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shooks-stupid-stuff · 2 years

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AHAHA IT'S FINALLY DONE-

so hi yes @m-chromatic made a template for what if your oc was a secret boss and ofc i had to do it with The Funny One (aka sakomi)

and uh

piracy :]

full design/doodles/me rambling about this concept bc i really like it beneath the cut-

fuck i just realized i forgot her collar on the 'how they met the knight' drawing goddammit-

it's FINE that one's shitposty anyways-

ok so anyways. yeah so what's going on here huh? piracy. piracy is going on.

now to be CLEAR: sakomi is a lightner so like. she's not supposed to be a PIRACY WEBSITE or anything, no. she's a pirate, she DOES the pirating herself. don't ask how that works just accept it it makes sense i swear-

so like, i dunno i kinda just was thinking of designs and went 'yeah i should give her an eyepatch' and then i remembered piracy existed and it just worked (especially bc sakomi is based off of me and i pirate stuff all the time-)

oh yeah before i forget, initial design doodles + explanations on that-

god man i thought that citra joke was so funny when i thought of it.

it's really not.

uhhh anyways, so! design process woooo-

so, sakomi's og design takes a lot of inspiration in the outfit department from rudolf fire emblem (my beloved), so like. ofc i took more inspiration from fire emblem civbchjvb-

specifically with the scarf-bow-cape thing, which is inspired by generic adventurer class outfit from fire emblem fates (because that design slaps so fucking hard) as well as the hat and boots (the boots to a much lesser degree). other than that just y'know, a slightly torn up pirate coat and eyepatch for the pirate aesthetic, and gloves with colored fingertips bc they're c o o l (yes they aren't fingerless gloves).

and the in-universe explanation for why/how she has video game clothes is: she pirated them.

this is ADVANCED PIRACY (but more on that in a sec)

already explained the dumb joke one, so uh other doodle. so like, remember those anti-piracy psas that would play before movies? like, the one's that were edited to say you wouldn't download a car. so like. what if that but more fucked up-

like the eyepatch is not just for show (she accidentally poked her eye out with a ds cartridge, what a dumbass) but what if she tried to pirate a new eye

yeah it didn't work- (it did for her leg though so no more perpetual leg wound but still that's Fucked Up)

again, don't ask how this works it's just a cool idea and i like it (also she can threaten to pirate people's organs and that's just funny)

but yeah she probably participates in whatever black market cyber world has (it probably has one let's be real)

ok so now: i will uhh actually explain the stuff on the template one by one

before:

so sakomi's whole deal is that she's a lightner who's been trapped in the dark world for like 2 years and as such just basically lives there now. she has a small shop that is also her house (the curtain separates the two) and uh. yeah she doesn't get many customers, and being fucking TERRIBLE socially if she doesn't already know someone doesn't help. but she gets by (somehow). she's incredibly lonely, essentially being the odd man out in every way possible, but she gets by. i'll go into more detail on this in a later section though, so for now i'll stop.

after:

man oh man she's a criminal now-

jokes aside, she's still a shopkeeper, just for less than legal things now. some stuff is even free (but it's download only, physical media is still way cheaper than official releases though) but some of the pirated items are a bit lesser quality than the originals. you get what you pay for, i suppose lol.

obvious melee joke is obvious

additional sprites:

well (shitty) overworld sprite aside, w e a p o n s

she has a fucking gun oh god oh fu-

and a cool sword (also stolen from fire emblem, will elaborate in a bit). yeah she fights with them idk what else to say, no way in hell i'm coming up with like actual bullet patterns (yet)

item drops:

YES OK THIS I HAVE STUFF TO SAY ABOUT AHAHA

ok so first the scarf:

i kinda already explained the design, but the effect. not only is it a touhou reference (kinda) but also it reflects sakomi's feelings of loneliness and isolation. when you're all alone and feeling own in a sea of people who are all talking with others, it often can feel like your invisible (same when the few friends you do have ignore you in favor of other friends they like better; and yes, i'm speaking from experience). and since in dr certain attacks will target certain party members, it would make sense to translate this into an in battle effect that makes the character with it equipped less likely to get targeted. other than that it's inspired by the koishi card from touhou 18, except instead of making it impossible to die by touching an enemy it just makes your hitbox smaller cjvhcbj-

and next, the sword:

SO WHO HERE LIKES FIRE EMBLEM-

ok this one is simple. in fe there's a sword called the killing edge (yes i looked up synonyms for both words lmao) and it increases crit rate. so i made a bootleg (pirated) version of that, and since crits don't exist in dr it just makes the sweet spot for attacks a bit bigger (the little bar you hit for max damage). it's design is based off of the fire emblem awakening version of the killing edge (since it's my fave character of that game's signature weapon). not much else to it i just like my dumb anime tactical rpg lol-

how'd she meet the knight:

ok i know i made this one shitposty but i do have a legit thing for it lol

also no, i don't think the knight is gaster. fucking sue me.

aaaaaanyways. so imagine being sakomi in this situation.

-you've been missing for 2 years so your family/few friends think you're dead and you doubt you'll see them again because your stuck in some computer dimension

-you have terrible social anxiety and can't even bring yourself to talk to people unless it's strictly business

-you feel like you're annoying and no one actually likes you because you tend to ramble about interests a whole lot

-you hate that you snap at people when your irritated, regardless of if they actually irritated you or not

-you feel isolated and cripplingly lonely

-you have no friends or life to speak of as of now

-you have no customers and barely can scrounge up enough money to afford to live

-half the time you struggle to find the motivation to even do anything anymore

and really, there's more but i think you get the picture. she ain't doing to great.

now she suddenly gets a regular customer, one that engages her in conversation and actually seems interested in her incessant rambling. one that feels like a friend. and she latches onto that, HARD. that momentary escape from feeling like a lonely, pathetic piece of garbage. it gets to the point where she only has the motivation to do stuff in hope that they'll return to her shop and talk to her; the point where she starts to think of this person as her best friend (borderline idolizing them subconsciously), and feeling like their attention is what makes it worth doing anything, getting depressed when they don't show up for a day.

but one day, they just stop showing up. gone with no explanation. she sees them talking to someone else one day, but they don't acknowledge that she's there.

it's devastating, being tossed aside by someone you thought of as a good friend. and she kinda just.... snaps. one things leads to another, and yeah.

well that was depressing, anyways, moving on to-

angst square:

-goddammit.

ok well this is less angsty, just kinda more depressing. at this point, the idea of friends kinda... makes sakomi irate. what, so she can be tossed aside again? yeah, no. never gonna happen. she doesn't feel joy from relationships with others anymore, and she doesn't feel sorrow about her past struggles with it. she just feels rage about the whole subject. she feels she doesn't need anyone, when really she needs someone now more than ever. but y'know. she's a bit too far gone to realize that, i guess.

ok, god i have written a fucking lot, but god this was fun to do. if i do any more with it i will 100% ignore the depressing shit, but i did want to address it here because it really reflects a lot of shit that i've been going through lately friendship-wise. it's hard, it really is, and there is no feeling worse than the feeling of crippling loneliness your left with when a friend fucking ignores you in favor of talking to someone they like more (especially when you're sitting with them and REALLY just being ignored). but ah, i'll just leave it as that. honestly working on this has helped me feel a whole lot better about all that stuff, and also gave me my art mojo back so hey! win-win.

if you actually read all of this, then thanks :]

#sakomi [oc]#gasterfyuroc #deltarune oc #WOOOO IT'S DONE #warning: there is a like college-essay length ramble beneath the cut chjvcjv be w a r n e d #not gonna say much here bc i said most of it under the cut but #man this was fun and man did it make me feel better about some things lol #hope you enjoy my 4(?) days of labor lmao

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doublerainebow · 3 years

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Artist Resources (Part 1?)

This is basically just going to be a bunch of resources I have found to be useful. I can’t say that I’ve used all of them, but I’m sure they’re all worth checking out.

I’m also gonna try to put a detailed description for most of the links so you have a better idea of what you’re getting. I apologize in advance if some of them are redundant lol

(I put “Part 1″ if in the case I make another one)

~Links to Tutorials, Tips, Resources, etc~

Another Resource List -- Leads to another Tumblr post. Apparently, the post isn’t mobile-friendly, so it’s suggested to view this on Tumblr browser. Has a bunch of other links. I’ve checked out a few of them (mainly the copyright stuff lol), and it seems that some of the links may be a bit outdated. Still, it doesn’t hurt to check out the links.

Arms and Legs -- Leads to another Tumblr post. A handy tutorial on elbow and knee placement.

Art & Game Dev -- This leads to my personal playlist of a bunch of YouTube videos. Has a bunch of tutorials and interesting videos that I’ve collected over the course of a few years lol.

Blamblot -- A website that contains resources and tutorials on comic lettering. This is primarily in reference to western comics, but it doesn’t help to take a looksie.

Commission Calculator -- Leads to another Tumblr post. Helps artists to stop selling themselves short.

Comparing Heights (hikaku-sitatter) -- A height comparer for centimeters.

Comparing Heights -- A height comparer for feet and inches.

Mouth Shapes and Lip-Syncing -- Leads to another Tumblr post. Useful for... drawing mouth shapes.

Reference Angle -- Useful for when you’re trying to map out a face from an odd angle.

Soft Proofing for Printing -- Leads to another Tumblr post. Helps when you’re trying to make prints of your artwork.

Textures -- A website full of different and mostly free textures. While this website is made for 3D texturing, it can also be useful for 2D drawings. Signing up gives you 15 free credits everyday, and you can use those credits to download some textures for free.

The Models Resource -- A website of models ripped from a wide array of games.

The Spriters Resource -- A website of sprites ripped from a wide array of games.

The Textures Resource -- A websites of textures ripped from a wide array of games.

~Links to Stock Images~

Please check out whatever policies they may have for their images before using them!

(not sure if any of them are active anymore as I followed some of these accounts a long time ago when I used to be more active on Deviant Art lol)

adorkastock (formerly senshistock)

anatoref -- Leads to another Tumblr post. Has a bunch of hand photo references

charligal-stock

HumanAnatomy4Artist -- Does contain nudity

null-entity

PhelanDavion

RobynRose

~Links to Other Artists~

Akihito Yoshitomi -- Yoshitomi is a mangaka who has tutorials on manga making. He also has an insightful series in which he drafts and draws a 30-page manga in 18 days. Remember that every artist works differently and his process may be different from another’s.

Drawfee -- Drawfee is an improv drawing show of four artists: Nathan Yaffe, Jacob Andrews, Julia Lepetit, and Karina Farek. While they don’t have tutorials in a sense, their videos explain the different processes they go through as they draw. They also occasionally provide tips, tricks, and resources in their videos. They do have another channel and a Twitch channel where they host drawing classes in addition to other fun shenanigans.

