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midnightactual · 2 years

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so I’ve previously mentioned that Bleach is Nietzschean and focused on the will to power (der Wille zur Macht) in a kind of shitposting way but I was actually being totally honest and accurate. we have not just Yoruichi (foremost martial artist of Soul Society) but Ichigo’s imagining of Kenpachi saying that he is driven by instinct, wants power, and thus seeks to fight. it would be naïve af to imagine this is purely limited to Ichigo considering it’s essentially what we see motivate Hollowfied Shinigami (the Vizard) and even to a large extent Arrancar themselves (who have moved beyond the subordinated will to live as embodied in their endless hunger)

in “Beyond Good and Evil”, Nietzsche writes:

Even the body within which individuals treat each other as equals ... will have to be an incarnate will to power, it will strive to grow, spread, seize, become predominant – not from any morality or immorality but because it is living and because life simply is will to power

and this is um essentially exactly what Zangetsu says a bit more poetically in the bottom three images and what motivates his “Horse and King” speech to Ichigo and which “Kenpachi” reiterates:

I’ve previously sketched out a set of physically consistent rules by which willpower expresses itself in Bleach with Soul Physics but this is itself the origin of that willpower

we can tie this in with some interesting thoughts by one David Chalmers:

Chalmers' own thinking drew on these insights, proposing a "non-reductive" approach to the hard problem via the suggestion that every form of information processing entails an irreducible component constituting the basis of conscious experience. According to this view, the relatively simple information-processing taking place in the brain of a mouse yields relatively simple experiences, the immensely complex information-processing taking place in a human brain yields immensely complex experiences, and, most provocatively of all, even the minimal kind of information-process taking place in a device like a thermostat may yield a minimal kind of experience. Consciousness is, in other words, an inherent property of the Universe itself: something that cannot be explained merely in terms of matter.

(the fact Ginjō calls out a telephone pole of all things here is 100% a way of explaining Chad hitting Shrieker with one early on in the manga btw)

this is a very Japanese idea (tsukumogami) but it accords pretty well with Chalmers’ “information processing” theory of consciousness. if we now return to the Wikipedia page on the will to power:

Influenced by his earlier readings of Boscovich, he began to develop a physics of the will to power. The idea of matter as centers of force is translated into matter as centers of will to power. Nietzsche wanted to slough off the theory of matter, which he viewed as a relic of the metaphysics of substance.

in other words, Nietzsche was sort of gesturing at the idea that matter itself can retain its own will to power... which is like retaining consciousness (Chalmers) or a soul (Bleach)

the concept of reii in Bleach is a measurement of this retention. when reii becomes strong enough the will to power (here embodied by reiatsu) cannot be separated from the matter (reishi) because the individual’s will to power has been imprinted upon the universe itself

Bleach is Nietzsche's physics of the will to power in action

#Out Of Character #Bleach #Meta #[ it's also worth noting ]#[ Ichigo goes to an inner world ]#[ within an inner world ]#[ as he has this experience ]#[ with not!Kenpachi ]#[ usually black empty space ]#[ means a memory ]#[ but here it's like ]#[ Shadow used when fighting actual Kenpachi ]#[ where time stops ]#[ so uh Inception is also a thing in Bleach ]#[ you can go down the layers ]

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relimerance · 3 years

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Hi! If I may ask, is there a story behind the drawing of 1010 you did on your 'Greetings NSR fandom' post, or is it just a doodle? They all seem so confused.

its more of a shitpost if anything, there’s a story behind it but not to the lore.

i had gotten into the fandom and around that time, i was reacting to gameplay as my intro. when i finished watching it, i showed a few of my random images to my friends and i found one image that’s of Lunch Club:

and i decided that i wanted to redraw it. i asked my friends for which 1010 member was who and they decided it for me. and thus i drew it.

but it is honestly a shitpost-

#ask

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pengosolvent · 6 years

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really frightened that i am lacking something essential and will never be able to be a skilled or creative artist no matter how hard i try. equally frightened that i have sabotaged my own progress in various ways and have wasted years backsliding and will never “get back” any skill i did previously exhibit. do you have any suggestions for how to continue to produce art and improve even when constantly suffocated by fear

anon this is a common but unfortunate occurrencei feel this a lot too this is a very long reply because i think about this kinda stuff often, so there’s a readmore

i’ve got some advice for you, though i’m sure you’ve probably already heard some if not all of this before, so i don’t mean to talk to you like this is new magic info, but just reiterating stuff that i try to keep in mind that might work for you tooalso i want to point out that i’m not a professional remotely, so the things i’m stating are completely from my own personal experiences ….. and also i struggle with perfectionism and other things so while i give this advice i also still have trouble with the problems noted and also i use a lot of examples and comparisons when i talk because its easier for me to understand things that way

anyway:

