#it could possibly be easier for a beginner? i do feel like making them in this form leads to better results tho
Note
Every time I see your sprite work, it just makes me want to make a sprite edit of Akane with the design I made for her in my "She Was Saved" AU (An AU based on the idea of Akane surviving the events of DRA), but I've never done any sprite work so, do you have any tips?
Ok ok so, first things first, i wanna make it clear that none of my sprites are made from scratch, they're sprite edits, hence why i always tag them as such. Every single one of them used some canon character as a base for the base sprite (that one fitst sprite where the character is just standing there with a simple expression) and a handful even have canon sprites uses as bases for poses. Just figured i should make that clear so there's no confusion here.
While I'm not sure if I'm the best at giving tips n stuff, here's what i could think off;
I think the most important tip i can give anyone who wants to get into sprite editing is MAKE A BUNCH OF LAYERS‼️Save things separately just to be sure rather than merging them because that almost always leads to more time spent later down the line. While the amount of separate things certainly varies from artists to artists here's the one i use for my edits.
The app i use (Ibis paintX) allows me to make folders with a bunch of layers to them so i use them to keep stuff more organized.
On the first pic well have a folder with the base sprite, one for the different poses and in Beni's case two for the different eyes she has (one for the normal eyes and one for the ones that are part of the glasses, normally i only have one layer with all the eye variants)
On the second image I've opened the folder that holds the base sprite, or should i say just sprite since it's in this folder that i organize everything that belongs to one specific sprite when I'm making them as to not get myself confused. Anyways, you can't see in the screenshots but the first layer has her glasses, second has her eyebrows and mouth and the third has the eyes.
Fourth has the main body lineart and fifth has the main body colors, please keep those separated as by doing so you make it easier to add those lil effects onto the character's faces on certain expressions + having the lineart of the main body always helps when sketching and connecting the different arms to the main body.
Lastly you got the arms, but ideally you should make the arms/poses in a way they can be placed over the body layers since that just makes things easier to put together, i just have this habit of placing the no pose arms under everything else.
When editing i make the different arms and eyes in advance so that when i start making the different sprites i can just duplicate the canva with the first one a thousand times and everything will carry along with those. Saves time in the long-run + you don't need to separate all layers on them (lineart, colors, shading) since they're just parts there's no problem in just merging them together.
A very important thing to note tho i that if the character has glasses or any accessories that you plan on removing or moving around in some pose/sprite this accessory should be made in a different layer from the main body, this makes editing easier than if you had to just erase and refill the part where the accessory was in the sprite you don't want it to be in.
A similar rule should be applied to the character's hair, if they have short or mid length hair you can just add the whole thing to the main body sprite, but if the character's hair is long you should make this bluk/back part of the hair in a separate layer placed under the main body layers. This also apllies to any back accessories.
Here's Akira as an example; she has one layer for her glasses, one for the back/bulk of her hair and one for the guitar case she carries.
These are essentially the basics of if, so let's go over to some actual tips.
Make the sprites on a small canvas.
Since the Danganronpa another games are made on game maker the size of the character sprites is surprisingly small, while I don't think you should just do it on the same canvas size as the actual sprite, it's good to have a smaller canvas so that the lower amount of pixels gives it a look similar to the in-game sprites + as you can see by mine, they don't actually look low quality at all.
(if curious, the go-to canvas size i use for most of my edits is 773x1020)
Use other sprites as references/bases
Especially if you're just starting on making sprites, use the canon ones for bases, references or even just straight up trace them. This will make the sprite look closer to canon and will start making you undertand the elements that make up the style of the sprite, do it enough times and soon enough you'll be able to make poses on your own without needing a sprite from the game as a base.
Remember! What's wrong about tracing is not the act of tracing itself, as the act of doing so is a great exercise to help you learn, the problem is when you do it and claim you made it 100% on your own. Since these are sprite edits, there's not a problem in doing so.
Observe and learn what makes up the style you're trying to replicate
This is hard to talk about since it really is something that comes with practice, I've been making sprite edits for like 5 years now so this stuff is like written on the walls of my brain by now. Just try to look and analyse the sprites and slowly you'll start seeing patterns and small onto them that you didn't noitce before, like how Linuj's sprites have a bit if line weight to them but are still on the thinner side, how he tends to make the hands a bit on the smaller side, how when he color the character's skins he makes the area near the top of the head a lighter shade than the rest of the skintone, the way he usually makes the character's mouths, and even some more complex things like how the male characters will have very little to no eyelashes while the female characters tend to have a whole lot of them, etc.
At the same time, there's no shame in deliberately ignoring some of these things. Personality the small hands REALLY bother me in a few cases and i tend to just make mouth shapes on a whim instead of trying to stay 100% close to the style. It's just a question of messing around and figuring stuff out, it won't look perfect on the first go, but overtime you'll start to get the hang of it.
#i hope this small sprite editing tutorial helps! if you have more questions feel free to send them#these are sorta all i could think of for now#you did mention that these are for an Au Akane so you could also try editing these out of her sprites themselves#instead of making a whole base and multiple parts just pick the sprites and edit the new design over#it could possibly be easier for a beginner? i do feel like making them in this form leads to better results tho#anyways. fun fact! i used the eyelash thing as a subtle form or trans coding on Akira's sprites :]#i love you small details that people won't notice unless pointed out ❤️#hyena ramblings#sprite edit#edit#sprite editing tutorial
17 notes
·
View notes
Text
Na'vi language
Summary: You were the new "acquisition" of the Omaticaya clan, the tribe had found you lost in the forest (you had been separated from your group on a mission to save your life) and they decided to take you with them since they did not want to take any risks: you were human and they had to decide what to do to see if you were intended to be a threat or not. Now, you had been with the clan for a while and the Sully children were doing their best to help you learn more about their culture and even more, their language. But, not everything went the best way for two of them.
Word Count: 1591
Warning: All of them have the same age
Pairings: sully children x female!reader
A/N: Sorry if there is more than one mistake, English isn’t my first language and I am still learning it. It’s my first time writing an Avatar fanfic! However, I hope you enjoy it and have a good time, thanks for reading! (:
Neteyam
You two had established a good relationship since he discovered that you were not a threat, from that moment Neteyam wanted to get closer and help you understand those lands, their traditions and the history of the people, because he could see in your eyes that you were a beginner in everything related to that world of which you knew nothing; he was more than happy to give you a hand and help you in whatever was possible. At the beginning, Neteyam and you communicated through gestures, signs and short words in English that his father and brothers had taught him, but, like you, he still needed practice to be able to dominate a whole sentence in English. Neteyam had become one of your best friends in the clan, so when he found out that you were to be given lessons of Na'vi he was very excited because he knew how fast you were learning and you were going to be able to communicate in a "more natural way" soon, no more English words and phrases that he battled with constantly and struggled to understand. He was very excited to teach you.
"Look, here's the deal: I'll teach you our language and if you say one correct word after another, you'll teach me that complicated and difficult language of yours, is that okay? It'll be an easier way for us to communicate! Tsun oe ngahu niNa'vi pivängkxo a fi'u oeru plite' lu!"
Lo’ak
Even when he knew you were not a threat to the clan, Lo'ak took much more time to trust and start a conversation with you because you were a human and he didn't know which side you were on, he barely knew you. The stories his parents had told him all his life about the RDA made him grow up with a feeling of constant alertness to any foreign movement, especially danger. He had learned to be distant and cold to those who were not part of his people or race, just as he was doing with you. However, as time went by, you showed him that you were friendly and had spent enough time in those lands to fall in love with every aspect and detail of Pandora, constantly trying to make him understand that not all humans were the same. Little by little, Lo'ak stopped being so defensive and began to approach you slowly, with "baby steps" (as his father would say) and the same way he got closer, it didn't take him long to fall in love with you almost instantly; a feeling that scared him at first and he tried to hide it as best he could, although, when he found out that you were to be taught to speak his language, he saw an opportunity to spend more time together even with his siblings around. He simply found it hard to take his eyes off you and even harder to accept that he was in love with a human. "You're doing great, y/n. Much better than us! Now, can you say tawtute?" he kept laughing with your pronunciation and the way you quickly managed to get frustrated, he found you really adorable.
Spider
Like Loak, Spider was hesitant to make friends with you and show you his ways because, like the others, he also thought that you were part of the RDA and that this was just part of a plan. However, time proved him wrong and besides becoming friends, Spider's heart developed something much deeper. At the arrival of these new feelings, he felt insecure and somewhat nervous, but, he thought that at least, he had a better chance than Lo'ak since the guy didn't have the least idea of how to dissimulate and didn't think he knew the meaning of the word either. When he was assigned the task of teaching you new words, Spider stayed leaning against a tree with his arms crossed watching how the others did all the work, not because he didn't want to teach you himself but because he knew that the others had more experience and knew what they were doing. Anyway, he would say phrases that always managed to make you laugh: "You said it wrong, Lo'ak! y/n, he's teaching you wrong. Don't listen to him, please!" "I'm sorry I can't teach you myself, y/n. My pronunciation is a hell of a lot better than Lo'ak's but my accent is awful." Those kind of comments always generated a friendly fight between the two brothers and some branch used to hit the head of the Na'vi.
Kiri
Unlike the two skxawng, Kiri was much more similar to Neteyam in many aspects; she was a very kind girl even when she was warned of your arrival, she was one of the first to defend you over the others by saying that she did not see you as a bad person. She was also very curious, so she went to meet you behind Jake and Neytiri's back to find out where you came from, who you were and what you were looking for in those lands. It didn't take long for the two of you to form a strong bond. But, at that moment, Kiri was worried because neither Lo'ak or Spider were teaching you useful words with which you could learn to communicate. All they were doing was laughing and being silly in front of you; on one hand, Spider wanted to teach you jokes and funny words so that you would "make good friends" while on the other hand, Lo'ak was determined to teach you how to say phrases like: "I love you", "Do you want to be my boyfriend?", "You are a cute boy" and some swear words; they were not teaching you anything at all. For this very reason and refusing to do nothing but watch, Kiri went looking for Jake.
"What's wrong, kiddo? is everything all okay?"
"They're not teaching her anything they should! Spider and Lo'ak are messing around and y/n is playing along with their joke simply because she doesn't understand what they're saying! She' s trying so hard to learn, but they're not helping!"
———————————————————————————
Hearing her words, Jake covered his face with his hands and let out a sigh, frustrated. He knew it wasn't a good idea to put two rowdy teenagers next to y/n, the way he saw it, they looked like two monkeys trying to get attention and it was a trait that always stood out to them.