EtheringtonBrothers -- Has a bunch of useful and eye-catching tutorials called “How to Think When You Draw”.

Mark Crilley -- Mark is a comic artist, specializing in manga, who has a bunch of tutorials about anatomy, perspective, comic making, and other things.

Miyuli -- Miyuli is an artist who posts tutorials on their Twitter. Their tutorials range from anatomy to clothing to other things. They even have a few books of art tips. Currently (as of the time of posting this), their 2018 version is free for download, so I highly recommend you download that. Some tips may be outdated, but they should still be helpful.

Whyt Manga (Twitter/YouTube) -- Odunze is a comic artist, specializing in manga, that has a bunch of tutorials on manga making and drawing characters of color.

~Links to Free Programs~

Blender -- A free 3D program if you’re into 3D modeling and such. I also personally haven’t used Blender (I use Maya lol), but I know it’s a respectable program.

Krita -- A free painting program if you can’t afford Photoshop or Clip Studio Paint. I personally haven’t used Krita, but I have recommended it to a few friends and they have positive reviews about it.

Paint Tool SAI -- Okay, this one isn’t free, but it’s a significantly cheaper painting program where you don’t have to pay a subscription. It’s 5,500JPY (~50 USD). I’m not sure how well it still works on modern computers (the last update was 2016), but I still use it here and there because I love the pen tool feature it has, and it still works like a charm for me.

~General Tips From Raine~

Raine admits that she’s guilty of not following her own advice, but Raine hopes that the tips that she does know will be beneficial to someone who will follow them. She’s also going to keep all her tips under the cut so as to not make this post a huge wall of text (even though it technically already is lol)

Also, if you have some resources, tutorials, tips yourself, please feel free to send them to me and maybe I’ll make a part 2 to this post!

ALWAYS LOOK FOR REFERENCE. This should really go without saying. You can’t draw from life if you refuse to observe life itself.

If you can’t find the exact thing you need, MAKE YOUR OWN REFERENCE. Time and time again, I can’t find something exactly that I need. So instead, what I do is that I take pictures of my own reference. Sometimes I even grab a friend and take pictures of them doing whatever it is I need.

Have a mirror handy when you’re drawing. Sometimes what you need is actually right there in front of you.

Having trouble drawing something? Do some studies. Take the time to understand what it is you’re drawing. I can’t remember the exact story, but I heard that the people who were working on Tarzan were having a hard time drawing his hands. So, what they did was spend a few hours looking at hands to try and understand how they work.

IT’S OKAY TO STUDY THE ART OF OTHER ARTISTS. Just as we look to the old masters as a reference, it’s definitely okay to look at modern-day artists for reference. Just don’t go copying exactly everything that they do, or worse, trace what they do. Just don’t do it... at all.

Not every line needs to be realized. The viewer of your work will automatically connect the dots.

DO NOT TRASH YOUR OLD DRAWINGS. Please, never ever do this. Your old drawings have value to them, even if they look terrible to you. Old drawings may hold ideas for things you could do for the future. They also serve as a way to see how far you’ve come as an artist.

GETTING BETTER AT DRAWING TAKES TIME AND EFFORT. You’re not gonna get better overnight. It’ll take months, or even years, to feel like you’re a competent artist, and even then, you’ll still have room for improvement.

DON’T LOOK DOWN ON YOURSELF IF YOU’RE TAKING A LONG TIME TO GET BETTER. It’ll be better for your mental health in the long run.

Alternatively, DON'T LOOK DOWN ON OTHER ARTISTS EITHER, ESPECIALLY TO MAKE YOURSELF FEEL BETTER. You know the struggles it took for you to get where you are, so don’t go putting down other people when you’ve been in their shoes once.

KEEP DRAWING. If you’re not making an effort to get better, then you’re not going to be better. I get that it’s hard to find the inspiration to draw (I’m very guilty of this), but just keep trying. It doesn’t have to be big or spectacular. You don’t even have to post it if you’re the type who likes to post their art stuff.

Try to find references from real-life. It’ll help you better understand form, lighting, shadows, etc., especially if you’re going for a more realistic kind of art style. Otherwise, finding reference from things like cartoons, anime, comics, etc. are just as good.

Try new things. Try new art mediums. Try a different art style. Switch up the way you do things. Maybe you’ll hate it, maybe you’ll like it. Who knows if you don’t try.

Watch time-lapses (or speed draws/speed paints) of other artists!

Pinterest and Google are your friends if you need tutorials or references or whatever.

If you’re offering commissions, DO NOT WORK UNDER YOUR LOCAL MINIMUM WAGE. You are literally devaluing the work you actually put into a piece.

I like to think I’m an aficionado of Photoshop, so feel free to ask me questions on how to achieve something! I’ve used Photoshop for about 11 years now and know my way around the program. On another note, I do recommend setting custom keyboard shortcuts in Photoshop because the default shortcuts are terrible (in my opinion), and because having custom shortcuts increases the speed of your workflow.

Because I’ve been seeing this a lot lately in Twitter, you’re never too old to start in art. Art is just one of those things that anyone can pick up at any age because the only thing you really need to get good in art is time, diligence, and patience.

Try not to post hi-res images of your artwork to prevent art stealers from selling your artwork in high resolution.

Always, always, always add your signature and watermark on your artwork. I like to add my signatures and watermarks in places that’ll be hard to erase or crop out. I’ve also seen people add their signatures and watermarks in creative ways (ex. on a character’s shirt). You need to protect your work in an era where people will just blatantly steal it and make profit off your work.

Tag List

@reality-is-often-disappointing

#artists #artists on tumblr #artist tips #artist resources #art resources #artists of tumblr #art tips #art tutorial #raine rambles and muses #raine can art

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purplesurveys · 3 years

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1115

survey by vintagekid

Name: Robyn.

Happy with it? I am now, but I certainly wasn’t as a kid. Other kids were cruel and would tease me solely for my name, which made it hard for me to socialize. I got the same bad Batman jokes too many times and I also got called a boy. These seem petty now, but as a kindergartener adjusting to life in school, it had been traumatizing and made me wonder if my classmates were going to remain the way they were for the long run which no 4-year-old should be mulling about, really.

Do you wear stilettos? When I get the chance, which isn’t very often at all. But I do love stilettos.

How important are looks to you? I find this question very vague, but generally looks matter to me to a certain extent, like how I’d want to look nice and proper for a job interview or for formal occasions such as weddings. Relationship-wise, I also think I have to feel a level of physical attraction towards someone for me to consider seeing them.

How often do you download music? I don’t anymore. I stream all my music.

Can you name a philosopher? Socrates.

What would you do if two unicorns tried to whisk you off to candy mountain? I just looked this up and this is apparently in reference to an ancient viral video, like it was around before viral videos were even a universally-acknowledged concept. That said, I don’t have a clue how to respond to this lmao.

You became the deciding vote in an election, which party would you go for? I don’t base my voting decisions on parties because the party system in my country is a tragically broken shitstorm in which every single party rallies the same values and principles, just executed in their own – and usually poor and unsustainable – ways. I do my research on each candidate, see how they answer in debates, look at laws they’ve authored, see which marginalized groups they proactively support (if they do), and decide from there.

Do you have a bzoink account? I don’t but I’ve been a semi-regular visitor since like 2009.

How many phone calls do you typically make in a day? Zero. People usually call me.

What song are you listening to? Tell Me It’s Okay by, surprise surprise, Paramore.

Do you understand things others your age do not? I don’t know. Maybe. Everyone’s bound to understand some things better than others.

Do you hate people that label themselves? Why would I hate that? And why would their chosen label be my business?

How many windows do you have open? None. There’s plenty of mosquitoes at night, so even though the cold evening air would been pleasant to have we have to keep the windows closed by nighttime.

How superstitious are you? Not at all.

If you were in Harry Potter, which house would you be in? I’ve been told either Gryffindor or Ravenclaw.

Which comedian can always crack you up? It’s not a habit of mine to watch comedians.

Are you nagged about being on the computer too much? Not since I was a teenager. Since college I’ve been doing most of my work, if not all of it, through my laptop, and I think my parents understand that I have to use it all the time.

Do you feel bad about anything you've done lately? Nothing comes to mind, no.

What's your texting bill typically like? My SIM is prepaid, so it works the other way around. I put load credits in it only if I know I’ll have to call/text/surf regularly.

What song did you/do you want played at your wedding? Turning Page by Sleeping At Last.

Do you have a lot or hardly any lines on your palms? Idk, a decent amount I guess? I don’t think it hits either extreme.

What's your favourite word? Poignant.

Are you allowed to swear in front of your parents? Yeah. They’ll shoot me a glare sometimes, but I’m in my 20s and...they know they can’t really do anything about it anymore lol.

Do you eat apples? No.

What are your addictions? Coffee, I suppose.

What are some words you use in daily life? I use intensifiers often, like very, really, super, absolutely, etc. I’m also big on expressions hahaha like oh my god, seriously, for real, and ugh.

Do you look things up on Google constantly? Yes.

Where do you get your music from? Spotify. Sometimes YouTube if I wanna look for a leak.

