My best friend and I had a call recently---she’s back with her family for a bit helping out with some hometown stuff. As part of the stuff, she’s been going through a (deceased) relative’s scrapbook, compiled in the American Midwest circa 1870-1900 and featuring mostly cut-out figures from the ads of the day.
She talked about how painstaking this relative’s work was. (Apparently the relative was careful to cut out every finger, every cowlick; this was by no means carelessly or hastily assembled.) But she also she talked about how---the baby on the baking soda ad is ugly, it is so ugly, why anyone would clip this heinously ugly illustrated baby and paste it into a scrapbook? Why would you save the (terribly told, boring) ghost story that came with your box of soap?
(Why include these things in the first place? we asked each other. ”There’s a kind of anti-capitalism to it,” she mused.)
And we discussed that for a bit---how most of the images, stories, artists, and ads were local, not national; they’re pulled from [Midwestern state] companies’ advertisements in [Midwestern state] papers, magazines, and products. As a consequence, you’re not looking at Leyendecker or Norman Rockwell illustrations, but Johann Spatz-Smith from down the road, who took a drawing class at college.
(College is the state college, and he came home on weekends and in the summer to help with the farm or earn some money at the plant.)
But it also inspired a really interesting conversation about how---we have access to so much more art, better and more professional art, than any time in history. As my bff said, all you have to do to find a great, technically proficient and lovely representational image of a baby, is to google the right keywords. But for a girl living in rural [Midwestern state] of the late 1800s, it was the baking soda ad, or literal actual babies. There was no in-between, no heading out to the nearby art museum to study oil paintings of mother and child, no studying photographs and film---such new technologies hadn’t diffused to local newspapers and circulars yet, and were far beyond the average person’s means. But cheap, semi-amateur artists? Those were definitely around, scattered between towns and nearby smallish cities.
It was a good conversation, and made me think about a couple things---the weird entitlement that “professional” and expensive art instills in viewers, how it artificially depresses the appetite for messy unprofessional art, including your own; the way that this makes your tastes narrower, less interesting, less open.
By that I mean---maybe the baby isn’t ugly! Maybe you’ve just seen too many photorealistic babies. Maybe you haven’t really stopped to contemplate that your drawing of a baby (however crude, ugly, or limited) is the best drawing of a baby you can make, and the act of drawing that lumpen, ugly baby is more sacred and profoundly human than even looking at a Mary Cassatt painting.
And even if that isn’t the case....there was this girl in [American Midwestern state] for whom it was very, very important that she capture every finger, curl, and bit of shading for that ugly soap ad baby. And some one hundred years later, her great-something-or-other took pains to preserve her work---because how terribly human it is, to seek out all the art we can find that resonates with us, preserve it, adore it.
It might be the most human impulse we have.
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one thing i noticed (form personal experience and by observing other artists) is that the longer you draw and create, the more boring it gets to simply replicate references, especially when it comes to characers' fashion choices.
with bnha, i keep mine pretty simple and basic because teens ARE very trend-loyal, but mainly im just lazy lol, but when i AM motivated, i love to think about characters' personal style, what could influence them, but also more trivial things such as budget into account, which is why i love to draw Deku in basic tees or clothes provided by his school (while bakugo gets to wear ed hardy and shoto wears arcteryx). i also love to limit the items like its just more realistic to me when someone as ordinary as deku wears the same 5 crewnecks all the time
which brings me to my actual point, namely that the more frequently you draw, the more you learn to do research andto combine your findings into sth new rather than staying faithful to one reference, and i think that's what makes good art so good, being able to draw inspiratioin from all kinds of niches and creating something that feels very authentic and suspends the spectator's disbelief. sometimes i see art and i know exactly which fashion editorial or which kpop idol was referenced, and I'm not insinuating these are bad things i do that too (less frequently now but i sure did!), my point is it's kind of nice to see how ALL artist start out with rather derivative art but eventually move on to create more authentic art that is less about drawing beautiful and perfect people and more about trying to individualize them and that ALSO means giving them weird clothes, scars, asymmetric eyes, a receding hairline etc. like drawing the same beautiful character 200 times gets so boring and it's just more fun to try and make them a bit more human
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I could go on and talk about how Laerryn is not, in the end, motivated by hubris. Though The Age of Arcane is the age of Wizards who believe themselves bigger than gods. Or, or, I could talk about how Laerryn Coramar-Seelie was pushed by grief so deep it doesn’t just come in waves, it never fucking leaves.
