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rococospade · 8 months

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Have some Letho attempts, in oil paints(!)

Art, life and cat updates under the cut.

Art update:

I’ve opened commissions again for the next two months (October-November 2023). The last one in my queue is nearly finished, and I’m excited to share it — though I’ll have to crop the tumblr version substantially. I’ve also been working on tutorial content for digital painting. Monie’s been poking me for years to do one on sheer fabric, and I’m trying to edit that between other tasks. I’ve thought about doing one for scars as well — is there anything you struggle with that you’d be interested to see a tutorial or tip-sheet for?

In terms of personal work I’ve struggled to connect with my digital painting in the last few months, so I’ve been working more with traditional mediums. I love watercolour, I’ve been fiddling with my oil pastels since I don’t want them to go bad (they keep for about 3 years past opening, apparently) and I’ve wanted to try oil painting for years. Last week I finally took the leap and bought some water soluble oil paints: pictured above is my first attempt with them.

Oil paints are slippery little bastards — I had a teacher tell me “it’s like painting with colourful mud” over a decade ago when discussing them, and that sort of prepared me. I finally get it. They move constantly, even if it looks dry it’s likely not, I have no idea what I’m doing, disposal is a pain, I am wrong at every step, and I love them. Oil painting looks so cool! It’s so much easier to rework than acrylics! This is not always a good thing! I’m having a great time :)

Naturally, upon getting a new and notoriously difficult medium, I dispensed with looking up guides (surely things I watched or read months and years ago are sufficient for right now?) and sat down to screw around with the paints a few evenings ago. This resulted in a muddy mess even with a limited palette, but I’m a toxic goblin who doesn’t learn, so I shrugged and started working with the muddy tones to try and fix it.

@silverscalestudios was kind enough to give me a quick and dirty explanation on workflow when they found out what I was doing. Thank you again for that! I spent a while last night reading about various forms of underpainting because of you, and will give brunaille a try. I knew underpaintings were a thing but I didn’t know *why* or how important they really are — it didn’t occur to me the oil colours would be so transparent. Hopefully the next picture will be a little bit neater as a result of your intervention — thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me about it!

I found some useful videos on YouTube as well, but I’m struggling with colour temperature shifts. Some studies might be in order.

As usual I’m not satisfied with anything I do for long. My current goals are to learn more of the body’s simplified muscle groups, simplify my compositions more, and make more illustrations with character interaction as the focus. Also, I guess, to gain some competence with the mediums I’m playing with — but that’s a bonus more than a goal. Oil pastels especially are just so pleasant to work with that even if I hate the result, the process is too enjoyable to complain. And failure is how we learn.

Potentially useful tip, buried for anyone who read this far: assign yourself studies for the projects you’re currently working on. This took me far too long to learn, but if you struggle with doing general studies for the sake of them, do them to prep for a specific painting instead. If you suspect something will be difficult (the hand gesture, the colour scheme, lighting, expression, whatever) grab or make some ref and doing a couple of studies, so you can fail quickly and make ugly versions. It’s a huge timesaver when it comes to the final piece. My big, detailed paintings usually take 10-20 hours, so I’d like to get any difficult elements sorted before I start whenever possible.

For an example of studies for a painting: the four roughly scribbled Letho’s in coloured pencil on this post — those were done after I had my composition sketched onto the canvas, to figure out what I wanted to do for colours. And I’m glad I did! I tried the analogous scheme on a whim, and if I hadn’t done this study, I’d have played it safe and gone with a mostly neutral palette. Next time I’ll also do some lighting studies so I have a detailed plan for those before I start painting. Traditional media in general involves a lot more concrete planning than digital, and working with it is underscoring how many bad habits I have — especially with massively reworking paintings mid-process.

I did have a photo reference I was using for this painting (one of the images from the rogue warrior reference pack by Noah Bradley) with the lighting and hair modified to try to resemble something I’d seen another digital artist do, and by awkwardly tilting an asaro head in my kitchen to figure out how the lighting would work. There’s a relatively common lighting scheme in anime-esque art where just the tip of the nose is lit. It’s cute, but playing with the asaro head, I found that the top half of the area around the mouth should also catch at least a bit of light. The lighting ended up being repainted into something more standard for this, but you can see the triangle of light on the upper mouth area in the wips.

Life update:

Well, it was a nice run, but spouse and I finally caught corona last month >< that was horrible. I got lucky, in that I only had for a week or so and it was a mild case. Now I’ve mostly recovered except for a cough. “Mild” is still probably the sickest I’ve been in my life. Do not recommend. Will be going for the booster as soon as I’m able to, I do not want that shit ever again.

I’ve been doing a bunch of new things like sashiko (satisfying), trying to make pie crust (hard! But delicious, and the ingredients are cheap enough that I don’t cry over failure. Please give making pie crust a try, if you haven’t, it’s really not that complicated — the recipe I’m using only calls for 3-4 ingredients, and it’s so versatile. We’ve had like four quiches in the last week and a half) and trying to cook more. Adulting is hard. I’m also considering more decorative embroidery attempts, because I’m reentering my goth phase and want to customise my clothes with little mushrooms and skulls :) it would be cute.

About the cats:

Cloud is cancer-free! She has to get rechecks every three months, but the little monster made it. She celebrates by trying to sleep with her butthole on my face, which is terrible. I love her dearly. I wish she would stop with the butthole thing though.

Sheik is currently taking her turn as the cat with medical problems. She couldn’t eat for a few days and the vet rushed us in when we called. The vet came in and informed me that she wasn’t eating… because she had gas. It’s in her small intestine, which isn’t supposed to have gas in it for cats? Good job, you little weirdo. She’s getting further checks or it this month.

We also adopted an adolescent cat. He’s bonded very well with Tez, whom our other cats — well, they don’t hate him, but they’re a bit aloof. Tez is very big and a bit like a bowling ball with teeth, and most of our cats are old (or Jetta, who is full of bitter hate) and do not appreciate being tackled by said bowling ball. The kitten loves him, and Tez seems much happier for the company. He’s more gentle with kittens than adults. Not all of the cats are thrilled, but our oldest queens have accepted the kitten, so it should be smoother sailing from here. Unfortunately they like to play at 8am, so I am suddenly on an adult sleep schedule for the first time since working from home. Nothing like a teenage cat launching himself onto your abdomen to get the day started :) They were yelling at each other as I typed this, but now he’s laying beside me like a prince. … and attacking my cardigan. Nevermind.

Currently trying to find more ways to install cat climbs and enrichment, since we’re running out of corners for cat trees. Debating the merits of a cat run — we have very tall walls, which is neat but also I don’t trust these guys not to fall off. If we could spring for a modular system that would be neat.

If you’re getting two cats, pro tip: get two with similar coat patterns but different sizes. You will hate yourself. It’s very funny, and you can disorient any house guests!

#Rococo rambles #personal #rococospade art #Long post

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chaoticrobotics · 10 months

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Please don't rush your comics take it slow and steady I know many people are eager to see more from your comics but please don't forget your human you need to take breaks from time to time art burnout isn't a joke I myself was once a artist and i quit that because it didn't bring me much joy anymore because of excessive burnout so please from one artist to another Take a breather maybe plan what your gonna do for the story going forward maybe take some inspiration from the game or something though whatever the outcome I will honor it.

Oh don't worry about the story itself. I have it all planned out and am absolutely not changing it (other than possible dialogue changes, I have the major plot points all set though). So that's not the issue.

It was the actual art itself. You are right, art burnout isn't a joke, and honestly I'm pretty sure I've never been closer to quitting art than when I was making Security Alert. The only difference with me is, art is one of the very few things that bring me any sense of joy. It's literally either a select few video games, or making art/stories, and at the time of making Security Alert I was in a video game burnout too and struggling through college.

All of that built up to make me miserable to draw and probably super depressed looking back at it (though I wouldn't hit a true low until my last semester, if I was still trying to do the comic then I don't think I would have made it).

Anyway, thank you for your words. I do appreciate them! I am going to take my time with this comic. Maybe even try out a different format or something. Smaller parts or less detail in the art. I just want to get the story out, and since I am not a writer, I have to draw it. But I'll definitely be taking my time when drawing it.

I'll be honest, I don't know how many people might have realized it, but I am a serial procrastinator that needs deadlines to get shit done, and I get stuff done all in one go or not at all. So all those big parts I posted? Those were all done in basically one sitting. Some of them were done in 3 days with me getting a total of like 3-4 hours of sleep on the weekend, not even counting the editing I did for videos. So you can probably see why I started to resent the comic and start to burn out from it.

I'm literally just rambling now, but I wanted people to know a little bit about what I went through since I know not everyone will be as understanding as you or other people who have sent in kind words to me in the past. I've learned my lesson then, and since I am not in college anymore, I won't feel rushed to get things out before the weekend is done or be rushing myself to make people happy.

It honestly all really sucks because I was always so happy to post the comic/tiktok and pass out finally, then to wake up to a flood of nice messages. But it would all too soon go away because only a day (sometimes not even) after posting people would be demanding the next part. It just sucks since I did have fun a lot, but also had that fun drained away just as quickly.

I don't even know what I am trying to say anymore. Thank you for the nice words. I will keep to my word about not rushing myself or pushing myself too much. I do feel like I am, at some point, going to try doing what I did before and pull all nighters and fuck up my sleep schedule drastically, but I'm hoping I will recognize the signs this time and take a step back once I possibly start doing that.

