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writingquestionsanswered · 3 years

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Tattoo Shop AU - a quick, practical guide for writers

Guest Post by lebanon-hangover

lebanon-hangover said: this is based on my personal experience with the industry only, so depending on the era and country you are portraying, it may not be 100% accurate for your setting.

Hygiene

It may not be obvious at first glance, but most tattooists are clean freaks. We work with human blood every day, and we get clients from all ages, ethnic and social economic backgrounds, with all sorts of medical conditions.

We usually mop frequently, bleach the sinks, wipe down everything, and use cling film or bags to wrap everything. I mean fucking everything. We also scrub in, and sanitise the area on the person we work on.

Needles are collected in a sharps bin, and handled very carefully. Medical waste goes in yellow bags, and both are collected by a professional service.

Used ink caps may look full, but the ink gets diluted by blood. Like you dip the inky needle into the person, but you also dip the person’s blood into your ink. These are medical waste too.

Cleaning up must be done promptly after the session. Bin everything disposable, put things through the ultrasonic and the autoclave, and sanitise the area. We may take machines apart, but more for maintenance than cleaning, sometimes we swap parts in them too.

We have two sinks, one for hand washing, one for cleaning.

All inks and needles have use by dates.

The internal dynamics of a studio

Depending on the country, some tattoo shops tend to have ties to biker gangs, and some of those internal dynamics and unwritten rules are often present.

There’s a pecking order and it’s dead serious. Basically the longer you’ve been in a shop, the higher ‘rank’ you are, you get the better positioned stations, first pick of walk-ins, etc (Unless the client is asking for someone by name). Regardless of your actual experience in the industry, like if you move into your old apprentice’s shop, they are still senior to you. If the owner or their partner is an artist, obviously they are on top of the chain by default.

We are self employed, but we have a boss. You are only making money if you are working, but you still have set work hours.

We get paid by the clients, and we pay the studio a cut. In return, there are some items provided by them, and some we buy for ourselves. Usually the chairs, tattoo beds, gloves, cleaning products, clip cord covers, masks, aprons, ink caps, vaseline, green soap, and some basic ink is provided by the shop. We buy our own machines, arm rests, stations, pedals, power supplies, clipcords, tips and grips, needles, special colours, stencil fluid…these are a personal preference, and often depend on the artists’ style.

We totally ask to try out each other’s equipment sometimes, or ask for a certain type of needle if we ran out.

The receptionist is usually just one of us, maybe a piercer, but it also can be a hired person in top studios.

The apprentice in the traditional system is often mistreated, and they have to pay for their education, have to be there multiple days a week and don’t make any money. It’s kind of like a tear them down, build them back up again thing to see if they are really serious about the job. Times are slowly changing, but 99% of them will always need a second job. Most of them are working as bar staff.

When you open a new studio, you must visit all the existing local ones and introduce yourself, otherwise you may get a brick through the window. Otherwise there’s not much beef among individual artists, they are often friends, go to conventions together and party after, etc.

The Artists

Tattooing is a fairly physical job, stretching skin is very important. We have to also keep our clients safely still, so we often use positions to pin them down a bit. Sometimes you hit a reflex point on the foot or under a knee, and you don’t want to get kicked. Sometimes you have to pull away super fast, cos they are sneezing, yawning or giggling.

Most tattooists drink a lot of coffee, tea or energy drinks.

Some people are all rounders, some have specific styles, but we recognise each other’s art styles. Sometimes we delegate work to each other, if we think our coworkers style fits the concept better. For example if there’s a person who does script well, we give them those projects.

We don’t like when people come in with designs from other artists. Art theft is frowned upon, and we work best with our own drawings.

Most apprentices practice on their own legs, and sometimes we tattoo each other when it’s quiet. Most people have cover ups, or bad pieces from their early days. The artists’ own tattoos sometimes are in a different style than what they do, but we like to collect ink from friends or colleagues we admire.

In the first 1-2 years one is an apprentice, then junior artist. At 5-8 years of tattooing, you have earned your stripes and are considered an experienced artist.

Conventions are really fun, but can be stressful. You can make good money working at one, and sometimes get awarded for it too. We can also spend a lot at a convention.

Sometimes we poke our fingers by accident, and it’s a scary thing. Good case scenario is just some random dots on your fingers. Let’s not go into the bad case scenario.

We do guest spots sometimes, just to meet new clients, and change it up a bit.

We spend a lot of time drawing up things, and designs are meant to fall on specific muscles, stretch with the skin a certain way, so they are tailored to the body proportions of the client. A good tattoo is also an optical illusion, complimenting the body shape.

Social media presence is like a second job, you need good photos, and you need to market yourself.

Tattoo ink does not wash out, so some stains are inevitable when pouring it out. Those ink bottles get stuck so easily, and we wrestle them a lot. We try to avoid it, but wearing all dark colours is a thing for a reason.

The Clients

Tattooists need to have a good ‘bedside manners’ too. We get nervous or self conscious people, and we are told personal things during long sessions. For example scar coverups and memorial pieces can be very emotional.

We have pretty good poker faces and first aid trainings. People can faint, get shaky, throw up, some have seizures, have b.o., get sweaty, etc the same way as at a blood donation event? It’s no big deal really. We sit them down, give them some water and some sugar, and re-book them if necessary. Most artists keep some wet wipes, mouth wash, deodorant, sweets, maybe even some clean clothes at work, just in case.

If someone comes in with a wild idea for a jobstopper, we would sit down and have a long talk. If they haven’t got many tattoos, we usually try to stir them towards more safe choices, offering them creative ideas. It’s like those jedi mind tricks sometimes.

If someone is undecided, we show them our own hand drawn flash sheets. Once its gone, its gone tho, we don’t use the designs twice.

Pinterest is full of photoshopped fake tattoos, some that won’t even work as real ink. Many people also touch up their work digitally on photos, so some clients have really unrealistic expectations.

We can totally tell if someone is intoxicated or hangover. It thins the blood, and they bleed out the ink, and it’s super annoying. if it’s bad, they will be sent home and rebooked.

Some folks are self conscious about body hair, their size, stretch marks and scars. Chances are, we have seen similar, and we aren’t bothered by it, because it’s work. Surgery scars, scars from accidents, self harm scars, burns, we see it all the time. We shave some really hairy dudes all the time girl, your legs are fine. Seriously. If something makes tattooing you dangerous we will tell you.

Fit, muscular people are harder to tattoo because they are really firm. Its a workout for us.

Everyone gets midnight messages about the aftercare from nervous clients, and drunken booty calls about getting inked right at this second. We have copy paste replies…

We get creeps sometimes. Stalking, weird conversations, tmi info dumps etc.

Other things to include (for fun, or for plot reasons)

We sometimes have those “oh fuck” moments. We all do, but mistakes can be fixed, and we play it cool.

Tattooing takes time. Usually 30 minutes to multiple sessions though years and years.

Healing tattoos takes about 2-4ish weeks, and your characters shouldn’t go roll around in dirt, sunbathe, swim, pick at the scabs. Nasty infections, and messed up tattoos would be the results.

If you have a strong immune system, and you get a lot of work done in one sitting, you may get a brief bit of a temperature. It’s normal, and will go away.

Its a lot easier to get seriously drunk after getting a tattoo. Be careful.

We sometimes draw on each other for practice with our marker pens.

Tattoos are inside the skin, not on top of it. Imagine a low opacity, skin toned layer over the ink, adding to the healed tattoos’ colour. Please stop making your characters skin fully transparent.

Heavy blackwork and palms are done in multiple sessions.

You can’t cover up moles, because if they develop skin cancer, the dermatologist can’t see the signs.

There’s a stereotype about piercers having blacked out sleeves.

Stencil fluid looks just like cum.

You get that annoying itch on your face when you scrubbed in, put on gloves and finally ready to go.

Some artists have a strong preference for coil or rotary machines, and they bicker about it a lot. Coils are louder, more punchy, and more traditional, perfect for lineart. They can be customised, and they last forever. They are also called glorified doorbells by people who prefer rotaries. Rotary machines are smoother, lighter, and often use needles that are pulled back into the cartridges for safety. They are better for shading and delicate line work. Older tattooists often say they are dildo or butt plug shaped, overly delicate and are for “soft millennials” only.

Every artist owns like 5 to 20 machines, and they have specific machine builders they are loyal to.

The “which cable is broken and cutting out” guessing game. Clip cords and pedal cables get worn out easily, and that results in your machine running really jerky.

Walk-in always show up 10 minutes before closing.

We often look quite silly at work. Sleeves rolled up, folks use all sorts of plastic ppe, headlamps, and we tie up our hair. Add couple of purple smears from carbon paper, and we aren’t scary at all.

#writing guide #writing tips #writing advice #writer's guide #writeblr #writing community #writing #writing help #submission

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cargopantsman · 3 years

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Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here

Trigger warnings: All of them, because I am lazy. Also none of this is sensical.

Utter, hyper-caffeinated brain noise.

The problem with the concept of a "sense of self" is it already tries to concretize an amorphous abstract. It makes us want to point at some thing and say "Well... that's me." Whether it is a set of ideals that we try to live by, a set of activities that brings us a sense of joy or fulfillment, or, gods forbid, and entirely different and other person that "completes us."

I've always had an affinity for trickster figures and shapeshifters. The wearers of masks, the truthful liars, the artisans of duality, yada, yada. Since I was a child my first instinct has always been to blend in. If into the background, great, but if need be, if I needed to blend into the social fabric around me, I could do that too. To throw this into the high school backdrop; I wasn't a social butterfly, I was shy as could be, but I got along with the jocks, the goths, the nerds, the art freaks, the band kids, the preps, the whatever. Where ever I was I could fake that I belonged there. I was comfortable drifting in between worlds. (Looking back, I could have caused a lot more chaos with the information I was privy to at the time...[Oh, there's a constant point. I'm good at keeping secrets, keeping confidence. I'll lie my ass off to keep a secret.]) Does any of that really help drive a sense of self though? When your natural instinct is to mirror, to blend, to fade? When your point of pride is walking into a room unnoticed and, even better, leaving a party unseen? Does being a ghost count as an identity?

