major decisions.
But don't worry, Mercury's stay in Taurus isn't all bad news! It can actually help you reflect on your finances and identify areas where you're overspending or bleeding money. You can even use this time to organize your finances and negotiate with creditors. Just don't rush into anything.
On April 7th, there will be a Full Moon in Libra, which will help resolve any issues related to changing residence that have been on your mind since the beginning of the year. If you're in a committed relationship, this decision might have caused some disagreement, but now you'll finally come to a consensus.
April 11th is going to be the luckiest day of the year! The Sun and Jupiter will conjunct, bringing unexpected and positive events for everyone. So, take advantage of this day to start something new, make an extra effort towards your goals, or take a first step towards something you've been wanting. You might even be surprised by a marriage proposal, a date invitation, or a business partnership offer. Venus is entering Gemini on April 11th too and staying until May 7th. It's a good time to start a new life in a new city or country. If you're single, you might meet someone from far away who makes your heart skip a beat. If you're planning to move or travel in April, do it before April 21st because Mercury is going retrograde and things might get crazy.
The solar eclipse on April 20th will bring new beginnings in relationships and business partnerships, but it might also mean the end of something to make way for something new. This eclipse will happen in Aries, close to Jupiter and tense for Pluto, so expect some changes in your romantic or business life. You might get married, or you might decide to end a relationship that's been holding you back. This is also a great time to find the right business partner or expert to help take your work life to the next level.
On April 20th, the Sun will also start its annual passage through Taurus, where it will stay until May 21st.This reinforces the importance of paying attention to your finances, especially debts and investments. The Sun will help you clarify any issues and prepare the ground for a new beginning.
Scorpio Rising/ Sun
Hey siren!In April you'll probably start feeling more energized thanks to the new diet or workout program you started last month. As you get stronger and healthier, you'll start thinking more about your relationships, both at work and in your love life.
Mercury's gonna be in Taurus for a loooong time this month - almost two months, from April 3rd to June 11th. But from April 21st to May 15th it'll be in retrograde, which means you gotta be careful with starting new projects, signing contracts, or getting married. Take this time to reflect on past relationships instead.
The full moon in Libra on April 7th is a sign that you're finally finishing up a work project you've been working on for a while. You might still need to tweak a few things before it's ready to show off, though.
On April 11th, Venus is moving into Gemini and it's a great time to see some financial growth. You might get a bonus or a prize if you're working for someone else, or if you have your own business, you could see some major profits.
This is a really special month because April 11th is the luckiest day of the year! Jupiter and the Sun are gonna be in conjunction in Aries, which means good things are coming your way. If you're thinking about starting a new job or business, this is the perfect day to do it. And it's also a great day for your health, so you might see some improvements there too.
But watch out for the solar eclipse in Aries on April 20th. It could bring some changes to your work life over the next six months. Keep an eye out for events a week before and after the eclipse - they could reveal some important information. On the same day as the eclipse, the Sun moves into Taurus, which means you'll be focusing on your committed relationships. Use this time to figure out who's really there for you and who isn't.
Sagittarius Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! April is going to bring some changes in energy from what you've been feeling in March. Your focus is going to shift to your routine and work gradually, so keep that in mind. Mercury is going to enter Taurus on April 3rd and stay there for almost two months until June 11th. If you plan to change your work routine, start a new job, or adopt healthier habits, it's best to do it before April 21st or after May 16th.
The Full Moon in Libra on April 7th will bring some closure to a situation that started in March. This situation may involve a close friend or an adult child, and it could be related to a confirmed pregnancy or change of residence. This Moon may bring some distance into your life and might change some plans you made for the future. Perhaps you and your friend were thinking about participating in an event or developing a project together, but with the pregnancy, change of residence, or commitment assumed by this person, your plans will need to be redirected.
On April 11th, the Sun will meet Jupiter, which is considered the luckiest day of the year, and it will bring positive energy to love and romance. If you are already in a committed relationship, take the time to do something romantic with your partner. If you are single, it is possible that you will meet someone special that day. Also, it's a good day to place a lottery bet or participate in some sort of raffle, as your luck will be at an all-time high.
