#i might upload some more sketches that I took from my sketchbook

[issie-https]

𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐍 - 𝐒𝐋𝐈𝐏𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐓

𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐬𝐢𝐱 𝐨𝐟 𝐓𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐧.

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: Mentions of kidnapping, mentions of injury and Sid mocking your moans.

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐬: 1116

𝐀/𝐧: HALLO! Im currently sick so uploads might be more frequent for the next couple of days. MAY OR MAY NOT!!

NOT PROOFREAD‼️

I woke up in Chris's arms, his mask was slightly off centre and I could see his lips.

"Stop staring," he groaned as he sat up.

"Wasn't staring, I have fixated eye syndrome," I said.

"Mhm, sure," he grumbled.

He got out of the bed and walked over to the door, "come on."

I furrowed my brows but followed him despite my grogginess. He took my wrist in his hand and pulled me towards the kitchen before pointing at a seat, "sit."

I did as I was told, guaranteed, I felt somewhat safe around Chris but I still didn't know what any of them were capable of if I didn't obey them. He opened one of the top cabinets and pulled out a first aid kit.

"Couldn't you have done this in your room?" I narrowed my eyes at him.

"Mick told me he wanted to show you something today so it's better if I do it in here," he shrugged.

"Any heads up on what it is?"

"All he said was he wanted to show you something."

I just nodded and held out my hands to him. He removed the bandages and took a look at them, the swelling had gone down and the bruises had gone a different colour whereas the scabs and cuts were very visible but completely fine.

"You won't need them re bandaged but go careful," he said as he put the box back in the cupboard.

"What happens if I don't?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Attitude," Mick warned as he entered the room, "you need to go get dressed."

I turned to look at him, he was just wearing his mask and a pair of black sweatpants. Me on the other hand, I was still wearing Chris' boxers and shirt. I got up from my seat and shuffled my way through the halls until I reached an open door, I peered inside and saw Sid sat on a roof swing while flicking through a comic.

"Has that one got words, Ivy League?" I smirked.

"Fucking Christ, you scared me," he placed his hand on his chest, "only a few but you said it counts."

I rolled my eyes then studied his room from the door, "you just gonna gawk at me or invite me in?"

"Wanna come in?" He offered.

"Yes, thank you," I replied and sat on his bed, "do you know where Mick is showing me today?"

"Nope. Did you have fun last night?" He smirked.

"What do you mean?" I avoided eye contact.

"Please, Chris. Fuck me, Chris," he mocked me with a laugh.

"Shut up!" I gritted my teeth at him.

"Fuck, ahh~ Chris," he continued his mocking.

I got up from his bed and started to walk towards the door, "wait, Y/n don't go. I was just joking."

"Mhm."

"I'm sorry," he said quietly.

I stopped in my tracks and walked back into his room. I one again looked around, my eyes landing on a sketchbook on his desk, "can I see?"

He nodded and went back to reading his comic. I flipped through the pages, some had drawings of flowers, some had drawings of bugs while others had drawings of... body parts.

"I'm a boob guy," he whispered in my ear.

"Stop doing that!" I gasped and swatted his chest.

"You like them?" He asked pointing to the sketch of boobs.

"They're very real looking, I'll give you that," I nodded slowly.

He rested his head on my shoulder, watching as I flipped through the pages. His arms held my waist tight, I could tell he just wanted some comfort — and I didn't blame him because I did too. However, our wholesome moment was cut short by Mick calling my name.

"Mick needs me but I'll be back," I waved to Sid.

I ran down the hall before running directly into Mick - who was now wearing a plain black shirt- "where were you? And why haven't you changed?" His blue eyes bore into my soul, staring into me as if he wanted to know more about me.

"I couldn't find my room," I replied shyly. I'm not gonna lie, Mick scared me - he was at least six foot five with black hair and blue eyes. Every time he looked at me, his eyes held one emotion — what emotion it was was hard to determine without seeing the rest of his face. It could be anything from hatred to admiration or annoyance to lust.

"It's just down here," he replied, grabbing my arm and leading me to a door with so many fucking locks on the outside.

"What should I wear?" I looked up at him.

"There should be a knitted sweater in there, so wear that with anything," he said before closing the door behind me.

I went over to the closet in the corner of the room and opened it to find a few of my clothes from my house and some clothes I hadn't seen before and amongst all of them was one knitted sweater. I grabbed that along with a pair of mid-rise jeans and my favourite Converse shoes.

"Im dressed!" I yelled to Mick on the other side of the door.

He let me out and held my wrist tight, pulling me towards two big wooden doors.

"I thought I'd take you out to the garden today, Clown gave me the green light to," he said, this time, a smile was evident in his eyes and slightly on his lips from what I could see.

I also smiled, for the first time in what felt like ages, I was finally allowed to go outside.

From the second I stepped foot outside, I didn't want to leave. I could hear the birds, I could see the sky and the minimal clouds, I could smell the fresh rain that must've fallen the previous night and most importantly of all, I could feel again. I could feel like a human and not just an object that had been stolen, I could feel... feelings again — happiness, anger, contentment and fear. "Look here," Mick said as he dragged me - again - towards a flower bed.

"Are these your flowers?" I asked while inspecting all the different kinds.

"Yep, all of us got to add a couple pieces to the house that we thought you'd like and I chose these and something else you'll see later," he replied.

"Mick, they're lovely!" I beamed as I hugged him tightly.

I could tell he was unsure about the hug but he nonetheless hugged me back, rubbing soothing circles on my back with his thumb.

Once again, our sweet moment was cut short by someone yelling our names.

#slipknot #sid wilson #joey jordison #paul gray #chris fehn #jim root #craig jones #shawn crahan #mick thomson #corey taylor #author #ao3 writer #writer #issie https

[marksinn]

Passion Project: Inspiration

I don’t think I’m starting at the beginning with this post. Keep your eyes peeled for later posts that explain what I’m doing and why.

After a month of thinking about, sketching and painting designs, I have finally done something. Essentially, recently watching two films has pushed me into action, and a part of me is ashamed to admit it. There isn’t a word count or any typesetting to curtail my thoughts here, so strap in.

When I created this brief I figured I’d draw a million wee skateboards, colour a few of them in, then fling my favourites into Adobe illustrator and make them look good. From there I would take the 5 best up to the skatepark and ask some of the patrons there which designs stood out to them. Next, I would adapt the three front-runners and create sweet PhotoShop mockups that would show what my designs would look like as skateboards. If I had the time, inclination or money by the end of the project, I would have the design laid onto a real skateboard (I’ve been looking to buy a new one for some time) and then be proud of myself.

So I’ve drawn some wee skateboards. Then I started upscaling the designs onto the floorboards of my loft:

This was an exercise to let me see how small things need to be adapted to be blown up. Skateboards can have any level of detail that you like on them, I hadn’t considered this until I was trying to draw a semi-perfect triangle for the traffic cone, or until I was using chalk to recreate four cubes. It’s also been fun to work with different media on chipboard - I have learned that most kinds of pencil, paint, chalk and charcoal do not like being used on chipboard. Decorating paint, however, has no such issues. Thanks, Dulux!

And so, with a few of these under my belt, I decided to try some digital designs. So I jumped into Illustrator and totally ignored my sketchbook, coming up with three designs that were all inspired by the day I had just had. The top design, I’ll focus on last, for reasons that will become apparent (unless you follow me on Instagram, where you’ll already know that it’s an absolute hit, with over 19 likes already!). I was told by a guy at the skatepark that he likes decks with very basic designs, just a colour or two, nothing overly detailed. Another skater told me that he often likes the basic wood background with one small emblem or sticker just beside the wheels.

The duo-tone design felt nice, I’m usually one for over-complicating things. I definitely have an attitude of “If there’s more in it, there’s a greater chance someone will find something they like”. The first colour choice put my girlfriend in the mind of a hand-bag she had seen photographed in the arms of Carrie Fisher - it was designed to look like a Prozac pill. So I changed the colours up, and added the separating black lines and textures to give it some subtle character. I then went full meta with the Minimal design. And, if I’m being honest, I’m incredibly happy with how it looks like a wee character. Expect to see that making a comeback in the very near future. But the top design is what really got me going. 

I’ve recently been watching...

...Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and have been loving Miles Morales’ multiple hobbies of graffiti, mixing beats and saving his neighbourhood from a variety of dangers. 

I then went to the cinema to see In The Heights, telling the tale of the Latin community during a blackout in North Manhattan. I found myself wrapped up in the romance, tribulations and music of the cast, and was felt oddly proud of Lin Manuel Miranda - who wrote this as a stage-musical while he was in college, had a modicum of success with it, then went on to create Hamilton, one of the most important musicals of our time. With the success of that particular show taking the entire world by storm, he was given the opportunity to make his old, relatively only semi-popular play into a blockbuster film. You can’t help but be inspired by someone like that.

I often find towards the end of a film I’m inspired by the characters’ journeys: be that from zero to hero, from lonely to loved or from rags to riches. Then I walk out and carry on with my normal life doing normal things. And as the hero of the story’s dreams all came true in the closing minutes (sorry for the spoiler, but it’s a musical, they rarely end in despair), a thought floated across my mind:

I’m utterly sick of being inspired

Now, to my credit, I did figure out in the car home that ‘tired’ would be a far more fitting and rhythmic word to use in this sentence, but this was a mentality that I found resonated really strongly with me. I’m very good at being inspired, I think most people are. We hear stories of people starting their own business, achieving some sporting brilliance or overcoming a personal hurdle and we say “Wow, isn’t that inspiring?” or

“It really inspires you to go out and make a difference!” or

“They are such an inspirational speaker!”

Then we go off about our day, not acting on the inspiration, and, for the most part, remaining uninspired. So I decided to act. 

I did some very quick research (/acquiring of images of graffiti) in order to get the right shapes and textures to create a spray paint effect in Illustrator. I did some very quick research (/confirming the colours) of South American flags, taking the blue and red used in flags of the home nations of Miles Morales from Spider-Man and Usnavi from In The Heights. And I created the top design.

YES! I had been inspired and I had drawn a wee picture to show that - I had acted on my inspirations!

Then I looked to my left and spotted three, blank skate decks that I had bought on a whim from Re:Ply (a wonderful wee company who do a great deal of charity work supplying boards to people who need them, selling boards to people who can afford them, and for a very reasonable fee, providing unusable decks to people who want to use them for artistic purposes). I realised I hadn’t acted on my inspiration, I had just drawn a few pictures of skateboards with the eventual aim of PhotoShopping them onto other pictures of skateboards.

So I took myself...

... into the city centre with a shoddily prepared speech: “I’m looking for some cheap, small cans of spray paint. I’ve no idea what I’m doing, or if I’ll be good at it, so don’t want to invest too much into this.” Hiding behind this self-deprecating shield I barged into multiple art-, pound- and model-shops and pleaded with the staff to help a young idiot out. Amazingly, a very kind shop assistant pointed me in the direction of Fat Buddha, a clothes shop I’d always ignored as it seemed a bit to “...” for me. I don’t know what it seemed, but I knew it wasn't my kind of shop. Happy to prove me wrong, the guys in there were super helpful and they helped me buy my first cans of spray paint. 

Now I’d spent money...

... and as a skinflint, that meant I had to get use out of my purchases. I had tricked myself into being inspired. Inspiration led me to the drawing, inspiration had led me to buy decks and the paint, now inspiration had to make me spray paint.

I’ll stop yammering on now. Essentially, I had planned on creating some analogue designs then digitising them (I’m guessing I should do a post on my brief, yeah? Might just upload the PDF to save me talking more), but then I found that I was doing the complete opposite. Genuinely accidentally. I had played with a few typefaces from various websites to get fonts that represented the ideas I wanted. The top one was semi-stolen (I can’t use the word ‘inspired’ any more in this post) from the end credits of In The Heights. The larger font is something of a nod to inspirational quotes you see on Facebook or on glittery frames in B&M.

I printed those out and cut them into stencils (very impressed that my digital boards have been drawn to a workable scale, thanks Maths). And after putting down a tack-layer (GRAFFITI JARGON (I think)) I sprayed the whole lot in blue.

Next, I tried to get a little fancy. Using cardboard blockers to create straight lines I added stars* (borrowed from the Puerto Rican flag) and made the bottom stripes vaguely reminiscent of America’s Old Glory.

I peeled the lettering off, and I’d done it. I may have to explain the overtly-negative inspirational quote to people, but to me it’s a clear sign that there’s no point in just being inspired, and that’s all I wanted.

A weight I didn’t know I was carrying was lifted from my shoulders. The plan was to possibly end up with a self-designed skateboard. And now I have one.

*Yes, I know they’re crosses.

#pp_hncgd1 #allhandsondecks #skateboard

[billyboymiki]

5 Works Tag Game

Rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and post or link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

I got tagged by @tippenfunkaport and @caramelaire for this tag game!!

I’m not one to compliment myself on anything honestly. Recently I remember thinking about how I barely drew anything this year. There was a part of my brain nagging at me to check how much I had drawn last year. So, I uh did. Turns out I drew basically nothing?! I triple checked this in fact. My DeviantART, Tumblr AND my camera roll. Nothing . . . I drew 5 very basic pinback button designs and that was it. I couldn’t believe it; but, it made be feel so much better about what I did this year. Basically my whole instagram is all artwork from this year, since I am actually really new to IG. I got super close to 40 works this year!

Now onto the works! They are in order of when I drew them 😊

Glimmer Inspired Patterns

I wanted to teach myself how to make patterns on Clip Studio so bad! I watched a couple of YT tutorials, and I can’t even remember why I decided to make She-ra ones specifically; I’m glad I did though! The Glimmer one means so much to me. Just looking at makes me so happy! The fact that so many people have now called it ‘aesthetically pleasing’ makes me feel as though I actually created a work that others could relate to. That was enough praise for me; to create something for myself that everyone else loved as well 💖

Glimbow Cuddle

This was my first real She-ra artwork. When I saw there was a Glimbow Week again I knew I had to join this one. I don’t know if anyone knows this; but, drawings take me forever to make. I used to be strictly a traditional artist and still prefer to draw rough drafts on paper. I couldn’t decide if I wanted them on Glimmer’s window seat or in Bow’s dads’ library. I was afraid of doing backgrounds; so, both sounded absolutely terrifying. I decided to go for the fireplace even if it meant fancy lighting on top of the background aspect. I think I actually spent more time on the lighting that’s hitting Bow than on anything else in this picture. It was worth it though. I studied how the show did backgrounds and lighting for a while. I tried so many different attempts at how I wanted it to look and ultimately went with this one! I love it so much 🥺

Bow’s list with doodles

Ah, yes the drawings I did for Tippen’s birthday!! I knew I wanted to draw a scene from ‘Tuna Cans’, but I was worried to try something like this. You see, I’m somebody that likes to stay in a comfort zone and only uploaded fully rendered perfect artworks. This year was the first time that I let the ‘fun’ aspect overrule my perfectionism. I’m so happy that I stepped out of my comfort zone for this, because I love Chibi styles so much. I can’t even explain the absolute joy I had drawing these. I didn’t tell anyone what I was up to, so it was just me laughing at myself for being an absolute goofball. The end result and everyone’s reactions were more than I could have ever expected. I’ve decided I’m going to revive this style soon as well so please look forwards to it!!

Space Suit Squad

Okay, so I cheated a little with this one! I couldn’t just pick ONE of the squad. Honestly though, I drew these with the thought of making them into prints in the back of my mind. I taught myself how to draw a space background and I’m really proud of it! So much in fact that the one in the final pictures is the first and last one I ended up doing! If I had to pick my favorites I think I’d have to pick Glimmer, Bow and then Catra. I LOVE the way I draw Catra I don’t know why? Maybe the eyebrows I’m not sure 🤔 It took me a while to decide on expressions and poses; although, I figured these were the ones because I could look at them and go ‘yep that’s them.’

Winter Glimbow

This one took me soooo long; I actually had to tell myself that I should put my pen down because it was done and I should stop touching it!!! I was sketching pictures in my sketchbook to make more patterns for my Redbubble account, and of course I’m like 100% Glimbow brainrot. My brain went, oooo you know what would be cute? If this skate was actually Bow’s and not just generic. So, I ended up sketching Glimmer’s as well. The heart that their skates make is like the cherry on the top for me, it had to be done! I’m not sure I did the background justice on this one? It doesn’t matter to me though because the concept was worth the effort. It was snowing here and I needed this picture like I needed air, even if it wasn’t even December at the time I posted it 🤣 I liked this one so much that I have similar ideas for the other seasons sketched out as well 👀

I’m sorry that I ramble so often. I’m like this quiet person; yet, it’s hard for me to get out everything I want to say? I’m horrible at it actually my brain runs at a hundred miles a minute and I’m not good with words most of the time. This turned out as more of a thought process than my actual feelings on each one I suppose. SO, in conclusion. I drew A LOT, I stepped out of my comfort zone, taught myself digital art and patterns. I let myself come to terms with the fact that not every piece of art has to be ‘perfect’. I drew at least 5 FULL backgrounds and I never used to draw them! I’ve also always been one for simple shading and lighting, and I do think there’s a time for that type of style, while other times sometimes a more difficult one might be appropriate. I’m glad that I did both because now I know I can do both, and they each give a characteristic that I adore 🥰 Thank you to everyone that has followed me through this journey, or just anyone who read my rambling! I have an honorable mention under the cut and some originals for anyone that made it this far! 💖

I’m not going to tag anyone; but, if you want to do this PLEASE do it. It was so great to reflect on what I did this year, it really surprised me and I think what you have done will surprise you as well! It’s been a rough year, and in the end we have been here supporting each other and that’s one of the most rewarding parts of being in a fandom! 💜

Glimmer screencap redraw

Another picture where I really tested myself on drawing a background! I love it even if it killed my hand!! The background definitely took the longest on this one too. My sister literally said ‘Wait, you did the background? I thought you just drew her?!’ And that was the only validation I needed!! I ended up thinning out Glimmer’s outline so she matched the background better. If you use the vectors on Clip please use this feature! You can do the opposite as well, it’s super useful!

Oh hi! Remember when I said I couldn’t decide between the two locations? Truth is, I also couldn’t decide if I was going to make it traditional or digital. I ended up getting really mad at the traditional version unfortunately. I haven’t gotten the hang of traditional backgrounds. In the end, I should have also done it in Copic and not cheap pencil crayons 😫

Just some space friends! There is something so rewarding about traditional art. Yes, I can see the mistakes and the proportions are most likely off; yet, it doesn’t bother me? I wanted to also show these bonus drawings because nobody is perfect and I thought some of you might like to see some of my process. Being able to hold it in my hands is something I will never tire of, in a way it’s super rewarding. I keep all my art actually and sometimes I like the rough drafts more than the finished work 👀 Outlining artwork can actually ruin the charm every so often 😔 I do really love the final versions of these though!

Annnnnd the last bonus!! As you can tell the final version stayed pretty true to my sketches! I almost went with a more realistic look and made the symbols ‘stitched’ onto the skates. In the end it felt like it didn’t fit the rest of the drawing unless I wanted to add extra details to the clothing as well. The wings on Glimmer’s skates turned into ‘Shwings’ PLEASE tell me other people know what that is? I had a pair a few years ago and misplaced them. I was doing the rough draft and it popped into brain and I treated it as a joke at first, until I gave it a proper chance XD In the end I fell in love with it!!!