"Expression of Will" comes to mind... what does that mean? Ok, so some abstract thing is inside of you and you manifest it objectly outwardly. I was an artist. I made images in my head and "kind of" manifest them on paper. Some times people see that paper... I was a writer... images in my head "became" words and some people saw that. I combined them into comics. Some people Saw that. Is that a lasting affect? Maybe the fights I've been into?! That time in 2nd grade someone was picking on a friend and I laid them out... the time in 8th grade someone was picking on me and clocked them down. Or in high school when someone decided to start some rumors and I held them up by their throat in the air until they turned blue? That was an inward thing that manifested outwardly. Nevermind good or bad, but was any of that... me?

Hmm. The beast. The primal... come back to that later.

"Expression of Will," "Expression of Will," "Expression of Will" ... What the fuck even is "Will"? Is this why philosophers get their heads so far up their ass? Is it a desire? The will to live.... living requires eating and the amount of times I forget to even do that... Maybe been looking at the phrase all wrong...

Will to Live (noun) It isn't a thing.

Will (verb) to (preposition) Live (verb)

Why does that sound better?

Desire to Live (noun)

Desire (verb) to (preposition) Live (verb)

Okay, that feels better even, but still... Sense of self, will, desire, expressions thereof. Are these just the aimless desires and wills? The fleeting flights of frivolous fancies festering forlornly in frontal cortices?

The self with the will can direct the desires towards living. "Get in the fucking robot Shinji!" "I don't wanna"

The (ghost) with the (strength) can direct the (impulses) towards (being). Getting too close to a concept of a soul on that one huh?

Forget self. It's a useless moniker right now. There is no self. It's just this mind alone for the first time in its entire life. (Not alone alone, there are friends, but they've learned more about me in the past two weeks than the past 6 years so...) "What did they learn?" asked the projection of self that defines itself by interactions with other.

I thought we were forgetting self.... not an option really. Sentience is a bitch like that. But they've learned I'll put up with a lot of bullshit under the guise of strength and integrity when I should've callously called this whole thing ages ago. That I can shut myself down completely in the interest of bodily-self preservation. (Not Self-self preservation, fuck the English language). What did I sacrifice? What did I shut down?

Everything.

That is less than helpful.

The Beast. Vince. Your Shadow.

My Shadow...

What do you desire?

Blood in the cut, tears in their eyes, power over someone that wants that power over them...

Do you want that? I don't want it, I just need it. No... I want it.

Is that all you are? A sadist? An animal?

Maybe... probably not though. A caretaker, and a sparring partner. A trickster and a shapeshifter. A crafter whose tools are destruction.

Next problem, grandeur. Mythologizing everything. But how to see a thing if you don't blow it up/magnify it?

You lack a sense of self because no one ever tested your sense of self. No one actually fought you for who you are. To find out who you are. The ex didn't. An old friend did until she got scared by what she found there.

You don't want to be yourself because it's not nice is it? You were raised to be nice.

College. I controlled the group. Never hit anyone after high school aside from set matches in classes or sparring for funsies. They all saw my eyes and stopped if they were getting out of hand.

The Dom-Friend.

Don't use the d-word on me.

Destroyer? Yeah, that one's fine. That one fits. He says as he carelessly tosses lit matches around his entire life. Can we bring up the phoenix or is that too grandiose? Why shouldn't it be grandiose? We spend every day of our lives going through the same kind of tedious bullshit all the time why not make our inner lives a bit bigger, a bit richer?

A bit darker.

Why do you want them to bleed? Hurt and comfort. That's a big theme, a trope if you will. Why not have both at the same? Why not let her think that I'm about to kill her but let her rest in the trust that I won't? Why not let me think that I'm about to break her while believing she is the most precious thing in the world?

Caretaker. A caretaker kills all the time. Tearing out weeds, uprooting the prized plant to move it to a better place for its growth.

Growth.

The self isn't going to be found just in ones self... not in another either. No, the self has to be found in everything. The things one wants to run to and run from. The soul (oops) is formed by what it crashes into right? The mind recoils from traumas races towards panaceas, why not, if one can, flip the polarity on the two. Bring the darkness screaming into the light so you can see it, bring the light quivering into the darkness so it can loose its terrifying brillance. Balance in all things right?

You're not a very positive person, they say. No... I'm not. It lashes out in bad ways sometimes, sure. Control, control, you must learn control. But being negative isn't bad. Not if you can grow from it. No plant can survive the sun for 24 hours. Trees sleep in the winter. We sleep, we heal, we grow.

Self-Destruction!! That's a fun one... seven fucking months downing a bottle of whisky a night. Whooo boy. Do Not Recommend.

Got a nice stay in the underworld though and trudged up a lot of shit. Now I'm sitting here with my ears ringing because I finally hit the personal limit on Monsters and my brain is overclocked enough I can finally see shit at 4 angles at the same time. I am a god damned quantum supercomputer of emotions right now.

Faith and faithlessness are the same thing. Have faith, trust the future, don't expect anything, don't plan your now for your future. Sounds sadly like live in the moment type bullshit, but life is weird and people are complex. Shifting drifting clueless animals that want to be safe but don't want to get stuck in anothers arms even when there is one whose arms are so safe.

The damage runs deep... and two people with damage running that deep. Hmm. How much healing can falling do? The other just puts a bandage over a puncture wound and both try to ignore it, but then the blood gets pumping, the heart pounds and poisons surge to the surface. It's neither one's fault really. Life is a trial of knives and we don't always have time or concern to tend the wounds properly. There's always something else that needs to be taken care of first.

Divorce is a helluva drug. It is maddening, the freedom to finally to be yourself is line having the lineart stripped off, there is a terrifying infinity in front of you and the only thing to do for awhile is melt. Let the slings and arrows just pierce and sink in. Anyone else tries to push the sludge of you into a shape might get hurt when they find the arrows. I want to go absolutely feral in a way. In a way the whole COVID mess is keeping me under lock and key so I'm just prowling around the empty house like I always have been, but now there's some sense... of purpose.

I'm raging against any depression, the executive dysfunction is going to have a talking to. The sense of self is going to be found in stripping this house down to bare walls and making a blank canvas. Bring everything down, ruin it all, start again.

My self is emptiness, it always has been. I can be anything, but I should be wary of ever wanting to be something. (My career options are AWESOME). But this is a different emptiness than before. Before I pulled the trigger and splattered the brains of the marriage across the floor I was just a void, and inky black pit of nothingness. Somehow, having the Shadow rise up and finally start getting along with the rest of me, the emptiness isn't.... void. It's just nascent possibility and that shouldn't scare me.

It does, of course, terrify me. First time in 40 years being legitimately alone is terrifying, should have done this kinda thing when I was 20, but... I was an idiot back then (60 year old me laughs from the future). But I think I can get a grip on the concept that "I" don't exist, but I'm real... ever changing ever dynamic, not who I was while I was married, but a mix of the me before, a angry beast now, and something yet unseen in the future.

#personal bs #vince rising #dan falling #don't try this at home kids

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the-odd-job · 3 years

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What is your step by step drawing process like, if you don't mind my asking?

I'll just use Sunstealer as an example since he's the most recent thing I did. Under the cut because this is horridly long. You wanted step by step, I’ll give you step by step.

That is a threat.

And every step of the way I use a sharp pen with high pressure sensitivity and a sharp eraser with high pressure sensitivity, unless stated otherwise.

1. Alright, sketch first of all. I pick a whatever color, set a folder to multiply, and add layers in it. I start with the face/helm and take moderate care with making it look decent.

2. From there I sketch the rest of the the pic, preferably very loosely. I aim to not lift the stylus from the pad very much and instead just SCRIBBLE lines into the vague shape I'm after.

3. Set the sketch folder’s opacity real damn low, like somewhere under 10%, create a new folder, set it to multiply, and this is where the horrid amount of layers and layer folders I use comes in. But, you can see I actually did a second sketch of the arms (and legs, though that isn’t visible here) ‘cause I couldn’t make them look right based on my initial sketch.

4. On top of my second sketch I draw the rest of the clean lines. The lines were drawn with this purplish color, btw. I use something akin to it pretty often in my lineart.

5. After all that I use the Auto Select tool to select everything outside my lineart, e.g. everything I don’t want to have color. I then invert the selection and lay down my flats. At this point I used the gold as my base color, but then added separate folders for each following color, clipping them to the gold base layer below. In the case of black, its folder has a whole bunch of layers while I tried to figure out what parts to color black. With layers for the different parts, I can just click them on and off to see what things look like with or without them.

6. Okay, now to the meat of things. I use a correction layer (hue/saturation/luminosity in this case) to change the base gold to a far darker color that I can easily edit later without losing my initial color choice, and create a new layer on top of all my colors, set it on multiply, and in this case used a sort of peachy color to add my first shadows on top of the whole entire picture. At this point the exact colors in use don’t matter one bit, though, as long as you see what you’re doing.

7. I create a second multiply layer on top of the last one, and go over the whole thing again, adding deeper shadows, this time using bright red. But again, color doesn’t matter yet. I like contrast too, so you can see some areas turn almost black.

8. Shinies! We add our first Add (Glow) layer (that can be named differently in other programs, in SAI it was just “Luminosity”). Once again, color doesn’t matter, just as long as you see what you’re doing, but I was working with about the same peach I used on my first multiply layer. And how I add the shines is basically just color the glow over the whole area, then use the eraser in sweeping and circling motions to remove parts of it. I don’t treat each plate/portion separated by lines individually, because then you’ll just end up with mismatched areas that don’t communicate with each other at all and just fight. (Remember to erase the shine from over your shadows too. Auto Selecting the shadows and erasing the glow from the selected area is a good trick.)

