I love your writing. It's just the best. Seriously I check dc dp tags to see if you've written anything.
By the way, can you write anythng with another dc hero or maybe a villain? Maybe Superman or Captain Marvel(Shazam) or anything. You don't have to obviously, but it would be really cool if you did.
Oh gosh, thank you! I'm glad you like my rambles. I'm happy to write you a dabble! Hope you like!
Billy Batson was expecting a lot when the Wizard told him to only break the ice crystal in dire situations. He figured if the dying man had enough time to pass on thousands of years' worth of knowledge and store Old magical artifacts, then the Crystal had to be a last resort.
He also figured it wouldn't be so darn breakable. Billy felt they should have made the last resort a little steadier if it was so important.
But no, one accidental trip over his far too worn-out pants legs had the thing shattering like cheap glass.
Billy stares at the shimmering remains, his heart pounding in his chest as the soft green glow that had always come from the crystal fades away.
"Oh no. no, no, no. I can fix this. I can fix this. " He whispers to himself, falling to his knees and scooping up the pieces. He tries to reattach them, but the crystal melts in his palms. "I can't fix this."
All this because some jerk kicked him out of his old sleeping place, down by the docks. He had been squatting in Old Man's Jackson shed ever since the man finally bit the dust, and he had been so excited to have a building all to himself. Word must have gotten around somehow because he comes back from a Justice Leauge Meeting to find a sixteen-year-old rooting through his stuff.
As a homeless ten-year-old, Billy had scrambled to reclaim his possessions, including this critical crystal, jumping on the intruder with a war cry. He got a broken arm, a black eye, and a few bruised ribs for his troubles.
Thankfully he could walk away with most of his things as the teen sneered and screamed at him while he ran away.
It's not that Billy couldn't fight off the homeless teenager, but he didn't, and to go all Captain Marvel on some random citizen. Captain Marvel can go toe to toe with Superman, but plain old Billy Batson struggles to take kids his own age. He's always been smaller than his age group, not to mention hunger's damage to him.
He returned to the abandoned subway, stumbling down the dark tunnel. Billy didn't like the place- it was damp and cold and a little too open if someone else wandered in, but it was the only place he could go for the night on such short notice. He was thinking of asking Batman if he could take more shifts on monitor duty just so he could sleep at the watch tower.
Then his pants leg got stuck on a broken stair, and he fell, sending his dew earthly possessions into the air. Now he was, blinking away the spots from the beating the teenager gave him and a powerful artifact he promised the Wizard he keep safe, broken beyond repair.
Against his will, sobs start to shake his body. The more he fought to clear his eyes from the tears, the more he began to fall. He leans his forehead on the floor, uncaring how a piece of crystal cuts his skin, causing a trail of crimson to flow down his face. What's one more scar on his already broken body?
In a moment of weakness, he violently wishes he could run to his mom for comfort. It's a fantasy. She's long gone, buried next to his dad, and his uncle was somewhere warm spending their money.
The knowledge causes more despair, and he sobs harder.
Why does he have to be here hungry, without a home, when his father's brother didn't even bother to attend their funeral is living off of his inheritance? Living great, if all the zeros he saw on the check were any indication?
Life is genuinely unfair sometimes. That's why he took being Captain Marvel so seriously. Someone had to protect people from the cruelty of life.
A swirling green portal rips open underneath him just as the trailing thought of I wish someone out there wanted to protect me just as much.
His echoing scream, the swirling green, is the last thing Billy knows before everything goes black.
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Billy wakes to the sound of someone humming. He blinks open his eyes, fighting against the exhaustion and the siren call of slumber. The first thing he notices is the soft green of the walls, like the color of Easter eggs he used to paint with his Dad. He smiles at them.
It's his favorite color.
Then Billy notices his eyes getting heavy again as he slowly turns his head into the plush pillow and sinks into the warm blankets around him. His body is boneless in comfort, his eyes are closed, and he's just dropping off into dreamland when his mind finally notices that you're homeless and don't know this room. You're in danger!
Billy leaps off the bed like he's been shocked, throwing the two blankets on the ground. Glancing around, he's horrified to see he's in some kind of kid room- comics, toys, posters- all tailored to his tastes. He can even spot an archeology kit for kids sitting on a desk, just like the ones his parents used to buy him when he wanted to help out in their digs.
