#these are all from ~2 years ago i think.. fun to see how my art style has changed

[emily-e-draws]

backlog of tlt nonsense from twitter I forgot to ever post here wehehe

#more to come.. :-) #gtn #tlt #the locked tomb #griddlehark #gideon the ninth #coronabeth tridentarius #ianthe tridentarius #these are all from ~2 years ago i think.. fun to see how my art style has changed

[idrawgaystffs]

Redrew a thing from over 2 years ago with some creative spice I’ve gathered since then, (The clean line art was Never to last, old me)

[Woah I reached the tag limit perfectly]

#my art stff #sanders sides #ts virgil #tss art #creative spirit possessed me till 3 am and I had this on my phone #it’s weird. i had realized that some people seem to keep the same style even as their skills grow and they learn more about anatomy. color #etc. and yet it looks practically the same as when they started. the base anyways #I did at one time do the thing where I drew the hair the same always the same two curls there and a sharp corner here. no matter where #they might be looking. but that made no sense and I learned about volume and strayed drawing hair as the actual strands it is #My Style has changed drastically since just 2 years ago. going on 3 with that new year on the horizon #and I even see change from my last year’s art. I’ve improved! of course there are missteps where oofs happen #but overall! new things have entered my art and I think of composition more and looking for inspiration is way more fun than it used to be #but yeah I am being taught art by an art teacher and I have artist classmates who are also super talented and have their own styles #so I guess that must have something to do with the difference #the hobby of art vs. the engine that is schooling and the constant push to become greater and show improvement #everyday we go over things that we kinda already knew. but seeing all the fancy words and figuring out how other people see those #same concepts is so interesting. #hm already quite a long rant in the tags huh #there is some downside to the whole going to an art class and ‘pushing to improve’ some people can’t handle it and get burnt out #I knew a fellow who really was bored of the class last year and isn’t here this year cause they had Nothing to gain from it #they already had friends to inspire them and knew so may cool skills and learned way more as a wee lad compared to us and their art #was awesome even placed in an official contest #so it’s strange to know that there’s so many variants in the artist’s life journey because we all start at different times and places and #with different levels of expectations and well that’s the cool bit isn’t it #I was thinking about some specific artists when I brought up the stuck to one style thing: both seem to be in college and yet they draw #in a certain way that I specifically abandoned #of course I hadn’t grown this much in no time. that flatish anime-eyed style is a remnant of my middle school days #Whoops more rantyness I’m just gonna leave this here #uh thanks for reading this if you did? #my art

[vetyr]

hi, i ireally love your work and i don't know if you've answered this before but, what kinds of studies do you do or how did you learn color theory? i wanna get better at rendering and anatomy but im having trouble TT TT

Hi! Long answer alert. Once a chatterbox, always a chatterbox.

When I started actively learning how to draw about 10 1/2 years ago, I exclusively did graphite studies in sketchbooks. Here's a few examples—I mostly stuck to doing line drawings to drill basic shapes/contours and proportions into my brain. The more rendered sketches helped me practice edge control & basic values, and they were REALLY good for learning the actual 3D structure behind what I was drawing.

I'd use reference images that I grabbed from fitness forums, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and some NSFW places, but you could find adequate ref material from figure drawing sites like Line of Action. LoA has refs for people (you can filter by clothed/unclothed, age, & gender), animals, expressions, hands/feet, and a few other useful things as well. Love them.

Learning how to render digitally was a similar story; it helped a lot that I had a pretty strong foundation for value/anatomy going in. I basically didn't touch color at all for ~2 years (except for a few attempts at bad digital or acrylic paint studies), which may not have been the best idea. I learned color from a lot of trial and error, honestly, and I'm pretty sure this process involved a lot of imitation—there were a number of digital/traditional painters whose styles I really wanted to emulate (notably their edge control, color choices, value distributions, and shape design), so I kiiind of did a mixture of that + my own experimentation.

For example, I really found Benjamin Björklund's style appealing, especially his softened/lost edges & vibrant pops of saturated color, so here's a study I did from some photograph that I'm *pretty* sure was painted with him in mind.

Learning how to detail was definitely a slow process, and like all the aforementioned things (anatomy/color/edge control/values/etc.) I'm still figuring it out. Focusing on edge control first (that is, deciding on where to place hard/soft edges for emphasizing/de-emphasizing certain areas of the image) is super useful, because you can honestly fool a viewer into thinking there's more detail in a piece than there actually is if you're very economical about where you place your hard edges.

The most important part, to me, is probably just doing this stuff over and over again. You're likely not going to see improvement in a few weeks or even a few months, so don't fret about not getting the exact results you want and just keep studying + making art. I like to think about learning art as a process where you *need* to fail and make crappy art/studies—there's literally no way around it—so you might as well fail right now. See, by making bad art you're actually moving forward—isn't that a fun prospect!!

It's useful to have a folder with art you admire, especially if you can dissect the pieces and understand why you like them so much. You can study those aspects (like, you can redraw or repaint that person's work) and break down whether this is art that you just like to look at, or if it's the kind of art that you want to *make.* There's a LOT of art out there that I love looking at, probably tens of thousands of styles/mediums, but there's a very narrow range that I want to make myself.

I've mentioned it in some ask reply in the past, but I really do think looking at other artist's work is such a cheat code for improving your own skills—the other artist does the work to filter reality/ideas for you, and this sort of allows you to contact the subject matter more directly. I can think of so many examples where an artist I admired exaggerated, like, the way sunlight rested on a face and created that orange fringe around its edge, or the greys/dull blues in a wheat field, or the bright indigo in a cast shadow, or the red along the outside of a person's eye, and it just clicked for me that this was a very available & observable aspect of reality, which had up until that point gone completely unnoticed! If you're really perceptive about the art you look at, it's shocking how much it can teach you about how to see the world (in this particular case I mean this literally, in that the art I looked at fully changed the way I visually processed the world, but of course it has had a strong effect on my worldviews/relationships/beliefs).

Thanks so much for sending in a question (& for reading, if you got this far)! I read every single ask I receive, including the kind words & compliments, which I genuinely always appreciate. Best of luck with learning, my friend :)

#answers to asks #illustration #art advice #art help #drawing #digital art

[canisalbus]

Hello! I'm not a furry either so I'm not sure how I stumbled upon your art, but I'm glad I did because I love everything you do for Machete and Vasco and I admire your art and how much effort you put in fleshing them out. They're gorgeous, and your colouring style is very pretty, too! I'd like to ask some things about them, if you don't mind.

1) Are they specific dog breeds? (I remember you said you're inspired by Borzoi fur for Machete's neck fur!)

2) Are dogs your favourite animal to draw?

3) How did you decide on their names?

The question about the names is because, fun fact: Vasco is an extremely popular football team from Rio de Janeiro, and right now they're competing in Brazil's largest football championship to become the country's champion. So I've been imagining Vasco dragging Machete to a football match and being wildly into it while Machete looks lost in the rambunctious crowd lol but also because I'd like to know if you're applying a nationality to them at all. Their clothes have picked my curiosity!

Thanks for sharing your art with us!

Ah, thank you! I'm glad you like my art and little guys.

1. Both of their breeds are fictional.

Vasco is a scenthound type of dog, if you applied Segugio Italiano's colors to Ariégeois/Porcelaine bodytype you'd get very close to what he's supposed to look like.

Machete is a sighthound and his closest real life counterpart would be Ibizan hound. He's mostly just a little fluffier here and there.

2. Yes, dogs are my favorite thing to draw. Canines in general. Sighthounds in particular.

3. I created Machete almost 16 years ago, I think I was simply reading about weapons and thought the word sounded sharp and had a good rhythm to it. In-universe "Machete" isn't his real name at all, it's something of a mean-spirited epithet/nickname he's acquired from his colleagues (mostly for being efficient at powering through mountains of thankless work, his severe (and increasingly cut-throatish) personality and the fact that he's originally from the part of Italy that was ruled by Spain at the time). His actual name (the one Vasco uses) hasn't been revealed.

I had liked the name Vasco long before I assigned it to this character, to me it sounds friendly and energetic but also noble somehow (but that's just my impression, I don't know any Vascos personally). One of the deciding factors was his color palette, I wanted to aim for shades that would resemble gold. In Finnish, "vaski" is an archaic term for warm colored metals like brass, bronze and copper. It's far fetched in retrospective but when the connection popped in my head I had to go for it.

As for the nationalities, they're both Italian. Vasco is a proud Florentine and Machete is originally Sicilian and now lives in Rome.

I can see how Vasco would be into football, Machete less so.

#answered #anonymous #Vasco #Machete

[izzywantscheesecake]

leo valdez x female reader!! dating headcanons *blows kiss*

Dating Leo Valdez Headcanons!

Pairing: Leo Valdez x Fem!Reader Fandom: Camp Half-Blood Chronicles/Heroes of Olympus Quick Synopsis: Just some paragraphs headcanons on how you and Leo would meet/what dating him would be like. Tags: Use of Y/N, Fluff, no specific physical description of the reader (other than the fact they're female coded), Comfort

HOW YOU TWO WOULD MEET I imagine Leo to be someone who looks for a person he's able to have a lot of common ground with in a relationship. Of course, he's able to crack jokes (even the not so funny ones) around practically everyone, but there's a difference between small banter and just full on being able to vibe with someone. I think he'd be very attracted to someone interested in the arts, or someone who likes to make their own things as a mean of self expression in general. We all know how Leo is in terms of self confidence - he'd like a person who is unapologetically them, proud of their art and self expression and someone who has enough emotional awareness to give him reassurance in a relationship when they can sense he needs it. You guys would probably first meet at some type of event or workshop, or if you're a camper, probably at the dining pavilion when he sees you and has to do a double take because "who is that cool girl I've never seen before?" he'd muster enough confidence to come up and tell you a corny joke, stumbling on his words, which makes you laugh.

"Hey, can I ask you something?"

You looked up from your feet, now practically face to face with this guy you'd never seen before. His clothes were wrecked with dirt and debris, so were his gloves.

He was standing awkwardly, and his hands, clearly shaking, were clenched into tight fists.

"Sure?"

"So um, riddle me this. Why can't you hear a pterodactyl going to the bathroom?"

"Because pterodactyls went extinct 65 million years ago?"

His eyes widened, and a red tint began to become more visible around his face as he scratched his head, messing up his already tangled locks of hair.

"Oh.. That wasn't what I was going to say," He chuckled.

You smiled, suddenly feeling a warm aura coming from this boy.

"Well, what were you going to say?"

"Because, uh.. The P is.. Damn, whatever. My name's Leo. What's yours?"

ACTUAL RELATIONSHIP HEADCANONS He was awkward at the start of the relationship, not really knowing what to say or what exactly "being a boyfriend" entails, but once he starts getting comfortable and more confident around you, that's where the fun begins (yes this is a star wars reference) Expect every Spanish nickname to be pulled out of the book. "Mi amor," "Hermosa," "Bonita," "Mi vida," "Corazón," if it exists in the Spanish language, he's most definitely said it. And he won't skip out on variations of your preferred name, or even silly sounding nicknames in public, like: "pookie" and "sugarplum" or some other stupidness. For dates, I believe he'd very much vary between educational and immersive dates and just straight up goofing off. It honestly depends on the season. Late Fall/Winter is for going to museums, workshops, possibly a joint coding class or hanging together in one of your rooms, and Spring/Summer is for exploring the town and having those cute little boardwalk + beach + ferris wheel dates. (I also imagine him to be somewhat clumsy and he WOULD drop ice cream all over the pavement.) As the son of Hephaestus, he is most definitely a human radiator. Definitely had a lot of fever scares just because of his temperature alone. But don't worry, he's fine. And the heat is an extra bonus if you're cuddling. Speaking of cuddling and physical proximity, Leo's love languages are gift-giving and physical touch. It doesn't matter if you guys have been apart for 2 minutes or 2 days, if he hasn't seen you in a little bit, he will greet you with one of those spin around hugs or a kiss on the hand. And for gift giving, he enjoys giving and receiving gifts. He likes to either make you little trinkets, or make/buy your favorite foods. He is a firm believer of giving his lady princess treatment, even on a dollar store budget. Though he wouldn't consider himself much of a photographer, I think he probably enjoys taking lots of pictures of you, both with and without him. It's to savor the moment, and also because he wishes he could've taken more pictures with his mother when she was still alive. He has a photo album of just you, him, and the adventures you two go on. You're not a stranger to pranking by him, by the way. If anything, he probably pranks you the most, out of love. You'll chase him down for a few hours, and he gets a thrill out of it knowing you won't stay mad at him forever. In conclusion, dating Leo can be rocky, calming, and give you a whirlwind of emotions, similar to how being on a floating trireme would feel.

A/N: I'm going to be real I never really paid much attention to Leo in the books, so I'm hoping this is accurate?? my bad if it isnt gang 🙏🏽🙏🏽

#percy jackson #percy jackson and the olympians #heroes of olympus #pjo #hoo percy #pjo/hoo #riordanverse #rick riordan #leo valdez #son of hephaestus #leo valdez x reader #leo x reader pjo #percy jackson fanfic #leo valdez fluff #leo valdez pjo #leo valdez x fem reader #izzy loves cheesecake!! 🎀

[lurking-latinist]

👀👀 wanna say more about your eusocial timelord theory?

when you sent this ask like a year ago apparently I did not, for which I apologize.

now it's the wee small hours and I'm trying to clear out my asks. but eusocial time lords are so fun. forgive anything that doesn't make sense/jars weirdly in this, I'm trying to explain some quite spitbally worldbuilding.

among other things, it's an explanation for (1) why are there so few time ladies on screen and (2) that very strange thing in I think it's in Gallifrey where Pandora was 'the first female President' and apparently that's a big deal? but like why would a different planet (where they regenerate!!) have the same manifestations of sexism as we have? and also vaguely riffing on the VNAs lore that Gallifrey used to be a matriarchy and Rassilon overthrew it, but also kind of completely transforming that lore.

so forget gender, this is not about gender. "male"/"female" is at best a very rough translation of the binary that Gallifreyans are concerned with, which is worker/queen. They are bees!