#she-ra #spop #fanart #tag game #billyboymiki #Miki speaks #long post #sorry #my art #I actually cried a little writing all of this 😱 #the only thing I wanted to do really bad this year was make an spop amv #I might juggle art and making one so I can get one out at some point

[ayamari-no-goshi]

Eidolon 3 | (T)

ff.net | AO3

Fandom: Danny Phantom (DP)

Summary:  AU: What started off as the result of a simple act of rebellion ends up causing his life to spin out of control. How will young Danny cope with the results as well as a past that has a strange habit of coming back to haunt him.

Warnings: rated T for violence, mentions of death, kidnapping, and various other things

Parings: hints of Danny/Sam much later on

Notes: originally uploaded to Ff.net. Cross-posted to AO3 and tumblr.

Chapter 3: Worries

"Sam… can you run this by me again?" he asked as he stopped searching for a moment and glanced at her. "What exactly are we looking for?"

Her response was a roll of the eyes. "I thought we went over this already… Don't you want to know what we saw last night?"

"I don't!" Tucker voiced, causing the two of them to look at him. "What? That thing was scary! For all we know, it could still be out here, and I for one, have no desire to see it again!"

"Why, aren't we brave?" The sarcasm in Sam's voice spoke volumes. In an almost immediate response, Tucker covered his head with his arms. Apparently, that tone was a verbal warning of the threat of pain. Sam could apparently be rather scary when she felt like it.

"Hey! Don't get mad at me! I just want to keep my good looks safe for the ladies! Besides, you're the one with the grudge!"

That answer just seemed to anger Sam more. "How selfish can you get? You don't even care that other people could be in danger?" Though it was true that she had sworn her vengeance on whatever they had seen, rational seemed to have come back to her in the hours after the chase. She currently just wanted to know who or what that was.

"I do… except, in my book, I come first! Besides, shouldn't this be a job for the police instead?"

"Like they're going to believe a couple of kids. We'll probably be the ones to get in trouble if we say anything. They only take it seriously if we find some kind of proof."

Danny stayed silent as he watched their fight continue. Sam did have a point; whatever it was that they had seen the night before could potentially be dangerous to anyone in the area. It also seemed unlikely that the police would believe them, since they would probably just pass it off as some kind of animal, which it definitely was not! However, he sided more with Tucker. If it wasn't for Sam's persuasiveness (aka threats), there was no way that he would have come back to the cemetery for quite some time.

He glanced around the familiar surroundings and shivered slightly. It was only about one in the afternoon, but it felt like it was much later. The shadows appeared more pronounced, the statues looked corrupted, and the air seemed stale and heavy. It was almost as if that thing's presence had managed to taint the area.

Even though he really did not believe in the so-called paranormal, there was definitely something demonic about that creature. That thought caused him to sigh. He was being silly. There was probably a very logical explanation for what he and his friends had seen. It was probably just some drifter or psychopath… which is just as comforting.

In truth, he would rather just forget about the incident and chalk it up as a bizarre situation that he never wanted to ever deal with again. He had also made a promise to himself to never again sneak out of his house at night; being scared half to death was so not worth it. However, he had this sinking suspicion that Sam was going to make him break that. Speaking of which…

"What…?" he asked after he realized that she had asked him something. "Sorry, I wasn't listening."

"Jeez, Danny, get your head out of the clouds." Judging by her expression and the fact that Tucker was hiding rather poorly behind a nearby bush, they had stopped arguing for the time being. "I just wanted to know if you had managed to get home okay last night. I mean, you didn't get in trouble or anything, did you? I kinda forgot to ask earlier."

He frowned for a moment. "Surprisingly… no," he replied before giving them a sheepish grin. "I… uh… fell when I snuck back through my window. If you haven't already noticed, I'm kinda klutzy. Winston's use to that, but it's a little weird for me to fall at night. If he did wake up, I guess he assumed I fell off the bed again."

Sam shook her head. "Again…?"

"I don't do it often!" he replied in an embarrassed protest. "Just a couple times a year!"

"And that makes it so much better."

"Um, I don't mean to pry or anything," Tucker interrupted as he came over. Apparently, he now thought it was safe for him to come out of hiding, though he did make sure that he was out of Sam's punching range. "But, why do you call your dad by his first name?"

That question earned another sheepish look. "Well… um… I'm actually adopted. Winston's been my guardian for as long as I can remember. Apparently, my parents had asked him to take care of me if anything would happen to them…" He sounded wistful for a moment before he sat down on a nearby bench. Raising his head, he glanced at them while wearing an expression that was unreadable. "I… I really don't know what happened to them. Winston's not very comfortable with the topic."

After a small pause, Sam glared at Tucker, who cringed. "Tucker! How could you bring that up?" she demanded as she moved closer to him.

"Sorry!" He immediately backed away from her as he raised his hands again. "I didn't know!"

That caused Danny to chuckle, which caused both of them to look at him. "It's okay, really! I don't mind. Let's just go back to searching before Tucker gets hurt."

"Tucker likes that idea!"

Sam glared at the nervous boy for a moment before poked him in the chest, "Fine, but this doesn't mean that you're off the hook."

….

"Sam!" Tucker whined about an hour later. "Let's call it a day! We haven't found anything! And besides, we promised Danny yesterday that we'd show him around."

Once again, Danny agreed with him. There were definitely less boring activities than failing miserably at finding anything. They had found nothing! It was as if there was absolutely nothing to even suggest that there had even been something other than him in this part of the graveyard within the last day. It was definitely frustrating since there was a small part of him that did want proof that he hadn't just imagined last night. Even if Sam and Tucker had seen it, maybe it had been some weird group hallucination. He had heard those were possible.

Sam glanced around again and gave a frustrated huff before she kicked the ground. "I guess you're right… even if I don't want you to be. I guess we should lea… Hey, what's that?" She pointed at something before she sprinted over to whatever it was that she had seen.

He and Tucker shared a look before they followed her. By the time they had reached her, she had picked up what appeared to be a piece of paper and was examining it. Apparently, it contained either an image or word that was holding her interest.

"Um… Sam… what… oomf!" Danny's words were cut off when Sam shoved the paper into his hands. "What the heck?"

She glared at him while she impatiently tapped her foot. "Just look at it!"

After giving her a look, he complied. At first, the only thing that caught his attention was that he was holding a rather old piece of paper. That normally would not be too weird since littering was unfortunately common, but this paper wasn't just weathered, but it also had a strange feel as if it was more along the lines of canvas than actual paper. He then noticed that there were black marks on it, which he realized was a sketch of what appeared to be some sort of figure.

He turned the paper a bit to see if he could get a better feel for the picture. It appeared to be an ink sketch of what he took to be a demonic figure with… possibly flaming hair. After a moment, he also realized that there seemed to be writing on the top of the paper, but the letters were too faded for him to make out.

"So… what do you think?" Sam asked after he had handed the paper to Tucker.

"Not much," he replied with a shrug. "Sure, it's creepy enough, but I don't think it's related to this. Papers find their way here all the time. Possibly someone lost it out of their sketchbook a while back."

She just shook her head. "Danny, I tend to do a bit of sketching myself… That's not a type of paper, if it is paper, that you commonly use. In fact, I'm fairly certain that I've never seen it before."

"Sam, you're probably over thinking things. I really don't think that it's anything out of the ordinary," Tucker told her as he gave it back to her. He then glanced at Danny and grinned. "Although Sam's usually pretty level-headed, she sometimes lets her love of anything weird run away with her."

"Take that back!"

"In this case, I don't think I will."

"Would you still say that if you weren't standing behind me?" Danny asked as he tried to turn to get a look at his friend.

Tucker gave him a serious look. "Dude, have you seen her boots? They hurt! Oh… alright." After receiving another glare, he gave up on hiding and looked over at the still irritated goth. "If it will make you happy, I'll try to find some information on it when I get home. Though, to be absolutely honest, I'm fairly certain that picture's nothing more than the product of someone's deranged… oh, I mean artistic… mind."

Try as she might, Sam couldn't resist chuckling at his comment. "Thanks. If anyone could find something, it would be you."

"I'm glad you noticed."

"Sure, I noticed. It's your only redeeming quality."

"Hey!"

"Sorry to interrupt another one of your fights," he told them as he raised an eyebrow. Their "play" arguments were throwing him for a loop. How was it possible they were still friends if that happened as commonly as it seemed? "But, am I missing something?"

Sam laughed as she waved him off with her hand. "Don't mind us. Both of us keep forgetting that you don't know any of this yet. Although he might not look like it, Tucker's amazing with technology. I swear that he could honestly bring down a satellite with that PDA of his." She then glanced over at the boy who had brought out said PDA and had begun checking it in a strangely loving fashion. "I'm actually surprised that he didn't mention it yesterday. Perhaps he was trying not to scare you way."

After a moment she placed her hand on his shoulder. "Come on! We should leave now before he starts trying to induct you into his technologic world…"

xxxxx

The door slammed which let him know that his charge was finally home. If it was any other day, he would have actually gone to greet the boy, but this was not the case. He was currently stuck on the phone listening to someone who was irritating him more and more with each passing second. Even though he was usually a patient man, it was taking all of his self control to not raise his voice at her.

"Ma'am, I understand the consequences," he told the voice on the phone tiredly as he tried to wrap up the conversation, "But I assure you, that not only am I acting on his parents' wishes, but that I am also taking very good care of him."

What the woman said next absolutely enraged him. "That remains to be seen!" was his indigent reply. "Please reserve your judgments until you or one of your people come to do that review. Now, have a good day." The woman had tried to respond, but he cut her off by slamming the phone. Those people were so tiring, but that one really knew what to say to get under his skin.

"Uh… is everything okay in here…?" Danny asked carefully as he appeared in the kitchen. His expression clearly said that he hoped that he was not in trouble.

Winston sighed and ran his hand through his hair as he sat down. "It's really nothing too important, just another call from the state. Apparently, they're now attempting to use scare tactics." He then looked at the boy and tried to smile, "So, how was your day?"

Danny shrugged as he too grabbed a seat. "Sam and Tucker showed me around town some more, and we hit the arcade for a bit before Tucker had to head home. We're going to try to get together again in a couple days."

"That's good…"

"Um… are you sure you're okay?"

He sighed as he looked up at the boy who seemed worried about the absent-minded response he had recieved. "Yeah… I guess I let them get to me more than I had thought. Anyways, how does pizza sound for dinner?"

"That sounds great!" Danny then got up and headed towards the hall. "I'm going to be in my room for a while."

"That's fine." Winston then got up and picked up the phone again. After calling the pizza place, he headed into the study and tried to relax.

Why was in the world was that man getting involved in this? He had heard the rumors that the man had begun to involve certain aspects of his many companies in some of the state cases, but until that call he did not believe that they were actually true. Due to the money that those companies held, it was going to much more difficult than he had originally thought to keep Danny. Not only that, but the head of those companies, Vlad Masters himself, had personally become interested.

According to that woman, he claimed to be a friend of Danny's parents. If that was the case, why didn't they ask him to take the boy? But, that was beside the point. Even though the man was well-respected, there was something that just did not sit right with Winston. Sure, he might be a business genius, but he had gained way too much power too quickly. There were rumors that those gains had not been made above the table, and Winston believed that they were true.

It was also known that the man was not above using underhanded tactics in court. If this case did end up going that far… there was no telling what that man might reveal. Danny's story was complicated, and even though he had done what was asked of him, it was unlikely that a jury would see it the same way, especially with how unbelievable the story really was. Most likely, Masters would corrupt the tale, making it even worse.

Then there was Danny to think about. While it's true that he had not be entirely forthcoming with what had actually happened, he had planned on revealing everything on his upcoming birthday. However, with the current mess, he was unsure what precisely to do. If he was to wait and the boy was told a corrupted story, it would most likely shatter his world. He could not let that happen, but he did not want to add stress to him, especially since there had been no indication it was true…

A sudden crash followed by a yell immediately got him out of his seat. That was….? What was that? He stood still for a moment trying to figure out from where the noise had originated when he realized that had been Danny's voice. Sure, the boy did have a tendency to trip, but there was no way that was normal.

He immediately ran to boy's room and opened the door. "Danny! Are you all right? I heard a crash!" He looked around expecting the boy to be near his chair or bed, but instead he was on the floor, plastered against the wall. His piercing blue eyes were wide and frightened.

Worried, he kneeled beside the boy, placed his hand on the boy's shoulder, and gently shook him. Unfortunately, he still did not get a response as Danny was still staring at something. His military instincts kicked in, causing him to tense and glance around the room looking for anything that was out of place. After a moment, he realized that nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but he still kept himself prepared potential surprise.

"Danny…" he whispered harshly to his charge as he continued to watch, "what happened?"

There was no sound until he heard Danny take a deep breath and move. He looked back to see the boy leaning his head against the wall. His breathing was still heavy, but it looked like the worst of the shock of whatever had happened was beginning to wear off. "Are you okay?" he asked cautiously as he glanced around again.

"Huh…?" the boy's voice was startled. Had he only just realized that he had come into the room? "Wh-what's going on?"

"Are you hurt?" he asked as he knelt down again. "Did something happen? Did you see something weird?"

At the last question, his charge tensed and glanced at his hand as if he was examining it. After a moment, he hesitantly looked back at him and shook his head. "I… I'm fine, but what's with the twenty questions?"

He raised an eyebrow at the boy. "Really? Daniel, I heard a crash and a yell from you. I was worried," he told him as he helped him to his feet. "Are you sure everything's okay?"

This time, he was answered with a nod. "I'm fine… I just … fell off the chair... and managed to knock some of the stuff off my desk…" Danny cringed slightly when he realized how weak sounding his excuse was. He then became more animated and began to push the older man towards the door. "I promise! I'm perfectly fine! N-nothing's wrong! Just give me a few minutes to clean up everything, and I'll be right out! The pizza's supposed to be here shortly, right?"

Before Winston even had a chance to attempt to get a word in, Danny shoved him out of the room and slammed to door. He remained there, a little stunned for a few moments. Whatever had happened definitely spooked the boy, it was probably nothing like he had said… but he could not help but wonder. A normal fall like that should not be so frightening.

He took another glance at the door before he headed back into the kitchen. Maybe he should watch the boy a little more closely, just in case.

#danny phantom #danny phantom au #fanfic #fanfiction #dp au #danny fenton #phandom #dp #sam manson #tucker foley #vlad plasmius #supernatural #fantasy #Eidolon

[let-me-make-you-proud]

Tangled: The Series Q&A with Kait.

This is a recapitulation from today’s (September 14, 2019) Questions and Answers session with Kait on the Tangled Discord Server.

Q: Which Disney princesses outside of Tangled the series can you see Varian being friends with? Nonfranchise ones included.

A: I think Belle is the first one who comes to mind!! She’s super studious and goes against the grain…not to mention her father is an inventor who’s a little off-base! 🙂 I think he’d be super comfortable experimenting with Belle and her dad and reading awesome stories! (Maybe even sharing the Tales of Flynn Rider with her! …Assuming she hasn’t read it! Haha. ) He could also eat ham sandwiches with Anna. Sorry. Second thought. Lol!!

Q: So Kait, as a storyboard artist on the show what kind of little details, quirks or creative touches did you or any other artists put into Varian scenes you or others storyboarded?

A: Ha!! Any acting scene with Varian I had…I pretty much based off of Anna Lencioni (my best friend/ another board artist on the show.) Anna makes these very specific expressions and she gestures to herself a lot and closes her eyes and creases her brows and says things like “A-huh! Actually…” or “Um!!” Before making a point and it’s always reminded me of him.

She kept a “flynnolium” prop from Halloween with green goo in a vial in her cubicle at work so long it grew mold. She said she was studying it. She found scrap metal in her boot one day. She has a basement lab for her experiments and crafts. She befriended two raccoons at her last apartment. She is the most accident-prone person with freckles I’ve ever met…she’s pretty much him.

Jeremy Jordan’s reads give you so much to work with…and I love that character so much I feel a natural sort of understanding of how he might say something or do something…but Anna would always do these specifically Anna things that I had to use for Varian.

Q: Do you have any specific advice for aspiring storyboard artists or people who aspire to work in animation?

A: Gestural drawings help you learn to draw fast…which is a very important part of storyboarding. I would say storyboarding‘ s biggest requirements are clarity and speed. Lots of productions have different requirements in terms of what they look for from story artists. Tangled‘s leadership cared a lot about drawing skill, animation, layout, etc. because it more strongly informed the animation studio to have those things. The show I’m working on now (Monsters at Work) is a 3D show…so for our production, the emphasis is more on story and speed. We pitch ideas more than we pitch drawings…so clarity is important and acting is too, but we’re far less precious about tying down drawings and animating since we shift into the 3D production pipeline after story. The boards are still very important…but the more technical aspects are a *little* less so. The focus is just more on story and character and what the board artists can bring to their scenes.

So I’d say just practice drawing…maybe try and give someone a prompt or ask a friend for one. Choose a theme! Maybe vampires? What’s the worst thing that could happen to a vampire? What’s the best thing? What’s the funniest thing? What if they were also an alien? Or fused with a werewolf? Or chained to one? What would happen? Giving yourself a starting point for an idea will inspire you to explore all the possibilities for humor, drama, etc. in that idea. If you’re struggling to give yourself a prompt, try looking online…or maybe choosing a song you like or a passage from a book for inspiration.

There’s also this really fun thing you can do to study cinematography and shot composition called a “three tone” exercise. Basically…put on your favorite (live action) film, grab a sketchbook, grab a black and grey marker, and use the white of the page for your third tone. What you wanna do is (as you’re watching or while pausing) sketch a small thumbnail using only three grey tones of what you see on the screen. Draw the shot- where the characters are, try and duplicate the lighting…it teaches you a lot! 🙂 (Phew!)

Q: Do you have any fun non-spoiler head canons about Varian?

A: I think his favorite dessert is apple pie and I think he bakes recreationally very often! He’s probably a good cook. (Though he may have one or two minor accidents……a burnt thing here and there. Minor oil splatters….haha!!)

Q: What’ve been your favorite episodes, both to storyboard and in general? Of course, no specifics if it’s S3

A: Haha! Well…What The Hair and Queen for A Day have special places in my heart because they were such big moments for my favorite character…(Varian, haha.) But I’d say the episodes I had the most fun boarding are all in season 3!!! Which is exciting! I have to start compiling some work to post! 🙂 I think the episode I had the most fun with is one you guys will really enjoy.

Q: Will we get some interesting surprises (In Season 3)?

A: Without any spoilers- absolutely!! The show is always full of those.

Q: So We’ve heard many fans express why they love Varian as a charcter before, I’d love to know what drew you and Anna to Varian as well and why you guys personally found him to be a great character.

A: When Shane Prigmore originally pitched the character to me, he was much younger. He was like 11 or so, I think? Maybe 12? He’s still pretty young…but what Shane said was that he wanted him to go from this wide-eyed kid to this dark, angry person whose bangs fell over those wide, bright eyes…just full of rage. That idea was super interesting to me…it just hit on something in character development that I felt like I’d never exactly seen before? He was so young and it was such an interesting idea to me to make a child the villain and to give that child a strong reason to be angry? It felt like it was taking this child very seriously, which I appreciate. It felt very real and very dark.

The thing that threw me through a loop but also evolved my fascination with the character was Jeremy Jordan’s casting. I listened to a lot of the auditions they had for various actors and I had seen a ton of Shane’s concept art of the character…a lot of them were VERY different than what we have now. One version Ricky Roxburgh (writer) contributed to had Varian cast as an adult in the story. But when I heard Jeremy I felt like I totally understood who Varian really was.

