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#where it was all like tutorial stuff framed as studying for school or whatever by the time i got to his phonecall so when he mentioned the
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killing him with my mind (affectionate)
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wasyago · 9 months
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how did u get so good at composition:3 did u like to draw background all the time or it came to be after practice how long does one piece usually take:333
hehe well, thank you first of all. second of all... um both? practice yes, no one gets it on the first time. and just. i dont know? doing it over and over again and trying new things and experimenting, seeing what works, what doesn't, where the background is needed and not.
i remember i heard a lot of artists around me saying that they didn't like or couldn't draw backgrounds, and for some reason i decided that im not gonna be like other girls and learn to do it. and i uhhh.... just started? drawing backgrounds? i was trying, and watching tutorials on youtube, and seeing how other people did it and eventually it got easier? i can say that i definitely enjoyed figuring out how to do it, struggling to get the perspective and composition right. like, it was hard but i had a lot of fun doing it, so it felt natural and just like, normal art progression? it didn't feel like i was going out of my way to draw backgrounds, i just did it when i felt like it?
at some point i joined a character ask, you know, when people ask questions and you draw the character answering. and i decided that im gonna draw a background for each answer instead of it being a character on a blank background. and doing this, like, specifically trying to draw backgrounds and tell a story with them, and doing it regularly and coherently, it helped me progress a lot. like, i started with a character sitting on a couch in a room, and then it got better and better, multiple rooms, multiple angles of the same room, different locations and images. it helped me a ton. just, figuring out when you need a background, when its rather i did something simple for one frame and focused on the other instead, where the character needs to be positioned, etc.
i can say i didn't do a lot of proper studies, and if i did maybe it would've been helpful... i only drew things that were in my head, with characters that i liked, with imaginary locations and stuff. never really drew from photos... we did go on plein-airs, or whatever they're called, when i was in art school, so drawing backgrounds from real life probably also helped a little, but i can't remember anything about it so it didn't do as much.
i looked at a lot of art from cool artists and expanded my visual library, i analyzed their art trying to figure out why i like it and how to make my art have the same kind of feeling. and i still do! sometimes something just takes over me and i scroll pinterest for 3 hours looking at pretty art and going to artists' profiles and saving art and using it as inspiration later. and it helps! a lot!
i dont know where this post is going ummm. i guess if you want to learn to draw something, just like, start. scrap it if you don't like it and try again, have fun, don't get attached. and uhh, i felt a little nostalgic so here are some of my pieces that i did throughout the years. definitely feels like i got better at it recently, but there's still a lot of room for improvement
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oh and for your second question. one piece takes about ummmm... more than a thousand episodes, thats 20 minutes times 1000 devided by 60 devided by 24... we're looking at about 14+ days of non stop watching?
no but for real. i dont really keep track of time when im drawing, uhh. plus depending on the complexity... my recent jrwi drawings are sketches, so they took maybe one or two hours max. something rendered uhhh, maybe 5 hours? if i don't finish it in one day the chances of this drawing ever getting done are super low, soo yeah
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musubiki · 3 years
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I hope this is not spam because I was lately asking a lot of questions (also I talk a lot sorry for bothering you 👉👈)
Did you go to art school? Your art looks professional and very pretty and you manage to keep this flow that makes the poses, characters, coloring look very appealing, so I wanted to ask about your experience so I can improve my art because I just started posting lately on my tumblr and I want to improve the quality of my drawings! I’m talking about posing, camera angles and shading. You manage to use these elements in a way that looks very pretty and I want to learn how to capture that appeal! I know that everyone has their own learning pace and experience but in this medium other people’s experience is also very helpful
Sorry again if this is a bother I just want some art advice… also sorry I ramble a lot…
yeah no worries!! i like answering these questions!!
no, i never went to art school!! im 95% self taught, 5% looking at tutorials online for specific stuff!!
for posing: honestly most of the time is drawing a pose, thinking "nope thats not it," adjusting it, and thinking "thats not it either," until you eventually get it to "okay i can live with that" or something along those lines!! when i draw i have a rough idea of what kinda pose i want, its usually a combination of (general pose) + (emotion)!! for example the recent bikini mochi piece, i knew i wanted her standing up + nervous/self conscious!! you can observe people in real life / in media to observe what kind of pose expresses what emotion, like someone sitting up very straight and stiff can imply nervousness?attentiveness/anxiousness, and someone sitting slumped, hunched over, legs lazily folded can imply relaxation, idleness, etc!! so posing is about both action + what they feel!! hand gestures can also be good at expressing these emotions!! (a good example too is the "👉👈" hands to show like...nervousness?? shy?? something like that??) im pretty sure you can study more on this, but for me personally i just kinda use...,my own reactions/emotions as a model. how i react if i was in that situation, and the exaggerate it a bit so it communicates easier!!