The Time Ladies (i.e. Gallifreyans played by female human actors) that we see in the pre-War era (all of this applies to the pre-War era)--Romana, the Rani, Flavia, Inquisitor Darkel--are biologically the equivalent of insect queens. (And the Doctor, the Master, Borusa, the Floating Time Lord, Commander Maxil, etc. etc. are the equivalent of worker bees. The fact that the former all present as female and the latter all present as male is just sort of a translation convention/useful coincidence, I guess.) Gallifreyans evolved from a eusocial species and their early political structures were developments of the hive structure, with reproductive capacity strongly linked to political authority.

Presumably this is what Rassilon, or whatever revolutionary Rassilon stole credit from, is supposed to have overturned--the link between reproductive capacity and political authority. But in my version, it was before that that Looming became a thing: the queens had control of the Looms, so it was the ultimate refinement of their arts and sciences, and it was their way of getting rid of whatever drone class there used to be, if they weren't already parthenogenetic.

And that's why there's the stereotype in Gallifrey--mentioned in connection with Pandora, suggested as a concern about Romana--that a "female" (queen) President will be autocratic. It's seen as a potential return to "how things once were."

And then I did a lot of worldbuilding for how government worked at a stage in history when there was a sort of uneasy balance between reproductive and political power, but that was for a fic Moki was working on and I think she's still working on it, so no spoilers!

So what you end up with is a hive structure where the role of the queen has been sort of abstracted away into... well, the hive itself. The power at the heart of Gallifrey is Gallifrey. I feel like that explains a lot of what's wrong with them.

There might be another branch of the species that evolved away from eusocial structure into something more like solitary bees and that's the Shobogans, possibly, since nobody seems at all clear what the Shobogans are.

Also I read that with naked mole rats, the only eusocial mammal, there are a few in each colony that are predisposed to not fit into the colony and instead go and wander and find other colonies, to promote genetic diversity, and I'm just saying, renegades.

And after the War when there are often maybe two Gallifreyans left, that's why whatever's left of the hivemind keeps trying to get at least one of them to turn out as a Time Lady. Fortunately for the universe, neither of them seems that interested in reproducing.

#doctor who #headcanon

[emptymasks]

Old Web European Musical Sites

So this post started because I was looking through the waybackmachine on the Internet Archive for the old Disney Fairies site for a friend, and remembered I'd backed up some old musical related sites a couple years ago on the waybackmachine just to archive them.

Which made me remember how recently I saw someone on here, I don't remember who, asking if there were interviews either about Elisabeth das Musical or specifically with Uwe Kroger (the actor who originated the role of Der Tod/Death) in English to which someone had answered no but there are some quotes and fragments in other posts on here. Which made me remember an old website I'd found that did have interviews on and I went out to find it. After I found it, I tried to find another website I'd found that had nice old photos of Uwe on that I'd save for I'd never seen them anywhere else, but sadly can no longer find the site and I hadn't bookmarked it or archived it. But, in doing so I did find some others.

So, come along with me as I find some ye olde websites based around European Musicals and Non-English Musicals, all of which I am archiving using the waybackmachine and can be found on my archive.org account @ wennli3b3 under the 'web archives' tab on my profile.

What is old web? The aesthetics wiki describes it as "Essentially consisting of screencaps and gifs, Old Web is an aesthetic utilizing traditional web design elements combined with aspects of poetry and self-expression. This also includes GIFs, video games, and clip-art. This aesthetic expresses nostalgia for Internet culture of the early 1990s to early 2010s." Think of old GeoCities and AngelFire websites, the pre-2010s internet where it wasn't uncommon for anyone to make their own little website for anything and the internet wasn't just social media. There's just such a charm for me about these old sites and the work people put into customising and decorating their sites, often just as a fun project for themselves or a way to document things they loved. Therefore the websites we'll be looking at are from the 90s up to the late 2000s, 2010s and onwards websites don't count for this list.

What is the waybackmachine? The waybackmachine is hosted on the Internet Archive, it's a digital archive of websites that lets you visit websites as they were during the past if they've been archived there.

[Note: this post won't have clickable links because that can make Tumblr unhappy and either hide or soft-block my post, so sadly no clickable links, but I will write out the links with spaces in the hopes that won't hide the post and you will just have to type them in for yourselves, and I will link my web archive page in the replies to this post. I am also not claiming to be the first to back these sites up or discover them, some of them have already been archived in past, but doing them all under one account means you guys can have an easy list of them all in one place. Some of these sites no longer exist and are only accessible via the waybackmachine, in those cases I will save those sites to my web archive so they are all listed on one page.]

1. musicalvienna . at

Staring with a website some of you will be familiar with and while in it's current 2023 form doesn't count as old web and is easily accessible, we're going back in time with the waybackmachine to see how the site looked and what information it had about old current productions in 2000-2008. And frankly I don't know what to do with the information that at some point in 2000 there was a 'vampire museum' inside the Raimund Theatre that had what appears to be a wax figure of Steve Barton in his original Graf von Krolock costume. I. What??

2. eljen . net / kroeger

A fansite dedicated to Uwe Kroger, the actor, that was run seemingly from 1998-2002 that old photos, links to music that no longer work, but most important to me is the 'Press' page that has many articles and interviews with Uwe that have been translated into English! The site is also available in German eljen . net / kroeger / deutsch. A special shoutout to Uwe's own drawing of himself as Der Tod.

3. eljen . net / elisabeth

Run by the same person as the first site, in fact it is technically the same site however if you go to the root eljen . net there is just a blank page with a link to the /kroeger site, there's no direct link to the Elisabeth site, you can only find it through googling or having the direct URL.

4. iukc . de

The Uwe Kroger fanclub webite seems to have started around 2000 but it was taken offline sometime after October 2021 as going to the URL now leads to a 404 error page, but the site is still accessible using the waybackmachine. On a 2019 capture of the website it states this fanclub was dissolved on December 31st 2019 and was advertising the uwe-kroeger-community . com website as a new fanclub. Some of the pages are available in English and Japanese, but all of the pages are only available in German. The site includes information about the fanclub, as well as lists of Uwe's work, discography, and more.

5. gudrun-kauck . de

A site that as far as I can tell is run by someone just documenting their life and things they see, and that happens to include many musicals. Down the left side of the site there are pages for The Phantom of the Opera, Tanz der Vampire, Ludwig, Concerts, Musicals and Actors. Here there is so much information, interviews, photos, screenshots, transcriptions of scripts and lyrics, articles, and more. This site is a real treasure trove. It's been updating since at least 2004 and it's most recent update was in 2023. This site is in German.

6. jimsteinman . com

The Tanz der Vampire page on Jim Stienman's website has links to lots of articles, interviews and photos for the original 1997 Vienna production and the 2000 Stuttgart production. This site is in English.

7. carpe-jugulujm . com

Another site that is no longer active and can only be accessed via the waybackmachine, it was online by 2006 and taken offline between late 2021 and 2023. It has information on productions of Tanz der Vampire between 1997 and 2009 and is one of the few if not the only place I've found information about the 2000 Estonia production. This site is in English.

8. geocities . ws / mymusicalworlds

This website is all in Chinese, however parts of it are in English and German. It lists information on different musicals, actors, and has lyrics for songs, and photos. It also has midi files but, as with almost all of these old sites, the download links no longer work.

9. theatre-musical . com

This website started around 2002 and was closed some time in 2016, if you go to the website now all you'll get is a message saying the website has been closed, however the old pages are still accessible via the waybackmachine. There's pages for many musicals with lots of information about each show and each of these musical pages has a link to a page that lists other sites, official and fanmade, that are about this musical. There's many more sites to find via

10. elisabeth-fanclub . de

A fansite dedicated to Elisabeth das Musical, more specifically the 2001 Essen production and 2003 Vienna Revival. This site includes information and photos about these productions. It was online by 2004 and was taken offline some time after 2007 and is only now available via the waybackmachine. This site is in German.

11. sisi-net . de

While this site is more dedicated to the actual real Empress Elisabeth, it also has a page dedicated to Elisabeth das Musical which includes several articles and interviews for the 2001 Essen production. There is also some information on here about the Ludwig musical. This site is in German. It was online by 1999, in 2008 the site was empty and "'"under construction" and after 2008 seemed to have either had it's domain sold or hacked and became used for something else, and by 2019 was offline.

12. geocities . com / broadway / 8851

Another site that is dedicated to the real person Elisabeth, but also has information about multiple productions of Elisabeth das Musical. The site was started in 1996 and is no longer online as GeoCities no longer exists as a website hoster, but can be accessed using the waybackmachine. This site is in English.

13. elisabeth-musicpage . de

A German fansite for the 2001 Essen production of Elisabeth das Musical that contains information about the show, merchandise, photos, etc. The site was online by 2002, went under construction in 2005 and after 2006 went offline and only accessible via the waybackmachine. This site is in German.

14. elisabeth-das-musical . de

The old official site for the 2001 Essen production of Elisabeth das Musical. It's only accessible via the waybackamachine however all I could access is this homepage as the site seems to require flash player which no longer exists. The site was made in 2001, by 2006 it was redirecting to a different website that no longer exists, and by 2008 it was just offline.

15. sissi . nl

The official site for the 1999 Dutch production of Elisabeth das Musical. The site went up in 1999 and is no longer online and only accessible via the waybackmachine.

16. marloes . info

A site where someone cataloged every musical they saw between 1996 and 2004. Some of these listings link to their reviews of the musicals and pictures they took (the pictures of Elisabeth das Musical really interest me because they went on a night where Jesper Tyden was understudying for Der Tod (he usually played Rudolf) in teh 2001 Essen production).

17. danceofthevampries . com

The official site for the 2002 Broadway production of Tanz der Vampire. Whilst we all have... feelings about this production, the site's design is very of its time. It has information on the (re-written) plot, cast, downloads for the original English demo recordings (that no longer work), and more. In 2002 the cast page lists the Broadway cast, after the shows closure in 2003 these pages advertised the 2003 Hamburg cast, and by 2006 it now advertises the 2006 Berlin cast, and then even by 2012 that page was no longer being updated. This site is now only accessible via the waybackmachine, I don't know when exactly it went offline but I remember being able to acccess it back in 2020. This site is in English.

18. tanzdervampire . de

The official site for German-lanuage productions of Tanz der Vampire from 2000 to around 2004, mostly the 2003 Hamburg production. Some pages of the site sometimes redirect to musicalwelt . de, like the 'galarie' page that links to a page of many paintings by Mike Schöbs of the original 1997 Vienna production. The site is only accessible via the waybackmachine, sometimes I have difficultly loading the pages, and sometimes the pages on later dates redirect to stagegholding . de which no longer exists or works.

19. tanz-der-vampire . de

A fansite for the 2003 Hamburg production of Tanz der Vampire that is still online. It has info about the musical and this production. The page I found the most interesting is the info > links page. It has a list that includes screenshots of websites from around 2003 with official and fanmade sites for different actors from the musical (such as Marjan Shaki, Maike Switzer, Aris Sas, Thomas Mülner, Jens Janke, Ian Jon Bourg, Kevin Tarte and more) most if not all of these sites are on the waybackmachine (and I'm saving them to my own web archive page rather than listing them all here, Tumblr has a text limit and an image limit and we're already running close to it).

20. fuer-sarah . de

A fansite dedicated to actors who played Sarah including understudies, alternates, swings, and dancers who played Sarah/Solo Female Dancer in the dance sequences in Tanz der Vampire. This site is in German and is only available via the waybackmachine and was active between 2001-2005.

21. musicalland . de

A fansite dedicated to musical theatre with some more specific pages dedicated too Elisabeth das Musical, The Phantom of the Opera, 42nd Street and Mamma Mia. The site is still online and stopped updating in 2010. This site is in German. The link to the Elisabeth das Musical page no longer works, but can still be accessed using the waybackmachine.

22. old-hickory . demon . co . uk / jim

A fan page for composer Jim Steinman that has pages about his non-musical work as well as his musicals Tanz der Vampire and Whistle Down the Wind. The Tanz der Vampire pages include lyrics in German and English, as well as the entire original 1997 Vienna libretto translated into English, as well as the 2000 Stuttgart production's programme fully translated into English that includes information and interviews. The site is in English and only accessible via the waybackmachine.

23. romeojulietmusicals . com

A fan site for the French musical Roméo et Juliette that has pages dedicated to many different language productions with cast lists, information, lyrics and lyric translations. There are galleries on the site but the images on longer load. This site is in English and was online between 2004 to 2008. There is a 'related links' page that contains so many more links to other musical sites.

24. compat . tf1 . fr

A fan site for Roméo et Juliette for the original 2000 Paris production containing images of the cast, and video interviews and behind the scenes with links that no longer work. This site is in French.

25. mozartbudapest . hu

The official website for the 2003 Budapest production of Mozart das Musical. This website is only accessible via the waybackmachine, it contains the cast list, a bio of Mozart (the person), but sadly most of the image no longer work. I mention it here only because when i opened it I was surprised the original logo animation and music still played. This site is available in English and Hungarian.