He was a well-intentioned disaster with unchecked emotions. That. Is me! Haha!! I see myself in his imperfections, his emotionality in spite of his creative and often intellectual thinking. He wants to ascend to these levels he may not be ready to ascend to…he feels this need to prove himself and seek validation. I don’t know, I guess I relate to that! And I’m just a sucker for good guys gone bad. The other half of this, of course, is that he’s very charming and cute and super reminds me of my best friend, Anna Lencioni.

Q: Which character do you most like seeing interacting with Varian?

A: It’s a little spoilery for me to reveal that……..but I think you guys are gonna know when it happens! Haha!

I can’t wait to post THOSE boards

That’s actually right out of the episode I think I liked boarding the most, haha.

Q: If there was one prop (furniture, object, the like) from the Tangled series that could be made real and you could keep, what would it be..?

A: I think it’d have to be those little alchemy orbs that Varian throws? They just suddenly clean the whole castle hallway somehow and like…could use me some of that. He also has the one that removes stains from tablecloths, so. I’m sloppy. That’d be a big help. Haha!

Also his staff is pretty cool 😉, I boarded/created that staff…David Lee (prop designer) did its final design…haha

Q: I have a question about a scene in season 1. When Varian got back the first part of the scroll he mentioned that it took him a while to translate it. Has he really been able to read it or has it been a bluff?

A: Varian can indeed translate what’s on the scroll. 😉

Q: Do you have any networking advice for those trying to get into the animation industry?

A: Post your work!! Make it easily accessible, tag it well, just show what you’ve got online! Upload boards, animatics, drawings, etc. Creating an online presence can really help put your name out there. Apply for internships, jobs. I know it’s hard to network because a lot of industry professionals don’t have time to answer specific questions or give portfolio reviews…so it’s sort of important to take some initiative on that and be self-motivated.

For me, I studied the portfolios of Disney feature story artists, CalArts students, etc. and tried to structure the presentation of my work based on that. Also, it helped me get a sense of what pieces of work would best showcase where I was trying to go and what I was trying to do. I’d ask yourself those questions as you develop a portfolio and artistic voice online! 🙂

My first feature job after a trainee program in New York at Blue Sky happened because Doug Sweetland (Pixar animator, feature director, awesome dude) found my work online and liked it. He just reached out based on that!

Shane Prigmore actually reached out to me for Tangled similarly.

Q: Besides Varian, do you have a favorite character that you’ve boarded?

A: I always love Eugene. He’s the second character I think I’m most like. His acting was really fun to play with and I felt like I could push his expressions a lot because he’s so funny. I loved boarding Lance too (I boarded a lot of Lance in S3!!) but MAN was he hard to draw, haha! His face shape is just really hard to draw at certain angles.

Q: With Varian cosplay that is going on, what Disney character would you like to see Varian dress up as next?

A: Jack Skellington! Halloween is afoot. Jack is another well-intentioned disaster. Guess I have a type!

Q: What’s Varian’s opinion on raccoons, are they his favourite animal?

A: I imagine it’s because Ruddiger is always finding interesting things in the trash and giving them to Varian to use in his experiments. Also, they’re fat and cute.

Q: There’s a bit of an argument going on over how many freckles Varian has. Can you confirm how many he has?

A: Ha!!! Yes…one second… 14!!

Q: How big do you think Corona is? Like Vatican City small or Arendelle big?

A: You know, with the wall and all, it actually feels a little on the smaller side to me? I’m sure there’s a little bit of discrepancy between the movie’s version of Corona and our version…but based on where we went within Corona on the show, I’d say it feels on the smaller side.

Q: Are there any non-spoiler Varian scenes or moments that didn’t make the cut that you can share?

A: MAN. Yes. There is one scene that changed after I rolled off the episode and I’m very sad about it. I’ll post it after the episode airs! There was also a line of Varian’s that I boarded to a specific read from Jeremy Jordan and that read was not chosen in editorial later so…I’ll post that one too, haha!

Q: What is your favourite song from the first two seasons so far?

A: All my favorite songs are in season threeeeee…hahahaha!! I think Let Me Make You Proud or the Buddy Song are my favorites. Buddy Song still gets stuck in my head now and then.

Q: What do you think Varian would order at a drive-thru? Specifically at chipotle 😂

A: Chipotle isn’t a drive thru!! Hahaha He’d get the kid’s quesadilla from chipotle. I think Varian is a fries/chips kind of person…something to snack on while he works! He probably also likes milkshakes.

Q: (Continuation from the question above) Chocolate or vanilla?

A: He’d revolutionize by combining them both. FOR SCIENCE!

Q: What is, in your opinion, the most challenging part of varian’s design to draw?

A: His goggles, hahaha. Or just his…hair in general.

Well it’s funny too because when you board these guys, you get used to doing a shorthand for them and then when you go to draw them FOR REAL you realize how complicated that actually is and how wrong your shorthand actually was? Hahahaha

Q: is Varian ticklish at all?

A: I feel like Varian, Eugene, and Lance are all equally ticklish. To the point of absurdity. Cass would fight it as long as she could…but when it finally got to her, she’d laugh uncontrollably. Rapunzel, she’s the TICKLER.

Q: What do you think Varian opinion and belief on magic is now that he’s seen it with his own eyes?

A: I imagine that he certainly believes in it now and no longer underestimates its powers…but I imagine he’s ultimately more comfortable staying in his own lane and working with worldly properties!

Q: If Varian would have been able to meet Demanitus…how would their conversation had looked like?

A: I feel like Varian would have had a TON of questions about his legendary device and whether or not he truly traveled dimensions.

Q: Did Varian have any other friends in old Corona before he met rapunzel?

A: Probably not many…he’s a bit of a hermit. I think Ruddiger is his best friend……. It’s sad but I also think that’s kind of why it hurt so bad when Rapunzel wasn’t able to help him. Also why he was SO excited to have Rapunzel, Cass, and Eugene come visit.

I think the village looked at Varian as a little unstable or worrisome. I’m sure everyone knew he was very nice…but they were likely very unnerved by his inventions.

Q: Do you think Varian ever tried to synthesise gold or the elixir of life like a real alchemist?

A: I’ve wondered that myself!! I think his alchemy has proven to be more about other people…helping others, making people proud. Maybe if someone he cared about was in need.

Q: If you were to meet Varian in real life, what would you say to him?

A: What elixir did you make to get THAT kind of volume? His hair’s so POOFY! Honestly, I’d probably just give him a hug.

Q: How much does Varian know or remember about his mom?

A: I’d say about as much as the photo of her on the wall.

Q: Is there spoiler about his hair streak? Or is it just by design?

A: It’s totally by design. I think it’s safe to assume it’s probably the result of some lab accident!

Q: In what ways is Jeremy Jordan like Varian?

A: I don’t know Jeremy Jordan personally, haha! But I think a lot of these inflections he adds to Varian sort of off the cuff probably come very naturally to him. I know he often wants to do his own pass at the musical arrangement Alan Menken writes…like he’ll want to do something a little different, in his own way, and it will change the song completely!! In an awesome way. That’s a little Varian-esque. In the “Let Me Make You Proud” reprise…Alan Menken had sung that “they are going to pay…they…will…pay” all in a low, downward tone. Jeremy wanted to scream it and make it powerful and angry and loud when he said “PAY” and you could just hear the spite in his voice for the “they will pay.” Genius!

Q: What was the most shocking moment/revelation of the series to you (minus anything season 3)?

A: It’s hard to say because I knew most of what was going to happen long, long ago. I think one of the things that made me go “oh dang!” was something Tom Canfield boarded. It’s that part in Destinies Collide where Lance slices the entire statue down the middle with a sword. What a BAMF!

Q: What were your thoughts on the early concept of Varian having an apple orchard and being a farm kid instead of a young alchemist?

A: He still kinda has those things! Quirin is a farmer as well as the village leader and there are apples on their little farm estate! 🙂 I think that makes Varian very unassuming as a mad little scientist. I’m sure that’s how (Ruddiger and Varian) met! Remember, he used his purple tacky goo stuff to catch raccoons so they wouldn’t eat the crops! And Ruddiger’s favorite snack is apples. 😉

Q: What is his official height and weight?

A: Smol.

Q: How did you guys come up with Varian’s name? And was there any other name suggestions for him before the name ‘Varian’ was chosen?

A: I’m not sure who came up with that name, actually! I’m sure it has something to do with the meaning of the word “variant” which means something that varies, changes in form.

Q: What’s his last name?

A: His last name!! I have NO idea and it bothers me!!! A Disney magazine referred to Varian, Ruddiger, and Quirin as “The Ruddiger Family” and I still haven’t stopped laughing about that.

Q: What sad Disney movie moments would make him cry?

A: Oof. Lion King.

Q: What musicals do think Varian would enjoy?

A: Little Shop of Horrors! I think he’d see himself in Seymour! Or Wicked…you know, that villain arc.

Q: How did Arianna and Fred meet?

A: I actually don’t know off the top of my head!

Q: Would Varian enjoy rollercoasters?

A: I think he’d enjoy how they’re MADE and then scream his head off while riding one, throw up his cotton candy and corndog, and go play carnival games instead. Then get mad that they’re rigged.

Q: So what comes next for you now that the series is almost over? Any big plans?

A: Well the series wrapped for production a while ago! I’ve been on another show for almost a year now! 🙂 I’m working on the new Disney+ show Monsters at Work as a director! It’s an awesome, awesome show…totally next-level…I’m shocked that I’m getting to be apart of something like this. It’s a direct sequel to the movie that serves as an office comedy (a la The Office, Parks and Rec) and has so many characters that fit immediately into the Monsters Inc world. Monsters Inc is my favorite Pixar movie…so I literally come to work and leave work on the same high! It’s an awesome, awesome show with a great crew! 🙂 It’s also just really exciting to be apart of the first original animated property for D+!

Q: How would you compare working as a director to working as a storyboard artist?

A: It’s hard work, just as hard, but in a different way! For me personally, I’m a little easily fatigued by drawing? I get a little creatively frustrated because my thoughts move quicker than my hand. Or because I don’t always feel like I can execute in a drawing what I’m thinking in the way that I want? Part of that is just being an artist…and it’s not ALL the time that I feel that way…but I think I have a certain stamina for drawing that I found challenging to increase.

Directing is just different! It has a lot more to do with managing a team, communication, coordinating, listening, speaking up, problem-solving, being very aware of story as it applies to ALL parts of a production. I don’t draw as often anymore. You have to consider a lot more…more people, more constraints, more difficulties, more opinions, more solutions…it’s just MORE. And you also still have to draw! 🙂 It’s very busy work, but it’s AMAZING and I love it. I feel like I’m contributing to animated storytelling a lot more in this role, actually. I love working with people, I love workshopping, and I love helping! I’m also just spoiled to be working with some great people right now. It’s a blast.

Q: Are any Tangled: The Series crew joining you on that show?

A: Yes!! Tom Caufield and Wendy Sullivan were on it for a minute, but they’ve both moved on to Dreamworks recently! James Suhr (board artist), Isabelle Gedigk (season 3 board artist), Naomi Hicks and Casey Coffey (revisionists), David Lee (props), Ricky Roxburgh (writer), and I are all working together again! It’s awesome.

Q: Does Varian, deep down, blame himself for the amber?

A: I believe he does.

Q: How do you deal with artist’s block?

A: I try to think about the intention behind what I’m doing. Why is the scene I’m working on very important to the story? If it feels unimportant or boring, how can I make it interesting? What can I do on my end to make it more inspiring or fun without going too far off the rails and still serving the scene’s purpose?

If it’s not work-related, I try and start with some fan art or something familiar for me to draw. I have a lot of scribbly Varians in the margins of a lot of my sketch documents. I use him as a warm-up a lot. It helps build my confidence to draw something familiar/ that I think I can draw pretty well.

Q: What’s the hardest scene you’ve ever had to board?

A: Oh God. ANYTHING with action. I’m not an action gal. Lots of stuff in S3. I was board partners with Wendy Sullivan and ended up getting a lot of action to board even though she’s WAY better at it than me!! It was an interesting challenge…but it was very, very challenging. Ben (Co-EP) was a great mentor to me in the scene I did for the mid season. He was very patient with me, despite my shortcomings as an action board artist, haha. I enjoy boarding for comedy much more.

Kait: Anyways, I should probably head off now! Thank you guys so much for all the questions!!!! You’re awesome! I hope you’re all super excited for S3! It’s a great one.

#tangled #tangled the series #rapunzel's tangled adventure #varian #Q&A #Tangled crew #Question & Answers #Kait #ruddiger #Rapunzel #Eugene #Lance #Cassandra

[girls-scenarios]

Ocean Muse

Idol: Miya (GWSN)

Prompt: This is probably pretty unique but can I request a fic for GWSN's Miya with a female reader? The reader works as a rescue diver and Miya is an artist. Miya surprises the reader with a painting of sea life + her diving and Miya confesses at the same time? Feel free to change up what you need to lol. A fluff piece, non-idol!AU. If you do this one thank you! And make sure to take care of yourselves this blog is amazing!

Writer: Admin Kiwi

A/N: I love GWSN, they seriously have no bad songs and are all super sweet and fun girls. I really recommend you all check them out! They also upload covers and short videos of themselves that have English subs, so you can get to know them well! Anyway, I hope you all enjoy!

♡ Tip Jar♡

It was frustration that originally drove Miya to that cliff by the sea that overlooked the beach. For a month, she’d holed herself up in her studio, working to no avail. Hundreds of pieces of paper and canvases littered the floor, painted and then trashed out of frustration. During her most successful year yet, she’d hit a wall: she could paint nothing she was satisfied with and had no inspiration for anything new. Frustration took over, and it was that frustration that led her to pack up her things and head to Jeju, ready to give up forever.

Jeju was exactly what she needed. It was summer, and the air was warm, kissing her skin and relaxing her sore muscles. The picturesque scenery and the peaceful atmosphere even encouraged her to pick up her paintbrushes again, ebbing the anger and annoyance from her shoulders. But it was the cliff that truly changed everything.

She found it while she was out driving, looking for a good spot to sit and relax, and perhaps even paint or draw a little something. It was located near a busy beach and, further down, a dock, where fishermen were always going in and out. But up on the cliff, it was quiet, the wind carrying up the faint sounds below. There was a small bench located near the edge, as well as a metal fence, and that was why she stopped her car and walked over. The air was clear and salty, the sun warm, and somewhere nearby, birds chirped. Down below, she could see families coming and going, and it made her smile.

This was the perfect spot.

She settled down on the ground near the fence and pulled out her sketchbook but left it closed on her lap, breathing in the clear air and closing her eyes. When she opened them again and looked down, something near the cliff bottom caught her eye, and she leaned over to look. Divers, all in black diving gear, were walking out of the water. She had heard about the female divers here, but this didn’t seem to be the same thing. In fact, they seemed to have some sort of health or emergency symbol on their suits. Fascinated, she watched as the group began to take off their equipment and masks, talking among themselves.

As she watched, a gentle wind brought a laugh up from below that seized her heart as the wind ruffled her hair. You pulled off your mask and revealed your face, knocking the breath out of her as you ran your fingers through your wet hair and smiled, saying something to your friend that she couldn’t hear. Despite how far away you were, Miya couldn’t take her eyes off of you. There was something so... alluring about you. About the way you skillfully took apart the equipment with a smile on your face, all while seeming to lead the team. She’d never believed in love at first sight, but what else could this be?

When you walked off towards the pier, carrying your equipment, the spell was broken and she could breath again. Turning around, she stumbled back to where she’d left her art supplies and quickly opened her sketchbook, sitting down on the bench. Your smiling face still ingrained in her mind, she began to draw, full of inspiration for the first time in months.

-

The sketch turned out wonderful, a still of you looking out towards the ocean and smiling, and she hung it up in her new, makeshift work space in the studio apartment she was renting. A thrill rushed through her veins again, and she itched to paint you, to get a closer look at your smile, and to see you again.

So she ended up back at that cliff, her sketchbook in hand, eyes trained on the sea. She had a reason to paint again.

-

Sometimes, you showed up on the beach. Other times, she waited only for you not to appear. Through her watching, Miya started to understand your schedule and your job. You were a rescue diver, that much she’d gathered from overhearing your conversations when the wind was right, and this beach was a practice site where you trained new divers, which explained why you weren’t there every day. Her sketchbook filled up with drawings of you: you coming out of the water, you laughing with your trainees, you diving into the ocean. Alongside those drawings were sketches of ocean life, the beach, and the view from the cliff. Everything seemed to inspire her now, and she loved it.

Eventually, she worked up the nerve to go down to the beach one Monday when she knew you’d be at the beach. Sure enough, you showed up thirty minutes after she did, leading your team towards your normal spot. She watched in awe as you suited up for the dive, taking note of all of the different types of equipment in her sketchbook. This close, she could hear you explaining them all, so she jotted down notes, wanting to make sure her paintings were as realistic as possible. It was interesting, too, how much work went into diving. It fascinated her that people could remember all the rules.

When you went underwater, she busied herself with drawing a group of seagulls and a two nearby fighting crabs until you resurfaced once again. As you chatted with your group and took off the equipment, she took a deep breath and psyched herself up. She had to talk to you. It was now or never.

Thankfully, you always had a habit of walking behind your group, so she wouldn’t have to stop you in front of everyone. As you picked up the last of your things, the rest of the group already going ahead, she carefully approached you.

“Um, hello. I’m sorry to bother you, but could I ask you something?”

You looked up, a bit startled, before smiling, standing up straight and nodding. “Hello, and sure, I don’t mind!”

“Can I ask what you guys are doing out here? With the diving, I mean.” She felt embarrassed as she spoke, her cheeks heating up. This was dumb. What was she even doing?

“Oh, I’m training some of my trainee rescue divers! The water is deep in this area so not many families come over here, but it’s still a relatively safe dive spot, so it’s a good training area.” You tucked your wet hair behind your ear, looking at her curiously. “I hope we aren’t getting in the way of anything.”

“Oh, no!” She waved her hands quickly before gesturing to her sketchbook. “I’m just an artist and I’ve been coming to this beach for inspiration. Since I see you here a lot, I started to get curious. It’s really fascinating to watch you dive.” Did that sound weird? She was sure, but you didn’t seem to think so, your smile widening.

“Oh wow, I’ve never met an artist before, but I’m glad you find diving interesting!”

“Can I ask what a rescue diver does?”

You thought for a minute. “Well, we do a lot of things. A lot of times we get called in to help with sinking boats but really we’re called for any water-based accidents. And sometimes we help with collecting things from sunken boats or cars that might help if there’s an investigation.”

“Wow,” Miya said, eyes wide in awe. “You have a really important job. Isn’t it stressful?”

“To be honest, yes,” you said with a little laugh and nod. “But it’s my passion so I don’t mind it.” You held out your hand. “I’m (Y/N) by the way.”

“I’m Miya.” She shook your hand and smiled. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“Can I ask you something in return?”

That took her by surprise, and she raised her eyebrows. “Oh, sure! Since I asked you so many, it’s only fair.”

“What do you do? As an artist, I mean. I’m not really familiar with that kind of stuff.”

“Mostly I paint, but I like to do sketches before I start my paintings. Especially if I’m painting something real. Like the ocean, for example. I want everything to be right.” She shrugged. “It’s nothing impressive but I enjoy it.”

“No, I think it’s impressive! I can’t paint so I’m always amazed with what artists can do. I’d love to see your work sometime, Miya.” You smiled brightly, and internally, Miya panicked. How was she supposed to explain a sketchbook full of, well, you? Swallowing, she quickly flipped through the book, finally landing on the sketch of the crabs from earlier.

“Here’s one of the sketches I did today. It’s nothing special, though, it was a quick drawing.” Her cheeks flushed and she wished she could show you something better. But you, on the other hand, let out a little gasp when you looked at the page.