On the same day, Venus will enter Gemini, benefiting committed relationships. If you are married, it will become more romantic. If you are in an informal courtship or romance, you may feel the relationship evolve and become more committed.
The solar eclipse in Aries on April 20th will be a powerful event that could bring significant changes in your romantic life. If you are dating or in an informal romance, you may have a falling out with someone you are in a serious relationship with, and this may involve money. If you are not in a relationship, it's possible that you will meet someone new with whom you will end up having a strong relationship in the future. Also, if you already have children, you may be surprised with a school or welfare need that demands unexpected expenses.
Starting on the 20th of April, the Sun will cruise through Taurus, and it's all about work and routine. You might find yourself feeling more productive, organized, and healthy during this period because these things will be on your mind. It's a great chance to take a good look at your work routine and see how you can make it healthier and more productive.
Capricorn Rising/ Sun
Hey siren! So, in April you might be getting a new home or selling your property, or even moving into a new house. March might have been an exciting month for you when it comes to real estate and family matters. Now that these issues are resolved, you can focus on your kids and personal projects that bring out your inner child. You can even take some time off for leisure now.
Mercury enters Taurus on April 3rd and it will stay there for almost 2 months.During this period, you might realize that you've been too focused on real estate negotiations and family issues, and you forgot to take some time for yourself. The retrograde period from April 21st to May 15th could be marked by a comeback of personal projects that you do for fun and pleasure. If you have kids and you haven't seen them in a while, this could be a great time to get back in touch with them. You could also use this time to resolve conflicts that may have caused some distance between you and your children.
On April 7th, there will be a Full Moon in Libra, which might be tense with Jupiter. This could mean that you're closing a chapter in your career and professional life. Maybe you're leaving an old job to start a new one or leaving a company to take a new opportunity. This Moon might be a bit heavy because it also talks about distance. Sometimes, to continue a professional relationship, you need to be in a certain place in the world, but you can't or don't want to be there anymore, so you decide to end it.
On April 11th, Venus will enter the sign of Gemini and stay there until 05/07. This will help you improve your health and make your day-to-day life healthier. You might feel a considerable reduction in stress, and your day might become lighter. You might even reduce your workload, which will give you time to take care of yourself, your health, and your well-being. We spend so much time working and producing that we sometimes forget to take care of ourselves. This is your opportunity to rest and review your life.
April 11th is going to be special for you and your family. You might receive some awesome news, like a new addition to the family, or finally getting the keys to your dream home! This is a time to think big and see your life taking a big step forward in terms of home and family.
On April 20th, there will be a solar eclipse in the sign of Aries. Don't worry, not all eclipses are scary. This one is actually going to be a gift! Solar eclipses always bring new opportunities and changes, and this one will be no different. It might ask for some adjustments in your life, but that's just part of the process.
This eclipse might bring news that you have to move suddenly, but it's not going to be harmful. Maybe you'll find the perfect new home, or a roommate might suddenly move out. Also, be prepared for the possibility that a family member might need your help or advice.
On the same day as the eclipse, the Sun will begin its annual passage through Taurus. This will be a great time to focus on leisure, romance, and fun. If you have a lover, your passion might increase, and if you're single, this might be the time when a new romance starts to develop. So, get ready to have some fun!
Aquarius Rising/ Sun
Hey siren!In April you'll be all about family and home! March was a pain with all the paperwork, but now you're looking for stability and security. Mercury's entering Taurus on April 3rd and will stick around for almost two months.During this time, you should avoid signing any documents related to real estate or housing. From April 21st to May 15th Mercury will be retrograde, so you might end up regretting the contract or getting tricked. If you've got any paperwork to sort out, try to do it in the first half of April or leave it until later.
Mercury's extended stay in Taurus might help bring you closer to your family. If you haven't seen certain family members in a while, now is the time to reconnect and hang out. The Full Moon in Libra on the 7th is a good time for closure or maybe even changing where you live or work.