So don't be upset (saying this to the general audience/whoever reading this, not specifically you) if at some point in the future, if the comic does continue, that there might be another hiatus. Will definitely try not to go on a basically year long hiatus like I did last time, but depending on how my mental state is, it might be a pretty long one.

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srarlight · 2 years

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Just how exactly do you juggle so many skills/disciplines at once, and do you have any advice on how do so? I've been trying to improve at art/music/editing for years and haven't made much progress, so the fact that you're way above average in all of those (way better than most people who just do one of those things) is utterly mindblowing!

Hey there!! ahaha this is quite the nice ask! I am happy to hear you think so! ;v; I left some thoughts under the cut!

For me it's usually been an experience of seeing something I like, and wishing there was more of it and realizing if you want more of that thing or vibe, sometimes you have to make it your self and then getting pretty dang tunneled into the idea of making it -v- Juggling everything in my free time hasn't always been the easiest, something will always pop up and slow me down, but I tend to get so easily excited by ideas, that I end up with enough hype for a project to keep going for loooooong periods of my life, even if that means get only a handful of hours here and there to work. Something I have done is try and set time aside to learn and although it doesn't always end up happening on the days I want, having a little, "lets mess with editing or music day" helps me form habits.

As for how it started, I love multi media, so if I wanted to make videos with art and a little motion + music and editing, that kind of forced me to try and learn a little of everything. When I was trying to pick up a new next skill set, the first hurtle was always the program and figuring out all the ins and outs. I've spent a lot of the time learning just on forums and tutorials to get past what I consider the first huge initial hump of- "how do I get this technology to do anything I want it to??? so many symbols and buttons for which I have no idea what they mean or do". After I finally brute force my way through that, it comes down just to the artistry of it which is usually harder to pin down. I don't usually have a strong initial idea of how to replicate a good aesthetic and draw/write/edit it to look how I want at the start. A lot of that just comes down to research and looking at lots of examples of similar projects with vibes I like. Seeing how other things sound or look and aiming to try and make my own version of that thing and being okay if the project is a little off, but I still got some aspect of it how I wanted so that'll make it all the easier for the next project.

But if anything for advice, I feel like the reason I've been able to keep at it for so long out side of my brain just tending to get fixated, is that I tie learning a skill set to things I really enjoy. So my personal stories or projects, not aiming to have it be a lively hood or built to appease a certain crowd. It's like hitting two birds with one stone in my mind and can be properly encouraging to keep digging in and seeing what else I can try. I can learn in a safe no stakes environment making pmd stories or other content that's mostly to push my own enjoyment-buttons. Come flaws or struggles, that thing of my project exists now cause I gave it a try hah. I found that slowly, but surely if I keep up studying examples I like while making my own thing, eventually more informed detail and aesthetics emerge.

I have no idea if this information is helpful, but it's how my life has been with art for a long while! Thank you again for the nice ask ;v;

#asks #text

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therealraeweber · 2 years

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I present to you, a somewhat-wonky little After Effects edit where I tried to make my eyes look like Castiel!

I made this little video with the goal of seeing if I could create the effect I wanted purely with my pre-existing knowledge of After Effects, and not use any of the tutorials or pre-made effects that I would usually rely on. I was pleasantly surprised with the outcome I got here, even though it was a bit of a struggle.

I got in the mood this evening to do this, so I set up my studio and quickly filmed some clips to use. I originally thought I would be editing my eyes to look like the Scarlet Witch, so these videos were a bit more Wanda-like than Cass-like. While I was editing, I had a lot of trouble getting the look Wanda has, so I opted for Cass' look which is a bit more simplified. I'm hoping to use this type of effect once I finish my Cass cosplay (which will hopefully be soon... the wings are killing me a little bit).

One of my dream jobs is to work in VFX (yeah... I know how those artists are being treated rn... it's unfortunate but this is a medium I would really love to work with professionally so I'm going to keep working towards it for now), but I am still very much a beginner. I was really hoping that being at art school would teach me the skills I need to go into this line of work (especially since I've been taking video art and digital media classes), but they've been kinda letting me down in this area. Mostly in class we just cover the artistic concepts and meanings, and nothing technical (which is what I struggle with and actually need to learn). So this leaves me in a sort of weird position where I don't really know... how to learn this stuff.

This took around 1 hour to edit, so all things considered it's not bad. This is definitely something I want to try again soon when I have more time to sit down and work out the proper way to do this style of effect. VFX is my Everest. I will climb it.

#after effects #video editing #supernatural #Castiel #I don't know what I'm doing but at least I'm trying #this was a fun little experiment

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grandmagbignaturals · 2 years

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venting

Very little makes me as nervous as the question “will I ever be able to earn a living?” Not “will I ever be able to earn a living doing something I love” or “making art”. Just. Earn a living. Full stop. Last day job I had I burned out hard due to my disability and mental illness. Neither of those things are going away. So I make my games and stream and I'm trying so hard to work in a way that is sustainable to me. But it's kind of hilarious how much work it is to establish that kind of baseline. As a direct result of the above, the twitter bullshit going on right now stresses me out. Twitter is my biggest audience. Just over 500 followers. an average of about 5 interactions per tweet. Right now my biggest priority is building that audience. Not so that I am popular, not so that I get clout, just so I can make a few dollars and pay for my medical care. If twitter really is imploding, bam, that’s my audience shaved down by about 400-450 people. I have a few over 100 followers on tumblr, a few under 50 on twitch. About 65 on instagram (and god knows if those are real) and a similar number on tiktok. In a very real way, this is going to impact my ability to grow. And here’s the thing about growth. There are shitty ways to achieve it. There are pretty ok ways to achieve it. Reality is, the best way to achieve an audience is to be beautiful and well connected. One or the other will do, to a point. I’m starting from neither. Which leaves me, realistically, with the shitty ways. And I say shitty hear to mean two things. 1) shitty to other people, using people, attacking people, manipulating people, straight up conning people. Or 2) shitty to me specifically, as a person whose brain is about 40% self loathing on a good day. Feigning enthusiasm makes me want to die, most engagement farming exhausts me, and my adhd locks video editing behind a barbed wire fence. Tiktok isn’t for me, I’ve learned pretty conclusively. I don’t like the way people have to act, and I’m not good at that kind of acting. Streaming I’m finding much more comfortable! But struggling to build an audience on twitch. And maybe five out of a thousand people are making a living on ttrpgs alone (and fuck, I am not going to be one of them without the ability to do my own art or go to conventions, no matter how good my writing is.) So the question remains: how am I ever going to earn a living? And the answer remains: I have no idea and it terrifies me. I know I’m far from the only creator in this situation. Far from the only disabled person who has no idea what to turn to. It doesn’t stop being scary because I have company in my fear. I’ll work something out eventually, or I won’t. But i’m going to fucking suffer getting there.

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golbrocklovely · 2 years

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I fully agree with you, if he hasnt walked a mile in another person’s shoes, someone who hasnt had it easy, hasnt lived a life of privileged or had that cushion where he knew if he fucked up he could easily move back with mom and dad, then he has no right to tell people how it is and how its supposed to be based on what he’s read off self help books. Its not like he spent years helping malnourished children in a extremely poor part of the world and went “wow these people with so little still manage to be happy by doing this”, no he bought philosophy for dummies and ran with it.

Personally i think the people that preach the most like he does are trying to convince themselves they are happy, so they go on these rants and spiels trying to convince people it should be like this or that because that is how their life is currently like and because they really aren’t happy. Not to sound like a jerk because i’d kill to have that life where i can be my own boss, follow my own schedule, and my biggest headache is “i need to edit & film” and not “how the fuck am i going to pay rent”, but Sam is over here complaining about editing all the time and how “its starting to feel like work”, yeah im not gonna feel bad for you buddy when you’ve had the means to hire editors and a team, no one told you to disassociate from friends or move and buy A second mansion and just abandon the first one. His issues are rich people problems and for him to have the audacity to say we shouldn’t put all our joy into vacationing!!! When the majority of us cant afford to travel every other week like him is absurd.

The same way Colby gets called out for the littlest things, i WISH someone would call him out and tell him if he feels like ranting to go to a therapist first and then if he still can’t scratch that itch, to actually take the time to get out of his comfort zone and learn about people and society instead of being so generalized with his thinking.

i don't think he would have to go that far to understand struggle. but i do think weirdly he can come across with a lack of empathy. i think he genuinely cares, but i don't think he fully grasps how bad some ppl have it. hell, even i to some extent don't. but bc my lows have been deadly to some extent, i care for those who have struggled more than me, bc i could barely make it thru.

and you nailed it right on the head. i think internally he struggles to find himself, to find things that make him happy, and bc of that, he tries to project this air of "i'm so happy and you can be just like me if you follow along." and it's just… not realistic.

i personally believe that regardless of life circumstance, you can still bitch about how life feels. even they have bad days. my issue is that maybe venting to us isn't the best way to go about it. go vent to your influencer friends who understand you gripe. i will say tho, when they do complain, they also immediately follow it up with "but we don't really have all that much to complain about" so… win some lose some lol

but i do get your point that they could easily hire someone to help take the stress of editing out of their life, but instead don't forever whatever reason bc they want someone they can mold into the perfect editor for them.

side note, and not related to this at all, on xplrclub they talked about how they might be hiring this one editor who's gonna basically do sam's half (or at least help out with that half) and i'm just like…. WHY THAT HALF??? they bitch constantly that they don't want anything flashy that a lot of editors do now-a-days, so clearly they want control on the back end of the editing. why not just hiring someone to cut the video up and make it make sense, and then the two of them can split between the music, subtitles, transitions, ect???? that would be SO much easier. also i basically said at this point they should just hire a fan to edit bc even i at this point could make a video like theirs lol

anyway back to your ask

oh yeah, when he talked about not living for things like vacation and trying to find happiness or positivity in the mundane, i get it. but like…. wrong messenger. you can actually afford a vacation. some of us can't and will never be able to. so like, if we some how miraculously can, shut the fuck up and let me enjoy it sksksks

highkey i would love for snc to both go to a therapist. like, i just know they need one. we all do tbh. but at least they can afford to go to one.