What do you think of people with afros? That they are people with afros...? I don’t really know what you’re looking for me to say, lmfao.

survey by charey-chas

Do you like getting your picture taken? Not for the most part. My body instantly gets all frozen and awkward when a camera’s placed in front of me, which I hate because I do wish I could have more photos of myself around. Is your phone anywhere near you? It is not, actually. It feels great and I really should start making it a habit to keep it away from me entirely on weekends. Do you ever enjoy going to school? In my first school, I enjoyed going mainly (and probably only) for my friends; but Catholic school was predominantly a torturous experience. The rigidity isn’t something I look back fondly on, and it felt like being kept on a tight leash for 14 years. College was a lot more enjoyable in every way possible. I liked going to (most of) my classes and learning as much as I loved the vibrant org culture and the general freedom that comes with university life. Have you ever gone on a road trip? Lots. The Philippines is a relatively small country and unless you want to jump to a different island altogether, there are many provinces you can readily travel to by car. Who do you get along with best in your family? Nina, my sister. Then my dad. I clash a lot with my mom and I don’t talk to my brother. Based on your personality, what animal do you think you'd be? Cats and I don’t get along very well hahaha but I think I’m similar to them. Would you ever buy anything from an infomercial? Maybe once, just to be able to say that I have. Have you ever made a snow angel? No, because I’ve never seen snow before. Have you stayed in a hotel in the last month? No. We had a brief getaway in Tagaytay but we switched things up and went to rent a condo, instead of book a hotel room, for a weekend. What's your most comfortable outfit? If I want to go for comfortable, I usually go for my rompers or jumpsuits. Do you text or IM more? IM these days. Would you rather listen to music or play it? Listen. I have no music-playing skills whatsoever. Have you ever been in a hot tub? Sure. Do you like pizza? LOVE IT Are you sleeping in your own bed tonight? Yes. If not here, the couch. But most likely it will my bed tonight. Are any of your friends having a sleepover right now? I doubt it. Angela and Hans had an overnight stay in Batangas a few days ago for their Valentine’s shenanigans though, which I guess kinda counts as a sleepover. Have you ever been to a house party? I don’t think so. That’s something I missed out on in my college days, but I don’t mind. Do you listen to your iPod or the radio when you're in the car? I think I keep a good balance. If my phone’s battery is not very high I’ll rely on the radio; and sometimes I’ll sync my phone’s Spotify to the car as well.

survey by charey-chas

What song is stuck in your head at the moment? RAVI’s BUM. What's your fathers' middle name? He doesn’t have a second name, but I’m not sharing his legal middle name on here either. How many hours a day do you spend on the computer? On work days, I’d say 8-10 hours. On weekends, maybe a little slightly less than that since I do like getting off the laptop sometimes to rest my eyes. Could you live without the internet? People from the past managed to live without it, so I know I can. It would just be extremely inconvenient; and having been dependent on it for such a long time now, I would likely be clueless on how to navigate most activities. What's something you're really into? Learning about cultural differences!! That’s why reading survey answers has always been fascinating to me. I would love a website that dives into the various everyday behavior people observe in other countries, but the ones that do exist use like 20- or 30-year-old sources, so they aren’t even relevant at all anymore. What's the last movie you saw in theaters? Knives Out. Have you ever seen a movie in 3D or in an IMAX theater? Just once. It was Denise and Leigh’s 18th birthday treat and they brought us to watch Doctor Strange in 3D. Do you prefer skirts, shorts, or skorts? Shorts. Have you ever vandalized? Just a few school chairs in grade school, but otherwise I’m too paranoid for vandalism lol. What's the longest you've stayed up? Maybe a little longer than 24 hours. Who'd you have a sleepover with last? Gabie. When's the last time you baked something? Nearly a decade ago. Our oven was new at the time and I wanted to try baking cookies. Do you like to dance? When I’m alone. Do you scratch mosquito bites, even though you're not supposed to? Yup. Are you afaid of spiders or do you like them? I mean I’m not fond of them, but I also don’t scream and run away when I see them. I just don’t care for them for the most part. What's a pet you've always wanted? I’ve only ever wanted dogs, and now I’ve got two of them. Do you like mice? Not really. Would you ever get a tattoo? Sure. I’ve been considering it for a while now; it’s just a matter of being able to save up for one. Do you prefer to walk in the street or on the sidewalk? Street, if it’s bare and safe enough. Otherwise if I’m in a busy city with regulations and all I’d obviously rather be on the sidewalk. What's your favorite t-shirt? My CM Punk Best in the World merch. Who did you last think about? I remembered Deina when I was thinking about the tattoo question. She got a pawprint tattoo on her wrist shortly before her senior dog passed away and ever since learning about it I’ve also been thinking about getting the same tattoo. Do you like giving hugs? I love giving hugs and it’s an automatic response for me whenever I see someone I love, which is why Covid is such a torture for me. Do you prefer hardwood flooring or carpeting? Hardwood. Did you/will you get a car for your 16th birthday? No. I got a car when I was 17, around six months before I started college. Have you ever eaten a worm? No but I’d be willing to try.

#survey #surveys #a few short ones in one post

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iampikachuhearmeroar · 4 years

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some fun tl;dr advice from your local bookworm and future librarian/information specialist (📖📖📓) about recreational reading, FOR FREE:

as everyone in the country bunkers down to self-isolate themselves and does whatever else to avoid the spreading and catching covid19/coronavirus (both in australia and internationally).....

my one piece of advice for something to do while self-isolating is for people to fill their days up with audiobooks- as there are a few apps and also an entire Internet Archive (internetarchive . org.... i’m only writing it like that to avoid a link lmao)- that allow you to read books for free.

of course, i know many people are obviously actually “working from home” or are about to be working from home- so they’d rather veg out on a netflix binge after a hard day of work. that’s more than fair; after cramming copious amounts of info into several excel spreadsheets; or more than a few “hey, this video meeting literally could’ve been a frickin email, frankston.” meetings etc etc.

but if you run out of things to binge watch/catch up on on netflix et al; get sick of just mindlessly scrolling through your social media feeds and drowning in coronavirus story/status after coronavirus story/status; or even get sick of your self-isolation playlists on spotify or youtube (apparently people are doing this???)- and instead want to fill your brain with idk: a harry potter audiobook, a cookbook (?), some self-help books; or idek maybe some “boring old books” such as wuthering heights or pride and prejudice....

hit up free phone apps like podbean & audiobooks (literally it’s just called audiobooks) or even apple books that comes free with everyone’s iphone (some classic book recordings are literally $1.99!!! cheap as fuckin chips). or, alternatively, you can download free audiobooks (and ebooks) from the internet archive. however, to borrow and read some books on IA, you’ll have to download adobe digital editions (which is also free, but you’ll have to make another free adobe account 🙄).

or.... if you can dig out your long forgotten library cards for the shellharbour or wollongong libraries (or both if you’re lucky: both libraries use the borrowbox app, along with few others, that you can find on their websites)- you can get far more recent books more in the self-help area (à la “everything is fucked: a book about hope”/“the subtle art of not giving a fuck”) or history/science/politics etc (à la 21 lessons for the 21st century)or even just fun kids/YA fiction to get lost in (okay yes harry potter, deltora quest, his dark materials etc etc)- ALL FOR FREE!!! “support your local libraries!” says the grouchy, but lively, librarian.

freeze your brain (not literally, obvs. please don’t go to source out a cryogenics place or buy a slurpee, silly) by throwing yourself into a fictional world and forget about the hell-trash-fire world that we’re currently in, because of the pandemic.

probably, some people will already know about the apps or the internet archive in their millennial “lets get things for free! let’s pirate it or something!” power and nous, that we all have, in this day and age; after growing up with limewire, file2hd and piratebay. hell, we learnt during the juggernaut that was the game of thrones franchise, that australia was probably the best in the world at pirating/torrenting media for free lmao.

of course, there are books- both modern and classic- that you’ll still have to buy on your kindle’s or iphones or google books (or shock! horror! in the last bastion, actual! hard! copy! print!)... unfortunately. but many of them are available on these free apps. again, i must stress, for free. just space yourself out away from covid-19/coronavirus, if only for one hour or a few; reading/listening to an audiobook for free. don’t let your head go to a mud puddle just because you’re off from work for a couple weeks to a month.

addendum: internet archive will also link you to free textbooks sometimes and other free online libraries. bypass audible’s monthly $16.45 monthly subscription fee for audiobooks, if you have time to read, y’all.

the only obvious thing is that audible has top-notch readers and productions of audiobooks (some with full cast dramatisations), where some of the free or cheap ones have mostly good readers; give or take a few that i can’t/couldn’t stand. but alas, go and get some free knowledge and free books y’all! finally, the best thing about an audiobook is that it’s another voice in your house other than yourself (if you’re living alone or at home alone very often that is lol) and it also makes you feel like you aren’t alone, because there’s another voice around.

okay i know i’ve talked about all of this stuff before on here already; but here’s a more comprehensive post to deal with coronavirus/covid 19. feel free to skip it tbh because i go on about audiobooks etc so often lmao.

#life #about me #shut up ilona #ilona tries to give advice #im only posting this bc i posted it on fb lmao #ilona’a audiobook obsession and reading journey 2020

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expelliarmus · 4 years

Text

I saw that ask meme with questions for gif makers going around, but I felt like answering them all on my own lmao

1. What are your top 3 favorite sets you’ve made

This one, this one (if the timing works lmao), and this one (I’m so proud of my AU gifsets... where did all that creativity go??)

2. What is your least favorite set you’ve made

I honestly don’t know... I don’t think I hate anything I’ve posted though. If I don’t like how it’s turning out, I just won’t post it lol

3. Which of your sets has the most notes

The most notes ever is this one I think

4. A set that flopped but deserved better

I don’t know... there’s a bunch, but I’m fine if a gifset flops

5. What is your favorite movie/TV show to gif

DOCTOR WHO

6. What is your least favorite movie/TV show to gif

I really don’t gif anything else lmao...

7. Who are your top 3 gif makers

I’ll just pick 3 people off the top of my head :) @shatner, @melodyspond, @stupidape

8. What gif trend do you hate

The pale/black and white gifs that are so hard to see.......

9. What/who inspired you to start making gifs

I wanted to gif my favourite parts of DW that I didn’t see anyone else doing, so I was like alrighty, time to learn how to do this!! I think the people that inspired me are long gone from tumblr, or I’m no longer following them because they’ve moved blogs (Natasha aka lumos-maxima... wherever you are, I MISS YOU... also Courtney aka needlebug I MISS YOU TOO)

10. What was the first gif you ever posted

THIS ONE! I remember being so happy about posting it, haha. Also, I still love that Confidential episode so much. I miss my space hipsters...

11. What is that one set you made that just won’t die

The Zoboomafoo one

12. What is the most embarrassing thing you’ve ever giffed

Everything I’ve ever posted

13. Where or from whom did you learn how to gif

Various tutorials on here and just by experimenting. I don’t even think I used Photoshop to begin with, since back in my Neopets days I used Paint Shop Pro to make graphics so I think that’s what I used first to try making gifs of videos.

14. How long does it usually take you to make a set

45 minutes to an hour or so?? It’s been taking longer and longer because the screencaps are so huge though and my poor laptop can’t handle it.

15. Have you ever had gifs stolen and reposted

Yes, and don’t think that I can’t tell when those are my gifs, even without a watermark!!

16. How long have you been making gifs

Since 2011...... my god

17. 10 sets, 8 sets, 6 sets? How many gifs to you prefer in a set

As many as it takes!!!!! But usually between 6-8

18. For the aesthetic, for the laughs, or for the feels what your preference

For FUN!

19. What is your gifting process like

Open video, find scene, screencap, load screencaps in Photoshop, resize to gif dimensions, add colouring, curse myself for picking a hard-to-colour scene, continue adjusting colouring and become increasingly frustrated because it’s not turning out the way I want it to, give up, add text, save gif, POST!

20. Mac or PC

21. PSDs or original coloring for each gif

Original colouring. PSD who???

22. What fandom/movie/show/person etc do you gif the most

DOCTOR WHO and more specifically, David Tennant... I think his tag has the most :’)

23. What is the thing you gif when you don’t have anything else you want to gif

Any episode with Ten and Donna, or The Eleventh Hour, or the Day of the Doctor, or Blink

24. 480p 720p 1080p? What is the minimum quality you’ll gif from

I used to be all good with giffing 480p back in the day, but I guess now it’s 720p since the gif limits have gone way up.