1- you are the person who sees your art the mostthis is a very obvious thing, to state but it ties directly into a lot of what you’ve statedyou feel you lack something essential, you feel you’ve backslid and lost previous skills, and youre afraidbut think about the other art you seeyou ONLY see the end result of what everyone posts… or even if people do post in-progress pictures or speedpaints, you’re not really seeing the “scope” of it with in-progress pictures, you don’t know how much changed or how much was erased how much time was spent how much etc with speedpaints, you see all the progress but its sped up and it’s easy to feel like all of that was done faster than it really was even if youre aware its sped up

and even if you watched a realtime video of someone drawing… theres thousands of hours outside of that video of this person doodling, and even THINKING about their art that you havent seen it makes other peoples art feel a lot more.. confident? secure?

for your own art however, you are fully aware of the struggle of every line because you’re the one doing it and thinking about itit might make you feel like you’re trying so hard when everyone else has just Got it

2- experiencing art as a consumer vs a creator is a different feelingthis is directly tied to the previous idea but it’s easy to feel like you lack something essential when, instead of consuming the art, you are the one producing it

here’s an example: i love horror contentnot all of it of course, but i love horror that really makes me think and makes me see a characters motivations and really digs in deep psychologically and sticks with you even after you’re done experiencing the media

however it is very very hard for me to make anything that is strictly horror. for a long time i thought i was just bad at it, but i realized later that i’m not missing something that helps to write/draw horror … i just experience horror different based on if i’m consuming it vs making it part of the horror appeal to me is the MYSTERYif i am writing/drawing horror, there is NO mystery! i know everything there is to know about the situation i am making! i know all the character’s motivations, i know everything there is to know about every tiny detail and even if i am writing something where i don’t know what happens so it’s a purposeful mystery (such as in this comic where i don’t know what happens if you take off the tinier beak) it sometimes feels less Cool Mystery for me and more like “oh no i don’t know this thing, oh god, i’m a bad writer”i’ve gotten over that little by little, but it’s still hard to shake that i’m “missing” something with work that ISN’T mine its easy to put meaning that may not have been totally intended and THINK that the person meant it, and thus feel like that thing is more thought-out than it actually is

you might be experiencing something similar with art… where it feels like when you see OTHER art, you feel happy or like theres a meaning there etc but with your own art, you can’t capture that same feeling… it could literally be because you know what youre going for and what youre doing because youre the one doing it

3a- old art feels better sometimes because it is more removed from youyou know better than i do in this regard if this is true to you, because sometimes people can genuinely get rusty and lose but for the most part older art tends to feel better due to the fact it is becoming more and more removed from your current state and mindsetold art starts to slowly get treated the way you read Other people’s art because you’re not staring at it constantly and you start to forget the process and effort behind the old art

sometimes you can’t see well if your new art is “better” or not because it is too current on your mind and you know how hard it is to make and if it does or doesnt match what you were going for or etc etcmeanwhile your old art starts to be viewed more objectively because you dont remember every difficult line with it, and you can see it as a bit better because you’re not bogged by the negativity

3b- even if you fell off, you can regain the skill

even if you DID get worse over time… you did it once before and you can do it againyou can learn from your old works, but also try to learn from your old mentality a lot of my old stuff was more expressive and emotivei could learn to do that again mechanically, imitating my old stuff, but a big part of why my art was that way was because my mentality was different back then i was louder, more open, etc etcthink about what’s changed within you to see reasons for things changed in your art

4a- fear only works if you’re afraid of being badit is important to be able to see ways you can improve… but it’s also important not to fear that you have areas that CAN improveif you view “making something bad” as a punishment/negative outcome your fear directs itself through all your art

the easiest point fear can attack is starting to draw at allbefore you start drawing its very easy for your mind to go “why do this? why try if it’s just going to be stressful” and all through out the process that ramps up like “see it’s just stressful why do it”

your fear seemingly offers you something to gain if you don’t even try: avoiding the pain of art altogether

but what if you were unphased by that pain? if you don’t care about making something bad, that fear can’t manifest

some artists start their day by drawing the shittiest thing they can to shake off rust and have fun doing it … drawing a cartoon character from memory, drawing and overly rendered shitpost etc now i’m not saying not to care about your quality and take a ton of shortcuts and blablait’s still good to want to learn and improve it’s just that you have to start rearranging your perspective on your steps to achieve that