#ask #personal

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jdyriot · 1 month

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I was trying to remember my life as a teenager and all I can remember is a creative trying to navigate the world with art as her guiding light.

As a little kid, I didn't remember much, but from what my older cousins had told me, when I am left with a pen, everything is a canvass for me. Even if it means drawing on my own skin.

There was even a time that I proudly drew bugs bunny on MS Paint when I was at my mom's office.

As a little girl, I was focused in competing academically in school. I was always the 2nd but never the top 1. It never bothered me and I knew I just had to do my best.

Kinder-Prep (4-6), Grade 1-6 (6-12 yo)

As a teenager, this is the phase where family issues were coming in and so at random times I cry in school without telling my friends what it was really about. They know me as a happy-go-lucky girl but in reality, they didn't know how much I was struggling internally. In class, I still excel especially in Math.

I did became a gamer. I was spending time & money on playing Ragnarok and even attended events with my "guildmates"

HS (12-16 yo), College (16-20 yo)

Deciding on what I really wanted as I grew older, I remember getting frustrated not being accepted in the top universities I applied in but I was grateful having a chance in UST as a waitlister for Communication Arts course, my 2nd choice even if my ultimate goal was to enroll for any Math-related course which I knew I was very good at. I was in my 2nd year in college when I finally let go of chasing this goal.

My dad bought a secondhand film camera from his friend. I learned how to use it and instantly fell in love with Photography, learned videography, then became good at editing. I have always been artistically inclined and loved navigating the world visually. I had became fond of sharing my overly edited photos online, sharing my thoughts through a blog, and becoming part of groups to make documentaries.

In our batch I was one of 3 who knew how to edit videos.

TV5 (20-26), AM (27-29), Freelance Editor & Producer (29 onwards)

At first, I thought I'm gonna be a cinematographer then came opportunities for TV Production I became a Tech PA, then Post PA. I was pretty happy with all the TV Shows I became part of.

In general I was really grateful for how I have grown in this industry.

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fanofbirdsflying · 2 months

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kpop idols (groups) vs. live singing: a constant fight in fandom:

the video below is a music show performance from the 2nd gen girl group jewelry

youtube

why am i showing you this video?

with every generation choreos in kpop have gotten more and more difficult (generalization) and dancing became more and more important. and while this might make performances more exciting on the one hand, it also impacted live singing of idols on the other hand. with every generation it feels like, plain live performances are more and more difficult to find. we now have to play detectives to figure out if the performance we're watching is a lipped version of the studio version, a pre recorded live taping of the idols singing the song without dancing, how loud the backtrack is in comparison to how loud the mics are, if filters and pitch correction is used on the mics and whether or not the audio was heavily edited in post production before the performance was uploaded.

jewelry wasn't known as the greatest vocal group of all time, but they were a liked and recognized group. only 1 member, the one in the pink skirt, among them was famous for "not singing well/not knowing how to sing". the vocal performance of an idol in 2nd gen who was known for not being that good, feels like an average and sometimes even decent vocal performance of the following generations.

this song, i really like you, doesn't have the most difficult choreo, but most members in the group are able to move while also delivering decent vocals.

in kpop currently it feels like dancing and visuals are the most important thing, while singing feels like an afterthought. idols are constantly given songs that are too difficult for them to perform, whether it's just singing the song standing still or singing the song while also executing a difficult choreo. for some idols and groups the right move would be to tone down the choreo so that they can try to do their best with their vocals. for other idols more time taking actual singing lessons with good vocal teachers would help. some idols just need to work on their stamina. some idols just need different songs that suit their singing and skills.

we've have now reached a point in kpop where asking for decent live vocals is "a big demand". "you guys are never happy. when they lipsync you complain, when they perform live and make a few mistakes, you complain. you just want to hate!" is what a lot of fans of idols whose singing was criticized say. and it's true that there are ppl like that in the kpop fandom. but it's also true that a lot of idols just struggle with singing, and singing THEIR OWN songs and parts. this is a an issue. this is an issue of an idol and their respective company. part of managing an idol is to give them the right tools so that they can perform well. what i want from idols is to sing their own songs without being scared. but they know that they don't have the skills so they are scared when it's time to sing live without backtracks or audio correction/editing etc. part of an idol's job while performing is to sing, so they should know how to sing a little. nobody expects ppl to be whitney. having off days or making mistakes is normal too but there is a general skill issue with many idols. sometimes it feels like the idols spent and spend more time learning how to dance than how to sing.

i am aware that within the korean entertainment world there is a distinction between singers (for example park hyoshin, ailee) and idols. singers have the reputation of being skilled while idols have a reputation of being untalented, which is actually really sad. it takes a lot of skill to sing live and dance but it's not necessarily recognized as such because lipsyncing has become the default. (i totally understand when lipsyncing happens sometimes because of vocal rest, being sick, lack of good sound tech etc.) but again not singing live is normal now.

#th #Youtube #kpop #kpop live singing discussions

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puttlesculpts · 5 months

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Step 6: Build the skull mask, ruminate a lot. Blender pt 5

With the hood in a good enough place to move on, I wanted to see what it would look like if I used the premade skull mask I had found. As the existence of this post implies: it didn't looks very good!

Never even took a screenshot cuz I nixed that idea so quickly. Which was great, because it was a sign that I was getting more confident in what I could do and the sudden idea of making a mask from scratch was no longer daunting. So I mads a few references and set out to "trace" the model via a flat image and editing the primitive in the isometric views:

Took a screenshot as face-on as I could but still had to skew + mirror it in PS cus ya boy's face is pretty angled. At least the profile is easy to just rotate.

Anyway, here it is with the images placed for Optimal Isometric Modeling:

What you don't see here is the struggle to figure out the best way to actually trace things. Ya I could have watched a video, but at some point you just gotta play around with it on your own. So I ended up taking the woodcarving technique and moving all the vertices to where they needed to be at the most important angle. In this case, in Front View, where I moved everything to the exact place I needed it to be on the x/y-axis, which left most of the sculpting to happen on the z-axis.

This was ALSO the first time I ever deleted faces, something which I forgot I could do, and was much easier than my original plan of just sinking the unneeded surface into his face lol (should probably go back and do this for some of the boot parts)

The mask itself presented a pretty good set of challenges from the previous endeavors, especially with the more natural and rigid nature of bone. I feel like with the cloth of the pants/hood I was able to get away with a little less precision, as there is an inherent unpredictability to the way cloth falls which would not be too noticeable so long as I implied weight well enough (something I was conscious of and played around with :^) ), but the skull portion has a very distinct look with the shapes and shadows.

The mask also needs to be a balancing contrast to the otherwise soft nature of the surrounding cloth pieces. I am wary of my sculpts looking uncanny due to being too smooth and play doh-y (like how the Sims 3 sims looked lmaooo), which is where the skull would come in. I do plan/hope/am praying that brushes will help toward the end to give things a bit of a lived-in feel, and I know there's a way to add additional 3D textures similar to how you add 2D ones, but that was something I briefly tried to do in the past with no luck. In spite of that, I am confident I will be able to figure it out now that I've learned so much more about what I am actually doing in Blender.

With all that being said, the teeth killed me lmao

When I made the general shape of the mask, I thought about just using the mouth portion from the original model I was gonna use. However, that gave me a whole nest of problems on its own. Mainly these huge fucking clusters of vertices:

They made Blender super slow, hoping between edit/object mode was a nightmare, and applying a modifier was a guarantee like 5 minutes of no response. And I spent a good amount of time and troubleshooting trying to fix this (including decimating the geometry, attempting to remove this entire back side + extruding, mirroring, etc) but at the end of the day I just decided it wasn't worth it.

This was a major factor in my decision to started moving away from remixing existing models. I realized that I actually do care about the amount of control I have over them + with each successful part I made, it would make each borrowed one feel that much more out of place.

So major character development here: I am officially gonna axe any plans I had for borrowing models! Except for the skull pauldron, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there lol

Anyway, here are the steps I took trying to make the teeth work before decided to JUST include the teeth and do the rest of the sculpting post-print in epoxy.

I ended up using someone else's teeth tho cus I tried making my own via extrusion (looked bad, look like those lil square gums) and sculpting.

Turns out idk what teeth look like and I could not be bothered to do the entire reference process, especially when I KNOW someone out there probably made a perfectly good set of individual teeth. And someone did!

Anyway, I refined the mask further to give it more shape and will probably continue to work on the teeth as I progress onto other pieces. Who knows, maybe I will eventually gain the skills and confident to say fuck it and just make the entire mask in 3D too.

