occasionally subtle
Love Begins
taylor price
Not today Justin
EXPECTATIONS
Cosimo Galluzzi
RMH
noise dept.
roma★
pixel skylines
Game Changer & Make Some Noise
oozey mess
KIROKAZE
Keni
YOU ARE THE REASON
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No title available
#extradirty
Monterey Bay Aquarium
shark vs the universe
seen from Germany
seen from Türkiye
seen from China
seen from Spain
seen from Saudi Arabia
seen from Italy
seen from Indonesia
seen from Spain
seen from Russia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Poland
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Germany
seen from United States
seen from Hungary
seen from Italy
seen from Brazil
seen from Vietnam
seen from United States
@skeletally-almostalive
that thing where you suddenly have an Awesome Idea but you can't write it down anywhere at the moment so you just try to keep thinking about it so you don't forget it, but you also need to continue engaging in whatever activity you were just doing before you got that idea, so you end up forgetting it anyway except just the lingering memory that it was Awesome, is really really annoying
Writing is fun until you have to start the first chapter, and you've spent two hours on just one sentence.
Zoom In, Don’t Glaze Over: How to Describe Appearance Without Losing the Plot
You’ve met her before. The girl with “flowing ebony hair,” “emerald eyes,” and “lips like rose petals.” Or him, with “chiseled jawlines,” “stormy gray eyes,” and “shoulders like a Greek statue.”
We don’t know them.
We’ve just met their tropes.
Describing physical appearance is one of the trickiest — and most overdone — parts of character writing. It’s tempting to reach for shorthand: hair color, eye color, maybe a quick body scan. But if we want a reader to see someone — to feel the charge in the air when they enter a room — we need to stop writing mannequins and start writing people.
So let’s get granular. Here’s how to write physical appearance in a way that’s textured, meaningful, and deeply character-driven.
1. Hair: It’s About Story, Texture, and Care
Hair says a lot — not just about genetics, but about choices. Does your character tame it? Let it run wild? Is it dyed, greying, braided, buzzed, or piled on top of her head in a hurry?
Good hair description considers:
Texture (fine, coiled, wiry, limp, soft)
Context (windblown, sweat-damp, scorched by bleach)
Emotion (does she twist it when nervous? Is he ashamed of losing it?)
Flat: “Her long brown hair framed her face.”
Better: “Her ponytail was too tight, the kind that whispered of control issues and caffeine-fueled 4 a.m. library shifts.”
You don’t need to romanticise it. You need to make it feel real.
2. Eyes: Less Color, More Connection
We get it: her eyes are violet. Cool. But that doesn’t tell us much.
Instead of focusing solely on eye color, think about:
What the eyes do (do they dart, linger, harden?)
What others feel under them (seen, judged, safe?)
The surrounding features (dark circles, crow’s feet, smudged mascara)
Flat: “His piercing blue eyes locked on hers.”
Better: “His gaze was the kind that looked through you — like it had already weighed your worth and moved on.”
You’re not describing a passport photo. You’re describing what it feels like to be seen by them.
3. Facial Features: Use Contrast and Texture
Faces are not symmetrical ovals with random features. They’re full of tension, softness, age, emotion, and life.
Things to look for:
Asymmetry and character (a crooked nose, a scar)
Expression patterns (smiling without the eyes, habitual frowns)
Evidence of lifestyle (laugh lines, sun spots, stress acne)
Flat: “She had a delicate face.”
Better: “There was something unfinished about her face — as if her cheekbones hadn’t quite agreed on where to settle, and her mouth always seemed on the verge of disagreement.”
Let the face be a map of experience.
4. Bodies: Movement > Measurement
Forget dress sizes and six packs. Think about how bodies occupy space. How do they move? What are they hiding or showing? How do they wear their clothes — or how do the clothes wear them?
Ask:
What do others notice first? (a presence, a posture, a sound?)
How does their body express emotion? (do they go rigid, fold inwards, puff up?)
Flat: “He was tall and muscular.”
Better: “He had the kind of height that made ceilings nervous — but he moved like he was trying not to take up too much space.”
Describing someone’s body isn’t about cataloguing. It’s about showing how they exist in the world.
