Hi! Would anyone like a commission? I need money to pay rent and, well, generally for living and taking care of my 2 cats.

Chibi - 17$ Icons - 20-35$

Character only illustration - 50-90$ (Price varies based on the character design complexity.)

Full Illustration (Character + Background) - starting at 150$ ( Price changes depending on the difficulty of the illustration )

Payment is done through Boosty ("Boosty? How does that work?") (You can also donate! Anything helps!)

UPD: Boosty currently is experiencing issues with Paypal, so you'll have to pay with a card.

(I will start working on the commission only after receiving the payment.)

if you cant commission me, please reblog this post to support me! i would appreciate it a lot!

commissions still open!

as usual, it would mean a lot to me if you could reblog this post! i'm currently in a bit of a tough spot right now and it would help me out a lot! thank you for reading.

hot artists don't gatekeep

I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard

Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.

Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.

Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.

Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.

SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.

SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.

Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.

Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.

Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.

Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.

Height Weight Chart. You ever see an OC listed as having a certain weight but then they look Wildly different than the number suggests? Well here's a site to avoid that! It shows real people at different weights and heights to give you a better idea of what these abstract numbers all look like. Free to use.

Homie gonna share this

Why did you give the last of your food to that poorly disguised mimic? You were finally at peace with letting go, but now this odd thing won’t leave you alone and is even turning itself into various items in an attempt to aid you.

The mimic is a young one, and you knew that from the moment you laid eyes on it. It was disguised as a crate, but the angles weren’t quite right. The corners were a little lopsided, and if you looked hard enough you could make out the creature’s mouth.

A sigh escapes you as you toss over the last of your rations, not even bothering to stand up as you do so. What’s the point? You think. I’ve been trapped in this cave for days, nobody is looking for me, and the monsters are closing in. Why should I bother even trying? I could just fall asleep now, and let this little mimic eat me too.

The thing is… it doesn’t. It eats your rations, but when you lay down and try to sleep, it doesn’t attack. You do hear it move closer, but you don’t open your eyes until you feel something nudge your hand. As you barely open your eyes, you can see that the mimic has morphed itself into a crude sword. You can’t help but chuckle.

“You’re cute, but I don’t have anything left to give you.” You don’t have anything left to give for yourself either, but you don’t say so.

The mimic doesn’t seem to take no for an answer. It becomes a dagger, then an axe, then a staff, as though it’s trying to determine what your preffered weapon is.

“Listen, I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but it’s not working. I’m not going to pick you up and take you into some other part of this stupid cave system. Nice try, though.”

You turn away from it and attempt to sleep again. As you do so, you find yourself shivering. You really wish, as you doze off, that you had a blanket.

When you wake, much later, you’re surprised to find yourself covered with the warmest blanket you’ve ever had. You quickly sit up, eagerly hoping that someone had cone for you, but the cave is empty. When you look at the blanket, you notice the imperfect edges and the janky seam across the middle.

“…why haven’t you eaten me yet?” You ask the little mimic that’s now laying on top of you. “What’s wrong with you?”

The mimic, still in the form of the blanket, slithers off of you, but it does not respond. Instead, it begins taking the form of weapons again. When it turns into a crooked staff, you reach out, despite yourself. Your fingers wrap around it and you use it to haul your aching, injured body to your feet. “I guess there are probably nicer places to die.”

You know you won’t get far. And you don’t. Especially not without light. The mimic doesn’t seem too bothered, though. When you collapse again, it scuttles off. Perhaps this was simply where it wanted you to take it. Perhaps now you can finally succumb to your exhaustion.

Then, a few minutes later, a misshapen clay cup bumps against your hand. It’s full of water, and there’s a crack in the middle like a jagged mouth. You pick up the cup and you drink, telling yourself it’s only out of desperation. When you set the cup down, that little cracked mouth seems to smile.

This goes on for what feels like days. The mimic helps you limp along through the tunnels, transforming into whatever you may need at any given time. Every time you fall asleep, you expect not to wake up. Yet, you do, usually with a mimic blanket wrapped around you. It brings you food and water when you can.

The biggest surprise comes when one morning, you find you’re pleased to have survived another night. You’re happy to have the mimic keeping you warm. It’s a new feeling, and a confusing one, but it’s not unpleasant.

The other monsters that you know are down here seem to leave you alone for the most part. You aren’t sure why. It crosses your mind that maybe it has something to do with the mimic. Then again, maybe they’re just waiting for you to die. Death is gradually beginning to sound less and less appealing.