Up next: Additional head details, maybe the straps on his chest? Gloves pt 2? The BIG cloth wraps? tbd tbh

Sneak preview of the extra details + o ya I learned how to add simple colors cuz it was getting difficult to see all the different lil light gray pieces on his head, but then I got carried away and did the whole body

#blender #sculpting #progress #d4 #rogue #the colors are nice #makes him look a little less like a mannequin #but def makes it more obvious when i forget to unhide his eyeballs

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ten10dou · 5 months

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Sunohara Kokona

This is my 2nd illustration this new year and the reason it took 2 weeks to finish this is because I was also animating and editing a video I'm going to upload on youtube (please subscribe lol). I actually am really in love with how this turned out like I find her really cute and her pose proudly showing her pencil is just so cute. I'm still kinda struggling with the hair but not with the clothing folds as much. In fact drawing the clothing folds for this was so fun, triangle is the answer. I also find that the sketching part was a little bit easier for me even though I didn't draw continuously which is surprising because I actually felt I improve a bit even when I didn't draw.

I'm not quite sure if I can still finish a fully rendered illustration every week because I am also trying to do video editing and animation besides my day job. I am also trying to do a lot of things to improve my life this new year like a new year's resolution. I want to manage my emotions more which is actually going great because in the first few days of this new year I learned about Taoism. I saw a book called the Tao of Pooh but did not buy it which is a shame really, I should have plus I also have continued my exercise routine which makes me feel so good, I can't even explain. I also need to fix my sleep schedule because I've been staying way too late either drawing, animating or editing. Also need to lessen my phone use and mindless scrolling online. I want to improve on my art more. I also am planning on posting a quick art of pastries, foods or flowers with girls on a daily basis apart from my weekly posts.

#art #illustration #blue archive #Sunohara kokona

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itsjustjoshua · 8 months

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A trainwreck of my emotional state

Honestly, I'm having a hard time trying to word this. I don't want it to come off as an "Oh, pity this person", but I also don't know what I want it to come off as. I would also like to note that I am not su***dal, just struggling with perfectionism and a shit ton of self-hate and self-doubt

hate having nothing to do and having no one home around. It makes me feel so empty inside, and I turn to distractions. YouTube no longer helps, and neither does playing games. I feel like I know exactly why. I want to be somewhat out there online, and I don't want to be just the one playing the games. The hardest part for me is then getting the motivation to start/learn, as I just see more and more people out there. Who would want to play a shitty game made over a week, or watch a video on a topic when there are others on said topic with 200% higher production quality. These thoughts just completely make me lose interest in doing anything, and the cycle repeats. I desperately want an out to the cycle, but... I can't even get started. Any project, be it a game or video, I end up scrapping due to someone else doing it better. I want to talk about things that interest me, but I have no clue how to edit a video and do research on shit. For game dev, I have zero art skills for assets to be made by myself, and no money to hire anyone for assets, and zero time to even sit down to learn (Thanks American schooling system, I owe you one). We end up back in the cycle of wanting to do shit, get started, see someone do it better, then scrap it. It also doesn't help that if I can't do something perfectly the first time, I completely scrap it, and never touch that thing again.

I want to be free from this cycle of hell that I'm trapped in. Nothing seems fun anymore as I'm reminded that I want to be the one making these things, but whenever I get started, the feeling of "someone else has done it better, no-one would want to play your shitty game/watch your shitty video" comes on, and I delete it. I want to start. I want to get out there. How I will, how long it will take, and what I will start with, I do not know. This "I want to start" feeling will probably go away the moment I do start a project and it will get scrapped, so the cycle will once more repeat. I feel almost as if there are no options, and I am stuck in the cycle.

There are two things I've noticed I need to learn, Music-Making and Asset Creation for game design. The hardest part for me is, again, getting started. My slight perfectionism doesn't let me do anything unless it's, I don't know how to describe it well so this might make zero sense, an absolute masterpiece, Camellia-level stuff, in assets and music, which I don't even know how to make. This perfectionism and self-doubt/hate telling me that I'm never going to be capable of anything decent makes me not even want to start, again throwing me back into that cycle.

Another struggle for me is dealing with criticism, from others and myself. I know it's natural to have criticism, everyone needs it to improve, but for me, any bit of criticism, and I feel like the entire thing was absolutely god awful, the worst shit has ever been made. Most times the criticism isn't even from other people, it's from myself. Even if people are saying great things, I will still find and beat myself over every little thing, even if I don't want to. What is scaring me is what I will feel like when I start and work on bigger and bigger projects, if it ever gets there. How will I be able to handle others' reactions, and most importantly, how will I be able to handle myself?

Is this a cry for help? No, but also yes. I want to get started. I want to get out of this perfectionism, and self-doubt/hatred. I have some game-making skills, but I feel as if it's not enough, as if I'm worthless in this area and should just give up. I have noticed that my biggest hater is not someone out there in the world, but myself. This has been something I've been struggling with for a while, but now that the internet is more within my reach and I can start making things, these feelings have started to become not the most controllable.

I have no clue how to end this trainwreck of a post about my emotional state right now. (Any resources, be it mental health stuff, tutorials for art/music, or assets n shit ill take it.) Hopefully in the next 2 months ill have been able to start breaking the cycle and getting out there. See you in 2 months, if anyone even reads this.

#emotional trainwreck #gamedev #emotion dumping #self hate #perfectionism #mental health

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your-dietician · 2 years

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Katie Sturino Shares Story About Ramsay Hunt Syndrome

New Post has been published on https://medianwire.com/katie-sturino-shares-story-about-ramsay-hunt-syndrome/

Katie Sturino Shares Story About Ramsay Hunt Syndrome

Around the same time, I shared a video of myself with Bell’s palsy on social media. Having facial paralysis made eating difficult and suddenly I found myself chewing differently to compensate. I could no longer blink my one eye, which made it dry and painful. At night, I had to tape it shut to sleep. It felt scary and vulnerable to share this information with others, but I strive to be open about my life. Even though I felt a strong impulse to hide how I looked and retreat into the shadows, I didn’t. While hearing words of support and learning more about Bell’s palsy helped me as I coped, I also hoped that by sharing I would help normalize Bell’s palsy and other facial differences. And, it helped me feel less alone when I heard from so many people who experienced Bell’s palsy, Lyme disease or autoimmune conditions. So often, women in particular have invisible illnesses and they’re struggling without others having any awareness of their experiences. I hoped that by sharing what I was going through, it might help some people feel less alone.

By Saturday, my ear had become so swollen that I visited the emergency room. The doctor confirmed that I had shingles in my ear. They weren’t visible when I had gone to urgent care. Taking all my symptoms into account, including a negative Lyme disease test, my doctor determined I indeed had Ramsay Hunt syndrome. This diagnosis sounded wild — like so many others, I had only ever heard about it when Justin Bieber said he had it.

While I am grateful I received a diagnosis, it is still disappointing. I wonder why I developed such a rare disorder, and how I got shingles. Traditionally, shingles impacts older people, but my doctor now suspects that when I had COVID-19 in June, it knocked out my immune system, making me more susceptible to shingles and now Ramsay Hunt.

Ramsay Hunt is so rare that it’s been tough to find a doctor or a clinic who will treat me. Luckily, I do have an appointment with a doctor to figure out what the next steps might be. I am worried about contracting COVID-19 again because I don’t want any other negative health side effects to occur from the virus.

While I’m grateful my face now looks like it did before the paralysis, I’m still dealing with the invisible part of my illness. I don’t feel like me. I am really exhausted at times and still need to remind myself to say “no” (which is new to me). If someone would even tap my ear, the pain would be so intense it would feel like glass breaking in my brain. It’s tough to cope with lingering nerve problems. I also feel a little guilty about complaining. As women, we’re conditioned to simply say we’re fine and push through it. And I’m so used to hustling that it can be tough to be honest about how I’m feeling and what I need. I’ve been following up with my doctors, meditating, drinking more water and scheduling time to prioritize my health and recovery. I’m trying to be more mindful of my stress so that I don’t experience worsening symptoms.

I felt scared and vulnerable when I thought about sharing my story, but I wanted to in the hopes that I might help someone else going through their own health challenges. This experience boosted the empathy I already felt for others with invisible illnesses. I heard so many stories from people that broke my heart. I hope my experience also encourages people with Bell’s palsy to be less afraid when it comes to how they look. It feels easier to lock yourself away when going through this, but I hope that by sharing how I looked, others will feel less alone and more comfortable with how they look. At the end of the day, I just want my experience to normalize Bell’s palsy and facial paralysis, and to reduce the stigma some people feel.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

Katie Sturino, as told to Meghan Holohan

Read full article here

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blindbeta · 3 years

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Blind / Low Vision Person’s Review of “Blind” by Rachel DeWoskin and Why Writers Should Not Underestimate the Benefits of a Sensitivity Reader

[Content warnings: spoilers for the book. Ableism. Brief mention of an accident involving eye trauma. Mentions of suicide. Stereotypes about blind people. Also this review, because I focused on the portrayal of blindness, comes across negatively. Please know that I have no hate for the author and might even read another book she wrote. However, I did not like the way this book portrayed blindness and, as difficult as it is, I wanted to be honest in my review.]

I struggled with the title, and I’m not even sure benefits is the appropriate word. What I want to convey here is not Brought to You By Big Sensitivity Reader Company vibes, but more This Book Was Not Good and It Needed a Sensitivity Reader Very Badly vibes.

