lemonsssss

18 they/she I like lemons and I post stuff. Mostly reblogs for art tips and writing advice.

[lastoneout]

I love when people try to gotcha me on my stance that all sports should be gender integrated with "even American football???" because I can instantly come back with "oh lmao, no, I don't think ANYONE should play American football at all, it's way too dangerous" like nice try but I know no amount of testosterone is going to protect you from the profound, life ruining health issues caused by getting repeated severe concussions over the course of several years. No one should play this sport.

[lemanon]

Hi hello, non American here

Quick question

You guys are padded from the teeth to the tits, how the FUCK are you still getting injured????

[lastoneout]

Because there's no amount of padding that can truly protect the human body from getting thrown 15ft(4.5 meters) in the air by 250lbs(113 kilograms) of solid muscle hitting it at 21 mph(33 kph).

Truth is, the NFL obvious benefits from football being popular but football gives 99.9% of the people who play it the degenerative brain injury called CTE (chronic traumatic encephalitis) and there isn't really a way to fix that short of dramatically and fundamentally restructuring the entire sport to the point of it no longer really being recognizable as American Football so they spend a lot of money burying former players and doctors whistleblowing about CTE while also spending stupid amounts of money developing "high quality gear" and convincing the public and the players that this special gear protects them when it doesn't, so players keep playing rough thus entertaining and the public stays quiet while hundreds of young, often poor and non-white men are used for profit while being afflicted by profound, horrific brain and body damage all the fucking time until it kills them.

The short answer, you having to ask means sadly the NFL's lies and propaganda have worked exactly as they're intended to. It looks safe, so therefore it is safe. Even if it really isn't. No shade for falling for it tho, they spend a LOT of money convincing the public that American Football is safe when short of boxing and free climbing it's probably the most dangerous sport that currently exists and it truly should not be played at all in it's current form.

[lemanon]

Saying I've fallen to propaganda for something I don't even have access watch is a stretch but okay-

But yeah, that seems fair I guess

I guess I just got confused because apparently you guys don't crawl on top of eachother ala speckies and marks from what I'm told

[lastoneout]

That's fair, but the general perception that it's safe is indeed a major part of the NFL's bullshit. I don't think they purposefully launch each other into the air but American Football is absolutely a full contact sport where people collide at ridiculous speeds. If you've never seen it played tho it makes sense to think the padding makes you safe, but this should give you a good idea of how not at all safe this is.

[lemanon]

Ah... I see...

[lastoneout]

I love when people try to gotcha me on my stance that all sports should be gender integrated with "even American football???" because I can instantly come back with "oh lmao, no, I don't think ANYONE should play American football at all, it's way too dangerous" like nice try but I know no amount of testosterone is going to protect you from the profound, life ruining health issues caused by getting repeated severe concussions over the course of several years. No one should play this sport.

[lemanon]

Hi hello, non American here

Quick question

You guys are padded from the teeth to the tits, how the FUCK are you still getting injured????

[lastoneout]

Because there's no amount of padding that can truly protect the human body from getting thrown 15ft(4.5 meters) in the air by 250lbs(113 kilograms) of solid muscle hitting it at 21 mph(33 kph).

Truth is, the NFL obvious benefits from football being popular but football gives 99.9% of the people who play it the degenerative brain injury called CTE (chronic traumatic encephalitis) and there isn't really a way to fix that short of dramatically and fundamentally restructuring the entire sport to the point of it no longer really being recognizable as American Football so they spend a lot of money burying former players and doctors whistleblowing about CTE while also spending stupid amounts of money developing "high quality gear" and convincing the public and the players that this special gear protects them when it doesn't, so players keep playing rough thus entertaining and the public stays quiet while hundreds of young, often poor and non-white men are used for profit while being afflicted by profound, horrific brain and body damage all the fucking time until it kills them.

The short answer, you having to ask means sadly the NFL's lies and propaganda have worked exactly as they're intended to. It looks safe, so therefore it is safe. Even if it really isn't. No shade for falling for it tho, they spend a LOT of money convincing the public that American Football is safe when short of boxing and free climbing it's probably the most dangerous sport that currently exists and it truly should not be played at all in it's current form.