for camera angles: i feel like this is more about how dramatic you want the piece to be...for me i always saw a straight on, forward facing camera angle as like, yeah this isnt THAT important its just for dialogue. then you can move the camera angle around for the sake of variety, drama, or a lot of times to get things to fit in the same frame!! id say the best way to get better at this is just read some manga and study the panels to see what kinds of angles they use!! im not sure the significance of each of if theres a deeper meaning, but at least it can give you a little inventory of idea for what perspectives you can use when you wanna mix things up!!
for shading: literally dont worry about shading. just...,,,do your best. if im being honest, i still dont know how to shade. its been like, 10 years and i never learned to shade. cuz shading means you have to consider whatever youre drawing in a 3d space and think about how the light would hit it, and where the shadows would go and its jus....too much for me LMFAOOO I DONT SHADE 90% OF MY WORK!!!!!! so if you wanna shade just do your best. i have no advice on this im sorry;,,, just do your best or not at all and it'll be fine!!!
for colors: i dont have much advice here either, i use colors appealing to my own eyes, which is usually pastels/soft colors!! one piece of advice i have is use a brown overlay on top of your piece cuz ive read it "brings the colors together" (which i dont really get but i assume it sort of...makes all the colors become a little browner so it looks better together??? idk) and put an overlay/add layer on top of whatever color you want the piece to have!! i usually put pink over all my art cuz i love it lol
anyway i hope that helped a little bit!! i never learned professionally so i cant explain it in an academic way but as always, the best advice is just to practice. just accept that youre gonna be a bad artist until youre a good artist and keep drawing, its the only way to really get better!! ive been drawing for at least...7 years and i still look at pieces from a few months ago and go "ew disgusting" so,,...youre always gonna be improving just be consistent!!! good luck!!
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neverdoingmuch · 3 years
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Wait cql lawyer/law school AU
i got you my pal dont worry!!
law school, im gonna be honest and say i know like nothing about law or law school so pls ignore any inconsistencies or inaccuracies
lwj goes to law school and he is definitely the top student in his class. they’ve been there for like a month and everyone already knows he’s gonna be the best
his one and only competition is this dude called wei wuxian but lwj isn’t particularly worried about him
so far they’re still in the stage of the course where they do the fun things to sucker people into doing the class for the semester so there’s been some practise debates and arguments and stuff in their tutorial classes
wei wuxian has that Charisma and like yeah all of his arguments are perfect but also he has an amazing smile and people are like yes i can trust him 
(he’s definitely the sort to be like hm, the easy way to argue this case would be to quote some laws and use precedence to justify this but that’s boring)
lwj is also good at that sort of stuff because his arguments are perfect and everything is so perfectly researched that there should be no ground at all for someone to lodge a counterargument
(wei wuxian manages somehow and it makes lwj so mad)
but that’s whatever lwj thinks,, a lot of people join law thinking it’s gonna be like the tv shows and books and then get completely blindsided when it comes to the rote learning part or like the actual laws 
and for all of wwx’s confidence, lwj hasn’t actually seen wwx so much as touch the textbook/s and he always studies in the law library so he knows that wwx has probably never even been there bc he hasn’t seen him even once (why’s he looking? bc he needs to see which books wwx uses to study,, bc there has to be something going on there,, obviously)
then they do their first like proper written assignment and lwj and wwx tie for the highest scores and now lwj has a Rival and he refuses to lose to someone who thinks that putting a ‘-us’ sound at the end of a word makes it latin (did wwx say habeas corpus and then point at a soft drink and go  sprite-us can-us,,, maybe,,,,)
anyway! lwj and wwx are kinda rivals for the top spot and it’s one of those situations where one test lwj wins by a point but then the next test wwx gets full marks and they just keep exchanging the top spot in class
and this whole time wwx is like The Worst to have in class. he’s always interrupting to ask questions or just straight up not listening and spends the class doodling pictures of rabbits (they’re cute but wwx is terrible and he’s not allowed to make cute drawings)
so after a few months the most horrible thing happens.... they get put together in a project and lwj is like ugh. internally of course but his face is also saying ugh
the first time wwx and lwj get together to work on the project, lwj is prepared with a proper list of tasks to do all nicely split up between the two of them and a schedule for when they should get certain parts done by. 