Get ready for April 11th, when Jupiter and the Sun will be in conjunction in the sign of Aries, bringing lots of luck and success in communication. It's the perfect time to present a thesis, write a book or article, apply for something that depends on your communication skills, or even take a test or exam.
Venus enters Gemini on the 11th, which is a great time for romance and fun. Your relationship with your partner might improve a lot during this time, and if you have kids, you can spend some quality time with them.
The Solar Eclipse in Aries on April 20th opens up the possibility of an unexpected trip or some good news related to teaching. Solar eclipses always represent a new opportunity that opens up, but they also require some adjustments to be made.
On the same day as the eclipse, the Sun will start its annual passage through the sign of Taurus where it will remain until May 21st. This transit reinforces the theme of family and home. You might be thinking about settling in a particular city for a more permanent stay.
Pisces Rising/ Sun
Hey siren!So April is gonna be a good month for you to focus on getting some extra cash flow. The stars are saying that you might have been stressing about money in March, but things should start looking up now. You could even consider taking a little break or learning something new to help you relax and improve your skills.
Mercury's gonna be in Taurus for almost two months starting on April 3rd, so you might end up traveling more than usual. Just watch out for any bumps in the road during the retrograde period from April 21st to May 15th.
Now about communication, this could also be a great time to reconnect with your siblings or work on your public speaking skills. Just make sure to do it before or after Mercury's retrograde period.
On April 7th, there's gonna be a Full Moon in Libra, which could help wrap up any legal or partnership issues you might have been dealing with. If you've been going through a property dispute or inheritance battle, this Moon might bring some resolution.
Venus is moving into Gemini on April 11th and staying there till May 7th. And this move will totally upgrade your living space! Your home's gonna be prettier, cozier, and even more luxurious. But if you're planning any renovations, make sure you do it before April 21st.
And get ready for some big financial news on April 11th, when Jupiter and the Sun team up for some unexpected opportunities. This could be the perfect day to ask for a raise or start a new money-making venture.
But be aware that on April 20th, there's gonna be a solar eclipse in Aries, which could bring some sudden changes to your financial situation. It might seem scary at first, but this eclipse could actually be a good thing and open up new doors for you. Just keep an eye out before and after the eclipse to make sure you're taking advantage of any opportunities.
On April 20th to May 21st Sun will be in Taurus. This is gonna make you more open to new learnings, which has been a theme throughout the month, and it'll be back in focus again as the month draws to a close.
Sources:
[24] Astronalia | Mariane Chagas. Disponível em:https://www.youtube.com/@astronalia . Acesso em: 29 mar. 2023.
Dividers Arts//Dividers Wings
#all about astrology#astrology notes#predictive astrology#prediction#astroblr#witchythings#witchblr#astro community#witch community
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Hello! You’re one of my favorite artists, everything you make is so lovely :) I just wanted to ask, I would really like to make stickers in the future, and I was wondering- is it better to draw them at the size you plan to print, or is it better to use vector programs so it doesn’t matter? Right now I only have procreate which doesn’t do vectors, so I have to make them small so they’re the right size (but it can make the designs low quality :() Do you have a preference/what do you do?
Thanks for the kind words :)) I usually draw at double the size with 300 dpi resolution. However I think most sticker printers actually prefer you draw at-size: for example, if you want a 3 inch sticker your image size is 3 inches. If it is making the design low quality, I would check to see if you can increase the resolution.
My favorite sticker printer is Stickerbunnies, you can read their website for how to format your files for more help. Their prices are really good and their MOQ is low so if you're just getting started and don't mind doing a little extra work to format your files, I highly recommend them.
Otherwise, you can try out Stickerapp and they will do all the formatting for you. They are a bit pricier though. I've heard good things about Sticker Ninja as well. I also used Sticky Brand for a while.
Hope that helps - good luck!
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Hi pals!
I’ll still be travelling when you’re seeing this and haven’t watched the finale, so I don’t have any new content to share, but last week (maybe longer? I don’t know— rainforest brain lol) I posted a poll asking if anyone was interested in seeing a snippet of my editing process, so here it is feat. possibly one of my favourite Wrecker moments.
