Run Remi, Run

Writing side blog | I follow back and send asks from the-thing-that-dripped-blood | 22

[academia-lucifer]

@academia-lucifer

[moninils]

And all of this at once.

[nondelphic]

i love making playlists for my book. one day i may even write the book.

[redstonedust]

pet peeve is when you look up fashion references from a specific era and you keep getting modern day '[era]-inspired' fashion like NO i want authenticity damn it. i can see your 2020 photo quality and your 2020 hair and your 2020 makeup. youre not fooling me.

[bincliff]

hello i'm a historical fashion researcher and i have a lot of experience looking up things! this is a very widely experienced irritation and you're definitely not alone in this, but i am here to share everything i know!

so, ways to get around this:

turn off AI results. they're literally nonsense to us

don't use pinterest because the sources/provenance is often hard to trace

a standard internet search can be okay, but museum collections are the top tier (list of collections below this list)

instead of broad terms like victorian, regency, tudor, renaissance etc. try using the decade you're looking for. if you're not sure of what decade it is but have a vague image in your head, look on the fashion history timeline and just jump around until you find it. but even changing to e.g. 19th century will give better results than victorian

including terms like womenswear/menswear, daywear, formal wear, evening wear, court dress should increase the value of your search too

including "fashion plates" in your search can give you a nice impression of the intended silhouettes of the era. some of these might be a little stylised but will show you what was considered in vogue

for pre-fashion plate eras or things like makeup and styling, you'll have to look at portraiture or manuscripts. these are harder to actually find what you're looking for, but searching museum collections and limiting results to specific date ranges will be your friend

when looking at art, do bear in mind sometimes artists would paint fabric extra flow-y to show off their skills. it might not have been exactly like that in terms of fabric weight or drape. so, a pinch of salt required!

if you find something on image search where the provenance is dubious, reverse image search and you might find a source! i've been able to trace random pinterest images to real sources, but this does take a lot of time and effort and is often not worth the headache

some online resources and museum collections:

fashion history timeline is an invaluable resource if you're trying to get a feel for everything and should be your first port of call. it'll also link to good examples

the met has a vast number of extant examples of clothing, as well as fashion plates

costume institute fashion plates is a subcollection of the met for fashion plates (1800s-1922)

v&a also has many extant garments, fashion plates, and incredible articles on clothing and aesthetics. read the details of the objects because they'll often reveal a lot about the piece

lacma is good for C19th-20th pieces

nypl digital collection for photographs

national portrait gallery or similar for portraiture, or literally any museum in your country that has historical art

national museums scotland can be useful situationally but might be oddly specific

stout style history is a great collection for finding image references for fat people wearing historical clothes. survival bias of a lot of museum pieces tends towards smaller clothing that couldn't be repurposed, but this aims to counter that. it's not sortable, but is still a really nice resource

wikimedia commons is surprisingly handy! and the images, if you should need to link/repost them, are public domain

auction websites sound like a funny one to recommend. some won't have mannequins and some will. just look up historical garment auctions and you'll find some!

anyway, i hope this has been a good place to start for anyone interested! there are probably some i've missed because there are so many museums across the world and i don't know about all of them or can't remember them. but these are the ones i've used the most! (my specialisation/jobs i've had to research for have only really been in western fashion, so my resources reflect that)

[haemey]

Wikipedia has a list of fashion museums. Unfortunately, the page itself is only available in German, but the introductory paragraph is very short and after that, it's organised by country, and then it's a simple list. If you click on a museum's article, the website is usually linked in the overview table.

[savethelifeofmychild]

once i read everything on earth then i think ill be prepared to write

[chewing-on-lead]

[luna-azzurra]

FACIAL MICRO EXPRESSIONS FOR WRITERS <3

[pantserspen]

How to Fix Underwriting

1. Slow down at emotionally important moments.

Big emotions need space to land. If a scene feels rushed, pause the plot briefly to show how the moment affects the character.

2. Add reactions, not explanations.

Instead of explaining what a character feels, show it through physical responses, hesitation, or small actions that reveal emotion naturally.

3. Ground every scene in the senses.

If a scene feels thin, add one or two sensory details—sound, texture, smell, or temperature—to make the moment feel lived-in.

4. Let thoughts interrupt action.

A line of internal thought can deepen a scene without slowing it too much. Thoughts show stakes, fear, longing, or conflict beneath the action.

5. Expand consequences, not events.

You don’t need more things to happen—you need to show what matters. Focus on how events change relationships, decisions, or self-perception.

6. Strengthen setting where emotion peaks.

The environment should echo or contrast the emotion of the scene. Setting is not decoration—it’s emotional reinforcement.

7. Add specific details instead of general ones.

Underwriting often relies on vague language. Swap “they argued” for one sharp line of dialogue or a specific breaking point.

8. Let dialogue breathe.

Short dialogue exchanges without pauses can feel flat. Add beats—silence, gestures, interruptions—to give the conversation weight.

9. Show transitions between scenes.

If scenes jump too quickly, readers feel disoriented. A brief transition helps establish time, mood, and emotional continuity.

10. Clarify stakes early in the scene.

If readers don’t know what can be lost, scenes feel empty. Make sure the character wants something specific and fears losing it.

