#Building Blocks Webcomic

[luxshine]

I'm very happy to share my art summary here this year! And to be honest, I don't think I'd have predicted it in January! Starting with a gift I made for my dearest sobrinos @aristotlecoyote, that with my fave piece of March were my two pieces of Moon Knight (Even if I adore my boys still, i haven't been inspired for pieces of them in a while), then February and June get my characters from my webcomic Building Blocks, and April with the Little Mermaid (That I haven't watched because I don't watch Disney Live Actions Remakes on principle, but I hope did amazing because hell yeah! Black Ariel for the win) and May with my piece for Stephen King's Rose Madder. But then... THEN.. ok, you can see what ate my fandom brain starting July (Actually, starting on May, but I didn't start drawing them until July) because... well, then it's All Ram Charan and Tarak and a bit of pokemon and... Ok, yes, I need to thank RRR (and by that I mean Ram, Ramarao and Ramajouli) for ligthing my love for fanart so hard!

And now, on to 2024!

#Art summary #Luxshine art #Calico Chimera #Moon Knight #Building Blocks Webcomic #The little mermaid #Rose Madder #Stephen King #Fanart #RRR #Ram Charan #NTR JR #Tarak #Rangashtalam #Janatha Garage #Temper #Jai Lava Kusa #Rakhi #Yamadonga #Adhurs #Pokemon

[disquietedpalefish]

Me: Man, I spent hours building an extensive piece of location reference for a story in Minecraft and it's still barely a fraction done and I haven't touched it in around a year . . . maybe I shouldn't go that route, just stick to paper.

Also me: Oh, I should also build that town in Minecraft for reference.

#this is literally the only reason I play Minecraft #to BUILD #I've never played with someone #I've never played it straight... I may have tried a couple times briefly but I just wanna create #oh I may have played splitscreen once with my younger cousin but I sucked and just wanted to build #this is the whole appeal of the game for me #I did succeed in finishing one of my reference structures and it served me amazingly well #the cabin for the story that I started to make a webcomic of before bailing out #realizing I was in over my head :p #it helps me a lot to see the places in a physical way #and it's easier for me to build up the detail a little at a time #if I could have a little more just a little more tightness in the proportions of the blocks #and if it didn't take me so bloody long even in creative mode to build an area #it would be a perfect tool #ramble babble fafafa

[prokopetz]

More inadvisable webcomic gimmicks:

Webcomic whose server sniffs your IP address and displays subtly different versions of each page based on your geographic location; the art is identical and the story in its broad strokes is consistent across all versions, but the dialogue gives very different impressions of certain central relationships between characters.

Purportedly autobiographical webcomic whose protagonist's life story consists of the plots of various popular science fiction and fantasy films, played out in reasonably complete detail, but interpreted through the lens of the "describe a film badly in order to make it sound as boring as possible" meme.

Webcomic which builds up a dedicated readership, then begins updating on an irregular schedule with frequent unpredictable delays, taking each page down after a few hours and deleting that page's source files, with the explicit goal of causing as much of the comic as possible to become lost media.

Garfield-style gag-a-day webcomic in which every strip consists of an identical tableau of two characters sitting on a couch, differing only in their dialogue and facial expressions; a separate, entirely unconnected ongoing story is related wordlessly and in miniature via the window visible behind the ostensible protagonists' heads.

Patron-supported webcomic with two separate entry-level tiers called "See the Comic Early" and "See the Comic Never". If you subscribe to the latter, the author blocks your IP address.

#media #comics #webcomics #metatextual wankery

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

hi derin!!!!!!!! i had a question about your writing process - how far in advance do you write your serialized stuff? i feel like I’ve read so much about the process of writing novels and short stories and poems, but so little about how people sustain serialized fiction

I try to maintain a buffer of 3-6 months' worth of updates. This is my personal preference and not a universal rule; every web serial author will give you a different answer to this question. My buffer is much longer than most people I've spoke to; 1-2 months is more common. You absolutely need a minimum of 2 weeks, that's about the closest you can shave things, because you need to be able to cover for any minor blips in your schedule such as changing work hours, unexpected trips, or plain old writer's block. The #1 predictor of having any chance of success in web serial art (writing, webcomics, etc.), unless you're Andrew Hussie for some reason, is consistency -- you must have a schedule and you must absolutely stick to that schedule without big stops and starts. Hiatuses will absolutely kill audience interest. Occasional hiatuses in emergencies aren't the end of the world -- if you're in a bus crash, well, the story might have to go on pause for a month or two, and the audience will understand that if you a) tell them when you're starting again and b) don't make a habit of it. Heal if you need to heal, tend to emergencies if you need to tend to emergencies, but if your web serial is stopping and starting constantly for minor reasons like 'I ran out of chapters and I'm too busy/isolated/uninspired to write more', your chances of building a decent audience plummet. So you need a buffer big enough to handle situations like that and not force you into a hiatus.