needless to say, lwj does not expect wwx to be ready, but wwx is definitely on top of things
he rocks up and is like yeah let’s do this, this and this and have them done by this time - basically proposing to do everything that lwj has already written down
and lwj is pleasantly surprised and is like hm maybe i misjudged wwx and decides to like re-evaluate his opinion on him
in doing so he realises that when he’d never seen wwx studying, it wasn’t an exaggeration at all. he’s never seen wwx so much as touch a textbook or spend more than a minute on a laptop doing something that wasn’t minesweeper or solitaire
but wwx is also making all of their deadlines and even adds extra information and resources to their document that could be useful elsewhere and sometimes he shows up to their study sessions and he looks absolutely exhausted
eventually lwj manages to get the truth out and wwx is just like yeah it’s easier to get worse grades than a genius but if you both study and you still get lower grades, it’s not easy,, for jc or for me
so wwx usually studies at night when his brother is asleep and lwj is like that’s bad, you can’t keep that up and just when wwx is about to go off at him lwj is like you can come study at my place
and thus begins the wonderful time where everything is alright and lwj falls in love with wwx
they work really well together and wwx is strangely considerate and nice? when he finds out lwj likes rabbits, he goes out and buys bunny post-it notes for lwj and starts to always bring him a doodle of bunnies every time he comes over. he always gets his work done on time, early even, and his work is always so brilliant and every time wwx smiles at him, lwj feels warm inside etc etc
for a long while lwj is like yes (: this is friendship (: bc he’s never had a crush before but then on the day they submit their project wwx is like hey,, the two of us make a great team,, we should always work together,, now and next year and even when we graduate,, i want to help the innocent people who need our help and i think i’d like it a lot if you joined me and lwj has his oh moment
they get a perfect score on the project of course and even after it finishes, wwx keeps coming over to lwj’s place to study or just hang out and lwj is just falling more and more for wwx each day
they’re best friends now and everyone gets used to seeing them work together on projects and then turn around to try and decimate each other when they’re working one on one and lwj thinks that he might just be the happiest he’s ever been
but then one day wwx doesn’t show up to class. it shouldn’t be strange but wwx has never missed class even once and he ends up hearing from lxc who heard from jgy that wwx was caught sabotaging some other student’s work (the other student was jzxun, who had a fondness for playing devil’s advocate and other than wwx once telling him that his argument was shit, wwx never spoke to him or seemed to know who he was but lwj is a bit too angry to remember that)
he manages to find wwx outside of his dorms as he’s moving out and he’s just like why did you do that? and wwx is like oh y’know,, bc he’s not really sure what’s happening himself,, one second he was at the top of his class and the next he was being brought before a board and being told that he was being expelled but he’s not going to tell lwj that bc lwj would definitely try and stand up for him and then they’d both get expelled
but lwj is furious and just spits out well if our dreams meant so little to you then maybe it’s a good thing you failed now,, bc his mother was a lawyer who took all these little jobs that helped people who actually needed the help and lwj was looking forward to doing that with wwx and he doesn’t even seem to care that now they can’t do that 
wwx flinches and then smiles at him and just cheerily says, that’s me and leaves. he doesn’t look back and lwj doesn’t chase after him.
lwj doesn’t see him again for years (you can do 13 or 5 or however long you feel like)
lwj is a fully licensed lawyer and he’s working for the family company and he spends half of his time working on cases and uses the rest of his time to do like outreach programs where he goes and visits schools and runs sessions on what it’s like to be a lawyer, how to apply, and to provide assistance to any students who decide to study law at uni
and then at one of these programs he meets this kid, wen yuan, who is ridiculously bright and enthusiastic and has a smile that seems oddly familiar
at the end of the second session he comes up to lwj and is like mr. lan, is your name lan wangji? and lwj just says yes, expecting the kid to be a fan of one of his cases or something but then wen yuan is like oh wow! i thought i recognised you from my dad’s photo!
and lwj isn’t expecting much but he asks what the photo looks like and wen yuan pulls out this photo from his pocket and lwj immediately recognises it,, it’s the only photo he has of him and wwx
your father is wei ying? lwj asks him and wen yuan is like yes, hesitates, and then asks, would you like to see him?
