#nezjazz

[delimeful]

@nezjazz submitted: Ampen Virgil interacting with any of the three humans

lime: too accurate LOL

[death-defyy]

I'm just curious cause I'm lookin' to animate myself, but what program do you use to make your animations like the one with Susie??

I used Adobe Animate. adobe isn't really great, but it gets the job done lol

I really wish I could point to better programs but I've only used adobe animate :(

I will say it took me a while to really understand the program so definitely look up tutorials cause I didn't and it took me way much longer to understand it than it should've

I only have few things I can emphasize when using animate cause I wish I knew about them when I started

Symbols!!! symbols are your best friend. It declutters the timeline and makes looping animation easier. You want them to be graphics instead of movie clip so you can test them in the timeline instead of seeing them work after export.

The pencil tool is fantastic cause it lets you do shading and is the best tool in the whole program shading used to suck to me and then the pencil tool walked into my life

smoothing tool, when you go to modify tab on the top bar, then go to shape, and then smooth, it turns your brush strokes/ lineart into a cleaner look. This can be fixed if you adjust the brush settings in properties but sometimes the lineart just ends up a little too shaky.

other things to note is the properties window, it lets you adjust the to tools into your liking. Adobe by default (or maybe my copy didn't like me) has the brush not have pressure sensitivity. You can also adjust the frame so you change the blend mode and filters.

funny enough, I really learned how to use the program by watching phantomarcade fnf animation streams. so take that as you will

I hope this is somewhat helpful, and good luck with future animation projects !!!

[corruptimles]

I loved your Reigen lag train animation! What'd you use to make the animation?

Thank you! And, uh. My process is a bit goofy so this may or may not be that helpful

Storyboarder - I usually for actual storyboarding but sometimes I just use it to keep track of the shots I need to finish. It automatically creates image files of the boards which I reopen in FireAlpaca later

FireAlpaca - I use for the actual drawing of the frames and backgrounds, and testing sections of the animation at a time

DaVinci Resolve - For putting everything together; the art, audio, any transformations (Lagtrain is a lot of "the same animation but slightly to the right") and timing frames more accurately than I could in FireAlpaca

[adhd-adept]

I have self diagnosed adhd and i was wondering if you could provide some advice regarding reading. I used to be able to just pick up a book and read when i was younger, but now that I'm older it's a bit difficult to just pick up a book and read for the sake of reading. I love reading, but i just can't seem to motivate myself to.

Any advice? I'd really love to get back into reading, but I'm trying to find a way to do it easier

Hello! I’m sorry this took me so long to answer, I’ve been mostly off Tumblr for a little while. I saw this some time ago at 3AM and thought “this deserves a more coherent response than I can give right now” and then forgot that this blog existed for several days.

That said, I absolutely have some advice for reading! I was a big reader as a kid, too, and I’ve recently had to re-discover reading after a long gap in any time spent sitting down with an honest-to-goodness book. There are a number of things you might consider!

DISTRACTIONS

First and foremost, recognize the reason it is difficult to read! For me, it is because reading isn’t the most interesting thing available. That doesn’t mean I don’t love reading! If I can manage to sit down and read a book, it is immensely satisfying - but it’s the satisfaction of the effort you put into something paying off. My favorite hobbies - drawing, writing, reading - are my favorite because of that sense of accomplishment that they give me. 

I love the feeling of holding a book and watching my bookmark move through the pages each time I set it down. However, it doesn’t give me the same instant gratification of reading wikipedia, or tvtropes, or scrolling Tumblr, or checking notifications on social media; even when I am unsatisfied, or even frustrated, with the internet, it can be very hard to put down. I know that people will tell you all the time “You need to put your phone down more!!” It gets old. But they have a point. What people don’t tell you is how to do that. 

For me, that tends to be about making it inconvenient for myself to get online, or do whatever is distracting me. This doesn’t necessarily mean making it completely unavailable. The distraction just needs to be less available than the task I want to do. I am the kind of person who gets online out of muscle memory, and then gets stuck there. Thus, many of my tricks rely on disrupting the muscle memory that lets you pick up distractions. I will put my laptop charger in another room, so that my screen time is limited to its battery life. I might tie a string around my laptop, or tape it closed, so when I go to open it I will be reminded “Oh yeah, I don’t want to do this right now.” I will occasionally rearrange the apps on my phone, so when I try to open Instagram and end up with the weather app instead, the thought of “wait, how did i get here” will snap me out of the thoughtless habits that led me to pick up my phone in the first place. I’ve even gone so far as to tape my phone to the ceiling. Whatever works.