"They're flirting with her, aren't they? little bastards!"
"Spider yes but Lo'ak... he's not doing very well, he doesn't know how to dissimulate, he's terrible, daddy." answered the youngest of the family, Tuktirey, who at saying those words frowned and played with a plant, not entirely sure of the meaning of her words.
Jake was guided by his two daughters to the place and observed the two young boys with a very negative look on his face. Then, he shouted something to them in his native language so that y/n would understand perfectly and, he hoped that it would have an effect on one of them:
"Hey, both of you! Stop acting like lovesick monkeys and do what I told you! You'll have the rest of the day to teach her romantic lines and anything you want. Damn it!"
And to his good luck, they did. Both, Lo'ak and Spider turned red as a tomato and shrugged their shoulders in embarrassment, unable to look at y/n or say a word. Neteyam let out a big laugh when he saw the expression of both and then thanked his father with a nod of his head, very different from Spider and Lo'ak, who didn't know whether to murder their father or their brother first.
Kiri and her little sister returned with the others, now ready to teach y/n the right way. However, the girl didn't want to return to her lessons without giving the two of them their revenge.
"So.... lovesick monkeys?"
The laughter that followed from the three girls and Neteyam was an embarrassing blow to the naughty ones, although deep down, perhaps, they deserved it. That would be a good story to tell later, but now they had to get on with their lessons, including Spider and Lo'ak who had already had their little secret found out.
"Can you say "Jake skxawng?" were the last words Lo'ak addressed to y/n with a fake smile before remaining silent for the rest of the lesson.
—lightsofpandora
#avatar 2#avatar the way of water#lo'ak#lo'ak x reader#neteyam#neteyam x reader#kiri#kiri x reader#spider#spider x reader#avatar x reader#avatar x you#avatar imagine#james cameron's avatar#avatar 2009#avatar
3K notes
·
View notes
Text
Get to know me tag game!
Tagged by @kitkatt0430 thanks for the tag <3<3<3
1. Do you make your bed?
Nope. I dropped making my bed as soon as my mom moved out. Maybe even before that. I sleep on two blankets and under a blanket. It’s just easier. And I toss a lot in my sleep and shits were always on the floor in the morning anyway. So I just stopped wasting my time and energy on making bed
2. Favorite number?
I consider 666 and 13 lucky ones. And have a soft spot for 6 and 9
3. What’s your job?
Post office. Night shifts. Salary sucks but it’s like two steps from my apartment and I spend most of the shift alone there
4. If you could go back to school would you?
Honestly? No. I’m too anxious to go back to learning. I dropped out the first time around. And I don’t really have passion for any subject to put myself through this kind of struggle. If I ever find something worth it maybe, but for now no
5. Can you parallel park?
Nope, I’ve never learned how to drive
6. Do you think aliens are real?
I don’t have a strong opinion. But with the size of the Universe? I thinks that’s quite a possibility
7. Can you drive a manual car?
Nope, I’ve never learned how to drive
8. What’s your guilty pleasure?
Hmm, Catwoman (2004) and other movies/shows I love but they are considered bad. And yeah, I know that catwoman is bad. But Halle Berry is so beautiful! And I have working eyes!
(A Beginner's Guide to Endings on the other hand rated like 6 on imdb. I? I unironically think it’s a masterpiece)
9. Tattoos?
Yep! I have four for now: snake biting its tail on my right ankle (it goes around the ankle like a bracelet); flying crow on my right hand below the elbow; mass effect inspired geth crawling on my left shoulder and lightning and snowflakes (if you’re thinking it was inspired by ship you are right) all over my left hand below the elbow. Lightning goes on my palm and point finger.
If I have more ‘spare’ money… I’ll get some more. I have ideas and places.
10. Favorite color?
Purple since I fell in love with hawkeye. And it was black for the most of my life. I still love black.
11. Favorite type of music?
Rock. Or metal? Or hard rock? I never thought too much about the types. So lets say rock. All the rock
12. Do you like puzzles?
Kinda? I like them but they are usually very hard for me to solve. And I hate feeling stupid. I like idea but rarely try to really solve them
13. Any phobia?
Insectophobia. I can’t even go near some bugs. Just nope. I once almost jumped under the car to avoid a bug
14. Favorite childhood sport?
Badminton. We never played by any rules. Just ‘do everything you can to keep the shuttlecock in the air’. And I was good at it. At school we once played with tennis rackets for almost two hours. Good times
15. Do you talk to your self?
All the time xD Sometimes aloud. “You are a strong capable woman you CAN STOP READING AND FINISH THIS” can be heard every shift from me to me. Luckily I’m the only one hearing this xD
16. What movies do you adore?
Wrath of Man and Pacific Rim and all Resident Evil movies (with Milla Jovovich) and 10 Things I Hate About You and Bring It On and MASH and From Dusk Till Dawn are my comfort movies/shows. I love the Critters trilogy. I love the new Star Trek trilogy. Nightmare on Elm Street (old ones). The Gentlemen. Old Guard. Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV (I rewatched it like four times in a row). The Suicide Squad. The Boondock Saints. Ten Inch Hero. Drive Angry… Well. Like. I have weird taste in movies I guess? (I’ve mentioned only movies I saw more than 5 times)
17. Coffee or tea?
Coffee. I can't find balance with tea. It’s either tasteless or makes me sick because it’s too strong. Coffee I can drink non stop. Hot and cold, instant and beans. I love the bitter taste of coffee.
18. First thing you wanted to be growing up
Veterinarian, I think. I always loved animals and thought that being the one to heal them is the best career ever
Tagging (no pressure): @holycafe, @nixie-deangel, @luna-shimizu, @bedalk, @madsteacup, @mommalosthermind, @eaion, @thing2dani and whoever feels like participating :3
12 notes
·
View notes
Note
do you have any tips for like... paneling? your lil comics, if i could call them that(?) with Dave are well made (to me at least) and I'd like to get into making comics! or if you know any resources that helped you. :') - sincerely, a beginner.
sorry to be answering this so late, wanted to try and give some kinda proper advice haha
so what i do is i just make my posts as long as possible so that it takes up like all of ppls dash, this means they are forced to look at it and engage with it!
no ok but for real, first off
this is just how i do things and by no means any sort of proper tutorial or anything,
most of this is prob kinda basic and intuitive stuff, but its good to be reminded of the basics and to notice why you might be doing said things intuitively so you can start doing it intentionally
so how i approach things is by picking a focus panel
whats the Punchline/Emotional pay off for the page/comic?
and then i try and build the rest around that
for actual Comics not every page is gonna have one of those ofcourse and thats fine
i tend to often have to many focus panels,,,, lmao(which is why my posts end up so long,,,,)
i try to group similar panels and make them smaller, it saves space, makes it so the attention goes to the more unique panels and makes things feel more sequential(or u can do like me and have too many similar panels and think, what if i just make it an animation, its just a few extra frames right,,,?<- clueless(i have done this twice now,,, the second is still a wip,,, ))
heres one of my posts deconstructed using all this, id do more of them but i dont wanna make this even longer asdsd, but i think its pretty obvious to pick up on once you know the formula lol
after that i think its mostly just clear composition and flow so things dont get confusing(like what panel(also applies to text) youre suppose to read next and such(thats easier with this cus its usually just individual panels and not full pages))
edit: oh and resources that helped me, i mostly just looked at other comics, paying attention to how the paneling was effecting the story and mood!
some comics ive looked at for paneling inspo are houseki no kuni, how they play with contrast and stuff, idk theyre all just very striking, i looked at ajin at some point as well for help with some action stuff, most action shonen are also great for that 2
so yeah, just find a comic scene that has the same vibe that youre trying to get and see how they did it, finding a few and comparing and contrasting what you feel works best
thats my thought process while doing stuff at least!
i hope this helps at least a bit haha
#another thing a teacher told me at some point is to make things Look Intentional? in this case they were referring to comic panels#and how if you have one of those classic slanted dividers(i dont remember what theyre called.. n am 2 lazy to look it up)#make sure its not just slightly slanted as then often gets misread as a mistake like you just messed up a straight line#so basically go big or go home#like art has no rules so u can do whatever you want and different things work better depending on the piece but its advice i try and follow#also paneling for ask blog stuff is a lot easier then actual comics its prob a good place to start to practice this kinda stuff#timing is also important? timing is why im doing 2 animations.......#they just werent working as panels cus they felt too slow? cus it needed 2 many panels that were all quite similar#so they took a lot of space and took 2 long to go through#which is why i was like ill just animate it!<- does not like animating#the things i do for this blog u_u#rambles#advice#anon#art
23 notes
·
View notes
Note
I am sorry for bothering you, but if you don't mind, can you tell the tips for the very very begginers. I really want to start learning how to draw, but it is overwhelming and I don't no where to start and feel a little at loss
ha! One of these days I'm going to have to write something detailed and well-constructed to be able to answer these questions properly. ^^"
In any case, you're not bothering me at all and I'll try to give you a clear answer, but I apologise in advance if it's too long or if my English isn't good at times.
In short version I would just quote Lorenzo from How to think when you draw : source
My long version:
It's hard because everyone functions differently, but I'd say that first of all you need to define a goal or a project that will be your driving force so that you don't lose your motivation. It could be a personal comics project or doing fan art, it doesn't matter as long as you're enthusiastic about it.
If you have to choose between academic seriousness and fun, choose fun, because fun make you practice and practice make you progress anyway so you'll be less likely to get discouraged.
It's important to practice as regularly as possible, because your ability to draw is like a muscle that you need to maintain. If you don't practice enough, your progress will be slow, and if you don't practice for too long, you'll lose what you've learnt.
Having said that, learning fast is not an obligation - it depends on your goal.
For the technical aspects that you still need to learn between two sessions of fun, the order that seems logical to me is :
shape and volume || light and shade
anatomy
colour theory
perspective
composition
That's assuming you start by doing just characters before getting into complex backgrounds.
And bearing in mind that certain parts are connected together and can be learned simultaneously. For example, I've put perspective towards the end, assuming that you come to the backgrounds last, but it's useful for drawing characters too.
To make each of these parts easier, they need to be broken down into stages.
Shape and volume || Light and shade :
Shape and volume :
Basically, it's useful for everything else. understanding shapes allows you to decompose complex subjects so that you can reproduce them more easily. Absolutely everything around you and everything you want to draw can be decomposed in this way. It will then help you to know how to apply light and shade.