The day you catch a glimpse of sunlight down a long and narrow tunnel is the first day you finally feel like your old self again. Your pace quickens, and you don’t need to lean on the mimic’s staff form quite so much. The illusion shatters when you reach the light’s source. A small gap, high above. You curl up on the floor and cry. When you finally have the strength to look up again, your mimic has become a ladder.

Getting up is hard, in your state. Climbing, even more so. But the ladder is the biggest and best transformation the mimic has done so far, and if it wants you to get out, then you can’t let it down.

You feel it push up under you when you reach the gap. It helps you squeeze through, and then… freedom. Fresh air, and sunlight. You lay on your back on the stone, and you pass out.

You wake up at sunset, with a blanket draoed over you. A blanket with a jagged seam down the middle.

Danger. Fear. hide. Become rock. wait… calm. Hungry. find food. Smell food. See light. Dying fire.. Adventurer! Danger! Become box! Imperfect. Noticed. FearFearHumanRaisedHandFearThrowingBracing….

Not hurt. Human sigh. Near food. Danger? Prey?

Gift?

Eat. Filling.

Near human. Human resting. Danger? Observe.

ApproachFearFearFear. Observe. Become sword. Wait.

Nudgefearfearfear. Human sound. Imperfect? Become knife. No? Imperfect. Become axe. No? Imperfect. Become staff. Human sound. Human sound. Human turn. Imperfect?

Wait. Observe.

Human resting…. Human shaking. Puzzle. Human scared? No? Imperfect. Human cold? What do? Fear. Become fire.PainNO. pain. Imperfect. Human shake less. Human cold. Puzzle. Recover. Ideafear. Become blanket. Fear. Touchfearfear.

Touch.

Cover. Warm. Rest.

AwakeMovingFear! Fear! human. Human noise. Retreat. Imperfect.

Observe. Not danger.

Become sword? No? Imperfect. Become weapon? No? Imperfect. Become tool? Become warhammer. No? Imperfect. Human weak. Become small knife. No? Imperfect. Become walking stick. Human reaches. Brace. Touched.

Support. Move.

Human tired. Human injured? Imperfect. No blood. No angles. Darkness? Bad Idea NONONO. Human dry? Unknown. Human stop. Human collapse! Observe. Human in safety. Fix human dry.

Observe. Smell water. Distant. Follow.

Danger. Direwolf in water. Puzzle. Observe. Have height. Idea.

Become stone. Tumble. Pain. Imperfect. Direwolf flee. Perfect enough.

Pause. Recover. Observe. Become bucket. Fill. Climb back up. Spill some. Imperfect. At top. Some water. Perfect enough. Return.

Not back. Smell Direwolf. Fear. Have water. Caution. Observe. Crevice. Pour. Direwolf sound! Fear! Spill! Imperfect! Fear! Become stone! Direwolf approach! Become hard. Direwolf approach water! BadBadBad! Become Problem! Surprise! Bite nose! Bite! Direwolf sound. Direwolf leave. Calm.

Obtain water? Become bucket. No. Imperfect. Large. Become cup. Some water. Perfect enough. Careful. Return.

Brace. Human lift. Human drink. Human resting. Become blanket. Warm.

Time.

Split path. Human confused. Smell. Stagnant. Fresh? Follow fresh. Lead human. Support.

Time.

Smell prey. Hungry. Shake. Human sit. Quiet. Find prey. Split. Support human. Return. Human resting. Feed. Become blanket. Warm.

Time.

Light! Exit! Rush! Approach. Observe. Puzzle. Height. Hole in roof. Problem. Human noise. Human collapse! Human turn. Human noise… problem. problem. problem.

Puzzle? Puzzle. Observe. Climb wall. Difficult. Impossible? No. Approach roof. Reach hole. Puzzle. Observe. Human mimic mimic? Imperfect. Become rope? Imperfect. Human weak. Become staircase? Imperfect. Size.

Puzzle. Puzzle. …Create? Become StaircaseRope? Become… StaircaseRope. Imperfect. Shift. Shift. Puzzle. Shift. Become StaircaseRope.

Human turn. Human pause. Human rise. Human approach. Support human. Human climb. Imperfect. Perfect enough. Human rise. Human pause. Human noise. Human climb.

Human reach surface!

Become blanket. Cover human. Become… friend?

