Patroclus is Black. I have spoken.

🧊 Ice 🧊| 🔥👌🏾Grown, Black, & Geeky 👌🏾🔥 |🍵I share everything here, check my 📌🍵 | pfp by minkasreverie 🎨 header by sleepypigeon

[patrochilles-or-bust]

Fic Masterlist | Squidgeworld | AO3 | Bluesky (fic/art only)

Updated version! I ain't ever gone play that guitar, might as well remove it.

If you are looking for my character design and racial sensitivity blog, please go to @creatingblackcharacters! This is my main, where I relax and post strong political opinions. Stay at your own will 🤣❤️💕.

[patrochilles-or-bust]

Tell me why I dreamt that I got snatched up from my bed by Lestat and the one goblin guy played by David Bowie 😭 like I tried screaming and it wouldn't work. He was just constantly injecting me with something and then drinking me. 😭 Goblin Dude tried to take me after I tried tossing myself from a cliff I couldn't climb over, but they fought over it. and then when I tried to leave with my bestie (he literally told me to leave btw), he started abusing her 😭 dude can't even be nice to Black women in my dreams huh. No escaping the allegations. I just wanted a restful sleep 😭

[creatingblackcharacters]

Okay! So!

The #Melanin Beam Challenge officially ended today!

HOWEVER!

The queue for all of the amazing submissions this year spans into the middle of the week, atm! Y'all really went above and beyond! We managed to get the whole tag to #3 this year 🥹🥹🥹 thank you!!!

My point is, if you haven't seen your stuff shared yet, it's likely in the queue! Please be patient! It's coming!

And as always, my syllabus is HERE if you're looking for guidance. Unfortunately I've had to delete a lot of asks over the course of the week, because I said I wasn't taking any during the event and that boundary went... Somewhat ignored 😅

[tiktoks-for-dead-pope]

[jemeryl]

For @creatingblackcharacters Melanin Beam Challenge, I did Kira Nerys and Jadzia Dax from Star Trek Deep Space Nine!

There should have been a Black woman on the main cast of DS9 and I will die on that hill.

[premamelody]

i couldnt figure out who to do. i jumped between wof chs and dr ones but as soon as Black Ness even remotely entered my mind i locked in. it reminds me of another Black Ness take all the way back in like 2020 or 2021 that i drew fanart of but i did my own take.

@creatingblackcharacters my submission for the Melanin Beam Challenge!

[mel-addams]

Hiei and Yukina for @creatingblackcharacters' Melanin Beam Challenge this year! Happy birthday!!

Last year I drew Kurama, because I'm able to draw him (and Hiei) from memory, so it let me focus on the research and design adjustments (rather than having to also learn a new character from zero). But also like...while I don't follow the tags, I do occasionally run across YYH fanart, and I've noticed that when people change any of the guys' skin tones it seems to always be Hiei (and/or Yusuke) who they make darker. Which reeks of colorism (in the "darker = more aggressive" manner), so. Fuck that, pretty boy Kurama got to be unambiguously Black and beautiful last year.

This year I went for the twins, because...well, I'll grant that usually folks are only drawing the main four guys, at least from what I've seen, but. Hey y'all who usually draw Hiei with darker skin...how would you draw Yukina, if you haven't yet? If your instinct is to make her look different from him, why is that?

My process, rambling thoughts, and a version without the deckled edges under the readmore!

Have the no-deckled-edges version before my rambling, so you can see better (without having to scroll a thousand years) how Yukina has hooked her thumb around Hiei's to (kind of) hold his hand! Because he may not want to suffer physical contact from pretty much anybody unless it's a fight, but she is allowed because he loves her (even if he may never be comfortable saying it out loud).

One of the other reasons I went with the twins is because Rebelle updated and added a symmetry tool, which gave me the idea to use it to give them mirrored poses! Also, where Kurama was done with oil brushes (for the impasto effect, and to test out the new bristle brushes), plus a color palette based on paints for cel animation? For this one, I instead used a palette based on Prismacolor colored pencils, and challenged myself to only use colors I physically have (so I can eventually test out/compare some digital vs physical results, for color blending and such). I also used my colored pencil brush set (that I am still working on refining aaaaa), because I need to do a proper practice pieces with them to see what settings need adjusting! (I've mostly just been doing scribbly tests as I build the brushes. I've not had the time/energy to try them in a full piece (though I did start an old lineart recolor), which is VERY different from test scribbles, and this helped highlight some things that I was able to fix while working on it! The brushes still need more fixes, but...part of that is a "go on the forums and politely ask the devs if they would kindly consider making an adjustment or two to how the blend curve works at the lowest point, because while the previous version may have technically been bugged, it worked better for this very specific purpose of looking like colored pencils, via avoiding overblending fine texture into digital smoothness.")