A good article here.
Light and shade : not knowing how to sum it up in a few words, I found some useful links :
[link] [link] [link]
these three articles talk about the same thing, but maybe if you look at what else their authors have in stock you'll find something different or explained in a way that suits you better.
Anatomy :
Once you know how to build a human being with tubes and rectangles, you can go into more detail about anatomy.
You can start with the head alone, practising drawing it from all angles, with different characteristics, different expressions etc, then arms, then torso, etc and then gradually moving on to the whole human body.
Study the skeleton and musculature, it sounds annoying but it really changes everything.
Even if it's possible to know how to position a character correctly without it, the result will inevitably be better with it and it'll make your task easier and drawing skeletons is great fun!
This doesn't mean that you have to learn every single piece by heart, just that you know enough to be able to place the bumps and hollows in the right places.
a good article for beginners, giving the balance needed to avoid being overwhelmed by the study of anatomy.
I suggest as an exercise : with the help of references and tutorials, draw a character 4 times in an identical posture, except that first you only do the skeleton, then the musculature, then a normal nude, and finally with clothes to familiarise yourself with the behaviour of the fabrics. (The folds and drapes are, I think, a sub-chapter of the anatomy part because clothes.)
about folds and drapery [link] [link]
Colour theory :
Basically, it's what colour you get when you mix these two together, or which colour is best for shadowing this other one, or to produce a certain mood over the whole illustration, I have to limit my palette to these colours and so on.
Again, I can't summarise this easily but it's a big important part.
Just type colour theory in google or pinterest and you'll find so many good tutorials.
Note: again I think that, colour and light / shade are connected and should be learned simultaneously.
[link] [link]
Perspective :
For this part it's easy to broke it in steps.
Start by practising with a single vanishing point to understand the principle, then two points, then three, then the fish-eye effect.
I forced myself to do the spiral staircase exercise with the perspective, it was terrible but once you've done it and understood what you've done then you're good.
Better, you can test your understanding of perspective by having fun reproducing Escher's impossible constructions. I love his work.
1 point [link][link] 2 points [link][link] 3 points [link][link] [Escher]
Composition :
It's one of the last things I learnt and I can really guarantee that there was a before and an after to it. Composition is one of the fundamental that will make you say: I'm an illustrator, in the sense that I know how to tell a story, evoke a feeling with a single drawing.
[link] [link] [link] [link]
To come back to more general things, accept that it can take time, it's OK if it's not great at first, we've all been there. Don't put pressure on yourself and don't make yourself feel guilty by comparing yourself to others.
Be curious too, look for new challenges, and always do it for fun.
Finding a community in which you can make artist friends with whom you can share projects can also be great, because you feed off each other and that helps to keep you motivated.
Don't be afraid of failure, failure is good, failure is your friend. Because once you've identified the reason why you think your drawing is a failure or not good enough, you'll remember to pay attention the next time or it'll motivate you to do more training on that point. Knowing things is good, but turning them into reflexes is better.
Here it is, I hope it helps, most of the resources I learnt with were in French so I quickly tried to find the English equivalent, I checked them quickly, but I think it's ok.
And, the links I've found are just entry points, in some cases you'll need to find other resources, like anatomy for example, but just type anatomy tuto on pinterest and see what seems easiest for you to start with.
aaand this is the end, I think.
#ask#text post#every time I have a question like that I take the outline of the previous one and add a little something to it.#After some times I might have enough to write a book x)
24 notes
·
View notes
Note
Yandere rivals Lance vs Keith ~ (platonic/ romantic vibes for both if that makes sense ?) with a paladin in training ?
I haven't finished the show but I did do some research. If things seem wrong or out of character that's why. I got impatient and really wanted go write this also it's been in my drafts for a bit :( I may rewrite this in the future if it makes no sense.
(AU where Darling is trained to be the Blue Paladin by Lance and Keith-)
Edit: I actually want to flesh this out at some point, I can make this AU work with more tweaking lol.
Yandere! Lance vs Keith
Ft. Paladin-In-Training! Darling
Potential Voltron: Legendary Defender Spoilers/Black Paladin! Keith AU
Pairing: Platonic/Romantic - Rivalry
Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Jealousy, Dubious companionship, I'm going against canon plot intentionally for once in my life, Manipulation, Leans platonic but either works, Possible OOC characters I apologize in advance, Overprotective behavior, Controlling behavior, Mature language at one point, Slight violence, This is mostly just them being competitive.
There's two ways I could tackle this.
I could've written this with Black Paladin! Keith and Red Paladin! Lance but I also could've done a more general version with them still as their previous colors.
For this I'll base it sometime after Keith gains the Black Lion and Lance swaps to the Red Lion with research I did but in an AU. (I'm sorry if things seem off due to this :()
When the Blue Lion lacks a Paladin after Shiro's connection got severed from the Black Lion, something needed to be done.
A Paladin is needed for the Blue Lion... and you were chosen.
How you meet Lance and Keith is through your training.
Zarkon is still a threat and you can't form Voltron without the Blue Lion.
Essentially the gist of this is Lance and Keith act as teachers towards you, that was the idea in my head even if it doesn't make sense in canon.
Let's bend canon a bit as much as I hate to.
Obviously Lance is going to want the job of teaching you.
He knows the Blue Lion better than anyone, right?
Meanwhile Keith wants the job as he thinks if you connect with him it'll help connect to your Lion faster.
Lance is still a bit teasing and playfully flirty with you but is mature.
Keith still has to keep him in line yet it's easier than when they were beginner Paladins.
Keeping this general they both mostly have a mentor role with you.
Hunk and Pidge help you with training at times but Keith and Lance are your main teachers.
Lance sometimes brags about being your main mentor due to his past connection with the Blue Lion.
Keith shuts him down by reminding him that he's still leader.
They're both protective yet stubborn.
There's times they'd fight as they've been rivals with each other even before their new roles (according to Lance for the most part).
In terms of who you'd be the closest with... it depends.
You could be close to Lance, due to how often you train together and how playful he is towards you.
Learning to be a Paladin can be stressful and he wants you to stay in a good mood with him!
He teaches you how to use your Bayard, which appears to give you a preferred weapon you'd use.
He even teaches you how to properly use your Lion, you need to truly connect, after all.
Lance loves to praise you... he thinks you're a good fit for the Lion he used to use.
Keith is more serious and protective with training.
As the Black Paladin he feels it is his duty to teach you bravery in battle and how to use your given weapon in battle.
It's mostly Lance giving you Lion training and Keith giving you battle training.
Depending on which training you like more is who you're closest to.
This kind of rivalry isn't entirely violent it's more just competitive.
Their obsession just starts as who can train you better.
When you get closer to them that's when it swaps to something a bit more than competitive.
The two trust each other but they get jealous.
Lance gets more jealous than Keith.
Keith didn't have to step in...
He could've taught you battle tactics and Lion techniques alone!
Keith thinks Lance is being petty as usual, but secretly wishes he could train you alone too.
Paladins need constant training, when the two do train together it's harsher than normal.
It's like they're trying to one-up each other and it's almost always Lance instigating it.
Lance tries to make the whole rivalry all about impressing you.
Keith hates that you make Lance give into past behavior and wishes the Red Paladin would get ahold of himself around you.
Keith's much calmer as a leader, more stoic even.
He gives into his protective behavior when you're threatened.
In fact, your safety is the one thing that makes them work together and drop the rivalry momentarily.
What kind of teacher would either of them be if they allowed you to be hurt?
In this scenario they aren't really the kidnapping type of yandere.
They are sometimes violent but keep their composure around you.
Pidge and Hunk admit they fight and are competitive with your attention, but tell you they mean well.
They both care for you, platonic or romantic.
They'll work together when they need to.
They'd both be controlling at times, unfortunately.
Lance manipulates you into staying with him longer by using training as an excuse.
Keith is... uh... busy! So, Lance needs to train you in battle now!
Keith finds this irritating.
Keith uses his role of leader to get payback by giving Lance another task instead of training, allowing Keith to help you with your Lion.
Which pisses off Lance.
They may fight but they can work together when it's needed.
They applaud you when you're able to form Voltron for the first time with them
They both know with their training, you'll be a good edition to Team Voltron and defend the universe alongside them both.
Even if they do fight over your attention behind the scenes.
#yandere voltron legendary defender#yandere voltron#yandere lance#yandere keith#blue paladin darling au#black paladin keith au#red paladin lance au
53 notes
·
View notes
Note
do you have any advice for learning japanese, getting started? any cool handbooks, dictionaries or software?
Hi anon!! I got this message late at night and I didn't want to respond when I was super sleepy, so I hope you don't mind my answering now.
I'm flattered that you'd ask for my advice on this - I should probably note as a disclaimer that I'm very much still a beginner; I've been studying for less than two years.
With that said, my first recommendation in terms of online content has got to be imabi. It's far and away the best free English-language Japanese grammar learning resource I've found; essentially, it's an in-depth, straightforward explanation of virtually any grammar point that could come up in one's initial studies, and plenty of advanced material too.
In terms of dictionaries, I find that Jisho.org is the best English-Japanese/Japanese-English dictionary online; it's highly comprehensive, and also allows you to search full passages at once, which is an indispensible feature. As for Japanese-language dictionaries, I'd also recommend kotobank for ease of use, but there are many out there; looking up definitions in Japanese for Japanese words is worth the extra effort of reading/translating the dictionary entries, for the additional clarity on nuance and usage that it provides.
Finally, in terms of more general advice, I'd recommend using the language as much as you can day-to-day. If, like me, you don't have the opportunity to speak with native Japanese speakers regularly (or at all), the best way to do this is reading. Read Japanese newspapers, Japanese wikipedia, manga, anime screenplays, any number of classic novels or poems available online. Look up the words you don't know, study the grammar you don't understand, and eventually you'll find yourself looking things up less and less often. Read aloud, too, if only to yourself - obviously without any way to correct yourself, you'll make mistakes, but making mistakes is how you learn. Listening to recordings of native speakers - again, Japanese-language news resources & pop-culture (including music) are great ways to get a feel for pronunciation.
You've probably already heard this one, but - learn the two syllabaries as soon as possible. It's easier than it seems at first, and you'll really want to get sight-reading hiragana and katakana down before you start to study kanji. Because romaji isn't standardised (or, rather, because there are multiple competing standards both in Japan and abroad) it's really not all that helpful. Focus on using the language - writing longhand, typing, reading, and speaking - and don't worry about making mistakes. Even if it's embarrassing, it's just like using words in your native language when you were younger - if you use a word wrong and someone corrects you, you'll surely remember that word in the future, and that's how you get better at any language.
