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prof-peach · 3 years

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if fans wanted to include peach in stuff they write, would that be okay? and how would they write peach's personality? aside from "FIGHT ME" anyway, i think that much is a given lol. i only really write the anime characters 'cause that's what i know, but it sounds like it'd be kinda fun to try making a version of ash that fits into this blog's universe! nerf'd Obviously, but i think she'd probably appreciate how hands-on he gets when training his pokemon!

Ok, I get a lot of these messages, and I often hear folks wanting to throw peach into their stories and comics and writings, and I will always simply ask that if it’s published online publicly, to be linked to it so I can snoop and enjoy the content too. If someone asks about her in your work, let them know about the blog I guess? But literally I love that people take this stuff, these characters and stories, and make new stuff with it. No ones making money off my work here? So where’s the issue? Go for it buddy, knock yourself out, I’m all for it.

For you, and all the others out there who want to add peach, and other characters to your world building, I will give you a detailed rundown of the main lot, and how they behave, what they do, how they function. You can use that, use bits, or use none of it, I do not mind at all. If you’re creating something, you’re in control, not me.

So, peach doesn’t actually fight people as much as you’d think. She’s very aware most cannot and do not want to do that, and so she likes to keep to herself with regards to that aspect of her life, she doesn’t ask to spar with people, or even bring it up at all, but people ask her all the time, even if they clearly would lose or become hurt should she miscalculate during the fight. She looks at people like they usually create problems, and often has a somewhat reserved nature to other humans. You have to work quite hard to get anything more than formalities out of her. She will dead-pan handle people with blunt and very to-the-point statements, aid whenever possible, but very quickly get back to handling the Pokemon she so carefully tends. Her focus is clear, she’s all about hard work, her very small select family, and the Pokemon.

Her brutal, loud and brash personality only comes out with friends, family, difficult humans, OR any Pokemon. She will joke and laugh and play with Pokemon, but clam up around humans, maintaining tight body language and generally will be a little cold by regular standards. She does however have some weaknesses in this emotionless shield she puts up. When peach was young she was always angry, which swung so fast to sadness, back and forth. Her teenage years it just got worse and worse, it was crippling at points. She is to this day, full of fire and rage, even sadness, but now she has learnt to control it, to use it. When she sees that in others, it’s familiar, and she is pushed to drop the front, and be very real with the person. Underdogs I suppose, people who get bad reps, but deserve the same as everyone else. She can’t ignore it.

Once you start to pry open her personality, you’ll find she’s a lot more laid back and fun than originally appeared, you just have to work hard to find that side of her. She will meme reference, can’t dance to save her life, loves her coffee, and can be caught in quiet contemplation while gardening. This hobby is her calmest, and often is why she can stay so level headed when her quiet rage boils up again. Without time outside she will become grouchy, a little snippy, and lethargic. Will not go in the ocean for any reason other than life or death, is fine with ponds and rivers, or water at wading height. Likes the rain.

With regards to her training others, they usually have to tolerate her somewhat strict nature. She is a little....unforgiving, holds a grudge if you make a lot of mistakes, and has no tolerance for ignorance in the age of information that we all live in. In previous posts I’ve mentioned she’s only recently selected two students, after many years of testing kids who want to learn from her. Hundred tried out, only two have ever been approved. How she teaches is very fast paced, be prepared to get some scrapes and bruises, she will test your physical and emotional tolerances with intense tasks, carefully watching students like a hawk. Bad posture in your stance? She’ll be the first to tell you to sort it out. Not hearing your Pokemon partner? Right, now you spend the day without using words trying to communicate, let’s see how you like not being listened to.

This is a woman who has spent her life saying very little, and watching everything, she watches Pokemon and can see an issue from a mile off, and in battles, her observations are why she can react fast, and chose effective strategy to avoid damage and achieve results. Don’t let her body fool you, her strongest asset is analysing, watching, planning. Those skills have over the years transferred to people too. As a student, mistakes don’t go unnoticed with this professor.

Her methods are harsh but fair, and should you prove yourself, she will protect you with her life.

Because of her disinterest in kids and lots of noise, she does pass the training of students on to the other staff members whenever possible. Grey takes on the lions share of battle lessons, he is far calmer, more open and friendly, with patience for people, and an empathy that peach sometimes struggles to have. When you go through a lot of harsh training, and difficult events, it’s hard to change how you feel or think, with peach, well, she��s been through it. Most do not come out the other end in one piece, but she did, and it made her strong. You may think I mean strong like buff and big, and yeah sure she is, but I mean it mentally more than anything. Peach will not quit. She has learnt to destroy the boundaries that stop people getting hurt, gone is the fear that freezes you in your tracks, that feeling that you’ll pass out if you go one more step. She’s learnt to ignore it.

This means she’s a little forgetful at how it is to be normal, to be vulnerable and soft and squishy like students so usually are.

She has her issues, but for the most part, visitors get a laugh, a smile, a calm assertive confidence, and facts. She will indulge those who have genuine interest, or show a connection with nature, an understanding of the balance that needs to be struck for everyone to live well together.

Despite her many flaws, she’s fiercely protective, and will go above and beyond to defend the island, it’s staff, the Pokemon and the visitors. Injustice is her biggest gripe, along with littering, and she doesn’t stand by quietly if something happens that seems unfair.

You will not see her without Valka, her vulpix, close by. That Pokemon doesn’t like to be touched by strangers, at all, and will run the second someone comes at her with that intent. Peach will scold you for pushing yourself onto her, should you persistently try to get close to pet Val. They are in sync, if peach is sad, Val is sad, if Val is stressed, peach is stressed, and so on. They are inherently connected, it’s just been that long, the psychic bridge between them has been built, and reinforced over the years.

The only other Pokemon who follows her so endlessly is Booker, a teddiursa who’s pretty rough looking. He quietly trots behind, grouchy and stoic, they fight closely together a lot. He lost his mom a long time ago to poachers, and peach took him in, and changed her whole life for him. Not many people know, but Booker was the reason she left the rangers, changed career, and got so strong. Will tolerate people petting him but isn’t keen at all, grumbles a lot and tries to move away.

You may also need to know about the others, for the sake of writing, she here a few more bits that may be important to you, or others wanting to do this.

Grey is very tall, very burly, composed, tells bad dad jokes, is a bit of a goof if allowed to be. If he sees a pun, he’ll say it. Can’t help himself. Very nice guy to work with, good at keeping people calm and grounded. Pokemon are drawn to him like a moth to a flame, he gives off warm energy, and has inhuman amounts of patience. If you wrong his family however, he will snap back.

He grew up in the city, loves to swim and hike and cycle, can snowboard, is really sporty. A total brain box with held items, and boosting stats. He will explore many paths, to make sure visitors and students get the information they need, in a way that can be remembered and retained for later. Is a huge guy, but will get on the floor to play with a tiny Pokemon. Treats big “meaner” looking species like babies, very good with all pokemon.

His free time is spent either tinkering, swimming, or trimming his bonsai trees. This guy stares at screens a lot, so appreciates time away from them. Peach built him his own little greenhouse for his trees and tools, which he keeps clean and loves dearly.

His methods as a teacher are built around fun and games, he makes hard work easier to do by distracting trainers from the difficult bits, and focusing in on something more interesting or compelling.

His most commonly seen Pokemon would be a houndoom, Saxon, old battle veteran, retired now to herding and being a good boy. Very gentle, loves a pet.

Pari, now a fully fledged nurse, often oversees the labs front desk and pokecentre features, such as healing pokemon, and informing trainers who come to visit. Her skills with eggs and hatchlings is high, she’s great with younger Pokemon, and hands out good advice to trainers a lot. She’s not a fighter, never was, but can find any file, any study, any book, and any refrence you may need. A true bookworm, loves her romance novels, chat shows and upbeat celebrity gossip mags. Will cry at a lot of stuff, be it sad or happy.

She’s got a seriously upbeat personality, but if caught off guard or shocked, she gets a little flustered. Too much chaos will overwhelm her, but usually she’s on top of things. The years spent on the island have made her better at maintaining composure in emergencies. With lots of siblings, she’s very competent with others, and has a good ability to disarm cagey people with her jolly nature. Because of this, she can sometimes gain information from trainers that some of the more harsh professors may not have access to. Charming is a word for it.

Her partners are an eevee, and a happiny. They are quite sweet and well adjusted, the eevee gets a bit bouncy if you get it too excited.

#if you dont want to use the refs #im really cool with it #just enjoy yourself buddy #pokemon #prof.peach #peach talks #prof.grey #pari #dotaku island #dotaku staff #PLEASE #just ask me if you dont know something #or feel i missed something in what i wrote

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the-art-of-animated-gifs · 3 years

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Interview with my friend A.L. Crego

I have not met A.L. Crego. I have not spoken with him on the phone, in fact I do not even know what he looks like. But I can confidently call him my friend. Three years ago when I started this blog he immediately disagreed with me in the comments about things I was writing and I loved it. As a person putting ideas out there, you treasure things like that....because you know someone cares. We have had many back and forth discussions over the years....if we had lived in Paris in 1911 we would be having arguments at La Rotonde (not to compare either of us to Picasso).

A.L. Crego is a motion artist who does a wide variety of things. He has now become a very visible and active figure in the NFT Movement. He recently completed a large and very successful project in which he animated the work of a number of well know street artists on the building themselves, something he has done for years. His Tumblr page is a good place to start to see his work, which is largely surrealist in nature -- another Spanish artist following in the footsteps of other great Spanish surrealist artists.

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How long have you been creating gif art?

In a conscious and intentional way since 2014. Previously I haven't pay too much attention on one hand for its common use that was mostly ads and funny little videos, and on the other hand because it was a 'standard' format we accepted as something part of the web so I never stopped to analyze its potential. The key point for me was about 2010-2011 when the concept of 'Cinemagraph' was brought to life just giving it a name. It's format is .gif but its characteristics are different so I saw there the midpoint between photography and video, which gave born another format of art.

Art mutates when a new format appears. I was using and studying this format since then but it wasn't until 2014 that I decided to publish some of them.

What is your background?

In general terms, bachelor, 2 years of stone sculpting and two attempts of photography and audiovisual mediums. I say attempts because I gave up both of them as I was feeling that I was looking for something else more than studying all the previous history, style and isms, which is nice to understand where everything comes from and to be aware what are the key points on the history to use as reference, as a map. But in some way I felt limited as I was using digital tools since I had my first computer with 14 years, and I was being taught things I learnt by then. Even more in this times we are living where we are 21 century people, been taught by teachers from the 20 with 19 century methods.

A constant line that feeds my background is literature and music overall and later Street Art, next to more temporal interests as everything related with mythology, alchemy, history, psychology, neurology, biology, human condition in general... I don't have studies buy I'm a studying guy!

I always like to highlight that all these years that internet got strong and social networks appeared, I decided voluntary to be out of them. First reason was to keep my privacy safe in a growing world where it seemed that some "curtain" felt and everybody accepted that intimacy was now 'ex-timacy' and correct to show their private life, (this shocked me). Another reason was about the psychological effect that social networks were having on people I had around and everywhere in general. I started to notice patterns and "waves" about series, aesthetics, styles, and I was seeing clearly that if I go there, I will become permeable to all this "Amniotic Culture" I was trying to avoid.

This fact of being far (but study them closely) helped me a lot about researching and developing my own ideas and style, for the mere fact that I was using all this time and attention Social Networks require, on drinking from another sources. The B-side of this is that I was 'out of the radar' of mass people as this social networks are designed to live inside them. My idea of internet and spreading ideas is not in this way.

Where do you live and work?

In the north west of Spain, Galicia. Now due to Covid I travel less but before it, I was working and traveling many places as I only need a camera and a computer. This allows me move to work anywhere.

Do you think that animated gifs are a new art form?

I think so, despite the fact that the format existed since 1987. But as every new format of art it takes its time to be considered as art. The first photographs were not considered art until many years later. Same happened with film, same with CGI. Is nice to have in mind that gif format is the last strictly digital format of the three main ones on the web: picture, video and gif. Photography has about 200 years of history, video about 130, CGI about 60. Finally gif has 33, and used as art itself no more than 10-15. In the same way anybody takes a picture of anything does not convert it into art, is the same with gifs. One thing is the format, another is the 'art'. Everybody can take a picture, record a video or do a gif. The difference is on the how, the why, and from my point of view overall, the what.

Do you think that there is a difference between pure .gif files and the .mp4 files that people post on Instagram?

The first, big and obvious difference is the format. Is not the same a painting as a picture of a painting. Here happens the same. For example, if you treat a gif with Cinemagraph technique, you are converting in picture some parts of the image, so they still remain and with the texture and totally stillness of a picture. If you convert this gif into a mp4 this still parts, despite not having motion, will convert into a video texture (noise, subtle motion in pixels, etc) so the main characteristic, among the perfect loop, is lost. Another point is that you must play a video, a gif is always running. Waterfalls are always running and this characteristic is something that is inside our human nature, we react nice to "bucle" motions as waterfalls, fire, etc. We find pleasure on this. Of course if it's a video the perfect loop is lost and the visual mantra disappear. And another key point here is the soundtrack. In a video you can use sound to enhance or give another meaning to the piece that you can't with gifs. For me this is another characteristic that give meaning to gif. For me gif is silence, the sound is generated by the motion, the melody are the details and the beat the perfect loop. You can "hear" almost every gif.

The difference between a gif and a video is the same that between a waterfall and a hose (if this works).

What do you think are the characteristics of good gif art?

For me first and overall the perfect loop. Not using it is not using the only format that has this characteristics. Of course there can be gif art that is not perfect loop, but from my point of view and in my work is a must. It's a new way not only of creating but also of thinking. Imagine an still scene is easy, imagine an A-B point action is easy. For me the challenge is about thinking an idea that is perfect looped where all the elements interact and eventually come back to its initial point. Succeed doing this is where the perfect loop appears and you are not able to find where is the start point of the action. Like a visual mantra, that it's repetition leads you inside the piece. Gif art is nice to use the power of the hypnotic movements. Another point to have in mind for me is the flow of it, the frame rate I mean. Depending on the idea and the kind of animation this should vary; is not the same fps to achieve something with flow than if you want to achieve a more 'retro' old style. Another thing is about dithering and color palette. This second one is essential to understand as it affects the final file. When we work with photo and video we are using millions of colors but when rendered as gifs all the gradients, lights and even colors will change if there is a previous understood of this point.

As summary: If motion doesn't add, change of enhance the meaning of the piece, is expendable.

I'd would like to add that I'm not really supporter of this kind of gifs generated automatically that just move a still image itself. I understand that this 'technique' is used as a tool for certain motion (I use it) but not to move a whole image. I feel the same as if somebody hold a painting in front of me and moves it randomly. If the work was born still, it must remain still. A good example of 'inner motion', this means that the motion is implicit on the image despite not being in motion, are the photographs of Cartier Bresson for example. Giving motion to this pictures for example, will kill it because it will break the concept of 'perfect instant' .

'Instant' differs etymologically from 'moment' in the motion. So, still image (painting, photo, sculpture, etc) is an instant, videos are stories with a-b point, and gifs are moments, the mid point.

How would you describe your gif art?

I usually condense it as "Visual Mantras", as the technique and the aesthetic vary depending on the idea , but in all of them the perfect loop and the intention of hypnotizing is always present.

In another terms about aesthetics and themes I think ‘Industrial Nature’ can fit nice. I use a lot of industrial elements but I like to mix their mechanics with the biological natural ones.

How long have you been creating and selling NFTs?

I am selling NFTs since mid 2019, but it wasn't until October 2020 that I focused more on it and dug into the ecosystem to find new paths to focus my work.

Do you think that NFTs are a positive for gif artists?

For me, and the main reason I jumped into cryptoart and NFT, is that now I can certify my digital work as original. Even more to gif works as they were always understood as something banal and minor for the context of its born. Gif art was born prostituted, used mostly for ads and to claim our attention on the internet, next to the highest glamour of painting and traditional art, and 3d, photography and video these last decades. Even worst if we realize that gif format was the only visual format born by and for the internet.

NFTs are totally positive for gif artists because despite being a digital/online native format it never had its own ecosystem to live in. I feel that I was creating creatures for an ecosystem I was waiting to drop them there. Now with the blockchain, NFTs and cryptoart, I found the place where they can live, being watched by everybody and have the certify that is my work. Until some months ago my work was "free" on the web and I had no control over it at all. This was a huge problem I was suffering since my first month into gif art as people use it indiscriminately with no credit at all. It's ok, and I always defend that my work is to be seen, to be shared, but I was looking for the way to be able to have this link with my work without losing the option of being available for everybody. NFT totally changes this.