[lemanon]

Saying I've fallen to propaganda for something I don't even have access watch is a stretch but okay-

But yeah, that seems fair I guess

I guess I just got confused because apparently you guys don't crawl on top of eachother ala speckies and marks from what I'm told

[lastoneout]

I love when people try to gotcha me on my stance that all sports should be gender integrated with "even American football???" because I can instantly come back with "oh lmao, no, I don't think ANYONE should play American football at all, it's way too dangerous" like nice try but I know no amount of testosterone is going to protect you from the profound, life ruining health issues caused by getting repeated severe concussions over the course of several years. No one should play this sport.

[lemanon]

Hi hello, non American here

Quick question

You guys are padded from the teeth to the tits, how the FUCK are you still getting injured????

[digitalkiddo]

If you're writing anything involving cons, scams, heists, or morally questionable characters who are very good at lying, here are some free resources I've been using for research. Saving you the "why is this in my search history" anxiety.

1. The FBI's Famous Cases & Criminals archive (fbi.gov/history/famous-cases) has detailed breakdowns of real fraud cases, Ponzi schemes, and confidence operations. The language they use is clinical and precise, which is perfect for getting the procedural details right.

2. The FTC Consumer Sentinel Network publishes annual reports on the most common fraud tactics in the US. Great for understanding how modern scams actually work and what makes people fall for them.

3. The Smithsonian's American Art Museum has a free digital collection of forgery case studies. If your character forges documents or art, this is gold.

4. Court Listener (courtlistener.com) is a free legal database where you can read actual court transcripts from fraud trials. Want to know how a real con artist talks under oath? This is where you find out.

5. The Internet Archive's collection of old newspaper crime sections. Search for "confidence man" or "swindle" in papers from the 1920s through 1960s and you'll find incredible real stories that would feel too dramatic for fiction.

Bonus: The Psychology of Fraud section on the Association for Psychological Science website has accessible articles about why people trust, how deception works cognitively, and what makes someone a convincing liar. Essential reading if you want your con artist characters to feel psychologically real.

Reblog to save for later. Your WIP will thank you.

[archangelbeth]

Ooo, useful for game masters (and maybe players) as well, in the right kind of TTRPG.

[writersisland]

Random Tiny Events that Might Help Advance Your Plot

shattering a glass and cutting hand while trying to clean it up

getting disoriented and lost

a heavy storm forces them to seek shelter in an unexpected place

quite literally bumping into an old friend

requiring a change of clothes after spilling a drink

a blackout plunges the city into darkness

infected with a mystery illness that refuses to go away

a night out goes off the rails

finding and following a curious animal/creature

finding a mystery object

getting mugged or an important item stolen by a random pickpocket

an animal companion chooses them as their human friend

tripping and falling into a river / lake

[rileyav-moving]

artist tips

don’t save as jpeg

[suchirolle]

as a former yearbook editor and designer, let me explain this further

if youre only planning on posting your art online, them please save it as .png ;this is also better for transparencies as well

BUT

please, if youre planning of printing your art, NEVER use png. it makes the quality of the image pretty shitty. use jpeg or pdf instead. and always set your work at 300dpi to get a better printing quality - this means, the images are crisper and sharper and theres no slight blurriness. i had a talk with my friend who is currently taking design, and pdf is much better to use when youre working with a bigger publishing company because it still has the layers intact, but if youre only planning on printing your stuff at staples or at some small publishing store, the jpeg is the way to go.

this has been a public service announcement

[justhere4coffee]

I’ve replied to this once before but I see it’s doing the rounds again.

This is all utter bullshit.

I’m sorry but if your qualification is working on the school yearbook, you have no qualifications. Do not pretend otherwise. As a former professional photo manipulator for advertising brochures, I can say that you’re not comparing apples to oranges here - if anything, you’re comparing fruit to farmyard machinery:

JPEG is a lossy format. It is suitable for web imagery because it sacrifices detail for reduced file sizes, but in doing so it introduces artifacts that weren’t in the original; if you load a JPEG for editing, then save it as a different JPEG, then you’re adding more artifacts formed from those first artifacts. Do this often enough and you end up with a horrid glitchy mess that looks like a puddle’s reflection after a stone’s been thrown in. You’ve seen those memes that have 3 or 4 different “found at” tags along the bottom, that look like fingerpainted copies of the original? That’s why.