26. notredameonline . com

During 2000-2001 this URL was for the French musical Notre Dame de Paris and you can see this via the waybackmachine. The site then went offline after 2001 and the domain was sold and since 2006 has belonged to the University of Notre Dame. I really like the design of this site, sadly most of the links open pop-ups that no longer work. The site is available in French and English.

27. notredamedeparis . it

The official site for the 2002 Italian tour of Notre Dame de Paris. It has a lot of information about the musical and this specific production. This site is in Italian and is only accessible via the waybackmachine.

28. geocities . ws / dreamcatcher182004

A fansite dedicated to a few musicals that was last updated in 2003. It has pages for Chicago, Les Mis, Miss Saigon, The Phantom of the Opera and Tanz der Vampire.

.

So yeah, that was a list. I hope that was interesting or for anyone wanting to find more information about these musicals for research, essays, or just for fun, that this post was helpful or interesting in some way. There are a lot more websites than just the ones on this list, however Tumblr has both a photo and a character limit for text posts. If you want a larger catalog you can look at my Internet Archive (archive . org) page @ WennLi3b3 and go to my 'web archives' page, this lists both pages I myself have archived and pages other's have archived and I have bookmarked. Hope someone found this interesting. I just like making lists.

#this is so niche omg but i love old web and euro musicals and hey theres some good resources on here for anyone looking for info on musicals #hi im damien im 25 and i love to make lists #european musicals #non english language musicals #tanz der vampire #elisabeth das musical #notre dame de paris #nddp #retj #romeo et juliette #roméo et juliette #mozart das musical #phantom of the opera #mytext #masterlists #poto #europeanmusicals

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for trying to block evade?

This happened several years ago, so I'll put the ages that we were at the time.

I [17F at the time], had an extremely close friend [17F] of 3+ years, and I still haven't found any kind of friendship that came close to the level of trust / openness that was there. So some of this backstory ranges from 14yrs to 17yrs.

My home was abusive, and she and her mom helped me figure out what was rational vs irrational, normal vs not normal, and pointing out local resources to get help - which was absolutely amazing and I could not thank them enough.

She invited me to her house pretty regularly, a couple times a week. We'd have hours of skype calls. She got me roped into Undertale & the fandom. Well, not that we really interacted with the fandom at large. We only publically posted some of the art and barely got noticed haha. Between the two of us, we had something like 26 AUs and had a lot of rp with multiverse shenanigans - like over 1200+ pages of google docs rp, because that's where we did like 90% of it. After we hit like 100-200 pages, we'd make a new doc so it wouldn't take so long to load. And we had like, at least like 9 docs I think. I was mostly in it for her, because it was really fun to just make up stories together. I could've done it with any fandom she threw at me, undertale is just the one that was popular at the time.

At one point, I think when we were around 16, I asked her if she wanted to start dating. She said something along the lines of maybe in the future, but not right now - she wanted to focus on school. Even though she declined at the time, she did say she appreciated me asking and that it meant a lot to her. And there were 0 hard feelings about the answer, we just kept on going the way we were going.

She got hit with a really bad level of depression, and stopped coming to school. After 2-3 days, I started calling her every day around lunch time just to check in on her and see how she was doing. See if there was anything I could do to help - bring some snacks, catch her up on classwork for the couple classes we shared, stuff like that. This was for couple months. More than just a mental health day, and the only reason she gave was Depression.

After a week or two of the daily calls, there was probably an aspect of toxic positivity on my end. Like "You gotta Do Something to avoid being trapped in your misery, even if it's just baby steps like sitting outside on the porch or going on a walk down the block" Not maliciously, but more out of not knowing how to handle a situation like this & genuinely wanting to help her because of all the help she's offered me in the past & fueled a little bit by fear because Depresssion is the excuse that my abusive parents used to justify their shitty behavior & neglect. Not because I was afraid of what she'd do to me, but more what she'd do to herself. That's one of the only things I could think where I went wrong, which I completely acknowledge and understand now.

She was still inviting me to her house, and we were still doing our normal thing there. Drawing and writing stories together.

After 4-5 weeks [? estimate, time is an illusion] of her not showing up to school, I can't remember if I asked if it was helpful or if she suggested that I stop calling every day. Calling every day was making her feel worse.

I did end up calling the next day or two at lunch - crossing the boundary was not my intent. We had planned to hang out on the weekend again, lunch is just when I remembered & had time to call to ask if she still wanted to hang out or if she wanted some space. I think she said yes to hanging out, didn't mention anything about crossing the boundary. Same with the next day - there was something I needed to ask clarification on, it wasn't a check in, nothing was mentioned of the boundary. I can't remember what it was now. This is another one of the places where I think I went wrong, which I acknowledge & understand.

I did stop the check ins like requested though. After those two off days, I did stop calling her every day at lunch.

She finished out the school year having shown up to class maybe 3ish times, I think.

Again, we were still hanging out regularly. There was no indication that I was doing anything wrong, there was no indication that anything I was doing was wrong. She was still the one inviting me to hang out at least half the time.

There were some problems that I was noticing that I just wanted to have a casual chat about and figure out, but she kept pushing it off as a "I don't have the energy right now, we can talk about it later" and we'd go back to the fun things. I don't really remember what those problems were.

In the summer, I went to a different state to visit my older sister that I hadn't seen in years. I talked to her about it, I was excited for it. We were still chatting regularly during my trip over skype or discord.

And then, during my trip that I was so excited about, she drops this bombshell. She sends me several massive messages detailing out a bullet point list of everything I've done wrong, that she's explicitly breaking off the friendship, and blocks me. 95% of things on that list either flat weren't true, or gross misunderstandings of what happened.

It was genuinely horrible things too.

For example, one of the things on the list was "Suicide baiting" or "Suicide guilt tripping" or something along those lines, which had happened several months if not a year before this. -I've only ever communicated feeling acutely suicidal to her 1 time. -Long before that, she made me promise that if I ever felt suicidal that I was supposed to immediately talk to her about it, for her own peace of mind so she wouldn't worry about me. -I reached a point of feeling acutely suicidal due to abuse at home & general existential dread, that happened to be during a time we had an issue.

I purposefully waited until after the issue was resolved, like 2 weeks, before telling her. I did that specifically so it would not be taken as a guilt trip or a form of coercion while still holding as true as I could to my promise. She made me promise to tell her, it was something very important to her. I made very clear to say "this is something I experienced a couple weeks ago due to unrelated things, it is resolved now, I got help through xyz means and genuinely feel better. You made me promise to tell you so I am telling you, I didn't want to say anything while we were having a problem for xyz reason." I just wanted to talk, and clear up the misunderstandings. I wanted to have a good conversation about figuring out where the communication went wrong, try and figure out how she came to these conclusions, and how that differs from my point of view. Do something to work it out, and just talk about it, and try and salvage this 3+ year friendship.

After I realized I was blocked, I was going through so so many emotions all at once. The whiplash of going from 5 to 100, Upset that I wasn't given any sort of chance to explain, the 5 stages of grief, being thrown away like the gum off your shoe, worrying about her and if this was the stage of isolation for depression, holding out the hope that we could still just talk and work things out, angry that she kept pushing off and refusing to have any sort of serious talk before this, doubting if anything she had said on 'normal vs not normal' - particularly communication styles, thoughts that maybe she was abusive and manipulative all along, maybe I was continuing the cycle of abuse, trauma flashbacks, anxieties that I had since squashed as 'irrational', fear that this was a sign that she was about to fucking kill herself and maybe the whole list was a lie so I wouldn't try and reach out and stop her, doubting my own reality and maybe the entire list she sent me was true and she was justified in her actions.

Simultaneously trying to process intense feelings and realities if it was true and I'm really secretly a horrible monster, if it wasn't true and she was about to die, and old traumas getting dug out of the grave.

God I was such an emotional wreck and did not know how to process or understand anything that was happening.

This is where the AITA comes in -

I was pushing through back to back panic attacks trying to contact her and figure out what was going on. I didn't want her to die, if that's what was happening. I didn't want to be discarded and thrown away like a piece of trash, if that's what was happening. I didn't want to have 0 chance of learning & growing as a person even if this friendship wasn't salvageable due to my monstrous nature, if that's what was happening.

So I block evaded like fckn crazy. Gmail, pet game sites, discord, skype, deviantart, whatever online platform that we shared that had messaging enabled. I called her phone several times. On the 3-4th call, her mom picked up and told me that none of the above was true. That she wasn't about to die, that I wasn't being thrown away like trash, and that I wasn't a monster. She didn't agree with her daughters actions and thought it unfair to me, but ultimately it was my friend's choice. All simultaneously which just did not compute.

If the list she sent me was true, I was a shitty horrible person. If it wasn't, and she isn't about to die, then not be able to just have a calm sit-down conversation at some point about it and clear it up - if I wasn't worth even attempting to make that effort then I was being thrown away like trash. I kept trying for days afterwards to talk to her - just, anything at all. Nothing got through, she never responded to anything.

And... that was that.

I didn't have a chance to talk to her again. I didn't have a chance to clear up misunderstandings, or understand what I did actually wrong and where, or any sort of closure.

Sometimes if I'm remembering it and feeling paranoid, I'll check and see if she's alive by looking at her online profiles for any activity. Like, maybe once a year tops now. According to the petgame sites, she's still alive at least. I'm assuming she got new social media. Literally it's just a "is she alive, do I have to worry about causing her suicide" check, I don't stalk or look into anything further than that.

Anyway, AITA for how extensively & desperately I was block evading?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole #suicide cw

[yumedoca]

"It's a rumic world!!"

Day 7 of @rumicworldweek - Happy Birthday Rumiko Takahashi!! 🎉

Sadly, no art for today since it seems I've hit an artblock after drawing for almost an entire week 😭, but to be fair everything drawn for this week was for sensei's birthday after all. I wanted to draw art for Mermaid Saga, One Pound Gospel and Rumic Theatre, but unfortunately there's only seven days in a week (though I have drawn art for Mermaid Saga like a week earlier and I have drawn an art for one of the Rumic Theatre stories months ago. Sorry One Pound Gospel, eventually!!) And plus, when it comes to topic of Rumiko Takahashi and her works, I decided to talk about it rather than draw...

Rumiko Takahashi... Honestly, all her works mean a lot to me. Each have it's own reasons, reasons why they're more than just mere stories to me. I guess it's mainly because of how good of a storyteller she is. Here's a little tidbit from her which may show why:

And boy, does it make me feel exactly how she wants it to. She knows what the reader looks forward to and she delivers just that while having fun. The amount of love and passion in her works in insane and the little details put to the story and characters are exactly what I love about her tales. Then there's the amount variety when it comes to her stories which I think is the most obvious when you pick up just one volume of the rumic theatre, one moment you're reading a hijinks story about a boy who just want to deliver newspapers but keeps getting interrupted by invaders and half- fishmen and the next moment you'll be reading a horror where this high school kid who knows archery is trying save his girlfriend from being murdered by his yandere cousin.

Honestly, just the amount of one shots she have is enough to prove how much as well as the number of chapters her serializations have is enough to show how much dedication and passion RT has for manga and this dedication is just what makes their quality so good. Urusei Yatsura makes me laugh and reminds me to have fun and enjoy life. Maison Ikkoku taught me about growing up. Mermaid Saga is a spine-chilling story which talks about the price of greed. Ranma 1/2 brings about the topic of familial love besides the romance itself. I've only watched the OVA for One Pound Gospel, but what intrigues me the most is the fact that the main pairing is a boxer and a nun, it's like the strangest pairing you could make but Kosaku and Sister Angela make it work and let's just say I love these kind of strange pairings, lol. Inuyasha talks about letting go from the past while still keeping the important within you. Kyoukai no RINNE is quite nostalgic to me as someone who grew up in a family who's very keen on saving money and a lot of moments make me laugh because I've been similar situations and it's nice to look back on them. And finally, MAO is the series I'm currently growing up with.