25. Old dimensions or new dimensions and why

New dimensions because they look nicer on the dashboard.

26. How many un posted sets are in your drafts right now

ZERO.

27. Have you ever made a set, decided you hated it and deleted it? What was it

Probably at least one or twice, but I don’t remember.

28. Have you ever posted a set, regretted it and immediately deleted it

No, I don’t think so. I’m leaving my mistakes there for all to see!

29. Have you ever posted a set, realized you made a mistake later but it was already too late

Yes, I did this just the other day with that Missy, Bill and Nardole set. I got the dialogue slightly wrong lmao..... shh

30. How frequently do you like to post

I try to do at least one gifset a day if I can!

31. Do you schedule/queue posts or do you post right after you’re done

Right away. These gifsets are fresh off the grill.

32. What is your favorite tool/adjustment layer in Photoshop

Selective Color or Color Balance

33. Do you like to/can you make edits and graphics too or only gifs

Yes, I can do both but gifs are way more fun imo

34. A set that took you a long time/was really hard but you’re really proud of how it came out

I’m gonna say this one again because I was so proud of it when I made it, and I can’t believe I used to put that much effort into my gifs.

35. Do you change your giffing style a lot or do you have a set routine

I have a routine, as described above. My gifs are pretty much all made the same way as I describe in my colouring tutorial too.

36. Do you gif with something specific in mind or do you just wing it

Usually a mixture of both. I like to try to gif a different Doctor each day, so I’ll know who I have in mind but I’m not planning on a specific episode. I’ll just open up one of their series and go from there!

37. What sets if any do you have planned to make in the future

Idk, I was thinking of doing yet another gifset with Donna in it since I just finished her Big Finish series... but maybe I’ll do one with Eleven and the Ponds??? We’ll see.

38. What are you really excited to gif that isn’t out yet

The next Doctor Who holiday special?? :D

39. How often, if ever, do you delete old sets that you don’t like anymore

Never!! I love seeing how my gifs have slowly changed and improved over time.

40. Why do you make gifs

Because it’s fun, and it’s a way for me to relax after a long and busy day at work.

41. What is your least favorite part about your gif making process

When it takes forever for my screencaps to load, and when it takes forever for my gifs to save sometimes

42. How is your gif folder organized? Is it organized at all?

Lol nope.

43. Do you keep videos forever or delete them once you’re done giffing

I keep the episodes forever, but honestly I think I keep everything forever because I forget about getting rid of the other stuff like trailers and interviews... I should go through my downloads folder.

44. Ever had a gif become a meme? Would you like that if you haven't

I’ve had people use my gifs as reaction gifs and it is a weird feeling, especially seeing the gifs being used on websites other than tumblr. I remember seeing one of my gifs used in someone’s book review on Goodreads and I was like “WAIT THAT LOOKS FAMILIAR!!”

45. Ever gotten hate over a set

Not really hate, but I do get a lot people that are like “WHERE IS ______?” in their tags. And sometimes I just want to be like “Make your own gifs if you think they should be there!!!”

46. Ever gotten a really sweet compliment over a set

Yes :’)

47. Any advice for novice gif makers/people who want to start making gifs

Don’t give up!! Make gifs of whatever makes you happy, don’t worry about the notes too much, and use your tags! KEEP PRACTICING!

48. How would you describe your giffing style

I don’t know??? If someone else has a way to describe my style, then please let me know haha

49. How much would you say you’ve improved since you first started giffing

It’s been almost 9 years since I’ve started, so I hope I’ve improved quite a bit! :P

Well, that was fun. Congrats on making it to the end of this post!!! Now I will go make a gifset.

#personal #i hope the read more works for mobile people lol

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double-danganronpa-lost-faith · 5 years

Text

DDR:LF Progress Log

Hi everyone! Welcome to the first progress log.

It’s a post where I put all the things I’ve done for the fanganronpa so far that I haven’t posted anywhere; most of them are WIPs or Betas. It also works for me as a way to keep track of how far I’ve come.

Today’s post contains the following:

Character Bios (previously only available in the DR amino) and FAQ

4 WIPs of important CGs (well... more like 2)

3 Different types of Animation Tests

WIP/Beta of the GUI Design

Next objectives

If you’re interested in checking this post, keep reading it down below!

By the way, feel free to join the fangan’s discord server by going to this link https://discordapp.com/invite/aSd6PN4 ^^ with that being said, let’s begin the post~!

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Character Bios and FAQ

To start this blog AND this post on a right note, I’m finally posting on tumblr the character bios, which means you can now access to the information from each member of the cast of DDR:LF, which was previously only available in amino. You can find them in this post.

As for the other part, I wrote a FAQ with the main sort of questions there could be about the fangan. Feel free to give it a read here if you want to know about some basic stuff about the project, and if you still have doubts, please do send an ask! I’ll gladly answer it ^^

WIPs of CGs

You didn’t think that the only drawing I was working on were sprites, right?

In today’s post, here are some CGs WIPs that I didn’t get around to finish yet (since their priority is below the character sprites, but it’s a nice change instead of doing sprites 24/7).

First, the pre-trial CGs!

There are some expressions/positions that I might be willing to change, although that’ll come in later when I gotta sit down to finish these. But yeah, later. (Also, just to be clear, I drew these waaay back, so the designs might not match the current ones).

In a trial, depending the type of chapter, the 1st CG and 3rd one will switch places. The one that appears last will be the one that contains the protagonist whose POV we are witnessing.

Second, one of every prologue’s main CGs. “The killing game has begun!”

Looks of doubt and deceith are flying across the room! Who will make it through the end of the day? And who’ll be left behind~?

It might seem pretty basic without them being colored, but hopefully it’ll look better in the future!

Animation Tests

Man, this was a lot of fun to work on, and it was all worth it! I hope you all enjoy these as much as I did while trying to materialize these concepts!

#1 - Prologue Title Card

Every chapter of this story has a title card, just like the original danganronpa games. In the case of DDR:LF, this is more or less what each card will look like.

youtube

It’s kinda basic; elements being added to the screen here and there, as well as some silhouettes appearing.

What are these silhouettes, you might ask? It’s none other than the cast of the fangan, but it’s not just anybody who’s randomly picked. The silhouettes belong to the victims and the murderers of the current chapter, so for example, chapter 1 will have the silhouette of the 1st victim and the 1st murderer, but it’ll be modified enough for the silhouette to not be easily recognizable; nobody wants to get spoiled the deaths right at the start of the chapter, right?

Of course, the prologue is an exception... maybe.

A bit of the BGM was done by me, while some other elements of it were taken off from royalty free sound effects/melodies websites.

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#2 - Pixel Execution

As you all know, there’s always a pixel animation that starts off an execution. I have that too, of course! and in order to avoid spoilers + show you what I was able to do, I put myself in the place of the culprit. (I swear I didn’t kill off anyone yet... only after the fangan has started I’ll be considered guilty).

youtube

The background music was also composed entirely by me, although in the future it might change- but I don’t really know for certain, so get used to this for now :)

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#3 - Execution style test

I’ve recently downloaded the program Live2D, and what for? For executions, no less! After trying it for a while, I’ve concluded that it’d simplify my job a lot more than if I used sony vegas for animating the executions (not to mention it looks smoother with this new one).

youtube

For this test, I’ve used Seiji as my puppet. It might be simple, but it was to test out the limits of the program. It turned out really good imo! So I’ve decided to use Live2D to animate the executions (or at least, do most parts of them with it). I learnt some stuff while experimenting around with the program, so next time I’ll finish these sort of things even faster probably.

Also I put it on loop because a 2 second video is rather sad.

GUI Design

Now, I'll admit that I'm not the best at GUI design, but I tried my best to come up with my own design for the fanganronpa's interface, which I made based on a water-ish looking theme. The (not final) result of that is the picture below.

In case that you’re wondering, no, this isn’t any sort of canon conversation. It’s just the phrase I could come up with.

And yes, the background is from V3; I don't have any backgrounds at all for the project yet lol.

The sun and the fish on the top right corner will change depending on the time of day; but that's something that I'll keep to myself until the moment I start posting the story.

I have conflicted feelings with this GUI though, I don't know if I like it or not. It looks somewhat good but still off at the same time? Although it might just be me. If anyone has any feedback or suggestion for the GUI's design, the inbox is always open to receive such help!

So what's next?

Currently, I have loads of assignments at college, so it's kinda hard to make a balance between the project, social life and college work. However, the project is something that won’t stop.

The fangan has only one member, which is me of course; that means it’s going at a slow pace. I'm willing to make a recruitment for help, but that’ll be later once I have the basics to let someone else help me. If you’re willing to volunteer for this project, keep heads eyes up for the day I call out for help.

In the past, I tried to learn how to program with unity, but it’s hard to follow it up when the free tutorials are scattered here and there. When I have free time and everything art-related has been set up, I might try to pick it up again. I say might because I’m gonna start a tiny course for unreal engine at college. Maybe with the basics that they teach there, I’ll be able to do a better/quicker job than if I did it with unity (which I have 0 experience with). But the future is uncertain, so I’ll be the judge of that once I’m done with that course!

With that being said... as of now, the next objectives for the project (not ordered by priority) are the following:

Finishing Default Sprites.

I only have 7 default sprites done out of the 16 students, and I’m already working on the 8th. Half-way there?

Concept Art for each Room/Place.

While I have written down all the places in each dome, there are some that I need to draw the concept of the place, since the idea in my mind keeps changing them, I should settle them down.

Finishing Writing the Prologue and the Basics of Chapter 1.

I mean I already have like a half of these two things or more, but since I keep changing it, they never get any actual progress. Maybe I should learn to let it be as it is lol.

Creating 3D Assets.

Of course, I’ll make the 3D models for the rooms and props... well, I might do them; that is if I can’t find anyone that can make them. Pros of this is that I can do things exactly how I want them; cons are that it takes time and I’m not an expert in 3D modeling.

Trial GUI.

Class trials in danganronpa have a different GUI than the one used outside of them. We have a beta for the general GUI up there, now we need one for the class trial’s as well!

Concept Art for... a Trial Thing.

It’s no surprise that there are special things in fanganronpas, such as making changes to certain game mechanics, or creating completely new ones. The one I’m refering to in this case is a change to an already existing mechanic in the DR games. Can you guess which one it is~?

Splash Art.

During the first year of birthdays, I drew some sketches for the characters; those are the base for their future splash art.

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And last (and currently least important)

Recruiting Volunteers for the Project.