4b- no-stakes neutral is no problemhow do you get rid of that fear? how do you stop feeling being bad is.. bad?

try to view arts range as neutral to positive (as opposed to negative to postive) because at it’s base that’s exactly what art is what i mean by that is…let’s say you’re trying to draw a cat (and it’s not a commission or anything). your first attempt does not look anything like a cat this is not a “bad” thing though it may feel that way your failed attempt at a cat has not stabbed you or taken money or food from you or in any way truly inconvenienced you

the base idea is that you drew something and it wasn’t what you wanted this is completely neutral.. it’s like going to look for a new shirt. if you see shirts you don’t care for, you move past them until you get to the shirt you want.your “bad art” is just that. a bunch of shirts you don’t want til you find the one you’re looking for… you don’t have to pay anything for those “bad” attemptssure they take a bit of time and if you don’t have a lot of energy you might feel bad to use it on a drawing that you don’t enjoy and it can be frustrating if you keep trying to no avail, but all in all it’s not a stark negative

art isn’t a straight pathit’s winding, it’s really confusing , and it can be tiringbut if you go down a path that’s a dead end, you just try another pathdon’t fear reaching dead ends, there are always more paths

chuck jones (an iconic animator) said he had to draw multiple drafts to get expressions just right failure is in the eye of the beholder… he felt the first drafts for those expressions did not fit what he wanted, but he didn’t fear failure because of that even if the art was not by his standards, he continued until he got the one he felt was appropriate

it takes patience to get to where you wantif you stay patient you will eventually arrive there

5- drawing and thinking go hand in handart is a blend of being able to draw and being able to problem solve through what you already knowwhen i get stressed with art it’s usually because i don’t know what the hell i’m doing with no way to check myself if i’m close to what i want or not with me it tends to happen with backgrounds or animalsthis is why ppl typically suggest learning to draw cubes, cylinders and spheres from any angle because then you can transfer that base knowledge into other objectslike, cubes can be used to draw rooms, boxes, screens, fences, etccylinders can be pipes, water bottles, arms and legs, etc

transfering base knowledge is essential in art and understanding that you can do that, even if only as a base, helps a lotwith learning how to draw a mouse, you have a starting point for learning how to draw a rat (comparing the headshapes, sizes, ears, etc)… then you can use these two as a base point for drawing a squirrel, then a rabbit etc

another example could be maybe you know how to draw claws but not fangs… you can interchange the shape of a curved claw for a curved fang easily

starting with something you know and figuring out how to transfer the knowledge is very important and can help lessen that stress because instead of not even knowing where to start, you can problem solve to figure out what you already know under different termsits just all about knowing what connections you can try and learn, and working “smart”

on that vein… 6- perfecting things doesn’t make perfectit’s very tempting to make every tiny detail as good as you possibly can… but it’s very daunting and time consumingyou should try to work “smart” here too and now what i mean by that is … say i’m making a comic. i can make the comic to the absolute best of my current ability and take forever and become extremely drained Or… i could decide to try but still set a deadline for myself, and not worry TOO much about the smaller details why is the second one better? because i will get it done. if i try very very hard my ABSOLUTE best on a comic, making sure every single line is perfect, in a few months that comic will still be outdated. it will still get old and the amount i learned from it is limitedif i give myself some leeway (still trying of course, still learning and challenging myself) and set a deadline, i learn to be disciplined in my comics, i get a comic finished, AND i learn more because i am finishing more work in general

this is a really helpful video that explains this point more in depth

this isn’t to say you need to take the easiest routes for art that are availableit’s more like… back to the comic example, let’s say it’s like making a cake i can be a huge perfectionist about my cake, carving everything exact and putting every drop of frosting as exact as i can… but i’m still not a “master” at this i’m still learning the next time i make a cake i’m going to have to do the same situation … take forever to try to make the perfect cake

if i make a cake and still try, but accept when i don’t know how to get the exact result, my first cake is going to be a bit of a mess, but the next cake i make, i’ll be a little closer and in the time it takes Perfectionist Me to make 2 cakes, i might have already made 10 and i’ve sped up the process now and improved because i’ve learned a lot with those 10 cakes

there’s probably more that can be said about art, but i’m hesitant to try to dictate too much about how you experience your art and go about it i hope that this can help you at least a bit though