Blind is about Emma Silver, a high school student who goes blind in a traumatic accident. Here is a good summary and review by a blind person. I listened to the audiobook, which was narrated well. I’ll start by saying this will only be a review of the portrayal of blindness — I’ll try to leave my other opinions out just to keep things focused.

Unfortunately, focusing on just blindness means that it will not make this review more positive, because this book is about a blind girl recovering from going blind. In a way that is both inauthentic and swerves well out of the author’s lane. I say that because, as I hope will become apparent, this book consists of main character Emma being sad about being blind for the majority of the book. The book doesn’t simply have a character who goes blind. That is the main character’s entire arc.

This is a long review. However, I believe it will be invaluable for my readers and anyone who is interested in writing a blind character. Because this book passes most of my minimum standards for writing blind characters and was still lacking due to many factors, including stereotypes. I included many sub-headings so you can find specific topics easily.

Helpful Links

I include these links in the review. I’ll list them here for easy finding.

Here are two reviews of the book by blind readers: one and two.

Here is a video of the author talking about some of research she did for the book.

Here is my post Things I Want to See More Of / Less Of.

Here is my post about writing a blind character adjusting to being blind and being all sad about it when you aren’t blind yourself.

And finally, here is the post I shared that lists misconceptions about blind people.

The Author

The author, Rachel Dewoskin, is not blind. I did as much research as I could, but even if I hadn’t done so before reading the book, it was obvious she wasn’t blind herself. There are too many inaccuracies and offensive moments. This becomes a problem not because her MC was blind, but because she told a blind person’s story and used tropes in ways I think would be better off written by a blind person. If I’m going to read a story like this, I don’t want to read it from the perspective of a person who isn’t blind. When I get into the details of what went wrong, I hope you’ll see why.

Did the author do her research? Yes. The author met with blind people, clearly researched assistive technology and cane skills, and even taught herself contracted Braille. She talks a little about it in this video.

In fact, I wanted to say I am so impressed and grateful this author immersed herself in things like Braille and cane skills. None of my followers have shared that they went to a Lighthouse For the Blind or taught themselves to read Braille or spoken so passionately about why they loved it.

But sometimes research falls short. Or it is simply not enough.

That’s why I’m writing this review. For you writers writing blind characters when you aren’t blind. Because while the author clearly had good intentions, while the author clearly did her research and put in the time to learn and listen in ways I don’t think many of my followers have yet — the book was not authentic enough for me.

This book needed several sensitivity readers. If it had any, I would be surprised.

The Cover

The audiobook seems to have Braille on the cover, but I can’t tell if it is accessible or simply a picture of Braille. The cover features the word Blind in white print on a black background, with what seems to be Braille in rainbow colors that also spell out the title. I’ll reserve judgment here, since I don’t know the answer. If the Braille is tactile, then the cover is fantastic.

In the video I linked, the author seems to be holding the hardcover edition of the book with Braille on the cover. I can’t tell if the Braille is actually tactile or not.

What I Liked About the Book

I wanted to list a few things I liked about the book.

1. The main character is Jewish.

2. Emma has a large family full of well-developed characters and realistic portrayals of various ages. Everyone reacts uniquely to her blindness and I thought these characters were all used well. The scenes with Emma and her older sisters as well as the scenes with her mom were really great.

3. Emma gets therapy for her trauma. She also gets training to use a cane. These are annoyingly rare in stories.

4. As I said, the author clearly did her research. This is obvious when reading the book and In everything I found when researching the author after I finished it. I want to give the author praise here. I thought her explanations of technology Emma uses were the most accurate I have seen so far, both in books and when doing sensitivity reads.

What I Didn’t Like

I will start with this: Emma, after a year of learning to use her cane, is still using a cane inside her own house. After a year. This is not realistic, nor does it seem comfortable at all to use a cane in one’s own home. I don’t know anyone who does this and according to the other reviews, I am not the only one who was surprised by this.

Basically, this story would be okay with some inaccuracies. That’s to be expected. The real issue I had with this book was that it uses tropes the blind community generally hates and that the book is literally about !!! a character going blind and adapting. That’s the story. If you remove the blindness and the trauma, the story falls apart.

The author told a story that was not hers to tell and she did so badly.

If you are confused about why I dislike this, please read this post called Writing Blind Characters Accepting Being Blind When You Aren’t Blind Yourself.

What Did The Author Do Badly?

Trauma and Blindness

The story starts when main character, Emma, goes blind after a fireworks accident. Not only is this cliché, but it also tics one of my boxes in my Things I Want To See Less of post. This author wrote about a character going blind due to a traumatic accident. Link to the post.

In telling a story that was not hers to tell, here are some harmful things in the book:

The author does not do a good job of separating Emma’s trauma from her blindness. To be fair, this is difficult and most people don’t know to go about doing so with purpose. There are a lot of times in the book where the fact that Emma is traumatized leads to her saying a lot of terrible things about blindness and blind people that are never corrected or contradicted in the story. Again, if you are not sure why this is a problem, read the link I shared to my post.

Here are a few times this issue came up:

-Emma develops a habit of rocking, which myself and many reviewers know to attribute to trauma, but it isn’t clear if the author thinks blind people rock, as the stereotype indicates. Is Emma rocking as a trauma response or because she is blind? The book doesn’t make it clear. This is a time where authors need to be clear.

-Emma assumed she will never get a job, be kissed, get married, etc, after going blind.

-Emma yells about being ruined due to her blindness. The first two hours of the audiobook consist of Emma complaining about being blind. She mentions never being able to get a job a few times, assuming she won’t be able to work. While blind people do struggle with employment, this is due to discrimination, lack of transportation, lack of accommodations, lack of community support, and other systemic issues.

-Emma calls herself disfigured.

-Emma states she wanted to die. In another part of the book, when a background character we never met, Claire, completed suicide, Emma wonders if she was so focused on Claire because she wondered if she wanted to kill herself too.

-On the subject of the character, Claire, Emma states: “How easy would being gay be compared to being blind?”

This is especially damaging because some people are blind and gay. It also isn’t fair for Emma to compare them and the systemic issues that are faced by blind people and gay people. Emma not only trivializes homophobia, but also decides being blind is worse. For Emma, being blind is the worst thing ever, which is very isolating to read.

There are times where the fact that Emma is traumatized was not only grouped in with her blindness, but where the author used trauma to write ideas about blindness that are ultimately harmful.

This book, if readers of the blog want to read it, should be a lesson on why separating trauma from blindness is important. Whether that means making clear distinctions in the narrative itself or just not writing about a character going blind after a traumatic accident.

Let’s continue the overall things done badly.

Stereotypes and Tropes About Blind People

1. Rocking —

I have already mentioned the rocking thing above, but to reiterate here, not all blind people rock to orient themselves.

2. Touching Faces —

Emma and another blind character literally feel each other’s faces, one of the most hated tropes for blind people. In another scene, Emma feels another character’s face without asking.

3. Where Are the Audio Descriptions? —

Emma compares her life to a horror movie she couldn’t watch. This is a subtle reinforcement of the idea that blind people don’t watch films or television. The book makes no mention of audio descriptions. I suppose Emma and all the other blind characters simply don’t watch films or shows anymore.

4. Supposedly Fake Service Dogs —

Emma gets a dog that is specifically said to not be a guide dog. Emma brings this dog to restaurants and to school. Emma explains that she can get away with bringing her dog because no one wants to tell the blind kid no. This was, as you may be able to imagine, frustrating to read. Plenty of blind people have been denied access to transportation and buildings with a guide dog that is supposed to be able to travel freely. Emma’s blindness would absolutely not be a big help to her in bringing her dog places where it is not allowed. In showing Emma getting away with bringing her dog into restaurants when he is explicitly not a service dog, the author is contributing to a huge myth that prevents actual service dogs from traveling freely. Yes, this is only a book and it probably isn’t falling into the hands of someone powerful — however, it has probably been picked up by a business owner, a driver for public transport, a teacher, etc.

5. Avoiding words like see and look —

Emma avoids words like see and look. She also gets angry at her friends for using such words. At one point, Emma’s friend says something and Emma snaps, “I can’t see”. This prompts her friend to, according to Emma, never make that mistake again. Toward the end of the book, Emma is still avoiding such words.

Here is a list of misconceptions about blind people. Look at #6.

Here is another review of this book that also touches on this issue. The reviewer states: “The strange thing is that I’ve never known any blind person avoiding the use of words like “see” or “look.” Again, I’d hate for sighted people to read this book and think that blind folk all avoid words with visual associations; in fact, the only blind friends I talk to moan about sighted people avoiding the use of such visual words because they think we’ll be offended!”

6. All Blind People Are Apparently Totally Blind —

At one point in the story, Emma attends a school for the blind. Another character, who I think was Emma’s mother, says that the campus is beautiful. Emma makes this remark: “Why bother making a school for the blind beautiful? It’s lost on everyone anyway.”

Wow, Emma, that was rude. This is another example of where Emma’s pain and anger cause issues for readers. If they take this at face value, they may think that blind people don’t notice or appreciate beauty. More importantly, they might also assume, like Emma, that all blind people can’t see. As I have stated many times on this blog, most blind people have residual vision. Not everyone is totally blind. This is why, like beautiful grounds, schools for the blind also have things like stairs with high contrast.