Obviously, I can’t do everything in this project by myself. In the future, once I have made a base for every ground of the project, I’ll recruit people that can work from there. Artists (GUI,CG and Sprite), Compositors, and 3D modelers are the ones that I’ll be looking for in this recruitment. In an even-later recruitment, I’ll make a casting call for voice actors as well. Please be patient though!

---------------------------------------------

I suppose that’s it for this very long post. It took more days than expected to put everything together, but at last I can release it now!

Now, June and July are pretty busy months at college, so unfortunatelly the progress will slow down a lot more than usual for the next few weeks. Thanks for sticking around this project despite the long road it has ahead! ^^

See you all in the next post! And if you read this entire thing, thank you for your interest in the fangan! <3

#progress log #double danganronpa lost faith #byu talks #wips #tests

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libraryofluna · 5 years

Note

Do you have any tips on how to concentrate more in class? I’m in college and I just finished my first year but I did absolutely horrible. I missed so many classes because I’d stay up until like 2 AM watching YouTube videos and barely got good grades or passed exams because I never studied because I just was too lazy I guess. I want to change these habits because I’m studying to become a pediatrician and I need to stop being this way but idk how. I get distracted so easily.

Hey Anon

I know exactly where you’re coming from, I’ve been there.Now is it laziness or an underlying mental health problem? I have depression and my grades suffered when I didn’t get treatment or didn’t care for myself properly. Sometimes symptoms of depression/anxiety can seem like laziness due to fatigue and lack of interest in things, but it’s a health problem. Maybe you have ADD/ADHD? I don’t know you and your situation, so you’ll know whether or not you need treatment/therapy or just some motivation. Regardless, therapy can help everyone and I always recommend it for anyone having a difficult time with something (no matter what it is).•Getting your sleep schedule on track is a really good way to stay focused in class. Getting four hours of sleep a night is a sure fire way to fail (Been there, done that). Make yourself go to bed at a reasonable time, YouTube will be there on the weekends. Try to get at least 8 hours of sleep. Eat properly as well, aim for as much of a whole foods diet as you can. I know college students are limited on food choices (at least Americans), so at least be sure you’re eating SOMETHING. Bring snacks with you to campus to eat before class. I used to carry cliff bars with me as they gave me a glucose boost and kept me full until I could get a proper meal later. It’s hard to focus when your stomach is growling and all you can think of is lunch. Caffeine can help, but in small doses. A cup or two of coffee a day when you are really dragging is fine, but I don’t recommend chugging pots of it or you’ll be so jittery you can’t focus. Exercise can also help. Stay hydrated! Drink water! Wear comfy clothes to class. Basically you have to take care of your physical needs because your brain is a physical part of your body. Being able to focus/study is related to how well you take care of yourself. Keep yourself as balanced as possible. •On days when you are tired and don’t want to go to class, go anyway. It’s tempting to stay home, but don’t. GO! Even if you’re late, 30 mins of a lecture is better than 0 mins. Something is ALWAYS better than nothing when it comes to college. I was notoriously late for my first class of the day, no matter what/when it was, but I still went and it helped to hear even a little bit of the lecture as I had a better idea of the notes/textbooks I would review later. GO TO CLASS!!•In class I found it helped me to focus when I would take hand written notes (unless my prof was a super fast talker). I’d have to pay attention so I could figure out ways to write short hand notes. Writing reinforced it in my head because I’m a kinesthetic learner. Figure out how you learn best and base your note taking on that. •When you’re home and you need to study, turn off the TV and put your phone on silent. You can download an app that will block internet access or certain websites for a set time limit. I’d leave my phone on the charger in another room so I would wouldn’t even see it. Don’t study on the couch or in the bed, study at a desk if you have one or a table, just some area other than a resting/sleeping place. Eliminate as many distractions as possible. •Get a planner. Schedule time to study subjects based on when exams are. Write down all your exam dates and start studying for them a week in advance. Section out study times. That helped me so much because I'd always forget when the test was, seeing the times written out with study slots helped me stay focused.•On days my concentration was bad, I’d study for 10-15 minutes, then take a 5-10 minute break. It’s best if you can study an hour and then take a break, but that’s not always feasible when you just aren’t feeling it. Again, a few minutes is better than zero minutes, something is better than nothing. •Make friends with the people in your classes. Hold each other accountable for studying the material. Review together. I know I’d study harder when meeting up with friends because I didn’t want to embarrass myself by not being familiar with the topics lol•Make a vision board and set a motivational picture for your phone/computer background. Have something close by that reminds you of your goals.

Lastly, (and I don’t mean any offense at this but…) how badly do you want to be a pediatrician? It ultimately all comes down to how much you want this. As a doctor, you’re going to have to put in a lot of work. Peoples lives will be in your hands. Start thinking of school in these terms, take it very seriously because the work you will be doing is very serious. I don’t know if you’re in America or not, I know some other countries you go right to med school after high school. If that’s the case, you really need to take your studies seriously as you’re learning how to care for people. If you’re American and/or have to go through undergrad first, you really need to take your studies seriously because getting into med school is tough. Either way, if you want it bad enough you’re going to have to reach deep inside you to that fire, that passion that sparked your interest in becoming a doctor in the first place in order to force yourself to get there. Bust ass now (in a healthy way) so you can get to where you want to be in the future.When I struggled to focus at my desk, I’d look at my vision board and think about how I needed to sacrifice some of my free time now so I can be set in the future. I wanted to get into this lab program more than I’ve ever wanted anything, so I let my desire for it fuel me to take better care of myself so I could perform better.

My brother and I always joke, like when we can’t open a jar or something, we’ll say “you gotta want it!” I started using that as a motivational phrase (and it makes me laugh thinking of my brother lol).You’ve just gotta want it.

You can do it Anon, you’ve got this, I believe in you!💚

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lingmaj-blog · 5 years

Text

2019

Happy New Year, everyone! It's currently ~3:00 am and I may or may not be fighting off some sort of illness but there's no time like the present for planning lol. As my first original post and first post of 2019, I'm going to list out some goals I have for the upcoming year! I posted all of these on my Twitter as well, if you'd like to see them there :)

Either go back to school or join the Air Force (or both). I can take the ASVAB and possibly the DFAB(I think that's the other test) when we move to Cali.

Start playing piano and flute again! I love music and would love to be able to play more but I haven't made it a priority in the past. I'll focus on piano to start with.

Study Japanese every day. Even if it's only a few new words, it will add up fast!

Do skin care every day. At the very least wash, tone, exfoliate, and moisturize! It doesn't take long at all!

Work out more;; yoga, meditation, a jog... I don't have to go to the gym every day! Something small like this can help me form healthier habits and build up my self esteem.

Save $5,000+ over the course of the year. I'm pretty sure there's a website/app I saw a while back that can help me figure out exactly how much every month I'll need to save to reach my goal. I've been spending way too much lately and I still have some loans to pay off that start accruing interest in February so I'll have to be a lot smarter about that kind of thing!

Draw at least a little bit every day. Even just little stickynote doodles are fine! A little bit of practice consistently makes for good foundations (I'm pretty sure. It can't hurt, at least!)

Start journaling. There are some prompt apps I can use to help me out and I don't even have to make detailed journal entries. One or two things about the day or some expectations and I'm good to go! With this, though, I'd like to start doing more creative writing as well. Since I recently got an AO3 account and booted up my old lurker FFN account (boof_floof and boof-floof, respectively), doing things like short stories that take maybe an hour or two to write and posting those every so often and then having a longer series with more detailed updates that gets new chapters regularly would be wonderful.

Get out more and make new friends when I move to California! Maybe find some community groups to join.

Get a dog!! This will have to wait until well after the move but it's still very exciting! Dunno if I'll be able to get to know it very well though if I'm planning to leave soon anyway; either military or school. :(

Read at least 2 books of any genre a month. I can check a few out from the library and read for a while before bed! I'll take them with me when I'll have to wait for things. I need to try to avoid using my phone as a time killer as often; being prepared with books should help me with that!

Study/Play Go daily. At least one game a day, either online or with my brother on our board. Joseki and Fuseki aren't super important, but they're a good little bonus bit of study that doesn't take a lot of time commitment. I have a bunch of videos downloaded on YT that I need to watch as well, so I might as well make it "watch one lecture video a day and play one game a day". Then I can fill little gaps of free time with fuseki problems!

Do the 100 days of productivity challenge! I'll do my best to have them be consecutive days but that might not happen so I'll make it by goal to complete the challenge by June! That way I can do it at least twice over the course of the year :). Since I've had a hard time disciplining myself since I graduated, I'm looking forward to that feeling of accomplishment at the end of every day that comes with knowing that I got things done!

I'll be documenting my 100 days of productivity challenge progress here, as well as daily or periodic updates concerning my other goals. Here's to 2019 being a better year; a year of self-improvement and dream actualization; a year of emotional and mental wealth and security!

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nameslife · 2 years

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📝🎤🌤🎤📝 . . . ⬅️ Swipe Left ⬅️ . . . The written words are an excerpt from a verse off a verse I wrote back around 2011...(If you like this kind of rhythmic/heavily visual poetry... go follow my poetry page @poetiv8tion . . . . The audio in the video clip is from "IN".. an unreleased track I recorded around 2011-2012. Produced by @maestagram140 from the UK (One of the illest producers I know). On this joint, I was basically talking to anyone trying to intimidate me/take what I worked so hard to achieve. Promising them one hell of a fight lol. I'll be releasing this on my first (and last) curated playlist project entitled "Finale". This will be the first ever project I actually PROMOTE correctly. It will be available for FREE DOWNLOAD only on my website. The site is still under construction but it's coming ridiculously soon. . . . Thanks for your time. . . . N-A-M-E-S (at Shining) https://www.instagram.com/p/CXMcUhJlfZs/?utm_medium=tumblr

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biancasiercke · 6 years

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What are some good techniques/practice animations one can do to get better?

I recently joined “Animated-buzz”. It’s a website where artists can help each other by critiquing artwork, animation and answering questions. Daniel Marinca recently asked a really great question. Namely: “What are some good techniques/practice animations one can do to get better? (Besides practicing squash and stretch?”) I took some time to answer the question and thought I would post the answer on my tumblr as well. Please note that all of us, professional and student alike are always striving to improve. I am therefore by no means saying that my answer is perfect. I’m simply hoping to give back to the community. A huge credit to where I am goes to the incredible mentors I had and the amazing people I worked with, that shared their knowledge and experience with me. I would love to give back to this wonderful medium in any way I can :)

Practicing animation.