Which is different for every author. For me, it's 3-6 months.

[notxtwhiledrive]

Fool's errand~ Art I drew as a decal for a split mechanical keyboard I'm planning on building then theming it after the webcomic Lackadaisy.

I'm really obsessed with making things smaller. next one on the chopping block is my keyboard. I already have a 70% keyboard, but that's still too big for me. I'm looking at the Corne keyboard. a small 36/42 key keyboard.

I'm theming it lackadaisy with Rocky and Mitzi art that I made adorning both of the splits. I'm planning to do a method where you put a thin layer of laser printer toner (which basically is just very fine black plastic powder) on top of the keyboard key, then slightly melt and bond the design with a laser engraver.

Still choosing and scouring out the components. but really looking forward to etching the design.

Character from @lackadaisycats

raw decal

#furry #lackadaisy #lackadaisy cats #fanart #lackadaisy fanart #furry art #artists on tumblr #lackadaisy rocky #rocky rickaby #keyboard #mechanical keyboard #laser engraving #tracy j butler #keyboard art

[gay-disabled-characters-showdown]

LGBTQ+ Disabled Characters Showdown Round 1, Wave 1, Poll 13

A character being totally canon LGBTQ+ and disabled was not required to be in this competition. Please check qualifications and propaganda before asking why a character is included.

Check out the other polls in this wave here.

Jedidiah A.A. Martin-Camp Here and There

Qualifications:

refuses to label his sexuality but BOY does he like men (looking at Mr Sargent for this one :3) also has ADHD! but its not known how attention deficient or hyperactive he is

also is a stupid cringefail loser who I want to push down a slide that's been fermenting in the sun all day during summer <3!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Propaganda:

Raised in a religious yet wealthy household, Jedidiah Abraham Adonias Martin--also known as "Jed", "Jeddie", "The archivist", "The clockmaker", or various misspellings and mispronunciations of his name--refuses to label his sexuality, but BOY does he like men (looking at Mr Sargent for this one), and also has ADHD! He may have dropped out of medical school and is "too repressed to write poetry", but he's still one of the camp nurses, alongside Sydney October Sargent! After talking to a bunch of birds, we found out that Jedididididiah will die on a Thursday (not a spoiler as of writing this). It has also been confirmed that he has a photo of Sydney on his desk (aww) and he plays D&D. Oh, and he's terrified of all things shelled. Would you like a snail as you think about voting for this loser? (affectionate)

Submitted by @spud-the-stupid

Ballister Boldheart-Nimona (Film)

Qualifications:

He has a boyfriend (and then they have a sort-of-breakup but they're back together by the end) and he has a prosthetic arm.

He’s gay and missing an arm.

He’s explicitly gay, in love with a man. He loses his arm then builds himself a prosthetic while on the run like a badass.

His boyfriend cut his arm off :( he uses a prosthetic now. His arm got chopped off after being falsely accused of killing the queen, he spends the rest of the movie with a prosthetic metal arm. His arm was also chopped off by his lover, Ambrosius Goldenloin, during said false assassination.

Canonically has a boyfriend and built his own prosthetic

Qualifies by both being canonically disabled (amputee) + canonically gay

Propaganda:

Please plz plz vote for him

His boyfriend cut off his arm. He made himself a prosthetic. He used his arm to block someone’s sword. He kissed his boyfriend. He has sad wet cat eyes, which isn’t relevant but still. He has them.

He’s so GOOD even though he’s having like the worst day ever (specifically talking about movie but webcomic also applies). He has the biggest wettest eyes how can you not root for him????

People love him! He kinda looks like a sad, poor little cat. A real soggy wet kitten man.

Let's see. He and Ambrosius are lovers, or at least boyfriends, from the moment they're introduced. Ballister gets his arm chopped off by Ambrosius during the false assassination. Ballister spends the rest of the movie trying to convince Ambrosius and the kingdom of his innocence, with a metal arm replacing his missing one. It originated the phrase "Arm Chopping is not a love language!" Did I mention he's a main character too?