I know Rumiko Takahashi will never see this but.. Thank you so much for everything, your characters and stories managed to lift my spirits in the darkest of times and remind me that everything will eventually be okay. I know I'm not the only one who thinks this and all of what I've said is why I love Rumiko Takahashi and her stories.... ♥

I'm glad that I was able to participate in this year's Rumic World Week. Thanks to everyone who's liked and reblogged my posts and I hope everyone reading this has a great day ahead!! 🌹

«previous

«first»

#im sorry there was no art!! #anyway #i like how in the edits it looks like kosaku and angela are looking at inukag #thanks for having me!! #rumiko takahashi #rumic world #urusei yatsura #maison ikkoku #ranma 1/2 #mermaid saga #one pound gospel #inuyasha #kyoukai no rinne #mao #rumic theatre #kattena yatsura #those selfish aliens #the laughing target #my edit #rumic world week #rumicworldweek #god i love them all sm

[in-g-major]

ATLA Unpacked: Ty Lee's Potential

One of the many things we missed out on from ATLA Book 3 was a Ty Lee character arc. Of Azula's trio she's ultimately the least explored and most auxiliary, which is sad. The possibilities were certainly there: a girl who seems too good-natured for the ruthlessness of the Fire Nation, coerced into helping Azula, seemingly naive about what her nation is doing or perhaps too timid to voice her concerns. Gee, all that sure rings a bell doesn't it? So, here are some things that I think could have been done w/ Ty Lee given what we know about her. 1. Friendship with Zuko and eventual Redemption Arc Canon screwed this one up during "The Beach," but there's no reason it had to be that way. Ty Lee should have been the person Zuko warmed up to the most given that they're both more caring people than Mai and Azula. With Ty Lee and Zuko, you have two sheltered and privileged teenagers who don't quite fit the mold of what Fire Nation children are *supposed* to be. As a result, Zuko is banished and Ty Lee leaves her aristocratic home life behind. Zuko's banishment and journey across the world helps him realize that the Fire Nation's war is wrong. Ty Lee, who was part of a traveling Fire Nation circus and eventually traveled the Earth Kingdom with Azula, could have easily come to the same realization. We never even get her perspective on the war in canon! Just imagine Ty Lee and Zuko bonding over martial arts, theater, and collecting pretty sea shells. They bring out each other's best qualities and motivate each other's redemption. 2. Standing up to Azula This has been commented on before, but Mai being the one who defies Azula instead of Ty Lee during "The Boiling Rock" is not a satisfying emotional climax. Mai happily left her boring life behind in "Return to Omashu" as soon as Azula gave her an opportunity, and she openly defied Azula's orders with no fear of retribution at least once. What Azula represented for Mai wasn't fear. Azula was the metaphorical "devil" on Mai's shoulder, distracting her from her lack of emotional fulfillment with fun and thrills. The one who was genuinely afraid of Azula, and abandoned her passion out of that fear, was Ty Lee. Ty Lee standing up to Azula and emerging victorious is far more emotionally and narratively satisfying given their dynamic. It also gives Mai a more character appropriate choice to make in the situation. Which leads me to my third point 3. Mai and Ty Lee marsreds made a fantastic commentary I read years ago. I'll link it in the comments, but her point was that throwing Mai into an awkward and uninteresting relationship with Zuko took the focus away from her relationships with Azula and Ty Lee and made her character arc about a boy. It's a pretty damning commentary on the sexism that seeped into the way ATLA's female characters were written, and how that became the norm for the franchise by the time of the comics. Anyway, a hugely missed opportunity for Ty Lee and Mai was their relationship with each other. Even though I am pro MaiLee, I won't make this ship heavy. Ultimately the writing has to come first, but Mai and Ty Lee do have a fun and touching dynamic. Ty Lee is even more playful and affectionate with Mai than she usually is, and Mai shows genuine care and empathy for Ty Lee. When they reunite in Omashu, Mai asks Ty Lee what happened with her joining the circus. Then, during "The Beach," Mai is the only one who stands up for Ty Lee, telling Zuko to back off and figuring out the root of Ty Lee's desire for attention. We never see Mai this invested in someone else's feelings and well-being with anyone else. The character appropriate choice for Mai in "The Boiling Rock" wasn't betraying Azula for teen love. It was choosing between the friend who encouraged her better self (Ty Lee) or the friend who kept her from growing as a person (Azula).

#atla #atla meta #ty lee #mai #azula #anti maiko #mailee #g major writes #g major meta

[fluentmoviequoter]

heyy, sooo could you maybe do one where the reader finds out dalton and chris kissed once at a frat party and she gets super jealous about it but its really fluffy at the end??

tyy and i love your writing SO MUCH btw 🫶🏻

I love this request so much!!! I hope I did it justice. Thank you for the kind words; I'm glad you're enjoying my writing!🤍

Warnings: jealousy, brief mention of insecurity, angst to fluff, text messages?. 2.6k+ words.

If We Met First

Chris: ‘I’m going to hang out with my roomie’s friends tonight. Catch ya next time!’

You read the text and catch yourself smiling, imagining what it will be like to spend time with Dalton without Chris there. Since you met and started spending time with both of them, you’ve developed feelings for Dalton but have never been able to talk to him about it.

Dalton: ‘I have to finish an art project tonight so we’ll just do it another day.’

Reading the new message, you sigh and toss your phone onto your bed, looking around as you think of what you can do with your free time. Before you can decide, your phone buzzes again. Chris sent you a direct text inviting you to her dorm to meet her roommate and friends. As if she knows you plan to politely decline, she points out that you haven’t had time to make more plans. You reluctantly agree, so she sends a string of emojis and tells you to come over whenever. With a final sigh, you get up, change, grab your things, and begin the short walk to Chris’s dorm.

“There she is!” Chris exclaims as you walk through the open door. She introduces you to the other girls and pulls you to sit on her bed as they continue talking.

“As the resident sophomore,” one of the girls says, “I feel it is my duty to ask how things are looking on the relationship front? Freshman year is one of crushes, first dates, and messy breakups in my experience. So, where is everyone on that spectrum?”

Seemingly intrigued by the question, the other girls sit on the floor with her. You remain on the edge of Chris’s bed as you listen to their answers. One is already on boyfriend number 2, another is talking to a new guy but isn’t sure how she wants to proceed, and the other is in a committed relationship that started in middle school.

“Alright, Chris, what about you? Something going on with that ex-roommate of yours?”

You feel an emotion you can’t place begin stirring as Dalton is brought into the conversation.

“Dolphin was a temporary roommate and we’re still friends,” Chris explains before quietly adding, “Although…”

“Spill!” All of the other girls yell as they lean in.

“We went to this frat party the first week of school right?” Chris begins.

Your phone buzzes, and you pick it up without looking at it, too invested in where this story is going.

“We went upstairs and were alone in this bedroom.”

Your phone buzzes again, and you tune Chris out slightly as you see Dalton’s name.

“And then I kissed him.”

Your head jerks up as you hear her. I have to get out of here, you think.

“I’ve got to go,” you say as you stand up. “Thanks for inviting me, sorry to leave early.”

“No, don’t go! We’re having so much fun!”

You hold up your phone and put on an apologetic look. “Something came up. Maybe I can come to the next one. Thanks again.”

Closing the door behind you, you faintly hear them start talking again. You lean your forehead against the door momentarily before clenching your jaw and walking away. A few minutes ago, you were convinced that Dalton felt the same, sending you shy smiles across the room, bringing treats when he picked you up from class. But he kissed Chris at a frat party, and neither thought to tell you. No, they let you into their group, convinced you they were just friends, and probably kept kissing behind your back as they laughed at how stupid and lovesick you must look when you lock eyes with Dalton.

Slamming the door of your dorm, you collapse face-first into your bed and wish you felt like crying. As you sit up, you realize that you aren’t mad at Chris and Dalton, and that emotion you felt earlier was jealousy. You want to be angry that they didn’t tell you, but really you wish you’d met Dalton first so you could have been the one to kiss him. Remembering that Dalton texted you, you unlock your phone and read the messages.

Dalton: ‘I finished my project if you want to come over.’

Dalton: ‘I know Chris is busy and feel bad we both canceled.’

Sure, you do, you think as you toss your phone onto your nightstand. 

You know you should talk to Dalton, but you won’t. Not right now.

The next day, you ignore your phone as you prepare for class. It buzzed several more times last night and this morning, but you would hate to interrupt if Chris and Dalton were talking on the group chat. Someone knocks on your door, and you pick up your bag before opening it.

“Dalton? What are you doing here?” you ask, peeking around the corner to see if Chris is there.

“You weren’t answering my texts, so I wanted to check on you,” he answers, smiling. “And I know your first class isn’t far from mine so I thought we could walk together.”

“You don’t want to walk with Chris?” You close your door and step into the hallway.

“Um, no. Chris doesn’t have any classes this morning, but I wanted to see you.”

“Oh. Well, I’m fine, my phone just died last night, and I didn’t have time to check it this morning.” You’re a step ahead of him, failing to produce any interest in his art project.

Dalton catches up and shrugs as he smiles at you. “So, do anything fun last night?”

“No. I went to Chris’s room for a little bit, but something came up, so I just went back to my dorm and went to sleep.”

Reaching the art building, you try not to look too eager to leave Dalton.

“Have a good day, Dalton,” you say without stopping, continuing toward your first class.

“You too,” Dalton says quietly, watching your back as you walk away.

In your attempt to concentrate on your classes, you only think about Dalton. When you try to stop, you picture him and Chris and feel like your skin is probably turning green as your jealousy grows. When your last class is dismissed, one of your classmates hands you a copy of their notes.

“You looked like you were creating a revenge plot and we have a quiz on Friday.”

“Oh. Thank you so much! Derek, right?” You put the paper in your backpack as you express your gratitude.

“Yeah, and no problem. I feel bad for whoever was on the other side of those thoughts though,” Derek says with a laugh.

 You smile at him and half heartedly roll your eyes. “Partly the fault of my delusion, but I thought my friend and I were on the same page, but we were not.”

Derek nods like he understands. “Walk with me? I need to make sure your plan is decent before I let you carry it out.”

You begin walking side-by-side as you state, “I’m probably not going to do anything. I’ll get over it eventually.”

“Well, it seems to me that if it’s affecting you this much, maybe you should do something. Talk to them, get revenge, whatever you think fits the situation.” Derek opens the door for you and stops at the top of the stairs. “Here’s my number, if you need to talk about it. And, full disclosure, my girlfriend is great at revenge plots so I’m sure she would be happy to help too.”

You take his number and slip it into your pocket as you smile at him. “I’ll remember that. Hopefully, she won’t need one since you just gave me your number.”

“Are you kidding? She’s convinced you and, what’s his name? Chris Winslow’s old roommate?”

 “Dalton?”

“Yeah, Dalton. She’s convinced you two are madly in love with each other. Don’t ask why she pays so much attention to other people’s relationships, she’s a psych major with no idea of the word boundaries.”

“Thanks again for the notes. I’ll see you in class.”

Derek nods and turns left as you turn right. Someone says your name, and you look up, quickly spotting Dalton waiting beside the sidewalk.

“Hey,” you say as you approach him.

“How was class?”

“Fine.”

Dalton looks over at you as you begin walking. “Professor Armagan said that the project I did last night was my best work yet.”

You hum non-committedly, chewing the inside of your cheek.

Dalton says your name and places a hand on your wrist to stop you. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Dalton. I appreciate you coming to pick me up from class, but you really don’t have to.”

Dalton looks into your eyes for a moment before nodding slowly. “Yeah, okay. Do you want to go get dinner tonight?”

“I’m not feeling great, so I’ll pass. You and Chris have fun. See you later.”

You walk away, navigating to your dorm on autopilot as your jealousy shifts from apathy to insecurity. Part of you is desperate to know why you aren’t enough for Dalton, and the other part is terrified to find out. Later, as your mind wanders to Dalton and his invite to dinner, you realize how hungry you are. Checking your mini-fridge, you settle on walking to your favorite nearby restaurant to try and find comfort in your favorite food.

“Hey.”

You raise your head and see Dalton on the sidewalk. “Hi.”

Dalton looks down at his hands while you think of something to say.

“Where’s Chris?”

Dalton looks up, his brows furrowed. “I don’t know. We didn’t have plans or anything.”

“I thought you were going to get dinner?”

“I invited you to dinner, but you said no, so…”

“Yeah, I actually just realized how hungry I am,” you explain quietly. “If you’re still hungry and the offer is still open, we can go.”

“Sure.”

You and Dalton walk silently, looking over at each other when the other isn’t looking. Dalton tries to act like nothing is wrong, as do you, but the dinner is awkward.

“Can I ask you a question?” you blurt out.

“Of course.”

“Do you think Chris is pretty?”

Dalton’s brows furrow again as he mouths the question to himself. “I guess? Yeah.”

You nod and return to awkward silence. The walk back to your dorm is the same, and just as you did yesterday, you collapse onto your bed. Unwillingly, you cry yourself to sleep without changing your clothes or taking off your shoes.

On day three of your jealousy, you awake to see messy hair, dark circles, and bloodshot eyes looking back at you in the mirror. You make yourself presentable enough and begin walking to class. You decide to leave class early and meet Dalton at the art building. Even though you’re jealous and miserable, Dalton didn’t deserve to be treated like you did yesterday.

Standing at the bottom of the stairs, you watch people file through the door as classes let out. There are only a few classes in this area today, so it should be easy to find Dalton. The door opens again, and Dalton walks out with Chris. You swallow harshly and look to the ground before walking away quickly. Your hopes that Dalton didn’t see you are crushed as he yells your name. Ignoring him, you continue walking toward your dorm. He catches up and wraps his hand around your forearm, spinning you to face him.

“Hey, where are you off to so fast?” he asks.

“It doesn’t matter, Dalton. Go back to Chris.” You try to pull your arm away, but he doesn’t let you. He moves with you as you pull harder.

“What are you talking about?”

“You and Chris. I know, Dalton. So just go.”

“You know what?”

You look up at him as your free hand pries his fingers off your arm. Once free, you walk away as fast as you can. Safely in your dorm, you unlock your phone and see a missed text and a call from Dalton. As you debate blocking his number, another text comes through.

Dalton: ‘We need to talk.’

Dalton: ‘Now.’

Typing a single word, you respond: ‘Fine.’

A knock immediately sounds on your door, and you look through the peephole before opening it. Dalton walks into your room and rubs the back of his neck as he looks at you.

“What do you think is going on between me and Chris?”

“Why does this matter?”

“Why are you acting like it doesn’t? You have been acting completely different the last two days, and now you want to act like all of this is normal?”

“This is the new normal, get used to it, Dalton,” you snap.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Dalton asks, raising his voice and his arms in exasperation.

“You tell me! I’m not the one who kissed Chris and then let my new best friend fall in love with me!” Your anger dissipates slightly after your outburst, but you continue breathing heavily.

“What?” Dalton whispers.

