#lily talks

[neo-trinity]

gif tutorial

@bakedbakermom requested a tutorial on how i made the gifs in this set, so i've put together a little walkthrough of the process for this gif under the cut!

(disclaimer: this tutorial assumes that you already have basic photoshop/giffing knowledge - i.e. how to make and colour gifs using correction layers, how to use things like layer masks, etc. if you don't, i recommend these tutorials, they're very comprehensive)

alright! so as stated before, i'm not going to go in-depth here on the basics of gifmaking. for this one in particular, i blended three gifs, but we'll get into the third one later.

(i should also mention that blending gifs as i did here is usually easier if you have scenes with shadowed/dark areas like the ones above, so to keep that in mind when picking your scenes! i also find it easier to use scenes where there isn't a whole ton of movement going on- again, not a requirement but it's easier to plan and position gifs if the characters aren't moving across the whole canvas)

first, i started by making the base gifs of mulder and scully in "paper hearts". both are cropped to 540x540 px, and the same length (around 50 frames). i did some standard sharpening, brightening, and adding contrast (my usual process is curves, a b/w gradient map set to "soft light" at around 20% opacity, and messing with the levels a bit) before using selective colour and hue/saturation layers to highlight the teal and peach colours in the gif. sometimes this is enough colouring on its own, depending on the gif and the look you're going for, but in my case i wanted to add more.

so, on top of my colouring, i used a combination of layers set to "colour" and "hard light" to paint over the background of my gifs in teal and peach. on mulder's gif i also used a gradient fill layer in the two colours set to "colour" and used a layer mask to erase anywhere i didn't want the colour to be. the opacity levels for all of these layers again just depends on how vibrant you want your colours, i just mess with that on a gif-to-gif basis.

so we have our two gifs, cropped and coloured to fit the palette we want. next, i converted each coloured gif into a smart object, by selecting all my layers, right clicking, and hitting "convert to smart object."

once that's done, you should be able to click and drag one of the gifs onto the other gif's canvas, so that it's sitting on top. then change the blending mode of the top gif- most people use lighten or screen, this again depends on the look you want and the gifs you're using. for this one, i used screen. it'll probably look something like this:

at this point you can move your gifs around and position them as you like. for mine, i just moved scully a little off to the right, as you can see. in order to get rid of the part that's covering mulder's face, i added a layer mask to the scully gif and used a large, soft brush set to black to erase it.

(another note: i didn't need to do it here, but if you want to move/erase parts of your bottom gif, add a layer of solid black underneath both gifs.)

usually i would stop blending here, but for this set i decided to add a third gif, so i made and coloured the gif of mulder and scully holding hands, using the same methods as the first two. this one was cropped to 540x405 px to make it fit better on the canvas, since i knew i only wanted it to cover the bottom part.

i converted it to a smart object and dragged it onto the same canvas as the other two gifs. this time i used "lighten" as my blending mode, positioned it in the bottom right corner, and again used a layer mask to brush away the parts i didn't want.

on top of all three gifs, i then used layers set to "normal" and "hard light" to brush some extra colour onto the gif. this part i also just play around with on a gif-to-gif basis, but for this set i mostly used a combo of colour, hard light, and normal layers at varying opacities until i got the look i was going for. i generally just like to use big soft brushes to add colour around the edges, as i did here.

now, i have a bunch of texture/grain pngs saved on my laptop that i like to add to gifs for some extra flair, so i opened one of those and cropped it down to 540x540px. i then added a gradient map to give it that peach colour. (any textured png/jpg should work fine for this, as long as you have your gradient map set to black and white/your accent colour)

like i did with my gifs, i converted the texture + gradient map to a smart object and dragged it onto the shared canvas. i set the blending mode to "screen", with the opacity at 70%. i like to put these textures underneath the extra colouring i've done on the gif, as seen here. i don't always do this, but i feel like it sometimes helps the texture blend into the finished gif. you can also use a layer mask if needed to erase any unwanted parts of the texture.

now for the text!

for these gifs i used the font "IM FELL DW Pica" in both regular and italic, in black, at 16px. i didn't do anything fancy with the text itself besides adding a drop shadow in the blending options (right click on the text layer and hit "blending options).