5. Let Emotion Tint the Lens
Who’s doing the describing? A lover? An enemy? A tired narrator? The emotional lens will shape what’s noticed and how it’s described.
In love: The chipped tooth becomes charming.
In rivalry: The smirk becomes smug.
In mourning: The face becomes blurred with memory.
Same person. Different lens. Different description.
6. Specificity is Your Superpower
Generic description = generic character. One well-chosen detail creates intimacy. Let us feel the scratch of their scarf, the clink of her earrings, the smudge of ink on their fingertips.
Examples:
“He had a habit of adjusting his collar when he lied — always clockwise, always twice.”
“Her nail polish was always chipped, but never accidentally.”
Make the reader feel like they’re the only one close enough to notice.
Describing appearance isn’t just about what your character looks like. It’s about what their appearance says — about how they move through the world, how others see them, and how they see themselves.
Zoom in on the details that matter. Skip the clichés. Let each description carry weight, story, and emotion. Because you’re not building paper dolls. You’re building people.
I keep wondering, what if Sirius Black hadn’t found James Potter on that first train ride to Hogwarts?
Instead, the door he slid open revealed not a boy with messy hair and an ego to match, but a quiet, guarded Severus Snape?
Just two boys, neither loved quite right, thrown into the same compartment before the world told them they were meant to be enemies.
Sirius flopped down opposite the first lone figure he saw—black hair, hollow stare, arms crossed as if daring the world to speak first. He grinned. “Hi. You look like you hate everything. I think we’ll get along.” Severus looked up, unimpressed. “You talk too much.” Sirius tilted his head. “And you look like you haven’t smiled since birth.” Smirk met sneer in silence. It wasn’t friendship, yet, but something had clicked. The corner of Sirius’ mouth twitched. “Yeah. We’ll definitely get along.”
I love this and I'm weeping. Gimme a 50 chapter fanfiction where they slowly fall in love throughout the years..
I keep wondering, what if Sirius Black hadn’t found James Potter on that first train ride to Hogwarts?
Instead, the door he slid open revealed not a boy with messy hair and an ego to match, but a quiet, guarded Severus Snape?
Just two boys, neither loved quite right, thrown into the same compartment before the world told them they were meant to be enemies.
Sirius flopped down opposite the first lone figure he saw—black hair, hollow stare, arms crossed as if daring the world to speak first. He grinned. “Hi. You look like you hate everything. I think we’ll get along.” Severus looked up, unimpressed. “You talk too much.” Sirius tilted his head. “And you look like you haven’t smiled since birth.” Smirk met sneer in silence. It wasn’t friendship, yet, but something had clicked. The corner of Sirius’ mouth twitched. “Yeah. We’ll definitely get along.”
I love this and I'm weeping. Gimme a 50 chapter fanfiction where they slowly fall in love throughout the years..
Inspired by @fafodill 's musings on fem! Snape, I grabbed my tablet and did some sketching. I absolutely fell in love with this character all over again.
LOOK 👏AT👏THIS👏BEAUTY👏
all this talk about how all the hunger games boys are so obsessed with their girls and that makes them unreliable narrators but NOT ENOUGH talk about how katniss is so obsessed with peeta and that makes HER an unreliable narrator
My addition to this trend
outline story → ignore outline → write emotional mess → try to fix it → make new outline → ignore it again
katniss : “haymitch hates me so much! he despises me and everything about me!”
peeta : “that’s true. only i think he hates me even more…”
haymitch in actual canon : “those two are my only reasons for living and the only people left on this earth I love.”
i wrote 70k words in two weeks. was it hyperfixation? was it mania? was it a desperate attempt to escape reality by crafting a slightly worse one? yes.
the d12 wedding tradition being BREAD and FIRE how were the gale x katniss shippers so loud back in the day like in what possible conceivable world is everlark NOT the outcome of the series??????? how could anybody come to the conclusion that she was meant to be with anyone but peeta????????
"tumblr humor is only funny to tumblr users" NOT true. those bitches on pinterest love us.
Haymitch and Peeta playing chess post mockingjay based off a bts pic from the movies (reference under the cut)
oh don't mind me. i'm just pacing around my room reading my scenes out loud to judge their worthiness.
