Useful Shit - Tumblr Posts
another option:
turning it into a windows 95 logo is also acceptable.
Ahuman Flags !!
Ahuman: A form of nonhumanity where an individual does not connect to humanity/being human in any way. Oftentimes they're uncomfortable with being referred to as or grouped in with humans/humanity as a whole.
The term "antihuman" existed to describe this, however it's often been mistaken as misanthropy (hating humans/humanity) in some of the spaces I'm in, so a term often used instead is this one!
FAMOUS AUTHORS
Classic Bookshelf: This site has put classic novels online, from Charles Dickens to Charlotte Bronte.
The Online Books Page: The University of Pennsylvania hosts this book search and database.
Project Gutenberg: This famous site has over 27,000 free books online.
Page by Page Books: Find books by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and H.G. Wells, as well as speeches from George W. Bush on this site.
Classic Book Library: Genres here include historical fiction, history, science fiction, mystery, romance and children’s literature, but they’re all classics.
Classic Reader: Here you can read Shakespeare, young adult fiction and more.
Read Print: From George Orwell to Alexandre Dumas to George Eliot to Charles Darwin, this online library is stocked with the best classics.
Planet eBook: Download free classic literature titles here, from Dostoevsky to D.H. Lawrence to Joseph Conrad.
The Spectator Project: Montclair State University’s project features full-text, online versions of The Spectator and The Tatler.
Bibliomania: This site has more than 2,000 classic texts, plus study guides and reference books.
Online Library of Literature: Find full and unabridged texts of classic literature, including the Bronte sisters, Mark Twain and more.
Bartleby: Bartleby has much more than just the classics, but its collection of anthologies and other important novels made it famous.
Fiction.us: Fiction.us has a huge selection of novels, including works by Lewis Carroll, Willa Cather, Sherwood Anderson, Flaubert, George Eliot, F. Scott Fitzgerald and others.
Free Classic Literature: Find British authors like Shakespeare and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, plus other authors like Jules Verne, Mark Twain, and more.
TEXTBOOKS
Textbook Revolution: Find biology, business, engineering, mathematics and world history textbooks here.
Wikibooks: From cookbooks to the computing department, find instructional and educational materials here.
KnowThis Free Online Textbooks: Get directed to stats textbooks and more.
Online Medical Textbooks: Find books about plastic surgery, anatomy and more here.
Online Science and Math Textbooks: Access biochemistry, chemistry, aeronautics, medical manuals and other textbooks here.
MIT Open Courseware Supplemental Resources: Find free videos, textbooks and more on the subjects of mechanical engineering, mathematics, chemistry and more.
Flat World Knowledge: This innovative site has created an open college textbooks platform that will launch in January 2009.
Free Business Textbooks: Find free books to go along with accounting, economics and other business classes.
Light and Matter: Here you can access open source physics textbooks.
eMedicine: This project from WebMD is continuously updated and has articles and references on surgery, pediatrics and more.
MATH AND SCIENCE
FullBooks.com: This site has “thousands of full-text free books,” including a large amount of scientific essays and books.
Free online textbooks, lecture notes, tutorials and videos on mathematics: NYU links to several free resources for math students.
Online Mathematics Texts: Here you can find online textbooks likeElementary Linear Algebra and Complex Variables.
Science and Engineering Books for free download: These books range in topics from nanotechnology to compressible flow.
FreeScience.info: Find over 1800 math, engineering and science books here.
Free Tech Books: Computer programmers and computer science enthusiasts can find helpful books here.
CHILDREN’S BOOKS
byGosh: Find free illustrated children’s books and stories here.
Munseys: Munseys has nearly 2,000 children’s titles, plus books about religion, biographies and more.
International Children’s Digital Library: Find award-winning books and search by categories like age group, make believe books, true books or picture books.
Lookybook: Access children’s picture books here.
PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION
Bored.com: Bored.com has music ebooks, cooking ebooks, and over 150 philosophy titles and over 1,000 religion titles.
Ideology.us: Here you’ll find works by Rene Descartes, Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, David Hume and others.