then, underneath the text layer (i was working one word at a time) i used the rectangle tool to draw a small rectangle around the text- i wasn't too picky about the size or evenness since i was going for a collaged look. i set the colour of the rectangle to a light cream colour, and added a drop shadow in the blending options.

then i just selected both the text and rectangle and duplicated them using ctrl+j, changing the text for each word and adjusting the size of the rectangles as needed. once i had all of the words on my canvas, i just moved them around until i found a positioning i liked. again, since i was going for a purposefully scrapbooked look, i didn't overthink this part.

i exported my gif the way i usually do, with these settings:

and that's it! i used pretty much the same process for all the gifs in this set, give or take. hopefully this little walkthrough made sense, but i know i'm not always the best at explaining my process, so if anything needs clarifying feel free to shoot me an ask or dm!

#lily talks #gif tutorial

[shares-a-vest]

💖 Fic Writing Review 2023 💖

I was tagged by @penny00dreadful @rocknrollsalad @cranberrymoons and @unclewaynemunson Thanks everyone! You all smashed it in 2023. Here's to more words wording and fun fandom times with our faves.

Tbh, it took me a good month minute to work out how to do this, seeing as I don't post much to ao3 (something I intend on mending in 2024). I'm very much going with the 'feel free to show whatever stats you like' aspect of the rules.

But before all that, I'd like to use this post as an opportunity to acknowledge everyone who enjoys my writing. I kinda just fell into writing in this fandom and discovered that I love it!

I'm also sending love and appreciation to my beloved moots and everyone in the stwg discord server. Here's to another year of creating, sharing and interacting 💖

This fandom really is my happy place a lot of the time, a much-needed creative outlet and a space where I can talk to people who let me be my silly little old self.

I have so much I want to write in 2024 (including some in-the-works stuff listed below). One goal I know I have in 2024 is to write what I'll temporarily title, 'The Origin of Joanie Munson'. I would really like to knuckle down and write a looonnnggg fic this year that would tell that story.

Anyway, enough of me talking, I'll stop before I get too sappy...

Top 5 Posts by Notes:

Wayne and Claudia to Steve's Rescue

I'm Dating Garfield

My Prince

Eddie gets stuck in Steve's shower after the power goes off

Eddie Munson: Sparkly Vampire Boyfriend

Proudest Work & Reflections:

Wayne and Steve get hearing aids: This post was very much inspired by my pop's ongoing struggle with his hearing aids. HoH Steve is a beloved headcanon of mine so I was happy to receive so much love for a little ficlet that came from a very real place.

Steve spends Father's Day with the Buckleys: If there's one Steve trope I will write, it's Steve Has Bad Parents™. I always find myself writing this trope and getting Steve all sad and angsty as a personal coping mechanism/outlet for irl Dad Stuff™. I was a pile of goo over the tags and comments saying this ficlet resonated with readers! We really are just out here projecting onto our blorbos to get through shit.

Joanie Munson's First Word: I love my Joanie Munson AU. And one thing I love writing into it is Wayne being a doting Grandpa. It was a WIP for quite a while and I remember waking up at like 3am, unable to sleep and bam I finished it, proving that sometimes it's worth letting something linger in the drafts until the moment strikes.

My Fandom Events in 2023 (I did a sprinkling of others, but these I completed/worked on consistently):

Spicy Six Fanworks Challenge SPRING and SUMMER

Steddie Week 2023

Steddiemas

Upcoming Works & Events (aka, next in the pipeline):

Spicy Six Fanworks Challenge WINTER

Clarkson Mixtape Fic

STWG Hozier Project

Tagging some precious moots (plus those above) to send my love and good New Year vibes to! @thefreakandthehair @tboyeddie @steventhusiast @imfinereallyy @hbyrde36 @spicysix @momotonescreaming @withacapitalp @farahsamboolents @hellion-child @sidekick-hero (also feel free to do this tag game too if you'd like/haven't already!)