“I know you and Chris kissed at the frat party. And I want to be happy for you, Dalton, but I can’t. Not when I’ve been falling in love with you since the first time we met.”

“You’re jealous,” Dalton states. He knows better than to ask.

“No,” you respond quickly. “Maybe, yes.”

“Do you want to hear my side?”

“I think I’m good.”

“Because my side is that Chris kissed me at a frat party, not the other way around. And she only did it so that Nick wouldn’t know she was digging around his stuff. I never liked Chris like that. Then I met you.”

“So, because it happened before we met it’s okay?”

“Let me finish. I don’t like Chris that way and I never will.”

You look at Dalton, silently urging him to continue.

“Because I fell in love with you too. The moment I laid eyes on you, I knew that I wanted you in my life. Then I saw your smile, you held my hand when the power went out, and you left your classes early to go to lunch with me.”

Dalton closes the gap between you as he speaks. His hands raise to cup your face, and you wrap your fingers around his wrists.

“That kiss meant less than nothing. This one? This one is going to mean everything.”

You nod and look up into his eyes before closing yours. Dalton presses his lips to yours, one of his hands moving to hold the back of your head as he tilts your chin to deepen the kiss. You move your hands from his wrists to lay on his chest, pushing yourself closer to him.

When Dalton breaks the kiss, he lays his forehead against yours.

“I’m sorry I got jealous,” you whisper.

“I’m flattered you like me enough to get jealous,” he responds with a smile.

You gently push his chest as you say, “Stop.”

“You know you can just talk to me though, right? Ask me anything and we can clear the air without going through that again. Because that was painful.”

“I know,” you agree with a nod.

“I guess Chris’s roommate was right about us,” Dalton muses.

“Derek’s girlfriend is Chris’s roommate?” You realize with a gasp.

You both begin laughing at how you were the last to realize your feelings for one another. Your phones buzz and Dalton rolls his eyes as he shows you the text.

Chris: ‘If you’re not already kissing, please get it over with.’

“Wait, who’s Derek?” Dalton asks.

“Careful, you’re starting to sound jealous,” you tease.

“Then I guess we’ll have to kiss that away,” Dalton states.

You happily agree, ignoring Chris’s texts as your jealousy becomes a distant memory.

#dalton lambert x reader #dalton lambert fic #dalton lambert fluff #dalton lambert imagine #dalton lambert #insidious #insidious the red door #requests

[the-obnoxious-sibling]

in which lunch is had, old stories are told, and a misunderstanding is cleared up.

part five of the post-marineford portion of the near miss fics! (1, 2, 3, 4) if you have no idea what i'm talking about but would like to read a shanks/buggy story about kissing in disguise and then having to deal with the emotional fallout of doing that, click on this link, that's the tag for the whole thing in chronological order. (plus some complaining about writing, one inspirational improvised musical number, and a snippet of shanks pov) if you do know what i'm talking about: my intense examination of the cover to chapter 581 and frustrated googling of phrases like “oden cart curtain name” has finally paid off! also, i’d apologize for where this part ends, but that would be an enormous lie, i’ve been planning on ending this part on that line from the very beginning. >:3c enjoy!

With heavier topics taken off the table, the flow of conversation became smooth and easy.  Shanks asked about Buggy’s crew, his recent travels, his plans for the future; Buggy asked about the best places Shanks had been, who he’d met.  At Buggy’s request, Shanks devoted a full twenty minutes to a detailed description of his meeting with Rayleigh; to Buggy’s delight, it turned out Rayleigh was in Sabaody because Shakuyaku, the former Amazon empress, lived there.  Buggy had always been impressed by her, if a little privately judgy of her taste in men, so hearing that the two of them had semi-retired together made him smile.

As did the revelation that Shanks had first seen a wanted poster for Buggy the Clown—his earliest one, actually, before he’d perfected the crossbones and had still been experimenting with lip tints—when Rayleigh pulled a copy out that day.  “He keeps an eye on all the newspapers, from the four big seas and the Grand Line alike,” Shanks explained, digging his toes into the sand. (Buggy had gotten tired of his push-pull relationship with the tides and insisted they move further up the beach.) “I think he’s found and kept a copy of every one of our bounties.”

Buggy tried not to be obvious about how much that meant, but he had never been good at holding back the waterworks when he got emotional.  Sniffing thickly, he said, “That stupid old man… your bounty’s gone up so many times over the years without the picture ever looking different!  What a waste of his space.”

One of Shanks’ eyebrows went up—probably, Buggy realized a moment later, at the implication that Buggy had also been keeping track of Shanks’ bounties.  Ah, well, in for a penny… “Seriously!  It’s bad design!” Buggy insisted.  “If the only changes someone like me ever noticed are that you grew that shitty little beard—”

“Shitty?”  Shanks pouted, running his thumb along his jawline.  “It’s not that bad, is it?”

“It’s worse without the mustache,” Buggy said bluntly.  Shanks played up his shock, gasping and grabbing at his heart like an elderly man.

Buggy rolled his eyes.  “As I was saying: if all I ever noticed was the beard and that your hat disappeared at some point, your average citizen’s not going to realize the Marines have released a new poster and the bounty went up!”  Jabbing a thumb brazenly at his own face, Buggy said, “At least I had something new going on each time.”

Shanks cocked his head at Buggy.  “About that… do you change your makeup style so often for fun, or are you still searching for the perfect look?”

Buggy scoffed.  “There’s no such thing as perfection when it comes to art, or fashion,” he said.  “There’s just advancing your craft.  Every time I change my look up, I’m incorporating newer and flashier techniques, and better supplies.  The makeup I had access to fifteen, even ten years ago would never have lasted a day in Impel Down, let alone weeks.”

“That’s true,” Shanks said thoughtfully, hand on his chin.  “The stuff you have these days is much—” He cut himself off, glancing over Buggy’s shoulder.  Buggy turned to see a cluster of men in ragged prison uniforms standing maybe forty feet away, staring at them and then glancing away awkwardly when they met Buggy’s eye.

“I told them not to bother me today,” Buggy grumbled, giving the group a half-hearted glare.  They visibly quaked, knees knocking, but neither moved nor explained themselves.

“I guess our presence is interfering with their shore leave,” Shanks said, slipping back into his sandals.

Looking past the men revealed the beach had gotten crowded while Buggy wasn’t paying attention—save for a fifty-foot ring of emptiness centered on him and Shanks.  These men had only approached them because there wasn’t anywhere else to be.  Sighing, Buggy stood up, brushing sand off the seat of his pants.

“Lead the way, then,” he said grimly.

With a polite smile and a wave to the former prisoners, Shanks walked back up the beach.  Buggy gave them a glare, and a threatening slice-your-throat gesture (made more emphatic by the way Buggy separated his neck as he sliced) to encourage their silence before following Shanks further inland.

The terrain got a bit jungle-like as they went on, but there were neatly trodden paths between the trees.  It was a civilized corner of nature, and Buggy found he didn’t mind walking through it with just Shanks and his questions for company, even when those questions started getting a bit specific for Buggy’s tastes. (What did Shanks need to know about his plans after he found Captain John’s treasure, anyway?  Was he trying to go after Buggy’s next prize while he was still busy with the current one?)

It was the middle of the lunch hour by the time their jungle path led them back into town, which was almost suspiciously convenient timing.  Buggy glanced at Shanks, trying to figure out if he’d planned this or was just aimlessly wandering.  Well, either way he’d better lead them somewhere soon—Buggy was hungry!  He wanted to eat the kind of food he couldn’t get back on the ship—nothing a typical chef in a typical kitchen could manage.  He wanted something that involved a deep fryer, or another equally specialized device.  Something that would be too much of a hassle to make on a ship.  Something…

“Hey!”  Shanks turned to grab Buggy’s attention, pointing at a yatai on the opposite street corner.  “What about that?”

Buggy spotted the word written in bold white letters on slate gray cloth and started to laugh. “What are we, on a themed vacation or something?”

“You’re the one who put the idea in my head!” Shanks said defensively, grinning.  “I know it’s out of season, but…”

“No, you’re right, we have to,” Buggy said, and led them to the oden-ya.  “I’m just going to look like I’m obsessed, is all.”

Ducking under the bamboo noren curtains, they found themselves in a cozy space, with three stools set up along a polished wooden table the same length as the cooktop.  A gorilla mink stood behind the partitioned oden pot, rotating skewers of fishcake in their niches within the steaming broth.  He glanced up at their entrance, a friendly customer service smile spreading across his face.

“Welcome!  Looking for oden this afternoon, or just something to drink?”  He gestured to one side, where beautiful little sake flasks and other bottles of alcohol were arranged on shelves that took up the whole side wall of the cart.  “I’d be happy to warm a flask of sake up for you on the stove if you’d like.”

“We’re looking for both, thanks,” Shanks said warmly, stepping up to the counter.  “I don’t suppose any of your sake is sourced from Wano?”

The mink wrinkled his nose thoughtfully.  “I may have some in storage, but that stuff tend to run a little pricier, given… well, if you’re asking for it, you must know.”

“Of course you have expensive tastes in booze and nothing else,” Buggy said with a smirk, bent down to inspect the sake that was actually meant for sale.  “Come on, look, they’ve got some West Blue stuff, you were always a sucker for your home ocean.”

“Oh?”  Shanks leaned over Buggy to get a better look at the stock, and a prickle of heat went up Buggy’s spine.  “Ooh, I do like that stuff.  But I really had my heart set on something from Wano…”  Turning back to the mink, he said, “Sorry to trouble you, but can you bring out what you have from Wano?  I promise the price isn’t an issue, and I won’t have any problem drinking a flask of each.”  The mink ducked around back without complaint.

“More like a couple flasks of each,” Buggy muttered, but he didn’t mean it cruelly.  Shanks liked a drink, he always had—and rumor said the last time he saw Whitebeard before all this he’d matched him cup for cup.  Whitebeard-sized cups, too, which meant he had to have a crazy tolerance these days.  Good for him.  Buggy wasn’t quite as capable, but he could hold his liquor.  He wouldn’t be any kind of ex-Roger Pirate if he couldn’t.

“Guilty,” Shanks said, sing-songy, reaching over Buggy’s shoulder to snatch one of the larger bottles of shochu.  “Can you grab a flask or two of the West Blue sake for me?”

Buggy rolled his eyes, grabbing two.  “One of them’s for me.”

“We can share,” Shanks said mildly.

Buggy snorted. “If by ‘share’ you mean I get one cup and by the time I’ve finished it the flask is empty, sure, we can share.”

Shanks laughed.  “Am I that bad?”

“You’re just too fast about it is all.  I like to linger over a drink, really savor it.”

“Oh, you like to take your time, do you?”  Shanks’ smile, already suggestively wide, spread wider still when this comment flustered Buggy.

“I didn’t mean it like that!” he snapped.

“No?”

Why do you sound disappointed, Buggy was tempted to ask—except no, no he wasn’t, he did not want to know why Shanks might be disappointed Buggy hadn’t intended to be suggestive.  He had already decided he wasn’t going there.  “I just mean you rush things a bit.”

“…do I?”

Once again feeling like Shanks was reading things into what he was saying, but this time not at all sure what deeper meaning Shanks was taking from his words, Buggy averted his eyes, setting the pair of sake flasks down in front of the stove top.  “Yeah, I know you like getting drunk, but there’s such a thing as pacing yourself, you know?”

Before Shanks could respond to this—with who knows what kind of misinterpretation of Buggy’s words this time—the mink returned, a crate of sake in flasks and jugs of various sizes in hand.

“Here we are!”  With a soft grunt of effort, the mink set the crate down in front of Shanks.  “Let me know if anything catches your eye.”  He spotted the flasks of West Blue sake Buggy had set down and quickly made room in a pot of steaming water for them to sit and warm up.  “Now, were any items looking especially appealing today?”

Buggy glanced sideways; Shanks was occupied with intently inspecting the sake.  Well, if he wanted something specific he could ask for it later.  “Two bowlfuls of whatever the chef recommends, for now.”

The gorilla nodded.  “Coming right up!”  And he was as good as his word, quickly throwing together a wide, shallow bowl of savory golden-brown broth with a skewer of fishcakes, an egg, and a few slices of daikon for each of them. It looked wonderful, warm and familiar, and it smelled even better.

Before Buggy could take a sip, Shanks had flung his arm across Buggy’s chest, blocking the spoonful of broth from reaching his mouth.

“Hang on,” Shanks said, weirdly serious.  “You have to have this first.”  He held out a small flask of Wano sake, tilted just far enough to encourage Buggy to grab a cup and accept the pour.

“Not warmed up?”  Shanks expression didn’t so much as twitch.  Buggy huffed.  “Fine, fine... you and your expensive tastes.”  He accepted the cup, swirled it for a moment to breathe in the aroma—they really did make it different in Wano; was it something in the water, or the rice?—and took a sip.  Then blinked, goggled at the half-drunk cup, and slung back the rest with a warm floaty feeling in his chest.

Setting the cup down, he breathed, “Is that...?”

Shanks grinned.  “Special pure rice brew.”  He spun the flask around to reveal the maker’s mark.  “From the Kuri region of Wano.”

Buggy snatched the flask away.  Looking it over, he said, “Seriously?! From the same brewery?”

“And you wondered why I was so insistent.”

Buggy shook his head, laughing a little in disbelief, and poured Shanks a cup of the stuff.  He glanced up at their host, politely not bothering them even though he had to be confused, and said, “This exact same sake was the first drink the two of us had, back when we were—what, eleven? Twelve?”