9. More shinies! This time we want it to show up as a bit lighter/brighter than our previous shiny. Using a brighter color or higher opacity does the trick. I do the same thing of coloring large areas and erasing shapes out of them afterwards, but this time I make it argue with my first glow layer a bit. Some overlap is good, but I also want them to live their own lives. (I included a view of the second glow layer alone, but I worked with both glow layers visible.)

10. We now have two multiply layers and two glow layers. What we also have, is a base color (gold) and separate folders for every subsequent color (black, face, insignia in this case. And optic, but let’s not touch that yet). We now copy our two multiply layers and two glow layers, and move copies of them into each folder (sans optic) and clip them to the base layer in that folder. We move copies of the multiply and glow layers right over our base layer too, below our other color folders. (I deleted the glow layers from the “face” folder because I don’t want the face to be as shiny, and the multiply layers from the “insignia” folder because there’s actually no shadow over the insignia.) We can make our original multiply and glow layers invisible so they’re not messing things up, and what we should have is... The same exact thing as in step 9. Wow.

11. Now we actually make it look good! Though let’s just color the optic while we’re at it so it’s not all empty. Anyway, this is the stage where we really start to think about color and opacity. I want a neutral lighting to showcase his colors best, so let’s see how we get that. The thing we’ll just do is use Tonal Correction > Hue/Saturation/Luminosity to change our multiply and glow layers one by one, starting from our first multiply layer. I turn the other multiply and glow layers off so I can see what I’m doing and and tweak the colors until I get something that doesn’t scream “interesting lighting”, because I want neutral lighting.

12. Then I go through all of the layers one by one and do the same thing to each of them. The reason I have them each on separate layers is exactly this, that I can affect all of the drawing’s colors individually and make them look just as I want to and always have the option of just going back and easily editing things. I also add a glow layer to the face, but with a brush rather than a pen so I get a softer look, buuut then add a second glow layer with a low opacity to add just a little bit of sharp light in there. And now we have a thing! But it looks pretty flat, doesn’t it? We don’t want that.

13. First of all, let’s add some soft glow to the gold. New glow layer below our multiply and other glow layers, choosing a soft color to accentuate the gold, and then using either a brush or airbrush we add just a bit of color in there. Arrows point to the spots where I added it, because we want the effect to be subtle and easy to miss.

14. We can do better than that, though. Let’s add a multiply layer and do the same thing, adding juuuust hints of darker color here and there. It adds a touch more depth, but again, we want it to be easy to miss.

15. Let’s have a look at the black, next. You may have noticed I turned off the second glow layer on it entirely, and that’s because it was decided that the black shouldn’t be as shiny as the gold. We still want to add some life to it though, and because Sunstealer’s black tints towards blue, let’s make some blue happen by adding a glow layer, and again, very softly with a brush or airbrush, add just hints of color in there.

16. It still doesn’t really good though, does it? It’s pretty boring and lifeless despite our efforts. More layers, then! Some fucking edges, this time. A glow layer above all of our existing layers and folders to affect all of them (except optic, ‘cause optic doesn’t need it), take good ol’ bright white, turn the opacity down a bit, and add sharp light to the edges. Like, all the edges that are touched by light. Seams, everything. We want this motherfucker to shine.

17. Okay, now do the same, except this time on the shadows. The layer is on lower opacity and I didn’t use white but desaturated blue instead. Just add a bit of reflected light in there.

18. Slowly getting there, but let’s do a couple more things. First of all, warm color. Basically, I just like to slap a random color on top of the whole damn thing when I’m finishing a drawing, using either a color, a glow, or a normal layer, depending which one gets me the best results that time. Or, all three, if that’s what I feel like. This time I used a color layer with briiiiiight neon orange. I switched the layer to normal and opacity to 100% so you can see where it’s actually applied, which is, again, on top of all the layers. A pretty large area, but even on 100% opacity with a normal layer you can see it’s pretty transparent. If I had wanted to do a more interesting lighting, I would’ve left it more visible and maybe added another similar layer in a different color, but I wanted neutral lighting so we leave it as just a tiny, tiny hint in there.

19. Still not done. Colors reflect other colors, so let’s make that happen on the black and have it reflect our gold some.

20. Almost there. What are we missing? Color correction, that’s what. I didn’t do much of it for this piece, but with some I really play around with correction layers and layers set to overlay and whatnot. But let’s see what we have here. First of all, there’s one brightness/contrast correction layer affecting the gold only, increasing the contrast so things look a bit brighter.

21. There’s also a second brightness/contrast correction layer, this one simply increasing the brightness a bit. It’s mostly for the sake of the black, because I wanted to make it look a bit more blue by making it lighter, but it worked to make the whole image a little brighter along with it. Aside from the optic, that’s still on top of everything else. But like said, how many corrective layers I have going on depends entirely on what I’m doing. In some cases I can have around a dozen in effect, not all of them always affecting the entire image, but split around to do their thing on different layers.

22. But speaking of the optic! It glows, so let’s make it glow with two layers on top of both of the “color” and “lines” folders. One layer is for the blurred red glow, the second is for the sharply reflected light.

23. And for things like these I like a simple background, which I generally do by just using a couple of gradients and altering their color to whatever looks decent. I also often add an outline to the entire character in pieces like this to make the character pop a bit more, by just copying my base color layer and performing gaussian blur on it.

WHEEZE. That’s that, though. Finished product can be viewed here.

Oh, and ctrl+shift and tap will jump you straight to the layer you tapped on. Makes moving between layers and finding the damn layer you wanted to edit a hell of a lot easier.

Annnnnd obsessively naming layers and layer folders so you can tell what the heck they actually are when you have way, way many layers to work with.

*thumbs up*

#asks #anonymous #is that step by step enough #i might've forgotten to mention some layers because there is A Bunch even just for the colors #but i tried to be thorough #but yeah non destructive editing and editability #that's how we get to some overachieving layer counts but make sure we can always go back and always have control

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jabbers-artsy-hoard · 3 years

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All right, ladies and gents and non-binary friends! The fact of the matter is, I’m currently struggling to make ends meet. I’m not going to lie about that. I have no job, no money currently coming in at all. At least not from my end. I’m not going to let it keep me down, but I am going to look to you guys, to the people of Tumblr, for a little help while I try to get my life in order.

So I am opening up some fairly limited commissions. And by limited, I don’t mean ‘limited time offer’ or that I’m going to limit how many commissions I take. No, nothing like that. Instead, it’s going to be limited to what I know I can do well right now, and may open up for other things later. That being said, let’s get started!

Have you ever wondered what your muse would look like, if they were a dragon in the Spyro universe? Or maybe you’ve wondered what you would be like if you lived in the Dragon Realms. Well, wonder no more, friends! Because that is exactly the kind of commissions I am offering you! It’s been a lot of fun for me to try to translate other characters into Spyro-verse dragons. Typically they’ve been humans to dragons so far, but I’m willing to do absolutely any kind of muse! Animal or alien or humanoid, throw them at me!

So yeah. I’m starting with Spyro-verse dragon/dragonsona commissions, since it’s the easiest for me to do right now, and they’re the ones I can get done quickest for the time being. My computer has been buggy lately, so while normally I would offer other options such as icons or rp graphics, I can’t include those at this time. Even if I do have a couple icon commissions that have been unfinished for months.. But anyway! Without further ado, let’s talk prices!

All right, so I am offering these commissions in a few different ways, but I’m not going to put the prices too high for now, because.. well, I need to get people to start buying first. So, I’ll start low and maybe move up as popularity grows, I dunno. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Anyway! Commission types and their related prices are as follows.

Basic Sketch - $10 (+ $5 for any additional characters, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example:

Inked - $15 (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example:

Inked & Shaded - $18 (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example:

Inked & Digitally Colored - $20-$30, depending on complexity (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories, please allow up to two weeks for coloring, I have limited resources)

Example: Currently N/A

Full Scene, plain sketch - $30-$40, depending on complexity, usually features up to three characters in the base price (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example: Currently N/A

Full Scene, inked lineart - $35-$45, depending on complexity, usually features up to three characters in the base price (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example: Currently N/A

Full Scene, inked & shaded - $38-$48, depending on complexity, usually features up to three characters in the base price (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories)

Example: Currently N/A

Full Scene, inked & digitally colored - $40-$50, depending on complexity, usually features up to three characters in the base price (+ $5 for each additional character, + $1 for large weapons or accessories, please allow up to one month for coloring, I have limited resources)

Example: Currently N/A

Expression Sheet - $20, comes in a basic set of six, can be ordered in multiple sets, each additional set costs $10 if bought in a single order

Example: Currently N/A

Now, I am also offering something in addition to just making the drawings themselves. Each commission, when finished, will be gifted to the commissioner free of charge, and in physical form. Yes, that’s right. Because I am going to be doing these commissions by hand and on physical paper, once they’re finished, I am going to ask you guys for an address that I can mail them to.

Now, I’m not asking you to give me your home address necessarily, unless that’s the only place you can receive mail, but if you have a P.O. box address I can send your commissions to, then that’s what I’ll be asking for. And actually, I should mention that this isn’t required. It’s just an added bonus if you would like the physical copy of the original work. But you don’t have to take it if you’re not comfortable giving me an address. I can also keep the physical copy, safely tucked away in a file of my work.

This might not include digitally colored commissions, but there is a possibility if I am able to access a place to print them. I do have somewhat limited resources, but I am always happy to give you guys the actual artwork that you pay for, and you don’t have to pay shipping fees. That’s the gifting part of the deal. All you’re paying for is the process, the time, and the artwork itself. Even if you don’t want to have it in person.

And that being said!!

Oh, but.. Wait. Just one more thing.

If you are under 18+, do not read below the cut. Any requests for these extra offers by anyone under 18 will be denied.

