There's light somewhere

I'm in editing hell and spent the last few hours trying to reconcile the official D&D Faerun map from 2015 and the in-game map from BG3 and the world map from BG1 and BG2 to make everything work, when I get the wild hair up my ass to check the artbook, and low and behold, there's a goddamn world map I forgot about! I'm a goddamn idiot. I kept assuming they were moving in a general west to north pattern (kinda like BG1's worldmap) instead of a vague west pattern.

Cool writing sites and programs I'd like to share:

Scrivener: My go-to writing program for long pieces. Back when I was just a beginning writer, I would have a folder littered with dozens of documents: documents dedicated to individual characters, chapters (yay, early days of fanfiction), and outlines. Now that is all kept in one neat little file. It opens fast and you can go down a rabbithole with all the different bells and whistles. What's also nice is that once you buy the license (so long as you stay in the same operating ecosystem; if you switch from Windows to Mac, you'll have to drop money to get a license), it's yours forever. I've had to reinstall this program on multiple different computers, and I've never had any issues with it.

yWriter: A freeware version of Scrivener I used back in college, though I think this predates it by a decade? I've linked to a program review site to give people a better idea of what it looks like. I haven't used it in a while, but for what it was, I really found it helpful.

LibreOffice | OpenOffice: Freeware word processors. I've used both, and they're both pretty good! IIRC, one is a fork of the other, which more or less means they share the same DNA. LibreOffice, from what I understand, updates a bit more often than OpenOffice. Either way, both are miles better than whatever bullshit Microsoft Word is pushing, and I'm unfortunately up-to-date with it thanks to my office job.

Written? Kitten!: A cute little in-browser writing app that rewards you with images of kittens for ever set number of words you write. 

4thewods: A cute writing-based RPG recommended to me by musekicker. I haven't yet explored it, but it kind of reminds me of an MMO version of a similar writing browser-based RPG I used to use.
 

Tip of My Tongue: A thesaurus with a more robust search system, including searches done by word particles, close rhyming, and phrasing.

I didn't do much writing today; I managed to get like 4k done yesterday, so I took it easy. I did do some planning for the next chapter, though, so I'm very much looking forward to cranking that out.

I played a lot of Baldur's Gate 3 today and getting through parts of Act 2. I didn't realize how much I had missed from my first playthrough--I purposely kept Minthara from dying during my goblin camp escapades, so she's a funny new recruit to have. I also didn't realize she also has a fuckton of ilithid powers unlocked? Insanely funny when she's doing that shit while in the same party as Halsin. Makes me want to dig around on AO3 to see if anyone has done Halsin & Minthara interactions beyond being enemies. Also, I managed to have Rolan stick around the Grove, so I'm seeing his storyline, and I understand why people love this little asshole.

I also finished reading a longer short story called "Pushkin's Photograph (1799-2099)" by Andrei Bitov. It's apart of a 1989 short story collection from Soviet-era literature, this one being the first in the collection. "Pushkin's Photograph" was one I had to take in over the course of several reading sessions since it was a bit dense and trippy as hell in the beginning. The story liberally swings between time and place, but that's not a bad thing, given the main character Igor is a time traveler from 2099 trying to make contact with Russian poet Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin, and he goes a bit off the rails the longer he stays in the past. The thing that really makes it so weird is the "present" author asides and just how they almost "randomly" pop in. I say "randomly," but by the end, it feels thematic?

It's really hard to get my thoughts nice and readable; translation is hard and playing catch-up with the literary references that are second nature to Bitov's original audience (or at least, I'm thinking they are?) did throw me for a loop, but I'd at least recommend it as a piece of weird fiction. If nothing else, there are a lot of juicy themes here on chasing an elusive muse and the horrors of the march of time.

I've been having the urge to take drawing classes again. I had a semester in college where I took a life drawing course with figure and gesture drawing, and goddamn it, do i miss it. Drawing the models really improved my understanding of anatomy and made my art look so much better. There are a couple of classes that are a longer series that are a bit on the pricey side (for my budget! The classes are understandably priced!), so that's out of the question at the moment.

I did find a pose reference thing that works great for gesture drawing, though I'm just being picky and wanting a 3D model since it just...feels easier for me to transfer that 3D to 2D and make it look nice? I'm also out of practice, so there's that as well lol

For now, I'll probably practice with that SketchDaily cite, but I'll also look to my community ed programs to see if they have anything related to life drawing.

The Legacy of the Anime Never Meant to Be Real, and the Company Built on Memes: A funny video about a 2000s magical girl doujinshi series. I love weird shit like this. I don't know much about the doujin scene besides some things that cross the language barrier (Touhou and the When They Cry series).

"AKU" MV from Queen Bee: I just stumbled on this artist's MV, and the simplicity of the whole zoom in and zoom out combined with the imagery is absolutely haunting. I'll be checking out more music from this group for sure. Gotta love artists that do some genderfuckery.

Scientists Are Reviving Climate and Nature Research Effors in the Wake of Trump Cuts: An article I saw while at work, but just got around to reading. This is incredibly relevant to my state as our state equivalent of the EPA is doing a lot of work to limit pollution. It's the same energy as the people who collected and published data about COVID deaths during the early parts of the lockdown. I hope there'll be a further buildup to support these efforts as it becomes one of the only ways for us to fight climate change (and similar projects that are focused on other community health initiatives).