PNG is a lossless format that comes in two primary flavours, PNG-8 and PNG-24, which use 8 and 24 bit colour respectively. 8-bit colour is what you have in GIFs, a limit of just 256 different colours in a predetermined palette, usually automatically chosen by your software when saving. These files will look the same as GIFs, potentially with large patches of solid colour instead of the usual gradual shading seen in 24-bit imagery. This is usually better for small banners or pixel art, as it can yield smaller filesizes than GIF format. (There is an animated version called MNG but it has very little web support, hence the continued use of GIFs.)

PNG-24 is great for larger images where detail is as important as colour depth, as well as printable RGB images and (if supported by the client) full colour images with gradient transparencies. It most certainly does not make “the quality of the image pretty shitty,” as it preserves every nuance. File sizes can be smaller than JPEG for small images, or significantly larger for large images.

PDF is a container file, whatever you put into it will be pretty much preserved as it was, so you gain nothing but lose nothing.

TIFF is what you need to be using for archival or print-quality imagery. It has support for multiple layers, multiple colour channels (RGB as well as CMYK, which is essential for accurate print rendering), and everything is preserved exactly as it was seen on-screen when being composed. There are compressed versions available, they use similar methods to PNG in order to maintain detail without sacrifice; next to whatever your graphics program uses natively, this is the most interchangeable format available for professional use.

DPI is important only when used in combination with image dimensions; in and of itself it serves no purpose. If you make a brilliantly detailed 640x480 image & set it to 300dpi, you’ll receive a brilliantly detailed 2 inch x 1.6 inch print. This is great if you want to make a postage stamp, but not if you’re creating an A4 flyer! Determine the image’s dimension then set the DPI accordingly; 72dpi isn’t hideous especially for text-heavy work (it’s ~3 pixels per millimeter), and 150dpi can be suitable for many images. Unless you’re interested in photo realism, 300dpi is usually overkill - for our hypothetical A4 flyer, you’d need a file of 2490x3510 pixels for edge to edge printing, with a correspondingly high memory requirement and filesize even if using a compressed format.

Keeping the layers intact is utterly unimportant for print work unless you want to use a separated colour print method that requires multiple passes to lay down each ink. If you send a file with all the layers, masks, etc. off for printing you’re liable to get it sent back unactioned, as they won’t want to take responsibility for choosing the wrong elements for printing. Save your work with everything intact, then save a flattened copy especially for printing purposes - this is one of the reasons Save Copy As… is a common option in graphics manipulation software.

This has been a Public Service Rebuttal.

[queensimia-deactivated20181215]

FUCKING THANK YOU

As a designer who’s worked a few years for a newspaper, I cannot begin to tell you how much OP’s post (edit: response, technically) made me cringe. I would have killed to get a photo as a TIFF for once instead of having to tear apart PDFs only to find a 50x100px 72dpi shitty JPEG inside for the 5 millionth time…

JPEG and PNG are best suited for web formats (and it is perfectly fine to save your web version as JPEG, that’s what it’s goddamn for). You will make a designer cry if you send a web-safe JPEG for print, however. And if you have a vectorized logo saved as EPS (or even better, AI), you will make that designer’s year.

[sweetwhitechoco]

Reference, and sharing for others.

[crabussy]

after almost eight years of extremely damning evidence, I think THE MOST irrefutable proof of me being part of a system is sunny, turning around and walking away from a rare (AND RIDICULOUSLY CHEAP) vintage mlp figurine while I screamed in despair from the backseat. I would never in a million years have done that. monstrous cruelty to horse boy. unforgivable (looks at her sweet smiling face) maybe forgivable

[saszor]

[ID in alt text]

"Tutorial" on how to draw an OC with dwarfism (well, some of it).