What do you think will happen in the future as NFTs get even more popular?

In general terms I think it will happen the same as when print got more popular. People will use it more, a lot of crazy and useless things will appear, tons more of different uses and useful purposes, (not only on art). This opens a new door a lot of people was waiting so the future is unpredictable but we can feel where things are going. NFT arrived to stay and the concept of decentralization is something that was always present on the internet since first days but born inside a centralized system. NFTs are being a way for people to understand the 'peer to peer' philosophy and this makes people think in different codes, so we can expect a lot of new horizons, in art, music, design...

What do you think of the environmental impact of NFTs?

This question can goes really deep but in general terms I think that is something that is being oversized due to the hype and the boiling point we are, and it's understandable because is not false that it has an environmental impact, as everything does. But on the other hand I have two main areas in mind. The first and the obvious from my point of view is that when something is new and developing is less efficient, in the way that it requires more effort to achieve the result. But at the same time, the more this technology is used the more is developed and all this issues are part of it. The first car was not electric.

The second point that usually reverberates in my mind and that it seems that 'hard critics' omit is that they are not having in mind that this NFTs we mint, give us a profit that can be used offline to do another things that can be useful to solve this problem, for example, investing part of this money on living on our own in a minimal and clean way (not working for huge multinational that their environmental impact is tons times more than NFTs and then being part of an ONG to feel clean) and on using part of this money on looking and researching new ways to mint and to keep this digital ecosystem more efficient and clean. Every development needs time.

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If you have found this content valuable considering getting me a cup of coffee

#gif aesthetic #street art #surrealism

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katytheinspiredworkaholic · 3 years

Text

Deleted Scenes: A Character Study (Part 1)

Longer title -- “Deleted Scenes: if the Criminal Minds writers had any idea how to incorporate dramatic back story into a working narrative, A Character Study”

Every once in a while I get impassioned about something that happens in the show, or more importantly that doesn’t happen in the show -- but should have. This will probably be one of at least a handful, but for now, enjoy the pinnacle of my rage. Fueled by all the OPENINGS for Hotch to talk about his past and the writers taking advantage of NONE OF THEM, but this was my breaking point.

Rating: General

Warnings: mentions of past child abuse

Pairing: none

Characters: Hotch, JJ

Episode, and placement: Season 10, Episode 05, “Boxed In”; after the episode

Word count: 2,404

Ao3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29796501/chapters/73302726

A Prime Example

Very few things get to Aaron Hotchner. Especially things that are said with no relatable context to him or the details people don’t know about his life. His past, in particular. He pushes them back in compartmentalized little boxes, carefully labeled and sorted and set aside to be unpacked at a later date. They aren’t important when he’s on a case. When a twelve-year-old boy is missing and his life hangs in the balance. When time is of the essence.

Which is why, on numerous occasions, he lets the things people say slide.

Especially on the topic of Nature versus Nurture.

He, himself, has written a handful of papers and reports on the very argument. There’s no doubt that Nature and Nurture have complicated roles in why ‘bad people do bad things’, in layman's terms. But the stigma surrounding it, cutting it into a black and white, all or nothing scenario will always rub him the wrong way. Not because he believes in it, one way or the other, but because he lives it. Day after day.

It’s not his team’s fault that they don’t know that. Hotch keeps those parts of his life to himself. Lessons only he has learned, and has grown from, and keeps as careful guidelines.

Until this case.

“I guess we all become our parents at some point.”

The way JJ had said this -- steady, with no hesitation, despite the choice in phrasing indicating it could be a right or wrong assumption -- gave the statement an air of inevitability. Creating a precedent in her mind that set Hotch's teeth on edge, though it had not been the appropriate moment to correct her on it. But it's not the first time JJ has said something along those lines.

“Does the son of a sociopath even really have a chance?”

Not a lot gets to Aaron Hotchner. Every other remark, observation, detail of an unsub’s correlation between their upbringing and their crimes he doesn’t let sting his exposition. It has never affected him before, and he vowed it never will. His father doesn’t get to take that away from him, too.

But the inevitability of her statement, indicating it was only a matter of time. No matter what he has done with his life or the person he has worked so hard to become and imbody, ultimately it wouldn’t matter in the end. That one day, Aaron Hotchner would be just like his father. He doesn’t know if he’d be able to live with himself, if that were to happen.

That single, throw-away sentence, with a pedestrian phrasing he has heard over and over again, gets to Hotch. It buries itself in him like a tick and refuses to let go, not for tweezers or fire or smothering indifference. It is still there, echoing in his head as if shouted down a long tunnel, even after they get back to Quantico and are finishing up the closing paperwork later that week. He finds himself barely able to glance at JJ for longer than a moment without hearing her words once more, and Hotch berates himself for it. Over and over again. This is why he shuts it all down and doesn’t talk about it. This is why he keeps it buried, where it will never resurface. It interferes with the present, with his work and his friendships and his relationship with his son.

His past needs to stay dead and buried in a plot in rural Virginia, where it belongs.

“I have those reports for you, Hotch,” JJ says, as if procured by his musings. He glances up for the briefest of moments, barely a blink, to acknowledge her and nod in thanks as she leaves the folders on his desk. Then he’s turning back to the SWAT team justification reports and expects that to be the last of it. Drowning himself in his work, where everything is strict codes and formal speech patterns and no emotional influence whatsoever.

Which is why he is surprised to hear JJ address him, again. Never having left his office.

“Sir?” The formal term catches his attention even more. “Is everything alright? Did something happen after you missed Halloween night?”

“What?” The question genuinely throws him off, though it doesn’t show on his face. He had missed Halloween, the first time he had ever done so, but Jack understood. He was always much more accepting of the parameters of Hotch’s job than Haley ever was. It was all he’s ever known. “Oh, no -- Jack had a fun night. Slept on the couch so I could see him in his costume when he got home. How was Henry’s night?”

“He and Will had a great time,” JJ answers, her careful, worried expression not waning in the face of Hotch’s slightly more upbeat tone. It’s something he slips into subconsciously when speaking about Jack, or to Jack, or anywhere Jack might hear. Compartmentalization. “I just… noticed you seem off.”

Hotch nods once, in acknowledgement, because he knows he has. He’s working on it. There was no need for an intervention like this. He’s the Team Leader and Unit Chief, he wasn’t the one people were supposed to be checking on.

“Delayed reaction to the case,” he answers, looking back to the SWAT team report and signing off on another section for mobilization after hours. Overtime justifications. Bureaucracy needs the ‘i’s dotted and ‘t’s crossed. “Nothing to worry about.”

JJ takes pause, and still doesn’t make for the door of his office. Like she needs to elaborate somehow, now that Hotch has left a small crack of an opening into his inner sanctum.

“I know we all have cases that hit us too close to home,” she concedes, the start of a much longer speech. “Young boys, even the troublemakers --”

“No, JJ, I appreciate the concern,” Hotch interrupts, and does his best to appease her by keeping the hardness off his face. “But it’s nothing to do with Jack or facts we found. It’s a personal matter.”

“Of course, it’s just --”

Years ago, that would have been that and JJ would have left his office. But time and history have blurred their relationship from boss and subordinate to friends and family. Personal matter no longer meant private, it meant a switch in barriers. It meant family.

She steps closer to his desk.

“You are always there for us, for these kinds of cases.” Her blue eyes bore into his, a technique Hotch recognizes as a fellow parent, to get through and make sure the person they are speaking to is really listening. “But, do you ever allow anyone to be there for you?”

He sighs through his nose. She’s not going to let this go, he can see that. No profiling needed.

“Sit.”

Closing the file, Hotch resigns himself to the fact that this was something inadvertently he’d been wanting to talk to JJ about, anyway. She had been a profiler for the team almost nearly as long as she’d been communications liaison, now, and although this could have waited for her performance review -- it tied into what was bothering him. The small smile of victory, and relief, slips from her lips as she sees the serious set to Hotch’s mouth. JJ is one hell of a profiler. The best ones did it without even knowing they were doing so.

“Wait… is this about me?” she looks mildly scandalized to even have to suggest it. Although really, it shouldn’t surprise her too much. Hotch knows he isn’t great about making things about himself, even when the conversation is supposed to be. So he gathers his thoughts, with such little prep time, and decides to start with where this whole debacle had begun.

In the car. When JJ had made her off-handed comment.

“The events of our lives shape us, and bring us here. As they do for everyone. It’s a technique that also helps us narrow down our profiles. How we were raised, what he have gone through. Heredity factors.”

JJ is staring hard at him, now. Deciphering the point, attempting to look ten steps ahead when Hotch has barely revealed three.

“You’re talking about Nature versus Nurture.”

“You could say that,” Hotch acquiesces. “In a lot of ways we are our parent’s lineage. Unless we choose not to be. I only became a prosecutor because my father was. But now, here I am.”

The parent’s lineage is a direct drop towards the conversation in the car. Both JJ and Hotch are intelligent adults, as is the entire team. Sometimes the most direct reference isn’t needed. Sometimes a key phrase is what links the mind back to the moment, replays it in the mind’s eye so it becomes fresh and there’s no confusion. Fewer words can connect more than a thousand, Hotch had learned that early on as well.

“I was… I was speaking more toward behavior,” JJ elaborates, still unaware where the conversation is going. How this has correlated to Hotch’s odd mood.

“I know you were. And my statement still stands,” Hotch answers plainly. “I’ve noticed that sometimes agents, myself included, let bias dictate their profiles. And we need to stray away from that kind of influence.”

JJ’s slight frown becomes defensive. Confused, but not angry. She’s learning quickly, Hotch notices.

“Nature and Nurture are a part of standard psychology practices. With a lot of information and testing to back it up. Spence could give you statistics for days, I’m sure. It’s proven.”

“Yes, as a theory. Not as a rule.” Hotch continues, giving her that steady, stern but gentle tone that borders on chastisement.

“I have yet to see an exception to that rule, when it comes to children of violent offenders,” JJ buckles down. “If they are the target of that violence, it warps them, Hotch. Plain and simple. How do they recover from something like that?” She’s shaking her head, getting caught up in the emotional aspect of it all over again. The hopelessness of its appearance.

“Any way they can.”

Now he has JJ’s attention, because she hears the shift as soon as it forms on his tongue. The air heavier, hazy like an old memory.

“Sometimes they leave home as soon as they graduate just to escape the situation, and spend their whole adult lives trying to eradicate it. By burying themselves in, say… Law School.” JJ’s stare goes vacant, and Hotch at least has the decency to look away from her as he continues. He has a point to make. “So they can put away people like their abuser. But when that’s not enough, prosecuting after the fact, they start to focus on ways to catch the offenders in the act. Save victims in the real world. Use what they know from experience, but in the field, so no one else slips through the cracks.”

“H-Hotch, I--”

“If there was a file on me as detailed as these on my desk, and there probably is somewhere in this building,” Hotch barrels on, not letting JJ get a word in edgewise. “Then the first seventeen years of my homelife would look nearly identical to John David Bidwell's childhood.” He didn’t need to go into further detail, though bullet points from the case all bust flash between them in neon.

Strict, domineering father figure. Church every Sunday, as a control and appearance factor. At home: a constant deluge of beratements, fear, shouting and fists. Something was always wrong, someone always deserved a punishment. No one was safe. They did what they could, followed the rules to a tee, but that wasn't always enough.

They survived, because that's all that they could do.

And he had.

“If you really require a physical, living exception to the rule, I’d like to hope we know each other well enough that you would consider myself that exception.” It’s the closest he’s ever come to admitting what happened in his father’s household, and Hotch knows that’s as far as he will let it go. No elaboration needed. “Even if I can be ‘a bit of a bully’.”

Stunned and shocked, the last part probably wasn’t needed. But, again, Hotch has a point he’s trying to get across -- and he wants it to make an impact.

“Hotch, I’m so sorry,” JJ croaks out, and he still can’t look right at her.

“Don’t be, you didn’t know,” he soothes her, swallowing a little hard. “No one on the team does, not even Dave.”

“--No one?”

“The only one who probably did was Gideon, but not because I told him. He was just that good of a profiler. You will be, too, one day -- I see that level of potential in you. Profilers are always learning, evolving, developing their skills.” Hotch finally turns his head, and catches sight of JJ with her eyes bright and her nose red. Her tell-tale physical signs that she’s been holding back tears. “Let this be one of those moments.”

She nods, wipes at her eyes discreetly, and collects herself with more strength than Hotch or anyone else ever gives her credit for.

“Was he ever convicted? Your father?”

“No,” Hotch says, level. “He died of colon cancer ten years ago. He never even met Jack. Neither did my mother, though I am sorry for that.”

Silence stretches in the wake of Hotch’s reveal, and JJ only breaks it when she can’t seem to keep it back any more.

“You’re… you’re not really a bully. You know.”

“Yes, I am,” Hotch tells her, the smallest traces of a smile smoothing the sharp edges of his face. “But only when I choose to be. When it matters.”

JJ huffs out a watery laugh, scoots to the edge of her seat as if to stand, but hesitates once more.

“You didn’t have to tell me. But thank you. I’m… I’m glad you felt that you could.”

The sentiment warms the inside of Hotch’s chest, ice cold from the memories he never dredged up if he could afford it. It helps ease them back under the floorboards of his mind, where they belong.

“Thank you for listening.”

She was right. He didn’t confide in anyone, and he doesn’t know if this will help him -- more than likely, not -- but it helped JJ. And that’s what mattered. His team. His family. Growing, learning, becoming all the better for it. The best people he had ever known.

The family he had chosen for himself.

“Goodnight, Hotch.”

“Night, JJ.”

-end scene-

#I got irrationally angered and wrote a thing #criminal minds fanfiction #Aaron Hotchner #jennifer jareau #no ships #angst #cw: mentioned child abuse #katyswriting #idk what I'm doing but I'm doing it in style

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scoupsy-remade · 4 years

Text

For this gif tutorial I’m going to try to keep it as basic as possible, I may add a few tips for coloring at the end, but for the most part this is going to be how I make my basic gif. Also I’m not going to use my vapoursynth to process the video beforehand, just because I know not everyone uses it and it’s harder to learn. This is going to be just a downloaded mp4 video through the gif process. Don’t let the idea that this is a BASIC TUTORIAL fool you, I’m going to try to teach you a lot of things. It’s gonna get wordy, but i will try my hardest to keep the process easy. I’m just going to explain what things do instead of having you just copy + paste my method and not know what it means. okay? okay.

Before we start though, if you plan of giffing live stages you either need to accept the they will not be super crisp and clear OR learn how to use avisynth/vapoursynth to resize the videos without quality loss.

If you just want to gif music videos or variety shows then this should still give you HQ gifs.

Other notes:

try to ONLY use 1080p and up video if possible, maybe 720p if you’re really desperate, but anything under that... it’s not going to look good at all, so try to avoid using them.

The Photoshop I am using is PS 2020, so all my screenshots will be from that version and with my weird set up. But I’ve been using pretty much the same method since cc 2015 so other than the fact that some placements and names are tweaked, it’s the same. (If you can’t find something on your version shoot me an ask and I’ll try to help! And asks I get on this tutorial I’ll link HERE for future reference)

CUTTING VIDEO

To cut videos I’ll just use my quicktime player.

I use edit > trim to select the portion of the video I plan to gif and save that as it’s own new mov file.

which pops up this tab

that you just slide until the part you want to gif is selected

then just save it as a new video and your done with part 1

ENTER PHOTOSHOP

Now what we’ll do is open our photoshop and import that clip into layers

FILE > IMPORT > VIDEO FRAMES TO LAYERS and select your video.

A small pop up will appear to show the clip you’re opening, you can trim it further here or just keep going by clicking okay

my setup is weird for drawing BUT you should have it looking remotely like this:

The things you will DEFINITELY need to see are TIMELINE, LAYERS, ADJUSTMENTS. If you don’t have these sections you can add them to your screen by clicking on the WINDOW tab at the very top menu bar and clicking on them

LAYERS - this is pretty self explanatory but each row is a layer in the gif. the more layers the bigger the gif will end up, the longer it plays. So bigger clips will have more layers and end up as larger gifs in the end.

TIMELINE - This is where you can edit the gifs timing (make it faster or slower)

We’ll be doing a bit of work with it so it’s important to know it well

ADJUSTMENTS - Best friend and worst nightmare. this is where ALL the tedious recoloring is done. VERY rarely would you not use these. 99.9% of kpop things are filmed through a green or blue lense so you’ll want to fix that to not have ghost idols

So, Let’s make a gif

Step 1 - In the top right corner of your timeline is a set of lines, click there and then click SELECT ALL FRAMES

under each frame is a time stamp (this video’s is 0.04) this decides how fast each clip goes by, or how quickly the gif moves. Personally I prefer slower gifs, but I say anywhere between 0.04-0.06 is a decent speed.