This is always a hard question to answer, because it's such an open question. Each artist/animator is in a different part in their journey. One thing I would say is; try not to take on too much at once. I know it's really tempting to want to do a 10 second dialogue scene that has both physicality and acting, lipsync, and possibly multiple characters. Don't rush, you'll definitely get to animate those kind of scenes, but when starting out it's really great to do small exercises and learn from them. This way you can focus on one little thing and learn it well, then apply what you've learned to a bigger exercise later. Also it's always great to think about what it is that you're trying to learn from each particular exercise that you're doing. I don't know if it can help, but I'll write down a bunch of different ideas for exercises you could do. See which ones you are drawn towards, but don't feel pressured to have to do any of them. I'm just trying to generate some ideas for you :). I always tend to write a lot because I love animation so much, so be prepared for a long message lol 1) I know everyone hates the bouncing ball, but it's actually a great exercise. It teaches you spacing (as well as timing). How do you slow an object down and how do you speed it up believably? Learning this can be applied to how the hips of a character move, as well as many other things. If you have done the bouncing ball already, try to make your ball feel like a rabbit jumping. Then try to make it feel like a frog. What is the difference in spacing or timing. Does one need more hangtime, or is the difference in the take off? 2) a simple character jumping. iAnimates has a really nice simple character called "tots". It's pretty much a ball attached to a spiral/slinky, with a plank of wood attached to the bottom. If you can get a hold of a simple character like this and then making them jump, teaches you things like "overlap" and how different objects that are attached still move like they act as one character. It also teaches you about weight and follow through. I don't know if similar characters can be found on other websites for free. 3) an eye blink A blink can be pretty involved when you really shape the contact between the lower and upper lid. There are some pretty cool videos online analyzing blinks. These are two that I found on youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtYccevwDNY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73jRo4fwU3I&t=161s You could even expand on this exercise and animate a double blink, or a sleepy blink. Always ask yourself, what's the difference between the one I just animated and this new blink. How has the spacing and timing changed. 4) A foot lifting off from the floor in a walk. Things to think about when you do this exercise - when the heel has lifted off and is about to touch the floor, how does the foot roll down? (As animators we should never generalize, but most often the outside of the foot touches the floor first) - What kind of rotation does the food have when it's lifting up. Is the big toe the last thing that touches the floor? - how do you not make the foot feel broken. What kind of angles should you avoid. 5) Make the character go from a standing position, to bending their knees, and then getting up again. (you could just animate one leg) (just focus on the character from the hip down, don't worry about the upper body for this exercise.) - What is the angle between the foot and the upper leg. For parts of this movement they're going to be parallel. (this is similar to what happens in an animal leg) - how does the knee move? Does it simply move up and down, or does it veer away from the body and then comes back in? - how does the hip move? Does it drop first, does it get pushed up by this movement? 6) Lifting an arm, possibly elbow first, then stretching out and then bring it back down. (either controlled or loosely with weight) - when does the actual shoulder kick in when you lift your arm. - how do you make it feel like the arm is not driven by the hand (which sometimes can happen when we use IK) - how do you make the arm feel like it has weight. - what kind of an arch does the hand have in this movement. - what kind of an arch does the shoulder and the elbo have. - how is the hand rotating and dragging 7) a head looking around. - how is the head movement related to what they eyes are doing. Or if you want to ignore facial animation just see how a head moves around. If it turns to the side, does it start with Rotate Y, or is there some Rotate Z and X that happens first. - how do you make it come to a stop without it feeling stiff. 8) a walk cycle - (You can do a walk cycle as a treadmill or walking forward. ) Start with a generic walk cycle that doesn't have too much personality. - Analyze how the hips move. How many frames are near the top and how many frames near the bottom. What is the spacing like when you go up or go down, is it the same? What is the spacing as it moves side to side - What is the tilt of the hips when you lift of your leg off the floor? (normally the side of the hip that has the leg lifting up will drop, but this depends how high the leg lifts). - What kind of rotation is going on in the hip? - How do you give your character weight. Is it because of the spacing in the hips? - How does the foot take off? How does it land? - How does the foot travel as it passes the standing leg? Does it come closer to the standing leg, or does it move further away? - what is the relationship in the chest rotation to the hip rotation. How do they move up and down to create a fleshy overlapping motion - How do you create overlap in the head - How do the arms move in a walk. Is the shoulder leading the action? What is the elbow doing in relationship to the wrist. 9) Make a character start to move from a still position This is such a great exercise. I know it sounds simple, but there are so many small things involved. To be able to pick up the one leg, your body needs to shift. What happens to the rotation of the hip when you do that. Your body needs to lean forward to get you moving. Does that movement start from the chest, or from the hips? To move forward, is there a tiny movement back to "anticipate" that movement? 10) Make a character come to a stop from a walk. You have similar complicated things happening when you stop moving. How do you create a fleshy overlapping feeling when a character comes to a stop. What art the hips moving. Are they going up and down, left to right. Are you leaning forward or leaning back? For both this exercise and exercise 9, it's great to film reference of yourself from the side. Then if you have the software analyze the video by drawing a single straight line from your pelvis all the way through to your chest. Treat the trunk of your body as one shape and then see how your body is leaning forward or backward to start to move or to stop moving. 11) lipsync How do you create appealing lipsync, that doesn't have too many mouth shapes but still reads as what the character is saying? What kind of archs does the corner of the mouth travel in? Where is the biggest up and down in the jaw? (one great way to test this is to put your hand under your jaw as you speak. It makes you more aware of what your jaw is actually doing as your speaking). There was also some test animation done for Paranorman, to figure out what mouth shapes various characters would have. I believe the file is downloadable. If you can, try to export the sound file separately and then import the video and audio into a program like flash, after effects or even Maya. This will allow you to scrub the animation with the audio. It's a great way of analyzing what choices the animator made to archive at the final result https://vimeo.com/48783829 Another really great video to watch is "Animation Mentors" Spacing and Timing webinar. I love watching this video at least once a year, because it has so much great information. You can find it on their website here. http://www.animationmentor.com/resources/webinars/timing-and-spacing/ Lastly, another very important thing to consider is to study “acting” or better said “life”; as animation is about conveying a true performance. (if you're interested we can go into this more in detail in another answer) I hope this was not overwhelming to read but hopefully it gave you some exercises that you might like to try, or if not that; then some insights into what questions you can ask yourself when doing exercises. If any of you have any questions about something I wrote don't hesitate to send me a message. I'd love to help in any way I can :).

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purplesurveys · 4 years

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997

survey by deirdrelove

What is today’s date? October 26th.

Do you have any plans for tomorrow? Just work. All weekdays are for work.

Do you wear perfume or cologne? Usually, perfume. I have colognes too, but I like the scent of my main perfume far more so that’s what I choose to wear most of the time.

What kind of computer are you using? I have a Macbook Air.

What colour is your mouse? I haven’t used one in years. A trackpad has been reliable enough.

Is it sunny outside? It’s not. I’m not updated on the news but I think we’re supposed to have a really powerful typhoon pass by for the next few days, so the wind has been violent and howling all morning. Some of my co-workers have had power outages at home only used their mobile data today so yeah, it’s not looking too good. I’ve closed my windows for the meantime so that they don’t smash just in case the wind blows too hard.

What has the weather been like lately? It’s been very cold all weekend because of the rain, but it also gets humid every now and then. Still, it’s cold enough for me to turn off my fan all day which is good enough.

When was the last time you cried? Last night, I think.

When was the last time you sincerely smiled? I don’t remember. Maybe last night or yesterday afternoon.

When was the last time you laughed freely? I can’t tell you. I really can’t remember when the last time was. I’ve chuckled here and there, of course; it just hasn’t been hearty for a while now.

Do you eat breakfast regularly? No. I only have a cup of coffee so that I can get properly awake for workkk.

Do you take vitamins? Not regularly.

When was the last time you took aspirin or some other pain reliever? Saturday. I had a headache and was feeling a little dizzy so I had to take a Biogesic.

When did you learn to tie your shoes? Kinder 2, when I was five. One of our ‘exams’ was for the teachers to check if we can already tie our shoes, so my grandma had to teach me. I’m super awful with my hands though, and to this day I still struggle with tying my shoelaces and I still take longer than anyone I know.

What was your favourite grade in elementary school? 5th was fun until things fell apart by the end of it; 7th was great throughout.

Do you like clouds? I like when it’s cloudy, but I don’t lie on the ground and look at clouds.

What colour are your shoelaces? I have several shoes, but I think all of their shoelaces are white.

How many states have you been to? 0.

How many different countries have you been to? 6.

When was the last time you deeply regretted something? September.

Do you go to other people for advice or do you deal with things on your own? I like hearing what my friends have to think because whenever I’ve done things on my own I always fuck it up one way or another, and that sensation gets tiring at some point. Having other perspectives and voices helps as well.

How long was your longest relationship? 4 years.

What is your favourite brand of gum? I don’t have one considering they all lose their taste after a few chews. Whenever someone has gum and shares a piece with me, I just take it regardless of the brand.

What is something that you regularly wear that makes you stand out? I don’t know if I have anything like that. I hate standing out, anyway.

Do you own a debit card? Yuh.

A credit card? Nope.

Are you in debt? I am not.

When is your birthday? *sigh* Again, April 21st...

How old will you be? I’ll be 23.

What kind of cake is your favourite? Cheesecake! Flourless chocolate cakes and red velvet cakes are also great.

Do you prefer small birthday parties or big ones? For parties held by relatives I like them to be big, because it’s always nice to reunite with distant family members that I never get to see. With friends, small and intimate parties do the trick for me.

What song are you listening to now? No music, and I have a YouTube video paused.

Do you download illegal mp3's? I used to convert YouTube videos of audio tracks into MP3, if that counts. I never directly downloaded MP3s though; I always heard horror stories of those things containing viruses or the downloaded file not even storing the actual song.

What was the most traumatic experience of your life? [trigger warning] Being the main witness to my drunk grandfather beating the ever-living shit out of my infant cousin in his stupor when I was 9, and bearing the responsibility to tell that cousin’s mom, who was cooking dinner. I’m pretty sure I aged like 15 years from that moment alone.

Have you ever lost a friend to drugs or alcohol? No.

Who was your childhood best friend? Angela.

Are you still friends now? Yeah, for sure. I just asked her for dyeing tips an hour ago.

If not, why?

Are you sitting at a desk right now? Yes.

Are you eating or drinking? Nope, but I’ll be having dinner in about an hour or so.

How many surveys have you taken today? This is the first one.

Have you ever made a survey? No. I’m not the best in coming up with interesting random questions, so I’ve never given it a shot. Others are way better at it.

If you haven't you should. Its fun. =] I’m sure it is, but I really don’t think I’m creative enough for it.

Did you ever have any sort of collection? Nah.

Do you believe in Karma? I don’t subscribe to the entire concept as it’s defined in Hinduism, but yeah sometimes I’ll refer to its more informal description whenever someone does something that upsets me.