#nonbonart post

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iamcinema · 5 years

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IAC Reviews #004: Faces of Death (1978) [Retrospective #1]

Warning: The following film contains (real) graphic violence that might NSFL for some viewers; including that of autopsies, animal cruelty, air and road accidents, and simulated death media. If this seems like something that might offend or upset you, don’t seek it out. This retrospect, however, will discuss the film and these aspects without the usage of stills, and is marked safe. Read forward at your own discretion.

Let’s take things in a slightly different direction this time around, and discuss one of the most infamous pieces of shocking and controversial cinema of all time; John Alan Schwartz’s 1978 shockumentary Faces of Death.

While it doesn’t predate other films of a similar ilk like Mondo Cane (1962), Shocking Asia (1974), or even gory, road safety films like Signal 30 (1959) or Red Asphalt (1960), it could be considered to be the first film of its kind to become a household name - a pretty dark one, and bring the term “shockumentary” to the mainstream. Becoming a cult classic that out performed films like E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial (1982) in sales in countries like Japan in the 1980s, the film gained traction for it’s proclamation that it was banned in at least “46 countries” for its raw, graphic depiction of death caught on film in the form of surgical procedures, autopsies, animal cruelty, and news footage or home videos of disasters and accidents caught on film.

Since this year marks the 41st anniversary of the film’s release, why not touch on it again?

Faces of Death in One Gif:

Okay, so shitposting aside, let’s get down to talking about this.

One of the big things that ultimately comes up about the film is a simple one word question.

Why?

What’s so special about this thing that has caused it to remain so relevant and influential that it continued to inspire its own sequels and dwell in the hearts of other mondo/shockumentary based films or series like Banned! in America (1998-2000), Traces of Death (1993 - 2000), or modern day mixtapes like The Most Disturbed Person on Planet Earth (2014-). The film’s connections page alone is impressive, with it being given a nod to in mainstream films and programs like Scream 2 (1997), House of 1000 Corpses (2003), The Houses October Built (2014) and Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988-). This becomes more apparent when the topic of the authenticity of the footage is brought into question, and it ends up being one of the focal discussions about both this film and the rest of the series as a whole - with roughly 40-70% of the footage being staged or recreated.

To some, they can spot the fakes from a mile away without any hesitation, and some end up being genuinely surprised when they find out certain shots were, in fact, staged. This includes the famous alligator attack, the police shoot-out, the electric chair execution that often graces the cover of posters, and the beheading execution sequence that takes place shortly there after. However, not all the scenes are staged. Well, sort of. Some are in fact, genuine, but have tacked on moments to build tension or to pad them out; such as that of footage of a suicide jumper - which included additional footage of firefighters rushing to the scene and close-ups of the aftermath.

Furthermore, due to the quality of some of the footage, it can often be hard to tell and scenes that look cheap and fake end up turning out to be genuine. The content that’s genuine is often quite brutal, and it can be very in your face about it - giving you a true face to face encounter with what your own death might be.

The most infamous of the more graphic content is the unflinching depiction of animal cruelty in a number of settings and situations; including slaughterhouses, family farms, or at the hands of hunters, and poachers. In documentaries and interviews about the experiences from the crew during the filming of such scenes, such as the slaughterhouses. In the Fact or Fiction special about the series, the director talked about how they were once up to their hips in blood and entrails while filming at one of these locations. To state that these sequences aren’t graphic or violent would be a bold faced lie, and this chapter isn’t for those who are faint of heart and can be hard to watch.

Two of the more notable sequences that contain real footage include that of unaired news footage from the famous PSA Flight 182 disaster, a deadly plane crash that took place in the North Park neighborhood of San Diego, which killed several people on the ground and destroyed several buildings and homes, as well as footage captured by the film crew by pure chance of a drowning victim that washed up on the beach after being reported missing for several days.

“Okay, so it’s not all bullshit. So what? But that still doesn’t answer the question of why it’s so popular though to begin with or why it still is.”

Well, I feel like the controversy speaks for itself and maybe people end up just answering their own question.

