gabithebisaster

[gabithebisaster]

My current projects (July 2022)

Here's a post to sum up everything I am working on at the moment. I may make more of these posts in the future to help me keep track of things.

Starting new medication in february really changed everything for me. Not only was I able to finish old projects, but I had a ton of ideas and ambition, and here I am, a few months later, drowning in creative projects! A bit overwhelming, but a good thing!

Music

I am arranging YMO's Rydeen for an art challenge. The theme was orchestra, and all the other artist drew themselves or their OC playing an instrument. I decided to join to practice orchestral... well, orchestrations, and use the decent VSTs I finally bought lol. I want to finish quick, the deadline was the end of June (though outher people are late too, so I guess that's not too bad) and I am late alreadyyyy

Writing

I currently have two projects in this category: a lolita fanzine and a TTRPG.

The lolita fanzine is a french fanzine created by a parisian lolita group. I joined this edition to write a few articles and ended up writing a few more, and I am now helping the staff keep in touch with everyone, keep track of progress, I try to do the remaining things that need to be done, etc

The TTRPG is a pretty big project! My s/o and I are homebrewing it together from scratch. S/o is working on the "game" part, I am working on the "roleplay" part, basically. I am currently writing the lore of the country the campaigns take place. I am pretty slow, but I love working on it. In the far future I hope we can have a "deluxe" edition with illustrations by one of our friends, minis by another one of our friends, a gameboard, a CD with music cmoposed by me, and a lot of other cool things!!! But first we have to finish the bare bones and playtest haha ! Sadly, I won't reallly be able to talk about the contents. I'd really love to overshare with friends, acquitances and random strangers, but s/o and me are super scared of plagiarism, so no content sharing before we copywrite it!

Sewing

Shop opening is coming!!! Here are the things I need to do:

Alter a dress for a friend

Finish the pencil cases and take pictures

Make some ribbon hairclips and wristcuffs

OPEN SHOP!!!

And then I'll take a few commissions and maybe also make some ready to ship stock for a few items.

I hope to release preorders for cute plushies pencil cases at the end of the month, but that will be for another post hehe

[gabithebisaster]

crossposted from Instagram: there is a whole saga over on my Tumblr (also @babelstitch​ – in fact, you are here already, hello) about the making of this headbow, but it turned out super cute, dang it. So here you go, gratuitous collage of my very cute crayon headbow. Do I recommend this pattern? not unless you wanna pay $14 for a very very specific style, and also, you already know how to sew. Do I think this turned out stinkin’ adorable? Heck yes I do. ​​​​​​​​ ​​​​​​​​ #SpiteHeadbow #LolitaDIY #DIYLolita #Sewing #LolitaSewing #14DollarHeadbowPattern #crayon #bow #headbow #CrayonFabric #CrayolaFabric #CrayolaCrayons http://dlvr.it/SSjxqQ

[gabithebisaster]

To the photogrphers out there: AT LEAST SAY HELLO. That is basic politeness and will protect you from my wrath. I swear if I find that one rude guy from the music festival...

Strangers taking pictures without permission:

There's stuff that happens when you're out and about and dressed in a fascinatingly extravagant wardrobe, and some of it is things that you don't want to happen, but you know will happen. Sometimes it's losing a ribbon clip out of your hair, or spilling something on your dress. You don't like it, but it's part of the situation.

And sometimes it's strangers taking pictures of you without asking. You don't want it to happen, but it's going to happen.

Look, you being out and about and dressed strangely is not giving someone permission to take your picture. You have as much right to refuse a picture as someone wearing jeans and a t-shirt, or a nun veil, or or wearing a live bearded dragon as a hat. People often seem to think that because you look like a doll, they're allowed to photograph you like an inanimate object, and that's not true.