I hope this was helpful and not too long-winded, and again, thanks for the ask!! Godspeed in your studies, and feel free to send another ask if you have more or more specific questions (although again, I can't promise I'd be qualified to answer them).
17 notes
·
View notes
Note
Hi. Take care of urself
and may I request a Mari x reader where the reader makes these little clay items and sells them but will also give them as presents to the gang and also just hand her random items. If it’s not too much may this be romantic? You don’t have to do this if ya don’t have to!
take care of urself and good day.
-chaos mushroom
MARI WITH A READER WHO MAKES CLAY ITEMS
OK this is sososos cute!! hope u enjoy!
MARI
MARI would be the type of person to enjoy creating things with clay, possibly because she thinks it helps with creativity and inspiration!
though she’s never really used clay before, she would LOVE to try it out! she’s probably be a teeny bit frustrated that she can’t perfect a model she’s trying to do, but hey, at least she’s learning!
when she finds out you actually make clay items like pottery, keychains, etc. she is absolutely IMPRESSED! she thinks they’re so adorable
she’ll maybe request for her own clay items and keep it in her room, she just loves you and your talent! she keeps all of the gifts you got her on her side of the room
MARI will absolutely love it if you also give these items to her best friends and especially her younger brother. she thinks SUNNY will like them because of how creative they are
she even offers to help you sell them to anyone passing by! with her natural charms, it’ll be a lot easier. she won’t need you to pay her, saying she only does it is because she loves you!
if she’s taking a break from the piano, she might take classes for stuff like pottery so she can give you her own work of art! it’s not as good as yours, but it’s impressive for a beginner like MARI!
she’d also like it if you taught her yourself! she says it’s because she should "get a real professional" to teach her, although you know she’s just teasing you a little bit, but she does find your work more prettier!
she could just be sitting right next to you, watching and observing how you mess with the clay before turning it into something special. she can even consider this a date!
out of all the days, this one had to be one which you were completely out of ideas for something new to make. messing with a clay for a bit, you try and think of a something new to give to your girlfriend MARI and her friends.
speaking of your friend, she’s currently sitting right next to you, shoulders touched, and watching her hands play around with the clay as you try to come up with something. you really wanted to impress her, even if you already did in her eyes.
"everything alright, [READER]? you’ve been playing with the clay for a while now, is that your secret?" MARI eventually spoke with a tease at the end of her words, killing the silence between you two. it startled you for a second but you regained yourself and answered, "well, i kinda do always play with it while thinking of something new to make.. but now my mind is straight up blank with nothing."
you groaned a bit in frustration, and MARI understood how you felt in a way. she decides to tease you to make you feel better, giving you a smug look before resting her head on your shoulder. "really now? is it because i’m here? because your amazing girlfriend is watching you and you wanna impress her with your awesomeness?"
"gah— MARI..!" a bit flustered from MARI’s teasing, you looks away from her with red cheeks. she technically wasn’t wrong, you were trying to think of something super creative to impress someone like your girlfriend. MARI laughed in satisfaction from watching you blush heavily.
"you know i’m just teasing, [READER], but i know you can do it! expand your mind!"
27 notes
·
View notes
Text
That’s an excellent question, but not one that can easily be answered. There are really two versions of DQ7. The PSX and 3DS versions. And there are reasons to play either.
Some brief differences would be.
PSX: 2D sprites in 3D environments, random encounters, longer time spent in Estard
3DS: All 3D models, overworld enemies, shorter time spent in Estard
The biggest change imo is how different the vocation system is between the two. In the original you would choose a vocation to get its skills and then change vocations so your skills would carry over and if you change to a specific vocation when the last one “matured” you could get really good hybrid skills (like Sword Dance, the must-have hybrid skill). You basically plan out your vocation path so you get the master vocation you want for each character and pick up good hybrid skills along the way. In the 3DS remake, only skills from beginner and monster vocations carry over, but intermediate and advanced vocations will quickly learn skills from the vocations needed to unlock them. But this means that in the PSX version, Champions can use Sage skills if your Champion went through the Sage vocation at some point, but 3DS Sages can’t (unless they go through a monster vocation that has those skills).
I like the PSX version because I think hybrid skills makes planning a specific progression of vocations more interesting, but there are people that swear by the 3DS vocation system since it matters a lot less what order you choose to master vocations.
I also mentioned the time you spend in Estard is different and that’s because the PSX version has a notoriously long prologue. It will probably take a couple hours before you even get to your first battle. This is a major turn-off to many. The 3DS remake sought to remedy this by removing an entire dungeon from the prologue since it was entirely puzzle-oriented with no battles. I both like and dislike this change because I do think it messes with DQ7’s setup, but it also makes it easier to recommend to people who don’t want to go through the entire prologue.
The 3DS version also has an entirely reworked script and even changes some names (most notably the character Gabo is renamed Ruff). I would say the 3DS script is generally better, but the PSX one was also noticeably edgier. This worked in Maribel’s favor since she’s a character with a really sharp tongue. It helps with how down-to-earth the characters in 7 feel when compared to the characters in a lot of other DQs.
Also, regardless of which version you play, don’t use the stat-boosting seeds until you unlock vocations. You could do this earlier, but if I told you the exact moment you can start using them it would spoil a big moment in the game. Also keep in mind that even when you get to the point you unlock vocations, there will still be two other party members you’ll get later.
Also be sure to really research how vocations work when you unlock them. In both versions you’ll have to see what the requirements are to unlock each advanced vocation so you know which routes to go down with your characters, but for the PSX version you’ll also have to look up the hybrid skills and factor in those (you should at least have any character in the Dancer vocation briefly switch to the Warrior vocation and any character in the Warrior vocation briefly switch to the Dancer vocation to learn Sword Dance whenever possible).
#i’d say base which version you choose to play off which version of the vocation system you like the most#for the purists (like me) i would say play the psx version and then eventually play the 3ds version when you want to play it again
5 notes
·
View notes
Text
Any tips when being new to writing?
Hi, I am so sorry for this late reply! I didn't mean to take so long to respond to this.
There are many things I could share to a new writer but mostly I think I'll settle for these 8 simple things.
8 simple things for new writers:
1. Keep a writers book
Fill it will all the ideas you have. Add to it, lists of everything, names, places, favourite words, prompt ideas. Let the book reflect your writers mind so it's something tangible you can work through rather than an abstract idea stuck in your mind. My writers book is divided in sections, has lists upon lists of names for characters, synonyms for words I tend to overuse, backstories for the characters I have written, want to write, and will probably never write. My writer's book has an examination pad stuck into and about a hundred different pages held together with paper clips for each story I'm busy working on. I go into great detail when I'm in the research and plannings stage of my writing and EVERYTHING I find goes into the book. You never know when it will come in handy. This is currently my fifth writers book and each book I compile is totally different than the last. So get yourself a writers book and guard it with your life. A lot of what you write in there might seem like random nonsense until one day... it's not. So make your lists, fill the pages with random quotes and dialogues, names for possible characters, a list of character traits. Whatever it might be, write it down. Fill the pages of your writers book so that finding the words to write your story is all the easier.
2. Research. Research. Research.
An important part to being a strong writer is researching all aspects of what you want to write. Even if you think you know about the subject matter, it doesn't hurt to research it. This comes in handy when you're fleshing out your plot and characters. When I'm writing I research everything from different weapons used for great battles to clothing to how you would call your beloved in Korean. It's especially important to be informed of your subject matter if you want your reader to find your story believable. It also helps you manipulate the information to make your plot unique and captivating. If you're delving into writing a character that speaks a different language - research it. Research mannerisms, character traits, nervous ticks, research how to write smut (believe me it's not all just smashing and smooching!!!). Research how to write realistic fight scenes (how much blood can you lose before you pass out? Getting punched in the nose will make your eyes water no matter what Hollywood tells you!). Research government systems (I routinely do this when I start writing my Harry Potter fanfics) and religion, mythology, science, fashion era clothes (What type of suits did men use in the 20s? and what about women's clothes in a fantasy story?). Basically, If you don't know, find out. This is what will set you apart from other beginner writers. Be careful not to include everything that you research. That’s not what this is about. This is simply making you a more informed writer. I've research everything I've just stated above. Even the smut. So don't be afraid or ashamed. And if you're still unsure - ask another writer. I promise there are writers (on here and on other platforms) that will be more than happy to help.
3. Keep It Simple Silly (or KISS !!!)
People often think writing is some convoluted process. It doesn't have to be. Keep it simple. Write about simple things. Use simple imagery and language devices. It doesn't always have to be Tolkien type stories. Sometimes the stories that receive the most response are the simplest ones (As a fanfic writer - I can attest to this). Don't overly complicate your plot line - as a writer you should be able to follow it effortlessly but more importantly your reader should never feel lost when reading it. You want to take them on a journey not lose them in the forest. This also applies to the language devices you choose to use. Are you writing in the present tense or the past? As a new writer it's often easier to pick on tense and just stick with that. Your use of imagery should never be overused and clichéd. Stay away from the clichés. If you can't find a way to compare her beauty to the resplendent moonlight then simply say 'she is beautiful' - that too can be powerful. In the previous point I mentioned researching about everything you don't know. It's also important to know what to include from your research. Don't include unnecessary facts that will only serve to bore or confuse your reader. The research part is strictly for yourself so be careful of what you include - you don't want the important details to be lost in an overly complicated plot. This is why the planning stage is so important. It will help you iron out the details of what is actually important to the story and what you think might be important.
4. Write - as often as you can and wherever you can
Write whatever you want. Whenever you want. It doesn't always have to be you sitting at a desk with a notebook or computer in front of you. Some of my favourite scenes that I've written were done on my phone. I have a special notebook type app that I use specifically for writing little snippets. It's not perfect. It never is. The writing is usually riddled with typos. But I write them down before I forget and use that to build on later. Don't wait to find the perfect writing environment - create it. As a writer, you never know what will trigger the next must write idea. So always be ready to jot it down. Fill the notes on your phone with these little ideas. The important thing here is that you are continuously write. Don't stop simply because you find it difficult. Over time you will develop your own process of writing and it wlll hopefully make you a stronger writer. I look back on the stuff I wrote at the very start of my writing journey and yes I absolutely cringe at what I wrote. But if I had stopped, I would never have developed the skills I have now. The only way to get better at writing is to actually write. All the time. So you want to be a writer? Then start writing.