7. Subtle Use of the Idea That People With Low Vision Should Rather Strain Themselves Than Be Blind —

This one was less obvious for me. However, once I thought about it again, I understood what I was reading in this character. There’s a rather outgoing character named Seb whose personality is very refreshing in this story. Seb attends the school for the blind with Emma. Seb has low vision.

So Seb wants to get a job. Remember how Emma was afraid she wouldn’t be able to get a job now that she is blind?

Instead of showing Seb getting a job to prove that idea wrong, he knows he has to conveniently not mention being blind when he applies, showing up in sunglasses and without a cane. The book states he worries he wouldn’t be able to fill out the application.

Here is what the book states:

[Quote] “He got hired without telling any of the guys who ran the place that he wasn’t sighted; I know because he had confided in me and Dee the week before that he wanted the job—if friend worked there and said they had an opening—but Seb was worried he wouldn’t be able to fill out the application. So he showed up one night before closing time, wearing sunglasses and not carrying a cane, and asked all casually if he could grab and application and bring it back the next day.

And he spent all night filling it and brought it back the next day. He didn’t mention that he was blind or that the application had taken six hours to finish with the help of his sighted brother.” [End quote]

Seb has no obligation to reveal any personal information to them. If he wants to fill out the application on his own time, in a way in which he feels comfortable, that is fine. However, the book implies he thought he would not be hired if they knew he was blind. Rather than talk about the employment discrimination that is such a huge problem for blind people, the book decides to skip over this. And rather than address Emma’s fear-based expectation that she will never get a job, presumably because she doesn’t think blind people can do anything, the book ignores it.

Seb getting a job, especially in this way, does absolutely nothing to assuage Emma’s fears. Or challenge any possible low expectations the readers may have.

Seb fills out the application by himself and it takes six hours. Six. Hours. His brother also helps him eventually and it still takes that long. No one I know, even with intense internalized ableism, would sit there for six hours doing something like that.

Seb should be using a magnifying device or a scanner app. There is tons of technology out there for people with low vision and the author chose to include absolutely none of it in the book. Instead, she chose to show a character struggling for six hours without exploring his reasons for doing so. Does he do this because of internalized ableism? If yes, how can the same character tell Emma the school will get rid of her “Poor Blind Kid bullshit”?

Now, in some families and some cultures, it would be more appropriate for a family member to help. However, the author tells us nothing more about Seb’s culture, his family life, or his motivations. I assume he did not ask for his brother’s help until later, because I can’t fathom why having a family member help from the start would take six hours.

Why is a character doing this in a story that is supposed to be about adjusting to blindness? Clinging to his remaining vision instead of using a few adaptive tools to make things easier on his eyes hardly makes him a good role model for Emma. Why is a character modeling independence in this specific way? In a way that tells Emma that it is better to struggle with a little vision than to be totally blind?

This is reinforced when Emma says some kids, including Seb, pass well. This is something that cannot be given nuance unless it is written by someone who experienced it. Otherwise, the story shows Emma over and over again that being blind is bad. Undesirable. Which is ableist.

Do people struggle with this? Absolutely. Did the author write it well? No.

And Here Are a Few Things That Could Have Been Done Better

In this section, I wanted to go over things I thought could have been done better. They aren’t necessarily harmful, but I wanted to mention them.

Sunglasses

The main character wears sunglasses when she goes out. This is likely because she has a scar she feels self-conscious about, but this is still a big stereotype that the author could have taken more care with.

O&M Issues

So Emma has someone come around to teach her orientation and mobility, which was nice. The author put in her research here as well. However, the instructor leaves after a time, which seems odd. Rather than work with her around her schools or other locations, he decides she has learned all the basics. I received O&M training until university.

Now Let’s Examine The Blind Characters vs Tropes

In this section, I want to go over the biggest tropes in the stories structure, the number of blind characters, and what I normally advise to get around these issues. We’ll see how this advice compares to how the book turned out.

So, the things to look out for are:

-tokenism

-blind characters going blind through trauma

-blind characters being sad about being blind

Examining Tokenism

Emma is not the only blind character. The blind characters include: Emma, Sebastian, Dee, and Annabelle. I normally say to have one other blind character at minimum. The book meets that requirement.

Examining Blind Characters Going Blind Through Trauma

I also normally suggest avoiding characters going blind through trauma, especially main characters. If the writer would like to go ahead with this, I normally suggest 2 or 3 other blind characters who didn’t go blind through trauma. With 2 as the minimum. I admit, I prefer the main character not to be the one going blind through trauma, simply because the main character has so much power in the perception of the reader.

Let us examine each character.

Emma - went blind through a traumatic fireworks accident

Sebastian- unknown

Dee - unknown

Annabelle- went blind through Retinitis Pigmentosa

On the topic of Dee and Seb, Emma does mention they may have better hearing, which she claims you only have if you lose your sight before the age of ten. We can guess that Dee and Seb both went blind in early childhood or were born blind, but we aren’t sure. What I want here is explicit confirmation that other characters didn’t go blind through accidents. We only get that with Annabelle and her RP.

Not only that, but the other blind characters are not in the novel as much. Annabelle only shows up at the end, seemingly as a way for Emma to help another recently blind person to show how she has developed. Seb and Dee are only in a few chapters, mostly as flashbacks. They don’t get much backstory or development either.

However, it fills my minimum requirements, so I’ll let it pass.

Examining Blind Characters Being Sad About Being Blind

This is literally Emma throughout the entire book. Until the last few chapters.

Annabelle has a similar, shorter arc, although she is only 9 at the time. Annabelle comes in near the end of the book.

It is normal for people to need an adjustment period, particularly if they are young. However, to have the entire book consist of Emma being sad and having trauma focused mostly on her blindness is not something I’m okay with. Especially because, as I wrote in this post, it can leave non-blind readers with a very negative impression of blindness. Again, why would I want to read about this arc from an author who isn’t blind? Why make the entire book about adjusting to blindness?

Anyway, then we have Seb and Dee.

There characters were refreshing in this story, which is mostly Emma being sad and angry.

Dee doesn’t seem to be sad, but we don’t know much about her. She does seem well adjusted and laidback. She and Seb go skiing, so that’s something.

Sebastian gets a little more attention in the story. He does tell Emma the school for the blind will knock the “BPK bullshit” or “Poor Blind Kid bullshit” right out of her. I thought it was funny. Sebastian also has a big personality and interests outside of moping about being blind. He enjoys skiing and, according to Emma, he would have no problem with presenting on the Lighthouse For the Blind in front of people who aren’t blind, unlike Emma, who struggles with calling attention to her blindness. Which I can understand, what with the awkward questions her sighted classmates give her.

However, Seb also has an issue with hiding or fighting against his low vision in some parts of the story. If Sebastian were the main character, I could understand some of the things he does. However, this does not go well at all with Emma’s arc.

Anyway, Seb and Dee don’t get nearly enough time in the book for me to feel 100% comfortable using them as exceptions.

How Would a Sensitivity Reader Help?

If I were doing a sensitivity read for this book, I would suggest including more about Seb and Dee and the school for the blind. I would have explained that the way the story sidelines them shows Emma is not okay associating with her blind friends. I would have asked for more backstory, more contrast between them and the main character, and possibly a few more blind characters Emma met at the school for the blind.

If the writer was insistent on having Emma go blind in an accident, I would have suggested reducing the time she spent depressed and shifting the focus from her blindness to her traumatic accident. I would have had the author work harder to separate the two, even if it took Emma a while to do so. I would have also suggested reducing Emma’s remarks or have them called out. For example, her comments about not being able to get a job or beautiful schools being lost on blind people. Sebastian would have been excellent in this role.

I would have worked with her to either get rid of or subvert the list of stereotypes. Most of them are easy fixes.

I would have told her blind people don’t use canes in their houses. I would have given suggestions for assistive technology for Seb to use. I would have helped her with the section on trauma and blindness, reducing or erasing a lot of the issues I included there. I would have suggested giving Emma an arc that isn’t entirely about adjusting to blindness, even if her story starts with going blind.

I probably would have seemed nicer about my feedback because the author still had opportunity to make changes.

The author could have done more research on stereotypes and cane usage, but I think there is an important lesson here about the benefits of sensitivity readers.

In the end, a sensitivity reader would have fixed most of the problems in this story, despite the amount of research the author did. Research cannot always teach you everything and that is where a sensually or authenticity reader comes in. Moreover, there is a certain respect in involving communities you are representing. In paying them in money or exposure. In listening to their voices and respecting what they say. If the author was willing to learn Braille and sit with blind people to learn about canes and technology, why did she stop at getting sensitivity readers? Why does it feel like she didn’t want to include the blind community in any meaningful way?

I hope this helps someone.

-BlindBeta

#blind person reviews a review tag #book talk ; let’s review published books #review #blind representation #blind #blind characters #writing blind characters #trauma narrative #stereotypes #blind tropes #eye trauma #ableism

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nerdy-simp-7120 · 3 years

Note

hi! if you're comfortable writing this, could i ask for a scenario? this has been in the back of my head for a while.

what would be the reaction of the brothers + dateables of watching mc play resident evil in the dimitrescu castle? who would be down bad the most

thank you! feel free to ignore this if you don't want to write this ofc

I love this ask (stan tall vampire lady). The only thing is that I accidentally turned it into a “how they feel about the game.” I managed to add in some parts with MC playing as well to make up for it

Update: I literally finished the request yesterday but my wifi went down and I lost everything 😩 😩

I also wrote this in the middle of the night so sorry if there are any errors! Enjoy!