and that’s how lwj finds himself following wen yuan to some dinky little office that has a plaque outside that reads wen and wei
(wen ning is the nicest and sweetest person ever and lots of people underestimate him but then he’s an absolute monster on court. he gets up and completely decimates the opponent and then at the end is like (: it was so nice to meet you!! i am baby!! and all that,, you know our boy)
anyway they walk in and wwx turns to greet wen yuan but then he sees lwj and is like woah! you! and he’s not sure whether to hide or go and hug lwj so he just gives him a fist bump,, like a bro,, and immediately wants to shrivel up and die
anyway they get the reunion stuff out of the way, swelling music, tender wrist holding, lots of staring, lwj silently declaring his wholehearted love for wwx and refusing to believe rumours about him again even though he doesn’t actually know what happened, you know how it goes
from wwx’s side of things,, after he got kicked out he went to some small uni. good in its own right but not known for their law program and ended up specialising in family law
the first case he ever won was for the wens to have the right to keep custody of a-yuan and the first case wen ning ever won was to let wwx adopt a-yuan bc i’m soft like that
so wwx has just been kinda vibing,, being a single dad, living with the wens and helping to make that difference he always promised he would
now this isn’t gonna be some au where lwj goes oh my! i must give up my high salary job and work with wwx! bc lwj has been doing good stuff at his current job and for all of his family’s stuffiness, they run a fair and just company 
but! he does end up helping wwx when wwx gets a letter with a bunch of information about the jins and how they’re actually super corrupt and evil (big surprise,,) and how wwx was maybe definitely framed bc he was doing some casual work on the side and stumbled across some bad shit on the jins back in uni
lwj ends up being the one to take the case officially but wwx is definitely the guy leading it and so lwj ends up spending most of his time at the wen-wei office
lwj definitely bonds with wen yuan, who also wants to go into law, and writes him recommendation letters and helps him edit his applications and stuff
(and one day wen yuan is like leaving you was the hardest thing dad ever did and i dont think you appreciated how much he cared about you. he really did think that he annoyed you ‘til the end and lwj is like no! he didn’t! and wen yuan is like yeah i know but you gotta tell him and lwj really does mean to but the time is never right or something like that but also wen yuan is all but calling lwj dad at this point)
anyway they end up going to court, side by side, working as a team just as they promised to do and just as they finish their final day on the case, ended with the jury ruling jgy guilty and wwx’s reputation all but saved, wwx turns around and flings himself at lwj
is he crying? is he laughing? a bit of both tbh but wwx ends up confessing right then and there, still on record and everything (is that how that works??? idk! let’s say it does)
and what can lwj do but make out with him?
did a news crew come in to film the results of this massive court case just to end up with five minutes of wangxian kissing?? maybe! but when it played on tv it meant wwx and lwj didnt have to actually tell anyone they got together
(and does lwj eventually pop the question using wwx’s bad latinification? yes and wwx is too busy laughing to accept at first but he does and they end up being the worst possible tutors for wen yuan as he goes through law school bc they keep being all gross and lovey-dovey and acting like law school is the most romantic place in the world)
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xxx-cat-xxx · 4 years
Text
Peter Parker and Bruce Banner’s Guide on How To Make Iron Man Sleep
For @sallyidss. Happy Birthday, Sally! This is about 1% hurt and 99% comfort, or in other words, pure fluff and chicken soup. I hope you enjoy it and I hope you have a wonderful day!
Thanks to @whumphoarder for beta reading and to @maikkuax for the video game reference.
____________________
Peter wakes up to a dazzling amount of texts on Saturday morning. 
One is from Tony, sent at 3am, telling him that Bruce is sick and might not be able to help Peter with his biology project today as they had planned, but he is still welcome to drop by the tower.
Then there’s another one from Tony three hours later asking him whether he could pick up some soup while on the way; one from Bruce at 8am, telling him that Tony is sick too, but ‘he won’t admit it so just try to somehow get him to rest once you come over’; and then one more from Tony telling him to ignore whatever Bruce just told him.
Peter grins to himself while reading the texts - he can almost hear his favourite superhero couple bantering and fussing over each other. Then he gets up for breakfast with May and a shower before heading down to the corner grocery store. He gets soup (chicken for Tony and vegetable for Bruce), as well as some of the Fairtrade chocolate bars that Bruce buys for ideological reasons and Tony eats en masse because he’s got a secret sweet tooth. Peter stuffs the groceries into his school bag along with his laptop and makes his way to the tower. 
*
Tony definitely looks under the weather when he opens the door; pale and with a very clown-like red nose that is dripping constantly. 
“Hey kid, thanks for the delivery,” he jokes with a raspy voice. He takes the bag and mimics shutting the door in Peter’s face before smirking and opening it fully to let his unamused mentee in. 
“Very funny, Mr. Stark.” Peter removes his shoes and jacket and then stops, frowning. Through the hallway, he can see that the bed in the master bedroom has been demolished into what looks like a heap of firewood. “Uhm, what happened to your bed?”
“Well…” Tony interrupts himself to cough harshly into his elbow. “So, uh, we had a bit of an exciting night. Not in the fun way, unfortunately…” he trails off. “Anyway, Bruce went back to sleep after breakfast, but I thought we could head to the lab and start working on the chameleon fabric you suggested for your suit.” 
Peter is sure that working in the lab is the opposite of what Tony should be doing just now - his mentor looks even more tired than usual and the slightly glassy quality to his eyes suggests that he is running a fever - but Peter also knows that saying this out loud will only be counterproductive. 
“What if we watch a movie instead?” he suggests.
“I’m not watching a movie at eleven in the morning,” Tony protests. “We have the whole day in front of us - time to build, invent, change the world..." He flaps his hand. "All that jazz."
