#nextlvl rambles

[nights-at-crystarium]

Thinking about the internet, how I and my peers have been brought there by... Love. Passion. Joy. It had to start offline. Music, books, movies, games. Characters. The connection would look like "you - your fav media - the internet". You'd go online to look something up about the thing you love, maybe connect with the other fans. For me it was a local pop rock band and anime, Sailor Moon and anime in general, I didn't even know the term "anime" back in 2002-2004 when I went to the internet cafe.

A search engine. An empty address bar. You enter the name of the door you like, and take your first step into the unknown and exciting. Things were genuinely fun back then, when many online places were made by fans for fans.

I wonder how different are these things for the younger people. Nowadays the internet is so pervasive and accessible, it's just something we inevitably end up using. Do you recall your first internet memory? What kind of emotion brought you online?

[nights-at-crystarium]

To toot my own horn for a bit, I'm so happy with one visual choice I made for Fragments, that being the "cinematic" panels instead of the traditional manga/webtoon format. There are so many works in that format to compare to. The bar's so high, my own bar as a reader, and the "collective" bar so to speak. Poor paneling instantly sticks out to me when I see it, but it doesn't mean that I could do better. Weird human brain stuff.

So yeah eliminating this for my comic was probably the best decision that I made. I know sure as hell I would've gotten stuck in the limbo of redoing the panels ad nauseam, I would've wasted so much time agonizing over the basic construction of each page instead of actually getting things done. Not to discredit my own cinematic style ofc, there's also skill and thought going into it, but to me it's so much easier, and there's plenty of fun to be had too, it's surprisingly flexible to me.

[nights-at-crystarium]

Just wanted to appreciate the two good things that happened recently that sound rather lowkey, but they made me giggle and kick my feet in delight. Someone said that they like to visit my blog "proper", i.e. where the custom theme's visible, wiggle the cursor and sprinkle Vivi with stars. And the other thing is someone mentioning that they noticed Lucky's portrait update on my site. I think these two moments stand out to me because they happened unprompted, without me pushing anything in people's face (I'm so tired of self-promos), reaffirming that at least several people care and genuinely look at my stuff of their own accord. This happened a few days or even weeks ago, but it still keeps me warm. Thank you.

[nights-at-crystarium]

There isn't a single Echo scene in Fragments so far because, if we were to rank storytelling tools/devices by power, it'd be like a nuke, something so extreme that it makes me recoil from it as a writer. It may add or detract from the canon msq experience, I'm always of double mind about it in canon, and in the comic I just don't know. It's a perpetual wip though, so maybe one day I find a place for an echo flashback that feels more or less justified to me.

[nights-at-crystarium]

i'm in agony bc i wanna talk about ViviEmet so badly, it's been a year and i'm still at peak obsession, i wanna post more art and gposes but the potential of it will feel wasted until i've actually told their story in the comic, nice and proper, not in some random text infodump that only a few people will read and remember. all the cute and heartbreaking and awful and hilarious things these two have done, they exist only in my brain and the comic script for the time being, and they're constantly clawing and biting their way out

[nights-at-crystarium]

I was rather unhyped for the Rak'tika arc in Fragments bc it's a bit of a nothingburger in canon and irrelevant to Vivi, it was carried by 1 (one) original Emet scene from the first iteration (from when Fragments was gonna be wolgraha only) that got even better when I suddenly got overtaken by the need to rewrite everything to include a tragic wolemet, other than that 1 scene I just wanted to do a quick "montage" episode and move on with the msq.

My opinion about the canon Rak'tika stuff didn't magically change, but since then I decided to go balls-deep with the original scenes, add more worldbuilding where I'd wished there would be more, and now I'm like HOLY SHIT RAK'TIKA SOON. Dunno just rambling about my internal process and relationship with the ever-changing comic script :>

[nights-at-crystarium]

new year new meeee

I don't talk too much about myself, but for those few who know and refer to me by name, it's J (Jay) from now on!

"Aho" was terribly outdated, associated with a fandom I've moved on from, and, most unfortunately, with people that hurt me. I've been wanting a new name for years now, and I'm finally settling on J (Jay). It has nothing to do with Jayce lmao. It's simple, common, gender-neutral, and rhymes with gay.

[nights-at-crystarium]

hp 🟩🟩🟩🟩⬜

EVENT: get an ask about Fragments

hp 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