11. Use the “what are they feeling right now?” check.

After each major beat, ask what emotion is dominant in that moment. If it’s missing on the page, the scene is likely underwritten.

12. Expand scenes that feel “too clean.”

If a scene resolves too neatly or quickly, it probably needs more tension. Messy emotions and unresolved feelings add depth.

[your-fave-hates-ai]

YOU

YOU HATE AI !!

[very-gay-alkyrion]

[goqmir]

setting up a tiny detail in one chapter to pay it off in the next few chapters feels sooo devious like oooh i can't wait to write the small little reference here that 70% of readers will miss but 30% of readers will cheer for

[dialupmodern]

it feels so good loading the gun when you're Chekhov

[fidelcostco]

[willgrahamscock]

genuinely how do you stop using Ai? (This is coming from someone who really wants to quit but lord I feel drained. like I can come up with ideas but I can’t execute them without help anymore.)

I can’t force you to do anything, but creativity is a muscle that atrophies the less you use it. The more you rely on generative AI to create things for you, the less you’ll be able to come up with things on your own. So in reality you’re hurting yourself in the long run.

[willgrahamscock]

Also, no one is forcing you to write. It’s okay to take a step back and focus on something else for a while. Or alternatively. Write terribly!! Half ass it. At least it belongs to you. Anything AI creates is just an amalgamation of the same 5 things it stole anyway, it’s not able to be creative, since it’s not human.

[wisteriagoesvroom]

like I can come up with ideas but I can’t execute them without help anymore.

well. a few tips i would share here as someone who has had to try and move past some form of creative block multiple times:

put the work down. come back when you're ready

imperfect is better than none

look around you, digest other art that you see and consider why you have a reaction to it. (and the key part is YOU need to digest and consider it. the LLM is not doing that. the LLM cannot self reflect and come up with genuine emotional reaction, it simply does not work or function like that)

you do have help. talk to your mutuals! bounce ideas off other people! join a creative discord! look at prompt accounts! join challenges or exchanges! do writing or art sprints! there are so many options and communities and spaces and creative tips that existed before AI, and still exist, and work very effectively

on the idea of "can't execute them with help"... that help has come from invisible hands and large language models that replicate other works in the public domain. sometimes with consent and sometimes without (see: the data scraping of ao3 recently). is that something you really want to support?

and i genuinely implore you: what do you think an AI can do for you that you cannot? what is the level of impossible perfection you are striving for? why do you care so much about executing something perfectly every time? is that why you're in fandom or any creative pursuit in the first place? and if so, is it time to reconsider whether this whole endeavour really makes you happy? in which case, maybe go back to point 1.

[run-remi-run]

To expand on the first idea: I have multiple WIPs right now and it's not uncommon for me to step away from them for months or even a year+ at a time. Eventually, usually through the consumption of other media, I will come up with an idea that gets me working on one again.

Is it a slow process? Yeah. But the work is all mine and I'm proud of it.

[holmesandtheroman]

NOTICE: As more and more fanfic writers are using generative AI for their works (you uncreative dweebs), I hereby swear on everything I hold dear that I have not and will NEVER use generative AI in ANY of my written work. Everything I post will be organically and creatively my own.

[willgrahamscock]

just saw a fanfic on ao3 have a dedication for chatgpt... that section is meant for your horny perverted mutual who proofread your work, you violated sacred law and you will be torn apart and laid bare btw

[willgrahamscock]

anyways, if you feel the need to use ai to do your work for you, consider this: get a new hobby because this one isn't for you

[jerryiothy]

Consider this. Not everyone has that time, or energy. Again, I just don’t understand this whole thing of “effort is important”

if it were, capitalism wouldn’t work.

[willgrahamscock]

not to point out the obvious but capitalism doesn’t work or people would have the time and energy to sit down and put effort and even enjoy their hobbies?

ai gets trained on real people’s effort and most of these companies are stealing content that was posted online, for you to just sit there enter a shitty prompt and bam, you get a picture of a big titty girl with 8 fingers or a story that is made up of cliches and patterns.

answer me this what do you get out of doing nothing to achieve a mediocre result from ai when the joy of creating comes from the act of figuring it out and doing it yourself, honing your skills?

[willgrahamscock]

you’re not entitled to the emotional rewards of having readers and being a writer!!!!

[run-remi-run]

I have an ungodly combination of writer's block and perfectionism (thanks, Mr. Cabibo) but I'd rather never finish any of my works than use AI.

[wonderstruck]

If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading

[absurdlyinaccurate]

me, the motherfucker with over 50 abandoned works in progress: i have an idea

[kimabutch]

One of my favourite questions for figuring out a character’s motivations is which qualities they most fear being assigned to them. Are they afraid (consciously or unconsciously) of being seen as stupid? Ungrateful? Weak? Incompetent? Lazy? Cowardly? Intimidating? Like they actually care? etc.

It’s such a fun way to explore into who they are, why they do what they do, what they don’t do out of fear, and how they might be affected by the events of the story. And I love when characters have negative motivations—trying to avoid something (in this case, being seen a particular way) as much as they’re trying to achieve a goal.