Rules: Feel free to show whatever stats you have. Only want to show Ao3 stats? Rock on. Want to include some quantitative info instead of stats? Please do this. Want to change how yours is presented? Absolutely do that. Would rather eat glass than do this? Please don’t eat glass but don’t feel like you have to do this either.

#lily talks #writing wip #tag games #pinned post

[littlestlilies]

#Lily Talks #I'm curious because I do both but obviously both take time commitment

[umilily]

They’re in an important meeting. Do not disturb.

#lily talks #lily plays enstars #this is the best update yet #they’re just lil guys #i will raise an army #they’re strategising as we speak #with just one like of my office you too can support the himeru army #lmao

[ilovefictionalmen-123]

I'm sorry requests are taking so long. Just

Fucking bear with me, I'm so tired of life

#x reader #call of duty x reader #konig cod #konig x reader #könig x reader #könig #alejandro vargas #alejandro x reader #ghost x reader #price x reader #bg3 x reader #dammon bg3 #bg3 dammon #bg3 astarion #bg3 #baldurs gate 3 #lily talks #bpd sucks

[deepersea]

finally working on the fic again, but at what cost...

#lily talks #i have the bad feeling that i will need to edit this so much #my head is so mushy and focusing my eyes feels like an olympic sport #i wish i could just think the words and they'd appear in word

[team-star-official]

Hello rotomblr! My name is Lily and this is the official blog for Team Star! We’re here to answer any and all questions you may have! Our asks are open!

________________________________________

If you want to see Penny’s blog, see: @cassiopennia

This is ran by same person who plays penny on the discord and runs that account. If you need me for something OOC dm me on the RPM discord

haiii its mars again: Back on my pokeblogging shit. as always unreality warning lolz

#team star #rotomblr #pokeblogging #intro posts #Lily talks #admin talks #real pkmn #pkmn irl #penny pokemon

[lewdladylily]

I have to ask: Are there IRL casinos with girls in sexy bunny girl outfits or where did that idea come from?

So the classic bunny suit was designed by playboy for the purpose of creating a uniform for the waitress staff of their chain of nightclubs. This is why the playboy bunny outfit has a strong showgirl style to it.

Despite Playboy's rather famously being a nudie magazine, the clubs themselves were not strip clubs. They were more like combination casinos and high end drinking parlors, with sexy women performing dancing and singing and serving drinks. The idea is essentially appeal to the horny rich men in the world that will feel awesome when a beautiful woman lights their cigar as they play poker. And, of course, the bunny suit was the uniform for the female floor staff.

Now these clubs don't exist anymore, with the last of the classic clubs closing in the 90s and while there have been three or four attempted revivals, no really playboy club has stayed in business for long. Really, playboy clubs were only a big thing for about 25-30 years, but they were very big in that time. Because of the fame of the nightclubs and the outfit being a very well designed showgirl outfit it has stuck in the public consciousness ever since, especially in Japan (for reasons I am not really sure of).

So in Japan the bunny suit remains a very popular outfit for the kind of work that calls for outfits like that, such as hostess clubs, and though it has basically been completely divorced from Playboy the associations with Vegas night life (show girls, high class gambling, etc.) remain strong.

So yes, there are IRL casinos with girls in bunny suits. The used to be in the USA, now you can find them in Japan, and there is a strong reason for that association in that this role is specifically what the bunny suit was created for.

#lily talks #At first I wondered why you asked me this #but then like #I am kinda publicly obsessed with bunny suits #also I knew basically all of this off the top of my head #so you asked the right person I guess :)

[speirtons]

quick everyone tell me your thoughts on masters of the air bc i’m so NERVOUS for some reason and i want to talk to my fellow hbowar lovers

#lily talks

[lilyssims]

drop this sunflower🌻into the inboxes of the blogs that make you happy! lets spread a little sunshine ☀️

you're the sweetest, thank you

#lily talks #asks #nonsims

[honimello]

oh i’ve about had it lol

VENT TW

i posted my fourth chapter of in the midnight hour on ao3 (5th chapter on ao3) and the first comment i get is just… so disheartening. it wasn’t necessarily mean but it wasn’t very constructive either, it was just sort of rude. obviously i fixed what they were upset about (i forgot to mention the readers pronouns in the summary) but i really don’t understand why they had to say it the way they did.