I also used a paper that has little dark flecks in it, some blue and some brown, because it gave me a subtle impression of both snow and embers! I had to decrease the scale of it slightly, because it's a more rough paper that made it difficult to get even coverage with the colored pencils. So I had to find a size that gave me a more fine texture, without totally losing visibility of the flecks I picked it for. (And then I messed that up at one point when I tested a brush setting change with a smoother paper real quick, forgot to change the paper back, and colored Hiei's coat with a totally different paper texture...so I had to erase and redo it to make the texture match. Which was actually the second time I redid his coat, since the first time I colored it was one of the points when I realized my brush settings needed fixing, because the shading looked weird. I also almost made the hiruiseki the wrong color. >.> I reflexively made them cream (in part also because it stands out better against Yukina's kimono so my brain went "this makes design sense"), but then remembered the necklace ones are blue and THAT IS AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION DUE TO THE SOURCE OF EACH COLOR/TYPE OF STONE)

I also didn't draw Hiei last year because I didn't have time and he felt like the "obvious" choice, as far as his hair just...needing texture, the end, done, easy-peasy, now it's a sculpted afro. (Though freeform locs would also work really well.) Kurama took more research and consideration, and was more fun in that way. (Though the cornrow design could definitely look better, and I have SO MANY thoughts that I didn't put in that post, so like. I'll probably do another drawing or edit with him sometime, with each age we see him at, and ramble more in that post.) But drawing Hiei and Yukina let me at least ponder a tiny bit more over her hair, and how it'd be similar-to-but-different-from Kurama's (since the silhouettes are so close). I went with a low puff twist-out for her, though it took a bit to settle on what to do for her bangs...I'd considered finger coils, but ultimately made them twist-outs too, so she could have accurately maximum floof. Though the shape is a little flat on the right side because I didn't want to totally cover her pointy ear 'cause I think it's cute.

[hiddensfolks]

Second submission for the Melanin beam challenge by @creatingblackcharacters! Air Shakur and Tosen Jordan from uma musume. Given they're named after Tupac Shakur and Michael Jordan respectively and already make multiple references to them in their design and stories, the fact that neither of them was written to actually BE Black or Blasian always felt a bit strange to me tbh. They're both characters I'm fond of though, so I'm glad I got a chance to draw them!

[aoitodoshusband]

guy who’s totally not late: IM NOT LATE!!!!

two Black edits + my own art for @creatingblackcharacters melanin beam…… aoi todo!!!!! i have a very strong headcanon for aoi especially, i think hes Black american mixed japanese :)

notes on aoi. hes “relatively” more tan than the other japanese characters in jjk, just by appearance alone. his cursed technique is called “boogie-woogie”, which if you know much about Black american music culture, really sticks out. he also calls his best friend “brother”, and in some translations, “homie”, which strikes me immediately as AAVE. his hair also can sometimes look like locs even in the original.

he’s frequently called a “gorilla” by a variety of characters, which speaks for itself. despite that, he’s the most intelligent of the students, and he’s praised consistently as incredibly powerful. AND, he’s allowed to be cute!!! he has a crush on an idol girl (it leans into delusions icl) and even imagines himself in feminine clothes.

overall, i’m VERY endeared to this man, and I think he deserves being Black, AND cute :)

[alphascorpiixx]

[ID: flat color pencil and marker portrait sketch of Zelda from Twilight Princess, resigned to be Black. Her hair is in locs decorated with gold cuffs, and her expression is neutral with her eyes looking slightly off to the side. End ID]

Zelda for the last day of @creatingblackcharacters's Melanin Beam Challenge.

[creatingblackcharacters]

Happy birthday week! Was listening to Ba Bop Bye Ya at work and my melanin beam challenge idea entered my body fully formed.

R. Dorothy Wainwright from The Big O! Themes of personhood, agency, facade and identity all through the series but especially walking around as the perfect android, the mini-Deus, a father's daughter. Incredible character.

THE HAIR!!! Amazing job 👏🏾

[creatingblackcharacters]

Not necessarily a transformative Melanin Beam because she doesn't have a canon race/appearance outside of how her clothes are described, but this was my design for Aranessa Royce (from critical role's campaign 4) !!! Hit her with the Melanin Beam nonetheless!

If a story doesn't clarify what a character looks like, as far as I'm concerned I can imagine what I want and it's canon. So, she looks right to me! Excellent piece!

[kitkatnerds3]

@creatingblackcharacters Happy Melanin Beam Challenge!

Hissabeth is one of my absolute favorite characters in Reverse 1999, so it was very fun to draw her and engage in such a cool challenge at the same time! I hope you have a lovely day!

[sivavakkiyar]

Langston Hughes

[the-bitter-ocean]

The irony of nonblack people specifically calling Black Americans “Amerikkkans” is baffling to me. Hey I need you to look at me. Who do you think is the predominant target and victim to the kkk. Do you know what the kkk even is. Why do you think calling random black people online and comparing them to the racist group of white people who systematically target, abuse, and execute black people (that are still doing this to this day currently), why do you think doing that is acceptable? Do you have a fucking brain. You can (rightfully) criticize the country of America and its government *without* being fucking antiblack to the people who are historically marginalized.

[chroniccoolness]

racist white canadians and europeans want you to believe the slave trade worked like this

it did not. it is public knowledge the slave trade worked like this

and in fighting antiblackness within canada and europe it is so so so important to acknowledge these places's participation in and benefit from the transantlantic slave trade. Slavery is not just the US's dirty past, it is a triangular industry lasting centuries that white people in the united states, canada, and europe benefitted from and continue to benefit from to this day. Slavery was good for white canadians and white europeans. They liked it. they encouraged it. they had slaves, they profited from the slave trade, and they used products grown from US slave labour in every day life. The slavery of Black people would not have been possible on the sheer scale at which it happened if it were not for active, consistent participation from europe and canada.

[thelemonadeartblog]

re-biracializing our whitewashed queen from NINAH: Vera! for @creatingblackcharacters melanin beam challenge (happy birthday btw!)