What do you thinks happens to us when we die? Permanent sleep.

What age do you think you'll die? My late relatives all passed between the ages of 70 to early 80s, so maybe by then. But idk, I hope I get my great-grandma’s longevity (she died at 95) because I’m still competitive when it comes to age and I wanna make it to that high a number, ha.

If you knew you had one more month to live what would you do? Well first I’d give out a sigh of relief because thank fuck. After that I’d probably spend the whole month eating all my favorite foods and traveling, at least to the cities that are now accepting visitors. I’d write down instructions for Kimi so that he’s properly cared for, give away my stuff, try to see some friends before it all ends.

About how long was the last book you read? It’s around 600 pages but I’m barely 50 pages in.

Have you read any books by V.C.Andrews? I don’t think so.

Have you ever read a play before? Yes.

A play not written by Shakespeare? Yes.

Have you ever read a play outside of school? Yeah, I have.

What is one career you don't think you could do no matter how much it paid? Engineer.

Would you want to live in the country or the city? City, without a doubt. I like the countryside and it’s certainly relaxing, but I need things to be constantly going on; I like my environment to be hectic, be loud, be busy. Too much quiet isn’t good for me.

Do you prefer large cities or small ones? Large.

Do you/Did you ride the school bus? Yep.

If not how did you get to school?

Do you have iTunes on your computer? Yeah but only because I’m on a Mac and I’m not sure if I can remove the app from my laptop. I haven’t used iTunes since high school though, and if I could I’d get rid of it.

Have you ever edited Wikipedia? Yeah, when I was like 10 lol. It wasn’t to mess around with an entry though; I saw an inaccuracy and genuinely wanted to help out.

Have you ever edited any other wiki? I’m sure I edited more than one page.

Is there a website [besides social networking] that you check almost daily? I don’t think so.

Are you procrastinating? Nope, all my homework for the day’s been done.

Do/Did you make good grades in school? In college, yes. I paid less attention in high school and my grades occasionally showed it.

What is your relationship with your parents like? It’s very casual and not very deep at all. I don’t confide in them, and the thought actually makes me squirm. I’m still skeptical of my mom and I don’t let myself get invested in her after the hurt she’s put me through in the last few years, but at least we don’t yell at each other as much anymore.

Do you have a better relationship with one parent than the other? You can say that. I get along better with my dad.

Do you look like your mom or your dad? Mom. But for some friends, my dad.

Do you write things on your hand to remind yourself? This is what I did in high school, but I haven’t done it since.

Do you use your phone as an alarm? If I need an alarm, yes.

Do you listen to music while you sleep? Nope, but similar. I turn on videos because talking sounds make me sleepy much faster.

Do you get scared when you know some virus or sickness is being passed? I mean if it’s like a plague then yeah, obviously. But to connect this question to today’s situation - after getting used to Covid stats and seeing the ratio of those who die from it vs those who end up healing from it, I’ve highkey stopped being afraid of it lol

Are you realistic? Yes.

Do you sing in the shower? Nope.

#survey #surveys

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mustafa-el-fats · 3 years

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in: Featured, Heading Out On Your Own, Money & Career, Networking, Professional Skills

Brett & Kate McKay • August 9, 2012 • Last updated: September 23, 2020

Managing Your Online Reputation

This article series is now available as a professionally formatted, distraction free paperback or ebook to read offline at your leisure.

All the basic life skills we’ve covered so far in this series have been things that your dad, and even your granddad, had to learn when he left home for the first time too.

But today’s young man faces a new challenge that Pops never encountered: managing his online reputation.

Despite the nascent nature of this skill, I truly believe it’s one of the most important things we’ll talk about in this series. As the line between the offline and online world gets increasingly blurry, your online reputation is your reputation. Before you meet your freshman roommate, before you pick up a date, before you shake the hand of a potential employer…you better believe they’ve already Googled you, already formed a first, first impression about you, your interests, and what kind of person you are. Thus, if you’re not careful and conscious about the content you create online, you can end up shooting yourself in the foot in all areas of your life.

Heading Out on Your Own…And Into a Fishbowl World

Leaving for college or another kind of adventure after high school has long been an exciting and heady time. It’s an age where you’re experimenting with ideas and values, testing new freedoms, meeting new people, and often changing your mind about who you are and what you want out of life. One week you feel one way, and the next you feel another. During this process you often make mistakes, and do bone-headed things that twenty years later will still make you wonder, “What was I thinking?”

Just a decade ago, only you, and a few of your closest friends, would have held the memory of those crazy and sometimes cringe-worthy moments. The only record of them could be found by digging up a private photo album or journal.

Today…it’s a whole new ball game.

Now, everything you do and say can potentially become part of your permanent and public record. Everybody’s got a smartphone and can snap a picture of you anywhere, anytime and post it online. And things that go up online about you and from you can remain there forever. Mistakes you made when you were just 19 can haunt you for the rest of your life. Being a young man used to mean you could entirely reinvent yourself by moving to a new place and making new friends, but now your online reputation will follow you wherever you go.

I don’t mean to sound all doom and gloom about it. But that’s the sobering reality of living in the Internet Age, and it doesn’t help to bury one’s head in the sand and try to whatever that reality away. It absolutely doesn’t mean that college can’t still be the fun, spontaneous experience it’s always been; it just means you need to take a conscious, proactive approach to taking responsibility for what parts of that experience end up online and in the public eye.

Why Is Proactively Managing Your Online Reputation So Important?

One of the greatest things about the internet is that it is a giant pot that people can both add to and take from. This puts the most enormous wealth of knowledge in human history right at our fingertips and provides an endless amount of inspiration that can be added onto and “remixed.”

The downside of the big internet pot, is that the moment you put something into the pot, you pretty much lose all control over it. Many viral embarrassments have started out as something someone just wanted to share with a few good friends. But those friends shared it with their friends, who shared it with their friends…on and on until it ended up on Tosh.O.

There are essentially no guaranteed take backs when it comes to what you put online. You can erase your Facebook status, blog post, comment, tweet, or video, but someone else may very well have already shared it, copied it, taken a screenshot of it, or downloaded the video and reposted it somewhere else. How websites looked on a certain date in time are captured and archived on sites like the WayBack Machine (take a look at AoM circa 2008!). Emails that you thought you deleted forever can still sometimes be retrieved, and just because you deleted an email doesn’t mean the person you sent it to didn’t archive it. If someone else wants to post something of yours, you may not be able to get them to take it down without suing.

All of which is to say, pretty every piece of digital content you create can potentially exist forever. And this digital record can be accessed by any of the 250 million internet users in the US, not to mention the 2 billion online all over the world.

What’s on that record can have a big impact on both your personal and professional life.

Your college’s admissions office may have Googled you when they looked over your application. As soon as your freshman roommate knew you’d be bunking with him, he Googled you. When you network with someone at a party and tell them about your great idea, they’ll Google you later. And 81% of singles say they Google or check the Facebook page of someone before meeting him or her for a date.

Even though only 7% of Americans think their online reputation influences hiring decisions, in reality, 75% of US companies have made an online screening a formal part of the hiring process, 85% of recruiters and HR professionals say that having a positive online reputation influences their hiring decisions, and 70% of recruiters say they have rejected candidates based on something they found about them online. And since those numbers come from a study done in 2009, they’re undoubtedly even higher now.

What kinds of online discoveries cause recruiters and HR personnel to push your resume to the trash? This chart shows the most common red flags employers look for:

As you can see, it’s not just content you create that employers are checking out, it’s stuff your friends and colleagues post too. Be careful who you associate with.

Some young folks may be tempted to respond by saying, “Well, if a company is going to reject me for posting pictures of my drunken revelry, I wouldn’t want to work for them anyway.” But that’s pretty short-sighted. I’d venture to say that these companies aren’t rejecting candidates so much because they like to drink or swear, but rather that their willingness to show off these behaviors publicly shows a lack of judgment and wisdom. Not at all an unreasonable assumption.

The information that new friends and potential employers can find about you online may not even be true. Some people will try to verify it, some will not. And what they see will often come without any context – maybe you were being funny, maybe it’s an inside joke, but they won’t know that, they’ll simply make immediate judgments about what they find. This is why when it comes to managing your online reputation, you must be both proactive and defensive — deleting anything inappropriate, wisely choosing the digital content you create, and purposefully creating positive content about yourself.

Self-Reflect Before You Self-Reveal

“Young people in particular often self-reveal before they self-reflect. There is no eraser button today for youthful indiscretion.” –James Steyer

There are some practical ways to manage your online reputation, and we’ll get to them in a moment. But the first step in taking responsibility for your online presence is creating a mindset for how you want to approach your online life.

Matt Ivester, the author of lol..OMG! (despite the silly-sounding title, this is actually a great book, with solid advice from the guy who learned about online reputation management firsthand from his misadventures in founding Juicycampus.com), suggests three questions to ask yourself before you put something online:

1. Why are you doing this?

Why? This is the most important question of all, and one that unfortunately usually goes unasked and uncontemplated.

Today’s colleges are welcoming the first “digital natives:” they’ve never known a time when the internet wasn’t a huge part of their lives. And even for those who are old enough to have used encyclopedias for elementary-school research papers, interacting and participating online has become so ubiquitous that it’s hard to imagine that life was ever any other way. This is just how things are, and we do what everyone else is doing, so much so that we hardly ever ask why we are doing those things. Once we do start asking why, the answers are surprisingly hard to come up with and articulate.

Why do you update your status or share a link on Facebook? Do you want to share news? Are you bored? Do you want to be thought clever? Are you trying to make someone else jealous? Do you want to see if people feel the same way as you? Why?

Why do you care how many likes or upvotes something you submit on Facebook or Reddit gets? Is it confirmation that you shared something with value? Why?

Why do you leave comments on blog posts? Do you want the author of the blog to know that you appreciated the article? Do you think you have the insight to add that might help another reader? Do you want the author to know how and why they are wrong? Why? What do you hope to accomplish? Do you think it will change their mind? Is it because the psychological angst you feel when you think someone is wrong needs to be discharged? Why?

Why do you participate in online forums? Does it provide a feeling of camaraderie? Do you like to hear others’ opinions? Why do you respond when you think those opinions are wrong? Why do you care what a stranger thinks about you? Why?

When you ponder the why behind creating any kind of online content, from a status update to a YouTube video, you may come up with a reason that you find satisfactory and worthwhile. Or you may find that your motivation is hard to make sense of and decide it’s not worth your time. Either way, by asking why, you’ll become what Ivester calls “a conscious creator of content.”