5. Write. Edit. Read. Edit. Repeat
One of the most important things new writers tend to overlook is the editing process. I cannot overstate how important it is to edit what you write. No matter the length. 100 words? Edit it. 500 words. Edit it. 1000 words? EDIT IT. 10 000 words? EDIT IT. Yes, it can be a painful process but it is what will set you apart from the truly amateur writers. It also shows that you respect your readers enough to go back and check your own work. No one is perfect and you'll be surprised at the mistakes you pick up when you edit it. Don't be afraid to use systems like Grammarly to help you edit your work. I use this for the writing pieces that are usually over 1k words. I would also suggest that if you are writing longer pieces to write it, step away for a bit (this lets the plot and characters cool down) before going back to edit it. Reading what you write is soooo important. You should be able to read what you write. Read it not as the writer but as your target audience. See what mistakes you pick up from this and edit it. The key part here is not to get stuck in the editing process. As a new writer, edit it for the grammar and ensuring your plot makes sense. leave it to stew and then move on. Most of my writings that I did at the very start is completely riddled with mistakes. I wish I had done a better job of editing it but I keep it up as a reminder of where I started. Don't be ashamed of the mistakes you make. Learn from them. Use them.
6. Music and muses
Find all the things that inspire you and make it easily accessible. I have a minimum of five different playlists that I keep ready for when I seriously get in the mood. Depending on what I am going to write, I try to find a suitable playlist or mood music so to speak. I have music for epic battles (Two Steps from hell is amazing for this), a dozen favourite playlists of all the amazing movie soundtracks - (OSTs are the OG and they will feed your soul when it comes to setting a mood) - Ambient Worlds on YouTube have WONDERFUL playlists that you'll just lose yourself in. When writing fantasy based stories I learn towards the Game of thrones playlists and for the more soft romance I go with How to train your dragon. Currently I have at least two playlists on Spotify that I use when I'm writing. (One is purely kdrama OSTs and it never lets me down and another is based on a current WIP I have). For reference Alexrainbirdmusic (both on YouTube and Spotify) have AMAZING music that is great for whatever mood you're in. I have some fave playlists I can recommend but honestly, everything on their channel is a win. I have three different boards on Pinterest for the sole purpose of keeping me motivated. I have a writers board filled with all kinds of writing tips - everything from dialogue to names. I have a visual resources board that is filled with all the things that inspire the different stories I write. Pictures of the most (seemingly) random things but they have always come in handy. And boards for my kdrama and tv series I watch.
This is all just an example of my music and muses of course. You pick whatever feeds your writer's soul.
7. Read. Writers read all the time.
As a writer it's so important to be reading what's out there. Not just in keeping with the writing trends and tropes but so you can learn from other writers. I learnt the most from reading other writers work on fanfic. Read badly written stories so you can understand how it doesn't fit. Read stories that are even better than the original. Believe me there are thousands of those. Leave comments (nice, constructive ones! We don't need no trolls here), ask for advice, get involved in discussions with other writers. I have met so many interesting people on here that I absolutely adore! They're always so supportive and they keep my motivated. We discuss the trials of being a writer, our plot ideas, or we simply gush about our current fictional obsession - whether that be another story or character. Read so that you can be involved. You want to be a writer? You have to be a reader too. I know it might seem crazy to try and juggle it all - watching the content, reading about the content, and then actually writing it - its A LOT but you will find a way to accommodate it all.
8. Create a process
It's important to create a constructive writing process. For me, I start with an idea and then I delve into the research aspect and from that I start planning out the story. I layer the story as I plan it out and then I start writing it. I usually keep a chapter by chapter break down of what I'm going to write - mostly because I tend to confuse myself and it helps me keep tabs on all the little details. Usually in the research part I collect all the visual resources I'd like to use later on. Once I start writing it's pretty easy going. I tend to leave the editing until I'm done with a particular section/chapter. I edit, leave it for a bit, go back and read to catch any of my mistakes and then I cross my fingers and toes and upload it. 😅
So as a new writer, think about the type of process you want. My process works for me. It's taken years to fine tune it and it's one that is always changing because as a writer I am always changing. I'd say set some basic rules for yourself and work around that. For example, for me its always: research, write, edit, read, edit then upload. Always in this order - no matter the length of what I'm writing. But again this is my process and it's what works for me. You'll figure yours out the more you write.
I hope in some small way this helps you. There are a dozen more things I could have listed but I felt these were the most basic and important things new writers need to keep in mind.
Good luck and happy writing! May your writing journey be an epic one 🫰🏼
#submission#ask and answer#the lady answers#sorry this took so long#writers on tumblr#writers ask#ao3 writer#tips for writers
7 notes
·
View notes
Text
Anon wrote: I’m INFP, I took creative writing as a minor major for university, I absolutely love it, but I’m struggling with some bits. Could you please help me? (P.S the order is random and does not reflect the importance).
First, criticism. Our seminars after the lectures are based on us, students, giving feedback for each other, and the negative feedback always upsets me. I talked with our supervisor about it and he assured me that it’s normal in the beginning, but I always feel like it’s painful. For me, writing is a self expression, and i feel like these criticisms always finds their way to wound my whole existence. I’m getting better and critically filtering the feedback and using it for good, but what can I do to not take it personally and to lessen the initial pain?
Taking things too personally means that your view of the situation is too narrow (Ne fail). Yes, it hurts to hear criticism, but the purpose of the criticism is to use it constructively to improve. If you feel hurt, go off and lick your wounds for a bit, and then get on with improving yourself. Feelings can't be eliminated; just let them be what they are. An important point you're missing is that improvement, progress, or growth comes at a price. The price you pay is to have your feelings hurt for a bit. Are you willing to pay? Immature INFPs aren't willing to pay because they are unrealistic and believe that life should always be easy and good things should just happen all the time.
Second, confidence. It’s the first time i share my writings with others, and I’m not confident about it. I’m usually content with them, but what if the world won’t? I know I lack confidence in general, but in this field, I’m totally beginner and my confidence level is zero, how can I keep writing and sharing, when i feel like my writing might be trash? This is affecting me negatively, I’m finding it difficult to pick a theme or an idea that interests me because i feel I’m not capable enough.
Real confidence should come with building real competence. There needs to be some tangible sign that your skill is improving. What standards/benchmarks are you using to quantify and measure your process of learning and improvement? It shouldn't be based on "feelings". It should be based on FACTS. This is something INFPs struggle with when Fi and Te are too far out of balance.
Third, I’m struggling with making my ideas clear, I receive a lot of feedback about students being confused with it. When i write for my self, i like bizarre and symbolic language, which may come up not really clear for anyone other than me. I’m trying to make it more clear, but i feel like I’m losing my authenticity in the process. How to find balance between being genuine and writing but I desire to write, and also keeping it clear for others?
Part of what makes art great is its subjectivity, how it affects the individual. It's not about writing for oneself vs writing for others. It's about being able to see your work from a variety of perspectives so that you can be more skilled at choosing the perspective you want people to use, i.e., to have greater control over how your work is perceived. Your imagination has its limits. If you don't view your work through the eyes of others, you'll never know how your work does/doesn't appeal, and you'll never be able to maximize its impact. Do you want to have such control over your work? If you do, you have to pay the price of hearing about how people view it. Once again, are you willing to pay the price?
Fourth, trusting that i will get better. When I’m really bad at something, it’s so difficult to see positive future. I want to be a better writer, but the idea that i may not keep me stuck and worries me. There’s of course a possibility, but I can’t see it clearly and this scares me. How can i have more positive attitude towards future in situations where I currently suck at it (to an extent).
See my response to point number 2. It's easier to have faith and be positive when your confidence is growing (because your competence is increasing).
Fifth, which is I believe is linked to fourth, how do i stop ideas of regret from attacking me? I’m content with this major the process of writing is really fun, but when I’m struggling, i feel like i should’ve not picked it, and then lose the desire to work.
It's GOOD to regret your mistakes, because that prompts you to learn from them and do better next time (i.e. achieve gradual, incremental progress). However, if you drown in regret and think it means you should give up on yourself, then you're getting trapped in Si loop patterns and Ne development is necessary, see the Type Dev Guide.
Sixth, editing. I do enjoy writing the first drafts, but these are rarely good. I need to edit a lot to produce a decent piece of work, but this is boring! When writing a first draft, i feel fresh and full of ideas, but when editing, i need to think through and make minor changes which can make me procrastinate a lot. How do i get my brain to use to doing this process?
If you truly believe in your work, shouldn't you believe that it deserves the effort of refinement? If you want your work to be at its best, putting time and energy into its refinement is the price you must pay. Once again, are you willing to pay the price?
Seventh, is it always the case that ideas floating in the head would look different on paper? I spend the big part of writing time imagining, and then when i finally get enough will to write, the text looks a lot worse then how I imagined it. This is causing my a big waste in time. Are there possibly better approaches?
As a writer myself, I can relate. Language has its limitations. And your skill of using language needs a lot of practice to improve over time. You can't always find the perfect way to express an idea. Turning the abstract into the concrete is no easy task. But a real writer enjoys the creative process and exploring possibilities. The process of gaining control over language and making it work in your favor is just as important as the result. If you can't enjoy the journey, you won't get to where you want to go.
Eighth, how to read objectively so i can give more effective feedback to my classmates? I usually read for pleasure and I criticise things into i like them or I don’t, which is not acceptable here. But I can’t think and provide opinions/suggestions outside of my own preferences.
This is most likely a matter of not having enough theory under your belt. There are methods of literary critique that you should learn and apply in such situations. Best to talk with your instructor or a tutor about how to learn it. When people opt to do creative writing only instead of a full program in literature, they often miss out on the theory side of things. It's important to be well-rounded in understanding how theory and practice inform each other.
Ninth, i shy. I can’t write freely when there is audience. I feel so exposed and vulnerable because, usually, what inspires me are things related to me. This link is usually implicit, and they won’t know, but i still feel like i want to hide, with my writings, in cave where no one can see. I tried to to present writing that is not at all personal, but I can’t find motivation to work on such things. Who do I get less shy? (I’m shy in general too and find it difficult to share things)
When INFPs are out of touch with Te, they don't want to accept the reality of what needs to be done for success. In order to learn something new or become something better, you have to push yourself out of your comfort zones. Staying in your comfort zone is how you get trapped in stagnation. Are you willing to pay the price for success? Motivation shouldn't come from what others do/say. Motivation should come from how badly you want to succeed.