Step 2 - with all the frames selected, click on the small down arrow next to any of the frames and change the speed to your liking. (I’m going to use .06)

Step 3 - in that same tab of lines we’ll now click CONVERT TO VIDEO TIMELINE, which will change our Timeline to look like this:

Step 4 - Back in our very TOP menu we’ll click SELECT > ALL LAYERS, then on the TOP menu click FILTER > CONVERT FOR SMART FILTERS (this might take your computer a minute since our File is still pretty large.) Now our Time line will look like this:

Step 5 - Sharpening

This one is VERY MUCH something you’re going to have to play with to get your settings to be how you like them. It’s also where I’d use topaz adjustments, BUT since I said we’re doing basic PS gif we’re just going to be using smart sharpening. SO:

in the TOP munu again, click FILTER > SHARPEN > SMART SHARPEN

A pop up window will appear and you can edit the settings to your liking. Mine:

Step 6 - Resize your gif or crop it to tumblrs standards: big singal gifs have a 540px width || Two gifs use 268px || and three gifs use 177/178px

To do this we’ll use the crop tool and type in our dimensions in the menu bar:

and then crop to your liking. (this doesnt resize the gif it just crops to the correct ratio so we still have to shrink the gif)

Next, we’ll resize the gif to that size in the TOP menu click IMAGE > IMAGE SIZE a pop up menu will appear and you’ll type in your resize ratio and click enter.

Now technically thats a gif. it’s TECHNICALLY done. but mine is white washed and there are words on it that I dont want so onto the coloring and blurring.

First I’m going to show you how I blur text on gifs. because text is EVERYWHERE in kpop content and it’s hideous and I hate it. so lets kill it.

BLURRING LETTERING

First we’re going to add a new blank layer to our LAYER TAB by clicking the little box with the + inside at the bottom

Sometimes doing this can mess up the timeline’s selection but its SUPER easy to fix so lets do that.

So in our timeline we have these two bars on each side that select what part of the gif will play. this is also where you can readjust your gif if it has extra frames at the end, or it ends up being too large and you have to make the gif smaller to save it. Just click and drag the bars back to where our gif actually ends, and all is fixed!

Now on our new layer we’re gonna take a paint brush (one of the ones with a lot of fade NOT the solid circle ) and paint over where the words are like so:

MAKE SURE ITS ON OUR BLANK LAYER AND NOT THE GIF LAYER!!

I know it looks stupid but trust me okay.

Now in your LAYER tab we’re going to duplicate our gif layer by right clicking on it and selecting duplicate.

Then we’re going to drag the new gif layer so that it’s above the paint layer in our LAYER tab :

Now, right click on the top gif layer and select CREATE CLIPPING MASK. it should put a little down arrow to the left of the picture, toward the paint layer. This means the gif is ONLY visible where that paint is now.

So we’re going to click on FILTER in the TOP menu again (while we still have that top gif selected!) and Go to BLUR > GAUSSIAN BLUR. a pop up menu will appear and you can just drag the radius until the text is as blurry as you want it to be. (also IF you missed part of the text, you can just go add more paint to your paint layer and it will blur wherever you paint!)

so now my gif is like so:

So now we’ll color him, because he’s pretty washed out.

ADJUSTMENTS

This is where I’m going to be the least specific about what I do and more about what tools do, so that you can learn how to color things the way you like them!

The Adjustment tab on Photoshop has 16 options but I’m really only going to talk about 6 of them. We’ll do it in order though. All the actual adjustment tools will open in the PROPERTIES tab

Brightness / Contrast - Pretty self explanatory, but definitely should be toward the end of your coloring, as if can effect the quality a lot. Small adjustments do A LOT so don’t go crazy,

Levels - Levels is all about the balance of how dar or light your gifs will be if you adjust in the RGB layer it will adjust for the entire image, but if you change the selection to RED/GREEN/BLUE it will adjust just those colors hues. Also there are three small droppers to the left of the graph. using those you can select which part of the gif you want the image to recognize as the lightest/darkest part of the gif, and the tool will adjust the gifs coloring to that point. ( play with those droppers! magic happens i swear!)

Curves - Kind of like levels but instead of how light or dark the entire image is it works more on contrast. REALLY play with the curves options, i’m sure most things you can do with other tools can also just be done in curves if you’re patient enough to learn

Vibrance / Saturation - Vibrance will make duller parts of an image higher contract and brighter and saturation will make everything a more neon shade. or in reverse lowering vibrance will dull out the things that were already neutral and saturation will dull out the more vibrant parts of the image (usually reds)

Color Balance - Good for fixing tones. so if a live stage is SUPER BLUE!!!!! you can readjust and calm down the blues to dull them out or get rid of them completely. Again play with this its insane what it can do

Selective Color - adjusts the different colors in your image without touching the other colors. if you wanna touch the reds, make them pinker but not change the blues and greens, you do it here

If you want MORE drawn out explanations of what each of the 16 adjustment layers do here and here are actual articles you can look at. But it’s all about practice. playing with all the adjustments alone and together. Finding out what you like to do!

Now when you gif is ALLLLL colored and you’re ready to save it we do FILE > EXPORT > SAVE FOR THE WEB and a whole new window of options pops up. I’ll give you two examples of how to play with those options and then we’re done!

keep in MIND tumblr’s gif limit is 10MB which is pretty huge now, but still watch your gif size!!!!

AND SAVE your done!

I hope this was helpful! Let me know if you have any questions,again I’ll have an ask tag for it and it’ll get linked HERE if people end up needing help!

Happy giffing!!!

#drm.pst #drm.txt #Gif tutorial #this is LONG okay please be aware of that before you open it #als i did NOT reread it because it took me 3 hours to type out so it's probably a grammatic nightmare #BUT i'm JUST under a new milestone so i'm gifting this early because i had the patience to do it today lmao

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chappybird · 4 years

Text

How to Get Roleplay on F-List: A Guide

Hey all. So I’ve had a few people ask me how on earth to get RP over F-List, or for those that have tried, say its too confusing. While F-List is a much different format than I think a lot of people are used to, it’s a pretty reliable source of RP once you get used to it. So I’m going to walk you through, step by step, how to start from nothing and get a profile set up to start RPing. F-List is 18+ Only and is a Restricted To Adults® Verified website. You can learn more about it by clicking the RTA logo at the bottom of f-list’s main page.

F-list’s main landing page can be located at https://www.f-list.net/.

Note that my f-list may look different from yours because I’m using dark mode (which can be set in the account tab) and I’m a subscriber, so I don’t see ads.

Step One: Make a Profile

Making a profile, or as they’re known on F-List, a character, is your jumping off point for getting started. There are three main factions on F-List: Anthro Characters, Canon Characters, and Original Characters, with subcategories of each. You also have hub profiles. There is a right way to make a hub profile, but that’s not something I’ll be talking about on this post. Hub profiles are pretty universally disliked on F-List and are often seen as a mark of laziness, and I do not recommend making one to look for RP on. You should make a separate Profile for each character you want to play as. If you have a normal account, you can make up to 150 different characters. If you’re a subscriber, you can make significantly more than that depending on your tier.

Choosing a name for your character is very important! You want something attention grabbing, but since each character has to have a unique name, this can get a little tricky. Today I’m choosing to create a Link from the Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time. As this is a popular character, it can be difficult to track down a good name. You can be clever with naming conventions, while making it obvious who you’re playing, or you can add in underscores, hyphens, numbers, etc. It’s really up to personal preference. I advise not getting too abstract with your character name. Just pick something easy to read and to the point. Once you’ve decided on a name, click the create character button to open up the character editor.

Step Two: Holy Fuck Dude That’s a Lot of Shit To Fill Out

Take a deep breath. The character editor is very intimidating to those that haven’t used F-List before. Perhaps you have used F-List for it’s old intended purpose, just to list your kinks to link people to when RPing on other sites. Your first instinct might be to scroll down there and start picking kinks willy-nilly. Stop. In the grand scheme of things, this is not as important for getting Roleplay and if you do it incorrectly you might actually hurt your chances.

Now that we’ve calmed down you’ll notice two things at the top of the page. A big white text field, and this guy:

This, more than anything on your profile, is the most important thing. If you have this on profile, you will almost never get any roleplay. This is your character icon, and it’s the first step on your journey to doing this whole thing correctly. All you need to do is find an image that’s 300x300 pixels or smaller and upload it with the Choose File button. Then scroll down to the very bottom of the page and hit save. Search on google, and if you have a hard time finding something of that size, A great site to use is https://lunapic.com/ to edit pics if you don’t have Photoshop or Gimp. Choosing or creating an image with some sort of transparency layer is recommended because it makes your icon look more polished, but you don’t really need to do that. This isn’t an image software guide so I’ll leave that to you to figure out. If all you can do is crop an image into a square, that will do perfectly. But you need to have something here. Besides your character name, it’s the first impression you’re going to give to people when using the site. I have honest to god had people message me on empty profiles that having nothing but a character name and an icon.

Sourcing your images is a bit of a grey area on f-list. It’s not really an art sharing site, but if you choose fanart that someone doesn’t want to be reposted, it can be removed by the mods if you’re reported for it. So we’ll just use some official art that already has a transparency channel and crop it using Lunapic.

Step Three: How To Set the Profile Up

If you’re following along, you should have something like this by now. This already gives us an idea of who you’re playing, and what they look like, and while you might get a couple of weirdos messaging you already, there’s still a lot to do. So let’s go over what to do next.

Now that you’ve already created a character, it will be listed under the character tab. Further characters will be listed in alphabetical order. Navigate to your character and click the “Edit” button underneath their icon.

We’re back to the big scary page. Remember that big text field? We’re going to ignore everything else and focus on this first.

F-List uses standard BBC code tags with [square brackets.] You can find some buttons that will give you tools like bold, italics, color, hyperlinks, and quote blocks. There are many different ways to create eye-catching descriptions. I would say the three basic ways are minimalist, inline based, and heavy BBC code. We’ll go through the first option in detail but if you’re interested in the the latter, there is actually a few F-List profiles that teach coding and even have a few templates to use. User beware, though. Many F-List users use these templates and they can sometimes look a bit generic as they are overused.

Templates: https://www.f-list.net/c/profile%20templates

Coding Help: https://www.f-list.net/c/profile%20references

If you want to make an inline based profile, having access to software like Illustrator, Photoshop, GIMP, and similar content is good to have as well. You can also make a blend of the three styles of profiles. I’ll link some examples of my own profiles for reference. Some of these have text included in the inline. Some of them just have an image with the text written out underneath. Again, it’s really up to your personal preference.

https://www.f-list.net/c/Rival%20II/

https://www.f-list.net/c/Lion%20Heart/

https://www.f-list.net/c/The%20Fire%20of%20Tamaran/

Now would also be a great time to familiarize yourself with the rules. Keep an eye on these, especially if you play contentious content.

https://wiki.f-list.net/Code_of_Conduct

Some big things to look out for and not to do: Photographs and realistic images of animals are not allowed. Even Nonsexual ones. Photographs and 3D renders of minors (even nonsexual images or nonsexual profiles) are not allowed. If there is even a hint of the character being a minor, do not use photographic or 3D renders. (For example: Tom Holland’s depiction of Spiderman. Even though Tom Holland was an adult when he played the role, the character is a minor.) Sometimes these can run into a lot of grey areas, but it’s better safe than sorry!

Step Four: Creating A Minimalist Profile

We’ll start with a short description. It’s really important to make sure your character’s name is present in your descriptio, especially if it’s not the profile name. If you’re feeling particularly lazy, you can copypaste something from a wiki or official description. Let’s start with something like this.

Link had humble beginnings as a boy that lived in the forest with the Kokiri. Known as the boy without a fairy, Link led a simple life until one day, the dying Guardian of the forest, the Deku Tree, set him upon a Quest to save the Kingdom of Hyrule from darkness. Arming himself with the elemental powers of Hyrule and the legendary Master Sword, Link journeyed through time to the Dark Era of Hyrule to challenge the evil Ganondorf and save his Kingdom from evil.

Shoving this into the Description box and hitting save will generate something like this.

You might notice that this looks like crap. And it does! however, we can very easily fix that with the power of just three simple BBC tags. Those being [center], [color], and [sub]. plus a little something extra I’ll explain in a moment. Let’s add those in like so.

[center][color=green][sub]Link had humble beginnings as a boy that lived in the forest with the Kokiri. Known as the boy without a fairy, Link led a simple life until one day, the dying Guardian of the forest, the Deku Tree, set him upon a Quest to save the Kingdom of Hyrule from darkness. Arming himself with the elemental powers of Hyrule and the legendary Master Sword, Link journeyed through time to the Dark Era of Hyrule to challenge the evil Ganondorf and save his Kingdom from evil.[/sub][/color][/center]

Instead of hitting save at the bottom of the profile this time, we’re going to click “Preview BBC Code” to get a look at what our coding has done.

Fancy.

But it could use a little work. When I’m making minimalist profiles, I like to make the lines of text a little shorter so it’s a little easier to read and looks nicer. Make sure each line of text is about the same length as the previous (minus any BBC tags)

[eicon]blank[/eicon] [center][color=green][sub]Link had humble beginnings as a boy that lived in the forest with the Kokiri. Known as the boy without a fairy, Link led a simple life until one day, the dying Guardian of the forest, the Deku Tree, set him upon a Quest to save the Kingdom of Hyrule from darkness. Arming himself with the elemental powers of Hyrule and the legendary Master Sword, Link journeyed through time to the Dark Era of Hyrule to challenge the evil Ganondorf and save his Kingdom from evil.[/sub][/color][/center] [eicon]blank[/eicon]

You’ll also notice that I placed an eicon tag with a “blank” body. Eicons are essentially image macros that can be used all over the site. Using the blank one here is a good way to put a block of empty space on the top and bottom so the text isn’t too crowded by the frame of the description box. Another couple to keep in mind are [eicon]under construction[/eicon] or [eicon]WIP[/eicon] if you want to save your work now and get right to chatting and exploring the site. This signifies that you’re still working on your profile and more will be added later. You can create your own eicons by going to Account > Icon gallery. Keep in mind each eicon must have a unique name across all users. Inputting this into the description and checking how it looks in the preview, we end up getting something that looks like this:

Looks like we got a bookmark while we were setting the profile up. That means someone saw us while browsing new characters and decided they want to keep an eye on our profile and are likely interested in RPing! If you like, you can disable bookmarks per character in the character editor under settings. Generally speaking though, bookmarks are your friend and it’s how people will find you to RP later.

Optionally if you want to add an inline, just upload an image of your choice in Account > Inline Images. You can then add it in the character editor using this button.

This isn’t a tutorial for creating inlines, but a general rule is to make sure it’s sized well, and transparent images tend to look better than non-transparent images.

Step Five: Character Details

Opening the Character Editor once more, a couple basic things should be filled out. We will take this section by section.

Settings: Some general tweaks to change and edit. Personally, I like to turn my timezone off, and besides that, I like to have my Guestbook and Bookmarks turned on as well, but all of these settings are up to you. A big one a I suggest turning on is “Custom Kinks Sort First.” This will come up later but it’s good to turn it on.

Character List: For now, you can ignore this part. You can use this to have certain characters grouped together and will show up in the sidebars of these characters. I haven’t run into any limits for how many character lists you can have, but keep in mind a character can only belong to one list at a time.

Images: If you have any images you want to upload, this is the place to do it. Headcanons of body types, additional art you’ve drawn or found, can be added here. You can add descriptions to each image that will appear when a user hovers over the image. Keep in mind, again, that usage of fan art is a grey area on F-List. It’s not an image posting site, but some artists do not want their art reposted at all.

Profile Info: You don’t need to fill out every single detail here. Bits that aren’t filled in will just not appear on your profile. It’s a good idea to fill out your gender, and in many cases, your orientation. Both are under General Details. Filling out RPing preferences is also a good idea. It’ll keep people from approaching you IC using first person posts if that’s not your thing.

Step Six: Kinks and Custom Kinks

This is probably one of the most overwhelming parts of the process. My first tip: Ignore the Kink section for now. Instead, skip ahead to the Custom Kink section.