Free Books on Yoga, Religion and Philosophy: Recent uploads to this site include Practical Lessons in Yoga and Philosophy of Dreams.
The Sociology of Religion: Read this book by Max Weber, here.
Religion eBooks: Read books about the Bible, Christian books, and more.
PLAYS
ReadBookOnline.net: Here you can read plays by Chekhov, Thomas Hardy, Ben Jonson, Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe and others.
Plays: Read Pygmalion, Uncle Vanya or The Playboy of the Western World here.
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: MIT has made available all of Shakespeare’s comedies, tragedies, and histories.
Plays Online: This site catalogs “all the plays [they] know about that are available in full text versions online for free.”
ProPlay: This site has children’s plays, comedies, dramas and musicals.
MODERN FICTION, FANTASY AND ROMANCE
Public Bookshelf: Find romance novels, mysteries and more.
The Internet Book Database of Fiction: This forum features fantasy and graphic novels, anime, J.K. Rowling and more.
Free Online Novels: Here you can find Christian novels, fantasy and graphic novels, adventure books, horror books and more.
Foxglove: This British site has free novels, satire and short stories.
Baen Free Library: Find books by Scott Gier, Keith Laumer and others.
The Road to Romance: This website has books by Patricia Cornwell and other romance novelists.
Get Free Ebooks: This site’s largest collection includes fiction books.
John T. Cullen: Read short stories from John T. Cullen here.
SF and Fantasy Books Online: Books here include Arabian Nights,Aesop’s Fables and more.
Free Novels Online and Free Online Cyber-Books: This list contains mostly fantasy books.
FOREIGN LANGUAGE
Project Laurens Jz Coster: Find Dutch literature here.
ATHENA Textes Francais: Search by author’s name, French books, or books written by other authors but translated into French.
Liber Liber: Download Italian books here. Browse by author, title, or subject.
Biblioteca romaneasca: Find Romanian books on this site.
Bibliolteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes: Look up authors to find a catalog of their available works on this Spanish site.
KEIMENA: This page is entirely in Greek, but if you’re looking for modern Greek literature, this is the place to access books online.
Proyecto Cervantes: Texas A&M’s Proyecto Cervantes has cataloged Cervantes’ work online.
Corpus Scriptorum Latinorum: Access many Latin texts here.
Project Runeberg: Find Scandinavian literature online here.
Italian Women Writers: This site provides information about Italian women authors and features full-text titles too.
Biblioteca Valenciana: Register to use this database of Catalan and Valencian books.
Ketab Farsi: Access literature and publications in Farsi from this site.
Afghanistan Digital Library: Powered by NYU, the Afghanistan Digital Library has works published between 1870 and 1930.
CELT: CELT stands for “the Corpus of Electronic Texts” features important historical literature and documents.
Projekt Gutenberg-DE: This easy-to-use database of German language texts lets you search by genres and author.
HISTORY AND CULTURE
LibriVox: LibriVox has a good selection of historical fiction.
The Perseus Project: Tufts’ Perseus Digital Library features titles from Ancient Rome and Greece, published in English and original languages.
Access Genealogy: Find literature about Native American history, the Scotch-Irish immigration in the 19th and 20th centuries, and more.
Free History Books: This collection features U.S. history books, including works by Paul Jennings, Sarah Morgan Dawson, Josiah Quincy and others.
Most Popular History Books: Free titles include Seven Days and Seven Nights by Alexander Szegedy and Autobiography of a Female Slave by Martha G. Browne.
RARE BOOKS
Questia: Questia has 5,000 books available for free, including rare books and classics.
ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT
Books-On-Line: This large collection includes movie scripts, newer works, cookbooks and more.
Chest of Books: This site has a wide range of free books, including gardening and cooking books, home improvement books, craft and hobby books, art books and more.
Free e-Books: Find titles related to beauty and fashion, games, health, drama and more.
2020ok: Categories here include art, graphic design, performing arts, ethnic and national, careers, business and a lot more.
Free Art Books: Find artist books and art books in PDF format here.
Free Web design books: OnlineComputerBooks.com directs you to free web design books.
Free Music Books: Find sheet music, lyrics and books about music here.