He always thought he actually found something in his little play rocks while waiting at one of the tents as his parents worked. They always beamed when he showed them the fake dinosaur bones he discovered in his kits.
He even has nice, fluffy pajamas. The kind that doesn't have buttons or zippers but is oversized, so they let him toss and turn in the night. His bottoms are a grey and black checker pattern, while the top has the Batman symbol proudly on the front.
Everything is perfect, from the decor, to his clothes to even the furniture placement.
It's the bedroom of his dreams.
Oh gosh, he has been Coraline-ed!
"Oh, Billy! You're up. Breakfast is ready and I just finished ironing your uniform." A man's voice says from the doorway. He swings his head around to see a man in his late twenties in an apron smiling at him. He's handsome, has fluffy black hair and baby-blue eyes, and practically embodies comforting vibes.
The other-mother.
"Who are you!?" Billy demands, fist raised. He can't go Captain Marvel with someone dead on staring at him- at least he risks his secret identity, but he has been on the streets long enough to put up a decent fight.
The man seems flabbergasted by his aggression which causes Billy to bristle until he slaps his own forehead.
"Right, forgot about the introduction. I'm Danny Fenton, and I will be your new guardian until you are old enough to care for yourself." Danny smiles, and the boy can't help but find it too pretty to be authentic. "As per your request as the champion of Magic."
Billy has been taken by someone who knows he's Captain Marvel. Which could be better on the one hand but on the other, it means he can do this.
"Shazam!" A bolt of lighting has him shifting into his adult form and flying a break neck speed towards the threat. He intends to punch Danny, but his fist is caught in Danny's palm like it's nothing.
Danny seems unimpressed. "Don't think you can Shazam yourself out of class, young man. Being a hero will cut your attendance, but I won't allow you to skip just because."
Calm yourself, child Batson Solomon says to Bill. King Phantom is here per your request for aid. He will not harm you.
What request!? I never called for him!
When you broke the Infinite Realms Crysta of distress, you called for someone to protect you like your caregivers once did. King Phantom is the most vigorous protective spirit in all the realms. He answered the call. Solomon replies. Billy can feel the god shift on his golden throne a sense of amusement. It's strange to know what the gods are doing without really seeing them He made a deal with the wizard to pose as your father until you are of age. You both are bonded by this Oath.
An oath. That made Billy feel a little better. He knows that once an Oath is made, no one in the parties involved can break it. If the Wizard had done one while borrowing Billy's body then Billy would be untouchable until the contract was done.
He has a new dad that would be bound by magic and the might of the six gods to protect him.
Billy was curious to know if that was a good thing or not. Being protected is not the same as being loved.
"Kid? You okay?" Danny asks.
"What is expected of me? What do you want me to do?" Billy counters, floating back a little now that he knows what's happening. An Oath is a two-way deal. If Danny had to pretend to be Bill's father, then Billy had to do something for Danny.
"Well, I expect you to have your teeth brushed and eat your breakfast before class, but something tells me that's not what you mean." Danny jokes with a chuckle. Billy frowns, which makes the humor on the man's face disappear. "In all honesty? You are my anchor. I haven't been in the material world for years. Not since my home dimension was destroyed by an asteroid. I missed it. I missed people."
Okay, nothing sinister. But he would never let this random stranger think he had the right to boss Billy around.
"You don't have to pretend to be my dad when we're alone. And you can't tell me what to do!" Billy hisses, expecting the man to get upset like other foster fathers had been before he ran.
Danny nods. "Sounds fair. Sorry for coming on like a fruitloop."
"A.....fruitloop?"
"A big fruitloop. One with a cat."
Right.
"You said my uniform. What uniform?" Billy asks to choose to come back to Danny's odd phrase later.
"Gotham Acadamy. I signed you up for classes-"
"We're in Gotham!? Why?!"
Danny tilts his head. "It's the only place with enough death to sustain me."
Billy is glad he is Captain Marvel right now. Otherwise, he thinks he would need more guts to ask. "Why do you need death?"
"Not death itself, more like the by-product. I need ectoplasm since I;;m a ghost." With a bright flash of twin rings, Danny shifts into a very obviously non-human form, and Billy's mouth drops.
"You're dead?!"
"So-and-so. I'm a halfa. A being dead and alive but at the same time neither" Danny rubs the back of his neck, twirling his small point tail nervously. "Yeah, it's a bit confusing. Sorry."