Custom Kinks are a good way to tell people what you really want. Click the Add +1 Custom Kink button to make a new custom kink. You can fill out the basic title of the kink, and a description. Or if you prefer to leave the description blank, just press the spacebar. Select what category you want the kink to appear in (Fave, Yes, Maybe, No.) Try to avoid using inflammatory language against different races, genders, identities, and don’t kinkshame. This is a site based primarily around finding rpers that have the same interests and kinks that you do. Save the profile when you’re done and we’ve got something like this.

And really, you can probably start roleplaying like this. Maybe add a couple of images, and tweak a few things. So if you like, skip to the next step. But for now, I’ll go over the kink list.

The most important think to remember is you don’t have to add every single kink to your profile. Try to select the most relevant things, and avoid redundancies.

For example, I’m not interested in Vore of any kind. So I can put the kinks Vore (Being Predator) and Vore (Being Prey) Into my No category. Or, if I want to make it even more simplified, I can add a custom Vore kink and put that in my No category. Likewise, if I don’t want to do any sex driven play, I can probably go ahead and just put sex driven there and ignore most of the kink list. Kinks that are not relevant such as Vaginal Sex (Receiving) on a cis male can also be ignored. Kinks are broken up into sections, and while it is a lot, just take your time, go through it sensibly, and take a break if you want to. Remember you don’t have to add every single one to your profile. This will ultimately be easier on you and make your profile easier to read.

After a bit of editing, this is what my kink list ends up looking like:

You can try exploring the Subfetish editor but it’s a little confusing to navigate and isn’t very necessary. And now, your profile is done!

Step Six: Using F-Chat

So now that we have a profile set up, it’s time to find some partners. Regardless of what way you want to connect, if you prefer script or para, the main place you’re going to find RP is through F-Chat. There is currently both a desktop and mobile client. if you select Chat you’ll see the option for both, and clicking on them will take you to instructions on how to set those up. We will however be using the Browser client in this example. Go ahead and select F-Chat 3.0.

You will be taken to a landing page with a drop down of your characters, with the first character you created selected as the default. (You can change your default character in your account settings.) You can have up to three characters online at once. Keep in mind this goes by IP address, so if you have a roommate that also uses F-List, those will count towards your total number of online characters. If this becomes a problem for you, just use a virtual machine or connect to the internet via a different method, such as with data. (F-List is not that much of a data drain.)

Here is what you’ll see when you open F-Chat. You’ll see I already have people in my friends list and my bookmarks (that I’ve blurred out for courtesy.) These will appear the same on all the characters you sign in as. I will be notified whenever one of my friends signs in or sets a status. You can set these notifications to show only on the console if you’d like to in the settings. Let’s set a status first.

Here, you have the options of selecting from the default Online status to Looking, Away, Busy, and Do Not Disturb. These all do what you’d expect, with Do Not Disturb turning off the sound that would play when you get notifications from personal messages or pings.

The Status Message is an optional addition, and it’s great for if you’re looking for specific things or want your friends and bookmarks to know what you’re doing. Be careful not to post anything that breaks F-Lists code of conduct. F-List does have an aggregate of every status you ever posted logged on their server, so throwing a temper tantrum and posting something inappropriate and then taking it back later might still get you in trouble.

While the Character Search Option is available to you, I’ve personally never found it very effective. You can search users by kinks, but keep in mind it doesn’t search by gender or orientation, or what species or even if they’re canon or original. Instead, we’ll go right to the settings tab.

General: Just your general settings. You have a few options here to tweak and while most of it is personal preference, I’ll highlight a few to keep in mind.

Disallowed BBC Code Tag: good for if you find a particular colour particularly garish as a text colour, or if you find an eicon that you no longer want to see anymore. Enter Sends Messages: I have this set to off so I can avoid accidentally sending a message for when I post. When this is enabled, just press the send button on screen to send messages. Otherwise, if you want to linebreak in one post, just press Shift + Enter. Animate eicons: If you’re running a slow computer, or have a slow connection, turn this to off. Eicons are used as memes a lot in F-Chat, and some of them can get a little ridiculous. (Someone has compressed the entire Shrek movie into an eicon and uploaded to the site in very poor quality for example.) There can also be bright flashing colours or even nsfw images. In general these eicons are all 100x100 pixels in size, but some users like to tile them together to create bigger images so it can sometimes get out of hand. This is something up to personal preference, and while I have Animate eicons turned on, I can see why some people wouldn’t like it. Idle Timer: If you are the kind of person that walks away from your computer without changing your status, or you have fallen asleep with F-Chat open, it’s good to set this to a reasonable time. If you’re in Online or Looking, after you’ve been inactive for the depicted number of seconds, your status will be set to Idle. This is so other users know that you’re not ignoring them if you don’t respond to their messages. A downside to this is if you’re tabbed out or multitasking, it’ll set you to idle when you may not intend it to and going back to the window switches you to Online again. It can be a little spammy if you’re constantly switching between Online and Idle. Font Size: If you find F-Chat’s font too big or too small, you can edit that here.

Notifications: While this section is pretty self explanatory, I’d like to specifically go over the Custom Highlight Notify Words.

Now, because each profile has to have a unique name, you might want to select additional pings. For example I might want to add Link,Zelda,Hyrule,Hero,Hero of Time to my list. Everything is comma seperated and not case sensitive. There are a few things to keep in mind.

Common word pings: If I add Link to my list of pings, I might get pinged whenever someone talks about a url link, or a chain link, or any other common use of the word link. It therefore might be better to not use the word. If you have a profile name that is a common word, it might be better to also uncheck the option for Notify Messages Containing your name.

Similar Profiles: If there’s another Link in chat, then I will be notified everytime someone refers to him by name as well. This is less of a problem on more niche characters, but it’s something to keep in mind! You can set pings by room, so perhaps a solution to this is using Link as a highlight word in the Canon Characters room, but not using it as a highlight word in the Nintendo room. More about how to do that later.

Hidden Users: Pretty self explanatory once click over. If you keep seeing an ad you dislike, you can hide all advertisements from said user (re: character) going forward. Keep in mind this is not your block list.

Import: If you make two profiles and want to have these settings copied from one to the other, just log into the profile you want to import to, and select the profile you want to import from. Make sure to go back to change your pings if needed.

Lastly, we’ll be looking at the channel section.

You might be starting to be overwhelmed again, and that’s okay. There are a lot of options, but most of the time, you’ll only want to select the options that are relevant to us. Check off the list of rooms you want to open a tab for. These will begin to be added to your sidebar. the number in brackets signifies the number of users thats joined that room. By default, this list is most popular to least popular, but I personally prefer alphabetical. There may be some channels that you find inappropriate, offensive, or contentious, but your best bet is to ignore those parts of the site. It’s an Adult site that is heavily moderated by a mixture of paid and volunteer staff. Every effort is made to ensure that no real people get hurt, but it is understood that as an adult, you are responsible for curating the content that you consume. This is one of the fundamental principals that F-List is built upon.

For now, I’m going to go with Canon Characters and Canon Characters OOC from this list.

You will also notice an Open Room tab. Unlike the Official Channels which are moderated by F-List staff, Open Rooms are chat rooms created by the userbase, and moderated by the userbase. While the standard F-List code of content is applicable to all areas of the site, special rules may apply in these rooms, and you’ll find things like rooms dedicated to certain kinks, species, and fandoms. I can try searching for a few things I think might be applicable to me, such as Hyrule, Zelda, Nintendo, and Elf. Some of those get hits, and some of those don’t. I can also check them off to add them to my list. (Note that search terms have to be entered one at a time. I cannot search for multiple things at once.)

Once you’ve selected the channels and rooms you want to join, you can click and drag on the tabs to reorder them on the sidebar. If you’d like to pin a chat, You can just press the little push pin symbol, which will then turn green. (You can do this for User Messages as well.) This means when you sign out, these chats will still be there when you sign back in. Note that settings and pinned chats are device by device only, and furthermore, channels and logs will not carry over between characters.

Make sure to read the description of each room you join. There are often specific rules (such as no ooc talk in the canon characters room, and no male characters in the lesbians room.) Clicking the gear will allow you to change settings on a per-room basis.

Step Seven: Actually Finding some RP

Now, after all that effort, we’re finally ready to find some RP. You have a few options on how to do this.

You could just join a few rooms and set your status to looking with a status message on what you want, but this is considered very passive. You may get some people that reach out (As you saw, someone had bookmarked my Link less than an hour after I made the profile before logging into f-chat.) But your best bet is one of three options.

Look at the Ads: Whenever you’re in a room that allows ads, you will sometimes notice a differently coloured message fly by looking for roleplay. This is an ad. If you see one that seems to fit what you have to offer, you can right-click on their username and select “Open Conversation.” A chat window will be open under the PMs section on your sidebar. You can view this conversation like you would a channel. Keep in mind that users are not notified if you open a conversation with them, only if you send them a message.

Create an Ad: Make sure you are in a room or channel that allows ads by checking the description, you can select the ad tab in the lower right hand corner above the text input box to write an ad instead of a chat message.

Making a normal chat post saying “hey does anyone want to roleplay with me” is considered spam and could result in the mods having a word with you.

You have similar tools to what you do in the character descriptions, and clicking each one will automatically place the tags in the text box, with the eyeball being a preview and the question mark being a how to. You want your ads to stand out, but you don’t want them to be too obnoxious. Take a look at what kind of ads other people are posting to get an idea of what’s expected.

Talk to Others: And lastly, you can just play in public rooms or chat with people in ooc channels. This is a great way for others to sample what you’re like to play with and vice versa, or even just to get to know potential partners. In my general experience, you’ll have more luck finding people to play with long term in the user created Open Rooms than in the Official Channels, but ever case is different. There are a vast number of styles, methods of RP, and types of partners you can find.

That’s basically the ins and outs of F-List! The more you’ll use it, the more you’ll understand how it works and the social etiquette on the platform. Like many sites, it certainly has it’s share of dark corners and flaws, but all in all it’s a pretty good website to find people to play with! Have fun!

#cherp #mxrp #rp #tumblr rp #flist #no tea no shade for tagging other RP sites #just giving people more options and I've been asked about it a few times

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libermachinae · 3 years

Text

Fault Lines Under the Living Room

Part I: Listen - Chapter 1: A Commotion, Eager and Anxious (Previous)

Also available on AO3! Summary: Arcee arrives on the Lost Light just as someone else is getting ready to leave. Chapter Word Count: 3010

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“Hey, you’ve reached Captain Rodimus’ personal hailing frequency. If you’re calling to complain again about mandatory hab sweeps, please refer to recent events involving briefcases and the hereafter outlawed opening of. If you have news involving foolish, ridiculous, or nonsensical obstacles in our quest, input 1 to be transferred directly to Megatron’s personal comm line. If you have a complaint regarding sign placement, grammatically incorrect maintenance manuals, or that weird temperature difference between floors 7 and 8, input 2 for Ultra Magnus. If you’re lonely and want someone to talk to, input 3 for automatic directions to Swerve’s. Input 4 to be connected with me, provided I’m—”

Beep.

“Rodimus?”

“Blaster! Great timing, we just got back from Fortuna. Don’t talk too long, though, Magnus just handed me my prep for the hearing and these datapads are engraved with his personal insignia.”

“Sure, Rodimus. I’ve got incoming transmission from an unknown caller, not laying down any codes I’m familiar with. Tried pressing for details, but all they’re letting slip is they want to talk to you. Want me to patch them through?”

“Hm. On the one hand, unknown caller with mysterious intentions almost always means trouble, right?”

“We’ve ended up in some axel grease for it in the past, yeah.”

“And the reason we set down on Scarvix was to avoid creating more problems while we deal with the fallout from the last batch.”

“I thought it was to give the crew a day off?”

“And that’s why you’re our morale guy. Ratchet would probably tell me to ignore it, right?”

“I guess.”

“You don’t think he would?”

“Not really sure how the CMO’s opinion is relevant.”

Because Ratchet’s vote was the only one he knew.

“Yeah, never mind,” Rodimus said with a shrug, almost losing his balance in the process. “Ultra Magnus would say the same thing, anyway, and he’s counting on me to get to the hearing on time. He cares so much , he ‘summarized’ Brainstorm’s alleged code infringements himself.” He shifted the armload of datapads. The topmost pad was hanging off the edge, preparing for freefall, but trying to tilt it back to safety risked upsetting the rest of the pile.

“Nice of him,” Blaster said.

“Yep, super nice. He went to so much trouble. Really dug into the details, researched historical precedents, looked at the case from every angle. He probably buried his essay on the origins of Decepticon as an adjective somewhere in here.” The datapad tilted and dropped. Rodimus shifted his weight to one leg and kicked with the other, bouncing the pad off his knee and catching it with his teeth. “You know ‘at? Hure, ‘ut the comm hrough. ‘robably just a co’arketer, anyay.”

“Yes, sir.”

The familiar click and beat of a line being transferred. Rodimus deposited the datapad on top of his stack and started walking again, forgoing his office in favor of a detour to the middle decks. The view there was more impressive, the angle revealing the organic landscape that stretched between the Lost Light and Fortuna, a popular interstellar rest stop with enough mechanical business to make it worth the daytrip. Chomskians were their patrons of choice, but a hand over the faction insignia and most folks would let it slide. Walking the length of the Lost Light revealed a subtly changing view as the gleam of the mechanoid hub altered the silhouette of the city, and Rodimus busied himself tracking the shuttles, jets, and personal aircraft traveling in and out, letting it distract him until his comm came back.

“Am I speaking to Captain Rodimus?” an unfamiliar voice asked. Cybertronian, definitely, but otherwise unknown.

Cool .

“Yep, captain of the Lost Light and quester for the Knights of Cybertron,” he said. “What’s up?”

“This is Autobot Arcee, requesting permission to dock in the Lost Light’s shuttle bay.”

“Arcee?” Rodimus went through the list of all the Autobots he knew, ignoring the space where Arcee’s origin should have been. Some folks, MTOs especially, didn’t like to broadcast that information, and it wasn’t strictly necessary for a personal database search. Regardless, “Sorry, Arcee, I’m not remembering you. Who did you serve under?”

“New recruit. Was working with Prowl for a bit, now Optimus Prime. We’ve met.”

He had to hold himself back from shutting down the call. The datapads wobbled and he quickly righted himself.

“We have?” People who worked for Prowl were strategic about when they released that information. If she really was a new recruit, it was possible no one had explained to her yet that, ultimately, everything led back to him. It was the only justification he could find for staying on the line and not telling Ultra Magnus to initiate an immediate sweep for unauthorized listening devices.

“Well, no. But I crashed a shuttle for you. Into Galvatron.”

“You did?” And just like that he had forgotten Prowl entirely.

“I did. Me and a few others. It didn’t do much, but you and Optimus managed to take care of Vector Sigma anyway, so, bygones.”

Why couldn’t he remember this? It sounded awesome .

“Totally,” Rodimus said, feeling a swell of pride as he remembered the moment Optimus had set aside his doubts and trusted Rodimus’ word on the Matrix. Up until that point, his chosen name had felt ill-fitting, like the myriad of function tests that preceded a new harvest’s official classification. Or, in his darker moments, like the Primes of old, who claimed the Matrix’s blessing despite no legitimate connection to it. Optimus had put his faith in Rodimus, though, in his connection to the Matrix, and that faith had been rewarded , not punished . For once, his destiny hadn’t been priced in spilled energon.

Not that they hadn’t seen any.

“So you decided to get the brand and make it permanent?” he asked, pulling himself back to the present.

“Yes.”

“Then yeah, come aboard. ‘The more the merrier,’ as Megatron would never say. When do you estimate your arrival?”

“I’ve just breached atmosphere, should be there in an hour.”

“Perfect. I’ll send instructions along to open the shuttle bay doors and will be there to meet you.” He passed the news to Megatron and Ultra Magnus and was unsurprised when only the latter acknowledged the alert, as well as a bunch of forms that seemed incredibly tedious and not worth the bandwidth. Maybe once the hearing was over, he could sit down with his co-captain and remind him of the responsibilities he had agreed to as part of his deal. That would be a proper, leader-like thing to do.

Or he could let Megatron continue to wallow in whatever new misery he had concocted for himself. It certainly made his shifts easier.

He and Arcee exchanged farewells and his comm powered down, leaving Rodimus to strategize. Arcee’s arrival meant he did not have enough time to get back to his office, read through all of Magnus’ files, and make it to the shuttle bay, especially with all the effort it would take to even work himself up to unlocking the datapads. Better to make a good impression on their new guest and bump out the least pressing task. He could do his reading once Arcee was settled.