2. Is now the right time?

The internet creates a perfect storm for impulse control: at the same time that it actively solicits impulsive communication and make satisfying those impulses incredibly easy, it makes taking back the results of those impulses incredibly difficult; it’s easy to hit “send” or “submit,” and quite hard to un-send and un-submit something.

Facebook asks, “What’s on your mind?” while Twitter wants to know “What’s happening?” They owe their existence to people’s desire to share their thoughts, videos, and photographs – and they need to be constantly fed to survive and grow and make money. And blogs (including ours) want to engage readers and build community and so ask for comments. The internet is set up to encourage you to share whatever thought crosses your mind, and taking that thought from your cranium to the walls and screens of the digital world only takes a few clicks.

But just because you can share your thoughts on impulse doesn’t mean you should. Not only because you probably haven’t thought through the why behind wanting to share first, but because strong impulses are usually born from strong emotions: anger, depression, and grief, or from chemically-altered states (like being drunk). When you spout off and share personal feelings while emotional or trashed, you will likely come to regret it once those strong emotions fade or you sober up.

The best thing to do when you feel you’re dealing with an impulse to put something online that you might regret later, is just to sit on it. The internet creates a false sense of immediacy, giving you an overwhelming feeling that you have to respond now. But what you’ll find is that something that felt super urgent and mega important to say in the moment, will seem totally pointless when you wake up the next morning.

One method I use to thwart impulsive responses is to imagine myself living before the internet. If I feel a burning urge to tell the author of an article what a chucklehead he is, I think of reading a magazine in the 80s, and how I would have had no outlet to express my opinion about it besides writing up a letter to the editor or talking to my wife or close friends about it. Or if something annoys me and I want to rant about it on Facebook, I think of a time before Facebook when I would have had no choice but to keep my rant to myself. It makes me realize that just as sharing whatever crosses your mind wasn’t necessary then, it’s not necessary now. The fine-folks of the 80s, while they made some questionable fashion-choices, weren’t any less happy than we are now that we’re able to shout what we’re feeling and thinking to everyone 24/7.

3. How controversial do you want to be?

The younger generation (including those my age) was raised with a lot of rhetoric about how special and unique they are, how important it is to be “authentic,” and that it’s good to be “transparent.” This can lead folks to throw caution to wind about what they share online because, “I’m just trying to be me! And if other people don’t like it, they can bite me!”

But just because you can now display your opinions and personality to a greater number of people than ever before, doesn’t mean you should, or that the more you share, the more authentic you are. Going back to my suggestion of thinking about life before the internet, people used to only be able to share their quirks with a close circle of family and friends, and they weren’t any less themselves than we are (actually they were probably more themselves since they didn’t get instant feedback on all of their quirks).

Examining the meaning of authenticity isn’t within the purview of this post (although it will be a future series), but suffice it to say for now that the ideal for many of the great men of the past was not transparency, but sprezzatura – only revealing themselves to others slowly as a relationship of trust developed. You may want to “be yourself” by trumpeting your religious, social, and political beliefs online every chance you get, but if those meme’s you keep flooding Facebook with is the only thing new acquaintances know about you, they may decide they don’t want to get to know you before they even do — they’ll miss the complexity of your character that would have shown through over time…that you’re both a liberal and a rabid gun owner, or a fervent Christian and a scientist, or a zealous vegetarian and a Marine.

The three questions above can go a long way to helping you judiciously choose what and what not to post online. A final question to consider is what the general public might think of the content if for some reason what you post went viral or you were suddenly thrust into national prominence. Would it embarrass your family? What impression would a stranger have of it? You and your friends might think it’s funny, but would others find it offensive? You never know who’s going to see your post, what’s going to be dug up on you later, and who might be looking at your phone.

How to Manage Your Online Reputation

Managing your online reputation involves both deleting content you don’t want out there and creating content you do. Follow the steps below that Ivester and others have suggested, and complete each step right after you read it. This is the kind of thing that’s easy to put off indefinitely. Do it now.

1. Google yourself.

Before you can know what actions to take to manage your online reputation, you need to know what’s already out there. To do this, first deactivate Google’s customized search – when you typically do a Google search, the results Google brings up are based on things like your location, what you’ve clicked on before, and things your friends like. But you want to see what would come up if someone else searched for you. Here’s how to take off the customized search feature.

If you have a common name like “Rob Smith,” then search for your name with a qualifier like, “Rob Smith St. Louis,” or “Rob Smith Tulane University.”

After you look at Google’s results for you, check out other search engines like Bing and Yahoo as well.

When you look at the results that come up for your name, try to imagine what conclusions someone might reach about you if they had no other context for that content, and knew nothing else about you.

2. Try to remove content that you don’t want showing up in search results anymore.

After you do a search for yourself, it’s time to try to delete things that showed up that you’d rather not have out there anymore. Maybe you signed up for an internet forum with your real name. Maybe you left a comment on a blog post under your real name. Maybe you wrote a review or a blog post that you now feel is too controversial. Some of these things you can delete yourself.

If you can’t delete something yourself, like a blog post comment on another person’s blog, then try to contact the owner of the site to see if they will remove it for you. They may or may not, but the nicer you are about it, the greater the chance of them helping you, so make your request as civil and appreciative as possible.

If you can’t find the contact information for the site owner, try the site WHOis. Website registrars are required to publish the contact information for the person who registered the domain. Oftentimes when you look up a site on WHOis, you’ll find that the owner has decided to keep their direct contact information private and have instead given a proxy email address. Either way, your email will end up in the same place.

Understand that even if you’re successful at removing the offending content from a site, it may take a few days or even weeks before it’s reflected in search engine results. Also, understand that the offending item really hasn’t “gone away.” There’s a chance that it has been archived on the WayBack Machine. Remember, what’s put on the internet stays on the internet forever.

Moving forward, be extremely judicious when using your real name online.

3. Proactively create a positive first impression online.

Your best bet in managing your online reputation is proactively creating positive content about yourself that pushes the bad stuff off of the first few pages of search engines. Set up accounts with large social networking sites that typically rank high on Google and other search engines. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google+ profiles are often on the first page when you look up someone’s name. Set up accounts with them and post stuff that you’d be proud to have your name associated with.

The best thing you can do to ensure positive stuff associated with your name is at the top of search results is to start a blog and update it regularly. If you can, try to secure a domain name with your given name for your blog. What should you write about on your blog? You can publish your resume (redacting phone numbers and addresses, of course), write posts sharing insights in an expertise you might have, or use it to create a portfolio of your work if you’re a freelancer. Whatever it is, make sure it’s stuff you want associated with your name.

Cross-link your blog and all your social networking profiles together: put your link to Facebook and Twitter on your blog, a link to your LinkedIn profile and blog on your Facebook account, and so on.

Even if you don’t plan on using Twitter or Google+ or even putting anything on your blog, it doesn’t hurt to have your name registered with those accounts and domain. You don’t want some Joe Schmo mucking up your good name with a bunch of crazy online antics.

4. Adjust privacy settings on Facebook and clean up your Facebook Profile.

To ensure that potential employers or love interests only see the best of you when they look you up on Facebook, make the following adjustments:

First, take a look at how your profile page looks to the public. If you see any information visible that you don’t want strangers to see, make a note of it.

To change what’s visible on your profile page, click “About.”

Click “Edit” on the next page. On each segment select “Friends” if you don’t want anybody who’s not your FB friend to see a particular piece of information. For networking reasons, I’ve left my job and school information visible to the public.

Visit the Facebook Privacy Settings page and adjust all your privacy settings so only your friends can see photos and status updates you make.

On the privacy settings page, update what your friends can share about you under “Timeline and Tagging.” Enable the ability to review and approve posts or photos that you are tagged in before they’re published on your Timeline. You can also disable Facebook’s tag suggestion when your friends upload photos that look like you. You don’t want your name tagged in an unflattering photo or post.

While you’re on the privacy settings page, limit who can see posts from the past. Even if you used to post everything publicly, this will retroactively make those posts private.

Review the photos that you’re tagged in and untag yourself from any unflattering photos. While you’re at it, you might ask your friend to remove the photo if it’s something you don’t want out there. Even if you’re not tagged in the pic, it could come back to haunt you.

Leave groups and unlike pages that may be seen as controversial…or just dumb. At least set the privacy settings on them so only your FB friends can see the pages you like. how.

5. Be more conscious of what you share and whom you share it with on Facebook.

Ask the three questions we covered above before posting something on Facebook. That will save you a lot of grief.

Also, take into account if what you’re about to share is appropriate and relevant to ALL your Facebook friends. You don’t need to share your weekend plans with your old boss and former professors. In real life, you adjust what you talk about depending on your company — do the same on Facebook. Create lists on Facebook for close family/friends, acquaintances, professional colleagues, people that are the same religion as you, people you enjoy talking politics with, etc. Before posting something, ask yourself if this is something all your friends would be interested in or is better for a specific list of your friends. And even if you’re only posting for a list of close friends, still keep in mind what others would think if that status or photo got shared with people outside the list. It could happen.

6. Create strong passwords for your accounts.

If the recent story of tech writer Mat Honan’s online life being completely demolished by hackers doesn’t motivate you to strengthen your online security, then I don’t know what will. Create strong passwords for all your accounts and change them every six months. A strong password is at least 8 characters long and includes at least one special character (&!#) and both upper and lower case letters. Your passwords shouldn’t be the same for all your accounts. To manage all your passwords, use an app like LastPass.

To reduce the chance of getting hacked, enable two step authentication. Here’s how to do it on Google (if you use Gmail) and Facebook.

7. Use passwords on your laptop and mobile devices.

An unattended laptop or mobile device provides a devilish opportunity for friends or random strangers to mess with your online life. I know several people who had to do a lot of scrambling to recover from an offensive tweet sent from an unattended iPhone by a mischievous friend. Avoid that. Enable password protection on all your mobile devices.

8. Set up a Google Alert for your name.

Keep your finger on the pulse of what’s said about you on the web by setting up a Google Alert for yor name. Just enter your name as a search query and Google Alert will email you a digest once a week (or daily if you want) of all the new content that’s hit the web with your name in it.

Conclusion

The internet is an amazing educational, social, and networking tool — you just need to use it wisely. Using it too little can be just as damaging to your personal and professional life as using it too much. Be a “conscious content creator” and use sound wisdom and judgement in deciding where you personally want to draw the line between your public and private life.

Any other tips on managing your online reputation? Share them with us in the comments (only after asking yourself why you’re commenting and making sure it’s the right time, of course)!

Going Undercover: How to Protect Your Privacy Online

Being a Gentleman in the Age of the Internet: 6 Ways to Bring Civility Online

Escape the Algorithm!

3 Ways You Should Never Start an Online Comment

16 Ways to Support the Art of Manliness in 2016

How to Support and Follow the Art of Manliness

Tags: Heading Out on Your Own

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