“Okay, okay…” Peter thinks for a second before an idea hits him. “But before we start with the suit, I do need your help with something else.”
“Now what?”
“So, Ned and I have this gaming commentary channel on YouTube where we livestream playing “The Witcher 3”? And it’s going pretty well, but Ned says he needs help developing his stage persona, you know, talking in a way that is interesting and keeps your audience engaged? So, he thought that you might give us some advice because you’ve got a ton of experience with speaking in public and all that?”
(It’s not entirely a lie - Ned and Peter have joked about getting Tony involved in order to increase their viewership, but he is pretty sure that Ned would be mortified upon hearing that Peter actually suggested it to the billionaire.)
“Wait, you and Ned are making videos of you killing virtual trolls while talking about it? And people actually watch that?”
“That’s...another way of putting it.”
“Sounds like a gigantic waste of time.” Tony scrunches up his nose. “Either I play the game myself, or I spend my downtime watching something interesting.” 
“Hey! Our last one has more than 3000 hits!” Peter defends.
“People have too much free time. Including you.” Tony points his finger at Peter before quickly covering his mouth to contain a sneeze. “But I suppose I can take a look if you really want me to…”
Peter grins. Stage one: complete.
They settle on the couch in the living room. Tony can’t suppress a small sigh when he leans against the cushions. He massages the bridge of his nose in a way that makes it clear to Peter he must be nursing a headache. 
“Hit me, kid,” he orders.
“Okay, but before we start, you need to know a few things...” Peter launches into a long-winded explanation of the game’s storyline with more than a few unnecessary details of the characters’ backgrounds. He pretends to concentrate on the screen where he walks Tony through different tutorials, but out of the corner of his eye he sees his mentor slowly sinking deeper and deeper into couch.
“...and then they bring Uma to the witcher school of Kaer Morhen,” Peter goes on as Tony tiredly attempts to follow along, his blinks growing longer and longer each time, “where Yennefer removes his curse and transforms him into Avallac'h...” 
When Peter can’t think of anything else to babble about, he starts playing their most recent video. Tony sits up a little straighter and rubs a hand over his face to concentrate. But at about the two minute mark, he stops the screen with a wave of his hand.
“So, not to be rude, but that was kind of painful, Tony declares. “You guys literally started with a 45 second explanation of why you prefer the old controller design to the new one. No wonder you’re putting people to sleep.”
Peter frowns a bit. “I mean, we weren’t that bad…” he defends. “And the new ones do kind of suck.”
“Sure, kid,” Tony huffs. He shifts position on the sofa with a sigh. “Alright, listen. It’s obvious that you two are knowledgeable about this game, but if you want to engage your audience, you’ve gotta try to establish your credentials in a way that’s still interesting and relatable. For instance, I once started a TED Talk by describing how I hacked NASA during an MIT frat party so that I could send a rocket to draw a dick over San Francisco. ”
Peter snorts at that admission. 
“See? Exactly,” Tony points out. “That’s the kind of reaction you want your audience to have - that’s called a hook, kid.” 
The longer they watch, the more Tony seems to be melting into the couch. His comments become less and less frequent, and at some point he leans his head back against the pillow, barely looking at the screen anymore. By the third video, Peter can see his mentor’s eyelids fluttering shut. 
He waits for a few minutes and then pauses the screen, just to see Tony’s eyes fly open again. “I’m listening!” he assures. 
“Yeah, I know.” Peter hides a smirk. “Just, uhm, relax a bit.”
“I see what you’re trying to do here, kid. I’m not stupid,” Tony protests nasally, stifling another sneeze, but he doesn’t make any move to get up from the couch. 
Peter starts the video again, knowing that the battle has been won. Five minutes later, Tony is asleep. 
Peter watches a few more videos on his own (now that he pays attention, he realises that most of Tony’s suggestions, despite being sarcastic, are actually in line with what the popular streamers do) before FRIDAY informs him that Bruce has woken up. 
He finds the scientist in the kitchen, making tea. 
“Hey Dr. Banner,” Peter greets. “How are you?”
“Hey Peter.” Bruce gives him a warm and slightly sleepy smile. His voice is a bit hoarse. “I’m fine. Is Tony asleep?”
“Yep,” Peter declares proudly. “Used my hypnotically soothing voice. And obscure video game lore."
Bruce heaves out a sigh. “Finally, thank god. I had, uhm… kind of an incident last night and I don’t think he slept at all after that.” 
Peter thinks back to the broken bed frame and chooses not to comment.
“Do you want some tea?” Bruce asks.
“No, thanks. I’m okay.”
Bruce takes out a box of cookies instead and hands a few to Peter. “So, what was this thing you wanted me to look at with you?”
“Oh, it’s just a bio project,” Peter says with a shrug. “But we can do it some other time, when you’re feeling better.”