If the weather permits, I might also walk a little ways down the block and find somewhere to sit and read. This can come with its own distractions, but it gets me away from my laptop, and I get a tiny bit more exercise and sunshine than I would have otherwise! This depends, of course, on whether you have transportation and whether you feel safe. But getting yourself out of the house can be a great way to get away from the things that would otherwise draw you away from reading. If you have a local cafe or library that permits you to sit and stay, those are also great options! I will bring my phone when I leave the house, but I might put it at the bottom of my bag, or put a bit of scotch tape over the power button, so that I have my phone in case of emergency but it’s just slightly inconvenient to get to without thinking about it.

It may not be the internet distracting you. But whatever the distraction is, it doesn’t need to be less compelling than reading. It just needs to be less readily available than your book is!

ENTHUSIASM

Another thing that prevents me from reading is that it often doesn’t have the same sense of urgency that other tasks might, whether that urgency is real or not. Give yourself a time limit! I may own books I haven’t read yet, but I will get to a book sooner if I have borrowed it from the library, because I know there is a deadline to return it! 

You can also get other people involved. If you have a friend who wants to read the same book, commit to a chapter or two a week and then call to discuss it. 

Or, if you have a friend who would be interested, and you are comfortable with your reading voice, you could read to someone! It might feel weird to offer, but you’d be surprised how many people really do enjoy being read to. If you both have time in your schedules, you could try to set up a regular call to get through a few chapters at a time. 

Generally, having a friend who likes the book is great for maintaining enthusiasm, even if they’re not reading it with you - I get to books faster if someone with similar taste says “This is one of my favorites! You would love it!” If you have a friend who has read the book you plan on reading, announce to them that you intend on reading it. Their enthusiasm might help you feel more compelled to read it, and there’s a good chance that if you don’t sit down and read it, they will remind you by asking “Have you read it yet? What do you think?” the next time you talk to them.

PREPARATION

Another great way to make reading easier is to set up a reading space beforehand. It’s one thing to pick up a book and say “I’ve been meaning to read this.” It’s another thing to put on some pajama pants, make a cup of tea, and curl a soft blanket around your shoulders before you settle down to read. For one thing, it’s just nice. But more importantly, it can function as a signal that tells your brain “it is Reading Time now. We are in the Reading Zone.”

Do you ever watch a TV show or listen to a podcast, and you let the theme song play on the first episode, and then skip it for the rest? Even if I’ve watched a show before, I will play the theme song on the first episode I watch that day. It’s the same principle - it serves as a transition, an intro that says “this is where I am now, and this is what I’m doing.” Give yourself an intro for reading! Have a certain spot that you like to sit when you read. Have a certain snack you eat beforehand.

I have all kinds of tasks with little “rituals” before them that help me focus on that task, or certain items that I interact with which I associate with it. I call them “declarations of intent,” and once I’ve made a declaration it’s easier to commit to it. Sometimes that means simply saying out loud, “I am going to do the laundry now.” Sometimes it means I wear a certain shirt if I’m planning to go for a walk that day, or drink from a certain mug at breakfast if I want to get some homework done. I have a specific hat that I put on when I want to write a certain character. Try to find something you can do to act as a cue that says “When I do this, then I will read a book.” Because of this, it can help to really lean into whatever the “aesthetic” of reading is, in your mind. Embrace a reading atmosphere!

It may also help to recognize that reading is something you can work your way up to! There is no shame in being out of practice with a hobby. I took my reading proficiency for granted for a long time because it was just a part of my life. It may help to think of reading as a skill! Start with something smaller and work your way up. Pick up a book of short stories or folktales before you tackle that six-book series you’ve heard good things about! Set achievable goals for yourself when you’re setting out. An early success can make a huge difference to morale, and it’s much better to start “too easy” and accomplish something than to jump in at the deep end and be frustrated by an early setback.