Walking around weighed down by the burden of knowledge was a drag, though, so he stuck to the part of the plan that involved getting rid of the datapads. He spent the remaining walk to his office (longer now after he had inadvertently walked in the opposite direction while on the comm) thinking about what he could do with the surprise free time. Maybe take a quick lap around the lower decks or make his first official visit to “Visages”. Something fun, carefree, and just barely skirting regulations; something normal , to start the work of convincing everyone, again, that things were going to be fine.

~*~

Ratchet was not stalling.

There was a chance he was overpreparing, but better that than the opposite. The galaxy was a big place, and if he was even slightly accurate in his guess of how far Drift would wander in his search for redemption, he would be touching corners of it even the war had never brought him to. So, an abundance of fuel was necessary, at least enough to last two bots a month plus about half that for the journey outward. Then medical supplies: wiremesh bandages, nanite gel, intravenous lines, sparkstarters, sorted boxes of nuts and screws, antiviral uploads, rust repellant, strut stabilizers, soldering wires… The shuttle was turning out better equipped than some of the mobile surgeries he had worked from during the war; even some hospitals had been dangerously low on materials he now found in abundance. For the first time, he had the resources to make sure nothing and no one would be lost to shortage, and he intended to take advantage of that new luxury.

Following that, the next logical step had been to make the rest of the shuttle comfortable as well. Two Morphy berths with recharge docks. A media library of music and movies to pass the time (the former Cyclonus’ recommendations, the latter, Swerve’s). A few selections from his private engex stash. A box of data blockers he had buried deep among the medical supplies and would claim were standard for any med kit if interrogated.

He nudged the box of Hex pieces against the wall with his foot. Was it alright there was nowhere to sit beside the naviconsole and the berths? He had though Drift would appreciate the economy of a smaller shuttle, but with the cargo loaded the atmosphere was shifting from cozy to cramped. Would Drift feel claustrophobic, reminded of squatters’ dens and Decepticon outposts? Drift was also a high-energy bot, who would probably itch for a chance to spin his wheels from time to time. Were the fuel reserves large enough to accommodate multiple planet stops?

Ratchet’s knuckle had worked its way between his teeth before he realized what he was doing. Dropping his hand, he forced himself to turn around and exit the small spacecraft. He was committed. Out of anyone on board, Drift had done the most to earn this home. If no one else was going to step up and do the right thing by returning it to him, Ratchet would resign to do it himself.

He heard a commotion, eager and anxious, as he stepped out into the shuttle bay. The hangar doors were opening, sunlight slipping through the growing crack, and several parked crafts were being taxied out of the way. Not wanting to get cut off by wandering shuttles, he hurried to the pedestrian entrance, where most of the voices were coming from: a small crowd, loiterers looking for the new source of intrigue. Whirl and Tailgate were among them, providing running commentary as the unwieldly ships skirted just shy of scraping each other’s paint off, so it was no surprise to find Cyclonus standing further off.

Perfect. Though Ratchet and Cyclonus were not on bad terms, neither had ever tried to expand their relationship past the occasional long-suffering glance. If it had been one of the bots who had his spark twisting every time he bumped into them in the hallways, Ratchet would have worried about giving his plan away, but he doubted Cyclonus cared whether the something-like-guilt was visible.

“Cyclonus,” he greeted.

“Ratchet.” The older of the two offered a polite nod, though his gaze returned to the door.

“What’s going on? Somebody forget something in Fortuna?” Ratchet kept his voice light, curiosity without investment. A change in routine could mean nothing, but by now everyone knew it could also be the start of something weird, dangerous, or a combination of the two. Either way, it would end up among Swerve’s stand-up material.

“New arrival,” Cyclonus said. “Arcee of the Darklands: a tested warrior with a spark that rivaled Galvatron’s.”

Might as well have called herself Foreboding of Doom and saved his declarative archives the search. Ratchet wondered if he should move his departure up.

“Is she here? Did I miss it?”

Rodimus’ panicked shouts preceded his stumble into the hangar. Ratchet greeted him with a pointed look, which he shouldered by simply not noticing it while his gaze darted around the room.

“Not yet, Rodimus,” Hoist announced over the loudspeaker. “We’re just getting the last shuttles cleared for landing.”

“Oh, thank Primus,” Rodimus said, tilting his head back as his fans released a cloud of warm air. “Fantastic.”

“You look like you gunned it to get here,” Ratchet said, waving away the smell of an overheated engine.

“No, that would be speeding, which is definitely against spacetime law,” Rodimus said, straightening to flash Ratchet a deeply unappreciated grin. “I ran. I told Arcee I would be here to meet her, and it would make for a pretty bad impression of the ship if the captain failed to live up to his promise.”

“Don’t you have a hearing to be getting ready for?” Ratchet asked, the question slipping past his censors. Slag. That was not the note he wanted to leave on. The stress of his impending departure was getting to him more than he had realized.

Rodimus shrugged, unaffected.

“Magnus gave me all the materials, just need to read them. Won’t take long.”

That stirred something in Ratchet’s spark.

“Good to know our justice system is under such attentive care.”

“Perhaps this is a conversation that would be better saved for when we are not moments from new introductions,” Cyclonus interjected, his deep bass distracting enough to halt those emotional processes of Ratchet’s that started to loop out of control whenever Rodimus opened his mouth. He set his vocalizer to standby, not trusting it to wait for his command, and wondered whether it would be better to get out sooner. Before his own smart mouth made his worries a reality.

The appearance of the approaching shuttle did not ease his concerns. Starting as a speck above the horizon, all optics were on it as it approached, a little blob of a spacecraft dangling over the city of Fortuna. Big, for a single occupant. Ratchet hoped he was wrong, but he noticed something further odd as it came nearer.

Whirl took care of that loose thread of optimism.

“It’s purple,” he said, with a coy look at Cyclonus, who ignored it with enviable steadiness.

“It’s a Decepticon vessel.” Ratchet had seen enough in his time. After the fall of Tyger Pax, Autobot regulations had outlawed all colors between navy and magenta for ships, and he could think of no other species brazen enough to steer a spacecraft directly into civilian airspace. “Rodimus?”

“Blaster confirmed Arcee’s ident after our call,” Rodimus said. “Bit of a garish choice for a ride, but it’s her.” He had maneuvered himself to the front of the group, standing at the front like he was putting himself on display for an honored guest.

“That is rich, coming from you.”

“Thanks, Ratch,” Rodimus said, casting over his shoulder a wink and a grin before he turned back to face the oncoming ship. Ratchet’s frown deepened and he ignored the way the gesture reminded him of Drift.

He never knew what the bot had seen in Rodimus. Short-sighted, selfish, and with an ego that could have powered the ship if he could have been bothered to contribute that much, Rodimus’ ability to perform feats no one else would attempt meant he was also prone to making mistakes they neither could have imagined. For all the time Ratchet had spent on the Lost Light , he still had no idea the limits of chaos Rodimus was capable of summoning to it, so he let triage and combat protocols idle in the background while they waited.

It was not a nice landing. The thrusters were still burning several hundred feet out, so they all heard the roar of wind buffeting ailerons as the shuttle struggled to slow itself down. It was only by the combined effects of the Lost Light ’s buffeting shield and the shuttle’s reverse engines that they did not suffer a catastrophic collision, and even then, the shuttle bounced as it finally touched down, coming within feet of kissing Huffer’s personal speeder. Ratchet still did not remember to vent as it struggled through taxiing, twice having to reattempt a maneuver as the combined efforts of Hoist, Rodimus, and a group of volunteers guided it to its designated space. Only when the engines finally shut down did Ratchet hear the collective sigh of multiple hydraulics systems releasing their tension.

“Guess Darkland warriors don’t need to know how to drive,” Ratchet muttered. He thought he heard Cyclonus huff, which was enough to get a chuckle out of him.

That was it, though, because in the next moment Rodimus was rushing to the lowering hatch, his spoiler flicking behind him like an insect wing. Ratchet caught a glimpse of a labyrinthine cargo hold before Arcee stepped forward, filling the space, and descended rapidly. He tensed, ready for something else to come charging out from behind her, but besides a look passed between her and Cyclonus nothing immediately hostile revealed itself.

“Welcome to the Lost Light,” Rodimus said, standing aside to let Arcee descend. The hatch raised as soon as she was standing on the Lost Light’s floor, blocking Ratchet’s view again.

“Yes, thank you.” Her tone was clipped, not the melodic veil of sophistication Ratchet had come to associate with Cyclonus, and she scanned the assembled bots with a look of blatant suspicion. Ratchet could relate to that, if nothing else.

He glanced at the purple ship once more while Rodimus led Arcee in the direction of the rec rooms while the rest of the crowd dispersed. Ratchet himself would never believe in anything as a sign or omen, but the sight of the purple plating made old welds ache, and he found his resolve. He would go get a drink. He would attend the hearing. And then, goodbyes or no, he was leaving that night.

#maccadam #transformers #rodimus #ratchet #my writing #longfic #fault lines #im posting this so late 😂#life happens yknow

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cynicalclassicist · 4 years

Text

The Atheists Tragedy and The Lion King

So The Lion King is often termed as Hamlet with lions. Yet while looking around at Renaissance Tragedies I came across a piece called The Atheists Tragedy or The Honest Mans Revenge, which I feel resembles it more.

The play was written by Cyril Tourneur in 1611. He is also supposed to have written The Revenger’s Tragedy, published in 1607, now more generally thought to have been written by Thomas Middleton.

The play may be read here. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/55625/55625-h/55625-h.htm

A summary and further details may be read here. https://cord.ung.edu/athiests.html

So in The Atheists Tragedy we have the French Baron Montferrers, who has a son Charlemont and a brother D’amville (possibly a pun considering where he will end up), the titular Atheist. As this is the Renaissance the portrayal of atheists is... not exactly pleasant, the usual official perception then was that atheists were inherently immoral.

Like Scar D’amville plots to seize power over his nephew, while pretending to be a kindly uncle. When his nephew Charlemont wants to go off to war D’amville loans him the money to do so, despite Montferrers wishing his only son to stay.

Scar also manipulates Simba into going, firstly to the Elephant Graveyard, which Mufasa has told Simba not to go to, by telling him only the bravest lions go there. Then later outright telling him to run away.

D’amville murders his brother by throwing him into a pit, like Scar murders his brother by throwing him off a cliff.

Well it isn’t really the fall that kills the Baron, D’amville’s henchman Borachio smashes his skull with a stone.

Scar seizes power on the pretext that with his brother and nephew dead he is heir. D’amville fakes his nephew’s death, having his henchman Borachio bring a false message that Charlemont was killed in war, the war which he encouraged his nephew to leave for.

Scar seized power believing his nephew was dead, having sent his hyenas to kill his nephew after telling Simba to run away and never come back. However Simba escaped them and flees into exile.

D’amville also has a trouble with incompetent henchmen, sending Borachio to shoot Charlemont when he visits his father’s tomb. But the pistol misfires and Charlemont kills Borachio.

Both heroes encounter their father’s ghost, Charlemont sees his father’s ghost just after their death, telling him to return to France.

Simba meets his father’s spirit when he is grown, by the prompting of the Baboon Rafiki.

This is often compared to the ghost of Hamlet’s father but is very different. Hamlet’s father tells his son to avenge their murder. Mufasa and Montferrers tell their sons to return home, reminding them of their duties. Montferrers even says to leave vengeance to God.

Now this refers to a scene cut from the film but retained for stage version, possibly for the content. Scar holds power but is paranoid, then decides to produce an heir.

Scar in The Madness of King Scar comments: Without a queen, what am I? A dead end, no line, no descendants, no future. With a queen, I'll have cubs... Immortality will be mine! Immortality will be mine!

Nala enters, the eventual wife of his nephew. He then tries to seduce her, telling her:

We'll create a host of little Scars.

But she rejects this and flees the Pridelands.

As D’amville says at the end of the first scene when his sons Rousard and Sebastian enter:

Here are my sons.— There's my eternity. My life in them And their succession shall for ever live. And in my reason dwells the providence To add to life as much of happiness. Let all men lose, so I increase my gain, I have no feeling of another's pain.

To enhance this power D’amville has his elder son Rousard marry Castabella, the betrothed of Charlemont. However Rousard is sickly and thus unable to produce children. D’amville decides that in order to continue his line he will have children with his daughter-in-law.

D'Am. 'By my persuasion thou wert forced To marry one unable to perform The office of a husband. I was the author Of the wrong. My conscience suffers under't, and I would Disburthen it by satisfaction. Cast. How? D'Am. I will supply that pleasure to thee which he cannot.

Likewise Castabella is horrified, calling it incest due to her being his daughter-in-law. Charlemont then frightens his uncle away disguised as the ghost of his father.

In The Lion King Scar, when attacking Simba’s mother Sarabi sees Simba, initially mistaking them for Mufasa. Interestingly enough the live-action version has Scar having designs on Sarabi... as if pushing the Hamlet link more.

Incidentally D’amville’s schemes come to naught. Rousard dies of sickness, Sebastian, who objected to his brother’s marriage and is on bad terms with his father, has been having an affair with Castabella’s stepmother Levidulcia and performs a mutual kill duelling her husband Belforest to give time for her to escape. Which proves pointless as on finding both dead she kills herself.

Both D’amville and Scar start to lose their sanity. D’amville after counting the money from his brother’s revenues sees them in a dream. With his sons dead D’amville observes there may be a power above him. Before that he talks to the skulls in the graveyard, thinking his brother’s ghost is after him.

Scar in his madness still obsesses over his brother and plays with skulls.

Both have a meet-up between the love interests after escaping the villain. Charlemont forgives Castabella on finding out she was forced into the marriage and they lie down to sleep on skulls... of course fitting with the moralistic approach no further.

The Lion King, not being quite so conservative, has Simba and Nala meet in Can you feel the Love tonight and implies their union.

The Lion King clearly has the superior ending though. The Atheists Tragedy has Charlemont and Castabella sentenced to death for alleged fornication and Charlemont killing and D’amville agreeing to carry out the sentence.

In The Lion King Simba is accused of killing his father, with Scar forcing him back off a cliff in a similar way to how he killed Mufasa. Then when he tells Simba he killed Mufasa they are inspired to defeat them and force his confession.

D’amville himself tried to accuse his nephew of a crime when they first returned, having them arrested for not paying back the loan. Though his son Sebastian pays the money so their cousin can be released.

In The Atheists Tragedy...

D'Am. I ha' the trick on't, nephew. You shall see How easily I can put you out of pain.—Oh! [As he raises up the axe he strikes out his own brains, and staggers off the scaffold. Exe. In lifting up the axe I think he's knocked his brains out.

I would imagine that performing that on stage would get a laugh, especially with the Executioner’s comment.

But he’s still able to confess he was the villain before expiring.

Scar’s downfall works better, with him trying to throw the hyenas under the bus, surviving his battle with his nephew, but his hyenas, starved under his rule, turning on him.

Unlike Hamlet these works do not have the wronged party, the murdered figure’s son, take direct revenge. Frequently of course in Revenge Tragedies the Revenger will not survive the play, the implication being seeking personal revenge is a bad thing and will destroy you.

Simba does not actively seek revenge, refraining from killing his uncle when backing them into a corner and instead threatening them with exile. It is only when his uncle attacks that he fights, defending himself. Unlike Hamlet who plots revenge and in the process kills the innocent Polonius. Likewise Charlemont only fights for defence, killing Borachio when they try to kill him.

Hamlet is a much more questioning and complex character, questioning the natural order and natural rules. Charlemont is more of a good boy, doing what he should. This is contrasted with his uncle who completely opposed to natural rules, thinking of pleasure and the strength of his line, fitting the Renaissance stereotype of an atheist, even down to incest. His crimes are visited upon his sons, the elder with sickness, the younger, even though decent and honourable, also dies.

Charlemont says after his uncle’s death...

Charl. Only to Heaven I attribute the work, Whose gracious motives made me still forbear To be mine own revenger. Now I see That patience is the honest man's revenge.

The message is simple. Don’t take revenge yourself. Leave it to God. A quite conservative and pious approach. It is not overall a tragedy for Charlemont, who survives. Even the way the villain seems to lose through strokes of bad luck despite his cunning, one son falling ill after the forced marriage, another dying in a duel, a pistol misfiring, then D’amville himself dying in a contrived manner, seem to imply the agency of God.

The Revenger’s Tragedy is thought to act as a contrast, with the Revenger ending up dead.

Charlemont can now marry Castabella (still virgin due to her husband’s sickness) can wed.

The play ends with Charlemont saying

Charl. Thus, by the work of heaven, the men that thought To follow our dead bodies without tears Are dead themselves, and now we follow theirs.

Anyway with the villain dead Simba becomes King, and with Nala has a child, completing the circle of life.

All is good.