Free Fashion Books: Costume and fashion books are linked to the Google Books page.
MYSTERY
MysteryNet: Read free short mystery stories on this site.
TopMystery.com: Read books by Edgar Allan Poe, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, GK Chesterton and other mystery writers here.
Mystery Books: Read books by Sue Grafton and others.
POETRY
The Literature Network: This site features forums, a copy of The King James Bible, and over 3,000 short stories and poems.
Poetry: This list includes “The Raven,” “O Captain! My Captain!” and “The Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde.”
Poem Hunter: Find free poems, lyrics and quotations on this site.
Famous Poetry Online: Read limericks, love poetry, and poems by Robert Browning, Emily Dickinson, John Donne, Lord Byron and others.
Google Poetry: Google Books has a large selection of poetry, fromThe Canterbury Tales to Beowulf to Walt Whitman.
QuotesandPoem.com: Read poems by Maya Angelou, William Blake, Sylvia Plath and more.
CompleteClassics.com: Rudyard Kipling, Allen Ginsberg and Alfred Lord Tennyson are all featured here.
PinkPoem.com: On this site, you can download free poetry ebooks.
MISC
Banned Books: Here you can follow links of banned books to their full text online.
World eBook Library: This monstrous collection includes classics, encyclopedias, children’s books and a lot more.
DailyLit: DailyLit has everything from Moby Dick to the recent phenomenon, Skinny Bitch.
A Celebration of Women Writers: The University of Pennsylvania’s page for women writers includes Newbery winners.
Free Online Novels: These novels are fully online and range from romance to religious fiction to historical fiction.
ManyBooks.net: Download mysteries and other books for your iPhone or eBook reader here.
Authorama: Books here are pulled from Google Books and more. You’ll find history books, novels and more.
Prize-winning books online: Use this directory to connect to full-text copies of Newbery winners, Nobel Prize winners and Pulitzer winners.
For artists who have problems with perspective (furniture etc.) in indoor scenes like me - there’s an online programm called roomsketcher where you can design a house/roon and snap pictures of it using different perspectives.
It’s got an almost endless range of furniture, doors, windows, stairs etc and is easy to use. In addition to that, you don’t have to install anything and if you create an account (which is free) you can save and return to your houses.
Examples (all done by me):
Here’s an example for how you can use it
Comic Pages Storyboard Tutorial
OKAY SO! @biazerod asked me a little help on storyboarding and i decided to make this tutorial…i’m not a professionist. so don’t take these as golden rules…just advices! and as always sorry for the english FIRST THING FIRST! the storyboard part is the most important phase in a comic page ! you can spend an entire day storyboarding! because it’s the structure, the essence of the page! here’s some tips : 1- a page can start from 1 panel/frame (called splash page!) until how many f*cking panels you can fit ! (some pages , especially in french comics/bd can reach 24 panels/frames!) Exaple of splash pages:
(these are from the green lantern,DC and the newest Thor ,marvel ) Splash pages are a priority of American comics, you rarely can find them in french Bd ! they represent a scene of impact! a fight! a revelation! be careful! use it only one if two times on a range of 50 pages! cuz it cut the narration! instead in french bd you find this :
first one is from Blacksad 2# and second one is from Atar Gull see how high the number of the frames is?? the number of frames is very important in a page because it decide the narration time! :D also it all depends on the kind of ‘’direction’’ you want to use on your comic! so be really careful when you decide the number of the frame! LET’S PASS ON THE CREATION! 1- when you have a page that contains more than 3 Frames ALWAYS. ALWAYS HAVE AN ESTABLISHING SHOT!
the establishing shot is fundamental! BECAUSE READERS CAN UNDERSTAND WHERE THE CHARACTERS ARE! DON’T DO A COMIC PAGE FULL OF FACES !
DON’T DO THIS! LET THE CHARACTER BREATH! LET THE READER BREATH! PLAY WITH YOUR CAMERA! YOU HAVE THE POWER! in a comic page, is important to put the camera far away from the character most of the time! play with the different shots!