“What are you talking about? That’s a great sketch! If this is just a quick drawing, your paintings must be amazing!”

She blushed even more, laughing nervously. “I don’t know about that.”

“I’m sure they’re wonderful.” You checked the watch you had on under your sleeve. “Hey, I’m off after this, so if you want, why don’t we grab some lunch? You can tell me more about your art, and I can explain more about diving to you.”

Was this really happening? Miya felt a little dizzy but she grinned, tucking her sketchbook under her arm. “I’d like that.”

“Great! Then let’s meet at the noodle place up by the pier. I have to get dressed, but I know the owner there. She’ll give us a good deal.”

“I’ll be there,” she said, hardly believing what she was saying. Out of all the things she’d been expecting to happen, eating out with you was not one of them. But she wasn’t about to complain.

-

Despite the difference in jobs, it turned out that the two of you actually had a lot in common. You had the same music tastes, the same tastes in food, and the same favorite books. And, of course, both of you loved the beach. It was easy to chat and laugh with you, because you felt like a friend already.

When she left the noddle shop by the pier, Miya had her muse’s number in her phone and a smile on her face. She couldn’t wait to get back to work.

-

“Can I sketch you?” This was probably something she should have asked you before, but it was only now that she had the courage. She was sitting on the side of a boat, her legs dangling over the side and arms resting on the metal railing, watching as you got ready for yet another practice dive. When you smiled at her, she was overcome with affection and courage. The words just came out on their own.

“Me?” Your cheeks colored as you pulled your face mask up to look at her. “I-I mean, are you sure?”

“I’m sure. Whenever I see you getting ready, it gives me a lot of inspiration.” She had never seen you flustered before, and it was kind of cute, making her smile as she watched you busy yourself with tightening your vest.

“I don’t mind it,” you said, voice soft as you pulled the mask back down to hide your face. You were ready to dive now. “I’m flattered, actually.”

“Thank you. I’ll show you the sketch when you come back up.”

Whenever you jumped into the water, Miya got a rush of adrenaline, as if she was the one in the suit. Your head bobbed back above water for a moment and when you looked up at her, she couldn’t help but to smile and reach her hand out to you.

“Good luck.”

You didn’t say anything in return, your mask and oxygen mouth piece already in place, but you reached up to touch her hand, giving it a little squeeze before pulling away and giving her a thumbs up. Then, you were underwater, and she watched for as long as she could see you before you disappeared into the deep blue, leaving her with a pounding heart and a pencil in hand.

-

She could always tell when you’d had a long day. You would text her late in the evening, asking if she wanted to go get late dinner or meet up at a bar to chat. Sometimes, you would even invite her over, or she would, on occasion, invite you over to her place (after desperately cleaning up, of course). Your texts would be a little shorter than usual, and once the two of you got closer, you started to include little sad faces. It was cute, and she found herself doodling them in the corners of her pages.

On long days, you just wanted someone to chat with, so that you could forget the events of the day. She always made time to go out, putting off her art in order to meet up at your choice of a place. It was a little open-air bar and seafood place that became your go-to. From the benches outside, the two of you could see the beach. A light wind blew through every night and dark waves lapped against the sand and rocky cliff sides, providing a soothing background noise while the stars shined brightly above, twinkling as the two of you quietly talked, ate, and drank. Sometimes, it was cold, and the two of you huddled together for warmth. Other times, it was warm enough that the bench was hot to the touch.

Tonight was a cold night, so it didn’t surprise Miya when you leaned your head on her shoulder, letting out a sigh. The wind played with her hair and whipped against her face, but the noodles she had were warm, and she touched her hands to the bowl, warming her skin.

“Hey, Miya?” Your voice was light and airy. She figured you were already a little tipsy as she turned her head slightly, only to find your face inches from her own. You were looking at her with wide eyes, and her breath caught in her throat.

“Y-yes?” She managed to get out. You let out another sigh and turned away to look up at the stars.

“What do you think happens when we die?” Your question caught her off guard, and she froze, not knowing how to answer. You shook your head, still leaning on her shoulder. “Never mind. I’m sorry. That was a heavy question.”

She took a deep breath, then reached over to gently put her hand over yours. Deep inside, she knew why you were asking that question, and she wished she could make it all better. “All you can do is your best, (Y/N).”

For a moment, you were silent. Steam curled up from your untouched noodles. “I guess you’re right.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Once again, you shook your head, sitting up straight. “Not really. But thank you for the offer.” You stood from the bench and she watched as you walked over to the railing that separated the eating area from the road and rested your arms there. “Sometimes, I wonder why I do this job. Especially on days like this.” You tilted your head back and looked up at the sky. Your hair caught in the wind and your eyes fluttered closed as you breathed in the ocean air, half in the shadows cast by buildings and half illuminated by the mosquito lights and the stars.

“You do it because you’re passionate and you love to help people.” Miya paused, trying to find the right words. “Sometimes you can’t fight fate. But you have more successes than you do failures. You’re an inspiration to me.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

You turned back to her and smiled, a soft, sad smile, and there, with your head framed by the stars and the ocean lapping at the beach behind you, you looked almost ethereal. “Thank you, Miya. I always feel better when I talk to you.”

This was a moment she wanted to ingrain in her mind forever, so she took in the lighting and the way you looked, etching the memory into her brain. “I’m always here for you when you need me.”

You stepped back to the bench and let out a long breath, body falling into Miya’s and your shoulders sagging. She caught and held you, hugging you close, and you seemed to relax a bit in her arms, eyes closing once again. “I’m so lucky to have you.”

“No, I’m the lucky one,” she said, looking out at the ocean. You chuckled and she swallowed thickly, closing her own eyes. If only you knew how truthful she was being.

-

“Come on, let me teach you how to dive.” You were grinning widely, as if you weren’t proposing the scariest thing Miya could possibly think of. She could feel the blood drain from her face as she stepped away from the boat and back onto the pier, slowly shaking her head.

“I-I don’t know about that.” It was no secret that she was easily scared, but diving was a whole other level of terrifying. Even with all the equipment, the idea of being deep underwater made her heart drop. “I mean, I’ve never done anything like it before.”

“I’m a certified trainer,” you said with a laugh, reaching out your hand. “I won’t let anything bad happen. I promise.” When she didn’t take it right away, you raised your eyebrows. “Do you not trust me?” Your voice was playful, as if you were teasing her, and she groaned, taking your hand.

“I do trust you, but I’m not sure I want to be underwater.”

“Then how about this.” You pulled her onto the boat, the one you usually used when going out diving. It seemed much more intimidating today than it was when Miya just went out to watch. “We don’t have to go very deep. We’ll go to a more shallow area with roping to follow and I’ll stay right by your side the entire time. If you ever get scared and want to surface, all you have to do is give me this signal.” You pointed up, and she nodded, her heart pounding.

“I’m just really nervous,” she said, pressing her hand to her heart, and you smiled.

“That’s normal. I was nervous on my first dive too.”

The boat began to move and Miya swallowed, looking out at the deep blue ocean. Then, she took a deep breath and looked back at you. “Can I ask you to do something for me in return for me diving with you?”

“Sure.”

“I need photos of ocean life for painting. Do you know where to get a waterproof camera or something?”

You laughed. “I already have one of those, so we can do that today! Come on, let’s get you suited up.”

Miya sighed and let you tug her over to where the equipment sat. There was no way she could get out of this now.

-

The ocean was beautiful. Miya had seen plenty of documentaries about the ocean and underwater exploring, but seeing it up close somehow made it even more beautiful. When she first dove in, the water was cloudy and it was hard to see. But then, as the water cleared, she found the rope and grabbed on, looking around in awe. Already, she could see fish. She didn’t know the types of fish, but there were plenty, schools of them quickly swimming away from her. Where the rope sat, algae and seaweed was growing, and further up ahead, corals.

There were so many wonderful colors that it almost made her forget all of her fears. She studied everything closely: the green seaweed and the purple coral growths on the rocky sea bottom, the striped fish, the green, slippery eel, blue and red corals and hidden crevices with crabs inside. There was even some pink and tans mixed in, making a rainbow paradise under the ocean.

By the time she resurfaced, her heart was pounding for a different reason. That trip had led her to an artists paradise, and although she wasn’t sure she’d want to do it again, she was so glad she’d agreed to give it a try.

“That was amazing. You see that every day?”

You beamed and shook the water from your hair, looking proud. “More or less. It’s usually further out so there’s bigger fish and stuff, but yeah.”

“You have an incredible job.” Miya gasped and laid back on the deck, looking up at the clear blue sky. “But I’m not sure I could do it. You’re incredible, actually.”

Laughing, you laid down beside her. “It takes a lot of energy, but I love it.”

Turning her head, Miya looked at you, feeling her heart swell with affection. You looked so happy and satisfied and beautiful, and her feelings bubbled up, threatening to burst out of her chest. She wanted to say “I love you,” but she forced it down, looked up at the sky, and closed her eyes. She wasn’t ready to confess. Yet.

-

Painting was a slow process, because Miya wanted it to be perfect. All of the sketches, all of the photos, and all of the colors and moments she’d collected over her time in Jeju with you combined to make her final painting. Purples, blues, pinks, reds, blacks, and greens swirled together as she tried to recreate her feelings: the thrills, the ups and downs, the love, and the happiness she felt around you. She locked herself in her studio and painted with a passion she hadn’t known in months, pouring her all onto the canvas until, finally, it was perfect. It took her two weeks to finish the painting.

It took another week before she worked up the courage to give it to you.

-Hey, when can you come over? I have something I want to show you.

-I can come over now! Is that okay?

It was now or never. Miya took a deep breath and looked at the painting one last time. It sat on its stand in the middle of the room, everything else cleaned up and put away around it. It was as perfect as it could be, so she placed a white sheet over the top, and busied herself making sure everything else was perfect.

By the time you got to her studio, she had changed clothes, now in a fresh pair of jeans and one of her nicer button-up shirts with her hair perfectly in place. She was so nervous her hands were sweating, so she quickly wiped them on the jeans before taking another breath and opening the door.

“Hello there.” Your smile made her heart skip a beat. You were also dressed nicely, at least nicer than you usually dressed, looking like you were about to go into town. “Have you finished with whatever piece of art made you disappear on me?”

She flushed and rubbed at the back of her neck, grinning sheepishly. “Sorry, I tend to disappear when I’m really focused on something. I didn’t mean to ignore you or anything.”

You laughed, touching her arm and making butterflies appear in her stomach. “It’s okay, I was just teasing you. I’m excited to see what you created!”

Her mouth felt dry, but she knew she had to do this. So she smiled and closed the door behind you, gesturing towards where the painting was. “Come in, then, and I’ll show you!” She led you to the front of the stand and then left you there, moving beside the painting and raising her eyebrows. “Are you ready?”

You nodded, bouncing a bit on your feet. “So ready!”

This was it. All of her months of Jeju had led up to this moment. All of her months of sketching, the time she spent taking photos, the laughter she shared with you, and the inspiration she’d felt since she first saw you, up on that cliff. After a moment of hesitation, her nerves making her hands shake slightly, she pulled off the sheet.

There, on the canvas, was a painting of you. You were diving, heading for the seabed, swimming as gracefully as a mermaid. Around you were fish, corals, seaweed, and plenty of other sea life, all of the things she’d seen when diving with you. A rope ran along the seabed, and on the sleeve of your wet suit was your rescue diver symbol, proud in the deep blue of the ocean. A crab looked up to you, raising a claw in greeting, and bubbles gently floated up towards the surface, some of them curved in the shape of a heart. The colors of the ocean swirled together with care, bringing the entire painting together and pointing back to the most important part of the painting: you.

You gasped, bringing your hands up to cover your mouth as your eyes grew wide. For a moment, you stood still, before you moved forward to look closer at the painting, blinking away tears.

“Oh my god, Miya,” you said softly, voice breaking ever so slightly as you looked from her to the painting. “It’s... It’s so beautiful. I’m so touched.”

“It’s for you,” she said with a smile, making you gasp again, waving a hand.

“No, I couldn’t take it, really. You worked so hard on it, there’s no way!”

“I worked hard on it so that I could be proud when I gave it to you.” She wet her lips, clasping her hands together. “When I came here, I was totally lost. I couldn’t paint anything and I had no inspiration. But then I saw you, and that all changed. I had never seen anyone I was so fascinated by. You inspired me in a way that I hadn’t been inspired in a long time. I could draw you forever. You really became my muse.” She took a deep breath again before continuing. “Then we got to know each other and.... I realized that I really liked you. With you I experienced so many new things and felt so many emotions. I felt passion again. All because of you.”

“Miya....” You stepped closer to her and she quickly continued before she could lose her nerve.

“(Y/N), I like you, much more than as a friend. And I’m giving you this painting to let you know my feelings. It’s okay if you don’t feel the same way, but I wanted to tell you.”

You smiled, and before she could register what was happening, you were wrapping your arms around her in a tight hug. “How could I not love you, Miya? You’re incredible. I was hoping you felt the same way.” At your words, she let out a sigh of relief and hugged you back, making you laugh softly. “I’ll treasure that painting forever. I promise. I love it.”

“I’m so glad.” She felt a bit like crying, but smiled instead, pulling away to look at it. “I made sure it was perfect. Just like you.”

“I’m far from perfect,” you said, shaking your head, “but the painting is absolutely perfect. I can’t believe I’m dating such a talented artist.”

Her cheeks flushed with pleasure. She’d been wanting to hear those words for a long time. “Oh.”

A playful smile came to your lips, one that she recognized well now. “We are dating now, right?”

“I don’t remember ever asking you to start dating me,” she countered, just as playful, making you laugh again. She loved that sound.

“Then I’ll ask. Miya, will you be my girlfriend?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Great, now we’re dating!” You tilted your head, smile softening. “Hey, can I ask you a question?”

Miya was reminded of that day, the first day she really met you, with the tide rolling in and the sun high in the sky, sand in-between her toes and her heart in her throat. She might have already been in love then. “Sure, go ahead.”

“Can I kiss you?”

She laughed, leaning her head against yours, her heart overflowing with happiness and affection. It was desperation that first drove her to Jeju. But it was love that was driving her to stay.

“Always.”

#femifics #gwsn #girls in the park #miya #gwsn miya #gwsn scenarios #miya scenarios #girl group scenarios #kpop scenario #girl groups #kpop girl groups

[littlemisssquiggles]

Hi! I Saw that you did your drawings on an iPad mini 5, hows your experience on It? Is It too small? Or you can draw pretty good on It? Im asking because i dont know if i buy It, im kinda nervous that i Wont like the size. I dont really use Big things, apart from my computer lol Can i ask to have your full opinión?, i would be so gratefull! Also, your art is cute and well done!✨

Hiyaanon-chan! Pleased to make your acquaintance. Well I’ve been a proud owner of my Ipad Mini 5 since August 2019 and in myworkflow, I’ve used it now again for some light sketching and smaller projectssince I mostly work from my laptop with my Cintiq. I also have a Wacom Cintiq13HD and that’s my main workstation so most of my more finished art of recenttimes was created with that.

Butin the regards to the Ipad Mini 5, for me I really like it and I was actuallypleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed working on it for my stuff. Thegreatest challenge for me with my Mini wasn’t so much the size or the deviceitself. In terms of performance, the Mini works terrifically. I haven’t had any realissue with it. While it took me sometime to find the right art software for me to use that feels like what I’musing to on my laptop, drawing on the Mini works just as nice as I’ve heard for it’s bigger counterparts. As a matter of fact, I liked drawing on my mini so muchthat for a short time, I spent more time working on my Ipad than my Cintiq XD

Interms of the size—partof the reason why I chose the mini over any other standard Ipad was because ofits size. I wanted a digital tablet that I could use as a sketchbook for mydigital art. I wanted one that was great to draw on while being portable enoughfor me to take anywhere with me. The Mini is around the size of your average5.5 x 8 inches sketchbook which was perfect for me since most of my sketchbooksare around that size. Just like you, I prefer smaller sketchbooks as opposed tothe bigger pads. I personally feel more comfortable drawing in smallersketchbooks and they’re perfect for me since I can always pop them in my travelbag without taking up much space.

That’swhat I like about the size of the mini. It can fit inside my smallest shoulderbag and I can take it anywhere with me if I have to go somewhere and want to dosome art while I’m there. Ichose the Mini to do digital art on those days when I don’t feel like sitting infront my laptop and Cintiq or if I have to go somewhere and wanted to draw.

Lastyear, I took a trip off island with my family and thankfully my Mini arrivedjust in time for me to take it with me on the trip and I was able to do somedigital art while away from home. And when I returned home, I just uploaded theart I did on my Mini via iCloud and was able to download and continue workingon it from my laptop.

Sorryif this isn’t some extensive review XD. But since you’re asking me about myexperience with the Mini, that’s pretty much it. For me, I love working on themini and never felt like the size really compromised my workflow. I’m about to work ascomfortably with the Mini as I do with my Cintiq.

Butthis is mainly for my workflow. It’s really up to you and what you’ll be usingthe Mini mostly for. If you’re like myself and you work strictly on your laptop butyou’re looking for a portable tablet to do art on days you wish to work awayfrom your main workstation (especially if you travel a lot) then I will recommendthe Mini.

Butif the mini is going to be your full time drawing tablet device, that’s whereit might be tricky. Some artists I’ve seen have both the Mini 5 and one of thelarger tablets for when they need the screen size for bigger projects. Butpersonally, I think you’ll be fine with the mini. If you’re accustomed to workingin smaller sketchbooks then the Mini will be perfect for you regardless of itssize. And like I said, it’s size doesn’t hinder its performance. You can still createfull pieces on the Mini but it depends on which art software you use. Twosoftware for the Ipad that I can recommend are of course Procreate (which you might’ve heard about already since it’s themost popular art program for the Ipad right now) and Artstudio Pro (a great program that I personally believe deserves justas much love and recognition as Procreate).

BothProcreate and Artstudio Pro offer a one-time purchase fee to download and usethem and all updates to the software are free. Procreate is $9.99 USD whileArtstudio Pro is $11.99. Both Procreate and Artstudio Pro allow you to importand use your favourite Photoshop brushes. Not going to go into much detail onsoftware since you mainly asked about the tablet but of all the art softwarefor the Ipad that I’ve tried, these two are the best in my opinion. But if you would like for me to give my thoughts on using Procreate or Artstudio Pro for the Ipad, feel free to ask. 

If you want an example of another artist whocreates art with the Ipad Mini 5, I’ll recommend you to check out @sandraghart. I found her on Instagram. After pondering for months on which Ipad to get within my pricerange, seeing her work that was done on the Mini 5 helped me to finally decideto get it and I don’t regret it.

Ihope this answers your question anon-chan. Take care!

~LittleMissSquiggles (2020)

#Anon-ninja #squiggles answers

[jazzarray]

Riju Production Post

So I’m mostly doing this for my own references (and as a reminder to take more pictures while working on costumes for proper progress posts/threads), but I just wanted to take the time and put together a post on my process and methods while working on my fave cosplay to date, Riju from Breath of the Wild!