Of course The Lion King is quite by the basics in its Renaissance Play structure, I doubt the writers sought consciously to base it on this play. It’s just interesting food for thought. Perhaps because The Atheists Tragedy is so by the basics and standard moralistic and this is trying to tell a family friendly version of these plays.

Some good essays I found on this.

https://extra.shu.ac.uk/emls/journal/index.php/emls/article/view/446/325?fbclid=IwAR2ewO9GXlYLzL8Rqz2EqzR_ZpXdJMmFmoC2HxamR1p3m9fh6RcVsa9mmz0

https://ttu-ir.tdl.org/bitstream/handle/2346/19767/31295004630041.pdf?sequence=1&fbclid=IwAR19yKmgpvOVxEsO4fv65PtScBYVYxVxg3lYwZHJNANzXLMCSVEMi2raaqw

@blackcur-rants @epic-summaries @ylvisruinedmylife

#renaissance #the atheists tragedy #the lion king

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hazelenergy · 4 years

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How I Digitally Paint like a Scenic Artist/Designer

Aka: how I did this and put my degree to good use.

LONG POST WARNING

Step 1: Research.

First off, get to your image search. If you are going to be using Google, you may want to type “-pinterest” in the search to eliminate the countless boards.

I had to figure out clothing that is vaguely late 1800s. I found a multitude of reference images that were fancier clothes- but I wanted to find images of clothing for kindred across all social classes. Photographs from the era and paintings are your friend. They will more accurately showcase what was worn.

After Fashion research comes location research. The 1890s in America is known for the rapid industrialization. Factories were getting bigger and work days were getting longer. But, I wanted the moonlight to be cascading into the place, illuminating the scene. This means I needed to find a structure that had skylights or let sunlight in. And the best images I found? Slaughterhouses. Fitting, huh?

The same rule for fashion still stands- if you can find photographs or paintings from the era- they’re better. There are tons of places still standing today from the 1800s. But today, they look WAY different. Ya know, Abandoned! So just be sure to take this into consideration if you search “abandoned slaughterhouses” or go trespassing like I did.

Lastly, pose research. Finding the poses for a fight scene can be tedious. So, I enlisted some help from a few fight choreographers and stunt men. You can record their fights and play them back at quarter or half speed. You can also get a mirror and flop on the floor a bunch. I did both. This lets you see the action/motion lines you are going to replicate in the drawing. Heres how we initially did fina’s pose:

And sometimes you have to go back and get a clean shot. I ended up using this pose for the axe.

Step 2: Set up and Background!

When you open a new file, set it to the dimensions and resolution you want. I was working at 600. Usually, I’m working at 300-350. You can always reduce resolution. Its hard to prevent fuzzy lines if you increase it later.

I cannot stress the following enough:

You work background to foreground. Big Shapes and areas to little shapes. Work your way forward. What this means is you need to fill in as much space as possible first. Then build your details. I prefer working as follows: Big Solid tones, Soft shadows, Dark Shadows, Highlights, then final blend. Once you finish this, put an overlay on top. This knocks everything back and helps create the illusion of depth. See this at work with the video below or here

Step 3: Figure Drawings + Composition

Utilize that research and images you collected to pose your characters. I create subfolders for each set of figures. Organization is important here. This will help keep you on the right layer and prevent the eternal digital artist struggle of “Fuck that was on the wrong layer!”

Even after you move on to lineart and shading, Keep the sketch layer as a reference. You may need to see what youre original notes/ figures looked like as you do the lineart and shade. Don’t be afraid to move them around and alter the composition rn. You want to be able to make changes. Make notes! Detail light sources!

I’m about to through out some art jargon:

You want to think about asymmetric balance. The easiest way to achieve this in an eye-pleasing manner is to use the Fibonacci spiral. Yeah. This boi:

Place your figures and actions in a similar sequence to the spiral and the viewer’s eye tends to naturally follow it. This is sometimes called the Golden Ratio in the art world.

Doesn’t need to be perfectly on the spiral. You can break it- but its an excellent tool to plan how things move in the piece.

Step 4: Lineart

Once you got things sketched- its time to do the lineart. I’m using clip studio paint’s standard brushes. Nothing fancy. I often switch between the G-pen and the For Effect Liner. Mapping and Turnip are for thicker lines.

Usually I set these pens to a specific thickness depending on where I’m drawing.

My background figures are lined at 0.05 thickness, the midground is .1 to .2, Fina is .3 and the foreground is .4. I set my stabilization high to help keep my lines smooth. Stabilization 100 means there’s a significant delay between where the pen is and the cursor. I like the stabilization to be at 20 for freehanding and at 50 ish for outlining. Dont become completely reliant on the stabilization though. Good and smooth lineart is drawn from the arm not the wrist. Your range of motion is severely limited if you only move your wrist. Practice moving from your elbow and you’ll be surprised how much smoother your lines get.

Once I finish lining the figures, I usually go around it with an outline. This does three things:

1. Solidifies the figure and cleans lineart for paint bucket tool. More on that in the next step.

2. Its a stylistic choice. Helps give it that comic book feel with a heavy outline.

3. Pushes figures forward or back in the composition. Thicker outline helps denote that a figure is farther forward than another. My background figures have no outline to push them away

Step 5: Digitally coloring

For each figure you are going to select outside the lineart.

Create a new layer under the lineart

Invert the selection. Paint bucket. You should now have a solid shape of the figure under the lineart. Do not deselect.

Create a new layer above the one color. Title it solid colors. Paint in thick, solid tones. I like to use the mapping pen and turnip pen to color in my solid tones: skin, clothing, hair, etc.

After that, deselect. Create a multiply layer if you can. If your program does not have a multiplier function, Pick a tone you want to use for shadows and lower the opacity (usually 30-40% I like to use lavenders or blue tones). It will not be as vibrant, but you can edit it in post. Select off of the solid colors layer. I like to start with skin tones. Use the airbrush tool to create soft shadows. You don’t want to create harsh lines on this layer.

Then repeat this process with harsh lines.

Then knock it all back with an overlay. If you dont have the ability to create an overlay, you can again drop a solid color and lower the opacity, but you’ll have to mess with the color balance/ brightness/contrast to let all the hard work come through.

You’re going to repeat this for every single figure. Here’s a few color theory tips though.

Your overlay colors should be darker (not more vibrant) in the foreground and lighter (avoid using pure white) in the background. This helps with the depth of the piece. Things closer tend to be darker (not always true, depends on lighting)

You can choose to use color theory to aid your shadows. Instead of choosing black or grey for shadows, choose a complimentary color. I used a lot of green for this piece, I used red for really dark shadows. Its not that black drains color- its just loses some depth if not used carefully.

Keep your colors consistent. Helps unify the piece. You can strategically break the consistency to draw focus. For example, Fina is the only figure with a true blue overlay. This helps her stand out from the other figures who have reds and greens.

Step 6: Touch Ups and Final Renderings

Now comes the most tedious part. If you’re like me, your computer fans have been whirring for the last few hours trying to render this monster of a file. If you havent already, SAVE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS GOOD

These are the last four layers I have for the entire piece. Here, I am trying to create effective and believable lighting. This kind of work I have only been able to achieve in clip studio or photoshop. You can do it with normal layers, but choose your colors CAREFULLY. Stay away from pure white. Carefully utilize your knowledge of light and shadow to create soft highlights. Harsh lines tend to be a stylistic choice for me. The final layer, subtract, dulls out harsh red tones. I used this as a final overlay to help put everyone and everything in the scene. Without it, things are a little too green and skin tones are a little too blushed for vampires.

The challenge here is I want to tone down the red, but not lose the vibrancy of the blood. So, shift it to a blue. This also helped reinforce the “nighttime” effect. Its only a slight change.

Final thoughts:

Whenever you finish something, its important to reflect.

1. I am so FUCKING PROUD OF MYSELF. This is easily one of the most complicated pieces I’ve done in a while- and I’ve made 16′ tall faux stained glass. Brag. Let yourself feel awesome cuz you just made something awesome.

2. I timed myself on the piece. I could have easily spent another 7 hours on it. But its important to know when to stop messing with it. Partially for budget reasons but also when you get down to the details you can make yourself go insane. Theres also a ton of detail work I lost cuz of overlays or its just too small to notice. Fina’s face? hard to see cuz its not close enough.

3. I needed to take frequent breaks for this piece. That was good. Resting and stretching was very important. That is one of the reasons why I was able to work so fast.

4. I started doing more digital art in April 2020. I have to say, practice makes perfect. I practice drawing and digital painting for at least 3 hours a day.

That discipline has allowed me to improve so rapidly. So- I don’t wanna hear shit about I can’t possibly get this good! Or I couldn’t even draw a stick figure! BULLSHIT. You can. Get yourself some free software like Krita or Autodesk sketchbook and start playing!

And thats what I got! Thanks for coming with me on this long post!

#digital art #my art #okay to reblog #how to #long post

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coralstudiies · 5 years

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SURVIVAL GUIDE & STUDY TIPS

hello everyone!! this post is a collab with the lovely and amazing @boinkhs because we've both reached 2k followers :D she'll be doing study tips for college students and i'll be doing study tips for high schoolers. check out her post here!

i've split this into part 1. survival, which concerns how to study & learn better in general and just tips on how to get through high school. part 2. is on specific study tips for each type of subject, namely sciences, maths, languages and humanities.

Hope this helps <3

1. Don't snooze please

you just end up snoozing 5 times then you’re late for school

2. If you find you have difficulty getting out of bed, just keep in mind ONE TASK you need to do.

for example, making your bed. then you just gotta focus on that! it should help fight the sleepiness because you’re forcing your brain and limbs to be active.

3. Do the necessary things like brushing your teeth, putting on clothes and eat breakfast

i don’t know why but some people don’t eat breakfast before coming to school like ???? excuse me ???? please eat at least a small snack, or a fruit or something. your body doesnt function on an empty stomach! also, drink some water to hydrate yourself

4. On the road, you should do something that puts you in a good mood.

for me, i go straight to spotify and listen to my playlist. you should also review the previous day’s learning so that you refresh your memory before going back to class. personally this is my fav part of the day HAHAHA

5. If you like, you can choose to read a book.

just make sure you’re calm but ‘warmed up’ to focusing in a sense.

1. Hydrate frequently

idk man it just keeps you awake + i dont feel so icky if i drink enough water

2. Learn actively

if the teacher asks questions, try to answer. sit at the front row. offer to help give out the worksheets or notes. clarify your doubts after. when they speak, copy down notes. don’t worry about the aesthetic; i mean you can but you need to write fast and neat which unfortunately doesnt come together very often. i suggest you spend more brain power digesting and understanding the content.

3. Don’t over highlight

ONLY KEY POINTS that are stressed by the teacher. you can tell when their tone changes, expression changes, when they use more hand motions, or they keep repeating a few key words. yes , that. highlight that. stare at it while listening to them speak. make sure you understand. if you don’t please ask. but make sure you don’t have a fluorescent page because that’s not ideal study material!

4. Write down any questions you have

if they’re answered in the lesson, cancel them off. if not, ask after the lesson. dont be scared! *sends virtual courage*

5. Use whatever free time you have to finish homework

because you’re gonna thank yourself later. you should spend more time at home revising than doing homework. ( doing homework isnt equivalent to revising PLEASE I KNOW SO MANY PEOPLE WHO SAY THEY REVISED FOR 3 HOURS BUT ALL THEY DID WAS HOMEWORK ) also it feels better knowing you have one less thing to worry about

6. Record down all assignments, due dates and test dates

do it in a planner or your phone. doesn’t matter just keep them somewhere. it can be demoralising to see an entire entry of shit to get done but still it’s better than not knowing what needs to be done. ignorance is NOT bliss. try to color code or symbol code them, for example • for assignments (due date behind), - for tests etc. act on this when you go home (see below)

7. Have a file/binder some form of organisation to keep different subjects’ worksheets, tests, notes, reading etc.

you can have one massive binder, one binder for each subject, one folder file for each subject or anything that suits you. for me, i clip all materials of one subject together with a binder clip. the materials i use most are at the front for easy reference. then put those bundles into zipper files, perhaps one for math and sciences, another for languages and humanities. or whatever suits you best! make sure you have everything in one place so you don’t panic and dig through a pile of dog-eared paper.

8. If you can, when it’s near the exam period, don’t stay back after school unless it’s to study.

i used to stay back for training and to play volleyball with my friends and i kid you not we would play from 2pm to 6.30 pm and get nothing done but it was fun. and i’m not saying deprive yourself of that fun but when the exams are near, you should be studying somewhere quiet/ somewhere you can focus. you should go somewhere (preferably home) where you can focus and get things done.

9. Decide if you’re a lone wolf or if you need a study buddy/study group

personally i’m a lone wolf because i hate distractions and i don’t want to distract others. but when my friends ask me for help i don’t mind staying back a little to teach them and/or study with them. Personally i find that for subjects like english which require you to write about an array of topics, studying with someone else can help in generation of essay points and to just broaden your understanding of the topic. so yeah it really depends, just do what suits you :)

10. Take notes in class

try to understand while copying, and if you didn’t understand something, you should raise your hand and ask for the teacher to repeat so that you hear it again. also, it gives you more time to take notes as they re-explain the content. read them after the lesson is over to help internalise some facts. you can create your own method of organisation for your notes, e.g. colour coding.

1. Review the day’s learning on the way home.

if you take public transport, try to flip through your notes and worksheets to review new content for the first time.

2. Eat lunch, have a snack, take a shower, everything that’s necessary.

if you use your phone while eating, make sure you don’t eat slowly just to use your phone because that’s wasting time.

3. If you’re super tired, just have a 15-20min power nap

nothing more otherwise you will NEVER wake up until the dead of night. just take a nap to get some energy back. doesnt matter if you wake up feeling more tired, because you’ll shake that feeling in a while. keep a glass of water beside you so that you can drink it once you wake up!

4. Look through your ‘list’ that you made earlier in the day. (in class, pt. 6)

you might want to spend max 10 mins updating your schedule. then stare at the dreaded homework. start with the easiest and least time consuming to build up momentum. this could actually be the remainder of what you’ve finished in school. then look at the due dates. do them in order of due dates. unless it’s a huge project or assignment, you might want a head start on it!

5. With the remaining time, you should start revising

review the day’s learning AGAIN.

make notes/mindmaps/flashcards whatever works for you. you should prioritise the subject or chapter that you were most confused about. quickly revise and try to clear up any questions you have about the chapter. if you have additional time, go ahead and make notes for the next subject! another way is going through corrections and clarifying your doubts with friends/teachers, and summarise the day’s learning on a post-it or two. if you’ve already taken notes in class, look at other sources e.g textbook and combine what you’ve learnt before re-writing or re-organising your notes.

1. Pack your bag!

remove unnecessary materials, and pack the necessary one. make sure your bag isnt too heavy. you can choose to hand carry some files or binders if they’re too bulky, but make sure you’re all packed before the next morning

2. Have a meal & clean up

again, basic necessities. don’t go to bed hungry or feeling icky because thats not how you treat yo self!

Before class:

if you’re going to continue on a chapter, review the content that came before it. Try to make your own connections between the already learnt and to-be learnt content so that you’re mentally ready for class.

In class:

take down notes, highlight, annotate and DRAW DIAGRAMS. you can’t do sciences without diagrams. for physics or chemistry which require more calculation, copy down the problems your teacher goes through and solve them along with him/her. write the formulas on a post it note so you can stick it onto the page where you’re writing for easy reference. if the teacher plays a video which is MOST DEFINITELY NOT GOING TO WAIT FOR YOU you have to write only the relevant points in the most abbreviated form possible.

Note-taking:

I find that linear notes help me most in sciences. for chapters that involve lots of interconnected processes, for example o chem, then mindmaps or flowcharts will be helpful. also if you tend to forget something, post-it that stuff on the front page of your notes where you are FORCED to stare at it. yes. write down example problems and their steps, then write explanations for each step so that if you’re confused you can always refer back. again, draw any required diagrams.

Answering techniques:

if there’s a ‘standard’ way to answer it then you have to make sure you follow that way even in your homework because it’s muscle memory. when you get to exams, your hand will automatically write in the same format so you don’t lose marks or spend time recalling the correct format.

imo sciences are quite logical so as long as you remember and follow the flow you’ll be fine!

In class:

copy key terms, facts and examples and write all examples that the teacher has gone through. write all formulas and definitions on a post it, then shift it around the pages as needed. if there’s a type of problem you particularly suck at, ask your teacher for help IMMEDIATELY because it’s so easy to forget the steps to a problem.