How “It’s stupid to try and become a god” because she asked for the gods to save her friend. Pleaded with them to bring them back. That it was hubris that got her friend killed, and Laerryn is not the smartest person in Avalir for nothing. That she crushed it under her heel, but if her best friend, the greatest person she’s ever known had to die for her ambitions than it better well be fucking worth it.
That it is love, and love lost, that motivates her to do the things she does. And the fear of losing love again and again that motivates her to cast blight, despite her having paused for a second to listen.
Pride was her fatal flaw when Evandrian died. But it was not when she helped cause the calamity. It was love and love alone. Because pride is for people who don’t get shit done, pride is for the undeserving. She built a cathedral with her own two hands between working and researching. Between grief and mourning. Of course Laerryn is proud of herself, of course she believes in herself. She’s the goddamn Architect Arcane, she keeps this city afloat, makes discoveries for people to eventually use. She is the heart of the city. But she does not still her hand in pride, but fear, but love.
Love is what causes the Calamity. Love for Loquatious, love for Patia, love for her people. And also deep unsettling grief. Grief for what was lost to her, grief that the gods did not grant Evandrian reprieve. Grief for all the things that she could not save. Why would she waste her time trying to become a god, when she can show the gods that even them, even the mundane, even the mortals that they’ve created can do wonderful things and perform miracles. That they do not need them to grant them wishes, that they can do it themselves instead of waiting for the whims and whimsies of the Primordials to pay them any attention.
Why would the gods give her this power, this intelligence that she’s honed like a finally tuned instrument if not so that she can show them all that Avalir can be? And in the end, how could she learn? Why would she change everything? Change anything. In the end, her point was proven, the things she lost were no longer for naught. How could she ever regret what happened if in the end it was for love?
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RainCode Sickfic (Sequel 3) preview!
(RainCode Endgame Spoilers!)
Behind the mask…lies the pain you’ve kept hidden all this time…
So as I’ve briefly mentioned multiple times, over winter break I will be writing a new fic, aka the third and final part to my RainCode sickfic trilogy. I call the it the “Sickfics of the Heart” series~ :)
The final fic I write will take place in the post game. Where former Number One, Yuma decides to visit Kanai Ward to check on his homunculus Makoto before the year ends as a break. But he finds out he’s not in good shape health-wise and decides to try to look after him.
I will be making multiple references to my first fic “Home is Where the Heart is” so be sure to read that fic first!
This fic will also contain more angst. (that I will make super fluffy in return :3)
Here is the summary of what I have planned.
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Title: A Heartwarming Reunion
With his memories back, Former Number One, now Independent Detective Yuma Kokohead has recently solved yet another case. One more step towards his goal of eradicating all the world’s mysteries. He finds himself a little tired and realized that it was getting close to the end of the year. He thinks maybe it’s a good opportunity to take a small vacation to recuperate.
New Years is usually a time best spent with family. Sadly, Yuma didn’t have any blood relatives. His secondary family was the Nocturnal Detective Agency, but with the master detectives off doing their own thing, and the chief deceased (or rather wandering aimlessly as an undead homunculus zombie) he couldn’t be selfish and take up their time.
But as he thought back to his time spent in Kanai Ward's city of endless rain as an amnesiac, one person crossed his mind. The person who shared his face, his mind and his build. The homunculus clone he had to battle to solve the city’s mystery. (Though he could not remember what exactly happened) The CEO and now Leader of the clouded city of rain full of homunculi like him. Makoto Kagutsuchi.
Yuma thought to himself that even if they were previously enemies, Makoto was probably the closest thing to a blood relative he had left. So he decides to return to Kanai Ward to pay him a visit, to see how the city is fairing and hoping he had some time off to talk and catch up. And as the city’s leader, he was usually alone. He wouldn’t mind a little surprise visit from his original …would he?
Little did Yuma know, that Makoto may have needed his help more than he originally expected. He overhears rumors in the city that speak concerns of Makoto pushing himself too hard. It turns out their city’s leader was ill, and he had only gotten worse due to his days of continuous overworking and trying to brush it off, by hiding it using his mask.
Yuma is about to experience being a caretaker for the first time in his life, and to his own double. He has a bit of trouble at first, but he has a little bit of help from his heartwarming memories of his previous found family, the Nocturnal Detective Agency. He also finds out more about Makoto in the process. Realizing that he’s been in a lot of pain…that he’s kept masked all this time, all alone.
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Also yes this edit is terrible... x'D Makoto's sprite art makes it difficult to edit into his body... I tried okay? x-x;
Anyway, I hope you will look forward to it! I will try to get it done by either Christmas or...the end of the year :3c
Also this will likely be a multi-chapter fic.
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