Boring tired disclaimer: Keep in mind that this is an introductory "drawing" "tutorial" and has some generalizations in it, so not every “X is Z” statement will be true for Actual People. Which happens to be true for everything in general.

You are heavily encouraged to do your own research because this does not contain everything you should know before making a character with any type of dwarfism.

Consider supporting me on ko-fi if you find this to be helpful.

If (when) you repost this on pinterest at least put a link to the original post somewhere..

[mommy-knowss]

thank you @saszor for the amazing work u do !

The tutorials u put out have really helped me realize just how MUCH ableism is typically embedded in learning to draw. I think this would have been so helpful for me when I was earlier in learning art and under all the pressure from outside sources/internally to make my drawings look “right” (which is just someone who isn’t visibly disabled or w/ visible differences).

There is such variety to people, and while intentionality is important and it’s a skill that’s worth exercising to draw what is in your head, it has the potential to be so liberating to know that there also is probably someone who looks like your drawing either way. What if instead of “correcting” things like proportions and other visible differences, educators could encourage learning artists to look into people who look like the art already?

[the-child-death]

If you see this on your dash, it’s too late

((Reblog or Halloween won’t be celebrated. If you reblog this in 50 seconds, you’ll have the best Halloween and be blessed by the spoopy skeleton gods.))

((This skeleton will also break all chain mail or reblog or die posts and you’ll live a happy life.))

[lesvegas]

you can only reblog this if you're not racist

[valtsv]

forget age gaps or differences in rank or whatever the most potently dangerous power dynamic in any relationship is "people like you more than me"

[valtsv]

genuinely nothing is more corrosive to love, respect, or trust than the insecurity of forever being second and last in line. of always being the plus one but never invited; always tolerated on their behalf but never wanted on your own. of knowing that nobody's jealousy or admiration is about you at all, only your place at their side. you tell them that you feel like you only exist when you're with them, and they laugh, charmed, but it isn't a figure of speech. it's not enough that they love you best if everyone else loves them better.

[ravnervn]

The flipside of it is also ripe for some real agony. Utterly adoring someone and being unable to understand why no-one else seems to hold them with the same regard you do. Wondering why you seem to be so effortlessly loved and yet your light doesn't illuminate those you care for, only obscures them with its glare. Feeling constant paranoia that they resent you because you're the one who gets love. Feeling you have to love twice as hard as penance.

Either side of the coin, you can create a horrendous spiral of pain.

[fucktonofanatomyreferencesreborn]

A mouth-watering fuck-ton of hand angle references.

By Shadowcross on DA.

[kward-the-local-cryptid]

BLESS YOU, YOU  WONDERFUL PERSON

[crabussy]

the idea that people in a system are just as much real living people as the host should not be controversial yet somehow here we are.....

I think that being alive and having a sense of individual identity is more than enough criteria to constitute Being A Person. someone's personhood and sense of self originating from something other than Physically Being Born doesn't make them any less of a real person. if people in a system would prefer to be treated like PEOPLE then I'm very sorry but that's really not a big ask and all that is required of you in return is basic kindness and respect. and I hope that is a managable task for most of you!

[snowkissedmonsters]

Make Dialogue Good Again bitches i am NOT asking

[snowkissedmonsters]

"how do you write good dialogue" here's an idea let's just start with the characters NOT simply saying the plot out loud to one another for 20% of their conversations

[snowkissedmonsters]

actually let me be sincere here. I am not an expert on writing dialogue, but I flatter myself to know the basics at least. Here's some practical ways to improve dialogue:

read old plays. I'm not kidding. Read a play written pre-2000. Old Irish plays are my personal favourite because the dialogue is usually high context and hilarious

don't let the characters EVER say the plot out loud to each other. Allow the characters to say as little as possible to convey the plot to the reader/viewer; let visual language and context inform the rest. Readers are SUPPOSED to interpret, they are supposed to use their brains, for the love of god, LET THEM

"varying character voice" is not just about their accent or their social class, which are the two aspects I most often see varied in modern work. It more importantly means "how much would this character say, and what words would they choose to say it." Motive should always inform what a character reveals and how they reveal it. The most important part of a character's voice is the subtext within that voice - that's where their true characterisation is really hiding.