Warnings: cursing.

How the OM! characters would react to you playing Resident Evil (Dimitrescu Castle edition)

Lucifer

Will not care at first

"I hold no interest in such trivial simulations."

His weakness? Being a simp for you.

He decides to look into the game a bit more in private later on.

Will lowkey practice the game

If you ever catch him playing it, do not say anything because he will stop immediately, deny everything, and might not ever do it again

With time, however, Lucifer will come to master the game.

Here comes the showing off.

When you're rambling about the game with Levi, Lucifer will join the conversation and you two will be like "wow, boomer knows something for once--"

Or when you're struggling on a part of the game he will be like, "hand it over"

Before expertly getting through that part.

Can defeat Lady Dimitrescu if you ask him to but be careful cause he might make you beg

sadistic bastard

or you can be a badass and show him your skills

Will be a tad shocked at how easily you handled it but won't let it show (okay Elsa)

Also proud though

Lucifer's internal monologue: “That’s right- show them how it’s done, Y/n.”

Mammon

Scared.

Will watch you play and cover his eyes during every battle

"wHAT IS THAT?!" at everything you come across

I hope you're good at playing one-handed because you'll have to use the other hand to hold his throughout the entire thing

Admires you're bravery but would never admit it

"You were horrible! ...N-nice job beating the game, not that I c-care or anything. You sucked anyways!"

Not even 10 seconds later...

"Can I watch you play again?"

Comes to find that the faces you make are adorable: when you're concentrating on a battle, when you win, find a valuable item, etc

He loves being able to see how you're feeling up close.

If you catch him staring when you take a break or something he'll blush and either ask you if you have a staring problem or that you have something on your face

He may or may not buy cheap merch (a tiny key chain of Lady Dimitrescu or your favorite character) for you, all the while spewing lame excuses

Please bear with him- he's trying.

Leviathan

"YOU ALSO LIKE RESIDENT DEVIL?!?? Ah! I-I mean..."

Congrats, you just found yourself someone to discuss the game with

Is open to cosplay the characters with you

You two will have competitions to see who can beat the game faster.

You both also share theories with each other all the time

Or simply discuss the characters together

He purposefully stays quiet to hear you ramble on and on- dude finds it adorable

You two also sometimes argue debate over a character name or event in the game

Because while you have Resident Evil

He only knows Resident Devil

This is the equivalent of Devilgram and Instagram

I mean

They’re the same,

But a couple things were altered, y’know, to prevent copyright

So yes, there are definitely a few quarrels here and there

But all in all, it’s a fun gamer bud experience

Don’t tell him I told you but he thinks it’s hot when you show off your badass skills in a boss fight

Satan

He plays it on the lowkey.

Not because he’s embarrassed

But because he partially takes his anger out on the characters

During gory scenes, he imagines it’s him torturing Lucifer, fueling his determination to win

A calculated person, Satan is a smart player

But there are times when he’s particularly angry and he becomes a reckless one, jumping into fights impetuously

This is where you come in and beat the enemy for him

He may get angrier, thinking you are underestimating him

But, for the sake of the person he loves, he calms down knowing you didn’t mean to offend him

A small part in the back of his head also admires you for being able to handle the fight a ton better than he did

Congratulations, you just earned yourself the great Satan’s respect (resident evil-wise).

Asmodeus

“Oh my, I never knew you were into such gory games! Does this mean you’re into blood play, because I know many things about--”

He may look carefree on the outside

But on the inside?

Let’s take a look, shall we?

Holy shit

What the fu--

Jesus christ, can you pull a move like that in real life?

He needs to be careful to not piss you off.

If you can handle this, who knows what you could be capable of?

Hold on.

Wait, you look so concentrated

Eeep! How cute!

Anyways, it ends with him snapping a bunch of pictures

Keeps them for himself and may brag to his brothers about how he got some “special” shots of you

Obviously never elaborates on what the special part means to keep his dear siblings on edge because, what the hell, they want to know what these special shots are

Would not play the game because there’s “tOo MuCh BlOoDsHeD”

We all know he’s most likely seen his fair share of bloodshed

“What if the adrenaline gives me acne?”

He’s probably just bad at the game--

Verdict: Asmo is a simp and not afraid to flaunt it.

Beel

...Are you okay?

Do you think about homicide--?

Oh, that lady looks nice.

Huh, she’s 9′6″??

What’s her name? Lady Dimitrescu?

Okay-- WAIT WHY IS SHE TURNING INTO THAT??

Not scared, just a tad bit concerned

Poor Beel, concerned for Lady D :’)

Also, seeing the death’s of Bela, Daniela, and Cassandra hit different

Because he know what it’s like to lose a sibling.

Safe to say he understands Alcina’s pain when she raged about her children being dead.

Also concerned about how the gore could affect you

Because isn’t stuff like this supposed to traumatize humans?

Would support you regardless though

And thinks that you’re really brave for playing the game and still being able to stand strong

On another note, Beel decided to make small flower graves for the three sisters and Alcina because he’s adorable and kind like that

Belphegor

Likes the game but is too lazy to play himself

Regularly watches Satan play (or at least as much as he can before deciding it’s nap time)

I hope you enjoy Belphie using you as a body pillow and watching you play from now on

Makes small comments here and there to help you out

“To your left... Oh, and open the window- yeah, that one.”

Will smirk, impressed, when you deal with the fights and win yourself without his comments.

“That’s my Y/n”

(Sorry I don’t know what else to put for him :’))

Diavolo

“Is this a human trend?” meme

Will watch excitedly and “oooo” whenever you do something cool

Be careful though, because the questions will not stop as you play

“What’s that? I see. What’s it for? How do you win the game? Who’s that character? Why can’t you do this? What about--?”

Diavolo, you’re awesome and all, but please

shush

On the inside, is also one that might be a tad concerned about your mental health because doesn’t that gore traumatize humans?

Wait, you do this for entertainment?

...

Another warning: he will shower you in merchandise from the game

I am not above the fact that this man has a game room

And he will try to master the game

Casually pushes all his paperwork over to Lucifer so he can play Resident Evil

RIP Luci

Unfortunately, Diavolo will have trouble grasping the game and how it works

You will have to explain many things to him

Good luck- he’s a bit of a boomer (but willing to learn) and may or may not get distracted staring at you

But anyways, he enjoys engaging in the competitions you and Levi have

Whether it be playing as well or simply watching

He just loves to see you happy

Barbatos

Oh my, what’s this?

Will watch you play

and constantly criticize how filthy the Dimitrescu castle is

“Do they have any idea how many rats this can attract?”

Barbatos, your weakness is showing.

Seeing you so happy while playing the game helps him relax from his daily troubles tasks

He rewards you with a pat on the head any time you beat a foe

When Diavolo goes over to the HoL or when you come over to play in he silently cheers you on in the background.

Solomon

Yuh

Is educated on the game and knows his shit as the only other human

Maybe knows a bit too much of the game

You will later come to find out that, somewhere in his mass tangle of shady connections, he knows a developer

Might give you tips and tricks to get on higher levels

But never, and I mean never, challenge him like you would with Levi to see who can beat the game faster

Because he will beat you by a seconds on purpose, just to piss you of

all the while doing that dark, shady chuckle

Asshole

But anyways, if you manage to finesse and beat him, he will be

So confused

“I thought I did it all right, what went wrong...?” he thinks to himself.

On the outside, however, he’s smiling

Will hand over some praise to his little apprentice, but if you look carefully you will see a spark of annoyance

We get it Solomon, you’re a sore loser.

In the end, he will still leave somewhat impressed at your skillz

Simeon

w h a t

Is a little scared

“Is this one of them video games you kids play nowadays...? Just kidding. What are you playing-- oh my”

Might try to figure out how to play

But alas,

Simeon is yet another boomer

So he will have quite some trouble even figuring out how to move

And why does he hold the controller like that what

If you’ve seen that one picture of him holding his phone sideways you know what I mean

On another note, if you look through his poem book, then you may or may not find a few poems describing how amazing and badass you looked hustling the entire game

Luke

about to bomb this master hill

No literally is considering bombing the computer or whatever you’re playing on because wHAT IS THAT

He is just

Scared

This will give him nightmares for weeks

Apparently Alcina reminds him of Lucifer so he kinda

Hates her

Says he will protect you

--as he runs out of the room in fear

Irrelevant but the one he hates the most is fetus baby

Michael have mercy on this poor boy--

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krakenartificer · 3 years

Text

One of the things that I find hardest to do, that turns out to be textbook ADHD, is figuring out how to get started on a project

(I say, after having procrastinated on writing this, for the last 4 hours. Actually, I have no idea how long I've been procrastinating - I have timeblindness. But I did post a Facebook comment right before I tried to start for the first time, so I can check that. goes to check facebook ohno.jpg) (Two hours. It was 2 hours.)

That overhead/activation cost is so high, I desperately want to finish every project all in one go, in one sprint, rather than have to pay it twice. "Slow and steady wins the race," they say; "Just break it down in to steps and do a little bit every day," they say; and I cannot tell you how many times I have tried to make that work, but just doesn't. Paying the startup cost for 10 minutes of work isn't worth it, and deep down I know that, and won't let myself do something so extravagantly wasteful of spoons. That's not me being immature or unwilling to work -- that's me making an accurate and intelligent assessment of tactical realities.