18 notes
·
View notes
Note
🎻 💜
Thank you for asking! Apologies for the slight length on the second one but I did try to just keep Stasia’s a summary, and I’m on mobile so my thoughts are jumbled a little due to incorporating 6.4 lore still in some spots. So spoilers for EW below the cut!
🎻 VIOLIN — does your oc play any instruments? what is their skill level (beginner/intermediate/advanced/virtuoso/etc)?
Sadly none of my ocs play any instruments. Sibs mother attempted to get her to learn but she refused because was it really necessary for a lady to have playing music as a hobby? That wasn’t going to be her chosen hobby when she’d have to spend more time indoors as her supposed husband allowed.
💜 PURPLE HEART — what is your oc's ancestry/genetic background?
God I have thoughts on two of them for this one. I’m gonna do Sib and Stasia.
Sib is some old old old money with her family’s fortune having roots in Doma, which is why their name doesn’t reflect those of other Thavnairians and Hannish. Way back long time ago her ancestors came across a mine full of red gold and upon further digging found there to be more metals and ore and precious gems. Eventually they got more mines and soon found themselves moving the Thavnair near the time of establishment of Radz-at-Han hoping for better and easier trade. Their hopes were realized and their business took off and has been a staple despite their relatively small size among peers, though by choice as it has been a family business from the start. A more recent development among her family is their notions of beauty and their relation to dragons, the longer the tail, more scales one has, etc. means their line is closer to dragons of the first brood, this is false there is no relation to the first brood but good luck trying to convince her mother of such things. As the only living heir Siberite had expectations to run both the family business and marry higher if possible both of which she is well trained to do, now if only her parents can get her to come back home and stay there…..
Now for Stasia her heritage is a little different. She’s about 300 years old but not because she’s elezen or viera, no she’s half Ascian and half sundered soul essentially that can live for as long as she wants but can be killed like anyone else without the need for auracite, her youthful look is something she’s proactive about by using some dark magic. She has creation magic, though at lower level than the unsundered. She’s an oddity in that she can easily transport between reflections without needing to body hop (not that she could even if she wanted too, though she can do minor tweaking of her looks) and can bring others with her if she wanted. The last unique thing about her is that she is a new soul, having no memories or imprints of the Final Days like other sundered souls. All this simply because her father is Lahabrea.
When Stasia was born Lahabrea stuck around for a little while feeling the need to blend in and be there for his kid having made plans to leave them behind soon after Stasia turned 5, at which point her power of teleportation manifested and she found herself on the 13th. Once brought home Lahabrea worked on honing her skills and making them greater to allow for the free transport to come at will with little consequence, something that proved futile as with the control she gained it made going to the lengths expected of her near impossible at the age of 10. Finding her a disappointment and too weak to gain anything he taught, he left. Once on her own at the age of 16 did Emet-Selch find her and discovered that she was a new soul much like the phoenix her father made all those years ago. Gaining her trust he took over her teaching and she eventually came to help in creating the Garlean Empire posing as a cousin within the Galvus family. During their time together Emet told her of their history, about the world before, what would happen when all the rejoinings happened, told her of the paradise she would be in to help mark the start of a new beginning for their peoples.
While she spent her life with them Stasia never knew much on who the unsundered were before the Final Days….until a portal to Elpis was opened and she followed the WoLs to the past and met Emet-Selch, finding the truth in the paradise he spoke of real and seeing the origin of the sentimentality that led to his downfall and rejection of sundered souls as living beings (which her not being complete in a way must have meant he considered her in the same crowd). On her second trip did she find herself helping Siberite out in Pandæmonium Stasia found out she had an older brother in Erichthonios and that she’s more like her father than initially thought now that there wasn’t millennia’s worth of degradation on the mind. While she never told Lahabrea her relation to him it didn’t stop Erichthonios from figuring it out and asking in the stored memory of the crystal that she take to keeping an eye on him since he’d no longer be the oldest. While she still rejects these men as father figures (and will never forgive them for the pain they caused her) the trips to the past helped in gaining understanding on just how to move forward and make a path of her own.
#Thank you again for asking! again I hope it’s not too long!#I am always down to talk about them both more though! like there’s so much going on in the brain irt Stasia#siberite akagane oc#siberite chara ask#the akagane family#stasia oc#stasia chara ask#endwalker spoilers
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
2/1/2023 Update on progress using Glossika Japanese. Lessons listened to: 37
This update is mostly for my personal tracking later.
Downsides: I am struggling to get myself to listen to lessons. Based on time I have per day to listen to audio in the background, I should have gone through at least 100 lessons by now, and easily could’ve gone through 300. So 37 is... disappointing. I do relisten to the audios sometimes, so even though I’ve only gotten through 37 lessons I have probably listened to lessons 100 times. I suppose the upside is relistening to lessons before moving on is the actual way glossika recommends to study - listen to the prior day’s lesson before listening to the current day’s lesson. However, I was not trying to study how glossika recommended. I was trying to cram through as many audio lessons as possible so I could review if simply doing that and only that, was enough to learn a decent amount and see improvement.
I desperately would like to get through all 312 lessons in a month. Just so I could finish and prove to myself if it helps or not!
Since for me, a decent portion of these lessons are a form of audio review for me, so I do not need to be spending as much time on them as I am. I wanted to use these to review my knowledge and reinforce it, and strengthen my listening skills (and pronunciation knowledge) since I currently recognize more words by kanji meaning than by actually knowing their pronunciation (meaning I can’t recognize in listening words that I’d know if I was reading). So I feel I am... wasting a lot of my own time here, drilling beginner things I already know and working through the glossika lessons too slowly. Which is a bad perfectionist habit of mine that I often fall into when doing japanese study. oops.
I unfortunately have no solution to this tendency I have to avoid going through the lessons. I clearly am not super interested in the glossika lessons lol, they must bore me. For anyone else considering using glossika let this be useful to you: if you find it so plain its hard to listen to, it might be hard for you to push yourself to go through the lessons. The lessons are GOOD, don’t get me wrong. I just find it much ‘easier’ to make myself listen to a condensed audio of a video game (even though I know less words), or to play a japanese video game and look up words, than I find it to get myself to listen to simple boring daily life sentences in japanese/english. Just my personal focus issue. My brain loves to be challenged I think, even though I think in some cases like this it can make things less efficient.
Side studying I’ve been doing in japanese: I’ve played about 10 hours FFX and Persona 3 in japanese now. I went through about 300 memrise words in Nukemarine’s LLJ memrise courses before I got burned out with memrise again. I also have been playing like 50+ hours in the Yakuza games with english subs lately. While this doesn’t actually count as studying since I’m using english subs, I do hear the japanese audio frequently and I do think it helps me remember new words I’ve learned recently since I’m hearing them regularly and when I listen sometimes I try to compare the japanese I hear to the english subs and see if the translation changed anything. So all in all lets call the 50+ Yakuza games with english subs ‘mild review’ and count it as 10 study ‘review’ hours.
So total study time these past 3 months has been: 10 hours video games in japanese, 10 hours japanese audio with english subs (so review but not real study), 50 hours of glossika audio (each audio is about a half hour and I relistened to most lessons 2-3 times so I’m guessing around 50 hours total), maybe 5 hours memrise and trying out the Listlang app, maybe 4 hours on Satori Reader (which later on in my journey I think will be an excellent study tool to prepare for reading but I don’t have the money for a subscription right now). 10+10+50+5+4= 79 study hours. ToT
79 study hours over 3 months. Yikes. I sure am lazy. so in ~90 days I did on average ~50 minutes of study a day. Okay... not entirely awful I guess. I usually make good progress with chinese at 1-2 hours study a day on average, so 50 minutes isn’t way below that amount... it could be way worse. I’m frankly amazed I made noticeable progress in the last few months then, damn, considering it wasn’t like a few hundred hours...
Upsides: Despite my apparently not very high study hours... I actually have noticed significant improvement.
With Persona 3 - I played it 1 year ago and it took 1 hour to get to the save point. This month, it took about 20 minutes to get to the save point and I was able to get to the save point 3 times. So I was able to play the game 3 times faster, therefore I was able to read 3x faster. That’s a pretty huge improvement. I also was able to look up less words. When I played it a year ago I had to look up words frequently (about once every 2-3 minutes or more) and gave up even trying to read once I got to the school I just skipped text and tried to get to the save point as quick as possible and it still took an hour. This month when I played it I was able to only look up a word around once every 5 minutes, I could read the text fast enough that I did not need to skip text sessions to ‘speed up’ my playtime. I was able to spend some time actually exploring the character’s bedroom and school since reading was faster and therefore much more bearable. A 3 times faster reading speed is a REALLY noticeable improvement, I can’t express just how much easier everything feels when I can read faster. It makes the experience much easier and more bearable. Hiragana words and slang still made me feel very drained trying to understand wtf they meant by guessing, but it still felt 3 times easier than last year lol.
With Final Fantasy X - I’m noticing improvement AS I play. When I started, the menu was challenging, now I find navigating the menu quite easy and honestly a game menu is a great way to repeatedly practice recognizing words until you learn them. So is the combat menu. It’s like how in english we never knew the word ‘ultima’ or ‘aeon’ as far as the actual attack or creature they mean in a game, but we learn because a game teaches us. This is comforting, we have to learn these kinds of words even when playing games in english... so learning them in japanese is not really much different. So yeah, the pause menu and combat menu are already notably easier 10 hours in then when I started. Common words specific to this game were also picked up fast - I know know summoner, summon, defeat, cheer, pray, temple, monster, magic, boat, port, waruiwa - (used as ‘im sorry this is a bad time’ sort of like sumimasen but casual to end a conversation), a lot of more casual word endings or word forms (Tidus and Wakka...). This is comforting, as now I expect if I played something like say Nier Automata I would pick up the technology words eventually simply because they’re used a lot. Or in Kingdom Hearts I sure would pick up hearts, darkness, light, friends, friendship, worlds, keyblade, fast lol. I am also noticing it’s much easier to follow what’s being said in scenes then when I started. When I started I’d usually understand 1 part of a sentence but not all of it, or 1 sentence but then not 2 more then understand on again. Whereas now 10 hours in I watched the scene on Mihen High Road where Yuna and Tidus talk in front of the sunset. I understood every word of every single line, except 1 single line I didn’t know one clause within it. So I understood the scene Really Well, well enough to compare the japanese translation to the english translation I remember. There’s still lines where I only understand part of them (like when Seymour says ‘Then pretend I didn’t say it’ I understood that line but not the one right before it, or when Gatta says Chappu says spending time with your girl is nice but... I did not catch the part where I know in english he says ‘protecting your girl from’ sin is better. I only caught the ‘your girl’ part beforehand and ‘sin’ part toward the end). But I AM understanding a great deal of full lines, which is fun as I’ve been comparing it to the english translation I remember to see what was changed in english or kept the same. Lulu is... really direct in japanese just like she is in english, which I was surprised by. There’s also a part where Seymour asks Auron “It’s been 10 years, how have you been” or whatever, and Auron literally says “I’m Yuna’s guardian, I’m busy” then walks away. It was just really funny to me how directly he shuts Seymour down. Or when Gatta says when he told Lulu about Chappu, she hit him too.