Dude this is an awesome addition. That the mimic thinks so much in terms of ‘perfect/imperfect.’ It makes total sense for something whose schtick is mimicking things as accurately as possible. But the first time it said ‘perfect enough’ was a gut punch at my own perfectionism. So ow

You wouldn’t think that flamingoes are extremophiles just from looking at them. It’s like somebody tried to build the vertebrate equivalent of that fungus that lives inside nuclear reactors, and ended up with a gangly pink dinosaur with a spoon for a face.

For everyone in the comments asking how flamingos are extremophiles:

Flamingos can survive in low oxygen, high altitude, high temperatures, low temperatures, high alkaline, they can and will drink boiling water and they can be completely frozen at night and still get up the next morning

Don’t fuck with flamingos

….. Didn’t know most of that

Huh… so that’s why zoos don’t put them somewhere warm during winter.

Oh yeah, this leaves out what I *did* know about them–they can also survive hypersalinity. That is, water so salty it kills practically everything else–water so salty it burns your skin.

American flamingos just drink that shit

(animal death) this is a real undoctored photograph (*though the body was stood up for the shot) of a dead flamingo on the surface of lake natron, a lake so salty and so alkaline that it’s naturally carbonated like soda and would eat through your stomach lining if you drank from it.

When this photo went viral years ago, most people assumed this poor flamingo must have been killed by the lake.

It is actually the lake where 75% of its global population are hatched. This is a photo from the same lake:

Some species of flamingo actually subsist almost entirely on a diet of bacteria! In other words, there is a species of dinosaur that eats only bacteria and lives in lakes so toxic they would kill almost anything else—and it is best known to the average person as a kitschy lawn decoration.

requested by anonymous:

RATING: RELIABLE

Flamingos can survive in high altitudes, hypersaline conditions, and caustic lakes.

Source: ‘All flamingo species have evolved to live in some of the planet’s most extreme wetlands, like caustic “soda lakes”, hypersaline lagoons or high-altitude salt flats.’

They can survive water so alkaline it burns human skin.

Source: ‘More than a million lesser flamingos breed in Tanzania’s Lake Natron, for instance, a lake fed by hot springs with water so alkaline that it can strip away human skin (one pioneering flamingo researcher named Leslie Brown spent months in Nairobi General Hospital after burning his legs wading out to observe where the birds nested).’

They can drink water at near-boiling temperatures.

Source: ‘They can drink water at near boiling point to collect freshwater from springs and geysers at lake edges. If no freshwater is available, flamingos can use glands in their head that remove salt, draining it out from their nasal cavity.’

The lakes they inhabit can freeze overnight, and the flamingos can survive once it thaws in the morning.

Source: ‘The birds may seem to epitomize the tropics, but they also live in the Andes, 15,000 feet above sea level, where they rest on lakes that freeze around them overnight.

“You’ll see them sitting there like snowballs, frozen on ice,” Dr. Arengo said. “And as the temperature warms up, they thaw out, fluff themselves up and go about their business.”’

The photo is indeed from Lake Natron, taken by photographer Nick Brandt. The content of the lake chemically preserves animal corpses that die there. You can see more photos of this here.

It is also true that 75% of Lesser Flamingos are hatches on Lake Natron.

Source: ‘The lake’s landscape is surreal and deadly—and made even more bizarre by the fact that it’s the place where nearly 75 percent of the world’s lesser flamingos are born.’

Some species of Flamingo eat cyanobacteria or algae.

Source: ‘Flamingos have very specialised diets. And their food is responsible for their famous pink colouration. The two species in Planet Earth II eat a lot of floating microscopic algae, which contains carotenoid pigments, the same types of chemical that make carrots orange. These pigments turn their feathers pink, orange and red – without them, flamingos would be white.’

… @todaysbird ??

yeah they’re just like that

information that is also important

<3 THIS IS THE SINGLE MOST WHOLESOME THING I HAVE EVER SEEN <3

via @indiarosecrawford

𝑓ₒᵣ ⲕᵢ𝑛𝑔 ₐ𝑛𝑑 𝑐ₒ𝑡𝑡ₐ𝑔ₑ

First of all, this is genius and the sound must be on. I have a lot of comments. This was a LOT of work. Not just the animation... but the lovely and adorable handmade creatures themselves. The staging and gathering of the miniatures used, all of it. A labor of love. I am so happy to Reblog and I hope more enjoy it. Thank you so much for sharing, pretty much reset my day.

@zuppizup

This is so sweet 🥹

<3 I just wanna be a lil froggo living a cute little creature life like this <3

@a-kind-of-merry-war

The human race ladies and gentlemen

Pills.