(found this on google) WATCH MOVIES AND TV SHOWS. lot of them can help you so much you have no idea! a comic artist and a director do the same job when creating a story 2- Candy eye this is a tricky trick that can help you with the audience! when a character is saying something important or you have to introduce them , USE THE CANDY EYE DUDE.
the candy eye is , basically, a bust shot where you show the character,their features , usually with a cool or a funny expression ( or of course it depends from the situation) and believe me WORKS 10/10 with the audience ;) 3- HIGHLIGHTS THE IMPORTANT SCENE IN THE PAGE!
FINAL TIPS: - when you’re doing dinamic poses try and try again! the first one isn’t always the best! -USE REFERENCES. -A STORYBOARD PAGE CAN REQUIRE EVEN 4 HRS IF NOT AN ENTIRE DAY IF NOT AN ENTIRE WEEK. REMEMBER THAT THE STORYBOARD IS THE ESSENCE. AND THE REST IS DECORATION. - IMAGINE THE SEQUENCE! NOT THE SINGLE PAGES. THINK IN SEQUENCES! imagine what would happen after the page you are creating! connect the various pages NOT THE SINGLES FRAMES ! YOU’RE CREATING A STORY! NOT A SINGLE ILLUSTRATION! -AGAIN DON’T DO PAGE OF FACES. most important thing:
if the page you’re creating it stresses you! STOP. continue it when you are in a better mood ,dude. our job requires lot of time and effort, but it should be the job we love. so don’t stress yourself and keep calm. hope this is useful. don’t take this as golden rules, this is just the way i work :)
I am so envious of your fabric folds
ALL RIGHT I’LL TRY!Note: This is how I personally work with folders, i’m not right neither wrong, different artists have different ways to do the same thing. Remeber to check for more than one as refference!
The shame is HEAVILY influenced by the wind or movement on the character/object, so are the folds that follow the flow of whatever is influencing them!
Always consider the fabric you’re planning to use, a heavy one won’t have as many folds, but will have more bumps, meanwhile thin ones tend to have A LOT of folds and not so many bumps, and often fold over themselfs
If you don’t plan how the object/dynamic/wind whatever will influence the fabric, you may come up with this:
The tip of the arrows will have LESS folds because it’s where the wind is blowing, meanwhile the back of the arrows will have a lot of folds, since it’ll curl and bump on itself!
You can’t just toss folders around without planning how they will be affected, works very similar as hair does!
It ended up so long i really hope it helps omgg ;w;If you want to support me and help me to make more tutorials, you can always tip me! (Not mandatory, don’t feel pressured!)
Finding Character Voice
“Character voice” is rather self-explanatory, simply being the unique way a character speaks or narrates. Every character has a voice, some may just stand out more than others, and part of becoming a better writer is learning to work with voices that are unlike your own. Here are some ways to get started on finding a character’s voice once you have a character concept in mind:
Look into their background. What’s their education level? Does the area they come from have any specific sayings? Speech patterns are influenced by a surprising amount of external or upbringing-related elements, especially when it comes to slang and some aspects of grammar, so learn to look beyond the “now” for finding voice.
Personality and mood affect voice. A laid-back person is unlikely to speak or narrate in a snippy tone, unless that subject matter is super important to them. Likewise, a critical person may judge other characters more than another narrator.
Everybody has quirks of speech. Can also be known as ‘verbal tics’, though ‘quirks of speech’ refer to general unique speech patterns as opposed to a specific sound.
Voice is more than just tone. It’s related to perspective and how the character comments on the things they notice. Two characters may see the same tree, but the artist may describe the tree with specific colors whereas a nature-lover may know the species and its stage of life. The information that’s given to the reader through the narrator is a form of voice.
Some techniques for teasing out potential voice are:
Interview your characters with a series of simple questions that get harder and harder. Get personal. See what comes out in how they respond.
Write a letter as if by their hand, about a subject they’re passionate about.
Try acting things out as if you were that character. Have imaginary conversations or test different tones spoken out loud to test the effects.
Create a scene, then test it witch each different character. What do they notice that’s different from others? What’s the order of things that they notice?