Is a science nerd, built his own prosthetic arm with his non-dominant hand, accidentally adopted a trans chaos demon of a 1000yo being

A knight, Nimona's best friend and father figure of sorts, but the plot mostly revolves around him- Ballister is framed for murder and has to hide while trying to figure out who framed him and how to prove he's innocent. Nimona becomes his sidekick (he didn't want one, she just showed up at his place one day like a very chaotic stray cat) and together they form a great duo against the corrupt government. This is complicated by Ballister's ex Ambrosius, who accidentally cut off Ballister's arm and is a bit brainwashed by government propaganda. Oops. You should watch Nimona it's great 💞🦈

Submitted by @foulfirerebel (fifth person) and at least 7 others.

#polls #poll #disabled characters #lgbtq characters #disability #lgbtq #lgbtq dcs round 1 #lgbtq dcs wave 1 #jedidiah a a martin #camp here and there #ballister boldheart #nimona #nimona film

[doomsdaydicecascader]

on your point about the self-referential nature of homestuck, do you have any specific tips for people that want to create such an effect in their own webcomics? I'm just very interested in *how* homestuck was made, like in storytelling decisions and stuff, and I think that it's self-referential nature might be one of it's most consistently well-done qualities

sorry i got back to this one so late, i've been game jamming. so i think the biggest thing you can actually do for yourself is build pattern recognition when it comes to your own work. like. there's this advice that i think came from pixar but it's good advice and pixar hasn't made an uncomplicatedly good movie since the obama administration, so, like, grain of salt on that source.

it's that writing multiple drafts is an advantage because you can write your story first, and then go back at it with a critical eye and pick out your recurring beats, and finding ways to emphasize and represent those beats in meaningful ways becomes part of your story. this is the first part of what is ultimately pretty rudimentary symbolic work, though. like. "oh this sword represents the heros bond with his family"

where i think things like homestuck and petscop differ is that they sort of use narrative beats as symbols in themselves - homestuck is broken up into 4 parts, and each one is an iteration on the last, and it's actually really clear here from how much of a fucking flex the dancestors are, narratively. and that sounds insane to say, because they're terrible, bad idea characters, but like. consider the narrative profile of a character like damara.

damara's got a lot going on in openbound, but we can break it down into some digestible chunks of beats from other characters's stories: there's obvious imports like the megido name, of course, but you also get interesting stuff like using needlekind, and using those needles to do suicide threats, which puts this kind of abstract "rose-ness" in her profile. her relationship with rufioh ended tumultuously, with rufioh being paralyzed from the neck down, which resulting in him having a robot horse body. this puts "vriska-ness" in her profile, who is already loaded down with rose-ness by virtue of being a light player. this paralysis was also remedied by horuss kissing rufioh's severed head in front of a mountain, and involved sending rufioh the horse body piece by piece, this puts rufioh and horuss in the position of both of them having dirk-ness and jake-ness, which puts jane-ness in damara's profile too, which then turns into very indirect foreshadowing when damara's attempts at sabotaging the dancestor session are reflected in jane doing the same, spurned on by the same character, even.

(plus, if you read bdth: there's more. i've written so much more.)

another, that's a little bit more complex to explain, is the idea of tokenization. this is an idea that petscop expresses really well. i'm kind of cribbing from nightmare masterclass here, but in petscop, there's these things that are called "caskets". these caskets are not literally caskets (that which contain the dead) but they are called caskets by the game itself, which both groups the items together as a thing to be understood in terms of itself and very little else, it's sort of an insane flex too - just like. "here is how these items are grouped and a guiding word as to what this grouping entails, find the pattern in this or don't", it's all very abstract in ways that i find very very compelling.

there's a non-mechanic in petscop that i think is unbelievably compelling, which is that there are these "symbol blocks" - that's all they are. they're a block with a symbol on them. these symbols recur in multiple places, and their only purpose is to imply a correlation between the places they show up, and thus, it becomes self-reference.

another thing i think you could look at is the game thoth, which is a similar fuckin. masterclass in visual language. this is a twinstick shooter with no text in it besides level number, and the way it builds its visual language using just shapes and their relations in a space is fucking impeccable. when you're deep in the game, you recognize what an enemy will do immediately from its appearance, and that appearance is like, concentric circles.

recognizing these things, drawing these lines between recurring ideas, reusing ideas wholesale to create new expressions of ideas, that's the basis of all of this. its like hypertext! two webpages that link to each other are almost certainly involved in the other's function!

It's also logical, since there is essentially nothing new in paradox space. Everything that can happen is either a visual or substantive reproduction of something which has already transpired on a timeline, offshoot or otherwise.