When I started playing FFX this month I did not expect that I was going to eventually be able to understand the lines to this degree of detail. I thought at best I was going only be able to follow the main idea. Now to be fair: I’ve played this game before in english so I have that remembered english script in my memory to help me guess unknown words or lines. I expect a game I’ve NEVER played before would be considerably harder. However, this speed of progress bodes well for if I wanted to play Nier Replicant or Nier Automata. Apparently the navigation menus will not take more then a few hours to get comfortable with in japanese, and after enough hours I will be able to enjoy understanding the detail of a lot of the japanese lines. Which is definitely a good motivation to want to play more games in japanese - I am very interested in comparing the japanese script and choices with the english translation, and knowing it will be possible to do that is exciting.
With manga - an unexpected improvement. I’ve been opening up manga from time to time. I am finding some easier to read now. I think the improvement is mainly due to reviewing information I knew already because I’m using japanese more. I still find heavy adverb use and hiragana word usage hard and that’s where a majority of the unknown words I don’t understand but that are important are.
Basically - I’m seeing a significant reading improvement in both skill and especially speed at 3x faster than last year, ability to follow the speed up japanese in of cutscenes/follow the speed of japanese in audio much better than before, significant improvement in recognizing stuff I’ve studied before faster/easier, and some small but solid improvement in vocabulary. I did not expect any noticeable improvement until I’d studied a few hundred more hours, so honestly this is really great and a lot more than I expected.
In regard to the Glossika lessons: I DO think they’ve been helping, I Do think they’ve been reinforcing my knowledge I already knew and giving me good review, and while I struggle to listen to them often I do think they work similarly well for me as anki/memrise do except without requiring 100% of my focus when I do them. So the glossika lessons (audio flashcards) are easier for me to actually study. While I wish I was doing them more, I’m happy to say I do think they’re helping me improve like I hoped they would.
3 notes
·
View notes
Text
8 Cricut Home Decor Ideas to Elevate Your Space
Hey, what if I introduce you to the best Cricut home decor ideas of 2024? I know you must be searching for them; that’s why you landed on this page! By the way, I am really glad to see you as my reader. Do you know how important it is to have a decorated and classy home? It is very important when you want things to be cleaner and well-organized.
I am the kind of person who doesn’t wait for any occasion to decorate my home. I feel that home should always be aesthetic in appearance. I can never compromise when it comes to Cricut projects for home decor. Hence, I made a lot of home decor Cricut projects. And you can find all of them in this write-up. Let’s delve into it!
3D Pyramidal Art
Wall art can make your house look more attractive. It would be great if you could draw your guests’ attention to every corner of your house. Also, as an artist, I always prefer to showcase things that show my interest in the arts.
So, if you are also into the arts, you should try this 3D art with your Cricut. I believe these art projects are the best Cricut home decor ideas.
Frames
How about this ice cream wall art? If you or kids in your family are an ice cream lover, this can be a great idea for decorating the home wall. I prefer to hang out in my kids’ room as they are ice cream lovers, and they like such cute graphics with multiple colors.
From modern ideas to adding some refreshing color, you will want something like this for your child.
Buttercup Wall Decor
This buttercup wall decor is simple, yet it can be one of the best Cricut home decor ideas to try this year. I made it myself on my Cricut Maker, but you can also create it on the Explore series. Also, it is not going to be that difficult, and it is even easier for many beginner crafters. So what are you waiting for? This is your call. Try it if you find it fascinating. If not, let’s skip it and move on to another one!
Flower Wreath
Have you ever tried felt material? If you are a beginner, you might not know. But this material can be great if you want to create something like a wreath! In order to make an incredible wreath, I used woody climbers and felt material.
Moreover, the roses are actually made with Cricut. So, all you need is different felt colors. Just put them in Cricut and cut them according to the designs you have created. But, if you find it hard to create by yourself, you can also use SVG files available on the internet.
Layered Wall Art
How about this wall art? I was inspired to create such beautiful wall decor when I visited one of my friends’ new homes recently. Hence, I couldn’t stop myself from creating it. Also, this is the best fit for someone looking for the best Cricut home decor ideas. With such Cricut projects for home decor, you can make your wall look outstanding.
Plant Pots
Oh, how can you miss your garden, the beautiful area where you might get peace of mind? However, the garden is the heart of my house; it brings joy whenever I wander around in it. Hence, I wanted to make it as good-looking as possible. So, here is my plant pot that I created using a vinyl label and pasted it on my pot.
It looks gorgeous, doesn’t it? It was one of my best Cricut home decor ideas, thanks to my friend Jiya.
Welcome Sign
If you want the best home decor Cricut projects, you should try this Welcome sign board. I made this using a wooden plate and vinyl material to transfer my text to it. In addition, I first wrote the text in the stylish font on my Cricut Design Space. Now, you can elevate the welcoming vibes of someone special, guests or loved ones!
Doormats
Doormats are essential for keeping homes clean and organized and are inseparable parts of home decor. Hence, most people might need to pay more attention to doormat designs and their importance, but it is a must-have accessory if you want someone who loves decorated homes. In general, these small things matter, so make sure you choose the right home decor projects!
FAQs
Question 1: What can I make with Cricut to decorate my home?
Answer: Now, you can easily do the following projects with your Cricut. However, you will need some basic supplies, and you will be ready to go! Have a look at the home decor ideas for Cricut users:
Diamond hanging planters
Paper succulents
Reusable stencils
Floral monogram letters
Modern wall hooks
Leather geometric buffalo pillows
Wooden signs with quotes
Flower paper pinwheels
Home sweet home signs
Corkboard travel maps
Question 2: What do I need to make a wooden sign using my Cricut?
Answer: If you need accessories or supplies to make home decor projects like home signs, look into the following items. So, these items will be enough for you to make a wooden sign for your home decor!
A piece of 1/2″ thick.
Stencil vinyl
Small paint brushes
Finishing nail gun & finishing nails
Mod podge
A Cricut cutting machine
Mitre saw
Fine grit sanding sponge (optional)
Question 3: Can I use my Cricut Joy machine to make home decor?
Answer: Yes, you can make a wide range of Cricut projects. Be it for home decor or other personalized stuff, Cricut Joy can help you create most of the projects easily and without any issues. So, all you need is a collection of the right materials and tools to assist you in creating projects. However, there is only one: Cricut Joy can’t make bigger things.
Source: Cricut home decor ideas
Visit here For More Information: cricut.com/setup
You tube
Twitter
#Cricut home decor ideas#Cricut projects for home decor#home decor Cricut projects#cricut.com/setup#Cricut Explore Air 2
0 notes
Text
Advice From Those Who Lived During The Depression
There is a common theme running through all the following depression-age frugal ideas, and it is this: waste ABSOLUTELY nothing. In an era of scarcity, no one could waste anything. In sort of a way, it was a lot easier back then: products were built to last, and these products were built to be fixed. By the way, if you enjoy this article and want to read more articles on saving money tips please feel free to sign up here to catch every story when I publish! ⭐
Today, products are made to be wasted. However, it does not mean we need to buy into the waste/consume cycle. It merely means we must be a little savvier with how we spend our paycheck and what we do with the items we purchase. Below is a list of 38 tips from the Depression era:
1. Purchase Less — Occasionally it feels as if the more you purchase, the more that you need. Having fewer things and spending less money ceases that cycle. I have cut down on the things I buy. I now have five summer shirts, five winter shirts, two winter jackets, three jeans, and five pairs of shoes. And maybe about three nice outfits on hand for special occasions. That’s it.
The New Age of DIY
Don’t work extra hard to earn more money, learn how to save money by doing it yourself!
medium.com
3. Make all your stuff — Do you need a brand new bed frame or dining table? Why not attempt to make your own? Have you checked out the Ana White site? There are a lot of free, amazing projects showing a lady as someone capable with a saw and hammer!
4. Repair — It is much too easy to throw out what is broken and invest in a new one. However, if possible, and feasible, fix it instead of replacing it.
Video courtesy: Sustainably Vegan- 100 THINGS TO REUSE OR REPURPOSE YOU HAVE TO TRY
5. Repurpose Reuse — During the Great Depression, nothing was tossed out. Bread bags were reused as garbage bags or freezer bags. Old clothing was cut into new clothing or sewn into quilts, or cut into rags (they, of course, saved the zippers and buttons). Boxes, jars, and containers were repurposed for storage.
Priceless Blessings
Christian Historical Fiction
medium.com
6. Don’t use disposables — Disposables make you spend money on the same product every week. Reusable products mean you only have to pay for something once, which saves you money over time.
Video courtesy: Easy Sewing for Beginners- How to Mend Rips in Clothes
7. Mend clothes — Make them last as long as you can by line drying when possible and following washing directions.
8. Sew your stuff — If you make your clothes, bedspreads, linen, etc., you will be more than likely to have the desire to make them last as long as you can after putting in all of that work.
10. Use an apron — Aprons protect your clothing from stains, which helps them last longer.
11. Learn one or two handicrafts — Handicrafts make helpful hobbies, which avoids boredom and winds up with something very useful in the end.
Video courtesy: Doctor Mike — 10 Natural Remedies That Actually Work
12. Use home remedies — I am not against modern-day medicine, it is a life-saving, wonderful thing, and we use it when it’s needed. However, there is also a place for home remedies, and they complement modern-day medicine when it pertains to managing symptoms.
This Is How I Save Hundreds of Dollars on My Grocery Bill
These homemade cleaning products are so easy and cheap to make!
medium.com
13. Use homemade cleaners — Usually, homemade, natural cleaners are just as effective as chemical ones; however, they’re cheaper and decrease the toxic load inside your home.