I am also willing to accept nsfw commissions. Yes, that’s right, folks. Considering that I myself am 30+ years old, I do not mind the occasional ‘adult content’ commissions. These commissions can include:

Nudity

Sex

Gore

Vore

Horror

or any other type of content that would be considered nsfw. But again, these are commissions for your Spyro-verse muse. Only for dragons this time. But if all goes well in this first round of commissions, I may open this up for other types of muses as well. And, if you really want, I will also offer self-insert nsfw commissions. I do not judge, and I do not refuse any ship or muse or self-insert content.

Unless you are underage. Which, I have no doubt that the under 18s got curious and read all of this too, so I will remind you guys that I will be asking for the ages of any of these nsfw commissioners, and I expect honest answers. Especially since I will be going through a three-day long protocol list for these commissions to ensure that I am not accidentally selling p*rn or other such nsfw content to minors.

And for those adults who get subjected to this three-day process, I am honestly very sorry to make this seem a bit inconvenient, but I’m sure you all understand that I am doing my best to protect the younger folks. I want to be careful, and I want to do right by the youth of today. But that being said, I also will be doing what I can to ensure that an adult isn’t buying a nsfw commission for someone under 18+.

I am treating this with the same level of caution and dedication, as if I were selling alcohol in a grocery store, which I have read up on the laws for, actually fairly extensively, so I do know how to manage this. I’m sorry to those inconvenienced by this, but if you’re really getting inconvenienced by an artist taking the necessary precautions to protect any minors, then perhaps you shouldn’t commission me for something nsfw. Just something to think about.

#art commissions #commission info #;; the jabberwock makes art (commission info)#i hope you guys consider commissioning me!#i look forward to working with you!

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misdre · 3 years

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i wrote down some art-related thoughts and tips, inspired by people i follow who occasionally say the sort of things that they wish they were better at drawing but don't really know where to go with it, not like i'm much of an authority or anything and nobody's asked my opinion but, if this is helpful for someone out there, then it's worth writing!

- examine other people's art, especially those that you like, and study which things you actually like about it. you shouldn't directly copy someone else's art, but what you can do is take inspiration or study the details that you enjoy and adapt them into your own style. for practice it's fine to copy someone else, but if you post the final piece, you should mention whose art you referenced in it. also, do the same with art that you find yourself not particularly liking! think about the things that don't make it very good in your opinion and see if you can learn something from that. if you don't like your own art, you can even study what makes it disappointing to yourself. process it a little instead of just going "wow i suck at drawing" and moving on, even if it feels difficult.

- also related to the above: widen your view of how art can be done in the first place, and if you find that you're always drawing one and the same thing, maybe try something different every once in a while. and by this i don't really mean the actual subject matter but small things like, do you always use a black lineart brush? try using colours instead. do you reference fanart from official art? try making your own version instead or reference the style of some other series, go a little crazy with it. do you have a particular style of drawing eyes, or faces in general? play around with shapes and see how it turns out, go more realistic or more cartoony. i sometimes draw noses on characters and sometimes i don't, just kind of depending how it looks like to myself, and i don't draw nostrils because i don't really like the look of two holes in the face. you don't have to stick to just one "truth" with art. (of course it's totally fine to want to draw realistic humans and not the kind of anime stuff i personally do, these are just examples from me and you should focus on the things you like yourself)

- pay attention to shapes, and the fact that sometimes simple is better than adding too much detail. or if you like adding tons of details, then it may be better for the base drawing (e.g. the character under all that detail) to be extremely simple in contrast so that it doesn't look too busy for the eye. when i draw faces, i only really put details in the eyes because i like pretty eyes a lot but leave the rest of the face very simple, which makes the eyes stand out more. again, you don’t need to do that, but it’s something to think about when doing art. there are so many details to every single thing ever and it’s generally better to choose which ones you want to emphasise in art.

- a thing i see relatively often is that people draw in black and white, maybe with pencil on paper, and then lament that their art doesn’t get enough attention. the thing is, making b&w art interesting is much harder than giving it personality with colour, because it won't catch people's eye the same way. to me personally, an artist's use of colour is one of the things that draws me into their stuff (actually even the main thing in most cases), so while black&white art can be really beautiful as well and it's totally fine to want to pursue a b&w art style, i'd still encourage people to learn to use colours. it's much easier to give your drawings character with colours, and if you honestly want more attention (which is a valid thing to want), then i'd especially encourage it. it takes more time, so you may need to get used to the fact that finishing a fairly simple drawing can take 8 hours instead of one, though. at least if you're a slow ass person like me

- and as an addition to the former, there are so many different ways to use colour, so don't limit yourself by thinking there's only one way. you can even make art that's primarily black&white but add an accent colour or two in there and it already changes the feeling of the image completely (i do this sometimes and like that style a lot). or you can have a style that only includes flat colours and no shading or anything at all, you don't need to become a master painter with realistic shadows everywhere if you don’t want to. (if you do want to, then my best advice would be to study photos and paint using them as reference.)

- if you find yourself going, "this artist's colours are so good! i wish mine were like this!" -- why not use similar palettes with that artist then? think about what kind of colours you like and what kind of mood you want to convey in your drawing, bright hues will look completely different from darker or duller ones, blues will look cold and reds warm, some colours pop out more when placed next to another. don’t shade with grey or a darker hue of the exact same colour to make it look more interesting. look up palette websites, or study the colour wheel and pick colours from the opposite or adjacent sides for ideas of colours that go well together. this is the stuff that a lot of tutorials mean by colour theory, and it's not rocket science but actually rather simple when you take a look at the colour wheel. if you don't like how the colours turn out, play around with the hue, saturation, brightness and contrast settings all you want. most of the actual magic you see in a lot of digital art is adding layers with a multiply, overlay etc setting on top, so find those in your drawing software and go crazy with it. (they take a while to learn to use, i have plenty of drawings where i've used them badly, but that's just how learning anything is)

- youtube is full of videos of people doing complete drawings from sketch to finish. they can be a bit much for beginners (sometimes for me as well tbh) but give a good idea of the overall process of creating a full-colour illustration and what phases go into it. to me it's crazy that there's artists who put in the colours first and then do a lineart on top but that's just one simple example of how there's not just one way of doing art.

and just one practical thing that goes into doing digital art, you'll find that there are a million different brushes everywhere and every artist seems to have a “brush set” for different things and you’re supposed to know how to pick which to use yourself. if it's any consolation, i use exactly one (1) brush ever on clip studio paint and draw every single thing with just that one brush. because fuck that noise i don't care

#really just my number one tip is looking at art you like #and if you're like #i wish i was drawing like this person instead of how i draw!#then start drawing more like that person #there's no art police that comes to your door like sir you drew differently from before

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quaranmine · 3 years

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I started a short wip comic of Grian last night :)

I probably shouldn't even say that since I have a bad tendency to not finish things BUT it is paneled out and sketched and like one bit of the lineart is done so maybe soon??? It's been a while since I did art and I wanna do hermit art

#i also have a wip of x that i was gonna do to test out the speedpaint feature #but now idk if i want to post that speedpaint because i struggled with the anatomy for an embarrassingly long time #SIMPLE anatomy. and i lowkey dont like the piece. but im gonna keep messing with it!#quara blog tag

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batfossil-fr · 4 years

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I wonder, what would you say is the best way to start doing skins/accents? I kind of wanna do some but I don't want to waste a bunch of gems I already don't have for nothing

hmmmmm! I think the best way, if you’ve never done them before, is try playing around with the templates FR gives you. that way you can learn how the lineart/shadow rules work and you can see what shows up best on dragons - because visibility is actually a pretty big factor when it comes to accents (too many visible lines/shadows can make it look transparent). the lines/shadows are always a pain to work with, so it’s best to learn how to work around them before you try more complicated stuff. maybe try making a mockup accent for one of your dragons and play around with how it would look if you submitted it. if you think it would help, I can include some pictures of how I organize my layers / how my whole process goes (I use SAI, but it should be similar enough in photoshop or other programs).

if you’re looking to get a lot of prints out, you can absolutely try paying attention to certain breeds or themes to work with. you don’t have to stick with this though, a lot of people will like anything you put out there and you shouldn’t restrict yourself to make only what you think will be popular. it’s a lot more fun to do what you want.

as for the gems concern, one thing you can do is take preorders! that way you don’t have to spend your own gems on an accent beforehand. for preorders, people pay you before you submit the accent (I do 10 runs of everything at a time. a 10-copy print costs 2500G, so if 5 people pay me, I have enough to send it to print, and 5 people left over means I get 2500G for myself).

never take it too hard if you’re struggling to get enough people interested to print, though! interest is not representative of your ability. keep making things that you like, and eventually you’ll get your foot in the door so you can make some more neat stuff.

#wall of text but thats just how I be #hope this helps I am bad at explaining things but if you have any more questions I'd be happy to answer #or anyone else ^#asks #I myself still feel like I struggle with the visibility issue sometimes so it's a tricky thing to master #that or like... the weight of lineart and such #lots of trial and error

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unluckyxse7enart · 4 years

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Who wants a basic “art tip” tutorial?

It’s for what you can do if you accidentally line over your sketch layer and you prefer keeping your clean lines separate, if you’re interested. Please note I’m kind of lackadaisical about my art quality sometimes so this is by no means a total miracle worker, but it’ll get the job done without you having to redraw the whole thing!

This tutorial is done with FireAlpaca so results may vary but I think since FireAlpaca is a fairly basic program you shouldn’t have too much trouble replicating the results in any other program with a decent selection tool, and maybe the clipping ability depending?

I didn’t screenshot these until halfway through, so the rough draft lines had already been erased where I could because the actual ‘lineart’ layer was already done the rest of the way. If you’re concerned about keeping the rough draft just duplicate the layer before following these steps! here goes!

SO YOU JUST DISCOVERED YOU LINED ON YOUR ROUGH SKETCH LAYER!! WHAT NEXT?