#granted one of the pitfalls of abstraction is that it can be used in some really truly unintended ways. #jade is on-screen when its storming in bdth and i wonder how the shock fic homestuck interpretation community likes that #ITS BEEN LIKE TWO WEEKS SINCE I WROTE A POST THATS TOO LONG ABOUT HOMESTUCK #HOW I MISSED IT

[genericpuff]

lmao so RS just confirmed she STILL does not, in fact, have a buffer.

FAST PASS SPOILERS AHEAD

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To kick this off, let's be real, 2 weeks is NOT enough time to build up a reasonable buffer.

When she took that 2 week break after the wedding episode went up, I knew 1 of 2 things was going to happen:

She was going to piss away the entire break on social media not getting anything done

Even if she DID get anything done and a reasonable buffer of more than 3-5 episodes built up, the episodes likely wouldn't be very high quality as you can't turn out shitloads of decent quality panels like that in just 2 weeks.

I think Rachel really just needs to acknowledge and take ownership of the fact that she is not good at managing herself, her time, or her team. When she started LO in the Originals section, she even admitted to not having a very strong buffer.

Now yes, in her defense, she hadn't fully transitioned to drawing LO full time when she started, but even still, she seems to treat her FastPass episodes as her buffer rather than creating an actual buffer.

A buffer is not "well I still have 3 episodes locked to the general public" or "I have the next couple episodes sketched up".

A proper buffer is "I have the next several episodes finished and exported and ready for their respective release dates." This ensures that they aren't racing to meet deadlines during the release period after pre-production (which is a surefire way to screw yourself over or write yourself into a corner) and that if anything happens in real life that prevents them from working on future episodes, they can still put out new episodes because they have a cushion of episodes still waiting to be released. Webtoons typically recommends its creators have anywhere from 9-15 episodes of buffer ready by the end of the pre-production phase. That usually means 3 free episodes, 3 FastPass episodes, and at minimum, 9 more episodes sitting on the backend, adding up to a minimum of 15 episodes. It sounds like a lot, but when many WT series run for 40+ episodes per season, 15 is a small number. Especially for a comic like LO which had 90 episodes in its S2 run and 116 in its first season. S3 of LO is already 37 episodes in.

She's also basically admitted to just writing as she goes in the past because most people working on their webtoons in productions like these have at least a decent skeleton of a story going on that they don't have to write as they draw. Writer's block doesn't happen in webcomics unless you're writing as you're going, same as how it doesn't typically happen in animated movies because you should already have a basis to work off of before you start the brunt of the visual work that needs a narrative structure to exist.

Now, all that aside, the reason I'm bringing this up again (as I've talked about her buffer range before) is because I've once again been proven that Rachel doesn't have a shred of a real buffer.

And the smoking gun this time was the horse.

This stupid fucking horse.

Now, besides the fact that we're a little sus this is meant to be an in-comic jab at all the criticism of LO pointing out how Persephone always looks like an MLP character-

-but that pony toy drawing didn't make its first appearance in Episode 241, it made its first appearance on Instagram. Not as a preview for episode 241 or as an official LO drawing, in her own words, 'just a pony'.

As always, this is still just an estimation based on what goes out in LO and what Rachel posts to her IG/Twitter, but this pretty much tells me her buffer is STILL only 1-2 weeks ahead of time, because that pony drawing time lapse was posted two weeks ago. When we checked the actual timestamp of the post the day the episode it showed up in went up (Episode 241) it was ten days old.

Not to mention, the timestamps on those reddit posts? A month old. Granted, we had been making MLP jokes in the ULO/antiLO community prior to that, but the fact that this "my pretty pony" gimmick came out so soon after someone did literal art of Persephone crossed over with MLP, it really just furthers the suspicion (in addition to shitloads of other instances) that Rachel is snooping in on these crit communities to try and "clap back" at them through her comic. Which is something she'd only be able to do with a limited buffer anyways as it allows her to change things on the fly in response to criticism or whatever hurt her feelings that week.

That said, I won't be certain of this 1-2 week buffer estimation until we see when cowboy hat Hades shows up.

I'm calling it now - it will be showing up in this week's episode which goes up April 22nd.

Place your bets, folks.

#lore olympus critical #lo critical #anti lore olympus #antiloreolympus #essay post #unpopularLO #unpopularloreolympus

[archandshri]

9th feb '24 - [arch] characters, interactions and emotion - making a mini webcomic

Gahhhh Shri this has been an absolutely crazy couple of weeks!!!! Hope you are doing well :)) First of all, WOW! You have a lot of goals, and I’m sure you’ll get them done! I’ve worked a lot on my graphic design during the process of making Winter Wellbeing. If you wanna see a blog post dedicated just to that, I can do so! It would be cool to compare notes on the approaches we take for graphic layouts. If you wanna share your knowledge of camera skills when you build that up that would be awesome 😭😭

It’s been a tough few weeks, art wise. I have been reflecting on my process, motivations to create, the ego and all the baggage that’s lumped into the creative process for me. It turns out there’s a lot. I took some space from my illustration practise (literally for a weekend!) and began to realise how dysfunctional it is. I’ve been writing a lot about that so there may be a larger piece of writing coming about that at some point (no promises!!)