At home:

do your homework, do additional practice, correct your mistakes, clarify, and repeat. memorise formulas and definitions (perhaps using flashcards or post its) then practice more and make sure your concepts are strong. there’s no easy way and sadly this is all i can comment.

In class:

copy down notes, think actively, and if you’re given a sample essay you should annotate the heck out of it and keep it somewhere safe.

For essays:

read up more and write up. befriend the best writer in class and ask for their essays. write essay plans and consult your teacher. brainstorm possible approaches with friends. read the news, and copy the links of interesting online articles for future reference. have a go-to list of examples and quotes you can use, for any and every topic. read these like your bedtime story and never forget to keep updating them.

For comprehension passages:

read the questions first. then you’ll be more sensitive to what you need to read in the passage and how you need to analyse it. try to question yourself about how and why the author does something or makes you feel something. do not rush-read the passage or you will fail horribly (personal experience). do one or two extra comprehensions and ask your teacher to mark them.

In class:

ARROWS TO LINK EVERYTHING and annotate any class notes given. write down new examples provided by the teacher. if there is a link you ‘can check out’ go check it out. it’s probably something thats gonna be on the exam.

At home:

you have to rely on mindmapping and flow charts because everything is linked in some way and you cannot ignore those links!!!! although i do my humanities notes in linear form, my in class notes are all in the form of mindmaps. and actually i revise from those in a pinch because i can see everything at one go. watch vids on the concepts, for example plate tectonics. those things are so hard to see when they’re deadass sitting on the page and not budging. watch a video where they really move instead of being frozen.

If you’re so frickin lost:

watch more videos on the concepts, watch more videos on the events, search up interpretations online and ask your teachers!!! for everyone who gets equally lost as me when i’m faced with a new chapter, another way is to pre-read before the teacher starts teaching. if you’re lazy to read just watch a couple clips on it so that at least you have some background. even if you wake up the next day with 0 concrete memory, which you won’t, you’ll already have the flow of things which will help you if you’re usually the straggler.

(disclaimer i study geography although i've tried history and english literature but i think that they're similar to some extent, especially on how to study them)

#study #studyblr #studying #coralstudiies #revision #study motivation #notes #study tips #study advice #studying tips #studying advice #high school #lectures #tips #advice

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lia-jones · 3 years

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Growing Together - Chapter Eleven - Bonding Over Crickets

We stood before the old wooden doors, holding hands.

“We don’t have to decide anything yet.” Victor squeezed my shoulder. “We will just get some information.”

“I know.” I took a deep breath.

“Ready?” He gave me a loving smile.

“As I will ever be.” I offered him a weak smile in return.

He rang the doorbell, taking a step backward, his hand holding mine.

We were greeted by an old lady, with grey hair held up in a careful bun, deep wrinkles framing blue eyes.

“Victor! So nice to see you!” She took Victor’s hand, shaking it. “And you must be Andrea! Nice meeting you!”

“Andrea, this is Miss Dillon, the orphanage director.” Victor introduced us. I smiled, shaking her hand.

We were led into an old corridor, leading to what I suspected was her office. Inside, a table with tea and cookies was waiting for us.

“Sit down, let me serve you some tea.” She took the teapot, filling our cups. “So, Andrea, Victor tells me you would like to adopt a child.”

“We want to know more about the process, yes.” I said, taking the steamy cup from the table.

“It would be fairly easy, to be honest.” She sat down, her hands moving as she spoke. “Firstly, we have some standard procedures before we even introduce you to a child, like background checks, a full course you need to attend, a few sessions with a counselor. But I think, in your particular case, we can forgo all of those. Victor has been a good friend of ours for quite some time, and I think I know him long enough to know he is a good man and an excellent candidate for an adoptive parent. And knowing his standards, I can only assume you are no less than a remarkable woman.”

“To say the very least.” He smiled at me, taking my hand, and I let out the breath I didn’t even realize I was holding.

“I can see that.” Miss Dillon smiled. “Which is why I think you are good candidates to go straight to referral. What kind of child do you think would be the best fit for your home?”

“We haven’t really discussed it…” I hesitated, looking at Victor. “But maybe the younger the better, for a better adaptation?”

“Yes.” He nodded.

“Very well. I will look into our files to see what we have that we can refer to you, and then we’ll set up a meeting.”

“So, what’s it like?” I fidgeted in my seat. “We spend time with this child and see how it goes?”

“Exactly. You interact with the child to see if there’s a bond.” The director nodded.

“But… What if there is no bond?” I started to panic slightly. “What do you say to that child? I’m sorry, but they didn’t want you ?”

“Well, you don’t exactly disclose to the child what’s happening…” The director hesitated.

“Sure, but they know, right? They are children but they are not idiots! What if we don’t feel anything? What if the child doesn’t like us? Do we adopt her against her will? How does that happen?” My hand flew to my forehead, Victor catching it midair and squeezing it.

“Listen, there is no right method to do this.” Miss Dillon leaned on her desk, speaking to us with a knowing soft voice. “Trust me, we have tried several. This is the one that brings less anxiety to the children. Of course, there is the chance of refusal from one or both parts, but I don’t want you to consider the worst already. Just the fact that you are considering the child’s feelings tells me you won’t refuse any child, and any child will feel it too.” She gave me a soft smile. “We will be contacting you shortly. Just come with an open heart. You will do fine.”

Two days later, Victor got a phone call from the orphanage, saying that they had found a good match for us: a three-year-old girl whose parents had died in a tragic accident, without any known relatives. We scheduled a meeting for Sunday afternoon, and we bought a ragdoll to give her.

Victor seemed calm and patient with the whole thing. I was a bundle of nerves.

“I mean, this girl has some recollection of her parents.” I spoke from the walk-in closet, as I changed into a dress. “Can you imagine being so young, living with a happy family, and then being told you will never see your parents again, but Hey, here’s a brand new set of parents for you, they have actually no idea of what they are doing ? She’s going to resent us on principle alone. She wants her mother, not me.”

“Firstly, I don’t think they will be telling her that.” Victor walked in to pick a tie. “Second, remember what Miss Dillon told you? Just go with an open heart and you’ll do fine. These children are mostly starving for affection and in need of a good home.” He came to me, holding my chin, making me face him. “Besides, I know any child will love you. Just show them that warm smile of yours.”

“What if I don’t like her for some reason? What then?” I sat down to put on my shoes. “What if I find I don’t have a maternal instinct? That I am better off not being a mother anyway?”

Victor kneeled in front of me, holding my shoulders, a slightly worried look in his eyes.

“Why are you actively creating scenarios in which things go wrong? Do you not want to do this?”

“I do… I just…” I trailed off with a sigh. “I’m sorry, I know I’m being incredibly hard. I’m just afraid this won’t work. And this is our last chance. If we want to become parents, we need to do this right. How are you not nervous?”

“Being nervous won’t guarantee me success, quite the contrary. Besides, I’m not doing this alone.” He held my hand. “Neither are you.”

I would like to say his kind and wise words relaxed me, but they didn’t. The last time I had tried to become a mother it was only to get my hopes up and then see them crash down violently again. I wasn’t ready for another loss, I had just recovered from the last one. In retrospect, my intensive worry was my weird way of protecting myself in case it didn’t work. Should the worse case scenario happen, I was already protected.

It was a sunny afternoon, so when we arrived at the orphanage, all the kids were playing outside. We were told to wait inside, so our presence wouldn’t alarm the other children, while the girl was getting ready. We obediently stood in the corridor, waiting. Out of the blue, Victor got a phone call.

“It’s Goldman.” He read from his phone screen. “He knows I’m here, so if he’s calling it must be urgent. I’ll take this outside, send for me when they call for us.”

Awesome, just awesome. I was a nervous wreck, my palms were sweaty and I had lost my companion. I felt like a naughty kid about to be summoned to the principal’s office, the time dragging lazily. I looked at my wristwatch, only two minutes had passed since we arrived.

Trying to distract myself, I looked at the decorations. There were pictures of the kids in the orphanage taken every year, Miss Dillon present in every single one of them. It was clear that she was doing this for decades. In the children’s smile, a sad resignation, but a hope for better days. I could do that, I could give a child a happy life. I could give a child the dream of better days. And I would get those same days in return.

Lots in my own thoughts, I wandered through the corridor, when I noticed a small red-haired boy sitting on one of the wooden seats, holding a children’s book. Maybe I could talk to him a little. Victor was taking the longest time to return, and I was in dire need of something to distract me from my anxiety.

“Do you mind if I sit here for a minute?” I pointed to the seat next to the boy.

“No.” He didn’t even lift his eyes from the book to answer me, totally engrossed in the book. I read the title. It was the children’s book version of Pixar’s movie “A Bug’s Life”.

“That is an awesome movie.” I tried to make conversation, pointing to his book. “Do you like the pictures?”

“Pictures are for toddlers.” He scoffed, seemingly aggravated with my comment. “I’m already four, I am reading it.”

I was baffled. I chuckled to hide my surprise, hoping I wouldn’t aggravate him any further.

“Well, yes, if you’re four, you are certainly not a toddler.” I noticed the boy seemed pleased with my answer, the frown on his face relaxing slightly. “Who taught you how to read?”

“No one.” He shrugged. “I taught myself.”

“Impressive.” I nodded. “By the way, my name is Andrea. What is yours?” I extended my hand formally.

“Are you here to adopt a child?” He took his eyes off the book.

“I am here waiting to meet one, yes.” I answered, uneasy with his question.

“Then why do you want to know my name? You won’t see me again.” He looked straight at me, and that was when I really noticed his features. His hair was somewhat long and curly, and he was staring at me with sweet dark brown eyes that stood out from his very fair skin. I could see he wasn’t being defensive. He was genuinely curious as to why an adult thought of starting a conversation with him.

“Well, I could see you again.” I smiled. “If we were friends, I could visit more often, and we could talk about things you like.”

“Would you really do that?” His eyes seemed to be studying mine. “Would you visit me?”

“I would.” I nodded. For some reason, that idea excited me more than anything in this world.

And then it hit me. I was bonding with that boy. We were talking to each other for no longer than five minutes, and I already felt this affection towards him. And Victor wasn’t there.

“I’m Owen, Owen Cole.” His tiny hand reached mine, shaking it.

“Andrea Lee. Nice meeting you.” I melted with how adorable he was.

“Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you!” I heard Victor approaching us from the end of the corridor.

“I’ve been busy making a new friend. Owen, this is my husband, Victor. Victor, this is my new friend, Owen.”

“Nice meeting you, Owen.” Victor smiled as the young boy formally shook his hand. “Andrea’s reading you a story?” He pointed at the book.

“I know how to read. I’m four already.” He explained to Victor, as he took a seat next to us. “I need to study hard if I want to become an insectologist. Better start now.”

Victor raised his eyebrows at me, surprised.

“You’re a very decided little man.” I complimented. “You know, when I was a little older than you, I would go to the forest next to my grandmother’s farm with my brother to hunt for crickets.”

“That is so cool!” His eyes widened. “Do you know that only males chirp, to call females to mate or chase away another male? They produce that sound by rubbing their wings together. And the females have their ears in their legs!” He laughed.

“Oh, I didn’t know about the ears!” I laughed as well.

“How did you catch them?” He asked, excited. “Did you use a special trap?”

“Just an empty bottle and some sugar, and a lot of patience. We would catch dozens of them sometimes. I can teach you how it’s done someday if you want to.”

I sense Miss Dillon approaching us with a smile, only to go past us without a word. Owen kept asking all sorts of questions and showing us what he knew about his favorite subject, which was in fact quite a lot. Victor would mostly listen, dropping a sentence now and then, apart from the time he shared his experience raising silkworms. When we noticed the time, it was getting dark, and Owen was summoned for dinner. We left him with another formal handshake and the promise that we would come back next week to visit him.

Back at home, I felt exhilarated, talking about how sweet that boy was, and so very enthusiastic.

“He learned how to read so he could learn more about insects!” I commented as I mixed the dressing into the salad. “That’s how determined he is. Reminds me of someone I know.”

“He’s a great kid, yes.” Victor smiled knowingly. “So, do you want to start formally visiting him for adoption?”

“What about the other girl we were supposed to see? Miss Dillon didn’t mention her when we left.” I frowned.

“Miss Dillon has been doing this for many decades. She must’ve canceled the meeting the moment she saw the two of you talking.” Victor replied as he finished setting the table.

I went to him, wrapping my arms around his waist, tilting my head to look at him.

“Well, this is not a decision I can make on my own, and you were mostly very quiet. What do you think? Did you like him?”

“I liked him very much, he reminds me of you.” He kissed my forehead as he caressed my hair. “You know, the curls, the sweet brown eyes… He could easily pass as your child.”

“Our child.” I corrected.

“Yes.” He smiled widely. “Our child.”

“So that’s a yes?” I beamed at him. “Or a maybe?”

“A solid yes.”

He chuckled as I threw myself in his arms, covering his face with kisses. Carrying me to the kitchen counter, he sat me on it and took me in his arms, kissing me deeply.

“Is this really happening? Are we really becoming parents?”I whispered, afraid that somehow fate would listen and make things go wrong.

“We are.” It was Victor’s turn to beam at me. “To a very special little boy.”

“Are you happy?” I made him face me, so I could see his expression. His eyes were shining.

“Overjoyed.”

“I love you so much.” My voice was strained, overwhelmed with affection.

“I love you too, my light. Thank you.”

He held me tightly in his arms, and I could hear his heart beating fast with happiness. We had been through a lot, but we had finally made it. We were becoming a family of three. The happy family Victor never had, and the one I had always dreamed about.

#growingtogether #Growing Pains - Series #mlqc victor #mlqc li zeyan #mlqc fanfic #mister love dream date #mister love queens choice #love and producer #vic adoptive father

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allie1804-fan · 4 years

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Ile de Re (Chapter 1)

I wrote this fic last year, mostly while on holiday on this lovely island. If you are on Archive of Our Own, you may have seen it before. Written before Matrix 4 was announced and before Covid so sorry that the timelines are no longer realistic!

Summary

Keanu meets a chef to help him prepare for a movie role. Events conspire for them to spend even more time together than they planned and despite the large age gap, romance ensues.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

April 2020

Keanu hung up the phone and quietly fist pumped to himself. He’d just had news that a new project had been green lit. It was one he’d been collaborating on for some time - where he’d play an American chef, somewhat down on his luck who was establishing a new restaurant in a rural French town. The thing that thrilled him most was that the project afforded him the chance to finally learn how to cook – at least a bit - because he’d need to demonstrate some skill in the film itself and to ‘find’ his character he wanted to understand more about the craft of being a chef – especially the passion that drove them.

He went to his office and pulled out his laptop, opening a file holding details of some chefs who Erwin’s team had tracked down that fit the bill in terms of the knowledge they had and their personal experiences. He dropped an e mail first to a chef names Yves Le Gouhier and another to a woman called Claire Bonnevin. They each had restaurants in LA but were French natives who had trained at home before heading to America to open restaurants of their own. He hoped that the guy would say yes since he felt he’d probably relate better to his experience however he checked out both of their bios and looked at restaurant reviews on line.

A few days later, the decision was made for him as to who would give him the coaching as Mr Le Gouhier was out of town for at least a couple of months, establishing a new restaurant whereas Ms Bonnevin was able to fit him in for some daily ‘classes’ starting the following week. Whilst mildly disappointed, he also recalled that he’d actually eaten at Ms Bonnevin’s place once and had really rated the cooking which mixed homespun flavours with Gallic finesse - the seafood there was to die for. He responded quickly in the affirmative, and ever the perfectionist, asked if there was anything he needed to bring or any preparatory work he could do before Monday. Claire replied that if he could let her have a working copy of the script and tell her what his favourite meal was before the weekend – they could work on the skills he’d need to demonstrate in the film and, depending on what the meal was, also aim to make his favourite meal to a good standard by the end of the week. If he had some friends who’d like to eat what he made, then he should ask them if they were free.

“What a question!” he pondered, thinking about what his favourite meal was. Keanu was a man who liked to eat - so much so that he needed the counsel of his trainer Denise to keep off the pounds in between films! Would it be a good steak with garlicky greens and crushed potatoes?, veal with a cream and mushroom sauce, roast lamb with flageolets and dauphinois potatoes – this task was just making him hungry! He decided on the latter thinking it would be a challenge and fitted with the style of cooking they had at “Le Chat Botte” which was Claire’s restaurant. The pressure of feeding something he’d made that wasn’t bacon and eggs or a peanut butter and jelly sandwich was both thrilling and unnerving. He messaged his sister Kim, his mother and friends Rob, Alex and Josh who were all pleased to be free although they joked that they might need to go to Macdonald’s to fill up afterwards!