I saw this on somebody else's tumblr post which I now cannot find, but it's honestly a sublime piece of dialogue advice: whatever a character is saying, force them to Say It Without Saying It. If a character wants to be handed a red ball, they can say anything except "Hand me that red ball" to achieve that end. This goes for confessing feelings, outlining plots and plans, arguments, etc etc etc. If a character ever DOES need to say something super directly it should be an impactful moment in your story, NOT the norm.

[mysticpink]

Will forever be a Pink Diamond/Rose defender because people be hating her to much.

I fully agree, Pink/Rose did bad things but she has changed for the better.

“She abandoned Spinel” yeah, that was terrible but she probably abandoned her because she wanted to try and mature since Spinel was pretty much a toy, also we never heard Pink/Rose’s thoughts about it as she began fighting for gem rights. For all we know, she could have wanted to go back for her but physically couldn’t or just assumed the other Diamonds collected her. She probably never thought Spinel will literally be in that garden standing still for years

“She let Steven have deal with her issues” she thought the war was over. Literally her and the other Crystal gem’s biggest problem after the war was dealing with Corrupted Gems. The only reason why the Diamond and other homeworld gems got involved was because of the cluster, which the Crystal gems had zero knowledge off.

“But she hurt the Diamond’s feeling after her ‘death’” she literally didn’t think the Diamonds cared enough about her. Especially after emotionally and physically hurting her for years. Yes, they cared and love her but that still doesn’t justify what they did to her

“She acts like a child” not like other gems act like children or immature in the series (Amethyst or the group of Rubies being the biggest examples). And keep in mind, she did matured a bit

“What she did to Pink Pearl—“ it was an accident. Build up frustration will lead you to explode, which she did, but always in private but Pink Pearl was to close at the time. Obviously she didn’t mean to and she was punished by having Pink Pearl taken away and replaced by our Pearl. She learned her lesson and didn’t do that around Pearl.

Her biggest flaws is that she doesn’t know her importance to other people and not thinking fully ahead. Which is part of the reason she did what she did.

Do keep in mind, not saying no one should dislike her. But jeez how the fandom treats her worst than White Diamond

[lemanon]

Do feel like it should also be added on that we're more or less seeing her character arc in reverse

If you take every clip of her and view it in chronological order instead, you get a horrible person changing into someone who was willing to value others

You don't condone people for what they did in their teenage or child years, so why her?

[fangirlinginleatherboots]

things i did that forced me to be a better artist:

used a reference for everything

thinner line art (you think thats thin? go thinner….)

sketch, then do a cleaner sketch, THEN start finalizing

THUMBNAILS

color research, picking a set palette or light/dark for each work

you like that pose? redo it one more time

USE A DAMN REFERENCE

do not rely on stylization as an excuse for anatomy

draw the goddamn background you coward

just draw the hand- a bad hand is better than a hidden hand

the rule of thirds WORKS

take a considerable break between sketch and lines/paint

know that art takes longer as you get better at it

draw the seams on clothes

stop aiming for accuracy and focus on fluidity and motion, accuracy will come with practice of those two concepts

just…do the chiaroscuro. just DO IT. no excuses it always works

stop making excuses, make yourself an art schedule/set weekly(or daily) art goals and just DO IT.

[dragonfreak130]

hmm are the lines things enough? (I rlly need to learn how to do backgrounds, I am a coward 😔 😭😅😔)

[unheardoracle]

Your dialogue is stiff because everyone is being too honest

Great dialogue can come from radical emotional honesty. But in most real conversations, people

dodge questions

answer indirectly

lie (badly)

change the subject

crack jokes to avoid serious answers

lie (convincingly)

say half of what they mean

tell the truth but get so anxious/angry/defensive others now think they're lying

If your dialogue feels unnatural, it might be because everyone is saying exactly what they think, or articulating their thoughts too well. Try letting characters hide things instead.

Subtext is where tension lives.