14. Use hot water bottles — Less expensive method of warming the bed and staying warm in the wintertime.
16. Spend more time outdoors — Is it too hot indoors? Take all of your indoor work outside and sit in the shade.
17. Wear outfits more than one time — If your outfit isn’t dirty, wear it again before you wash and decrease the number of washes done.
18. Wash clothes weekly instead of daily — Having a weekly laundry day might seem a little outdated; however, during a period when folks wash clothes and towels every day, washing items such as linen and towels on a weekly basis instead of a daily basis will decrease the number of washes.
19. Bake other food while the oven is already on — Make the most of your oven and toss in something else while you are already baking some food.
Video courtesy: Howcast — How to Make Jams & Preserves
20. Preserve — Freeze vegetables and fruit or make jams and other types of preserves so that the harvest of today does not go to waste and it’s possible to make the most of everything out of season.
22. Wash dishes by hand — Washing inside the dishwasher might save water; however, it’ll cost more electricity. Instead, you should hand wash your dishes in a little bit of water to save.
23. Food foraging — Feed yourself free of charge with plants growing around the neighborhood. Before eating them, be certain that you know how to identify plants.
24. Scrape every last bit from a jar — Small rubber spatulas are the ideal tool for that. Making some jam shakes with the last little bit inside the jar is one other alternative.
25. Mix by hand — or chop or grate. Use a little elbow grease and save on the need for the gym, expensive appliances, and electricity.
Video courtesy: Frugal Money Saver — Frugal Living Learn How to Cook From Scratch! Tips for Stocking Your Pantry! Cream Of Soup!
26. Cook food from scratch — Consume healthy food that is less expensive than packaged and processed food.
27. Make your own soap — The majority of soap from the grocery store includes chemicals and is stripped of glycerine. Create your own higher-quality soap. If you use soap scraps, it’ll cost very little.
28. Always dry soaps — Whether purchased or handmade, soap will last longer if it’s dried. Put your soap in your clothing cupboard so it can dry, ward off silverfish, and give your clothing a fresh smell.
30. Curl hair using rags — Rather than using a curling iron, use rags to curl hair, which will save on electricity.
31. Squeeze the last bit of toothpaste out — Roll the toothpaste tube to use up every drop. Along the same lines, with a Q-tip you can also get out the last of your lipstick. Cut the shampoo bottle open or add some water to use the last bit of shampoo.
32. Try to shower less — Why take a shower on those days you spent all day loafing around the house? People have not always had the luxury of taking a shower on a daily basis. Sponge baths save water and are sufficient at getting clean on most days.
Video courtesy: AllMatters — How to use a Menstrual Cup — In-depth Instructional Video
33. Take advantage of reusable feminine products — Thanks to period undies and menstrual cups, it’s possible to choose products that are better for our environment, save money in the long run, and are more comfortable than their disposable versions.
34. Take advantage of the library in your neighborhood — Your local library offers so much more than books. You can stream movies, view DVDs, stream music, and listen to audiobooks, use their computers, borrow board games and puzzles, and attend classes. And more importantly, you can use those books to learn some new skills.
36. Free entertainment — Rather than spending your time at the cafes, shops, theme parks or in front of the Xbox or television, frugal entertainment involves telling stories, reading, playing board games, enjoying a day at the beach, having a picnic in the park, and hanging out with friends.
37. Grow most of your own food — Even just a couple of herbs in a windowsill can be an excellent start towards supplementing your grocery budget with your own produce. Organic food sources come at a premium; however, organic, homegrown food saves your budget.
Video courtesy: Growit Buildit — The Simplest Easy Method To Compost Piles!
38. Composting — Composting your scraps to add to the vegetable garden saves money and is the ultimate in recycling.
🌻Kristen is a contributor on Medium. Sign up here to catch every story when she publishes.
🧡Follow Kristen on Substack: https://substack.com/@kristenb
Originally posted on Medium
1 note
·
View note
Text
Violin Frets
I have a thing about frets, about them not being in tune. But there are other things about frets. You can't vibrato with frets, you can't slide (glissando) with frets. So it's weird that some of the higher-end electric violins have frets. But apparently frets on violin are not like frets on other instruments.
There are demonstrations of doing vibrato etc. on frets, but going by how frets are on guitar that really shouldn't work. Apparently, the difference is that violin frets are very small. Normally you'd press down behind the fret and the string would get pinched off by the little metal bar. But if they're really short you have to press on the fret directly, and there's no reason you couldn't roll your finger more forward or back on it. Slides are still going to sound a little weird, probably. But is that really a problem? Like, people do glissando on piano and that thing can't bend notes at all. So it's really more like a tactile version of those little stickers beginners use; it doesn't really tell you where the note is, but it gets you close.
So then, why? You'd probably assume it's like guitar and that they keep you in tune. But they don't, you still have to tune by ear. But it does make it easier. Supposedly there are people who'd object to that being a valid reason? But why? to give you something to feel superior about? That's stupid. Anyway, also apparently that's very important/useful in loud settings where you may not be able to hear yourself. So like, in a traditional orchestra where everyone's playing acoustic instruments that's never going to happen, you're always going to hear yourself the loudest. But if you're doing a rock concert or something with the drums pounding behind you, you may not. Also would be significant if you're deaf. It doesn't make any sense to me why a deaf person would be a musician, but I've heard of at least one. And I guess there's novelty, experimentation, and in my case, refinement? I'm not really sure what my deal is. But for instance, five-string viola seems to be able to do everything a violin and standard viola can do, and gives up nothing to achieve that. So having one would feel personally satisfying for some reason.
And hypothetically, this opens up some possibilities for bass. Not guitar, since you still wouldn't be able to do chords with semi-frets. But fretted basses are cheaper and easier to get than fretless ones. And particularly, I want a multi-scale fretless, which essentially does not exist. But if I can just file down the frets then I can achieve the same effect, and I don't have to learn how to make guitars myself to do it. Though I'm sure I will learn on a long enough timeline.
-
Tangent: it's hard to know what to pursue. I guess more fundamentally the issue is that I don't have the information necessary to solve the problem. In this case, I have limited time/energy/resources and multiple things I could spend it on. So, should I pursue bass things or should I pursue viola things? I could say that currently I have a bass but no viola, so the viola would have a more profound effect on increasing the amount of things I can do. Or I could say that working on bass would get me closer to resolving the bass problems, and getting a viola would open up a host of new problems. Although I suppose all of it is in service of trying to solve the 'living' problem. So I guess what I'm really after is the most accessible way to make the good brain juice.
But at what point am I supposed to be happy? Like, suppose I just save up the $1.4k for a Glasser 5-string. Problem solved? It still has the fragile wooden bridge, it still has the friction-fit tuning pegs, it still doesn't have any strap/harness system to avoid causing TMJ or neck problems. Okay, instead let's say I save up $2.7k for a five-string Viper. And for the example let's just say the amp and whatever else came with it for free. The problem is now solved. Then what? I move on to new problems?
Maybe this is all a consequence of believing I'm bad/not good enough. Like I'm looking for problems to fix, and finding them. But it's never enough.
I'm probably approaching this all wrong. There is this dumb thing I kind of feel good about. The problem initially was that I had a wooden cooking utensil soak up a bunch of beef fat, which then smelled strongly of beef and attracted ants despite numerous washings. So wood (some worse than others) has open pores, and I need to pre-fill those pores to prevent the utensils from becoming gross. Something like mineral oil is useless as it just washes off, and wax melts if you actually cook anything with your utensil. It would have to be a drying oil, or at least cured. I did try 'seasoning' wood as you would with cast-iron, just at a really low temperature. It seemed to work though it substantially weakened the wood. So the better option seemed to be an oil that dries on its own. The options and pros and cons aren't relevant to my point, I settled on using flax oil. For testing, I got a set of cheap wooden spoons, which I then shaped and sanded so they're smooth and not terrible. Then I started with the flax oil. The procedure is also not relevant to my point. I now have several very thin coats on these things. They are so smooth to the touch, but I can still feel the wood under my fingertips. It doesn't feel like it's coated in plastic. And all of the grain is starting to shine like medullary rays in quarter-sawn lumber. It's nice. It makes me happy?
Why? because it feels nice? because it looks pretty? Yeah. I feel some kind of way about that. Beauty?
I have not felt this way in a very long time. And never freely. I really am tired of making everything about her. But this is how she made me feel. This is the world I wanted and could never have. To me, she was beauty itself. Shall I compare thee to a wooden spoon?
Still, beauty is very difficult to achieve. I'm still me, I'm not a picky perfectionist for nothing. Everything grates on me. Everything falls apart if I look too closely. The only things I'm going to be happy with are things I've made myself, to my own standard. Of which I am not yet capable. I suppose I could break it down into smaller pieces. Like, I can't build my perfect bass yet, nor am I experienced enough to know that would entail. But I could find good strings for it. And then I could fit a new nut that's not worn out. And then I could adjust the saddle height. And then I could flatten the fingerboard. And eventually those little pieces should add up to something more.
Also, I suppose that sentiment of things falling apart should extend to her as well. Which feels.. cruel? Though it's hard to be sure, it wasn't until long after that that I determined I can't be the one who's wrong. What I'm about to say almost feels like too much of a stretch, but I think that's moreso because I'm not sure how to explain it. So, her music was flat, and generic, and poorly phrased. And that very much fits the pattern of what I've seen with music education. I know damn well she has things to express, but it's like she doesn't have her own voice to say it in. But it seems like the same kind of thing happens with communication. It's like people aren't ever really themselves, they're only ever performing a role they learned from someone else. And when understanding me, they shoehorn whatever I'm saying into one of those roles. That's where things fell apart. I was desperate to get past that, and I felt like it was my fault for not being able to figure it out. And if she were really the angel I believed she was, she would have seen that something was terribly wrong from the very beginning.
And I really don't know what to think about that. My impression is that people must be messed up in much the same way I was. That really there are wonderful, beautiful people buried in there that can't get out or don't feel safe. And sort of like problems in my household, it's not that the things that bother me aren't problems for others too, it's just that I'm the one who notices. But if they're in there, I've never been able to find them. Though some people seem quite nice so long as I don't look too closely.
0 notes
Last Seen Blogs
crossfit-effingham
CrossFit Effingham
magicalmantislanoha
Lanoha's Randomness
joanjoaqin
{ joan joaqin cafe }
byyeyolives-blog
JuanElCiego
lepos147
LEPOS