This post will be really photo heavy. And text heavy. Just heavy overall, so watch out on mobile (sorry ahead of time) - 

WARNING for hand closeup in the last image, scopophobia,

First things first, I gathered as many reference images as I possibly could. I went into the game itself and used nintendo’s handy dandy screen shot feature to take some pics. I also lurked around online in various boards and things to see if anyone else had taken some good detail shots of things I had missed. Here are some that i found the most useful:

Full body shots are always necessary. This one also gave me the bonus of being able to estimate how many coins to put on her skirt as well as a reference for the print inside of the skit

Much needed detail shots of the armor she’s wearing. I wanted to nail down the shape and dimension of everything as much as i could

And, since I love a good Prop, I had to make the Thunder Helm. The construction seemed maybe not simple but not ridiculous enough that I felt I could confidently reproduce it

Then I decided to do something I had sort of done before, but not to the extent that I did with Riju. I needed to draw everything out, write what materials would be used and where, how much I would need, the techniques I would use, etc. To save space, I’ll link to the post where I uploaded the four pages of breakdown I did for her --> here

I started on her probably later than I should have, around late Feb, March of this year (the con I debuted her at was in May). And then I messed around and didn’t get started on her as soon as I could have even after all my materials were bought.  Speaking of which, let’s do a quick materials breakdown and where I got stuff

I bought about 3 yards of a slightly see-through, light weight black knit from Joanns. I was also able to find a heavier cotton blend printed fabric that, from the wrong side mimicked perfectly the pattern on Riju’s inner skirt. 

I drafted my own patterns. The top was essentially a slightly bigger sports bra. The skirt I think I just kinda wrapped the fabric around myself and had my sister cut the angle I wanted. I used that piece to cut the inner lining of the skirt.

I hand painted the design on the top with 3d fabric paint. Some of the colors had to be mixed, particularly the gold. And i had to mix them multiple times bc I couldn’t finish it all at once lol. That was a pain. 

JSYK, you can mix fabric paint with regular acrylic and it’ll still be just as flexible.

I stretched out the top on a cutting board I had and held it there with wonderclips lol. Bootleg, but it worked

This was also my first time working with bias tape! It’s kinda rough in some sections but it gave the top a really nice finish, i think. I also added some lil shoulder straps on with the rest of the tape I had, just for added support.

Jewelry, Belt, Armor, etc Everything not fabric was craft foam of varying thickness. Everything was either primed with glue/water or was coated with a few layers of plastidip. The detailing on the chest and belt pieces were done with 3D fabric paint

The only pieces not foam or fabric are air dry clay and hot glue casted gems. I made my own silicone mold with pure silicone + corn starch + a bit of baby oil. I think I used oven bake clay for the negatives and just filled those babies with hot glue. Sanded down the sides to get the defined lines I wanted and painted them with nail polish. 

The air dry clay pieces coming off of the chest armor  were strung together with more invisible thread and kinda shoddily held together with hot glue. But It Worked, Okay?

Everything that needed to be put on that wasn’t clothing (chest armor, jewelry pieces, belt, the petal sash looking thing) was strapped purely with velcro. 

The shoes were just a thrifted pair of black heels and I painted the lines on with Angelus brand leather paint (this stuff is godly and a little goes a long way)  

Here’s the base of the front of the helm unpainted. 

I used 8mm eva sheet foam and 8mm dowels the from TNT Cosplay Supply as well as some basic 2-6mm foamie sheets from any store with a craft sections (I think i got mine from michaels? and some backup 2mm sheets from walmart)

The helm was a bit odd to pattern. I spent a lot of time doodling out shapes in my sketchbook. I made some v elementary templates out of poster board and had a Lot of re-working, especially with the slightly curved base of the front of the helm, the actual mask part. I knew it had to be two pieces  because trying to make it one would make the curves at the top wrong potentially. It also gave me a good guideline for the midline of the helm itself for coloring.

Everything was held together with contact cement and shaped with a heat gun. I learned with this project just how pliable even 8mm thick craft foam can get when it’s hot. I reinforced some of the curves by scoring the curves and gluing the cut section back together.

I primed this all with glue/water mix and everything was spray painted that base gold.

I....completely freehanded the non gold sections. I painted the brown of the front of the helm first and then remembered the gold sections going down. I think I tried to sketch out the lines at first and then just went “fuck it” and free handed everything. Took a lot of careful brush strokes and correcting but I think it turned out well.

if you look closely at the pieces with the half question marks on them, you can see where I attempted to correct some lines with hand mixed acrylic and didn’t exactly get the color right lol whoops. It’s only noticable in closeups tho.

The front and back pieces of the helm were held together via velcro. I wanted them to be able to come apart, especially since I knew I was going to travel with it. The whole thing is rather Rigid so it needed some way to be more travel-with-able.

Close up of the Helm. It was extremely light weight, if only a lil awkward to tote around. I made it way too big so it couldn’t even be worn properly lol.

Weirdest snail I’ve ever seen

Base wig was Buttercup in Rust Red by Arda . I also got a bunch of their long wefts in the same color as well as their red jumbo braids. I used their tutorial on how to style a Rapunzel wig as the basis for how to do the braid.

I ruined my first pack of jumbo braid hair and had to order more last second. The wig was one of the last pieces to get done. 

As in the rapunzel method, the braid is separate from the base wig and attached with hook/eye closures. It was still really dragging the back of the wig down, but I managed to braid in most of the base hair of the wig into the braid to hide the worst of it. It was so long, it reached all the way to my butt, i was so happy

The styling of the front of the wig was....mostly me winging it again. I knew theoretically what I needed to do -- tease the front bang a bit, add on wefts so that the hairline looked natural. But when I started doing so, I got impatient, like I normally do. To be fair the wig turned out way better than i thought it could given how much of a rush job the hair line and the bump + pinwheels were but hey

Everything got a generous helping of got 2 b glued spray

the side loops were completely separate pieces. I initially intended to sew them into the wig, but it was easier to put on and take off when they were separate

these were fabric hoops i stuffed lightly with pillow batting and, in another rush job, glued some wefts onto the loops. The gold rings were also just craft foam

 Aside from the lipstick, I didn’t do the best with my makeup as I could have lol

I didn’t properly plan out what to color my eyebrows with. And covering them up was a serious rush job -- I didn’t practice before hand like I should have so I didn’t get them as smooth as I wanted

I also used....regular lipstick as the color, not even a drying matte, so anytime my hands went near my face (which was often bc of the helm, I had to whip out my mirror to do a smear check

The eye makeup was lipstick as well, but a matte one! It’s colourpop, I can’t remember which shade. The lipstick actually on my lips was a cheap drugstore brand I found at a beauty store.

First pair of ears were i think from Aradani?? I can’t 100% remember; there was a booth at Katsu this year.... 

Second pair, bc i lost the first pair somehow, was borrowed from a good friend lol

Now I know how to make my own latex ears so that’ll be what I do in the future

Contacts were from Alice and Rabbit’s Shop

I’ve got a decent amount of (what I would/could have done betters)

I need to figure out a better strapping method for the jewelry. The velcro I used was pretty thick and i found multiple scratches where they rubbed against me all day (a couple of em briefly scarred lol)

I wasn’t able to isolate a good enough image for the sand seal emblum that’s actually printed on her skirt. I might just hand paint it on if I can draw a decent enough template

The back piece of the helm, the band that connected to the circle, was...a pain. Since I was in the heat, it lost its shape pretty quickly when not attached to the front part and having to reshape it caused it to crack quite badly. 

The aforementioned circular piece also wasn’t as securely connected as it could have been (i’m still trying to figure out what I could have done better. Maybe pins or something through the foam?) and I had to rush to the cosplay repair booth when I got to the con to make sure it didn’t completely rip off.

I found two pairs of black heels and neither of them fit well enough to walk in all day! so I would up taking a bunch of photos in the wrong shoes bc I had switched them out and forgotten to put the actual shoes back on lol. 

Practice the makeup!! Practice, practice practice. Especially eyebrow blocking bc mine are pretty thick and bushy and it Did Not work as well the first time lol. 

And last but most importantly: GIVE YOURSELF ENOUGH DANG TIME TO NOT RUSH

i was so hesitant to cut into anything, especially the foam, that i wound up working on things down to the wire, aka friday night before I was set to wear Riju.

Take time,especially when doing new things you’ve never done before

don’t be afraid to think outside the box and even reach out to someone, even if they’re a non-cosplayer, for help and ideas because they will probably save your ass (thanks dad)

So here is my little love letter to my Riju cosplay. It’s...admittedly in shambles kind of now. Half of my armor pieces had some bumps or breaks that are repairable but not a priority. The wig is a mess because the back kept tangling on my armor pieces. The band/back of the Helm is also a wreck, cracked to hell and back.

But!! I want better pictures of her, so I want to try and fix her up so I can at least do a decent photoshoot somewhere. I also wanna make a patricia plush! Maybe enter her into a contest??

Only time, patience, and a Lotta Money will tell lol

#jazz says shit #jazz takes pics #cosplay ramblings

[transcendence-au]

The Manor of Alcor (2/?)

AN: Whoops! Didn’t realize this hadn’t been uploaded last month. Chapter 3 is coming soon.

Also on ff.net

Orrie walked down the east wing of the manor with his strip of paper in hand. He passed several doors with names written on them. “Sarkozy…Jans…oh, Keller.” His room was second from the end on the left side. Turning the knob, Orrie stepped inside.

The room was fit for royalty. The ceiling was high with a pretty crystalline chandelier hanging in the center. The king-size bed was lined with white, fluffy pillows and framed with silky light-brown curtains. On the other side of the fairly large room were a small walk-in closet and a tiny washroom. Around the room were other pieces of furniture, a dresser and full-length mirror to name a few. Orrie dropped his belongings by the side of his bed, taking a moment to let everything sink in.

He was actually at the Manor of Alcor, picked against all odds to solve its mystery. He managed to befriend (at least he hoped) three people already. Smiling widely to himself, Orrie pulled out a sketchbook and pencil from his backpack, flipping it to the first available page not filled with miscellaneous scribbles and doodles. Concentrating, he began to sketch an outline of the mansion, taking notes and adding details to the rooms already visited or seen. There was the parlor room, the foyer, and the east wing where the bedrooms were located. They passed several other rooms and halls, of course, but he hadn’t yet seen where they led. There was still so much to explore– judging by the building’s size and what he’d seen, he hadn’t even covered a tenth of the whole area.

There was a knock at the door. Looking up from the last of his drawing, Orrie answered it. “Yes?”

“May I come in?” someone asked. Orrie put away his belongings and went to open the door. On the other side was Cliff, no Zahia in sight. “Hey there. Just wanted to know if you want to have lunch with us. Many of the others are heading out now to enjoy some barbecue.”

“Oh. Yeah, I’d love to,” Orrie answered, stepping outside. He followed Cliff down the hall. “But, um, aren’t we supposed to be solving a mystery soon?”

Cliff waved off his words. “That can wait a bit, don’t ya think? I mean, none of us really know each other very well, and this is the perfect opportunity to talk to one another. I’m sure afterwards we’ll all go our own ways to solve the mystery, but until then we should all relax and enjoy ourselves.” Orrie couldn’t argue with that. They traversed through a few halls and a magnificent kitchen with a dining nook, spotting the old couple—the Tosettis, if what Orrie read on their envelope was correct—making their steady way to the back door. Cliff held the door open for them, which they were quite thankful for, and the four of them went into the yard where the housekeepers and some of the guests were all hanging about.

It was bright and sunny, and Orrie regretted not bringing along some swim trunks so he could enjoy the pool. If he really wanted to, though, he could always just dip his feet into the cool water like Zahia was doing, several white lotuses floating daintily around her legs. Belle, Dipper, and Dug were sitting at the table, watching some game show on an outdoor TV connected to the wall. Orrie looked around, noticing a few people missing.

“Where’s Flynn? And Mr. Connolly?”

“Siegfried was busy looking for clues already,” Cliff answered, taking a seat next to Dug. “I have no idea where Flynn is. Probably wandering around himself.” While a bit disheartened he wouldn’t be joining them, Orrie still enjoyed his time with the others through talk and games, even watching and cheering Dipper on as he, Dug, and Zahia took part in a grilled-burger eating contest. They heard the story of how the Tosettis met and saw the pictures of the Lionharts’ wedding from two weeks ago. In return, Orrie showed them all photos of his family stored on his phone.

“Oh, you get your lovely hair from your father, I see,” Mrs. Tosetti exclaimed, “When did you both decide to dye it?”

“What? Oh no, it’s natural for us,” Orrie said, subconsciously fingering his blond hair streaked with strands of royal blue. “We’ve got Kinnara or something like that on dad’s side of the family. See? My cousin’s is green.”

“I wish my hair was blue,” mused Belle, “Or– no, purple! No, I’d want it to have, like, a rainbow of streaks!” Dipper just smiled, rolling his eyes at his twin.

Hours later, when the mosquitoes proved to be too much, they went back inside. Not even one minute after the last person entered the kitchen a housekeeper walked up to them. “I’m sorry to bother you at this time,” she apologized, “But Ms. Wheatly would very much like to speak with you all right now. She’s in the parlor room. If you’d be so kind.” And she bowed and left the kitchen. The group of eight made their way toward the parlor. Entering once more, Orrie spotted Flynn and Siegfried already inside. He split off from the others.

“Sorry you missed the gathering in the back yard. We were all outside hanging out. Cliff said he couldn’t find you.”

Flynn didn’t seem perturbed. “I was in the library while you were all outside. Figured I might see if there was a clue hidden in one of the books there.”

“Wouldn’t that be a bit cliché if it were?”

“Perhaps.” That was all he could say before Ms. Wheatly scuttled into the room, closing the doors behind her.

“Apologies for interrupting your activities, but may I be so bold in asking how committed you are in solving the mystery of this manor? The Master is growing a bit impatient that none of you has found the first clue yet.”

“We’re serious,” assured Siegfried, crossing his arms, “Just some more than others. Besides, we only just arrived some hours ago. And some of us here don’t know how to hunt for clues.” Every time Siegfried spoke it was like he was in on the act. Which Orrie didn’t mind at all because that meant he could hurry the process along for them learning what they needed to do. And indeed Ms. Wheatly nodded in agreement to his words.

“I see. So you don’t know how to search for clues. In that case I’ll tell you. Listen closely. In this mansion there are a total of seven clues you need to find to solve the mystery. For all but one of the clues you will first need to find a key. The locations of these clues and keys can be deduced through the numerous hints scattered around the house.”

“What kind of hints?” Zahia asked, “They’re not super hard puzzles, are they?”

“Nursery rhymes,” Ms. Wheatly answered, “In the form of a riddle. Solve the riddle and you’ll find the key or clue. But I must inform you that not all keys are in the same room as their corresponding clue. The same goes for hints.”

The guests gave varying remarks of understanding. “So hints lead to clues or to keys that unlock clues,” Dipper clarified.

“Correct. But finding the hint is no easy task. Here, I’ll help you search for your first hint.” And then she made quite a show looking around. Exaggerated motions of opening cabinet doors and gazing all around its interior, of ruffling pillows and examining every inch of them, or checking underneath every single piece of furniture. Silly as it looked it did tell Orrie one thing: the hints would not be in obvious places.

“Oh! What do you know?” As if to prove his theory, Ms. Wheatly, while moving aside some books on a shelf a little too enthusiastically, knocked a bust of an old man over. Beneath the marble statue was a hole– the bust was hollow. Ms. Wheatly reached inside and pulled out a tiny brown scroll, beckoning the guests over to her. Orrie was able to read it as she unfurled the paper:

“Buried atop Old Smoky.”

He blinked. Old Smoky? Like ‘On Top of Old Smoky’? So were all the hints based on classical Pre-Transcendence nursery rhymes? Depending on which rhymes were used this mystery might be a little harder to solve than he thought.

“What’s Old Smoky?” Cliff asked, “Sounds like a volcano’s name.”

“Very close,” Ms. Wheatly smiled as she put the scroll in her pocket. “A mountain. Based on the old nursery rhyme ‘On Top of Old Smoky’. Does anyone know how the first part of the rhyme goes?” Orrie refrained from raising his hand, wanting to know if anyone else was familiar with the song. Nobody spoke up. “I’ll tell you then. ‘On top of Old Smoky, all covered in snow’. That’s the line. Now where or what resembles a mountain with snow on top of it?”

She let the guests explore the room themselves. Orrie saw from the corner of his eye Siegfried step away from the party. To anyone who knew his little secret they’d perhaps assume he didn’t want to give the answer right away, and to those who didn’t he looked like someone who’d rather have others do the work. But the look in his eyes implied otherwise. He was watching them. Judging them in their ability to deduce. Orrie hadn’t solved the hint yet, but there was no way he was going to let the man assume he was on to him, so he opted to look around a lamp with a white lampshade over it.

It was Dug who finally figured it out. And by complete accident too. “Whoops! Didn’t mean to!” he hurriedly said, grabbing the fishtank in the corner he nudged off its stand. He straightened the box up before all its contents, inhabitants, and the items on top of it could spill over onto the floor. He sighed with relief before blinking his eye at the tank. “Wait…is that Old Smoky?” He pointed to one of the little plastic decorations inside. Orrie had already seen the aquarium that was designed like multiple biomes had merged into one, but even he overlooked the small toy that looked exactly like a snow-capped mountain.

“Buried atop Old Smoky you say?” Dug shuffled through the items resting on top of the tank, most of them folded newspapers. It was between two newspapers that a piece of a third slipped out. Dug caught it before it landed on the floor. The piece of paper was significantly older than the rest, browner and far more wrinkled. Dug had to squint to read its faded text.

Ms. Wheatly stepped over to him. “Would you like me to read it for you?”

“Yeah please.” He handed her the paper. She cleared her throat, and everyone paid close attention as she read the article:

“Six Found Dead, Suspect At Large

Police responded to a silent alarm early Friday morning. The bodies of six victims were found scattered inside an unaddressed mansion miles outside the city limits. Investigators believe the victims were all members of an illegal cult as only two of the victims had visible injuries. It is presumed a seventh cult member was the perpetrator and fled the scene. The identities of the victims have not yet been revealed at this time.”

Dipper crossed his arms. “That wasn’t very helpful as a clue. But I can’t say this exercise wasn’t informative. Thanks for showing us the ropes on how to look for hints.”

“And who to keep an eye out for,” Belle teased, pushing Dug gently, “We may have ourselves a Sherlock in our midst.” Dug blushed faintly.

“I’m so happy to have helped,” Ms. Wheatly said, beaming. “Now you only have six more clues to find. I’ll leave this one right here in case any of you wish to read it again. If you need any more help just come find me. But first I must help prepare dinner.” She guided everyone to the doors, closing them shut behind them once they left.

A sudden grumble made them all look around. “Hrm, I’m still hungry,” Dug moaned, patting his belly.

“But you ate twelve hamburgers,” said Zahia, eying him incredulously, “I couldn’t even eat half that and I still feel a bit nauseous.”

Dug shrugged. “Can’t be helped. I guess I’ll check to see if there’re any leftovers I can have.”

“I wouldn’t mind a quick bite to eat myself,” said Flynn, “May I join you?”

“Sure. Don’t see why not?”

“I’d like to get started looking for the clues,” Dipper stated, turning toward his sister. She nodded in agreement.

“I think I’m going to take a quick rest before dinner, dear,” Mr. Tosetti said to his wife.

“I want to relax a bit too,” Zahia wrapped an arm around Cliff’s waist. Her husband hugged her back with one arm.

“Yeah. We’ve got all the rest of the day to find hints. Let’s enjoy our honeymoon a little longer.” He playfully bopped her on the nose before leading them toward the stairs. After quick deliberation, Orrie decided to follow them and the Tosettis. He was not, however, expecting Siegfried to come along.

“Are you taking a break too, Mr. Connolly?”

“I may as well. The remaining hints, keys, and clues won’t be hidden until tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? So the rest of the day is just for us to, I don’t know, relax?” Let us familiarize ourselves with our environment is what he wanted to say, but the less he made Siegfried suspicious of how serious he was in solving the mystery the less he’d have to worry about him. There was just something off about the man. Siegfried nodded.