Throw each character into the exact same problem. How do they each handle it differently?
Good luck with your work and if there are any questions, drop them in my ask box and I’ll see how I can help. Just please read my Rules and Considerations page to make sure I’m the best resource, and consider a Gift of Coffee to grant me an energy boost, if you’re feeling generous.
Heather Nesheim - https://www.etsy.com/es/people/heddarsketch - https://twitter.com/heddarsketch
Alternatives for 25 overused words in writing
1. Interesting- note worthy; thought-provoking; fascinating; attracting; appealing; attention-grabbing; captivating; gripping; invigorating; engrossing; engaging; electrifying.
2. Beautiful- striking; stunning; magnificent; lovely; charming; gorgeous; radiant; dazzling.
3. Good- acceptable, wonderful, exceptional; positive; brilliant; first-rate; notable; stellar; favorable; superb; marvellous; prime.
4. Bad- awful; lousy; poor; unacceptable; crummy; dreadful; rough; inferior; substandard; atrocious; appalling; dreadful; defective.
5. Look- glance; fixate; observe; stare; gaze; peer; scan; watch; study; browse; eye; glimpse; review; inspect.
6. Nice- lovely; superior; pleasant; satisfying; delightful; likeable; agreeable; correct; adequate; swell; fair; okay; approved.
7. Very- extremely; exceedingly; exceptionally; immensely; tremendously; abundantly; particularly; remarkably.
8. Fine- satisfactory; worthy; respectable; exquisite; suitable; well; imposing; decent; admirable; praise-worthy; decent.
9. Happy- cheerful; delighted; pleased; content; amused; thrilled; elated; thrilled; ecstatic; on cloud 9.
10. Really- genuinely; truly; honestly; actually; undoubtedly; certainly; remarkably; incredibly; downright; unquestionably; extremely.
11. Sad- miserable; gloomy; devastated; down at heard; distraught; distressed; dispirited; sorrowful; downcast; feeling blue; desolate.
12. Big- massive; huge; giant; gigantic; enormous; large; colossal; immense; bulky; tremendous; hefty; sizable; extensive; great; substantial.
13. Shocked- taken aback; lost for words; flabbergasted; staggered; outraged; astonished; astounded; stunned; speechless; appalled.
14. Small- tiny; petite; mini; miniature; microscopic; minuscule; compact; pocket-sized; cramped; puny; undersized; limited; meager; modest; minute; pint-sized.
15. Angry- irate; enraged; touchy; cross; resentful; indignant; infuriated; wound-up; worked-up; seething; raging; heated; bitter; bad-tempered; offended; frustrated.
16. Know- understand; comprehend; realize; learn; perceive; recognize; grasp; sense.
17. Change- alter; transform; replace; diversify; adjust; adapt; modify; remodel; vary; evolve; transfigure; redesign; refashion; advance; transition; shift; adjustment.
18. Old- aged; ancient; matured; elderly; senior; veteran; decrepit; seasoned; venerable; past one’s prime; doddering; senile.
19. Think- ponder; reflect; conceive; imagine; contemplate; consider; determine; realize; visualize; guess/assume; conclude; envision.
20. Funny- comical; ludicrous; amusing; droll; entertaining; absurd; hilarious; silly; whimsical; hysterical; joking; witty; facetious; slapstick; side-splitting; knee-slapping.
21. Go- move; proceed; advance; progress; travel; walk; journey; depart; exit; flee; make one’s way; clear out; get underway.
22. Give- grant; donate; hand-out; present; provide; deliver; hand over; offer; award; bestow; supply with; contribute to; send; entrust.
23. Get- acquire; obtain; receive; gain; earn; gather; collect; buy; purchase; attain; score; secure; take possession of; grab.
24. Easy- effortless; simple; clear; smooth; straightforward; uncomplicated; painless; accessible; apparent; basic; plain; child’s play; facile; elementary; cinch.
25. Fast- agile; brisk; rapid; nimble; swift; accelerated; fleeting; high-speed; active; dashing; winged; hurried; turbo.