Monday came around and Keanu pulled up at “Le Chat Botte” at 9am prompt. Entering via the service entrance as instructed, he walked into a spotless kitchen with gleaming stainless steel work stations, hobs and ovens ranged along one wall and a large wooden kitchen table in the centre which had 2 sets of chopping boards in different colours along with a variety of knives, spatulas and other cooking implements arranged side by side in the centre of the table. No-one was in sight though Keanu could hear the sound of a voice coming from an adjoining room. Walking across the kitchen he stuck his head round the door of what turned out to be an office where he saw a petite, dark haired woman he recognised (from her bio) as Claire Bonnevin - she was speaking to someone on the phone in French. She raised her hand to him in greeting, mouthing sorry and hurried to complete the call.

“Oui, Oui, je te rapellerai demain - mon nouvel client vient d’arriver, oui oui c’est lui, donc il faut que j’accroche. D’accord d’accord, je sais. Au revoir”

Claire turned to Keanu blushing - she had the distinct impression that he’d understood that she’d just referred to him in her conversation.

“so sorry about that – that was my restaurant manager back home in France just giving me an update on my dad - he’s not been too well recently so we’ve been talking every day” Her English accent was excellent with only a slight gallic note.

Keanu stuck out his hand

“Nice to meet you Ms Bonnevin and no problem – you didn’t need to rush them off the line on my account”

Claire smiled and shook his hand, “I heard you were impossibly polite! – of course I did, I was eating into your paid time – nice to meet you too by the way. Keanu grinned - Claire could feel the colour rising in her cheeks again - she wasn’t exactly sure why - maybe it was the directness of his gaze or the brilliance of his smile.

“So, are you ready for your training?”

Keanu chuckled and responded with what he thought was the expected reply “hell yeah” but Claire didn’t react, “maybe the Matrix reference was unintentional” he thought – she was pretty young after all, (her bio said she was 35) so maybe she was one of the few whom it had passed by!

“So let’s go through to the kitchen and get started” she said leading the way back to the room where Keanu had entered earlier.

For the next 4 hours they talked through and tried out some of the particular skills that would be needed in kitchen scenes. Whilst they worked, they got to know each other a little with Claire wanting to find out about Keanu’s food knowledge and experience and Keanu quizzing her about her beginnings in the industry. He discovered that she grew up on a tiny west coast island in France called L’Ile de Re” where her Dad still owned a restaurant called, like hers in LA, “Le Chat Botte”. He no longer worked as a chef there but lived in the little village where it was, hence the manager being able to keep Claire appraised of his health. She’d learned her craft there and then moved on to train in Paris, New York and then LA to establish her namesake restaurant in the US.

For her part, from what Keanu said, she could see that despite not having grown up in a house where people had a passion for cooking, he nevertheless clearly had a passion for food - from the humble sandwich to fine foods from around the globe. He was also a quick study, picking up the knife skills needed to finely chop onions and garlic on film that he’d need. She was a patient teacher, though she would occasionally break into French when she was struggling to communicate the exact technique such as when at first he couldn’t master the rotation of the knife needed to chop finely:

“tient tient, comme ca” she said, placing her hand over his to show how the blade needed to rock back and forth over the garlic.

At 12 they broke for lunch at which point Claire challenged Keanu to make her his best sandwich from the ingredients on hand. He asked her what she liked and created a layered club sandwich which she declared excellent. By the time he left at 1pm, Keanu was convinced that she was an excellent choice of teacher and one he’d enjoy learning from. He could hardly wait for the next day when they were going to study cuts of meat by going to Claire’s favourite butcher.

The week progressed with a mix of hands on cooking classes and continued trips to suppliers which served to explain the importance of provenance and quality ingredients. They also worked on timings and started to plan the stages of creating the menu Keanu had planned for Friday’s lunch.

On Thursday Keanu tried out the dauphinois potatoes and was thrilled with the result - he was really starting to enjoy cooking and his rapid growth in skill. Claire praised him warmly and suggested he try a dessert as well for the next day.

“You could try something simple like a mousse au chocolat but I think you’re ready to really wow them”

“Oh yeah?” Keanu grinned “With what?”

“A tarte Tatin”

“What!, are you sure?”

“Absolutely – you’re an excellent student - let’s do one today together, you’ll master it I’m sure”

She showed him how to prepare the sugar and butter in a special tin that could go on the stove and then in the oven to finish. They prepped the apples placing them rounded side down in the tin and proceeded to caramelise the butter and sugar until it was a gorgeous molten mahogany. Then he learned how to make the shortcrust pastry using cool hands to rub the butter into the flour then bring it together to a dough which rested in the fridge. Once rolled out, he placed it onto the cooled apples, tucking in the edges round the sides. The result when they turned the tarte out (upside down to reveal the apples) was amazing – sweet, tender apples with the sugary caramel cut a little by freshly grated lemon rind and a melt in the mouth pastry to top it off.

“See!” she smiled, “I knew you could do it”

“No, you did it!” he grinned

“Well, OK so today we both did it but tomorrow it will all be down to you”

Friday came and Keanu got to the restaurant at 8am wanting to have as much time as possible to get everything perfect.

By 11.30 the lamb was resting, his gratin and tarte were in the oven and the beans were simmering gently.

The meal was beginning with a simple salade aux lardons - it was time to dress it with the vinaigrette he’d made earlier. He started to toss it gently but some lettuce flipped out over the side

“Watch out you don’t drop too many said Claire – unless you want lots of children’ she laughed!

“What?” Keanu asked, shooting her a quizzical look.

“it’s a saying we have in France that the number of leaves you drop when you’re tossing the salad tells you the number of kids you’ll have.

“Oh right” he chuckled, “that’s cute, but it’s way too late for that”

“What do you mean?, you’d have time to have them if you wanted, surely”

“I’m too old Claire”

“What, you must only be what?”, she paused to look at him and consider his face “…. About 45”

“Ha ha” Keanu laughed heartily.

“No, I’m fifty five”

“Merde” she exclaimed “ce n’est pas possible!”

Keanu shook his head and smiled - he loved how she reverted to French when she was reacting spontaneously to something.

“I’m afraid it’s true, so even if I had a wife or even a girlfriend, I still think it’s too late to be having babies. I might be dead before they’re 20 or 30.

Claire’s face clouded over

“Sorry I didn’t mean to be all maudlin” he said

“Don’t worry, it’s just my mother died when I was 25 so I know that’s hard – but people die all the time, young and old.

“Ain’t that the truth” Keanu agreed quietly, remembering his own past.

“and lots of guys have babies when they’re older. Maybe you shouldn’t rule it out”

“Maybe maybe, anyway, enough serious talk, we should raise a toast before our guests arrive”

He poured himself and Claire a glass of wine.

“Here’s to satisfied customers!” she said

“and here’s to you for being such an amazing teacher – I can’t believe you’ve got me this far so fast”

“well that’s really down to you” she replied, smiling, “you work so hard and learn so quickly, it’s very impressive”

“I don’t know about that!” he said blushing, “Anyway, let’s not get ahead ourselves, I haven’t served it yet!!

They put down their glasses and Claire went to see if the guests had arrived at the table they had set aside in the restaurant. Meanwhile Keanu busied himself with finishing the salad and carving the lamb which he was happy to see was just the right shade of pink. He put it in the warming oven and also took out the tarte Tatin praying that it would be as good as the one yesterday when he turned it out later. Finally, with the main course as ready as it could be, he took the salad and some French bread through to the dining room.

The meal went down a storm - at the end Keanu stood and raised a toast to Claire

“Thank you for all your kind words folks but we really need to toast this amazing lady who has taught this old meat head some cooking skill. He took her hand and placed it over his heart

“ thank you, thank you, merci beaucoups, I’ll be forever grateful!”

Claire laughed and blushed.

“Just wait until next week when we’ll have you working in the restaurant kitchen, then you might not be such a fan!”

He laughed

“That may be!”

They said their goodbyes to Keanu’s amazed guests and went to clean down the kitchen.

“How’s your dad by the way?”

“Oh about the same apparently – no better, but no worse, he just needs to take it easy and stay off his damn bike”

“Oh, a pushbike or a motorbike?” Keanu asked, his interest peaked

“A push bike – he’s not a racer guy like you!” Claire saw Keanu pull up each day often on different bikes so she knew about his passion for them.

“everyone goes everywhere on bikes on the Ile de Re” she continued - it’s a cyclist’s paradise with cycle paths across the salt marshes and oyster beds and through the forests. But he had a heart attack last year and whilst he is supposed to exercise, he just pushes himself too much and that worries me”

“Do you have any other family there to keep an eye on him?”

“No, I’m an only child and there are no aunts or uncles either.

“Is your father still alive? She asked.

“Yeah – well at least I haven’t heard otherwise! He left my mother when I was three and I haven’t seen him since I was 13.”

“Mon dieu that must have been tough growing up without a dad”

“Yeah well I had my mum and my sister - he wouldn’t have been a good role model anyway”

“I could see today that you adore Kim and your mother”

“Yeah, yeah I do - family and friends are my rocks to come back to - after every project that’s what I look forward to”

“You know you’re not at all what I expected!” Claire stated.

“Oh, how so?” he asked

“Well, a couple of people I mentioned you to said they heard you were a nice guy and very polite but I guess I just expected someone more ………..starry, you know!”

Keanu burst out laughing.

“Well I’ll take that as a complement” he said

“you should – you’ve made it a very easy first week of teaching” she smiled

“Well thanks” he said the colour rising in his cheeks.

They finished up in the kitchen and Keanu took his leave saying he’d see her at 9am prompt on Monday for his week in the working kitchen. He’d enjoyed her company so much that he’d almost asked her to dinner but held himself in check. She was so much younger than him and he knew his feelings weren’t entirely platonic. She was very cute with olive skin, beautiful eyes and a slender yet not too skinny figure – he didn’t really have a type but she hit the spot with him. He’d just have to quash those thoughts, focus on the learning and keep things on a friendly footing.

https://allie1804-fan.tumblr.com/post/625977593110364160/ile-de-re-chapter-2

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spontaneousmusicalnumber · 4 years

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SO YOU WANT TO TEACH PEOPLE ABOUT GENDER AND SEXUALITY.

Throughout my college career, I volunteered in a campus organization whose goal was to provide an opportunity for people to learn about gender and sexuality through facilitated Q&A panels. I loved it, and wish that there was more of an opportunity to create those experiences in the world at large. I’ve gotten some requests to share my experience, so here’s a write-up for the key points if you want to try and run one yourself.

These panels should be controlled, planned events for a cohesive group. I have done panels for classrooms, clubs, Greek organizations, and even a university staff department. They have a structure, a beginning and an end. You will be revealing a lot of personal information, so being comfortable in that role is a must. The state I live in has legal protections for gender identity and sexuality in work, education and housing so I never felt threatened opening up. You are under no obligation to do a panel if you do not feel safe.

Facilitating a Panel:

There is always a facilitator, and anywhere from 2-5 panelists depending on the size of the audience. The facilitator’s job is to organize and manage the event. They are the point of contact for the organization that requests a panel, they maintain control of the situation and ensure both the panelists and the audience feel safe and comfortable. They also make sure the pace keeps moving and can cut off a conversation if it gets too long or repetitive and not enough questions are being answered.

Ground Rules:

At the beginning of the panel, the facilitator lays down several ground rules. Both audience members and panelists are expected to abide by these rules at all times for safety and civility.

Rule 1: No Outing.

Ask if anyone in the audience knows what outing is, and if not introduce them to the concept of sharing parts of someone’s identity without their permission. Explain that this is a big taboo in the community, both for respect of privacy and for personal safety. Tell the audience that they are free to take away the stories and the general ideas expressed, but the names and identities behind them will stay in this room. This applies to audience members’ identities as well; they can be assured that the panelists will not share them.

Rule 2: Give Respect to Get Respect.

This one seems simple but is important to note. Aggressive or confrontational behavior does not lead to comfortable conversation or open minds. Let the audience know that the panelists are people too, and can choose whether or not they are comfortable answering a question. Just as the panelists are expected to maintain civility, so is the audience.

Rule 3: Assume Goodwill.

Trust that you the panelists are here to teach, and they the audience is here to learn. Ask the audience to use the most respectful language they can and assure the audience that the panelists will not attack or demean them for it. It is alright if someone does not know what words are respectful or offensive, trust that they’re trying and are open to being corrected.

Guidelines for Panelists

Start with your story. This is usually ~3 minutes long, and serves as an introduction to you. It can encompass a coming out, a realization, a meaningful moment, any combination of the above. My story talks about the rocky path to realizing and accepting I was asexual. At the very least, introduce yourself and give your pronouns. A good story will ‘drop breadcrumbs’ or introduce ideas for the audience to ask about.

After all panelists have told their story, the facilitator will open up the room for questions. These can be related to panelist’s stories, questions they had previously, or questions about current events. If audience members are unwilling to raise their hands you can try providing paper and pencils for anonymous questions. Cracking a joke about the 30 seconds of dead silence usually helps to break the ice, and once one hand is raised then usually the ball gets rolling. This is now your time to shine.

Speak from your own experience. If there is a panelist who has an identity you do not, they are the expert and it’s not your place to talk over them. You are the expert on yourself as well, so don’t let yourself get talked over. It is OK to not know an answer, just speak honestly. You can speak from research you have done or general experiences from people you know, but be sure to clarify that this is something you have learned from somebody else and remember to respect “No Outing”.

This is not the time or place to gatekeep. If you are an ace/aro/bi/pan/trans/NB exclusionist, I urge you to either keep your mouth shut when the topic shifts towards those identities or reconsider your place on the panel. Your job is to allow people to take an open, accepting stance towards non-straight and non-cis identities, not spread close-minded rhetoric. If you share an identity in a way that is different from another, say you are a dysphoric trans person for whom dysphoria is a large factor in your identity, you may speak from your own experience that way. However, you should not express that people who do not share your identity are not valid in theirs.

Be on your best behavior, no matter the question. This part can get hard, but it’s where “Assume Goodwill” comes in. Easily 99% of people in this situation will be respectful and just want to learn. They may not know what language is correct, or may only know offensive words for a certain idea. Correct these before you answer their question and explain why those words are harmful, but don’t shame them for not knowing the right language. You can ask clarifying questions if you don’t know what they’re getting at (or if you want them to realize what they’re getting at).

There will, rarely, be people who come with the intention of inciting anger or throwing insults or worse. At this point, they are not coming in to learn, so your goal is to make an impact on the other audience members. Respond to questions of religious intolerance with statements that that is not a belief you share. Request that they follow the ground rules, remind them of “give respect to get respect”. The facilitator of the panel or the organizer of the audience (if a classroom, the teacher) should intervene to ask them to leave if they cannot abide by the ground rules.

You can choose not to answer a question and can choose whether or not to give a reason why. “That’s too personal” is plenty. As an asexual on the panel I got more than enough questions about my sex life, whether I wanted kids or wanted to get married. These were questions I did not answer, instead offering a larger view of the community. I would explain how asexual people all had their own comfort zones and defined their sexuality differently, and while some decided they would like to be alone others can and do engage in all types of partnerships.

Unpack, unpack, unpack! Talk about the question that audiences are really asking when they ask who the man or the woman in a relationship is. Bring up heteronormative standards! Bring up sexist expectations of relationship dynamics! Bring up restrictive notions of gender! Bring up privacy concerns! A very simple question can reveal a lot about how someone’s personal biases shape their view of gender and sexuality so do your best to break it down in a way they can understand.

Try to define any words you are using. Audience members often won’t know what ‘cisgender’ means, or the difference between sexual and romantic orientation, or what dysphoria is. Try to keep them in the loop and be ready to provide definitions if the need arises. Again, defer to those who hold the identities in question before you answer and don’t be afraid to admit you don’t know something.

Closing the Panel

Refer the audience to resources to continue their education. Offer both in-person places like a campus LGBT services center and trustworthy online resources like AVEN for asexuality. Establish a point of contact between the facilitator and the audience if they feel comfortable doing so- can the audience email anyone with further questions?

After the audience files out, gather with the other panelists and facilitator for a recap. Talk about what you think went well, what you think could have gone better, if you felt comfortable or not, if you felt talked over or if you felt like you talked too much, and how you think you could improve in the future. This is best for a team that may meet again, but even for a one-off event I feel it’s important.

That’s the start of it.

IRL, a panelist undergoes a 2-day training and practice panel before they are considered a panelist. This post is 1500 words already, so I’ll leave it there, but let me know if there’s something I can explain better or if you want more resources or examples!

#my posts #long post

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