FORGIVENESS

On the topic of working your way up to things, I would like to say a word about mindset. It is easy to feel self-critical about things. Things that you think should come more easily to you. Things that you feel like you have no reason not to be able to do. One of the biggest things I’ve done for my ADHD is recognizing that there is always a reason why I behave a certain way. Accepting that allows me to actually address my struggles, rather than just feeling ashamed of them. I’ve had to accept that I won’t always do things that I set out to do the way I set out to do them.

I bring this up because not all of my advice here may work for you. In fact, some of it doesn’t work for me every time - a technique may work once, but I might fail to make a regular habit of it. I may make a regular habit of something, only to have it become less effective as the novelty of it, or my enthusiasm for it, wears off. I may eventually talk myself out of implementing an effective strategy because there is some part of it that I find unpleasant; or an intentional unpleasantness I once found motivating may eventually become intolerable.

That’s okay. I’m telling you now, it’s okay if that happens. It’s okay if the first method you try doesn’t work. Don’t set yourself up to feel frustrated. If you become frustrated, take a step back. If you borrow a library book and you still haven’t read it by the due date, just give it back. If you don’t actually enjoy the first book you pick up, put it down and try a different one. If you feel badly about not reading something your friend wants you to read, be honest and tell them you have a hard time sitting down, and that you don’t want to disappoint them if they keep asking, but that you will let them know once you have started it!

It can be easy to convince myself that feeling badly about something means it’s important to me, and that maybe if I feel bad about not doing something, it  motivate me to do it. There is a balance between making commitments, and not committing to anything that is just going to distress me. Sometimes there is a benefit to a sense of pressure, but I have to recognize when the pressure I create turns into frustration. That’s a fine line to walk! For all I speak of inconveniencing yourself, or holding yourself accountable, your strategies should ultimately feel satisfying, and show results fairly quickly! You may not see immediate results, but if it has been several days and your strategy isn’t working out, change tactics! And the moment you feel apologetic or ashamed about the thing you are trying to do, drop that strategy. Again, this can be easier said than done, but it is so worthwhile to learn how to allow yourself to “give up” on things that aren’t actually helping you, without feeling like you’re giving up entirely.

You want to get back into reading again because you want to enjoy reading again. If you set it up to feel like homework, or a chore, or an obligation, you may make it more difficult for yourself! Getting back into reading is about focusing on what you love about reading.

And hey, I’m always happy to help! I do only check Tumblr every couple weeks right now, but I’ll do what I can to be supportive. If you’ve tried these suggestions and they don’t work out, no worries! Everyone is different, and it’s no insult to me if things that work for me don’t work for you. But feel free to reach out again, let me know anything you have learned about how you function best in the meantime, and we can reevaluate your strategies!

I hope that helps! Happy reading!

[prokopetz]

Are there any good ttrpgs out there where the protagonists are kids/teenagers that you can recommend to me please? The only ones I've been able to find are little fears, kids on bikes and monsters and other childish things

Sure. I’m going to stick to games where the protagonists being kids is central to the premise, as opposed to games where it’s merely an option – we’d be here all day otherwise!

Bubblegumshoe - An adaptation of the GUMSHOE system (a tabletop RPG system designed for investigative procedurals) to the teen detective genre – think Nancy Drew and such. GUMSHOE’s central gimmick is the division of player characters’ skills into traditional roll-the-dice-to-do-the-thing general skills, and resource-based investigative skills that serve as point pools which can be expended to automatically uncover clues; the idea is that what clues you receive should depend on where you choose to focus your attention (and thus spend your points), not how well you rolled on your Perception check. If you haven’t played a GUMSHOE game before, this one’s a reasonably lightweight introduction.

Do: Pilgrims of the Flying Temple - A rules-light slapstick game about a group of wandering monks who respond to people’s letters asking their temple for help, and usually manage to cause even more problems in the process. As a young initiate of the eponymous Flying Temple, you have good intentions, the ability to fly (because flying is a martial art, obviously), and absolutely no useful life skills. By the book it wants you to resolve conflicts by drawing coloured stones from a bag, but just about any mechanism whose outcomes break down roughly 50/50 will get you close enough; you’re probably going to end up in some bizarre predicament either way!