All About Writing Fight Scenes
@galaxies-are-my-ink asked,
“Do you have any advice on writing fight scenes? The type of scene I’m writing is mostly hand to hand combat between two experts. I’m definitely not an expert so when I try to write it, the scene ends up sounding repetitive and dull.”
Fore note: This post is coauthored by myself and one of my amazing critique partners, Barik S. Smith, who both writes fantastic fight scenes and teaches mixed martial arts, various artistic martial arts, and weapons classes.
I (Bryn) will tell you a secret: I trained MMA for seven years, and when I write authentic hand to hand fight scenes, they sound dull too.
The problem with fight scenes in books is that trying to describe each punch and kick and movement (especially if it’s the only thing you’re describing) creates a fight that feels like it’s in slow motion.
I write…
Lowering her center of gravity, she held her right hand tight to her face and threw a jab towards his chin. He shifted his weight, ducking under her punch. His hair brushed against her fist, and he stepped forward, launching a shovel hook into her exposed side.
But your brain can only read so fast. In real life that series of events would take an instant, but I needed a full eight seconds to read and comprehend it, which gave it an inherent lethargic feel.
So, we have two primary problems:
How do we describe this fight in a way the reader can understand and keep track of?
How do we maintain a fast paced, interesting fight once we’ve broken down the fight far enough for readers to understand it?
(We will get back to these, I promise.) But for now, let’s look at…
Different types of “fight scenes:”
Keep reading
Clouds & Atmosphere Painting Tutorial - Digital Painting Basics - Concept Art by Walid Feghali
Please check out his work! its beautiful and he has tutorials posted
Happy Chinese New Year! Its the Year of the Dog so to celebrate, I drew up a collection of sighthound profiles (and hopefully more breeds if I can find the time)!
Sighthounds are among the oldest, fastest and tallest dogs in the world. Originally in the Middle East with the Saluki and Afghan Hound, sighthounds have since spread over Asia and into Europe and Africa. Not only used to hunt fast game like hare and deer by sight, the larger breeds (such as borzois, and Irish wolfhound) were bred to even hunt down wolves.
Other sighthounds not shown here include the Galgo Español, the Chart Polski, the Hortaya Borzaya, the Whippet, and the Caravan Hound. I didn’t include those breeds mostly because they can look very close to greyhounds and I wanted as much breed variety as possible!
“A Thread of Tips” by Shelby
• #16 is missing but to find out more tips, follow her on twitter; be sure to thank her! 😁
disclaimer: check sites and tips before using at your own discretion.
This is just incredible!
Here, have some fur and feathers
Would you ever do a simple tutorial of how you draw horses? I want to make centaur OCs but lord horses are difficult creatures to doodle 😭
Mmmm there are so many guides that cover what I do, and I reallydon’t do anything more than those. Still use the whole blocks and sticks andform building and whatnot. And a buttload of references. Anything I could say different would kinda step beyond the stage of simplicity?
To offer something though I would like, suggest tweaking the use of circles whenit comes to drawing horses. Or anything, really. Circles are great and highly accessible for fast, generaldrawing, but few natural things are perfectly round. Look at a horse from thefront or back - it’s square and flat and meaty and saggy too, depending on yourangle.
So like, I dunno, if you wanna step it up a notch, trychanging your use of building-circles into something like this
And especially practice being able to see these shapes indimension
And then piece them together. The triangle will really help guide the line up. Highly recommend.
Honestly I just follow the same gist of Hubedihubbe’s quicktut (please check it out, very good points made, much cleaner, actually labelled) so I kind of feel like I’m parroting here but.. I break down the rest inlines and diamonds.
As a personal preference, I like marking in the shoulderblade to elbow and the hip to knee, as they create pretty important shapes towardshorse recognition. If something keeps looking off, check your leg length. A super rough way to get a close idea of what you need can be found in using most of the shoulder block for a landmark? It’s not perfect maths, it’s a rough tell. The hind legs are then worked out via the red line, setting the hocks above the intersection across the knees
And uh, it goes on from there. You gotta look at pictures, dothe study, and learn the meats. No real other way around that part.
There’s a horse bod.