"It's fine....ugh so we just live in Gotham until I'm what eighteen?"
"Until your twenty." Danny winces at the glare Billy throws him. "Sorry, ghosts see adulthood as two decades for the living, two centuries for the dead. Since I'm both, I have to follow both and thus have to be your caregiver until you're twenty. I can portal you to Fawcett whenever you need to hero with the snap of my fingers. It'll be inconvenient, but I promise it will be better than the streets. And I will never, ever hurt you, Billy."
Billy crosses his arms, listening with half a ear as the gods start speaking at one, their voices and opinions a background noise he long learns to turn out until Atlas is louder than the rest.
I understand this might be a lot at once, young Batson, but accept King Phantom's help. You will no longer be alone. It is not easy carrying the world on your shoulders, trust me.
The god's words make Billy sure this is a good idea.
"Shazam!" With another burst of lighting, Billy is a kid again, stretching his neck back to make eye contact with the taller man. "Alright. You got yourself a deal .... again."
Danny grins, warm and delight dancing in his eyes. "Excellent! Lets's hurry then, we're supposed to arrive at your school early today to meet with a man in charge of your scholarship who is my new employer for computer software. That's our cover, by the way. We moved here after I got a job at the man's company."
"Who are we meeting?"
"Someone unimportant, I'm sure," Danny says, waving a hand. "My friend Clockwork set us up our background, we have the papers to prove everything."
Billy finds out that Danny really is from a different universe because how in the world could he claim Bruce Wayne as unimportant!
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I was wanting to try doing an art piece in the style of the signature spell poster art pieces you create. But I’m not really the best at coming up with a composition for such a thing.
Do you have a process for how you come up with the compositions for them?
oh, awesome! it is an INCREDIBLY enjoyable style to work in; I hope you have fun with it! :D
I'm not great at putting my thought/art process into words, so my apologies if this doesn't make a lot of sense, but I'll try! my first step is always to do a LOT of thumbnails to figure out both the idea and how I want to show it; not trying to do a real sketch or anything, just little doodles to figure out what exactly I'm trying to portray. (I also call these "garbage passes" because they're not meant to be any good, they're just there to throw things out. aha. ha. ...anyway.) I think it's important during that first stage to really focus on the idea and the layout and not to get too bogged down in the actual drawing yet!
I tend to save my final thumbnails, so I'll use 'em as examples (I posted the ones up through episode 5 here if you're interested!) (and, uhhh, spoilers through episode 5 also in this post, hopefully that won't be an issue!)
the main thing I try to think about in composition is balance -- not necessarily in terms of symmetry, but in where each element is placed and how much space it's taking up. remember, empty space is still space! it's also really important to think about the parts that don't have anything in them, as much as the parts that do!
personally, I like to divide things up roughly by both halves and by thirds -- there's a lot more in-depth info out there on why the "rule of thirds" in particular works well visually, but in short, our brains tend to focus on things that are placed closer to imaginary division lines, instead of in the exact center of an image. so even when I'm doing something that is very centered and symmetrical, I try to keep that in mind and generally aim around those for landmarks like faces/eyes (or...where they would be, anyway) and other focal points.
it's not a formula of "the character's face should be in this division of this grid" or anything, more like "our minds like to focus on these areas, let's think about how to use that", if that makes sense! and of course rules are made to be broken, art is lawless anarchy, and so on. but it can be a good starting place for deciding where you want to put things!
(blue - thirds, red - half)
and against the finished versions, because they do usually end up changing a lot (including the empty space of the border):
(...these actually lined up a lot better than I thought they would. :') it makes me look like I do things way more intentionally than I do.)
other stuff I just try to keep in mind is that our eyes like following arcs and paths, which can be a good way to guide the eye:
and frame and control the focus:
honestly, composition is one of those things I feel like I struggle with a lot, so I'm not sure how much of this is helpful or actually makes sense outside of my head. but hopefully it helps a little! it's all just stuff to think about while drawing and not anything hard-and-fast, so don't, like, stress out about making sure things are lining up exactly on the thirds or anything. again, it's more "our brains think these are the dopest parts of the rectangle" than anything else! take advantage of the cool parts of the rectangle!
NOW GO HAVE FUN DRAWING seriously though, it is always super cool that other people like this idea and style enough to want to do it themselves and for other/their own characters! thank you! ❤️❤️❤️
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