But for now, let's talk about little successes!

I’ve been playing with some characters for a while but I’d hit a bit of a block with the plot. I realised the expectation of having a finished project of high quality soon is unrealistic, and an unhealthy expectation to put on myself. I rarely give myself time to play with concepts for a long time and let the characters, plot and interactions evolve naturally. Maybe this in part came from sticking to the short university module turnaround. I noticed that that short turnaround was causing a lot of block, so I have decided to bench it as a comic for now and focus on using it as a playground - falling in love with the characters, creating stories and drawing them for fun. Maybe years down the line I’ll make them into a comic - we shall see! 

I *tried* to do hourly comics day this year and it didn’t quite work for me. I think I made 3 comics? And then got distracted with a bigger project that ended up taking a week or so to complete. Let’s have a look at it, shall we?

[you can find the full version here]

First of all, it’s based on an unfinished fanfiction I started a couple of months ago, which was mostly bad, but there was one nice scene that I liked and wanted to expand on. I started by having a look at the script I wrote and thumbnailing on the iPad. I’m away from home at the mo and usually would prefer to do most of my artwork traditionally, but because I don’t have access to a scanner, the whole process was digital this time. A lot of the pages got scrapped because the dialogue wasn’t necessary, and I’m not drawing pages that aren’t necessary.

some more development screenshots

I thought a lot about posing during the process, acting the scenes out in my mind and sometimes physically, really understanding the emotions of the characters, why they’re saying what they’re saying, their tone and how to convey that though their body language and expression (i find grian really annoying normally [affectionate] but I want this grian to step on me).

Pearl was hard with this because she’s quite erratic and unpredictable in this series, so I wanted her to switch from raw explodey anger to playful jabs at Grian. I’m hoping this comes across as somewhat insane, rather than tonally off and inconsistent. I did super enjoy drawing her and her explosive nature though, especially in comparison to Grian’s coldness.

I played with levels and monotone colour too - I’m not working with multiple colours much at the moment so I’m able to focus on things like values composition, characters and backgrounds. My skills limit the kind of stories I can tell currently, so I’m working to improve those foundations. Maybe when I’m back in the riso studio I can play with colours a little more.

Colours - despite the simple pallete it gets a bit nerdy here.I stuck to specific flat percentages for most of it - Pearl’s hair and Grians jumper are 60%, Grian’s hair and Pearl’s cloak are 20%. Then I added a 14% layer for shadows, using a ahrd blend eraser tool for highlights, making the images quite dark. I fill a layer with texture from Forystr’s riso brush for procreate, and turn it into a 40% opacity colour dodge layer. This gives it some much needed texture and makes the lighting feel low and nighttimecore. It also pushes the values to look really nice - I tend to be too scared to push them by myself.

I tried a few different colour layers to get a *vibe* but settled on a low percentage riso blue in a colour layer. All layers besides the riso blue are in a riso black, colour picked from a riso colour pallete. I learnt these tools - using percentages to get good values - from working with risograph. I really recommend having a look at these techniques and doing some monotone work. It's really improved by character designs, page layouts and compositions.

That's all from me today, though I have had MANY other thoughts over the past two weeks about creating, but perhaps we'll dive into them another time. If you (or anyone else) has any questions, hit me up with a reblog or an ask and I will get right to it. Lovely to hear from you! Hope your art is going great too :)) Arch :)

#archillustrates #arch is learning #project development #art #art process #art resource #process #artists on tumblr #illustration #comic #picture book #small art blog #art blog #illustration blog #female artists on tumblr #queer artists on tumblr #illustrator #book illustrator #female illustrator #queer illustrator #comic artist #comic art #female artists on instagram #artists on instagram #procreate #digital artwork #digital artist #artist blog #artist on tumblr #web comics

[magz]

Found cool kickstarter book. Ebook $10 and physical book $20 (u.s. dollar).

How to Webcomic: 2023 Edition

The updated 2023 edition of How to Webcomic includes all the content from the original book, plus ~70 pages of new, additional content!  This Kickstarter is to fund both a digital, DRM-free e-book version for reading on computers and mobile devices, and a physical softcover book! 