Dewfeathers Cosplay: A cosplayer I follow who works with focusing on reusing items; she does weekly blogs on what she's working on and could provide resources for those who want to be more conscientious about how they go about their cosplay. She did a panel at a con I saw last year, and I love her approach to cosplay as a non-competition cosplayer.

An animatic for the song "Anna" from Venice: The Musical: Finally, some good food for this musical. I stumbled on the soundtrack just a few years after the peak of Hamilton's popularity, and was obsessed with the soundtrack. The TLDR of this musical is it's a bit an Othello retelling that has some neat ideas but apparently had questionable execution.

I thought for today, I'd mention artists and albums I've had on loop for the last few weeks:

The Last Dinner Party: An alternative band from England. Itunes says their influences includes Kate Bush, and it really does fit. The first song I heard from them was "Sinner." The local station played a censored version of it, and I've kind of been obsessed since.

Marianas Trench: I joking call them a Canadian theater kids/boy band, but I've been deeply in love with their stuff since the early 2010s. Their albums are constructed like a good musical and are masters of referencing their old material in new ways that still is enjoyable for new listeners. Every album experiments a bit with genre and sound, but there's still a few consistent things they do which is always so much fun. Favorite albums are Masterpiece Theatre and Phantoms. My favorite song from them is "The Killing Kind," the bombastic closing song from their Phantoms album.

Autoheart: Another British band that's grabbed me by the throat. I don't remember the exact first song I heard from them, but some of my favorites are "Joseph," "Factories," and "Oxford Blood."

Baldur's Gate 3 Soundtrack as orchestrated by Borislav Slavov. This entire fucking soundtrack has me hooked, though special shoutouts go to the best boss music in the game: Raphael's Final Act.

Feeling a bit lazy, so I thought I'd share in a meme from cyare 

I've seen this floating around and I thought it looked fun, so: let's get to know each other! Give me a letter and I will tell you...

Something I love:
Something I hate:
Somewhere I have been:
Somewhere I would like to go:
Someone I know:
A Beloved Movie:
The Best Book:
My favourite song:

Want to play? Ask for a letter and post this to your journal ;)

I missed day 5 because of prior commitments and a nap, but that's fine.

Today's topic is about in-person/local writing clubs since I had that yesterday. This may also be useful for others who are discouraged after the closure of NaNoWriMo as we edge nearer to what would have usually been months of Camp NaNo. A writing club can be as large as a overlowing discord server or as small as you and a friend.

When looking or starting a writing club, you have to keep in mind a couple of things, the most important being:

• What are your time commitments?
• What resources do you have to hold or participate in meetings?
• What are your needs when it comes to writing?
• What are your writing goals?

( Read more... )

I decided to showcase some of the webcomics I'm currently reading.

Space Boy: It recently returned from hiatus in time for the comic's 10th anniversary! I've been in love with this comic since 2020 when I first binged it. I deeply appreciate how McCranie writes his characters with so much nuance and tackles hard feelings in ways that really breaks it down for readers, both young and old. Amy and Oliver's relationship is the center of the story, but McCranie does wonders giving weight to each of their relationships for others.

New Magical Me: A slowburn magical girl story centered on a team who won against their enemy, but lost their leader. Years go by and they're now adults when a new threat is coming back and their leader is actually alive and has now come out as a trans man. The two main characters, Rikki (former leader) and Winnie (dependable blue magical girl) have a really sweet dynamic as they have to relearn how to be friends after Rikki's apparent death and re-emergence.

The Eccentric Duchess: A not-so run-of-the-mill transmigration story. The MC transmigrates into a BL-bootleg of a game she was playing where she is the twin to the bootleg's protagonist. Rhian is a rather prickly protagonist, but she does have her sweet moments as she deals with the consequences of her actions. Her relationship with her siblings and other leads are incredibly well-done and is less focused on a harem "will-they-won't-they" like some others of this type of story are.

Suitor Armor: A medieval fantasy romance with heavy political intrigue elements. It's really hard to really give a good, succinct summary without diving into spoiler territory, but it tackles such hard topics like genocide and being a survivor with some semblance of power in ways that feel incredibly nuanced. The main relationships are Lucia and the suit of armor Modeus. It's incredibly slowburn, really sweet, and incredibly healthy, which sits as a much needed foil to the straining friendships she has as she comes into her own. I haven't read much of season 2, but my god is it tense.

The Blind Prince: A fantasy adventure story about a cursed young woman gets chased into the realm of the ravens, where she must team up with a captured prince in hopes of getting home. ELAINE MY BABY GIRL. She's my favorite type of "weak" female characters: knowing their abilities, but still figuring out to claim agency in their lives. She's resourceful and just trying her best. Her strict mother is also given such incredibly important nuance as she learns what happened to Elaine is determined to save her daughter. Sebatian, the titular blind prince, is also just such a fun character as a nice foil to Elaine. I really can't wait for season three to come out or this series to get a physical release.