“Precisely. Also, I wouldn’t get very comfortable with the idea of Ms. Wheatly helping us on the case.” Orrie looked ahead to make sure the Lionharts and Tosettis weren’t listening in before slowing his pace to walk beside Siegfried.

“Why not?” he whispered. Siegfried gave him a curious glance before opting to reveal his knowledge to the boy.

“Alcor is going to get a little impatient with us tonight and eliminate her as a means to encourage us to search faster.” Orrie looked up at him, horrified, but Siegfried chuckled. “Don’t worry; it’s all an act. The scene will be very convincing, though.”

Orrie nodded. “Okay then…” He wasn’t sure if he should feel impressed on how realistic the staff was going to make this an authentic murder mystery or unnerved. Maybe unnervingly impressed. He smiled at that silly musing before splitting from the group and heading into his room.

That evening—after dinner and while Orrie was lying content on his bed, drawing in his sketchbook—there was a loud shriek from downstairs. There were soon the sounds of footsteps racing down the hall and, while aware of what was probably going on, Orrie couldn’t help peeking his head out in curiosity. Cliff followed closely by Zahia rushed down the stairs. Orrie hurried after them. He caught up with the couple quickly enough and wordlessly the trio burst through the doors to the parlor. Everyone save the Tosettis were already present. And everyone included ‘Alcor’.

He was standing over a very realistic corpse of Ms. Wheatly, which was face-down in a growing pool of red liquid. Strips of clothing lay tattered beside it. Ripped pillows and bloody papers were strewn around, hinting of the struggle that transpired. Zahia gasped, hand over her mouth. Dipper and Belle stood frozen, barely able to believe what they were seeing. Dug looked ill, moving as far away from the body as possible. Siegfried seemed uncomfortable but stayed where he was at by the doors. Flynn was glaring at the perpetrator.

‘Alcor’ stared back, amused smile on his lips. “Y͟ou a̸ll̴ ̢see̕m a̷ b̨it u̸p̸s͠et͠.” He spotted the latecomers. “I d̕id̸n̷’t̨ ́th͟ink ̴s͢he’d caus͏e t͢hąt̨ m̢ucḩ of a̷ c̸ommo̕t̶ion͝.” Flynn flashed a glance back at Orrie before clenching and unclenching his jaw. When he spoke, though, it was with collected calmness.

“Why did you feel the need to do this? You are aware there are children present.” Orrie hoped Flynn wasn’t insinuating he couldn’t handle a little violence. Granted, murder wasn’t ‘a little’ violent, but considering who the star of the attraction was and the fact they were supposed to be solving a murder mystery in the first place…

‘Alcor’ chuckled. “W̷hy? Be̡ca͠us͟e yơu̵’re͏ t̨aki͟n͡g̸ to̧o lon̸g.” He rose into the air, settling into a cross-legged sit. “D̛on’t̡ t̴h̀ìnk I̶ h̨a̛d́n’͢t not̶iced M͠s. W̡hea͡t͠ly ̡hel͡p̢įn̵g y͝ou ơut̡ ea̧rlie͠r. He͝r͠ as͡s̀i̧st͢ance w͡as ͝no̶t par̵t̨ o͠f t̀he dea̢ļ. B̢ut I dec͠ide͞d to ̀let it̡ s̢l͢idè…until͝ I notįc̨ed how littl̨e h͞e͢ad̢w̵a͠y̕ th̷e teǹ of̛ yo̡ų were ̡ma̷king. So̴ I͡ go̵t r̵id̵ o͏f h͠er.”

“Wait, we were taking too long to solve the mystery with her help, so you decided to kill her?” Belle frowned. “What kind of sense does that make?”

“Why ̶do͠e͡s ̷ít̵ ͟ha̢v͟e to̡ ḿake ̡s͢ęn̴s̛e?” asked ‘Alcor’, “I̷ ex̸pected̛ ͠y͡ou to̢ ̷t̢a͟k̵e t̀h̨e mys̷t̕er̡y͞ se͟riou͞sly, s̸olv̶e it͏ q͠u̵ickĺy, and͠ yo̷u d͏i̛s͢app̕ointed̸ m̶e. I̴s͞ i͏t͠ tha̡t muc̀h ̛a su̷rp̸rise ́I too̷k̢ out̶ ḿy̡ f͏r̨ustra͢t͢íon on͡ o͟n̶é ̕of m̀y s͠erv̡an͞t̶s wh̛o, in͡c͡idenţall̵y, h͠app͟en͠s t̕o̶ b̛e̴ th̵e ón̸ly ̵o̷n̵e͏ he̶lping y̨o̡u al̕onģ?” He shook his head in mock disappointment. “Th̴is is ͏a͞ll y̧o͞ur f̡au̸lt̨, y̧o̷u ͡k̡now. S̷he̢ c̷ou̢ld hav̴e liv̶ed. B̢ut, ąl̴as͡, yo͏u lo̧st́ y̴ou͠r̨ t̷r̛ue͏ ĺover͡ fo̡r̀ c̢ourtin͡g too̷ slow͠. My ͡s͞u̸g̨gestion? Hùr̀ry i͠t ̕ùp.”

“Oh yeah? Then why don’t you do it?” Dipper narrowed his eyes at the person above him, the challenge in his tone heavy. Orrie felt a chill in the air; the teen’s anger was nearly tangible. “You’re so all-knowing, huh? Why don’t you use your omniscience to solve this stupid mystery yourself? I’m sure you could do it in an instant instead of toying with human lives.” He looked down at Ms. Wheatly; his face was unreadable. Belle, clearly troubled by her brother’s outburst, touched his arm.

“Dipper?”

His head whipped around toward her, his eyes widening slightly like he just remembered she was there. He again stared at the body on the ground before shaking his head. “Sorry. Forgot this was all an act. Just looked really…convincing.” He directed his leer towards ‘Alcor’ who, for once, didn’t look smug. “You know, I remember Alcor being someone who hated human sacrifices. Killing innocents because he was mildly upset was not his M.O. Only the worst of imposters would have gotten that tidbit wrong.”

‘Alcor’s’ eye twitched, indignation flashing in his sharp gaze. “P̷er̢h͡apş I ̢àm not̸ ás al̡l-pow̶ęrful̶ as͠ yo̧u̕ l̨ik͝é to̷ be͠lieve,” he growled. “Ńo͝r̸ as̶ m̵agn̶a̡ni̵m̸ous. Bưt…” He hovered closer to Dipper, nearly face-to-face with the boy. “I̴f you̢ k̵eep te͝s̵tíng m͡y pátįenc͝e, D̶ipper S͏t͟erl̨in̵g̛, o̡ne wo̴n’t ne͝e̡d o͠mn̛isc͡i͏e͡n͠ce t̷o fi͢g͡ure ou̷t͏ ͏wh͡o k̸i̴lle͞d ou̢r̸ ņex̛t̢ ͠p̧oten͠t͢ial͝ vìct́i͠m.” He snapped his fingers and Dipper was lifted right off his feet. The teen, completely taken aback, was too bewildered to fight the invisible force holding him. Another snap and he was thrown across the room, crashing into the opposite wall with a heavy thump! Everyone stood shocked by the action; Belle was the only one with enough sense to run over and check on her twin.

“Dipper!”

Her shout stirred Orrie to face ‘Alcor’, to call him out on his trick that went way too far. But when he turned ‘Alcor’ was gone. Beside him he heard Flynn curse in a weird language. “Where did he go?” he heard the elf mutter lowly.

The doors flew open, and two housekeepers rushed inside, one of them carrying a tarp. Cliff grabbed one of them by the arm. “Hey! This is getting a little—”

“Please sir,” the housekeeper interrupted, “We’ve got this under control.”

“You’ve angered him enough,” the other worker added, laying the tarp over the corpse. Orrie watched as the sheet’s pure white was slowly consumed by the absorbing red. “Just do what the Master has asked. Please go and solve the mystery quickly. We’ll take care of this.”

“Come on, Orrie.” Orrie felt strong hands pushing him out. Cliff stubbornly kept his sight away from the bloody mess as he guided the boy away. Zahia starred at her husband, worried.

Behind him, Orrie could hear Flynn speaking tersely with one of the housekeepers. “Quite graphic” were the only words he managed to overhear before being escorted outside. Siegfried and Cliff then herded everybody else upstairs.

“That looked scary real,” Zahia mumbled to Cliff, who nodded.

“Thought this would be a bit more family-friendly,” her husband agreed.

“Perhaps that’s just how their script was written.” The others looked at Siegfried. “That was almost the same scene they played out last time, and there weren’t any children present then. I’ll admit, though, they didn’t use magic on the guests.”

“Which was completely uncalled for,” Belle angrily spoke. To her brother and with a lot more concern, “You alright?”

“Well, I’ve been a whole lot worse,” he chuckled humorlessly. But Orrie could still sense the resentment around him.

“I wouldn’t worry too much about it, Dipper. I think it’s illegal for them to actually hurt their guests. Perhaps they overdid it with the effects.”

“Perhaps.” Though Dipper didn’t look convinced. “And maybe you’re right. That was some low level magic he used. I really wasn’t that hurt.” Orrie sighed internally with relief. The party made it to the east wing. As they dispersed to their rooms, mostly gotten over what had happened, Orrie finally mustered the courage to ask the twins a question.

“Um…I know it’s kind of in bad taste to ask this now after, well, you know…but can I team up with you? For the mystery?” Belle and Dipper stared at him, a bit confused.

“You mean after what that jerk did to my bro you still want to go through with this?” Belle wondered, though she at least didn’t sound very offended. Orrie felt his face redden.

“Please don’t take this the wrong way but yeah. I’m not interested in the prize and, to be honest, the acting is a bit over the top. I came here to have fun and enjoy myself. It’s another piece of Alcor I can learn about, and that’s exciting to me.”

Dipper nodded, his expression finally brightening somewhat. “I know what you mean. That challenge you just can’t ignore. Like a puzzle that needs to be solved and answers that need to be discovered.” He smiled. “Yeah! Let’s team up. We’re here to have fun after all– to learn about Alcor and solve an unsolvable mystery.” He held out his hand. Orrie took it, gripping firmly, his own smile broadening. Belle wrapped her arms around both of their necks.

“Alright! Nerds unite!”

Orrie laughed. “Well, we can start looking for clues in the morning. Siegfried secretly told me the hints won’t be hidden until tomorrow.” “Oh! So that’s how he knew what was going on,” realized Belle, “He’s been here before. Wait! Doesn’t that mean he has the advantage? He knows where all the hints are!”

“I’m going to assume the hints change locations each time guests come,” Dipper reasoned, and Orrie agreed. He bade them goodnight before entering his own room.

The sketchbook was still on his bed where he’d left it. He debated finishing the final details of what he could remember of the garden but ultimately decided against it, figuring he’d have plenty of time tomorrow. He changed out of his day clothes and grabbed something from his suitcase that was more comfortable to wear in the evening time. Sliding into bed, he looked around his room once more.

It was still just as beautiful as when he’d first entered. But…the space, the extravagance, the lingering amazement of being here…it was too foreign. Too lonesome. Orrie was familiar with it. A bit used to it. But that didn’t mean he liked it. Didn’t mean he’d admit to his new friends that he was scared to explore the entire manor all by himself. Because he liked their companionship; it was something he admittedly didn’t have a lot of back home.

Orrie settled into the sheets, wondering briefly what tomorrow would bring. For now he was comfortable and safe and had companions nearby. And in two days time, when this was all over, he’d be ending one adventure as a pre-teen and starting another by officially becoming a teenager.

Pleased by the thought, Orrie drifted contently to sleep.

Deep in the lower levels of the mansion, the man in front of the monitors smiled. His staff had pulled off yet another spectacular performance today. Mr. Goodman leaned back and stretched. With his guests full of food, sound asleep, and certainly excited for tomorrow’s mystery he could sit back and watch with ease, the greatest of the attraction’s hurdles finally crossed. It’s never easy to set a calming, relaxing air in a home blanketed with betrayal and death, but his dear employees were always up to the task of doing it, exceeding his expectations every year without fail.

He grabbed the cane by the side of his chair and used it to stand. Leaving the office, Mr. Goodman sighed to himself. Such a shame he only caught the tail end of Terry and Ms. Wheatly’s act due to helping some crew members—the realism of her death scene always unnerved even the toughest of men—but he’d be sure to congratulate them nonetheless.

And speak of the devil…

“There you are. I’ve been meaning to talk to you, Terry.” The star of the attraction was standing by the costume closet. Already he was unvested from his suit, most of his make-up gone, his voice modifying mic removed. Terry looked back, a light smile on his lips.

“Oh, hey there, Mr. Goodman. You need something?” he asked as Mr. Goodman hobbled up to him, his cane clacking loudly against the stone tiles.

“Mostly to congratulate you on another great performance. It’s not natural to keep saying this but you are perhaps the best Alcor impersonator I’ve ever had the fortune to have.” He laughed. “I bet even the real one would agree, don’t you?”

“Thank you. That means a lot coming from you.” Terry gestured for the elder man to follow; the latter did so slowly. “You probably didn’t hear but the kitchen’s a mess after Duglas Segal requested we make him a late-night snack. We’re cancelling the staff dinner.”

But Mr. Goodman shook his head at the news. “And miss out on your friends’ cooking? For shame, Terry. You know better than to let that happen.” He and his employee chuckled at the good-humored chiding. “But,” he continued, his smile fading, “on a more serious note, Terry, I did not appreciate what you did to our guest.” He stopped walking. “Did to whom?” Terry’s attempt to look innocently perplexed did not bode well with Mr. Goodman.

“Dipper Sterling. The one you used magic on to toss against the wall.” He darkened his expression enough to tell Terry he messed up. The young man at least had the decency to look guilty. “Magic of any kind is expressively forbidden on these grounds, except in—”

“—In a case of emergency,” Terry finished, interrupting the old man. “I know, I know. But that kid was so irritating. Made me look like a fool despite all the research I’ve done on the demon. And—” He paused, noticing the leer from his boss hadn’t lessened. “And I shouldn’t have retaliated like that.”

“You shouldn’t have retaliated at all,” Mr. Goodman corrected.

A faint scowl. “…Right.” Terry, after a silent moment, took a step forward. Mr. Goodman didn’t follow. “Coming?”

“I’ll meet you in the inner chamber in a short while. I first want to congratulate Ms. Wheatly. I wonder where she went off to.”

“I heard in passing that she’s already inside the chamber. If you want to catch up with her before she heads to sleep we should probably hurry.” The other frowned. Why would she be there? She always came to see him first after her act.

“But why?” he voiced his concerns, to which Terry shrugged. So Mr. Goodman followed. He would have made it to the end of the hall, too, were it not for the muffled thump! of something heavy collapsing. Mr. Goodman stopped in his walk, turning his head slightly to the side. “You hear something?”

Terry didn’t stop. “Like what?” “Sounded like something fell.” The sound of a door slowly creaking open sent his nerves tingling, sharp and echoing in the mostly empty hall. He spun around, noticing the closet door opening up to reveal a bunch of fallen costumes piling out.

Mr. Goodman hurried to the pile. “I’ll get that!” Terry, just then noticing the old man’s action, hastened over to him. But Mr. Goodman beat him, already bent and picking up the clothes. He froze when a hand caked in dried blood appeared from underneath a large shirt he’d lifted. Props had their own room, and besides he couldn’t recall ever owning a prop like this. He started to pick it up when he saw it was connected to an arm. Confusion and unease growing, he shifted the costumes away to—

“What…Terry– Terry, what is going on here!?” That was Ms. Wheatly. Bloody and dead and buried beneath the clothing. A nasty wound was torn into her front side, chunks of clotted blood still seeping out. “H-how did Ms. Wheatly end up—” He happened to look to his side. Notice the black shoes of the person beside him. Spot the smudge of equally dried blood on their tips and edges. His increasingly frightened gaze slowly lifted.

The cold fury on Terry’s normally calm face was intimidating enough for the old man. “I was hoping this’d go smoothly.” He snapped his fingers, and Mr. Goodman was lifted off the floor against his will. Terry’s scowl deepened, and with a swift flick of his fingers, the costumes and body of Ms. Wheatly were flung back into the closet. “Can’t believe dumb luck of all things cost me my cover. Doesn’t matter; I’ll have the others move her when I’m ready.”

“Others!?” Mr. Goodman’s eyes widened. Was the rest of his staff in on this? Terry smirked.

“Oh, they aren’t the ones you should be worried about. Now, why don’t you come with me to the inner chamber, hm? I’ve got big plans for you.” Mr. Goodman had no choice as he was levitated through the dark hallway, knowing full well they were too far underground for anyone to hear his cries for help.

#submission #fic

[dreamiggy]

Happy birthday Final Fantasy XV! This game and community came to mean so much more to me than I ever expected. I wanted to write down a short story of how I came to know it so if you’re interested it’ll be under the cut not to clutter anyone’s dash with a wall of words. The story is both sad and happy and still ongoing.

As a lot of you probably I first heard of the game in 2006 when it was still called Versus XIII and the whole visual world of it gripped me. I was only starting to discover different ways of creative expression at the time and those few minutes of the trailer and the music had a huge impact on me. Following the material that was released about this mysterious game I built a world in my head, an original story, with a character that was a lot like Stella (meaning sword wielding and badass…hey I was 14 at the time and that was about the coolest thing ever). Strangely enough now looking back that story (that I never really wrote down) had a lot of common themes with the original Versus XIII story that I had no way of knowing.

So in the next few years sometimes (even when I no longer cared about that original story) I came back to that first trailer and watched it for inspiration. FF VII: Crisis Core came out and completely got me immersed in its world and I felt like this next huge game, this Versus XIII that must be about to be released (hehh) is going to be just as engaging and emotionally devastating. Well on that account I wasn’t wrong, it is a lot like Crisis Core in causing your heart to break.

So around this time (16ish) I started taking drawing seriously. I got a sketchbook for my birthday and I started to fill it up. I thought I was going to be an illustrator or a concept artist at that point and that I will work on movies or computer games. I still had Stella standing in front of the moon as my background on my laptop to remind me what kind of things I’d love to work on. To remember what I’m working towards.

A couple of months later I got sick. Seriously sick. My hands and legs got paralyzed and I didn’t know if it was ever going to get better. At this point drawing and playing the guitar was my life and suddenly I was unable to do both. I got strong medicines that helped temporarily but I was better for a week and worse for three. Still I drew until I couldn’t hold a pencil any longer. My last drawings in the sketchbook at that time were a mess because I saw the pencil in my hand but I couldn’t feel it.

This went on for two years most of which I spent in hospital. Around the time when I turned 18 I started to get better. I was able to move and live as a healthy person again with only minor symptoms left behind. Fortunately it’s still like that to this day.

On the other hand I’m sure it’s not a surprise that I got depressed during this illness. I thought I had a plan that for my future and it all just went up in smoke. So even after I got better I couldn’t find the strength to continue what I did before. I stopped making music and I stopped drawing altogether for years. For some reason I just wanted to distance myself from what I did before.

Years passed and I never picked up a pencil again. I was afraid that maybe the paralysis will come back and I’ll have to stop again. So I became an English Major and studied video games from a scientific point of view. Then I got a job in the video game industry and slowly but surely let go of my fear of not being able to do creative work.

Then when Final Fantasy XV came out I got it as a Christmas present but I didn’t dare to start it. Some part of me was still trying to distance itself from my past dreams and I knew that this is going to bring back a lot of memories. So the game sat on my PS4 for months without me touching it. And then in the beginning of summer I decided not to wait any longer.