Step 1. Adjust your selection tool settings depending on the color difference between the lines! In my tool, I just left it at ‘1′ for “Tolerance” which is the lowest sensitivity, but if you have less solid clean lines or parts where it fades you may need to experiment!

Step 2. Select your intended clean lines! I’d recommend making sure they’re all connected to make this part quicker.

Step 3. Invert your selection! You can do so on FireAlpaca under the following dropdown menu:

Step 4. Once that’s done, go to ‘edit’ and “cut” the newly selected areas! This should clear the majority of the rough lines, save maybe a few edges depending on your selection sensitivity.

Just deselect everything and you’re ready to merge your two layers together to get that clean lineart!

Bonus: Got some rough edges that are obvious when you add colors?

If you have black lines, then just set your layer to “multiply”!

Orrrrr

If you have colored lines like I did for this piece, leave the layer at its normal settings. Add a ‘clipping’ layer that will only affect the lines...

...And color away! Depending on your image size the edges may look a tiny bit crunchy but are far less noticeable than before!

Hope this helps, I’m not an art program expert by any means but if there’s questions feel free to send them my way and I’ll see what I can do!

#long post #digital art tutorial #i guess?#art tips #digital art tips #firealpaca

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shiroinekosart · 4 years

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Here the Darkrai! It’s over, how nice 😭

And now I start with a VERY CUTE drawing: an “art trade” with an amazing artist, you can find him on instagram, he’s called “norbhood”. If you are an One Piece fan you must immediately go and follow him, with a simple pencil he does magic, I love the expressions of his characters! Obviously he wants a surprise so I don’t know if I will post the progress of the drawing or not, even if he shouldn’t have tumblr… I have to create a cute way to publish it 🤔 In reality he’s a lightning and the drawing for me has already done and completed… I have only done the lineart.

YEAH.

Maybe I’m too slow for these things. He gave me 4 pokemon to choose from and I opted for one TOO adorable. YES, IT’S A NEW ONE.

After this little special commission I am undecided about what to do, I saw the new pokemon cards and I’m like “interesting 😏”, but if you have ideas I will take them into consideration! But not a black pokemon please, I’m sick of black xD

I MISS 3 POKEMON AND I FINISHED THE POKEDEX IN SHIELD. YES. YES. YES.

It’s a big Darkrai~

#pokemon #pokemon sinnoh #pokemon darkrai #darkrai #sinnoh #pokemono art #galaxy art #colored pencils #traditional art #shiroi neko's art #shiroi neko #nintendo #nintendo switch #switch #game freak #niantic #pokemon go #artist on tumblr #pokemon galaxy

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callsignbaphomet · 4 years

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I can’t give out any proper art/writing advice or tutorials or whathaveyous but the one thing I can say with certainty is when you post art in whatever site you post art in do not under any circumstances add any negative comments about it, yourself or your work.

Do not. Not on the post, not in the tags, no, not even in the title. DO NOT DO THIS. STOP DOING THIS.

There are hundreds of reasons why you shouldn’t do this but I’m only covering one specific reason here. Why not? Because it’ll help you in the long run. Instead just add whatever text you wanna add to it that pertains to the work, maybe an explanation, say it’s fanart of your favorite thing/character/whatever/artist/friend. If you were practicing something or trying to experiment go ahead and type it up.

It takes a while to get the hang of this as talking shit about your work and abilities is sooooo easy--let’s face it, you’re your own easiest target to bully, and in a very strange way it makes a lot of us feel better and without even thinking it through we just do it automatically but trust me that “good” feeling doesn’t last and it does far more harm than good.

If you absolutely hated how your shading came out or how your color scheme looked or anything else that bothered you and you just have to rant about it then do it on a separate post. Hell, I’d even go so far as to say don’t say “Aw, fuck, I hate how that lineart came out!” Instead try typing “Aw, fuck, I should work on my lineart!”

Eventually you stop talking shit about your work and abilities and instead look at it in a whole new way. You start to think of the things you hate as things that could use some improvement and eventually you start to zero in on that thing and improve little by little.

When you say “shit this paragraph is bad and my writing sucks” when you post your work your closest friends and supporters will automatically tell you that it’s great and that you’re doing a great job and you get that feeling of reassurance and validation for 5.2 seconds and then it’s gone and you feel shitty again and the cycle continues. Meanwhile you don’t bother to improve, you feel like shit when you draw or write or create something and you stay stagnant and go nowhere. Talking shit gets nothing done.

Hell, go ahead and say what you liked about your work! Say how proud you are that you managed to try a new technique and it worked! Say this is the best (insert media) you’ve done to date and revel in that pride! Enjoy your hard work!

No, fool, it ain’t cringey, it ain’t making you sound stuck up or anything like that. It’s not like you’re saying you’re a master artist/author and that the world should suck your dick. You’re saying you’re proud of your work and you should be!

Yeah, this takes a bit to get used to and sometimes you’ll slip. That’s ok, just go back and edit the post to remove anything negative from it. If you rant and vent on a separate post it’s ok too but try to lessen it and keep it at a minimum and also try not to post art and then rant about it as soon as you hit the send button. You’ll never get out of that mentality that way.

Also please stop comparing your work to others. This is really a killer and it helps no one. If you have to go ahead and stop following artists you find yourself comparing to. Make it easier on you to relax; it ain’t a race. If you feel like your art gets more attention in specific sites then by all means go and post there, validation leads to motivation and yes, dammit it feels amazing! Go ahead. Check to see which tags get the most traffic in each site and use them. Ngl Twitter is not artist friendly unless you’re like extremely popular. Tagging system is...odd. Or maybe I’m just having seriously bad luck lol

And at the risk of sounding like a bitch don’t just sit there and beg for notes, likes, retweets, reblogs, asks, comments and validation and not give any in return. You come off like a greedy asshole. Right off the bat Ima say that only likes (Tumblr, Twitter and similar sites) are a waste of everyone’s time. Better if you just don’t like it if you aren’t gonna bother to retweet it or reblog it, this ain’t YouTube, likes do NOTHING. Maybe when you reblogged someone’s art/writing/work they went to your blog and see your work and also reblog it. Maybe they liked it so much they follow and they keysmash in the tags about how much they like it. You know, give and take.

This got a lot longer than what I had in mind but it’s just several thoughts on a tweet I saw sometime ago and it was still in my mind.

#werewolf howls at dusk #ja sure you can rb but this ain't to call out anyone or to invite anyone to act like an asswipe

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ca-3 · 5 years

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Hey hey!!.... do a coloring tutorial!!!.... Please?.. :3

Me knowing I’m terrible at explaining things and that I’m still learning how to hecking color too:

BUT SURE I WILL TRY MY BEST TO SHOW YOU WHAT I DO CURRENTLY. Cause it does really vary between each random drawing:

The way I color is weird sometimes cause I’m always trying a slightly different method??? and I’ve only recently started trying it this way. This will be a slightly watered down version of how I do things tho….

I’m going to draw something quick for this but hopefully it’ll get my point across kfjsalfjlsa

(picked Sakuya for this cause I can easily draw him pretty quick lol)

anyways yeah make your lineart (my own linework is usually a bit more “open-lined?” and has small imperfections that I usually correct bit by bit as I go along. Or you can do it before you start coloring. To me there is no wrong or right way to go about it I think? Do whatever is easier for you! Cause remember everyone does art differently!

1.) I like to keep all my things separate 90% of the time and before I start coloring I put all my color layers in a folder and add a “clipping group” layer to it:

to save time and if you need a more in depth explanation on how this works… here’s the video I watched to help me figure out how to do this. Really does help make coloring easier! (well for me at least I hope its useful for you too 😅)

2.) Add all the flat colors you need!

sometimes I like to blend a darker or lighter color into some of my flat colors with the blur tool (I try to keep the brush at a lower density like at 20% to avoid keeping everything getting too blended? If that makes sense.)

Tadaaaaaaaa

3.) I keep most of my layers pretty separate so it’ll be easier to add clipping group layers once I start the actual shading

You can use whatever skin color palettes you want for this!

the reason I do it like this is so it’ll be easier to blend later like this (I used the airbrush tool or you can use the blur tool again if you want) Again use whatever colors you want to darken or highlight or whatever you’re trying to go for?

Remember to click “preserve opacity” when you do this!!!! it’s next to clipping group!

4.) I don’t do a lot when coloring eyes….it really depends on how detailed I want to be. But since this is meant to be a simpler drawing it usually just looks like this and I use only two colors.

sometimes I’ll add a multiply layer or lumi and shade in there. I’m still learning how to color eyes too haha

5.) I add some shine to the eyes by putting one layer on top of everything else (including the lineart folder)and I preserve the opacity of my lineart and add some color to it (a lot of artist I know do this and when I watch art tip videos they usually recommend this cause it makes it look more lively? They say you shouldn’t really use black lines unless you are going for a graphic novel/comic kind of drawing?

—-GOING TO PUT THE REST UNDER KEEP READING SO THIS DOESN’T GET TOO LONG ON PEOPLES DASHES!!—-

6.) For hair I also do the clipping group thing. I set a lighter color for my flats so I can shade with a darker color later like this:

I ended up mixing another color in there and used the blur at very low density once again to make it a little softer? Remember don’t blend too much! One or two strokes of the brush is really all you need!

Also sometimes I like to add some pink (or any color can work depending on what you want to do) to the hair on of that and blend it in.

Also add some hair shine! (I use a lighter color from the original hair color so you still use it on “normal” setting still)

7.) All that stuff about using clipping group applies for clothes shading too. But instead of leaving it on normal I change it too “Multiply” instead, especially when there are smaller details on same area. It’s for when I want something done a little quicker?

and yeah gives you something like this! Remember when you switch to multiply the original colors when darken automatically so you might need to alter your colors a bit if you want it a little lighter!

also you can add some skin tone to the clothes too and blend it in if you want to continue the soft color effect to it?

done? That’s the basics I guess ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

there’s so many other things I could explain and fix here but I think you get the idea now. ^^ I HOPE SO AT LEAST.