Golden Sky Stories - We’re pushing the criteria a bit here – you don’t exactly play as children in this one, but as magical talking animals who have the ability to transform into human children. It’s set in and around small farming community and totally revolves around making friends with the townsfolk, to the point that it doesn’t even have a combat system; the worst you can do to another character is make them fall down. Has a variety of supplements that provide rules for playing as witches and fairies and chibified versions of D&D monsters and such, should you feel like branching out from the basic premise. (Note that this is a localised Japanese title, so expect the odd translation issue.)

Heroine - This one is built around a very specific premise: one player takes on the role of a young woman who’s just been transported to a magical otherworld whose trials an tribulations curiously reflect the difficulties of her everyday life, and the other players portray the various troublesome companions she encounters along the way. The mechanics are concerned less with success and failure than with whether the heroine manages to navigate the obstacles in front of her without acting like a big jerk in the process. Definitely favours the tone of sources like Labyrinth and MirrorMask, though you could probably twist it around to do The Wizard of Oz with a bit of tinkering.

Hero Kids - This one’s advertised as an introductory tabletop RPG for kids age 4–10, though in my experience the lower end of that range is a little optimistic; there’s enough tactical heft to the mechanics that if you try to introduce a kid much younger than six you’ll probably just end up playing the game for them. Still, it’s a neat little system that manages to boil Dungeons & Dragons’ multiplayer-chess-style combat and exploration mechanics down to a surprisingly light set of essentials. It probably isn’t going to hold an older group’s interest for an extended campaign, but the fact that it takes almost no time to learn makes it a decent choice for a pick-up-and-play oneshot.

Masks: A New Generation - Out of all the games on this list, this is probably the one where the protagonist skew the oldest, being in their late teens to early 20s by default. It’s an Apocalypse Engine based take on the “young superheroes” genre, running the gamut from Teen Titans and Runaways to the early chapters of Worm. (The later chapters are a touch too grimdark to really be within this game’s comfort zone.) The big idea here is that your stats represent various facets of your reputation and self-image, rather than concrete competencies, so they can vary a great deal over the course of a campaign – even over the course of a single scenario, if something life-shaping or traumatic goes down.

Tales From the Loop - Based on the art book collection of the same name, this one stands out among RPGs set in the 80s-that-never-was by going for full-on cassette futurism rather than settling for retro cyberpunk. The game takes place in a small town built around a massive particle accelerator, which is just as weird as it sounds. Focuses on preteen protagonists by default; if you’d prefer to play older kids, there’s also Things From the Flood, a standalone sequel that advances the timeline into the 1990s and explores a failed utopia where the grand promises of the previous game’s futurism never solidified, and now everything is slowly falling apart.

I’m also going to throw in off-the-main-list plugs for Double Cross (high school students who gain super powers after being infected by an alien virus – think Persona 3 meets Prototype) and Whispering Road (Ghibliesque road trip fantasy); the first doesn’t get a full writeup because the player characters’ age doesn’t really play a big role outside of character creation, and latter because it’s substantially similar to a couple of games already discussed.

[baydrakethedragon]

[Was thinking of having some ocs interact with the siblings] Hidden in the bushes was a naga toddler. Alec looked up at the female dragon, amber eyes were wide for a moment, he didn't look scared of Mith or anything, just curious of her. His little head tilted to one side, then he reached tiny little hands forwards with a almost playful squealing noise. "Puppy?" He questioned squeakily

Mith blinked in surprise. What a curious looking thing... And adorable. The female leaned her head down towards him. Wiggling her ear tufts. “Puppy?” she repeated back to him. She did her best to keep her telepathy from startling him: voice soft and gentle. 

[kissingagrumpygiant]

Adam

[koganthenaga]

Beady, gold eyes stared up at Kogan. The tiny, blue form of the dragon kit quivers in his presence. Didn't seem to recognize him. There was a weak, warbling noise from Avett as they back away, scared. The little one trying to make themselves look bigger, more scary. The dragon youngling was little enough that Kogan could hold them in his arms if he so please

Kogan had been looking for Avett. The naga found the dragon’s scent and followed it while calling his name. Kogan was extremely confused, however, when he found a baby dragon. Same color though... And the little thing looked so frightened. “Oh hey... Hey it’s okay...” he said softly. The naga reached a hand down to gently pet the little one’s head.