And yet the fact remains that almost nothing worth doing can be done all in one sprint with no breaks, and that forcing myself to try is detrimental to both my mental and physical health, and therefore I do need to learn how to shut down a project and then start it up again. This is not a complete list, by any means, but it's the best method I've found so far. The specific solutions may or may not work for you, but hopefully it'll give you some ideas on how to start designing your own methods.

My problems with starting my work fall into three broad categories: 1) reticulating splines 2) remembering what's happened, and what's supposed to be happening 3) translating knowledge into action

1) Reticulating Splines

"Reticulating Splines" is a concept I stole from Luna Corbden. They explain it in detail at [link], but the way I always think of it is that my brain only loads in high-res. There is no "just a quick overview" or "don't get into the weeds" for me -- you are getting every piece of information related to this topic, and every relationship between all those pieces of information, or nothing. And as we all know from waiting on high-res videos to buffer, that takes FOREVER.

Now that's not inherently a good or a bad thing.

Once that network map has loaded

I am amazing at pulling up details other people have missed: my map isn't fuzzy and pixelated.

I am spectacularly good at spotting edge cases and unexpected consequences: I'm looking at the entire project and all its interrelationships at the same time.

I am incredibly good at following other people's trains of thought even when they're communicating badly: I know every possible path between two statements, so when someone says they're related, I can back-trace what their route from A to B must have been.

I am a much better developer, a much better tutor, and a much better manager because of this capability, as long as you give me time to get the splines reticulated.

But it does mean that there's no such thing as a "quick question" for me. Imagine if every time you went to Wikipedia, it had to load every single Wikipedia entry in your web browser before it would show you the page you asked for -- that's what talking to me is like if you spring a conversation on me without warning.

It follows, then, that there's no such thing as a "quick code change" or a "quick edit" or (my apologies to all the ADHD peeps struggling to get through this essay) a "quick explanation". This is how the world exists in my head, with all these interconnected parts, and I don't know how to give you only part of it. If you want me to change the code to write to a different table, or to change my terminology, I have to load the entire program, or the entire essay, into my brain, then make the change, then shut it all down again, before I can move onto the next thing.

So that's problem number one: every time I stop working on something, and then try to start up again, I have to re-load the entirety of the project into my brain again.

So the first thing about starting projects is to

be compassionate with yourself while things are buffering.

You're not stupid for needing to take your time to review, and you're not wasting time scrolling back and forth and clicking between pages and re-reading things in an order that you could never explain to someone else, and you're not trapped in some failed-functioning dissociative circle of hell. You're buffering, and the extra time it takes you to load this data structure is proportional to your ability to do things with it once it's loaded. That's just how it works.

The other thing is to externalize the splines as much as possible. Which gets us into

2) Memory (working and otherwise)

Look, we all know how ADHD affects memory, I don't think I need to go into a lot of detail here.

So that's problem number two: every time I stop working on something, I completely forget wtf I was doing.

Which means that you shouldn't rely on your memory.

WRITE THINGS DOWN

I don't care if everyone around you thinks that this is easy to remember. I don't care if you understand it all perfectly right now and can't imagine ever needing a reminder of how it works. Your vision of perfect clarity is because the splines are reticulated; as soon as you switch gears, that vision is going to fade into nothingness and you will be left with only a distant fuzzy memory of the galaxy-brain comprehension you once had, unless you WRITE. IT. DOWN.

For projects, specifically, there are two things I find very important to write down:

A) the overall flow of the project: what the steps and the sub-steps are, how they fit together, what order they should be done in, and how to tell if they've been completed or not. (My system for this is described at length here [x])

B) What the current status of the project is right now.

Where am I in the overall flow of the project? What step am I currently working on? What is stopping it from being completed? As with writing down the overall flow of the project, remember that these notes are for you, not for anyone else: they only have to make sense to future!you. Don't write them down in a way that you would write a memo to your boss, or an way your English teacher would approve of -- write them down in a way that makes sense to you.

A sample of the types of notes I have left myself:

For reasons I cannot begin to explain, the enrichment template and the enrichment block strings that existed in the repo this morning bear absolutely no resemblance to the enrichment query that is currently running prod, and I cannot find any place that the correct templates and strings have ever existed. So .... idk, tbh. I can't explain it. But I can fix it. So. I have copied the query from a prod run in EMR, and pasted it into the templates, and submitted that as an MR. I also changed the block_strings in Rosetta. With those two changes, we end up with something that looks like what's in prod, even if it's not in Master. So can I proceed? Are we good? I don't know -- my brain is too tired and dumb to figure out how to tell that.

It's been running all week, but not actually providing any data, because apparently mvno_accounts hasn't been updating its metadata. So I MSK REPAIRED and that fixed the problem. I added an MSCK REPAIR to the code, and hopefully that fixes the problem. I still need to backfill everything between run_date=2021-08-10 and run_date=2021-08-17

Says it has partitions [screenshot] Says it doesn't have data [screenshot] S3 says the partitions have no data [screenshot] So that's nice, I guess. How do I get the damn thing to write?

It gives me a completely useless error each time, each time on a different query, and I have no FUCKING clue what the FUCK it wants. So it can just FUCKING FUCK OFF. I DON'T GIVE A SHIT ANYMORE

Things to note from these examples:

You are not being graded on grammar / spelling / punctuation. As long as the punctuation enhances your ability to understand the sentence, it's correct.

It's largely a snapshot of MY internal state, not the state of the project. In contrast to everything western-supremacist culture tells you about suppressing your feelings, emotions [x] make [x] memories [x] stronger. That last one may not look like much of a hint, but when I got into work the next day, I read that, and I knew exactly what I had to do in order to continue work on the project.

Also please note that I have been using this system for a while, and I've gotten pretty good at guessing what future!me is going to need. You'll get better with practice. Just keep swimming, and be kind to yourself

And then also write down ...

3) Translating knowledge into action

As Russell Barkley says, "You've got a real problem on your hands. Cuz you can know stuff, and you won't do stuff." [x] The ADHD brain (apparently, I'm not a neuroscientist, I'm just trusting this neuroscientist) has a gap, or a wall, between knowledge and performance.

That is to say .... apparently most people .... if they know what needs to happen .... that means they can just .... do it??? Like, that's enough?? IDK, it sounds crazy to me, but I'm trying to respect that neurotypicals are the experts on their own experiences

I mentioned this in my stimulus-setup post [x], but putting "I need to decide which window to put this fan in" doesn't do a damn thing for me. I KNOW I need to figure out which window to put it in; the step after that is measuring the window, and I can't bloody measure the window if I don't know which window I'm measuring, can I? That much is obvious; any idiot could figure THAT out. But how do I figure that out??

So that's problem number three: every time I stop working on a project, I've lost the momentum, and I can spin my wheels for hours trying to find enough traction to translate knowledge into action again.

The most common way to try to compensate for this problem is to just try to remember this information until I get back to the project, but that leads to so many other problems. I have to keep checking myself: do I still remember? What was that list? Run over it again? It's hypervigilance, and it causes all kinds of health problems, and it makes for shitty doing-work-while-I-sleep dreams, and it's also a terrible way to live. And also, even if I succeed, it means I'm keeping the damn thing in working memory, which I already don't have enough of.

No, what I need to write down, as the last line in that note I'm leaving for myself, is the actual next thing that needs doing. "Check which window better fits the fan." That's actionable. That's a clear instruction -- especially if I've already left myself a note about which two windows are the final candidates, and where the fan is. That takes the goal and turns it into a thing that can be done.

A sample of the types of notes I have left myself:

open ~/Documents/Rosetta\ Docmentation.docx

Pull a chair up to the loom, and start re-stringing.

Find the damn manuscript

Go through the pattern and ID (and outline in bold) sections that could be sewn together with all one piece of yarn

Things to note from these examples:

Some of these steps are really really simple. Yes, in fact, I did indeed get hung up -- not on the incredibly gumption-draining process of re-stringing a loom, no -- I got hung up on the fact that we don't keep a chair next to the loom. If I pulled a chair up, I could do the rest of the project. I refuse to be ashamed of this. Neurotypicals suck at stuff I'm amazing at, and I suck at stuff they take for granted. If I write down "pull up a chair", the work gets done. That's what works for me. So I do it. Remember that you can't edit the manuscript until you find it. Write out the full path to the file; start your instruction with "go to the garage" ... do whatever it takes to make it actionable for you

for computer work, see if your OS gives you a way to make the computer do some of this work. In Linux and macOS, open is a valid command, which means I don't even have to remember how to open a document: I can just copy-paste open ~/Documents/Rosetta\ Docmentation.docx into terminal, and the document I need will magically appear on my screen.

Because I already have notes on the overall flow (see step 2), I don't have to have a lot of details or context in these notes. I don't have to specify where "the pattern" is, because the project notes already have a link to the pattern for this project.

Actionable Takeaways:

Before you start work on something:

Figure out what needs to be done for this project and how all the pieces will fit together (Detailed post on that at [link]) into one big project operation

Write that operation down

Before you stop work on something:

Write down anything you're keeping in working memory in order to be doing the work you're doing

Write down your current emotional state / inner dialogue

Write down the simplest, clearest instruction you can on what actual action you need to do to proceed.

#adhd #adhd life #how to life #semi-solicited advice #long post #long long post #executive dysfunction cw #if you can't make your own executive function storebought is fine

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