“I’m okay...” Peter gives him a suspicious look and Bruce’s smile deepens. “No need for that - I’m not Tony, I would tell you if I wasn’t up for it. But I am actually feeling much better after sleeping and I wouldn’t mind some distraction.”
“Okay, well then...”
Peter likes Bruce a lot. It took him a while to get close to him because Bruce is not a person who easily lets people in, but now whenever Peter visits the tower, he looks forward to seeing the scientist almost as much as he does to seeing Tony. 
Tony is brilliant, energetic, and funny, and he constantly encourages Peter to think deeper, work harder, do better - to improve himself. Which is a fun challenge, but it can also be quite exhausting at times. Working with Bruce is the exact opposite. He makes Peter feel calm, slows him down when he overthinks, and makes it clear that mistakes are something that happen to everyone and nothing Peter should be too concerned about. While spending time with Tony is the equivalent of a rollercoaster ride, being with Bruce feels more like a calm day at the beach, and Peter has realised that he needs both from time to time. 
They move to Bruce’s study (since Bruce doesn’t allow food in his lab and they don’t actually need to do any experiments for Peter’s project) with Peter’s laptop, biscuits, and several bars of Fairtrade chocolate. 
*
Tony wakes up with the blurry images of a nightmare still on the rims of his consciousness. He feels cold, achy, and slightly out of breath. It takes him a few disoriented moments to realise that his face is mostly buried into a couch pillow, blocking his mouth and nose. He frees himself and sits up stiffly, wiping at his slightly damp cheeks. His nose is dripping annoyingly and he isn’t sure whether that’s only because of the cold. 
“FRIDAY?” he prompts nasally. 
“It is 1:17pm on Saturday afternoon. Dr. Banner and Mr. Parker are working in the study room. Everyone is safe and well, boss.” 
“Okay. Thanks, FRI.” Tony takes another few moments to ground himself before getting up from the sofa, rather unsteadily. His body seems to have tripled in weight and his head feels like an overfilled balloon that’s ready to burst. He kind of wants to fall back onto the couch and go to sleep again, but at the same time he definitely doesn’t want to revisit the dreams he just had. 
Instead, he ventures into the study where he finds his partner, who is sporting an adorable bedhead, together with his mentee enthusiastically modelling a DNA strand on a laptop screen.
“Coffee?” Tony asks hoarsely.
“Good afternoon to you too, Tony,” Bruce smirks and nods towards a pot sitting on the table. Tony pours himself a mug and downs it in one go, marvelling at how much better it makes his throat feel immediately. 
Feeling slightly more human and ready to deal with the actual world, he leans over Bruce’s shoulder and nuzzles his head against his partner’s ear. “How you feeling, green bean?”
“I’m much better. Sleeping helped a lot, actually.” Tony gives him a critical once-over and seems to accept that. “Peter is doing an impressive job with his project, by the way,” Bruce adds.
Peter blushes at the compliment. “It’s not me - Dr. Banner is helping me a lot!” 
“I’m really just sitting here and watching you work,” Bruce dismisses before addressing Tony again. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m”—Tony’s voice breaks in the middle of the sentence and he has to clear his throat before continuing—“I’m good.”
“Mm-hmm.” Bruce raises an eyebrow. “FRIDAY, what’s his temperature at?”
“100.2 degrees, Dr. Banner.”
“Thanks.” He turns to Tony, who is coughing again. There seems to be a brick stuck inside his chest and it feels like he can’t take a full breath at all. Bruce gives him a concerned look. “This sounds painful.”
“‘S okay,” Tony dismisses.
“Maybe you should try using the inhaler -”
“Stop mother-henning, Bruce,” he grumbles with a glance at Peter, who is very clearly trying to act as if he isn’t listening to every word, but the pain in Tony’s chest is suddenly replaced by a surge of warmth upon realising Bruce’s worry about him. The scientist seems to understand and just squeezes Tony’s hand before turning back to the screen.
Tony pours himself another cup of coffee and grabs a slice of toast as well as two of the chocolate bars before settling into the chair across from the two of them, munching away and watching them work. Seeing them together leaves him with an annoyingly sappy feeling. Bruce, usually rather shy, is much more self-confident around the kid and visibly happy about Peter’s genuine interest in everything scientific. He is also a much more patient teacher than Tony ever manages to be, which seems to be putting Peter at ease. 
After finishing his food, Tony debates moving to his own lab to get some actual work done, but he is so, so tired, and everything kind of hurts. Standing up seems like a lot of effort. So instead, he crosses his arms on the table and rests his head on top of them, closing his eyes for just a moment.