So, here's some things I think about when I go out and find someone trying to take a picture without talking to me:

I think it's important to note that someone who already has their camera out and is taking pictures of the overall environment is a different situation from someone who just pulled their phone out of their pocket to sneakily get a picture of your group. If they're already doing street photography, and you just happened to be something exciting that's on the street, that's an important distinction to me. I'm a photography nerd who used to develop my own black and white film and do prints in a darkroom. Street photography is a totally legitimate art and if often involves taking pictures without asking, but having people ask why you're photographing someone is part of street photography. Random guy in Barnes and Noble who is crawling around behind a bookcase to take pictures without you seeing isn't the same. I've found that, with a street photographer, you can ask if they got a good shot. A lot of the time, they'll then show you the picture and if you don't like it, they'll delete it. That doesn't mean they're not creepy. Photographers can be creepy. They also can be just a creepy rando. If they're doing creepy photos, proceed to step 2.

You're allowed to get angry when someone photographed you, but do you know what's more fun? Acting like they just did the most inappropriate thing that's happened to you all day. If you've worked retail for long enough, channel the conversation you've had where some random stranger starts talking too much about their erectile dysfunction medication but you're on the clock and just have to try to express through body language that it's NOT a good thing to be talking about. Imagine this from the point of view of the weird guy who just took out his phone to sneakily snap a picture. You're a douche, putting your phone back into your pocket, and someone starts treating you like you just started telling the walmart checker about your hemorrhoids. When you get angry at someone, they can get defensive and start justifying in their head why they weren't in the wrong. If you act like they just made the most disgusting faux pas ever, they start questioning their actions. We want them to question their actions.

It's not unreasonable for you to ask someone what they're going to do with the picture they just took. "Hi, did you just take my picture?" They say yes, "Okay, are you going to post it somewhere?" And if you don't like that answer, turn on the 'customer talking about their chronic UTIs' mode and go, "Please don't." If they say they just want to show it to a friend or family member, I usually try to kind of casually explain to them that it's pretty normal for someone to ask for a picture or ask for more about why I'm dressed like this, but kind of (*turns on the customer telling you about accidentally sending her mom a picture of her vibrator voice*) you know, weird, to just have someone bust out their phone and act like I won't notice.

If they're not going to ask for a picture you are totally allowed to ruin their shot. You can wreck a lot of people's "sneaky" picture-taking by shoving your parasol in the line of sight. Flipping someone off with your thumb out ruins a picture better than if your thumb is tucked in because it covers more space. Ideally, giving someone the bird with both hands and placing them about 4" away from your face will hide your face and effectively communicate to anyone who sees the picture that it was taken without your consent.

I've done a lot of photography as a form of art, and I do understand wanting to take a cool candid photo with some people you see on the street. Photography is about capturing the world that we see, and when you see something interesting, it's normal to want to turn that thing you see into art that you create. But I want you to be aware that you're competing in a world where everyone has a camera and many of the people who are taking pictures without permission aren't doing it for art reasons. The people wearing lolita fashion in the image you want to make also have people who want to text to their friends to show the creepy adults in costume at Denny's at 4 AM. It's not always easy to tell who is doing what, so being tolerant when the people you're photographing feel annoyed or uncomfortable or just completely exhausted by you taking the picture can really help. Honestly, if you have any experience doing street photography, you already know how to talk to people who don't want to be the subject of your pictures.

Also, as a side note, we get asked for pictures a lot. "Hi, I'm photographing this farmer's market and you five look really nice looking at the flowers. Is it okay if I take a picture of you doing that?" isn't weird. You taking a picture of the whole street as a landscape and we happen to be in it? Not weird.

You hiding behind a post and then holding your phone to your ear to pretend you're in a conversation instead of taking pictures? What the fuck are you doing?? That is weird.

My last piece of advice for someone who sees people in lolita fashion and who wants to take a picture: we do spend a lot of time trying to get good pictures of our groups and our outfits. If you're able to come off as a non-creepy photographer, asking if you can take a picture of the group and offer to take a couple with someone in the group's phone really cuts down on the creepiness factor and offers the group a little bit of compensation for letting you use them in your art.