i can really understand what it’s like to read something that you really like and then be pulled out of it with wrong pronouns or a description of the reader, but you have no right to tell someone they’re wrong or bad or gross or evil for writing it. all you have to do is either ask politely for them to specify in the description/summary, or don’t say anything at all and just click off the post. you do not have to read something that you don’t like or makes you feel bad. (and the readers pronouns were being used right from the beginning of the story and the summary so i don’t know why it was a surprise for them)

the readers pronouns are mentioned within the summary itself, but since i had afab as a descriptor for the reader this person decided that i was co opting trans language. i am not cis. i have been using afab and amab as descriptors for readers for a very long time, as well as trying to specify pronouns as well. they told me to use fem reader instead or cis fem reader but that’s not always the case! what if i want a reader who uses she/her, is afab, but isn’t cis? like i don’t understand why that’s a wrong label in this context?

am i in the wrong here? like can someone actually tell me if i’m the asshole right now because i feel so bewildered

this just makes me feel so horrible. first thing i’ve written in over a month and i can’t even fucking do that right it seems. i’m so just horribly sad right now.

#tw vent #lily talks #i worked on writing all day today and the first feedback i get is the most passive aggressive comment i’ve ever received #i feel like i should just stop writing like nobody fucking likes it anyways #what the hell is the point #am i just too old now like i know i’ve been here since like 2016 but when did being polite go out the window #like if they had just worded it differently i would’nt be feeling this way #like they literally feel like the kind of person who would tell me to kms and then act like they’re normal for it #this isn’t gonna leave my mind for a while #i should probably just block them to ease my brain or something #also the person writes harry potter fic. i’m astonished

[lmorgart]

Hey! Sorry to bother you. You are so talented! I adore your drawing style!I love your art and I saw you mentioned using a tablet. I have a Samsung galaxy tablet with the penup app. I'm very new to digital arts so what would be your advice for a beginner? I'm honestly grateful for any advice since I know almost nothing😭

hey, thank you so much!! i actually use my laptop for art - it folds into a touchscreen and i've only been experimenting with that (and the microsoft pen it came with) recently. typically i just use a pretty standard huion tablet that plugs into my laptop and clip studio paint to do art. so we're both pretty new to touchscreen tablets in that regard!

as for advice, my biggest tip would honestly just be to do lots of exploring and get comfortable with whatever you're using. there have been plenty of times when i felt totally stuck in my art and the key was just playing around with new brushes/colour choices/blending modes/etc. don't feel like you have to be stuck doing things one way because it's the "right" way. also, as silly as it seems, draw what you love! i'm being completely honest when i say my obsession with the matrix movies improved my art because i was just drawing it nonstop for like a year and a half 😭 everyone always says it but practice is always the most helpful thing, and having something you love to draw is the most helpful thing for that!

#i have no idea how helpful this is but i unfortunately operate purely on vibes 💀 if you want actual technical advice i'm not the person #but drawing often and experimenting is the majority of how i've learned anything #lily talks #asks

[shares-a-vest]

Why the fuck do I keep saying yes to arrangements that I'm not actually happy with???

#ignore me #i am once again annoyed at my own lack of assertiveness in the moment #i just always feel like im inconveniencing someone or putting them out if i say what I WANT #lily talks

[littlestlilies]

Happy New Year!

Thank you to everyone who sent their well wishes when I said I was going on hiatus. It really meant a lot to me.

I've been jumping between a lot of different fandoms. I've thought about writing and drawing for some of them, but nothing really stuck.

Surprisingly, reading back over Horror Bitty's last chapter and doing a little bit of editing on that inspired me to come back. So, no promises on regular updates, but I'll be around more.

All the love Lily~🌸🌺🌿

#Lily Talks #So yeah #I am still incredibly introverted and socially awkward #And as a result terrible at conversing #Thank you again

[umilily]

fuck it, i'm ordering sushi

#lily talks

[satoluv]

hi i ended school now time for training im so upset i dwna go!!!!

#lily talks