While it wasn’t the original mondo film, let alone the first to get international attention, it’s my understanding that it was targeted specifically with Western, theatrical audiences in mind. With the boasted reputation it garnered for being banned in nearly 50 countries and the in your face trailer with its depiction of corpses, religious cults, and general mayhem; it can be enticing to the morbidly curious, especially in the aftermath of the Vietnam war and the waves of anti-war footage and photography that had released in its wake. This inadvertently helped to fuel attention, controversy, and attention for the film, which Schwartz said banning it was the best kind of press it could have been given - proving the point that the more you tell people they can’t have something, the more they’re likely to seek it out . Like other mondo and shockumentary films that would follow in its footsteps, it’s also a time capsule of the period; such as with the aforementioned news footage from the PSA 182 crash that had happened barely two months prior to the theatrical release, and a chapter of the film dedicated to capital punishment, which had only been reinstated in the United States two years prior in 1976 following the Supreme Court’s ruling of the Gregg vs Georgia case.

Faces of Death was a product of its time, but did it age well? From a practical effects standpoint, I’d say not really.

As stated before, many moment come off as fake, and several of the ones that are clearly show to the point of it being almost laughable. The publicity fueled behind it resembles that of Snuff (1976) in some aspects, where the team behind it staged fake protests to get the film more attention and infamy for the iconic ending sequence. With that being said, I wouldn’t be surprised if the production team drew inspiration from that as a way to gain traction or beef it up for the masses. Just like with that film, the scene may have fooled some people back then, but by today’s standards, the effects are quite amateurish in nature and not something you’d get away with if you wanted to trick people. Even going by the level that’s being met for many horror films these days, there’s no competition; even for films in the independent and underground scenes from the last twenty years that had barely a fraction of the budget that went into Faces of Death.

From a cultural and influential standpoint, I’d say it has in a way.

Without Faces of Death, I don’t think we’d fully be where we are now extreme cinema, even for films that wouldn’t necessarily think of themselves as such; like Death Scenes (1989), which is more of a historical piece and A Certain Kind of Death (2003) being just about the process of death and what goes into how it’s managed. It feels like traces of it can be found in a ton of films, unless that’s just a stretch. There’s also the ongoing debate about snuff films as well, as there had been rumors that people were killed to make Faces of Death, and thus, the legend of snuff continues to live on in films like Cannibal Holocaust, (1980), Guinea Pig: Flower of Flesh and Blood (1985), Man Bites Dog (1992), Niku Daruma (1998), August Underground (2001), and Be My Cat: A Film For Anne (2015).

However, with the advent of the Internet, you can easily find whatever you’re looking for with a quick search with little to no real effort. It’s no longer a serious challenge to find audio recordings from the last moments of mass suicide cults or plane crashes, gruesome crime scene photos, or graphic videos of murders, executions, or animal cruelty. So, why pay (or stream) to see something that’s partially or mostly fake, when you can see something real yourself? With sites that cater to the morbidly curious or the few and far between depraved like Ogrish, Rotten, BloodShows, and BestGore, shockumentaries, even the rawest and unflinching of their kind become outdated and sort of pointless. This also applies to the MDPOPE, which is barely turning five years old as of this being written, which at the end of the day, is a simple mixtape of content you could find online if you’re willing to look hard for it.

Closing Thoughts:

With all of that said, would I recommend watching Faces of Death? In short, yes I would.

To quote Killion over at HNN; “Is the movie entertaining? It isn’t entertaining; it’s a rite of passage.“

Faces of Death is an exploration into death, and since I’ve first seen it roughly 13 years ago, I still see people who come out of it saying that it gave them a new outlook on life or has helped them to cherish their own with whatever time they may have left; which is a similar response I’ve heard from people who gravitate towards sites like BestGore or LiveLeak. If you haven’t seen it or you’re particularly on the squeamish side, I’d say to still give it a fair shot and see how you feel coming out of it.

Rating: 5.7/10

“In a world with no sounds,

Their cries go unheard.

Reality of life becomes totally absurd.

The counting of time is considered a crime,

And the money one earned not worth a bold dime.

So here they will lie for the rest of the night,

Their bodies remain still in darkness and in light.

Don't be afraid for it'll happen to you,

When all stops as your body turns blue...“ - Luther Easton

Closing Theme:

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#faces of death #fod #film #horror #documentary #shockumentary #mondo #mondo film #iac reviews #horror review

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