Not everyone is going to agree with this, and this is also a situation where it's entirely possible for there to be a lot of different opinions that are all correct. If you're in a group and going out in public, it can be very prudent to do a quick poll of the group and ask how comfortable everyone is with different ways to address someone taking pictures. I have a lot more tolerance for the artistic street shot snapper than the guy in Denny's who has opened the bathroom door and is trying to hide behind it so that he can get a picture of our booth (YES, THIS HAPPENED), but if someone in the group isn't comfortable with any pictures asked or unasked, it can really be helpful to have everyone on the same page.

[gabithebisaster]

The intro post!!

Hey there! Haven’t used tmblr yet, but just decided it was time for me to get started. I’ll introduce myself so you get to know me better and know what to expect

My name is Gabrielle, but usually people will call me by my nickname: Gabi. I was born in 1998 (putting it like this so I won’t ever have to update this data lol) I’m from France, and I’m a neurodivergent genderqueer baguette who goes by they/them! (My french pronouns are il or elle or iel if you’re curious)

I currently study to get a master’s degree in translation and writing, and I always feel nervous saying I have a bachelor’s degree in english (linguistics + English and American literature and history), now everyone is going to judge me when I make silly mistakes, oh my... But I’ve seen memes about english speakers being super kind to non natives who lack confidence, so it’s going to be ok, right? Anyway, tl;dr I’m a huge linguistic nerd and I love making fun of the (c)Académie Française every chance I get.

I love watching cartoon and anime (though I don’t watch as many anime as I used to) I love reading (though I struggle finding time to read all the books in my “to read” shelf, oops), I love video games, and I am obsessed with Miku Hatsune, our lord and savior. Oh, and in case I ever get political, I am a progressive leftist, more specifically what we call “islamo-gauchiasse” in France (reblog if you think that’s beautiful).

I have many hobbies, and that’s what I’ll talk about in this blog! I think they can be sorted in just a few categories:

Fashion

I enjoy sewing and make stuff such as plushies, accessories, clothes, and costumes. I also really love drag and alternative fashion styles. I don’t know all of the alt styles, but love learning about them. I wear goth and EGL, and also my own casual style. It would be hard to sum it up in just a few words, but if I get the motivations to post ootd’s I think you’ll get the idea!

I also want to start a little shop to sell some of the stuff I make, and with my mental health it’s quite the journey to get there! I hope I can launch it this month, but it may be harder than I thought...

Music

Well, alt music goes hand in hand with alt fashion, doesn’t it? I love to listen to metal, rock, hyperpop, eurobeat, video game ost’s, weeb stuff, some queer tracks...

I like to dabble on making some music on FL studio. So far I’ve only arranged existing tracks, but I’d love to try composing myself someday! But then music making in general can sometimes give me some sort of choice paralysis, so arranging  removes at least melody from the too wide option list, if that makes sense, haha

Writing

I’ve always wanted to try writing and dabble for funsies, but before I got on medication anxiety, depression and some of my traumas paralyzed me creatively, so I haven’t done much so far. At the moment I am writing the “roleplaying” part of a homebrew tabletop roleplaying game with my s/o. I also got the chance to write a few articles for a French EGL fanzine and plan on writing more “article”-like stuff in the future. I’d also love to write some fiction. Also, remember how I’m a linguistic nerd? Well, another hobby I’ve dabbled in and can’t wait to pick up again is conlang building! If you don’t know what conlangs are, they are artificial languages that fictional people would speak! A while back I started making one, hope I can find the time to finish it and make more!

In this blog, I basically want to write whatever idea I have and think could be interesting for other people to hear. Those blog posts would be mostly about my hobbies, could be tutorials are informational posts about whatever topic I chose, could be anything really! Maybe I’ll also post life updates and stuff about my creative projects, we shall see!

Anyway thanks for reading everything so far, I’m impressed tbh, have a virtual cookie!

Looking forwards to writing here again!

#blog intro