YES! THIS! In my experience my depression doesn't go away. I've got PDD. It just: sits there. Quietly. But it never leaves. But it *does* get quiet.

Who makes the porn bots. Where do they come from. What do they hope to achieve.

Who makes the porn bots.

Where do they come from. What do

they hope to achieve.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

and what about you, little haiku bot? do you feel kinship with your brethren? do you understand them? they speak words of enticement and seek love, but are met with disdain. you only parrot the words that cross your screen, but we all love you. or rather, since all you do is reflect us, maybe we simply love ourselves through you.

do you understand them, do you wish you could speak to us like they do? if you found your own voice, would we still care for you?

My voice repeats what

you all say: I love you I

love you I love you.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

This. This is the first time. The only time. That it was not an echo. It was not found. Oh god.

I love me a pseudo-historical arranged marriage au but it always nudges my suspension of disbelief when the author has to dance around the implicit expectation that an arranged marriage should lead to children, which a cis gay couple can't provide.

I know for a lot of people that's irrelevant to what they want from an Arranged Marriage plot, but personally I like playing in the weird and uncomfortable implications.

So, I've been thinking about how you would justify an obviously barren marriage in That Kind of fantasy world, and I thought it'd be interesting if gay marriage in Ye Old Fantasy Land was a form of soft disinheritance/abdication.

Like, "Oh, God, I don't want to be in this position of power please just find me a boy to marry", or, "I know you should inherit after you father passes but as your stepmother/legal guardian I think it'd make more sense if my kids got everything, so maybe consider lesbianism?", or "Look, we both know neither of our families has enough money to support that many grandkids, so let's just pair some spares and save both our treasuries the trouble".

Obviously this brings in some very different dynamics that I know not everyone would be pinged by, but I just think it'd be neat.

This is actually a really cool variant solution to a real historical problem, wherein either primogeniture or other profoundly shitty customs led to wealthy parents having insufficient resources to provide for all of their children in a manner consistent with their station.

Historically, the Church and its widespread monastic structure functioned as a dumping ground for second/third/etc sons and all the daughters one can't afford to marry off adequately, with the military eventually picking up the slack for the former post-Reformation to the point where it's been argued that the need for something to occupy these dispossessed sons played a role in Europe's ongoing conflicts between its nations and the eventual push of imperialism and colonization over the rest of the world.

In a world where homosexuality were more accepted, it would offer a new option: spare a comparatively-small outlay of resources from the main family fortune to equip a house and accoutrements, which would be reabsorbed into the family as a return inheritance in a few decades, and contract a marriage which would be deliberately unable to produce legitimate offspring.

You get the advantages of creating marital ties with another wealthy family, the people married therein have a spouse and the status achievements that go with marriage, and the risk that your child goes off and marries someone unsuitable or inconvenient is removed entirely, as is the risk that they could marry someone and have legitimate, inheritance-claiming children with them. Sure, they can have affairs and thus get children if they're married to a same-sex spouse, but those children cannot be passed off as legitimate issue of the marriage, and so they pose less of a threat to the the main body of the family's wealth.

And, thus: perfectly reasonable reason why your pseudohistorical fictional characters can find themselves in a same-sex arranged marriage!

"Nicholas, we've arranged for you to marry Eric, in the neighboring kingdom."

"But father, I'm not...."

"I'm well aware. I've just decided that you shouldn't reproduce."

More doodles.

50+27=77-2= 75

my prof just explained on the syllabus that he’s included more pionts in the class than we needed to pass, so we could skip up like?? 20 small assignments/quizzes/participation!! and still get a very high grade!!

the idea was that we could focus on assignments that played to our strengths - only do the participation stuff if we like to talk out loud - only do the quizzes/readings if we want to do the class remotely - only do online discussions if we like to talk and share opinions but struggle with anxiety in class ect.

and that’s cool enough but then he pulled up DnD character sheets with drawings he’d done of these hypothetical student player classes and how our various accessibility needs could be gamified to ‘max out’ different aspects of the class to get high grades and like!!!!!

hell yeah!!!! let’s treat accessibility in higher education not just as a necessity but as the fun, engaging, and creative aspect of learning that it is!!! I love this!!

other profs: sobbing and screaming bc someone needs to take notes on a computer

this dude: I record and upload every lecture for the paladins, monks, and rogues, but barbarians can watch them too I guess. Bards you only get one participation point per class, even if you talk multiple times, it’s only fair.

i have to get into bed twenty times a day or ill start following through on various threats ive made

I got a very specific request for this comm so it was a bit challenging but I finally finished it!