The book aims to teach you everything you need to know to jump into the wonderful world of webcomics, to help you get your story out there and succeed online! Topics in the book include (but are not limited to):

- Concepting - Writing and scripting - Drawing for comics - Paneling and visual pacing - Art programs - Building a website - Webcomic platforms - Self-promotion - Social media marketing - Monetization (Patreon, etc.) - Building a community

...and more!

---

"What does the new book add?"

The new edition of How to Webcomic includes approx. 70 pages of new content, covering topics such as:

- Worldbuilding - Crafting plotlines and conflicts - Visual storytelling, paneling, and composition - Backgrounds and perspective tips - A step-by-step guide to making comic pages - Advertising and building an audience online - Kickstarter and crowdfunding tips - Conquering art/writer's block - Updates/expansions to previous content And more!

Praise for "How to Webcomic"

"I can’t believe it, I finally got my motivation back to make a comic because of this book!"

"Great advice, clearly formatted, and super helpful for making any sort of comic! 10/10 recommend for anyone who wants to create a story in any form. Has cute illustrations inside and a humorous writing style as well!"

"I have learned things that I didn't know I needed to learn and I am so thankful to all the information provided in this book. The experience and knowledge in this book is remarkable."

[...]

#product #reference #webcomics #kickstarter #my upload #link post #o post

[luxshine]

These are the first ten pages of my other active webcomic, Building Blocks.

Imagine what it would be like being the superintendent of a building inhabited by Archangels, Horsewomen of the Apocalypse and other cosmic beings? That's the situation where Joshua, our main character, is, even if he doesn't know it yet.

I drew this pages back in 2019, so my style has evolved a lot (I update it on Tapas every thursday, pretty much without fail unless I need to do a small hiatus to finish some pages) and you can see the full story here: https://tapas.io/series/BuildingBlocks/info

But I will be posting 10 pages or so every Thursday here for now on for you to enjoy too!

Lemme know what you think of these ones, where we meet all the Archangels: Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Uriel and... Lu. Well, sorta.

next

#Calico Chimera #Luxshine Art #Building Blocks #Building Blocks Webcomic #Angels #Archangels #Supernatural #not the show #Webcomic #Original characters #Characters of Color #Female Characters #Queer Characters #Trans female characters #non binary characters

[gearbroth]

I’ve been curious about your space au for awhile and the characters you created with it, is it inspired or a cross over with a game of some sort or is it entirely original? Because the blips I see you create are really cool and I’m super interested in the story and art as a whole.

It's a bit of everything I guess! It was originally a "Sun & Moon" AU for Team Fortress 2, started in early January 2021 but the characters quite quickly began to change from their original intention ;w; subtly OOC to straight up different motives and desires; although I try to keep their personalities similar despite the whole different path of life, as well as create scenarios that build them into the characters they are/derive from!

October 2021 brought Gordon/Half-Life into the mix just on a whim. Since then, it's very much changed into it's own thing and become my own little passion project.

I've considered making it sorta Valve-oriented (recently have been concepting how to add Portal to the mix), but as it's become less of an AU and something I consider more of it's own story and have been adding original characters to, it's sorta inconclusive what it is right now.

I don't call it completely my own simply because the characters are derived from previously existing ones, be it in only appearance or personality too - but the story I have blocked out intended does take a completely different path, due to the inherent concept of their beings as celestial bodies in space, although I try to frame some events referencing pivotal moments to the original characters.

I'll still call it "TF2 Space AU" as was it's loose name at first! But I've also been calling the story as "Spaceau"/"Space-AU" lately :3

Whether or not I eventually break away from the original media it derives from, I’m unsure. I don’t think I’ll change their appearances/personalities however if so because they’ve been so set in stone, be it through the immense amount of art I’ve drawn, others have drawn, or sculptures even too. That’s who they are and I can’t see them differently.

There is SO much I have planned for it, my only struggle is time to commit to it ;w; but I hope to one day be able to share the whole story! Be it in little pieces, context-less and concept art, or more.

And sidenote; I tend to be a little closed off about it (mostly bc online social anxiety -u-””) because I want to have so much more already prepared to share, have all my plot notes concrete and just everything be perfect and grandiose once I think it’s ready. A lot of it is jumbled all over the place and I’m still fleshing out major plot points and middle points to be arranged all together in a concise story. But who knows! My hopeful intention is to have all the plot written together in a storyboard style final draft, so I can interpret it into a webcomic to share - as telling stories through visual art is my personal way to tell stories.