I hope I helped even if just a little bit. I think it would have been better if I made a video instead…. maybe next time with a better drawing!!! 😂

Thanks for asking ❤💌✨

#ca3 asks #mermaibee #mflkaljaslf I wish I made a better drawing now cause the tiny imperfections are killing me now but oh well #sakuya watanuki

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stardewpapaalec · 5 years

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Picture Imperfect

Pairing: Romantic Moxiety

Summary: Virgil draws to cope with his feelings, which could spell trouble when Logan accidentally finds out how he feels about Patton.

A/N: So I posted this a long time ago in four separate parts, but tumblr decided to be garbage and made it invisible on the tag search thingy, and I couldn’t save it. Instead, I decided to wait a while to calm down and repost it all-in-one so people can (hopefully) see it. I’m also tagging the people I tagged before so they know what all’s happening.

Warnings: Big panic attack/disassociation thing at the beginning and a minor one later, text is heavily altered when Virgil’s voice distorts (in case that bothers anyone), two sentences of suicidal thoughts, Patton almost cries a couple times, a single curse word, hot chocolate is mentioned twice, did I miss any?

Words: 3887

Chapter One: A Dark Corner

His fingers clenched the sleeves of his hoodie. They don’t want you. You only hurt them. You bring everyone down. He tried to focus on breathing. No, they care. You’re not the villain anymore. You ruin everything when Thomas is happy. That’s all you’re good for: ruin. He tried to calm down, but nothing worked. Things were shapes, words were sounds, his fingers gripped tighter, but the feeling was just fuzz, it’s not even fuzz the noise isn’t here it’s somewhere else my chest is tight where’s my heartbeat how do I breathe everything’s broken they know they know everyone knows he hates you he hates you you don’t belong here why do you even live anymore it’d be better for everyone if you were just dead

A faded voice tried talking to him. Odd-but-familiar shapes reached for him, a distant embrace that he didn’t know if he welcomed or rejected. He sensed a rhythmic motion; the only stabilizer he had to count his breaths.

In, 2, 3, out, 2, 3, count in head, stay in tune, chest is loose, steady now, breathing deeper, hold them closer, let them help you, you’re not alone, you are wanted here, do not worry now, it’s all coming back, shapes becoming things, these are someone’s arms, these are Patton’s arms?

Breathe. The world pieces back together. As he rests his head on Patton’s shoulder, he could hear his gentle voice more clearly.

“Are you okay, kiddo? What happened?”

The inevitable question. He opened his mouth to say something, but he closed it and sighed when nothing came out. How could he tell him? What could he tell him, without making things weird again? And the shaking – still shaking, even after he recollected himself.

He took a moment to organize his thoughts just to tell him anything at all, but his voice was still distorted. Doesn’t help that Patton is part of the problem. “I̵ l̵e̷f͢t.͏..so̸me̵thi͏n̸g̴ im͟pór͢t͞a̶nt ̛on̛ the҉ c̷o̧unt́e̸r ̷w͡hen ҉I̶ was ̕i͟n ̷the͏ k̢i̴tche̷n̴. Lo̷gan found̶ ít̷,̸ an͞d.̛..go̶d̸ ͢i̵f Ro͞ma͞n͡ ̵͘͠f̵̀ì͜͢ndş͘ ̀͘o҉͜u̧̕t͝͡,�� ͘̕t̀ò҉̷ó́,͞ he’͡͏l͡͏̨ĺ ͢n͡ev̶҉é̷͟r ş͘h̴u͟t́ ͟u̸͠p̨ ͏àb͝o̵ut̶̡́ ̶̕͜it̨!̵̨͠” The distortion worsened with his anxiety. If Sir-Sing-A-Lot gets ahold of that drawing, he’ll either tell Patton – no, everyone – about Virgil’s biggest secret, or tease him relentlessly about it.

“What was it?”

An even worse – but also inevitable – question. “̸̵͡I͠͏..͞͝.͝͏Į c͡a̴͘ń̸̵’͝҉t ̴̶̡t̸͢e҉͝l͢͡l̴̸͠ ý̡o͝u̸̕.͠ ̧I͘̕͢t̶’̕s̡͘, ̴̧u̢h͟,͏̛͢ ͜pe͡r͡s͡o̵̷̢ń͞a͘l̛̀͠.͘” He wished he could calm down again; his voice in this condition could give him away just as easily as his sketchbook.

“Well, maybe I can talk to Logan about getting it back?” he gently offered. “He probably just thought it was his and hasn’t noticed yet. I don’t think he meant to upset you...”

That proposition could go one of two ways: Patton could get the sketchbook and immediately return it to Virgil without looking through the pages, or anything would happen and he’d find out about the drawings Virgil made to cope with his feelings for him. The latter seemed more likely, and he knew Patton would reject him, anyway. But he couldn’t talk to Logan himself; a million more things could go wrong if he tried. All options were risky. The more time he spent thinking about it, the more he felt trapped into one option.

“.͢..̡fin͡e͏.͘” The distortion was fading. ”Ju͜st- ̛pl͢eas̢e ̛don͞’t ope̵n it, okay?”

“I won’t. You said it’s personal – I don’t wanna invade your privacy.”

“Thanks, Pat.”

Silence fell between them. Virgil’s body slowly loosened, letting him lean further into Patton’s embrace. The warmth inside him swirled around, it’s intensity matching the warmth against his body. He could hear his heart beating; slow and gentle, yet strong and somewhat loud at the same time. It seemed to almost match Patton’s in both pace and power.

He lifted his head to say something to Patton, but his gaze flicked from his beautiful eyes to the dark shadows growing underneath them. A twang fear shot across his heart. “You should get out of herè,҉ P̷a̢ţ. Th̷e̢ ro͢o͟m̸’̨s͢ s̵t̷a͡rtin͞g t̀o ͠c͞o̸rru̕pt̢ you̸.” The distortion started to return, this time from gaining power over Thomas instead of his own anxiety.

“Are you gonna be okay? You can come with me to my room, if you want...”

“I͡ th̡ink ̡I’̨ll͏ b̛e̷ ͟f̷iné. Yo̧u̡ ̧shoul̨d͘ ͠go,̷ ̀t̢ho̵ugh͘.͠ Q͜ui̕c̀ķly.͝”

Patton nodded, squeezing Virgil tighter for a second, then releasing to sink down and away. The silence left behind was strange and heavy. All too familiar for Virgil. He stared at the spot Patton was in, a looming sense of things shutting down without him. Stupid feelings. Stupid room. Stupid Virgil.

Chapter Two: But How Much Do You Know?

The detail is astounding. The anatomy is impeccable. The colors are absolutely stunning! Who knew Virgil could create masterpieces like these? The way they were crafted, the things they express, the mastery of every aspect in each picture – it’s almost inconceivable! Perhaps he could talk him into letting him keep one or two for his room?

He turned the page, careful not to ruin the delicate medium. The picture on the right was much more colorful than the left, but he wanted to keep his consistent left-right-left-right scanning of the pages. Except, the left page was blank. The smudged colors that transferred from the other side attracted his attention, making him falsely believe a picture was there. He looked back to the right, and saw a finished drawing of...Patton and Virgil? No, that’s definitely them. They were watching the sky, Patton leaning against Virgil, who had his arm across Patton’s shoulders. A small heart floated above them, teaching Logan something he didn’t know about-

“Hiya!”

Patton’s sudden appearance almost made him drop Virgil’s book. “E equals MC scared!”

“Oh, sorry, teach! Didn’t mean to square ya!”

He groaned at the pun and pushed his glasses back up. “Must you shout so loud when you rise? I could’ve attacked you.”

“Sorry, I just needed to ask you something.”

“Ask away.”

“Do you happen to have a, uh...something of Virgil’s? He says he put it somewhere and you took it, but he really wants it back because it’s very important to him.”

Logan felt something strong inside him. He knew it was about the sketchbook, but that one picture raised so many questions he was afraid of asking. However, he shouldn’t have investigated the pages in the first place. He already knew he’d done wrong, but perhaps returning the book could correct what he did...yet the questions drive him to learn.

He handed Patton the book. “It’s this. I thought it was my notebook, but I hadn’t opened it until now.”

“Thanks, Logan!” he exclaimed with purity. “You didn’t look in it too much, did you?”

“Not at all,” he half-lied. While he did look at more than he should, it couldn’t have been more than 7 pages. “But there is, um, a question I have for you. Regarding Virgil.”

Worry spread on Patton’s face. “What about him?”

“Do you, erm…” He realized asking such a question is much harder when you don’t understand many feelings or emotions. “...do you, perhaps, feel...a certain way about Virgil?”

Worry shifted to panic. “H-how did you know? Did Roman tell you? He said he wouldn’t tell anyone! Oh my gosh, please don’t tell Virgil! I-”

Uh-oh. Feelings. “Don’t worry, Patton. Roman didn’t tell me anything.”

“Then who did? How did you-”

“You did, just now.”

Patton felt like his entire body had turned to glass. One wrong move, and he would break into a million painful shards. “You...didn’t know?”

“No.” He wanted to say more, but for once, he had lost his words.

He absentmindedly gripped the book tighter. “...then why’d you ask?”

A million answers rushed through Logan’s mind. Instead, he adjusted his glasses and told him, “I believe Virgil could answer that much better than I can.”

He looked away, thinking. What Logan said...that could mean anything. It means Virgil could’ve seen him staring when he thought he wasn’t looking, then got suspicious and asked Logan to find out. It means Virgil wasn’t interested, but Logan didn’t have the heart to tell him. It means someone else wanted Virgil, someone he’d like so much more, and Logan wasn’t sure who’d be the lucky one to date him. It means...Virgil could like him, too. The book had something about Patton in it, but they were both afraid of rejection, so he didn’t want him to see. He didn’t want anyone to see. Now Logan has seen it, and it made him wonder if Patton felt the same way Virgil did.