But the reason of learning how to see those shapes indimension is so that you can push your poses further! Try piecing it together with your front-view knowledge. Andlook at references, always!
Shoulders are pretty narrow compared to the belly and hindquarters, unless you start looking into the draft breeds - then both ends more or less square up together. But moving on, more leggies are slapped on that thing
And fleshed out with all that meat knowledge :P (I know I haven’t gone into heads but this was about centaurs anyway. This guy just felt like he needed one)
And when it comes to practiceand learning, don’t be afraid to simply drawthese shapes directly over an image. It will help familiarise you with howthese base forms interact with one another, how far they can squash and stretchand look at a whole variety of angles. It’s just practice!
Doing that helps to gain asolid concept of the subject, so that when you do set out on your own you canfind that convincing territory.
So hey, this has been a very long and terrible not-tutorial. More like insight or something, and would only be helpful if you’re somewhat familiar with horses and already got the fundamentals of drawing down pat, since I skipped over a lot.
Haven’t drawn a horse before though? I recommend you the Shrimp method
Anyway, hope all this was kinda interesting
Some snippets from a Hat Drawing Tutorial I just posted to Patreon. I may share it openly, eventually, but for now it’s available to all patrons, $1 and up!
Actually
The question I get the most is how I write characters that feel like real people.
Generally when I’m designing a human being, I deconstruct them into 7 major categories:
1. Primary Drive 2. Fear: Major and Secondary 3. Physical Desires 4. Style of self expression 5. How they express affection 6. What controls them (what they are weak for) 7. What part of them will change.
1. Primary Drive: This is generally related to the plot. What are their plot related goals? How are they pulling the plot forward? how do they make decisions? What do they think they’re doing and how do they justify doing it. 2. Fear: First, what is their deep fear? Abandonment? being consumed by power? etc. Second: tiny fears. Spiders. someone licking their neck. Small things that bother them. At least 4. 3. Physical desires. How they feel about touch. What is their perceived sexual/romantic orientation. Do their physical desires match up with their psychological desires.
4. Style of self expression: How they talk. Are they shy? Do they like to joke around and if so, how? Are they anxious or confident internally and how do they express that externally. What do words mean to them? More or less than actions? Does their socioeconomic background affect the way they present themselves socially? 5. How they express affection: Do they express affection through actions or words. Is expressing affection easy for them or not. How quickly do they open up to someone they like. Does their affection match up with their physical desires. how does the way they show their friends that they love them differ from how they show a potential love interest that they love them. is affection something they struggle with?
6. What controls them (what they are weak for): what are they almost entirely helpless against. What is something that influences them regardless of their own moral code. What– if driven to the end of the wire— would they reject sacrificing. What/who would they cut off their own finger for. What would they kill for, if pushed. What makes them want to curl up and never go outside again from pain. What makes them sink to their knees from weakness or relief. What would make them weep tears of joy regardless where they were and who they were in front of.
7. WHAT PART OF THEM WILL CHANGE: people develop over time. At least two of the above six categories will be altered by the storyline–either to an extreme or whittled down to nothing. When a person experiences trauma, their primary fear may change, or how they express affection may change, etc. By the time your book is over, they should have developed. And its important to decide which parts of them will be the ones that slowly get altered so you can work on monitoring it as you write. making it congruent with the plot instead of just a reaction to the plot.
That’s it.
But most of all, you have to treat this like you’re developing a human being. Not a “character” a living breathing person. When you talk, you use their voice. If you want them to say something and it doesn’t seem like (based on the seven characteristics above) that they would say it, what would they say instead?
If they must do something that’s forced by the plot, that they wouldn’t do based on their seven options, they can still do the thing, but how would they feel internally about doing it?
How do their seven characteristics meet/ meld with someone else’s seven and how will they change each other?
Once you can come up with all the answers to all of these questions, you begin to know your character like you’d know one of your friends. When you can place them in any AU and know how they would react.
They start to breathe.
Well… that took an unexpected turn.
[edited pics 2 and 7 to remove the stand]
—
Want to use these photos as drawing reference? Go for it!
Have a pose request? Read the FAQ and then send me an ask!