He listens to Peter and Bruce when their conversation shifts from Peter’s project, to May’s new vegan disaster recipe, to the idea of using Peter’s webs in order to create a hammock that can hold the Hulk. Tony smiles into his sleeves, imagining Hulk chilling at the beach between two palm trees, swinging to and fro, to and fro, to and...
“Hey.” Bruce rests his palms lightly on Tony’s shoulder.
He jerks upright. “Wasn’t asleep.”
“What, I would never think that,” Bruce says with a smirk. 
Tony rubs his tired eyes and then his aching forehead. “Where’s Peter?”
“He went to heat up the soup for all of us.”
“Hmm.” Tony grabs Bruce’s hands and presses them against his overly warm cheeks, enjoying the cooling feeling they provide.
“Did you have a nightmare earlier?” Bruce asks, his hand now moving up to cup Tony’s forehead. “You seemed kind of out of it.”
“Yeah,” Tony admits, leaning into the touch. “I don’t remember what it was about, though.”
Bruce hums and presses a light kiss to the top of Tony’s head. “Fever dreams are awful. But at least you didn’t break any furniture upon waking up.”
Tony, sensing the guilt below the light tone, only huffs. “I’d been wanting to get a new bed anyway for a while now. Did you know there are self-making ones now? And levitating mattresses? Or we could go for one of those free-swinging beds, to match Hulk’s upcoming hammock.” 
Bruce smiles and shakes his head. “A normal one would do, Tony. Or we could try something different. Did you know that sleeping on the ground is actually quite good for your back?”
Tony snorts. “Yeah, no. I’m a billionaire, Brucie, we’re not sleeping on the ground because our bed is broken. Levitating one it is.”
Peter comes back with the steaming soup, which does wonders for Tony’s raw throat. At Bruce’s advice, he takes some Advil that muffles his headache a little and remembers the times a few years ago when he would be sick with only JARVIS as his company, feeling a little chilled and very lucky. 
*
In the end, Tony does agree to watching TV, but mostly because Bruce admits to still not feeling up for anything more demanding (which Peter suspects is not entirely true, but he definitely won’t call him out). They let Peter pick, who of course goes for the newest Orville episode, and settle on the huge living room couch with a steaming mug of tea (Bruce), a packet of chocolate (Tony) and another helping of soup (Peter). 
Peter notices after a while that Bruce is gently massaging Tony’s head, playing with his hair. Tony seems to be sort of melting into the touch, his head leaning against Bruce’s shoulder, eyes almost closed. He looks old, but not frighteningly so - more in a serene way that makes Peter want to capture the moment on film. 
In the years he’s known him, Peter has rarely seen Tony anything but buzzing with energy, jumping to and fro between ideas and lab tables. The only person who is able to slow him down and occasionally get him to take a break without having to outright trick him into it seems to be Bruce. And as sorry as Peter is to see both of them sick, it’s also heartwarming to observe how they are taking care of each other. 
Peter knows that most people his age find the idea of spending a lazy movie Saturday with their family kind of boring, but something in him loves the idea of settling down like this. Maybe it’s the fact that it reminds him of how it used to be with Ben and May, or that the time he spends as Spider-Man is already adventurous enough, or the sheer thrill of seeing Iron Man and the Hulk’s alter ego in their pyjamas on the couch, nuzzled up against each other. 
But whatever it is, there’s nowhere else Peter would rather be.
____________________
If you liked this, make sure to check out @twentyghosts‘ beautiful fic Cold, Comfort with a similar setting that inspired me to write this one.
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Taglist: @toomuchtoread33  @yepokokfine
@badthingshappenbingo This is my fill for the ‘Common Cold’ square.
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shunkashuutou · 6 years
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Hack U 2018
Wow, it’s been a busy summer vacation! From August 20th to 31st, some of my classmates and I participated in “Hack U”, an annual hackathon hosted by Yahoo.
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Each year, Hack U has different theme (this year’s was “Update Interaction: Call and Response”), and teams of 2 to 6 students have 10 days to create some kind of project based on the theme. Most of the participants are college students, and it’s mostly a contest for students studying programming, but the competition is open to all students from elementary school and up. As soon as our homeroom teacher told us about the Hack U, my classmate Ogura (who has the highest grades in almost every one of our classes) started putting together a team, and he invited me to join. We ended up with a team named “Banana”, made up of 5 first-year students from our class and 1 third-year student from the website engineering course. There were actually three other teams of students from my school too.
(Also, I have no idea why this contest is called “Hack U”, but the “h” and “f” sounds are a bit similar in Japanese sometimes, and there were several times when my classmates accidentally ended up calling it “f**k you” instead of “Hack U”, lol)
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Hack U is hosted by Yahoo, so when the competition started, they assigned each team a supervisor from Yahoo to help with any technical difficulties. On the evening of the first day of the competition, there was a kickoff event where we got to meet our supervisor and talk abut our plan for our project.