“Something like that,” Shanks said, watching Buggy with a pleased smile.  “Stolen out of Oden’s rooms on a dare—”

“—you’re the one who dared me!” Buggy snapped.  Thinking back, he added, “And he must have let us take it, we weren’t sneaky enough at twelve to get past Oden—”

“—oh, definitely,” Shanks agreed.  “Bet he thought of it as a rite of passage, stealing your first drink from under the nose of your honored elders.”

Buggy snorted.  “Definitely,” he echoed.  Giving Shanks a look, he passed this flask along to the mink as well.  “This stuff isn’t so fancy heating it will ruin the taste, right?  Might as well try it the way it was meant to be had.”

“Of course,” the mink said with a gracious smile, adding the flask to the steaming pot on his stove.  He watched the two of them dig into their bowls—delicious, of course—without comment, but as he carefully retrieved the first of the West Blue flasks from its bath he said, “Now, I haven’t thought about this in a long time, so I’m afraid I can’t quite recall… which of you is Shanks and which is Buggy?”

Buggy blinked dumbly up at the gorilla, his mouth full of radish.  Next to him, Shanks was pulling a similar face.

Hastily swallowing his mouthful, Buggy cleared his throat and said, “You know… both of us by name? But not well enough to know which is which on sight?”

The gorilla smiled sheepishly.  “I wasn’t sure until you brought up Oden.  That’s Kozuki Oden, isn’t it?  Which means the two of you must be Shanks and Buggy, they were the only other young people on the boat in all the stories I heard.”

“What stories?”

“‘The only other young people’…” Shanks lit up.  “Do you know Dogstorm and Cat Viper?”

Buggy nearly smacked Shanks.  “Seriously?!  Not every mink knows each other, Shanks!”

“Heh, actually...”  Buggy stared up at the gorilla mink in disbelief as he shrugged, making an embarrassed expression.  “The truth is, I only learned how to prepare oden at Duke Dogstorm’s request.”

“Duke Dogstorm?”  Shanks whistled.  “Somebody’s moved up in the world.”

Buggy jabbed him in the side with a free-floating elbow.  “I don’t want to hear that from you, Emperor Shanks!”

Shanks winced—an exaggerated gesture for the benefit of their audience—and leaned away from Buggy.  “Oh, come on,” he whined, “it’s not like I meant to become an emperor or anything.”

“Oh, of course not,” Buggy said, rolling his eyes and shoving a piece of tsukune in his mouth.  Eyes shut, he declared, “I’ll bet I can tell you exactly how it happened, too.  You had a meal with some mediocre pirate crew and made friends. Then some shitty Marines started beating the hell out of them; they could’ve just arrested the crew, but they decided to torture them for their own amusement.  Well, you could hardly let this abuse go unchallenged, could you?  So naturally you had to step in, and sent the Marines running with their tails between their legs.  And it was only natural that the pirate crew was thankful to you, but you never dreamed they’d all vow to follow you forever, forswearing their own flag in favor of yours.  Not daring to call themselves true Red-Haired Pirates, of course, but Red-Haired Pirates adjacent.”  Rolling his wrist, Buggy concluded, “And then that happened another twenty or thirty times, because you never learn.”

Opening one eye a crack, he glanced at Shanks.  “How’d I do?”

Shanks, red-faced, his fist pressed to his mouth to hold back laughter, nodded weakly.  “Well, uh... you’re not wrong,” he wheezed out.  Taking a drink to clear his throat and calm down, he sighed.  “Though you make it sound like far more of a foregone conclusion than it felt like when it was first happening.”

“That’s the benefit of an outside perspective,” Buggy said snippily.  “And also hindsight.”  Waving a hand in Shanks’ face, he said, “But enough about you!”  Jabbing the pointer finger of that same hand at their host, Buggy said, “What’s this about you learning to make oden for Dogstorm?”

The gorilla mink smiled, his eyes wide, and Buggy suddenly remembered hearing once that gorillas didn’t actually smile, but instead bared their teeth as a threat against potential enemies.  He pulled back his hand as casually as he could manage it.

“Do you really want to hear the story?  I’m told I can be a bit long-winded,” the mink said, fishing one of the Wano flasks out of its water bath and offering it up.

“Yeah, let’s hear it!” Buggy said, pouring a cup for Shanks, then handing over the flask so Shanks could do the same for him.  “I don’t know about Shanks but I haven’t heard anything from Zou in years, I’m dying to hear what those two have gotten up to.”

Closing his eyes, Buggy took a sip of the warmed Wano sake, not knowing Shanks was doing the same thing at the same time.  They set down their cups and sighed in unpracticed unison.  Suddenly aware of their double act, Buggy scowled at Shanks, who ignored him and made an encouraging gesture to their chef.  “Please, go ahead. I’d love to hear news of Dogstorm and Cat Viper.”

A sad expression washed over the gorilla’s face.  “I’m afraid I can only give you news of Duke Dogstorm.”  At the looks on his guests’ faces, the gorilla threw out a hand and said, “Not to say—please don’t misunderstand! Lord Cat Viper still lives! It’s just that I have not met with him since he and Duke Dogstorm first returned to Zou.  They... keep separate courts, and hours, and my service has always been to the day.”

A wrinkle appeared in Shanks’ brow.  “They don’t talk anymore?”

“It always turns into a fight.  Often one with devastating consequences for their surroundings.”

Buggy frowned.  That didn’t sound right.  Well, not the destruction—that sounded like those two—but fighting so badly they couldn’t even share waking hours... “What happened?”

The gorilla sighed.  “As I understand it?  Kozuki Oden died, and neither could forgive the other for failing to save him.”  A moment later, he gave Buggy a concerned look.  “Oh, are you hurt?”

Buggy blinked.  Staring down at his hands, he realized he’d snapped his chopsticks in half.  “I... no, I’m okay.”  The gorilla carefully plucked the broken shards of wood out of Buggy’s grasp, along with a splinter or two that had tried to wedge their way into his palms.  Thankfully the Chop-Chop fruit could handle any kind of stabbing, from needles up to legendary meito, so Buggy really was fine.

While the gorilla disposed of the pieces of wood, Buggy clenched his jaw, feeling Shanks’ eyes on him.  “I can hear you thinking.”

“…it makes sense,” he said quietly.  “What else could come between those two but the loss of someone who was as important to them as Oden?”

Buggy shot Shanks a narrow look out of the corner of his eye.  “Pretty sure I told you this morning that I was done talking about sad shit,” he warned, and Shanks raised his hand in a placating gesture.  The gorilla confirmed that Buggy wasn’t hurt, pointed out the extra chopsticks sitting in a cup to his left, and at their insistence told his story while they returned to their meal.

Dogstorm’s court sounded like a sight worth seeing.  Minks of countless animal forms, musketeers and attendants! To think Oden’s retainer had retainers of his own now!  And to think that he acted like a guy with such noble dignity, after the way he used to behave.

As the gorilla reached the end of his story—having made the closest thing to oden as could be produced with ingredients native to Zou, with Dogstorm pleased by the effort but quietly unsatisfied by the taste, the gorilla had left the court making a vow to learn the secrets of the oden-preparing arts, promising not to return until he was confident he would be able to put a true smile on the duke’s face—Buggy nudged Shanks in the side.  He glanced at Buggy, a half-eaten skewer of fishcakes sticking out of the corner of his mouth.

“Can you believe,” Buggy said with a shit-eating grin, “that the noble, wounded Dogstorm this guy is talking about is the same one who tarred and feathered Mr. Rayleigh?”

Shanks nearly choked before starting to laugh.  “How did I forget about that?!”

“I’m sorry, Duke Dogstorm did what?” the gorilla said incredulously, staring between the two of them.

“Wait, wait,” Shanks said, before Buggy could start to tell the story.  “If we’re sharing stories of mutual friends, you have to share a drink with us too.”  He grabbed a clean cup from a stack to one side and handed it over to the mink.  Shanks gave Buggy a pleading look, and with a magnanimous smirk Buggy chop-chopped a hand to swipe another sake flask from the water bath and pour for both of them.  “So—”

“Don’t you tell it!” Buggy snapped.  With a grin and a wave of his hand, Shanks metaphorically turned over the reins to Buggy, and took the opportunity to return to his sake and his meal.  “So,” Buggy said to the mink, “the first thing you need to understand about Dogstorm and Cat Viper is that they acted like respectful little attendants when Oden was around, but when it was just the four of us?”  Glancing at Shanks, who was grinning around the skewer in his mouth, Buggy cackled.  “They were just as bad as we were.”

Buggy went on to describe the prank in loving detail, alternating bites of fishcake with the reactions of the crew (mostly hysteria, especially from Roger) and the multiple attempts to blame the prank on someone else (Dogstorm nearly succeeded in pinning it all on Buggy, but forgot himself and corrected Rayleigh on where the tar had come from).  Shanks followed this up with a reminder of another time the four of them had been absolute nightmares to the crew of the Oro Jackson, and the story Buggy told about that day brought their host to literal tears of laughter.

They went around like this for over an hour, topping off their bowls and drinks all the while, recalling old times with the golden burnish of nostalgia softening the edges, easing the hurts and offenses of youth.  Gradually, the last of the fear Buggy had been clinging to all day faded.  It was hard to think that your childhood dread mattered much when looked at from so far off, in so fond a way. It was easy to smile at someone who so readily smiled back.

Eventually the broth pooling at the bottom of their bowls grew cold, and the flasks of sake they’d bought ran dry.  Not a soul had tried to enter the yatai while they were present, and Buggy felt a fleeting burst of pity for the gorilla’s business… until he saw how well Shanks tipped. With a light heart, Buggy waved a slightly drunken farewell to the mink—he’d paced himself pretty well, but a half-dozen bottles of sake split between two men were still going to have an effect—and ducked back out into the wider world.

The air outside was not exactly cold, but it lacked the cozy warmth of the oden-ya’s atmosphere.  It set something within Buggy out of alignment—or maybe back into place?  He stood just outside the noren with a hand pressed to his chest, trying to place the feeling, when Shanks made his own exit and nearly ran into him.

The proximity of Shanks at his back, with the last traces of that soup-warmed air drifting in his wake, sent a burst of longing down Buggy’s spine so intense his knees went weak.

Shanks’ hand went to his shoulder.  “Careful,” Shanks said, hoisting Buggy fully upright, the flat of his arm firm along the breadth of his back.  “You alright, Buggy?”

Fuck.  Even though it was the wrong arm, something about Shanks putting an arm over Buggy’s shoulder made his stomach flip and his heart kick into high gear.  Stupid, loyal organs didn’t have the sense Buggy’s brain had been given, to recognize that feeling feelings for Shanks was a very bad idea.

“Fine,” Buggy croaked out, taking a few careful steps away from Shanks to confirm he was steady enough to make that lie truth.  He shook himself off.

“Your tolerance not what it used to be?” Shanks teased.

“My tolerance is normal,” Buggy insisted, not looking back at Shanks.  “Yours, on the other hand...”

“Yeah, unlike you I’m actually fine,” Shanks said, picking up his pace to match Buggy’s stride.  Glancing around, his back straightened involuntarily with recognition.  Nudging Buggy’s shoulder with his own, he said, “Here, there’s a park nearby where we won’t be bothered.  We can sit down, let you sober up a little before heading back to the ship.”

Buggy drifted in Shanks’ wake on some old instinct.  It was only mid-afternoon.  “There wasn’t anything else you wanted to do?”

Shanks glanced at Buggy over his shoulder.  “What?”

“I dunno, some... sight you thought I should see, or a shop you like or something?”

Shanks blinked.  “Buggy, I’ve never been to this island before. I asked the locals for recommendations yesterday so I could have a good time with you.”

Buggy’s face went hot.  “You—stop saying shit like that!  Don’t you know how that sounds?”

“How it sounds?” Shanks echoed. He led Buggy through a tall, metal gate, into a walled-off plot of land with very little to it, just rock-paved paths, plaques underneath oddly colored trees, and the occasional bench.  Closing the gate behind them, he spun on Buggy.  “How does it sound?”

Buggy scowled and stormed past him.  Like Shanks didn’t know.

“If it sounds like I’ve missed you—well, sorry, Buggy, but I have.  I thought I’d been pretty obvious about that.”  When Buggy turned an incredulous look on Shanks, the corner of his mouth turned up, amused.  “Obvious to everyone but you, I guess.”

“You—you didn’t miss me,” Buggy said, insistent.  “You missed—” he gestured vaguely between the two of them. “—someone knowing you, without you having to say anything.  You missed having a history with someone.”

Shanks shook his head.  “I would love to see many people from back then again, but I’ve never missed any of them like I did you.”

“Oh, come on!” Buggy spat, “what was there to miss?  A greedy little brat who couldn’t decide if he hated you more than he was jealous of you?  A coward who ran and hid from every fight?”  The memory of Shanks leaning in close, a hand on his face, shot through Buggy.  Resisting another stab of longing, he blurted out, “Some stranger’s pretty face?”

“I missed my best—” Shanks’ face screwed up in confusion.  “A pretty face?”

Buggy hadn’t meant to say that.  He grimaced.  “You know.”  Swiping a hand across his face, he chop-chopped his nose off for a moment, hiding the gap behind his free hand.  “This one, that you liked so much that time.”

Understanding lit up Shanks’ face.  “Oh, the gorgeous stranger with stunning eyes.”  A sheepish expression coming over him, Shanks looked away, askance.  “Can I tell you something embarrassing?”

Buggy blinked.  Not the response he’d expected.  “Uh, sure?”

“I only thought those eyes were so stunning because they reminded me of yours.”