No. That couldn’t be possible. There’s no way Virgil would...would he?

He looked at the book in his hands, the tip of his thumb grazing the edge of the cover in temptation. Virgil said not to look. Anything could be inside…

He said goodbye to Logan, then sunk out. Keeping Virgil’s trust is more important. Even if it means he’d have to prepare for heartbreak.

Chapter Three: A Piece of the Puzzle

He finished the lineart, then stared at it. Of course the first thing he did when Patton got the sketchbook back was make another picture of his romantic fantasy. At this point, it was just pathetic. He knew he should stop doodling these things, especially now that his secret almost got out, but he loved being able to spend a few moments living in an impossible world where he and Patton could be so close and comfortable with each other. At the end, he’d always have to return to reality. The reality where Patton could never want someone like Virgil, and the drawings would stay fantasy.

Logan rose from the ground in front of Virgil’s bed. “May I speak with you?”

He kept coloring, refusing eye contact. “Why?”

“I...have questions. Some of which regard Patton.”

His pencil stopped. He glared at Logan through his bangs. “What’d he do?”

“Nothing yet, but it’s only noon.” He straightened his tie, trying to figure out how to say the dangerous things on his mind. “I, uh, must admit – and apologize – that after I mistook your sketchbook with my notebook, I did...look through some of the pages.”

Virgil’s head snapped up. “Why did you do that?!” he growled.

“Your skills are unlike anything I’ve seen before. The anatomy, the lines, the colors…” He cleared his throat, getting back on track. “I was captivated by your work. However, I did see one thing that I know I shouldn’t have, and-”

“Don’t tell anyone about anything you saw,” he hissed. “They can’t know.”

The aggression startled Logan for a second, but he continued. “I won’t. I shouldn’t have intruded in your personal secrets, but I’ll see that it never happens again.”

“Good.” He went back to his drawing. “You should leave. You’re starting to get eyeshadow.”

Chapter Four: Royally Screwed

“I just don’t know,” he admitted, gently tugging the sleeves of the cat hoodie around his neck. “What if he doesn’t like me like that?”

Roman sighed. “Even I cannot understand how you could fall for that storm cloud –” He felt Patton’s glare. “– but I have seen the looks he makes at you! I’ve seen his smile for every joke you make! And now, even Logan of No Emotion has brought it up, and you still wonder if he’d turn you away?”

“I mean, he probably just wants to stay friends! Maybe he’s not ready for a relationship like I am, and I don’t want to force him into something he doesn’t want!”

He grabbed Patton’s shoulder. “He does want this, Pat. Would Thomas help y-”

“No! Please don’t tell Thomas,” he begged, “Virgil would hear everything! I can’t-”

Roman cut back in, “then do you want this love to eat at you with every move he makes?”

“I...no, but-”

“Are you going to sit back and admit defeat, letting your heart shatter when he moves on because you didn’t take a chance?”

“...no…”

Roman’s voice boomed dramatically, “do you love him?”

“Yes,” Patton answered, gaining courage.

“Do you want him close to you?”

“Yes!”

“Then you march over to him and tell him how you feel!”

He jumped up excitedly. “Yeah! I’m gonna go to his room!”

“Yes!”

“And I’m gonna look him in the eyes!”

“Yeah!”

“And I’m gonna cry!”

“Ye- wait-”

“Because he’s so cute!”

“Uh, Patton-”

His voice grew fragile. “And I love him so much…!”

“Woah there, papa bear,” he said calmly, standing up to hug Patton, “we can do this. You can do this.”

Tears welled in his eyes. “I can’t…”

“Yes, you can. Come, let’s try again.”

Chapter Five: Shading in the Lines

He switched to a darker color, thoughts racing as he shaded. Logan’s the smartest, but he doesn’t understand feelings. He doesn’t really like Roman, but he’s creative and knows a lot about romance. Either of them could be equally helpful or disastrous, but who else could help? He can’t ask Thomas, either – he’d help the most, but everyone would hear what they’re saying! That would humiliate him, or worse!

The drawing was finished. He took a moment to admire it, smiling slightly as he imagined being in that world. Lying in Patton’s warm embrace, listening to his gentle heartbeat, playing with his fingers as they drifted into sleep...coming back to reality was more than crushing. With a heavy sigh, he stood up to put the supplies away. He triple-checked to make sure the colored pencils were all in the right spots and put them in the drawer first. The normal pencil went into its box with the others, and the eraser was just tossed into the drawer. It’ll turn back up eventually, just like the other erasers strewn about the drawer.

He turned to grab the sketchbook, which belonged- oh shit.

Patton had entered the room at some point while he was distracted. The sketchbook was left open, with the picture of Virgil’s recent fantasy left out for him to see. He held the book carefully, wide and curious eyes glancing all over the image.

Virgil felt his heart drop when the page turned, knowing another image of them together was on the other side. His hands began to shake. Tears blurred his vision. He wanted to do something to distract Patton; to delay the inevitable heartbreak. Yet, he couldn’t move. Anxiety crept up, he wanted to run, grab the book, his breathing changed, the shaking-

Through the blur from his tears, he saw Patton smiling. He forced himself to wipe his eyes and saw the softness of Patton’s expression. Adoration. Patton adored the drawings, taking in every detail, perhaps even trying to live for a moment in that world as Virgil had done so many times before.

He finally noticed Virgil looking at him and gave him a beaming smile. “Did you draw these? They’re so cute!”

A jolt of fear ran across his chest as he stammered out an answer. “I- uh- yeah, I-I did…”

Patton continued to talk about his art style, but his vision had focused on the shadow growing under Patton’s eyes, which was more alarming than whatever he was saying. He didn’t want to be rude and interrupt him, but he can’t stay in this room for too long! If he does, Thomas will-

He snapped back to reality when Patton said his name. “Virge? Is something wrong, kiddo?”

There wasn’t a choice anymore. He stammered for a bit again, then finally replied, “Pat, you need to get out of here.” Patton made a heartbroken face, opening his mouth to say something, but Virgil kept speaking. “You’ve been in here too҉ l̀on̢g.͡ Th̕e r͜oo͟m̕ ̢i̕s ̧co̴rr̨u̵pt͟in͠g͏ yo͡u͝. ̛Ỳo̸u ̧n͏eed t͠o ge̶t ou͟t̢ b̧efo͏re̕ i͝t gèt̶s ͝w̨ors̴e͝.”

His eyes flicked around the room and the sketchbook. “Come with me,” he pleaded, grabbing Virgil’s hand on impulse. It only took a second for him to receive a nod in agreement.

Chapter Six: Finding that Edge Piece

Rays of sunlight beamed through the windows, illuminating every corner of the room. Sparkles of light seemed to float around like autumn leaves in gentle wind. Birds could be heard chirping happily outside, singing sweet songs. The couch they were sat on held them perfectly; not too soft, not too firm, not made of leather. It was almost inappropriate how wonderful the room was after what happened earlier.

Patton teased the edge of the closed sketchbook, waiting patiently as Virgil struggled to find his words. He already had an idea of what he was going to say, but he wanted to give him a chance to talk. He always deserves a chance.

Virgil broke the silence. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?”

“I, uh...I could’ve reacted better to…” He gestured vaguely to his eyes. “Y’know.”

“Aw, Virge, you were just trying to keep me safe!” He looked at the sketchbook, running his thumb on the edge again. “I’m sorry for looking in your sketchbook without asking. You said it was personal, and I promised I wouldn’t look, and then I did anyway…”

“Don’t worry about that,” he sighed. “You probably would’ve found out somehow.”

Patton withdrew slightly. “And if I didn’t, you would’ve,” he mumbled.

“...what?”

He sat up quickly, shocked that Virgil heard what he said. “I- uh- the pictures- um- well- when I-”

“Hey.” He gently rested a hand on Patton’s leg, quieting him. “Take your time.”

The speed and energy of how Patton talked went entirely against what Virgil just said. “I just- I really, really like you, and I didn’t know if you liked me, and when I saw what you drew, I got super happy because I wanted us to do those things, too, and I- well- I just-” He let out a pitiful whine, then went quiet.

Virgil simply smiled at him. “I didn’t think you felt the way I do. You definitely deserve better than me, an-”

“I will physically fight you!” he shouted, tackling him with a hug. “You’re perfect and beautiful and amazing just the way you are!”

He chuckled. “Are we still talking about me? I feel like you’re just listing facts about yourself, now.”

“Virgil, that’s very sweet, but I also want you to love yourself!”

“Can’t, I’m too busy loving you.” Patton responded with a frustrated whine. “...how about a movie?”

He perked up, smiling brightly with hope shining in his eyes. “Can we cuddle?”

“If you want, that’s-”

“Yay! I’ll go make the popcorn!”

Patton dashed into the kitchen, a happy bounce in his steps. The floating sparkles in the room seemed to follow him for a bit. In Virgil’s eyes, they only accentuated his beauty. With a gentle sigh and a soft smile, he felt the warmth in his chest grow as he fell further and further in love.

Chapter Seven: Framework

The sunlight shone on Virgil, giving him a golden glow while he slept. Patton gently ran his fingers through Virgil’s purple hair, enjoying the soft and silky feel. The butterflies in his stomach still haven’t gone away. It had been over an hour since they made their relationship official, but he thought the glittery feeling in his body would change into something...smooth. Maybe warm. Like hot chocolate!

Virgil sniffed, scratched his face, then moved closer, practically laying on top of Patton with his legs draped across his lap. He buried his face in his neck, hummed softly in content, then fell back asleep. Patton almost wanted to cry; how else could he express just how madly in love he was with someone so adorable?