I started the game for the first time and when I heard the familiar notes of Somnus and saw the dark sky and the moon in the menu I cried. I cried and I cried without even touching the game. It expected emotions and memories to come back but not like this. I turned the game off without starting it and left it like that for weeks.

Still I felt like a door was open now that’s been closed for a long time. I started to play the game and found the fandom with all of you wonderful people in it. I saw people creating amazing art and writing beautiful stories and when I introduced myself here and all of you welcomed me right away. It meant and still means so much.

I decided to find that old sketchbook where the last pieces were so shaky and start to practice again. (When I upload a sketch those are still from there.) I might not be dreaming about becoming an illustrator now but I feel like I got back a long lost piece of me.

So this is my long story about how this game affected me and became something that accompanied me through some of the hardest years of my life. I keep saying how much this game and the community means to me but I hope this little story explains just how much. And all of you who took the time to read it: Thank you!

#hmm #I was thinking about telling this story as it was #I feel like I have so much to thank for in both the game and the community #Final Fantasy XV #FFXV #FFXV birthday

[myselfinserts]

“Whatever you do, do with determination.”

Early morning. Shower was done. Hair was dried. School uniform was laid out on his bed ready to put on after breakfast. Renato kept his robe on, slipping into some lounge pants before sitting beside his desk, pulling out his lap top to prepare for this morning’s post.

Every morning, he made a post. Either a photo or a video, or even a cartoony edit. He’d post it with something sweet and inspirational to say. Or at least, he hoped it came off that way. With an InstaHero account with over 250k in followers, he wanted to make sure whatever he posted gave the biggest smile possible.

Okay. How to start?

“Renato! Breakfast is ready!”

“I’ll be down in a bit mom!” Renato replied. He quickly turned on his camera, deciding on a video. It wouldn’t take long. He knew exactly what to say. 

Renato took a deep breath, and hit record. 

“Hey everyone! Your friend Pepito here. Sorry for the robe. Just finished getting cleaned up. Today I’m starting my first day at Baldoin Memorial.” He aimed the camera at his bed briefly. “See the lavender uniform? That’s Advanced Heroics right there. Can’t wait to see what I’ll learn.” He quickly turned it back to himself, brushing his hair back a little. “Starting a new school is exciting, but it can also be pretty terrifying. I know I’m a little nervous. There’s so many amazing students already in attendance at Baldoin’s, and I have a lot of catching up to do so I’m on equal footing.” 

Renato paused for a moment, his eyes glancing to the hat out of sight from the camera. He wore one similar to this one as a child, and anytime he wore it, he remained unseen by all. 

All but one person. 

“I think the thing I’m most excited about is the fact that I’ve got the slim chance of meeting an old friend. I remember sneaking into his school’s playground to spend time with him. He was my best friend, and I didn’t get the chance to say goodbye.” He smiled fondly. “But now that I’m back in Paris, I’m sure we’ll have a chance to meet again if he’s still here. He told me he always wanted to be a hero, and gave me some really solid advice when we were little. Advice I want to share with all of you now.” Little stars floated around him as he held out a hand toward the camera, as if to grab hold of the audience. “Starting a new school, working hard to chase your dreams, or even just finding the courage to wake up and get out of bed every single day. Whatever you do, do with determination. You’re your biggest hero, and I’m super-star proud of you.”

“RENATO! BREAKFAST!”

“Coming mom!” Renato gave a soft laugh, waving goodbye to the camera. “Anyway, I’ll see you all later. Maybe if I get lucky, I’ll post some photos of me at the school. Provided that’s allowed. Keep Star-Shining everyone!” 

Renato closed the recording, quickly uploading the video and then hurrying down for breakfast in the kitchen. His mother had prepared an entire spread using what they had left from that week. He sat down as his mother poured him a glass of juice, grabbing a sweet roll as she kissed his forehead. 

“Excited for school?” Inez asked. She had asked him that many times that week, but she would probably ask again every day regardless. 

Renato nodded, letting out a content hum as he ate. “I’m super excited. I can’t wait to see what kind of Heroes to be I’ll meet.” He cut himself a slice of the omelette, putting it on his plate before cutting another for his mom. “You need help with the groceries after school?”

Inez gave him a sad smile. “I’m afraid I’ll be out late today. But I already had what we’ll need ordered, so I can just pick it up on my way back.”

“I can still help,” he offered. 

“No, you focus on enjoying school.” She picked up the morning paper, flipping through the job listings. “We have enough to last us until the end of the year, but I still need to find work. Hopefully the bakery is still here, but if not, I’m sure I’ll find something. And in the meantime, you spend after school with any friends you make. Build connections. This is your time to enjoy your youth.” 

Renato nodded, but deep down he felt very guilty. He made more than enough through his InstaHero to take care of the two of them for the next five years. But his mother insisted he save his money, to not worry, and assured him that she’d provide for them now. Especially now that his father was no longer in the picture. 

But still, he wanted to help somehow. 

“Alright,” he conceded. “But if you need anything at all, just give me a call, okay?”

Inez smiled. “I will, I promise.”

“I’m holding you to it.”

The rest of the meal went by in a flash, and Renato hurried up stairs to get dressed. He adjusted his collar, fluffed up his hair as best he could before putting on the strange hat and grabbing his bag. He doubled checked to make sure he had his rail pass. He wouldn’t be allowed onto the train without it. 

Baldoin’s was a specialty school, with several classes divided into normal and advanced. In order to get there in time from his side of town, you’d have to take the monorail they’d specially installed just for the program. Rumors were flying around that if this system worked well, it might be implemented beyond the academy. He couldn’t wait to attend and see how deep the rumor hole went. 

Inez gave him some money for the day, giving her precious boy one more hug and a kiss goodbye. Renato hurried out the door, adjusting his hat once more and sprinting off to the station. No one seemed to notice him as he moved, seemingly a ghost to the large crowds bustling away on the early morning commute. But that was fine. He welcomed it. Knowing full well the moment he removed his hat, he’d be swarmed. 

At least he knew his train ride to school would be well needed space. 

As boarded the monorail and found himself a seat, he admired the many spectrums of colors the uniforms had, counting how many he’d probably share lessons with. Everyone seemed to be paired off, with more adding to their groups as they stopped at a few more stations along the way. The gossip growing louder with every new addition. 

“I can’t believe he’s going to be here!”

“Do you think he’ll be in our class?”

“I doubt it. He’s in ADH, according to his Instahero feed.”

Renato rolled his eyes fondly. Of course he’d be talk of the town. Renato just hoped they didn’t grow wise to him sitting just across from them. As he turned his head to get a better look, he saw another student in the same lavender hue turn around to look at them from over the back of his seat. He had been sitting alone, trying to block out the noise as he sketched, but had clearly gotten too distracted. His golden hair stood out against the uniform, red eyes gleaming behind a smart pair of glasses. His face was covered in freckles, and his smile was very familiar. 

No...no it couldn’t be. It couldn’t possibly be little Sorley Allard.

Could it?

“What’s going on, Gigi?”

“It’s Renato! He’s coming to our school!”

“Renato?”

“Renato Sevilla! He’s this really cool social media star. Funny, kind, handsome. He’s so cool.”

The girl held up her phone to the boy, and Renato could just make out that it was in full screen. It was the video from this morning, near the end as the stars came out. He hadn’t realized he winked. 

The boy’s eyes went wide. “Pepito…”

It is. It is Sorley! Holy shit, we’re in the same department!

Renato debated whether or not to approach. He hadn’t seen his friend in so long. There was no way he could just walk up and say hi, right? Surely not. 

But then again, this was Sorley. He always loved it when his best friend Pepito would suddenly show up. 

Maybe if I just walk up to him and say “hey, remember me?” Yeah...yeah that might work. Or maybe something cheesy like “I think we met before?” Dammit, why am I freaking out about this.

As Renato continued to panic, the train began to slow to a halt, the voice on the intercom announcing their arrival. Everyone hurried out of their seats, rushing to get off the train, several declaring they were going to try and find him. Sorley took his time though, fully engrossed in whatever it was he was drawing. Renato watched him, trailing not far behind as his friend continued to draw. Glancing over his shoulder, he could just make out the image. It was a video game character, surrounded by cherry blossoms and with a logo up near the corner. He immediately recognized it as the mark of his favorite gamer. 

So no only are we in the same class, but he still draws and likes watching Kasumi too! This is great! We’ll have so much to talk about!

Sorley took a step forward, and his shoe got caught on the way off the train. 

Shit! 

Renato bolted forward, carefully grabbing Sorley’s arm and using some of his stars to keep his sketchbook from falling. With a gentle hop, he readjusted his friend, helping him to his feet and making sure he was okay. 

“You draw really well,” he blurted out. “Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think we’ve met before?”

Crap, why did I just say that?!

Sorley turned to look at him, and immediately a smile blessed his face. Renato felt his heart skip a beat. Sorley wasn’t the same really tiny, pudgy faced kid he used to know. Only now did he register how thick the muscles on the arm he caught was. How smooth the skin. His eyes seemed more full of life as well. 

He...he grew up nice, fucking hell. 

“It’s good to see you again, Pepito,” Sorley said. “I’ve missed you.”

“Missed you too.” He let go of his friend’s arm and tilted his hat, trying not to show he was blushing. “So, I’m kinda new here. Mind giving me a tour?”

Sorley nodded, closing his sketchbook and putting it in his bag. “Come on. I’ll show you around.”

“Great.”

Renato followed Sorley out of the station and onto the school grounds, his first day of school finally begun. 

#myselfinserts #mybnhaoc #friends ocs #Days of Future Class #yeah I know I did this scene already but it's fun doing it from another perspective

[monalisaliveshere]

“The most sophisticated people I know – inside they are all children.” – Jim Henson

The photo above is of me and a whole bunch of cardboard on October 8, 2019 as I waited to introduce our Cardboard Creature project to an incoming class. It was all down hill from there!

Here’s how we did it:

I introduced this unit by showing Caine’s Arcade, a film by Nirvan Mullick. I’ve been showing this video to students for years, but this is the first time we’ve followed it up by working with cardboard. And I’m so glad we did!

Students started by responding to a bell ringer prompt in their sketchbooks: Design a figure you could make 3D. This prompt is purposely vague and open-ended, allowing for creativity and active imagination. It also initiates first consideration of thinking in 3D. This was a great opportunity to differentiate between creative drawing and scientific diagrams, although they both require creative thinking. These are a couple of the responses:

After sharing designs with the students at their table, groups were formed by students based on friendship, like-mindedness, and similarity of creature design. I encouraged groups of three, and when necessary due to class size, groups of two or four were formed. During their first group meeting, students compared designs and discussed possibilities for a design that either combined individual drawings or elaborated on one of the drawings.

Together we also looked at the cardboard artwork of artist Justin King:

Cardboard Animals By Justin King

And after a couple of classes as an inspiration boost, we also looked at the work of Monami Ohno:

Cardboard Sculptures By Monami Ohno

I also shared these three attachment attachments with the students through Google Classroom. We went over the various ways to construct 3D forms with cardboard so it becomes a mechanical endeavor, well thought out and conceived for prime support and bonding.

Students then began the design process with one person sketching for each group. I asked students to show me their plan for mobility for the figure and for attachments.

This went very well. Clearly there is no shortage of imagination in the 5/6 art classes! Here is a slideshow of some of the group drawings:

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The Creative Constraints for this project were:

Attachments must be made with attachment techniques and hot glue

Creatures must be self supporting and have mobility

Finished creature width and depth must fit within the designated box

Checking the size of the creature against the designated “size checker” box

Groups were able to start building as soon as their design was approved by me. We were using Canary Cardboard cutters and scissors, glue guns, yarn, and brass fasteners. No tape. We discovered along the way that fishing line was helpful for Phase Two: Stop Motion/Green Screen (shared in a separate post). A couple of groups also used sand for ballast on top-heavy models.

The cutters were arranged in little “toolkits” with 4 cutters and one scissor in each, enough for one toolkit at each table. At the end of every class students returned the tool kits and the glue guns (also one per table) to the supply table. I took a quick inventory to make sure they were all accounted for as I didn’t want these tools to leave the classroom.

I was thorough in going over the potential hazards of the cutters and glue guns. Early on there were five or six minor cuts and about the same amount of minor burns, for which band-aids and/or cold water soothed all. Fortunately, nothing was serious, and the accidents tapered to zero after a couple of classes. Experience and confidence seemed to build resistance to injury.

Here are some photos of the cardboard artists at work:

Checking the size of the cardboard part against the designated “size checker” box

Dedication!

And a video of one group explaining their project as they put it (her) together:

I teach nine different classes over two days. Classes are 50 minutes long. It took most groups between five and six classes to make their cardboard creature. As groups finished, they started Phase Two – Stop Motion/Green Screen, for which I had demonstrated the apps and process around the fourth class as some groups neared completion of their build. By October 30, most groups were finished building and we took a break from building/filming so I could show them Phase Three – 3D Design (shared in a separate post); how to design for 3D using Morphi App. I was also concerned about working with hot glue and cutters while the kids were wearing costumes on Halloween; I know my own costume was too “drapey” to be messing around with hot or sharp things.

Notorious Ruth Bader Gentili with the cardboard creatures

As the Cardboard Creatures were completed, they graciously posed for photos before being herded to the school lobby for display there. As two students and I were finishing up the display near the end of the block, students were pouring into the hallways for lunch and recess. We were mobbed with excited kids looking for their creatures.

Above photo credit: Jennifer Mannion

And now (drum roll, please) here are some of the Cardboard Creatures:

Reflection:

If I could bottle the energy the kids brought into the classroom for this project, I would apply it to some of the traditional art projects that cause some kids to check out, disengage, and mutter, “I’m not good at art”. Everyone was at home with this project. It was so different and challenging we all knew and accepted failure as part of the process. The class atmosphere was truly one of discovery, exploration, and true collaboration.

And if I had a nickel for every time a student asked, “Can we just stay here and do this all day?” I could pay for all of the glue sticks we consumed. Kidding not kidding. We went through about 200 glue sticks, necessitating a next day Amazon order in the middle of things to keep us in business. That’s completely my fault. Working groups can get away from you quickly. While you’re helping one group sort out structural issues, another group is using the glue to fasten one edge to another, which intuitively seems like it would work, but doesn’t. Cardboard is heavy and one bead of glue along the edge doesn’t support the weight. Mini-demos about this popped up in the middle of classes as I saw the mountains of glue on certain pieces. What’s the alternative? Tabs, flanges, and Lacing:

Much has been written about the important role of play in child development. This felt like play for all of us. As the teacher, my job was to facilitate the project and interactions. I would intervene with building help or smoothing group dynamics as needed. With group work, certain students struggle to maintain the balance between leading and being led. That’s where the teacher has a role in defining possible tasks within a project and helping groups to either separate out a little to make sure all are busy with defined jobs or to go all-in on one task. For instance, early on, EVERYONE wants to use the glue gun, and the teacher helps ensure that everyone has a chance.

Over the past few years I implemented group projects in November. The past few years, my fifth grade classes were engaged in the WeRMakers Product Design unit and the sixth grade classes incorporated 3D printing in the Game Makers unit. Typically we would have accomplished the important first tasks of creating a portfolio folder, making sketchbooks with covers that are also artworks, learning to photograph art and upload it to Google Classroom and our online gallery, Artsonia, as well as completing at least one additional independent art lesson before moving on to group work.

This year I shook it up a little, going from portfolio folder to sketchbook with cover artwork right into the Cardboard Creature group project. One reason is because at the end of the last school year, when I took inventory of my supplies, I also took a look at the materials I had collected through the years. I had an abundance of cardboard, including large sheets from the packaging of white boards throughout the school. As the project took shape in my mind, I reached out to my colleagues for more. It turns out Gary, a custodian at my school, is the keeper of the boxes from food deliveries, and there is a pretty good assortment in a space right outside the school kitchen. He kept us in cardboard throughout the project. Thank you, Gary!

I liked this scheduling shift a lot, as it tuns out. The group work enabled classes to get to know each other more quickly. This is especially important for my fifth grade students who come together from two different schools when they get to middle school. It also helped them to know me as a teacher earlier in the year – to learn that I value originality over sameness, exploration over duplication, and that when I get their attention, I say what I have to share and then get out of the way. This is a nice foundation to have established as we go forward into the school year.

Lastly, for me personally, I learned a lot about constructing with cardboard. I learned a lot about my students as individuals: the natural leaders, the forceful, the followers, the easy-going, the always helpful, the determined, the rays of sunshine. I enjoyed being in the art space with students, all 200 of them. No  school day or cardboard creature was the same. It was fun.

Holden waves “hello”

Brandon’s Mini-Mona Lisa

My demo for how to make a rounded form ends up as a hat/helmet, of course…

And it was magical. When I would lock up at the end of the day, I’d glance back thinking I might catch all these little creatures coming to life for the night. And when I opened the door in the morning and threw the lights on, I could feel a shift in energy, as if they had suddenly become still…the secret life of Cardboard Creatures.

  Cardboard Creature Project – Phase One – Build "The most sophisticated people I know - inside they are all children." - Jim Henson The photo above is of me and a whole bunch of cardboard on October 8, 2019 as I waited to introduce our Cardboard Creature project to an incoming class.