Buggy’s jaw dropped.  “The hell they did!”

“They did!”  Shoving his hand over his eyes, Shanks smiled self-consciously.  “Oh, I felt so ridiculous later.  That poor guy, I thought, was deserving of more than my secondhand affections.”  Dropping his hand to look at Buggy, he said, “Though that’s nothing compared to how ridiculous I felt the other day.”

Buggy swallowed, mouth dry.

“I’m sorry, Buggy,” Shanks said after a long, silent moment.  “If I’d known it was you, I wouldn’t have kissed you like that.”

Buggy blinked.

Well.  Of course he wouldn’t have.  That went without saying.

He stepped back.  “I know that.”

“You do?”  Shanks frowned.  “I… good.”  Shoulders hunched, he turned to peer down at a plaque mounted beneath a pink-leafed bush.  “That’s good.  I don’t want there to be any more misunderstandings between us.”

“What’s there to misunderstand?”  Buggy spotted a bench and sat down.  He immediately felt clearer-headed.  Maybe Shanks was right about his tolerance.  “I get it.  You kiss strangers, not old friends.”

Shanks paused mid-step.  “Are you…” He spun to frown at Buggy.  “Are you deliberately misunderstanding me?”

“Hm?”  Buggy had just gotten comfortable, hiking one knee over the bench’s arm.  What was Shanks talking about now?

“Buggy.”

Buggy craned his head back to look up at Shanks.  He looked tall from this angle, and taller still when he leaned over Buggy, resting his hand on the back of the bench.  Shanks’ expression was unreadable, but intense.  Buggy’s mouth felt dry again.  Oh, this was bad.

“I was not apologizing for kissing you.  I was apologizing for kissing you wrong.”

“Kissing me wrong?” Buggy echoed bewilderedly.

“If I’d known that stranger was you, I still would have kissed you, if you’d let me,” Shanks said bluntly.  “I’d kiss you now, if you’d let me.  But it wouldn’t be like that kiss, it would be different.”

Buggy blinked, dumbfounded.

Shanks… wanted to kiss him.

Not the stranger he’d taken him for back then, but Buggy himself.

Had wanted to kiss Buggy then.

Still wanted to kiss Buggy now.

Would kiss him in a different way from a stranger.

“Different how?” Buggy croaked out.

For a long, agonizing moment, Shanks stared blankly at Buggy.  A furious heat rushed into Buggy’s face—there was no way to take a sentence like that back.  He couldn’t pretend it was simple curiosity.  He couldn’t pretend he wasn’t eager to be kissed.

Slowly, Shanks grinned, infuriatingly smug.  “Would you like me to show you?”

#notfic #the near miss fics #one piece #shuggy #shanks #buggy #cackling to myself as i hit post on this bad boy

[thewritetofreespeech]

MC + Cursed Toddler-fied Boys (part 2)

prompt: I did a scenario a while ago for the ‘The Forbidden Book of Toddlerization’ event, but realized I never did one for the B-list boys. This must be rectified. (part i)

Diavolo

Seriously. You all needed to stop leaving cursed books around.

Once ‘The Forbidden Book of Toddlerization’ had been recovered from the last time it fell into the wrong hands, it had safely be tucked away in the archives. Where it was to remain, to your knowledge, for all of known time.

Or at least a year. Whichever came first, apparently, since someone had taken it out a let it on the loose.

“I can’t find him.” Barbatos bemoaned with a sigh as you both continued to search for his master. “You don’t think he could have wandered off somewhere? In his current state, there’s no telling what mischief he’d get into. Or worse, if people see him like this.”

“Diavolo is a pretty level headed guy.” You assure him.

“You don’t know what he was like when he was younger.” He sighed again as he closed the doors to one of the wardrobes, finding no young master in it. “Maybe he’s in the garden. I’ll check there.”

“I’ll keep searching in the castle.” You told him. To which Barbatos nodded and took his leave.

Once he was out of the door, and out of ear shot, you heard rustling under the bed that piqued your curiosity. “Diavolo?” You asked as you pulled back the bedding. “What are you doing under there?”

“SSShhh!” He hissed with a finger to his lips. “I’m hiding from Barbatos. I don’t want him to find me [Y/N].”

“So you masked your presence so he couldn’t find you.” Clever, for the mind of a child. “Why are you hiding from Barbatos?”

“Because if he finds me he’ll make me do work.” You tilted your head to the side, and Diavolo scrunched in tighter on himself. “He’s always making me do things I don’t want to. Write my lessons. Learn new spells. How to speak at public outings. It’s never any fun and it’s all work, work, work!”

“True. But we all have to do things we don’t want to now and then.” Although, this didn’t sound a lot different than Diavolo’s normal schedule these days. “Diavolo, did you open the book and curses yourself so you could get out of work for a few days?” His eyes shyly darted over towards you before they darted away again. “Diavolo.”

“I just didn’t want to be a grown up anymore!” He whined. “It’s never any fun. I never get to do what I want. People are always counting on me.”

You nodded. “I guess that isn’t very fun.” You shift around to lay on your stomach and be eye-to-eye with Diavolo under the bed. “We have fun together though, don’t we? And you don’t need to put a curse on yourself to make it happen. If you ever need a break, just call me. We can play together anytime.”

Diavolo grinned and gave a firm nod. “Can we play battleships and sea monsters once, before Barbatos has to change me back?”

“Sure. I think we have time for that.”

Barbatos

It was a wonder that this castle ran at all without Barbatos around. He had only been cursed for a few hours, and it already seemed like everything was falling apart.

“Boys! Seriously! Can you try to not break everything in the castle??”

“We’re trying, but this is really hard!” Mammon argued.

“Yeah,” Levi agreed, “cut us some slack. We only pretend to be butlers now and then. We don’t have the refined, gentlemanly arts of real butlers.”

“Barbatos does it.”

“He is a Satan.” Lucfier replied. “Why don’t you go check on him? I’ll try to keep them out of anymore trouble in their effort to ‘help’.” You sighed and left to do as you were told. At least you would be away from the sound of crashing.

“Barbatos?” You called as you opened the door. “Are you feeling ok?”

“Oh yes [Y/N].” Barbatos replied. Looking up at you with soft eyes from his small table setting on the floor. “We are having a tea party. Would you like to join?”

You looked around to see a pile of books, one ornate pillow, and an actual stuffed rabbit sitting in a circle with him. Each with a china tea cup in front of them. “Um….sure.” You come over and sit cross legged beside Barbatos as he prepared you a cup as well. “Who are we having tea with?”

“This is Lady Downing. She is from the region of comforter and came all this way for chamomile tea.” You awkwardly wave at the pillow. “This is Lord Booksly. He’s very well read.” You snort out a laugh as you take your tea. “And this is Thaddeus. He is a rabbit.”

“No title for Thaddeus?” You ask while sipping your tea.

“Rabbits can’t have titles. They don’t hold land. Because they are rabbits.” You let out a knowing ‘ah’ at the explanation, and choose to take Barbatos word for it.

You finish off the tea with Barbatos and soon enough, with his great powers, the curse wore off. He thanked you for keeping an eye on him and came out of his room to inspect the castle after the boys had ‘helped’. “Well….I suppose it’s the thought that counts….”

Simeon

The sound of foot steps barreling down the hall announced Simeon before he entered the room. “[Y/N]! [Y/N]! Can you read this book to me??”

You set your own book down and look over at him with a smile. Since his cursed episode, you had been watching Simeon to make sure he didn’t get into any trouble. Which, was pretty easy. He didn’t usually seek out trouble, and must have been a good cherub in his youth, because he just sat and read all day with you. The only ‘up roar’ he caused was when he went to find a ‘big boy’ book and have you read it to him.

“Sure. Which one did you pick?” He handed it to you and you have to snicker, finding a TSL book in your hand. “Wow. What a good choice.”

“Do you like this book?” Simeon asked, bright eyed, as he sat cross legged in front of you.

“Yes. I do. In fact the author is a very good friend.”

“Really???” He gushed, and you were literally biting your tongue not to laugh.

“Yep. He’s very nice. And funny. And handsome.”

“Can I meet him one day?”

“I’m sure you will.” You smirk as you open the book and start to read.

Later, when the curse had worn off, Simeon was very embarrassed that he had picked his own writing as his favorite book. “It’s a little narcissistic, don’t you think?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” you told him, “sometimes you need to be your own best fan.”

Raphael

You shouldn’t be surprised that it was quiet. Raphael was usually a very quiet person. But, if dealing with children had taught you anything it was when children were quiet something bad was going on.

“Hey there Raphael. Whatca doin’?”

“Coloring.” He replied. Still completely focused on his drawings.

“Oh, that’s nice.” Not as serious as you thought. “Can you tell me what you’re drawing there?” Thinking it would be a nice woodland scene. Or maybe some places around the castle.

“The Plauges.”

Your face went very pale at his answer and Raphael turned his picture around to show you. “That’s the river of blood. Those are the frogs & locusts sent to barren their crops. This is when Father sent the suffer and ash to destroy the cities of the sinners. This guy is dead because he got hit in the head with one of the rocks.”

“O….Oh…well that’s very….descriptive.”

Raphael smiled and went back to coloring. Completely obvious to the anxious knot that just tied itself in your stomach. Should you like….lock the door or something?

You asked Raphael about his picture when he was back to normal and he snorted. “Don’t be absurd.” He chastised. “The sinners were obliterated on impact when the suffers came. There would be corpses on the ground like this.”

+ Luke

Finally. The ‘Forbidden Book of Toddlerization’ was put away and out of sight. Hopefully under lock and key, and prepared to be thrown into the bottom of the ocean.

You let out a big sigh as you flop down into a chair. Letting all the stress of this week from a new batch of boys acting like children seep out of your bones. You suppose it wasn’t so bad. They were all kind of cute.

“Hey [Y/N],” Your ears pick up when you hear Luke’s voice.

“What is it Luke?”

“I was in the library looking for a new recipe book and came across this one.” He came into view and your face went white as you saw what he was holding. Your nightmare still very true. “Do you know what it is?”

“Luke don’t touch that!” You shout. Which startled the sweet lad, and causing him to drop the book and crack open. It’s powers activating and a big puff of smoke filling the room.

You cough and bat the smoke clouds away, not sure what was going on. This hadn’t happened before with the other curses. So you feared the worse as you called out for Luke. “Luke? Luke? Are you there?”

“I think so.” An older, deeper voice called back and, as the smoke selected, the statuesque figure of a young man was standing there. “I feel tall.”

Your mind went blank as you stared up at the young man in front of you. It was clearly Luke. You could tell from his eyes. But this hadn’t happened with anyone else. “What is going on?”

“The book must have realized I was already a kid and switched it in reverse.” He reasoned, taking a look at himself. “Instead of making me younger, it made me older. Both mentally and physically.”

“That makes sense.” Or as much sense as the evidence, and every other weird thing that had happened in your life in the Devildom, allowed. “Hopefully it wears off as quickly as the others.”

“I don’t.” Luke interjected. “I hate being the youngest. No one takes me seriously, or treats me like a joke.” You supposed that might be true. Unintentional, but true. “Plus, when I’m my real age, I can’t do this.” Luke‘s hand reached out towards your chin to clasp it, before he leaned in towards you. “You don’t take me seriously either.”

Your mind froze again as he continued to lean in. Clearly for a kiss. Unsure how to stop him or how to get your head wrapped around the situation, even as he came closer.

Luckily, just before your lips touched, there was another puff of smoke and Luke was at his proper size again. “Hn? What happened?”

“Nothing!” You clipped. You quickly scramble to get the book up off the floor and held it in a death grip. “You just grabbed the wrong book. I’m gonna….keep it with me for a while.” You hustle out of the room in a flash, then pull out your phone to ask, “hey Karasu-san, where is the nearest beach?”

#obey me #obey me diavolo #lord diavolo #obey me lord diavolo #diavolo x reader #obey me barbatos #barbatos #barbatos x reader #simeon #angel simeon #simeon x reader #obey me simeon #obey me raphael x reader #obey me raphael #raphael x reader #angel luke #luke #obey me luke #obey me scenarios #obey me imagine #scenarios #imagine #[found this picture online] #[artist ID is in the watermark at the corner]

[notshelbyuwu]

HI!! PORTAL 2 x MINDVERSE :33

I'm so sorry for my cringe btw :((

What if I added 4 idiots to your Portal 2? :3

Summary: After Chell leaves the hospital she basically thinks over the events of Portal 1 for a week, not leaving Felix and their shared apartment, eventually Felix and Barmey get them to spill about what happened and she does, telling them about the advanced portal technology and the crazy evil sentient robot who killed the whole facility and tried to kill them so she killed her first, aaaaand they didn't believe her, thinking they probably got fired or they quit and was just embarrassed about it, with Gordon (who was overhearing) instigating the idea, in his words "if they were stupid enough to put a killer robot in charge of the whole facility they would've shit down a looong time ago". Chell is upset/annoyed that her friends (+ Gordon) don't believe them and, after a lot of pestering, agreed to show them the wreckage of Aperture Science.

Felix was the one to drive them there, they all travel deeper into the facility and Chell tries to find the remains of GLaDOS while the others explore, little did they know, they accidentally activate the party escort bots and get ambushed by multiple of em, being knocked unconscious for struggled against them and placed in statis in the Relaxation Centers, being mistaken for volunteer test subjects.