(in any case: thanks for readin’ all this if you did! And thank you everyone whose been supporting me making this and been excited to see it. I hope to have more and more to share!)

#gear rambles #tf2 space au #spaceau #sorry this is a long message!! #i wanted to give formal explanation of it all for everyone also curious sdfhjskd #hope this all makes sense >< and thanks for the question!! #i dont answer a lotta questions mostly bc i straight up forget but i hold onto all of them #thinkin a lot about how to answer them the best way or letting the message help me reflect #anyway yeye aaa ty again and hope this makes sense!

[undertalethingems]

TV tropes? Is that a webcomic site? Did they ask for permission or did they just do it?

oh, no! TVTropes is a website that attempts to catalogue tropes--essentially the recurring building blocks of stories. It mostly focuses on officially published works, but if a fanwork gets popular enough it may get a page made for it. It's like wikipedia in that it relies on user edits to document both tropes and their occurrences across different media, so how accurate it actually is depends heavily on editors' understandings of both the media they're cataloging and what the tropes it uses actually are.

Despite that, as a reader it can be a useful way to understand how tropes can be applied, when they work and when they don't, how they can be averted or subverted, and what tropes the stories in a given genre often have. It shouldn't be taken as some kind of checklist, or critique, of how stories should be told, and it's certainly not just a list of cliches (and a story having any trope, even common ones, doesn't make it cliche!)--rather, like i said, it's meant to simply document the elements of stories that humans tell each other time and time again.

it can be fun looking up your favorite media, and it's often a decent source for behind-the-scenes and word-of-god trivia; it can also be useful for finding other stories that use the same tropes you like. just remember that it may not be 100% objective, and you'll have a good time ^^

#undertalethingem chats #not undertale #although undertale is on there XD #UG's page definitely doesn't have all the tropes it could #but that depends on people adding them and i'd feel weird adding them myself XD

[dash-n-step]

Part of what's fucked up about Marvel not capitalizing on Peni Parker's popularity is that fucking SPIDER-BOY is getting an ongoing before her

Like, yeah, a random, non webslinging spider showing up out of nowhere at the end of "end of spider-verse" was kind of funny, but he LITERALLY and CONTEXTUALLY did not seem to exist before that moment, so it's kind just Dan Slott playing around like he always does?

I don't have a problem with him having an ongoing, he seems like a fun kid, but I question the thought process here. People barely buy comics as is, so they make a new almost completely disconnected spider instead of building up one of the previously established ones?

The added bonus here is that you're basically allowed to do whatever you want, because it's a complete new earth that you don't have to catch people up on, and you can play around with dynamics, like how Daredevil is kind of Peni's mentor/replacement father figure.

It's like the building blocks are there, but then Marvel just decides to play with lincoln logs instead

I still haven't read the marvel webcomics featuring her that lean more towards how she looks in the first spiderverse movie, so i don't know how much those make it harder or not to continue her story, but still

#it's always easier as a fan to say ''wtf you'd make so much more money if you just did so and so'' but #peni parker #comics #dashingposts #dashingthoughts

[deusvervewrites]

I mean when you think about what was currently hot before MHA's first issue was release back in 2014 I believe, it was the MCU that bought back Superheroes as a genre as a whole so there was going to be some Japanese manga writers making stuff about superheroes. What made MHA distinct from fellow Superhero Genre One-Punch Man is that the former is Superheroes that happens to be in a school setting compared to Superheroes in an adult setting. The MHA setting in general would be an interesting plot as normally, the people who have superpowers are in a minority and placing it in where everyone is a super and in a school setting would place the lens on how such a society works.

And I'm going to have to agree with Hori's editors that Izuku getting OFA is a necessity in order to prevent the early MHA from being on the chopping block at Jump. If Izuku was written to be only a Quirkless hero, Hori would've been forced to nerf everyone else and give Izuku to be more of a Mary Sue Batman. As much as we want to have a Quirkless Hero Izuku in a Quirked society, I don't think it would make that big of an impact. It just that the fast pace nature at Jump kinda forces world building and plot points on the back burner. At least we have spin-off mangas like the School Briefs, Vigilante, and Double Team Missions that give out more characterization and world building if people are interested in those sort of things. And because MHA is now popular, we could have a non-Japanese Quirkless hero spin-off manga if he wants to(Japan is not the right setting to have a Quirkless Hero). The real concern is that Bakugo gets too much screen time from Hori that prevents the development of other characters and plot points but that is a separate issue.

MHA, like all other manga, has to survive the first few steps and make a splash compared to its competitors if it wants more chapters. If it was cancelled at Chapter 50 or so, we wouldn't be here complaining about the story, discussing what things could be better or different, or look that things that were in hindsight?