I use a myriad of different software depending on: my mood, what computer/tablet I’m using, what the image looks like, and how much energy I’m willing to put into it lol In this video, I’m using Lightroom on my iPad.
The three main factors I look mostly closely at when I’m editing shots are 1. lighting, 2. noise, and 3. resolution (read: clarity).
This image required pretty minimal work so it’s probably not the best example, but ah well. The process in the above video is as follows, and please note the video had been sped up to 2x for file size reasons lol
The first thing I’ll do is see what the auto edit function defaults to. Often times it overexposes the image, resulting in significant colour noise, but it gives me a decent idea of what I should expect in terms of colour corrections and exposure mapping. The auto edit function wasn’t terrible in this case, but did produce some colour noise, mainly on Wrecker’s chest plate, his sleeves, and the officers hat. Once I’m done the initial scope out, I’ll exposure the image as high as possible to crop it— usually with the subject being as centered as possible.
This software lets the user tweak the bones of the image individually in three ways, all of them very quickly demonstrated here. The first is the curve method which I despise and NEVER use— because it alters multiple aspects at once, I don’t feel like I have the same degree of control as the other methods. Next is HDR setting (the default upon import) using the sliders on the right. This is effective for images that are already pretty well lit, and does give me a little more control, but most of the time because the screenshots are so dark, I’m editing in SDR mode.
Once I’m satisfied with the exposure/lighting, I’ll move on to correcting colour distortion and saturating the image. This software also provides three methods for colour alternation and I’ll typically use all three in conjunction with each other. Colour mixing is extremely crucial when it comes to reducing odour noise and distortion. Because this software lets me isolate certain colours to adjust their hue, saturation, and luminance, I can typically reduce most of or all of the colour noise. However, it does have its limitations. In this particular post, desaturating the colour noise in Crosshair’s rifle coincided with blanching his skin tone, because this software does not let me isolate certain areas of an image. It was also important to me to emphasize the warm tones from the sunset in the background for the overall mood of the shot, so I opted to remove what colour noise I could and leave the rest. (You can’t win em all… especially when the starting image is near-black lol)
Correcting the colour distortion in this image was not particularly difficult, desaturating all purple tones removed the noise from his chest plate, and shifting green tones to something near a yellow instead removed the noise from his sleeve. I didn’t notice the colour noise on the officers hat until a little later, but that was pretty easily corrected too.
Once I’ve fixed the colour noise, I’ll shift to toning the overall image. Wrecker particularly looks good in cool tones, but It’s nice to contrast a cool tone background with the warmth of his skin.
Once the toning is done, I’ll move on the image clarity. I don’t have the means to alter the actual resolution of the image, but I’m particularly picky with balancing texture and clarity. Wrecker always looks the best with texture and clarity increased, because it brings out the scarring on his face and further humanizes him, but overdoing the texture can also emphasize pixelation. Once that’s done, I’ll reduce the overall noise only slightly (doing too much makes them look airbrushed and unnatural), and whatever is left of the colour noise (too much of this setting makes them look like ghouls LOL)
This software also offers a series of preset alterations/filters briefly shown in this video… but I’m not the biggest fan of any of them. I’m a bit of a control freak and would rather tweak each aspect individually to the degree that I like, instead blanketing the image with present modifications and then undoing certain aspects.
Before exporting the image I’ll do another once over and make sure I’m happy! In this case, I opted to go back in and add some darker tones back into the image. I don’t do this often, particularly when they start so damn dark, but I wanted to keep the focus centrally on Wrecker’s radiance lol
That’s about it. If I’m working on multiple edits in a set, this software lets me just copy and paste the settings, so the following images only require extremely light tweaks and take almost no time. And that, I’ll export, autograph, and upload!
Thank you for attending this unprofessional Ted Talk.
#starqueensrambles#things no one asked for but are getting anyways#Jedi queue-doo#starqueensedits#ungatekeeped lol#thats not a word#well… it is now
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