Chell Nanako (Attempt #4)

-The last one to wake up

-teams up with Wheatley to find her friends and escape

-Wheatley isn't too fond of the idea but doesn't try to sway Chell

-Chell was told she's only been asleep for 5 years

-won't admit it, but they actually have fun testing again

-They feel guilt for giving in and bring everyone to the facility, hoping they're not hurt or worse

-Grows attached to Wheatley because hes endearing to her, taking their mind off... Everything.

-plus, he's all she really has right now.

Gordon Freeman (Attempt #3)

-the 3rd to wake up, he was woken up by Wheatley who loudly knocked on his door

-Found an aperture science jumpsuit and boots in the closet

-Gordon saw how incompetent and wreckless Wheatley could be and ditched him at the first opportunity, choosing to traverse Aperture by himself

-actively avoids Wheatley

-stole a red portal gun from a tall deactivated robot

-ties his portal gun around his waist with a belt

-while traveling through what was left of Aperture, he came across the Oracle Turret, Gordon had never heard a turret speak like it did, so he took it with him, the turret helping him avoid danger while saying the vaugest and foreshadow-y things

-carries the turret on his back with a blanket

-Gordon is trying to find everyone, but his main priority is finding Felix.

Felix Freeman (Attempt #2)

-2nd to wake, Felix woke up on his own and looked around to see nature taking over his room

-Felix has no memory of who he is or where he is but he's absolutely terrified and tries to find a way out, ultimately giving up after what feels like days

-he camps out in the back rooms of Aperture, near some of the ramblings of Doug and a Chell mural

-Felix gets dresses and leaves him room, basically trying not to trip over a vine or fall in a hole.

-found a prototype portal gun in a pile of rubble, had no idea what it was and almost shot his head off

-ran into a companion cube and found it strangely comforting, he doesn't take it everywhere but comes back to it when he needs to calm down

-Felix sometimes runs into Doug Rattmans writings and secret rooms, he has no idea what they mean but it causes him to be super paranoid and suspicious of anything, getting an awful feeling about his situation

-recognizes the woman in the art, he finds them slightly comforting

Barney Calhoun (Attempt #1)

-first to wake up, Wheatley broke his door down and scared the hell outta Barney, also found vines growing around and almost grabbing his legs, ew

-was told to get dressed and he did, got a two piece jumpsuit instead of a one piece jumpsuit.

-immediately asked Wheatley what was happening and Wheatley told him they were escaping, when asked where his friends were, Wheatley, very bluntly, said "I don't know- probably dead, a lot of people died in their room, no one even told me the power went out in some rooms!" And this freaked Barney out, refusing to believe his friends were all dead

-this lead to Barney leaving Wheatley to find someone, anyone. He didn't want to believe that he was all alone in this

-he tied his jacket around his neck like a cape as a way to comfort himself

-found a blue portal gun from a small deactivated robot

-heard a small almost soft voice greet him from around the corner, as he turned the corner he ran into a turret that began to open fire at him, he just barely took cover, but not before a bullet grazed and scared under his left eye

-absolutely hates turrets, thinks the innocent voice they use is cruel considering how dangerous they can be

#portal #portal 2 #portal au #portal art #freemans mind #freemans mind fanart #gordon freemind #barneys mind #barmey calhoun #felixs mind #felix freeman #felix freemind #mindverse #gordon freeman #chell #chell portal #wheatley #glados #notshelbyuwu

[paracosmicessence]

Hey! I love your art so much 💖 I wanted to ask what program you use for 3D modelling?

aw thank you!! :3

and to answer your question i’m going to warn you this is going to be kinda long because i’m gonna use this post as an excuse to show my 3D models that aren’t awful (sorry lol).

i actually use two different programs, both for different purposes, but you don’t need to get both, it really depends on which kind of modeling you want to do.

1) the first is called Nomad Sculpt on the iPad, you do have to pay for it unfortunately but it’s definitely one of the best modeling apps for the iPad. i know Blender is free but my computer is really old and doesn’t run the program very well, and at this point i’ve already gotten used to nomad sculpt.

anyway tho, i use it for art-related things like the obvious 3D models, but recently i’ve been playing around with just making scenes to use as references for my drawings. they’re not anything impressive, most of the time i actually use it to make little figurines to print and turn into earrings/little friends that sit in my room just for fun.

i’m gonna show this first bc they look cooler once they’re printed and colored (also you can tell i printed mini crowley and aziraphale when my sonadow hyperfixation started bc i never actually painted crowley) (he’s just kinda sitting there oops).

the little red guys are actually my favorite bugs (goliath beetles), i made them about a year ago but i still wear them like every day.

and here’s what they look like in the app, it’s a little intimidating but once you get used to it it’s actually kinda fun just playing around and seeing what you can do.

2) the second program i use is Shapr3D (also for the iPad, but i think they made an update where you can run it on windows/mac). you also have to pay for this as a subscription which sucks, i’m only able to use it since the engineering program i’m in pays for it.

Shapr3D is one of the many CAD software programs out there, but it’s nice bc it’s very beginner friendly and very easy to use. CAD is mainly for architecture/engineering but i honestly think more 3D artists should give it a try. it’s really nice once you get the hang of it and (i’m probably biased bc i’m a student) i honestly prefer it over just normal modeling software because i feel like you can be a lot more creative with it.

right now for my engineering class, our semester final is to design and present something that’s functional, and we can either explain the math behind it or just 3D print it and demonstrate how it works, and i’m making a functional mini model of “the rack” trap from Saw III (i’m not psychotic i swear i’ve just had a Saw hyperfixation for 5 years).

i’m definitely gonna post it when it’s finished just bc i’m already excited with how it’s turning out, but for now here’s a couple at-home projects i’ve done:

(above) i have a bunch of wet liners and i designed a stackable holder thingy with bolts between the shelves and a little cute star screw to fasten it at the top.

(above) i also made a few rotating brush holders at home (bc the ones that actually rotate are like $40 for some reason) by buying a set of small sphere bearings at home depot for like $5 (that’s what those little metal things are inside the third one, i took it apart bc i don’t know how to put a video and a picture in the same post) (just pretend they’re spinning rn).

anyway that’s all!! if you actually read this whole thing i love you so much bc engineering and design is one of my special interests so thanks for letting me tell you about the silly things i’ve made :3

#asks #3d art #3d model #engineering #infodump #special interest #ermmmmm not sure what else to tag #this was just a really long post lol #bugs #good omens #autism creature

[sugajimin]

unhelpful tips and resources for gifs&gfxs

Hi everyone, I don’t know how useful this post will be but I wanted to share some of the things I learned through the years of creating content for tumblr and also new information I find every now and then. I see lot of new people who start creating content here and I want to help with what I know.

Note: I won’t upload any tutorial of mine or anything because I believe the resources I will link here will be more useful than just a tutorial that I won’t be able to explain well because English is not my first language. Let’s start!

First of all, few words about tumblr and how it works. Tumblr is a site with many communities. Every user has its own blog that can post many kinds of content, including a text,photo,video,audio,art etc. When you first join the site it might be overwhelming but in reality, it is not (*whispers* I personally find instagram harder to understand how it works). 

Like every site tumblr has its own search bar, tags, likes, reblogs(share on fb,rt on twitter),and follows. When you search a blog to follow and you see their posts you can like their post by tapping on the heart and share(reblog) by clicking on the two arrows button that looks like the recycle icon. 

What does reblog mean and do? 

Reblog is as we said the “share the post” of facebook, with reblog you don’t repost someone’s content but you share it with your followers and help it to be seen bymore people that way you actually help the creator to promote their creations. 

Likes

Unlike, instagram,twitter and facebook, when you like something the website doesn’t recommend the post to your followers unless they go to your blog via their phone and go to your likes page, if you have it unlocked, so basically, likes don’t help with supporting creators as much as reblog does. 

Tags

Tagging system on tumblr, in my opinion, is pretty fun both for the op of a post and for the reblogger. With tagging you can organize all the posts on your blog by anything you like. For example, if you tag artworks as #art and you want to find a certain artwork you reblogged a time ago you can just go to the tag and find it. 

For op you can use tags the same way as other sites to promote your work, as I remember the first 5 tags will be shown on the general tag like if you search on tumblr #artwork and you have the tag #artwork on the first 5 it will be shown there.. but I am not sure if this changed.

Creating a post 

As you can see from your dashboard(timeline on twitter) you have the option to create a text form post, a photo form post.. etc. You can experiment with all of these, don’t be afraid. I will focus on photo form posts because we will talk about gifs and gfxs.

The photo form(with the camera icon) post, is what most content creators use to post their creations like designs/graphics,art/fanart/photography, and gifs.

The site allows you to post 10 photos(if you want to post more I think Text form allows more). 

The size of your photos and gifs must be under 20mb for photos and under 10mb for gifs. 

As for dimension, tumblr has its own dimension but you can always post whichever you want, the bad thing is that the quality will be reduced on the dashboard and the viewer will have to click on every single photo in order to see the original quality. Here are the dimensions:

For a single photo/gif per columna it is 540px horizonatally

For 2 photos/gifs per columna it is 268px x 268px

For 3 photos/gifs per columna it is 177px x 178px x 177px (be careful the middle one always has to be 178px)

Themes

When you feel comfortable with using tumblr, you can customize your blog with beautiful themes that talented people have shared here! 

You can find and learn about themes here: @/theme-hunter

Gifs/gfxs

In this part, I will provide links and tutorials for gifs and graphics, But first of all you need a program for content creation. The most common one is Photoshop, you can buy a subscription from Adobe(it is expensive) or you can find crack version on the internet.  

Chaoticresource has a whole tag for photoshop and many more programs for you to start with photoshop. Not only that they have a whole list of resources for both giffing and graphic making. You can find their tag list with everything you need to here.

Here are some tutorials on how to make a gif

Tutorial by: misty-quigley

Tutorial by: kylos

Tutorial by: hayaosmiyazaki

Tutorial by: cal-kestis

Tutorial by: gr-ogu

Tutorial by: misfitsexual

Tutorial by: unbrokencolorings

Tutorial by: josefnewgayden (also has many resources)

Tutorial by: dunkzilladaddy

Tutorial by: theedorksinlove

Tutorial by: ashleysolsen (with more resources)

As you can see there are many different ways to gif, experiment with as many as you like and choose one you feel more comfortable with.

Usergif and deenafier  and cillianmurphy have collected many tutorials in their page/posts so I recommend reading them. 

Some random yet helpful tutorials I have and I find myself going back here and there are: 

The coloring tutorial by @/ daisylouisejohnson

The coloring tutorial by @/magnusedom

The color table tutorial by @/ggroupsdaily

The coloring tutorial by @/lee-haechan here and here

Coloring tutorial by @/binariesuns

Layer mask tutorial by @/daisylouisejohnson

Transition tutorial by @/fionagallaqher (and coloring tutorial)

Blending tutorial by @/linda-darnell

Blending tutorial by: @/morningstr

Channel Mixer tutorial (REALLY IMPORTANT IMO) by @/zoyanazyalensky

Glitch effect tutorial by @/nobodynocrime

Glitch tutorial by @/sarah-snook

How to fix orange-washed characters by @/zoyanazyalensky

Colored background tutorial by @/rafael-silva

Sharpenning gifs by @/joelmillrr

Coloring tutorial by @/yelenafbelova

Coloring tutorial by @/yenvengerberg

Don’t be afraid to experiment with gifs, try different styles and most important have fun!! I know thereis a lot to learn but trust me, it can be pretty fun! Good luck!

Now for graphics.. all I have to say is just have fun and experiment, experiment and experiment more! Here is a list ofresources I have collected that helped me improve my skills and find resources.

Where to find fonts/textures/vectors/mockups.

deviantart (everything)

unsplash (photos)

pixeden (mockups,photos)

graphicburger (mostly mockups)

freedesignresources (everything)

spoongraphics (mock ups)

graphicgoogle

rawpixel (photos)

digitalbrushes (brushes)

zippypixels (mockups)

dafont (fonts)

fonts by google

behance( under the tag freebie)

pinterest

fonts.ilovetypography (fonts)

gvfxarmy on twitter did an amazing job collecting resources.. you can find them here

List of youtube channels that will help you with tutorials and educational information on graphic design

Envato Tuts

Madia Designer

elliotisacoolguy

Brad Colbow

LearningScreen

PiXimperfect

The Futur

The Futur Academy

Jeremy Mura

Blue Lightning TV Photoshop

Nemanja Sekulic

Digital Art Creation

Will Paterson

Nobu Design

Satori Graphics

Logo Design Ideas

Adobe Creative Cloud (recommend to watch some of the livestreams they are interesting)

Gareth David Studio

Spoon Graphics

PSD Box Official

creatnprocess

Jamie Windsor

Dansky

Daily Photoshop Tutorials

How to Graphic Design

Photoshop Tutorials - PSt

Yes I'm a Designer 

Photoshop Tutorials

PHLEARN

Some other sites and links that i find interesting:

designbolts

thefutur free resources

The most important compositional principles in graphic design(article but check the site too)

The power of color (article, check the site too)

bezier.method (site to practice the pen tool)

aiga

httpster.net (site for inspiration)

access.mymind (color inspiration)

How to design a logo (article)

How to design a logo (article 2)

The Importance of Branding in 21st Century (article)

Color combinations

Lastly here you will find books and more resources for graphic deisgn! Thanks to @/isaaczara_ on twitter

That’s it! Hope you find this post helpful! I tried my best to not forget anything! 

Have fun on tumblr and on creating your content! Don’t give up and have fun creating!

#masterpost #a rushed masterpost #long post #hope it helps #resources #its not the masterpost i said i ll make its a similar one