His arms wrapped around Virgil’s body. He felt warmer without his jacket on, but his body was still somewhat cold. Is he always cold? Maybe that’s why he wears the jacket all the time; he just needs to keep all of his warmth in one place.

It was then Patton noticed he had spaced out, staring at Virgil’s face and rubbing his back. The staring may have been kind of creepy – he’s just so cute and peaceful when he sleeps! – but he knew Virgil was generally comfortable with him rubbing his back. It usually helped him calm down when he was panicking, or it made him feel better when something was wrong. Either that, or being pet on the head.

Patton’s hand moved as memories came back, gently petting Virgil’s head the way he did the first time he let him. He remembered the way Virgil relaxed, slow-blinking like a cat when he realized he actually liked it. Since then, it sort of became a way for Patton to show him that he was loved, even before he, well, loved him.

“Cold,” Virgil mumbled, bringing him back to reality.

Without missing a beat, Patton grabbed a blanket with his foot and pulled it up to cover them both. He felt a cold hand rest on his arm, and a small smile appeared on Virgil’s face with a quiet hum.

“Thanks, ba-” His body tensed up slightly. “Um, Pat.”

He knew what he was going to say. He knew Virgil was about to call him babe, but he stopped. He knew, and he wanted to say it, too, but he wanted Virgil to be comfortable saying it first. That way, they could use other cute nicknames in the future.

“You can say it,” he coaxed. Virgil shook his head in response. “Why not?”

Virgil started fidgeting. “...isn’t it kinda...early? Like, we just got together…” His voice trailed off as he tried to find other things to say. “Wouldn’t it be...a bit weird?”

“I don’t mind, but if it makes you feel weird, then that’s okay. It doesn’t have to be now.”

“...you sure you’re okay with it?”

“Of course! I’m your-” he giggled- “your boyfriend now.” He giggled again, vibrating with excitement. “Wow, it feels really good to say that!”

“I’m glad, because I’ll be saying it soon, too.”

“Aww, Virge!” He tightened his hug. “And if you ever wanna say any, y’know, cute nicknames, I’m totally fine with that. Just as long as you are, too.”

He scratched the back of his thumb, then rested his hand back on Patton’s arm. “Thanks...babe.”

With another giggle, he placed a kiss on Virgil’s head. “Anytime, sweetie.”

His smile grew a little brighter. “...can you keep, uh, doing the thing?” he nervously requested. “Please?”

Patton continued to pet him, letting him melt into his body with a contented sigh. After a few minutes, Virgil was limp, and his breathing became steady. Once again, he had fallen asleep in Patton’s embrace.

The sunset shone on them, giving them a golden glow while Virgil slept. Patton gently ran his fingers through Virgil’s soft hair, comforting him in his dream. The butterflies in his stomach had gone to bed, and the glitter in his body became smooth and warm, like hot chocolate was flowing through him. He was nervous – and he knew Virgil was, too – but as the world pieces back together, they will make a different picture than what’s on the box.

Taglist: @randomslasher @musikasworld @soft-transboy @fandersfic-moxiety

#moxiety #romantic moxiety #virgil sanders #patton sanders #sanders sides #Picture Imperfect

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cs-discourse · 6 years

Text

on the "edited" kit muzzles

i know you're "pausing salt" on this, but hopefully you'll post this as it's not salt and more of an explanation. and maybe it can get you fucking cave gremlins to shut up and stop acting like you know what you're talking about

first of all: editing the muzzles isn't allowed. thinning out the lineart or even thickening the lineart, however, IS allowed, given that the original shape of the muzzle is preserved. this rule pretty much includes the nose/nose bump and the end of the muzzle.

dog very obviously didn't touch the end of the nose or the muzzle on these kits beyond thinning/thickening the lineart to match his style. where the nose maybe looks extended is your eye being tricked by the pixel effect on the tip of the nose on the lineart, making it appear larger/pointier by laying atop the lineart. the white outline effect also makes it appear larger than it is.

and before you all try and point this out:

editing where the muzzle meets the forehead/editing the forehead itself has never been disallowed. when the nose bump gets removed or gets exaggerated that's when there's problems. if you don't believe me i implore you to go look at doktor monty/sangfroid's custom kals (particularly bugdul). i could point out other examples, ones that are even in the new nursery V3, but i don't want to put more people in the spotlight, especially on this fucking blog

now admittedly i don't know which of dog's batches they edited to fix their muzzles, which in my opinion shouldn't have even been done at all as they broke no rules, so these overlays could be outdated (though the kits look the same as when i saw them last night so? idk) or something. regardless you fucks need to sit down and stop singling out people for shit they didn't even do

and if you see this dog i'm sorry to bring it up myself but i'm tired of these anons pretending they're kalon staff, you don't deserve this sort of shit when you did nothing wrong :/

#this is the last thing im posting. palomino #submission #kalons

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mariamuses · 6 years

Text

Tumblr Friends

Chapter 2 ~ Usernames

My next few days could only be described with one word: spree reading.

Wait. That’s two words. Or is it hyphened? Whatever, you get what I’m trying to say.

I breathed and ate books. And pizza. And chocolate.

My days consisted on getting up, goin to my classes, coming back, eating and reading. I read everywhere. On the couch, on my bed, on the toilet, on the bathtub... My sisters put up with it because they knew what I was going through, and because they were too busy with their respective boyfriends to say anything.

You might be asking yourselves: why doesn’t she study?

Well, I’ll tell you. The day I caught Tamlin smooching Ianthe was actually the first day back from summer, so that meant that the professors hadn’t had enough time to dream about us and the way they wanted to torture us with projects and exams.

Another question that may be popping up in your head is: What is she reading?

Well, I’ll tell you. Only the best freaking sagas from the best freaking author in the world: Brandon Sanderson. I’ve already read the Mistborn Trilogy, but it is like my comfort food in books, so I reread it. And then I started The Way of Kings, the first installment of the Stormlight Archive saga, and then the second and third one, which just came out. Those will be Words of Radiance and Oathbringer.

I saw them a while ago in the book shop and just had to buy them, but Tamlin always said that reading was boring, so I never started them.

And now I’m starting them just to spite him. Even though he won’t see me. Or talk to me. Crap, I really didn’t think this through.

That’s actually not the only reason. As one of my other favorite author says: “It was books that made me feel that perhaps I was not completely alone. They could be honest with me, and I with them.”

And I desperately needed not to feel alone right now. So, I binge-read all of them (they’re like a thousand pages each) and when I was finished, I swear I could breathe a little better and life felt a little brighter.

As I read the last page of Oathbringer and closed the book, all I could think about was that it couldn’t be over.

It’s not over yet silly. There’s going to be seven more books.

You get me, it can’t be over right now. I know the story continues, but I NEED more NOW.

Go to the internet.

I should, shouldn’t I? I’ve heard about something called...Tumble? Timblr?

Tumblr.

Oh, yeah right. My best friend, Mor, who’s into super weird stuff, like History-wise weird stuff, told me about it, and also said that there’s this thing called fanfiction, where people who read a book keep writing (non-cannon, but still) about it. She says that, sometimes, the fic is actually better than the book coming after it, and that the authors put in tons of work so their followers can get a weekly update, and maybe even more. Currently, she’s reading a fic about Aristotle and his secret lover Hades, god of the Underworld. Like I said, weird.

I opened my laptop and turned it on, getting on my browser and searching ‘Tumblr’. Then I clicked on ‘get started’ and typed my email and password in. The username was the tricky part, because so many of the were already taken. At last, I decided to go with fey-oathbringer, thinking that if I wanted to meet people of my same fandom, my user had to be somewhat related.

Then I got down to bussiness.

To defeat, the huns.

Ups, there we go with the puns.

No, the huns.

No, seriously. I typed ‘stormlight archive’ in and... search!

After hours looking through and reading everything I could find about Brandon Sanderson on Tumblr, I had two conclusions. The first one was that people really put a lot of time and effort into the fics. The second was less of a conclussion and more a person, more especifically, stormblessed-radiant.

He was the epitome of all things good. Not only was he a hell of a writer, he was also a very nice person. I think so, at least. I mean, you can totally tell by his answered asks, no?

He could be faking it... He could be a she.

No! He’s good. And a boy. And adorable. And possibly very cute...

Okay, this got out of hand. Focus Feyre.

So I decided to follow him (definitely a him) and turned on the notifications so every time he posted something, I could be up to speed.

Now I just had to wait.

On Saturday, I woke up, had breakfast and pulled out my phone, only to see that stormblessed-radiant had uploaded a chapter of his latest fic, Alethkar Remembers.

Inmediately I propped up my computer and started reading it. I loved everything about it: the way he wrote the characters and their development, how he wasn’t afraid of putting some romance into it, how loyal it was to the books... It was so fine that it inspired me.

So, when I finished, I decided I had to draw some fanart of the main characters, maybe even throwing in one of the few he made up, just to see if I could do it.

Motivated, I got to work.

Ten hours later, I had my “finished” product.

There were three pieces of art, depicting Kaladin (with Syl on his shoulder), Adolin and Shallan and finally, Aadya (stormblessed-radiant’s incredible creation).

They were only linearts, because I knew myself enough to be certain that if I started coloring it, I would never finish.

With the last of the retouches done, I uploaded the pictures with a little text that said that I was new to the fandom and that Aadya was a non-cannon character taken from stormblessed-radiant’s fics. I also added a few tags and... there.

Now all I could think about the reaction the art was going to have.

I stayed glued to the screen of my computer until everything went black.

***

Here’s the next chapter!! I hope you all are enyoying it and ready for more.

Also, thank you so much for reading. I'll try to upload, at least, once a week. Scout's promise.

Read it on AO3

I’m tagging these lovely people @songbirdsbooks @kaliejane26 @personpersonper @turtlesnook @highladyfxyre who are willing to read my rants.

#my work #my fic #feyre #mor #tumblr #rhysand #azriel #cassian #nesta #elain #brandon sanderson

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