The event was on a very high floor of a skyscraper near Osaka station, and the room had a nice view of the city.
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The event was pretty chill, and they gave us lots of free snacks.
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So what exactly did we decide to make for our project?
We decided to make a web service called “Zucchi” (short for “aizuchi”, meaning “interjections”) that would listen to you talk and give simple replies, for times when you just feel like talking out loud. Zucchi doesn’t try to give any opinions or advice, it just listens and helps you sort your thoughts out for yourself. To make it feel more friendly than just talking to a computer, we decided to include 4 characters: a female character, a male character, a cat, and a fish.
We thought it would be fun if the characters had simple animations, and one of my classmates suggested that we try making 2D Live animations. 2D Live animations stretch and move parts of a two-dimensional image to make it look three-dimensional. Unlike traditional animation, you don’t start off with a bunch of different frames, you just use one image and make the parts move.
I had never even heard of 2D Live before starting on this project, but I downloaded some free software and watched a bunch of tutorials, and by the second day of the project, I was already able to make the fish character for the website! (We ended up using free stock characters for the other three characters, to save time)
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I’m so proud of how my little goldfish turned out!
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You can download a simple version of the Cubism Live2D software here for free, and they have lots of tutorials and videos about how to use it, so check it out if you’re interested in learning how to make these sorts of animations.
Aside from making the goldfish, I mostly did the html and css coding for the site. My classmate Ogura taught me how to animate things with css, so now I have a head start on the sorts of things we’ll be studying in class next semester!
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On Friday of the first week, about halfway into the competition, there was an event at the Yahoo office where we could meet with our team advisor and just have some work time in the Yahoo office lounge. (and lots more free snacks!)
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The Yahoo office is on the 27th floor of the Grand Front building (the first and second floors are a very expensive shopping center) near Osaka station, and they had an even better view than the place the kickoff event was at!
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Apparently the Yahoo employees gather here to watch the fireworks over the river when there are summer festivals.
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They also gave us a tour of the Yahoo office, which was pretty cool, but we weren’t allowed to take photos. I was really happy to see that everyone was dressed casually and that some people even had unnatural hair colors.
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Getting this website to work the way we wanted it to was a big challenge, and didn’t always go smoothly. For a while, the goldfish would suddenly start speaking in the female character’s voice if you said a certain phrase to it, lol. The photo below is of one of the stranger glitches that happened; on the left is how the female character is supposed to look, and on the right is what happened when I opened her files the wrong way!
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Friday the 31st was the presentation day!
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The final event was held in a big conference hall that was pretty close to my school. One side of the room had a stage and chairs, and the other side of the room had tables for each team to use to display their project.
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Here’s what my team’s table looked like!
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Our nametags had a free space to write whatever we wanted (hobbies, something interesting about ourselves, etc) I ended up just drawing a goldfish, lol.
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Each team gave a 3-minute presentation about their project. And when I say 3 minutes, I mean exactly 180 seconds; there was a big timer projected on the side wall to show the time, and it would chime at the halfway point and start counting down loudly when it got to 10 seconds. It was kind of scary, but it definitely kept everyone on time! I was pretty nervous, but I only had like 5 lines at the end of the presentation, and thankfully it went okay!
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The whole event was livestreamed on Nico Nico Douga and YouTube, so you can watch it online! Our presentation starts at 1:14:23, the camera crew came to interview us at our table at 2:19:19, and at about 2:34:32 my classmate tells me that I’m in the camera frame and I wave at the camera, lol.
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After the awards were given out (my team didn’t win anything, but the team who won first place really deserved it; their project was really cool!), they fed us pizza!
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And we got some free stuff if we filled out a survey about the event. (The Banana sticker wasn’t from Yahoo, my classmate Shou made those for our team to give out to people who came to look at our website.)
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Group photo with all of the participants and Yahoo staff! This photo was posted on the offical Hack U account, which is why I can show you without having to blur everyone’s faces. (I’m in the second row from the back, just to the left of the middle)
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And by now you probably want to see my team’s website for yourself! 
Here’s a link!
「Zucchi」
(Be sure to use Google Chrome! And this website is unfortunately not iPhone compatible, but it works in the Google Chrome app of most Android phones)
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Click the button that says “click!”, and when it turns gray, try talking to one of the characters. (Your browser will probably give you a popup asking if you want to enable microphone usage, so be sure to allow it) You have to click the button before each new sentence.
Of course, the site only has voice recognition for Japanese, so try saying something like “konnichiwa*, “tsukareta”, “yabai”, “nemui”, or *oyasumi*, if you want to hear any of the special responses for the male and female characters.
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It’s still technically summer vacation, but for the next two weeks, my school has summer group projects that the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd year students all work on together. So now that I just finished one group project; it’s time for another!
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