#ArtEducation #artsed #CainesArcade #CardboardChallenge #CardboardCreatures #collaboration #creativity #MiscoeHill #MonaLisaLivesHere #mursd #mursdvisualart #weRmakers #MakerEd

[sakura-soldier]

Tracey Madison - Avengers OC Uniform Design

I was going through tumblr about a week ago when I found a post written by my new friend @winter-is-ending/Singer of Water (she's also a fanfic author). She mentioned that she was thinking of making an Avengers uniform for her OC Tracey Madison from her Winter Series/Life At The Tower stories, but probably wouldn't find time to actually design it. So I decided to take matters into my own hands and actually draw it myself. Just for her. It took me like, a lot of references and drawing tutorials since I've never done a character design before. But I have to say, it's a really fun challenge. Takes away a lot of boredom, too. ^^ I drew this as if it's out of a fashion designer's sketchbook; you know, those sketches you would see in a magazine. There's a front view, a side view, close-ups, and even a few head shots. I put in a lot of effort for this since I haven't drawn for a long while. I also took inspiration from MCU uniforms and Flare magazines since I'm a huge sucker for fashion, and I even used my own clothes as reference. Something I have noticed these days regarding spy and tactical uniforms these days is that they look waaaay too monochromatic and plain for my tastes. I mean, don't get me wrong, I kind of understand why they're like that, it's just that I think there's should be more colour and individuality in a person's costume or uniform. You know, to make them more unique but still retaining cover. People can be fabulous and fashionable as long as they're still badass. section of the skirt/jacket flaps in the drawing so you could see it better.Her leggings are also charcoal black, but you could also see numbers there. To all you people out there, you'd be like, "Wtf is this?!?!?", but if you're a computer expert, then you'd totally get this. These numbers are actually part of data, as well as binary coding. They're those tiny pixelated numbers you'd find in a computer or laptop. They actually represent Tracey's status as a hacker, and the numbers could either be hand-sewed or stenciled with fabric paint, but they have to be a little subtle in colour. I wasn't sure if teal green would be a good colour, so Tracey (and @winter-is-ending/Singer of Water) could also choose either light blue, raspberry red, or silver for the numbers. And on her feet are simple black ankle boots; I don't think heels are comfortable to run in, so the soles are flat yet easy to walk on. Another detail you should know about are the cuffs of her uniform. Yeah, I know they don't look too significant, but take a closer look at its shape. They're curved in a unique shape so her hands will be warm and comfortable, but can still leave room for her fingers while typing. They look like fingerless gloves, which is the point; despite looking like cuffs, they ACT like fingerless gloves without taking off so much. Plus, Tracey could have space to roll up her sleeves. The teal green design on said cuffs are inspired by circuits, and have a slight Tron feel to it without being too flashy. I even added a bit of ruffles at the edges and raspberry red bows at the wrist for a cutesy touch. *^^* They COULD act like normal cuffs/fingerless gloves, BUT if she WANTS to (and if Tracey starts using hand-to-hand combat), they might also be weapons in their own right. She could shock or paralyze enemies by touching them, or generate enough electricity to create electric spheres, beams, or heated pulses to burn through any material with her hands. Think of Natasha's widow bites, Tony's repulsors, or She-Hulk's electrical gauntlets from Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. Of course, if that doesn't work out, then the circuit designs could also light up whenever something is downloaded from a computer or if she crashes data. Either way, however method they shall be used will depend on Tracey and the author. And finally, I wasn't too sure if Tracey is the kind of girl who lets her hair loose or prefers to tie it up during missions, so just for kicks, I drew up some extra head shots (her hair's a lot more fun to draw than her body hahahaha). I wasn't even sure if she'll have to wear a mask, headgear, or make-up/face paint to conceal her identity, but maybe she'll just experiment with different hairstyles to stand out (that is, if she has time to prep). So for each pose and head shot, I did her hair five ways. 1. Loose and swept up from behind, 2. A high ponytail, 3. A braided crown, 4. Low, wavy pigtails, and 5. A low side ponytail with two small braids merging into a Y-shape and tied with a raspberry-coloured bow (if you pay attention to its shape, it's more like Rin Kagamine's white bow; the kind you'd see in Japanese fashion and anime). Personally, I think the high ponytail, the pigtails, and the braid-n-bow ponytail (that's what I'm calling the 5th style lol) are my favourites, but it should be up to Tracey and @winter-is-ending/Singer of Water to decide on which one fits best. So why all this? It's simple: hackers are the hidden players in a world of spies and superheroes. Stereotypes feature them as weak and nerdy, BUT without warning, they can steal and manipulate data and information; the two most precious things in an electronically-driven era, but are often never thought of much. Whether those things are retrieved, created, deleted, or destroyed, hackers should NEVER be underestimated. Hackers are powerful in their own right and appearances aren't what they seem when it comes to them, so I made sure to portray that in Tracey. Hopefully, everything is easy to understand and I even made a colour palette for the uniform just in case. The materials I used were pencil crayons, four different types of pens, a thin fineliner, and a faulty pen brush. This should be useful for writing/artwork and I'm really proud at how it turned out! I hope they'll like it, both @winter-is-ending/Singer of Water and her OC! I worked my butt off for it! XP But~ it's worth it. *^^*

Update (Saturday. May. 13, 2017): I originally finished this uniform design back in Tuesday. September. 8, 2015, but that time, I didn't have a tumblr account, so I uploaded it in deviantArt instead.

deviantArt version: http://artist-cupid.deviantart.com/art/Tracey-Madison-Avengers-OC-Uniform-Design-559148441

Also shown here: http://winter-is-ending.tumblr.com/post/128686127039/traceys-uniform

Drawing and uniform concept design belongs to me, @sakura-soldier.

Tracey Madison belongs to @winter-is-ending/@the-melapedes-main-blog (also known as Singer of Water on fanfiction.net).

Please don't use the drawing or uniform design without my permission first, thank you.

#my art #fanart #marvel #marvel cinematic universe #mcu #gift pic #someone's oc #avengers oc #tracey madison #mcu oc

[planetarduino]

The $2 32-Bit Arduino (with Debugging)

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with the Arduino. But if I had two serious gripes about the original offering it was the 8-bit CPU and the lack of proper debugging support. Now there’s plenty of 32-bit support in the Arduino IDE, so that takes care of the first big issue. Taking care of having a real debugger, though, is a bit trickier. I recently set out to use one of the cheap “blue pill” STM32 ARM boards. These are available for just a few bucks from the usual Chinese sources. I picked mine up for about $6 because I wanted it in a week instead of a month. That’s still pretty inexpensive. The chip has a lot of great debugging features. Can we unlock them? You can, if you have the right approach.

The Part

For a few bucks, you can’t complain about the hardware. The STM32F103C8T6 onboard is a Cortex-M3 processor that runs at 72 MHz. There’s 64K of flash and 20K of RAM. There’s a mini-USB that can act as a programming port (but not at first). There’s also many 5 V-tolerant pins, even though this a 3.3 V part.

You can find a lot more information on this wiki. The board is a clone–more or less–of a Maple Mini. In fact, that’s one way you can use these. You can use the serial or ST-Link port to program the Maple bootloader (all open source) and use it like a Maple. That is, you can program it via the USB cable.

From my point of view, though, I don’t want to try to debugging over the serial port and if I have the ST-Link port already set up, I don’t care about a bootloader. You can get hardware that acts as a USB to ST-Link device inexpensively, but I happen to have an STM32VLDISCOVER board hanging around. Most of the STM32 demo boards have an ST-Link programmer onboard that is made to use without the original target hardware. On some of the older boards, you had to cut traces, but most of the new ones just have two jumpers you remove when you want to use the programmer to drive another device.

The “blue pill” designation is just a common nickname referring to the Matrix, not the pharmaceuticals you see on TV ads. The board has four pins at one edge to accommodate the ST-Link interface. The pin ordering didn’t match up with the four pins on the STM32VLDISCOVER, so you can’t just use a straight four-pin cable. You also need to bring power over to the board since it will have to power the programmer, too. I took the power from the STM32VLDISCOVER board (which is getting its power from USB) and jumpered it to my breadboard since that was handy.

The Plan

Programming the board is easy — I knew the community had done a lot of work to create a support package for it. You do need a recent version of the Arduino IDE (not the one that shows up in the default Ubuntu repositories). I downloaded version 1.8.1 from the Arduino website, just to be sure. That was the first step of my general plan of attack:

Load the latest Arduino IDE

Set the compile messages to verbose

Use the Board Manager to install the STM32 F1 packages

Get more tools

Capture the build directory

Run the right version of GDB

The recent versions of the Arduino IDE let you select platforms by using the Board Manager (available from the Tools | Board menu). However, if you look, you won’t see this board on the list. You’ll need to tell the IDE where to get the third-party support package. To do that, you can go to the Preferences menu item (on the File menu for Windows and Linux; I understand it is on the Arduino menu on the Mac). You need this same preferences dialog for step two, also.

Step 2 isn’t strictly necessary, but it will make step 5 easier. Just check “Show verbose output during compilation.” What you really need to know is the temporary directory the IDE uses for your build and this is the easiest way to do that, as you’ll see.

Further down the preferences screen is an entry for “Additional Boards Manager URLs.” If there’s already something there you should click the little button to edit the list. If it is empty, you can add this URL:

https://github.com/stm32duino/BoardManagerFiles/raw/master/STM32/package_stm_index.json

Now you can go back to the Tools | Board menu, pick Board Manager, and search for STM. You’ll probably see a few packages (I had three) but the one for the F1 will specifically mention the blue pill. Click the button to install and wait for it to do its thing.

Once installed, you’ll have some new entries on your board menu. When you have the blue pill selected, you’ll be able to pick a few options for uploading including the one we want: ST-Link.

Coding

The package has all the stuff you need to build and download programs using a variety of methods, including ST-Link. However, it doesn’t have the particular tool you need to do debugging.

It is simple enough to build the tools. The GitHub repo has the code and some simple build instructions. You do need libusb and CMake, but the page explains all that and once you have all the pieces, the build goes fast. For many OS choices, there are pre-built binaries you can use, too.

You’ll also need to know the USB ID of your ST-Link board and add it to the udev rules for Linux. If you don’t do this, you’ll need to be root to program the device and that’s not a good idea. However, depending on which ST-Link interface you use, it may already be there from other software or from the Arduino install. I’d try a test first and if it only works as root, you’ll need to update udev.

If you did your own build, I suggest running the tool stlink-gui to perform the test. You can also run st-info --descr

If you run stlink-gui, press the connect button with the ST-Link and blue pill powered up and connected. You should get the information about the device. If not, try as root. If that works, you need to update udev. I created a file, /etc/udev/rules.d/45-stlink.rules.

ACTION=="add" SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR(idVendor)=="0483", ATTR(idproduct)=="3744", MODE="0666", GROUP="usbusers"

You’ll need to modify that for the USB ID of your particular interface (mine was 0483:3744; the lsusb command can help). The mode allows all users to read and write the device. I made the group owner usbusers, but since everyone can access the device that probably isn’t strictly necessary.

Once you can do all that, try running the blink sketch from the IDE examples. Be sure to pick “Upload Method: STLink” from the Tools menu of the Arduino IDE. If it doesn’t work, you may need to use the tools you just built instead of the ones that come with the Arduino IDE. Mine worked but the debugging required the custom build (because the Arduino package didn’t ship with that particular tool built).

Finding the Tools and Build Directory

The Arduino IDE is pretty friendly, so it doesn’t try to install things like boards for all users, since that would require root. The board package you loaded winds up in your home directory under ~/.arduino15/packages/STM32/tools. There’s an STM32Tools directory and a few more levels down you’ll find copies of the ST-Link tools. If they don’t work, you can manually run the tools you built in the previous step to do your uploads. When we debug, we are going to do that anyway.

What’s really important though is back under the STM32/tools directory is another directory with the compiler that the IDE uses to compile your code. There’s also a matching version of GDB — the GNU Debugger — there that you will have to use.

If you loaded an example, make sure you save it to your own directory (I hate saying sketchbook). If you don’t, the IDE will make a private copy of any changes you make and things will get confusing.

Do a build (the checkmark icon) and — assuming you checked the box in step 2 — you’ll get a lot of output from the build tools. You might verify that the compiler in use is the one we mentioned above. You’ll also see that your program gets added to other things and put in a directory named something like /tmp/arduino_build_XXXXXX where the XXXXXX is a number. Your source code will be in this directory named something like sketch/Blink.ino. In the top-level directory will be the executable Blink.ino.elf. This is what you need to debug.

If you are comfortable editing your Arduino settings file (just be sure the IDE isn’t running first) you can also force a build directory using the build.path key. The IDE does have an “export binary” command (on the Sketch menu) that compiles to your sketch folder. However, this .bin file doesn’t have enough information for the debugger.

Debugging at Last

Finally, you can debug. Use the arm-none-eabi-gdb executable from the same directory as the GCC used to compile your program. This is important. If the versions don’t match you’ll get strange errors even though many things will seem to work. Provide the name of the elf file as an argument to GDB.

If you like, you can use the -tui flag to GDB to get a sort of text-based GUI. Either way, you have one more step to go. The st-util tool you built earlier can listen to the ST-Link interface and provides a socket that GDB can use to do debugging.

Start it like this:

st-util -p 1234

That will make it listen on port 1234. If you already use that port for something else, pick another one. Just remember that on Linux only root can listen on ports below 1024, so pick a bigger number.

Once that is running, you fire up GDB with your elf file name and issue the command:

target extended-remote :1234

Or, I’ve recently started using:

target remote :1234

You can run the two parts on different computers, so use a hostname if necessary (that is, devbox21:1234). Most times, the programs are on the same box and you can use localhost or omit it like I did. The difference between remote and extended-remote is that the server does not shut itself down at the end of an extended-remote session. It often works, but I have seen cases where I had to restart the server anyway, so lately I’ve been using plain-old remote to force me to restart it with each session.

A “load” command to GDB will now flash your program to the board. A typical session after a load might be:

break main continue list n n n

The “n” command steps to the next instruction.You can find a lot more about using GDB in an earlier post. You also might find it easier to watch the walkthrough in this video:

A few caveats. First, optimization can cause your lines to execute out of order, or even go backwards. It can also cause variables to not be visible where they have been optimized out. The other thing to watch out for is that, in some cases, the debugger internally single steps. This can cause very slow execution of delay routines, for instance. You might reduce or remove delays while debugging or be careful where you try to single step instead of placing breakpoints.

Final Thoughts

It would be neat if the Arduino IDE let you debug inside of it. However, there are ways to do that using Eclipse (and GDB) or Visual Studio (if you use Windows). If you are like me and OK with the command line, you might think about using one of the Makefiles for Arduino instead of the IDE. If you aren’t OK with the command line, there are GUI shells for GDB that you could try. If you’d rather hack the ST-Link firmware, we’ve seen that done, too. If you miss doing printf’s, you might want to try a Black Magic probe, which ought to work about the same as the ST-Link interface, but also provides a serial port for printf and other mischief.

By the way, Arduino isn’t the only choice for this board. It is possible to use mBed and other development tools with them. But that’s a topic for a future post.

Filed under: Arduino Hacks, ARM

The $2 32-Bit Arduino (with Debugging) was originally published on PlanetArduino

[juliamulders]

Week Seven.

Work in Progress presentation:

My Presentation Feedback (from peers & tutors):

Working from the inside-out is so important, it’s inevitable. The functions & the specific needs of this particular user group are the most important & with more development the exterior will happen naturally. For now your interior space is ‘infinite'.

As far as an instruction manual goes, you already have a big task with the design alone, the manual would be an ‘extra’, essentially you would be doing two projects - decide on the direction you want to focus on (ambition is good, but you might have to work very hard to pull off both a design project and an instruction manual. Furthermore, if this is very closely connected to the community, why would they need the instruction manual?).

No mention about the ‘nutrition’ through the presentation - this is a fundamental part of your project which needs to be focussed on to help inform your design. It is obvious that there is an issue - but how does YOUR design deal with the problem of nutrition?

How will your design make a difference compared to the ‘shed-like’ clinic buildings that are currently existing?

How do your paper studies relate to the local vernacular, local materials, community skills etc? Why don’t you think about re-purposing the local vernacular/materials (e.g. the precedent that showed bamboo tubes with vegetables growing out of them?) Possibly think about seedling integration? If this doesn’t work, what would work to make a ‘nutritional’ difference?

Be more critical through your process, & make it clear WHY the existing does not work.

Good presentation layout overall.

Progressing from last week’s 2D spatial diagrams, I began sketching from the ‘chosen/desired’ one. Initially I sketched the basic outline, extruded the walls to create 3D ‘boundaries’ & then developed these ‘boundaries’, exploring different ways the space could be manipulated (as can be see in the above images 1 - 6). From here, I thought it would be beneficial to create a simple SketchUp model (bottom images) to get into the 3D frame of mind, and also to get a sense of scale. At the moment, the space is probably too large and needs to be scaled down quite substantially, especially as I am proposing local materials for the construction. The shape & form of the space need considerable development, and I intend to proceed by working from the ‘inside-out’.

Over the past week, when I have needed a break from the FMP, I have thought of ways to improve my CV.  I don’t want to leave it to the last minute - it’s one of the most important parts of this whole 3-year degree! Looking back on my CV from 2nd year, I liked the fact that I presented my CV in a simple book format, but the content needed some serious tweaking. Fortunately, I was able to have a meeting with a friend studying Visual Communication, who helped point me in the right direction (I was totally over-complicating things) in terms of content, layout and colour (Thank you Liza!) I am concentrating on the digital version at the moment, which I have almost finished re-working & will upload the new version next week hopefully! I must remember: Less is more.

Taken from my presentation feedback: ‘Working from the inside-out is so important, it’s inevitable. The functions & the specific needs of this particular user group are the most important & with more development the exterior will happen naturally’.

I realize that an inside-out approach is the correct way to develop this project, but how? I have been given this advice in previous tutorials, but I can’t seem to grasp the idea and move forward with it so that it becomes beneficial to shaping my project. I took a step back and did more research into the ‘inside-outside approach to architecture’ and found examples of previous work to help me. The above precedent is ARUP’s Dwabor Kindergarten in Ghana.

Becci Taylor, part of the Building Engineering team at ARUP London says: “Why not design the building from the inside out – for its occupants? This would consider the opportunities afforded by its environment for views, light, air and energy, alongside the impact of the building on the environment. Occupants will always form a part of the control strategy – so we must optimise this relationship” (2015).  http://thoughts.arup.com/post/details/477/designing-from-the-inside-out.

I think this is a brilliant example of how the designers used the people/user group to inform how the space was generated. They collaborated closely with the locals in the area, paying attention to detail to ensure it would function to it’s full potential. Furthermore, it demonstrates an example of a design that incorporates the local materials (e.g. bamboo, coconut fibre & soil), & participation from the local community! Both essential to my own project.

It was a long Thursday afternoon working on the Exhibition designs with the rest of the Design Team. Before the meeting, I attempted to draw the sketches from the previous session in more detail, to help communicate our concept more clearly, as well as try and come up with a solution to how we would display our work (the most crucial part!). I felt that both the section & elevation helped to further understand our idea, we referred back to these throughout our discussion.

The display of 3D models is proving to be the toughest part because of the angled walls in the design. And not only this, but we soon realised (once Caitlin had drawn up the proposed design in SketchUp) that our design would not fit into the space we had been allocated! (Moral of the story: try to work to scale ASAP). We put our heads together once more, and came up with Plan B which we will be developing & testing in the coming weeks. Crossing fingers.

So although we are moving slowly, we are making progress. I think we are in that ‘frustrating’ phase where problem solving is never-ending, but we are working well together as a team to overcome this. Even though it was a long day, it was exciting to be a part of what I feel is similar to how a design team would work in reality.

I spent part of the morning organising & updating my sketchbook (I’ve realised that working in this way prevents me from going off-track) And because it was a clear & sunny day, Emily and I dedicated the rest of our morning to blogging in Coffee 1 Cafe. Why not hey?

Saturday research morning!

Over the weekend, Emily, Caitlin and I organized a work-session-afternoon together which Caitlin kindly held at her house. One of our tutors suggested that Caitlin and I discuss our projects from an ‘inside-out’ perspective, to establish how this could drive our community-based proposals. It was helpful to be able to talk freely about our work, giving thoughts, ideas and advice to each other where possible. During the discussion we spoke about how I could integrate ‘nutrition’ into my design (as it seemed not to have come through enough in my presentation). I was under the impression that my proposal functioning as a ‘nutritional health service’ in response to the issue of malnutrition would suffice, but it is clear I need to bring this aspect more into the design of the interior itself. How will I do this? My thoughts:

Cluster concept (carried through from the Feasibility unit) came about due to the fact that, traditionally, in this Zambian culture, different mud huts are built for different activities to take place, thus the circular ‘cluster’ formation developed.

Eating culture - round bowls are used to serve food separately, ready for the family to eat from communally (apart from the husband, who usually has his own plate & table). Is this something I could grow on? The ingredients?

Moringa Oleifera - as secondary to what eventually becomes my main design element, I would like to integrate agriculture into the architecture itself to magnify the importance of nutrition. This ‘miracle’ tree, as it is also known, has substantial nutritional value in its leaves (usually dried) & is already being used around the world to combat malnutrition. Could I possibly use the shape of this plants’ leaves, pods or flowers to inform the design of my clinic interior? This could be what (additionally) brings in the ‘nutritional’ aspect within the design in a more abstract & creative way?

Circulation routes - I feel that this is what I need to explore next in order to determine a final floor plan. In conjunction with the above thoughts, I will hopefully come up with an interior design that reflects how a nutritional clinic should function, look & feel like.

Below are examples of initial circulation route sketching I did on Caitlin’s Ipad. I was so excited about using a new tool, I got a bit carried away!