As disappointed as I am, I do agree that Midoriya getting OFA was the right call.

One Punch Man was also a very different kind of Superhero work, and was originally a webcomic rather than a manga publication, which meant they didn't compete much. The eventual manga of One Punch Man was an adaptation, which I'm sure made some interesting conversations among the Shonen Jump management staff

#asks #meta

[carpisuns]

For the artist meme -- 20 and 6! 🎨 if you like xx

20. how often do you get art block?

all the time 🥰 it's like clockwork lol sometimes i get sooo frustrated and cranky bc i hate all my art and i'm like "woe is me!! i've lost all my skills!! i'll never draw again!!" and then i'm like wait . i know what's happening here. i just gotta wait it out I'll be fine lol. it's nice that i also write bc then i can switch to writing for a while until the art block clears up 👍 i've found it's best for me to just take a break from drawing for a bit and not try to force it so my brain can like reset itself

6. tag your favorite artists/inspirations!

oh man there are so many!!!! i could name like 100 people lol but i'm gonna limit myself to the ones i think have had the most direct influence on my art style. hope u guys don't mind the tags<3

@ileniagennari was one of the first artists i latched onto stylewise. i used to study their work a lot because i am obsessed with the fluidity and softness of their linework and i just really like how they draw faces and bodies. their rendering is also amazing and feels sort of cinematic somehow? i've always wished my art could have a similar feel!

@anna-scribbles has also been a huge style influence for me and she's just also been a big inspiration in general as a close friend<3 i ADORE her work and have studied it specifically a ton. she draws the most blorby blorbos ever. blorbyness is her art trademark imo. and i want that for me too so i tried to steal it. i also think just sheer proximity to her and her art has made me pick up a lot of things from her automatically haha. in particular, i feel like the way she draws smiles is so perfect, and i always try to channel her when i draw smiles myself haha

@ladybeug inspires me so much and has taught me really valuable art skills! a while ago i came to a point in my art journey when i felt just really stuck and frustrated. like i could not for the life of me just DOODLE. i took everything too seriously, even if it was supposed to be simple and silly. i really needed to learn how to loosen up and enjoy drawing more. stephanie is like the most esteemed and delightful doodler i know so i came to her for advice and she DELIVERED. she gave me super helpful tips and invited me to make daily comics with her and it's been lifechanging! it's helped me focus on communication over perfection and feel more confident in my art, which i think had a visible difference in my style too. i learn SO much from just regularly enjoying stephanie's work, including her webcomic @datmcomic!!

@rileyclaw is a good buddy of mine and his work is so hugely inspiring to me! it's really educational to see his wips and learn from his process. and since he's an incredible animator as well as an illustrator, enjoying his work is part of what inspired me to finally take a leap and make my first animatic. i really love how he pushes/exaggerates body and facial expression to communicate emotion and how he makes such careful choices about comp and color and just Everything to tell a whole story with every piece of his art. i've learned a lot from riley on the storytelling aspects of art and that's something i continue to try to build on!

@knockknockknockingonhootysdoor's art is like an instant and intense shot of dopamine to my brain every time!!! i cant even tell you how HAPPY it makes me. i just stare at it and eat it all up and i'm always asking myself HOW does he do it?? how does he make me feel this way. and i think it's just like....how genuine it is?? i can just feel kryan's love for the story and characters in the way he draws and im not sure that is a stealable quality lol. but in particular something i really admire about his art is how SHAPE it is. i love how he builds each character with different shapes and how each design feels so unique and so fitting for them. i am trying to incorporate that more into my own art!

man i already have rambled so much and there are so many other artists i could go on and on about alskjdfjkla ok just real quick i have to shout out @picayunearts bc i intensely enjoy her work in both the ml and toh fandoms and her coloring and use of light and gradient always stands out to me so i kinda try to channel that sometimes! @smallpapers is another fav and i love how soft and simple her art feels! it's always inspiring to me. @raystel's work also inspires me a lot, whether it's fanwork or original stuff. she is so creative with character design and seeing the way she expresses her ideas in art is so cool!

and i would be remiss if i didn't shout out my sister @mozzys-studio who is the first person i came to when i wanted to learn how to draw and she taught me a lot! her art is beautiful<3

thanks for the questions! :D

artist asks

#there are so many more artists i could write paragraphs about.....but alas...... #blowing all of you a thousand kisses #halcyonhue #YOUR ART IS SO GOOD TOO BTW. i love how you use colors omg #ask #ask meme