Art is a way of survival

[campsis]

Eden Kalif, Good Cats

[lostinhistory]

[fouroclockwren]

YES OMG BRÜNNHILDE

[official-library-posts]

official library post

[ao3commentoftheday]

For anyone who hasn't seen them before, Hidden Search Operators are handy tricks you can use when you're either searching or filtering AO3.

summary: string is a generic way of explaining that you can search AO3 for a specific word that appears in a summary. You can do this from the search bar in the header, from the Any Field box at the top of the Advanced Search form, or from the Search Within Results box at the bottom of the filter menu.

Examples:

summary: Bruce

summary: "Bruce Banner"

summary: Bruce OR summary: Banner OR summary: Hulk

You need to put quotation marks around your search term if it is more than one word. The quotes make sure that the site searches for those two words together.

The other two operators listed work best in the Search Within Results box.

expected_number_of_chapters: 1 will return results where every fic has only 1 chapter currently posted.

You can use expected_number_of_chapters: -1 if you want results where every fic has more than 1 chapter currently posted.

otp:true will return results where there is only 1 relationship tag on the fic. If you want results where there are 2+ relationship tags (and no fics with only 1 relationship tag) then you can use otp:false

[katri-24]

This page is so beautiful and honestly I hope it reaches and helps any new people that are just starting out on Ao3 because it's helping me and I’ve been using the site for 5+ years now

[ao3commentoftheday]

I saw your tags @jackdaw-sprite and I figured I could offer you some help? You've got a few options to find fics that are actually about your fave who is often sidelined.

My own personal go-to is to use the Search Within Results filter. You can find the filters by clicking/tapping on any tag. If you're on a wide screen like a laptop, they'll be on the right hand side of the screen. If you're on a narrow screen like a phone, you'll need to press the Filters button at the top of the page to open up the menu.

In that menu, scroll down until you're near the bottom. That's where you can find the box labelled Search Within Results. In that box, you can type

summary: Renhardt OR summary: Rendog

When you filter for that result, you'll get 19 fics with that name mentioned in the summary, and if the name is in the summary you've got MUCH higher chances of them being central to the fic.

There's also a way to find fics with a tag in the X position. Fan coders have had this same issue, and so they've created userscripts that you can add to your web browser (like an extension). Here are a few that might be helpful for you to try:

AO3 Actually Relevant Characters - Sorts and highlights works based on how relevant the tagged character seems in the work's tags and summary.

AO3: Prioritise my Faves - Hide work if chosen tags are late in sequence, or if blacklisted tags are early

AO3 Secondary Character & Pairing Filter - Replaces works with placeholder if the tags you want aren't the first few tags, with option to show work.

Editing to add: this version of the post has a syntax error in it. To remove oneshots with a filter, use

-expected_number_of_chapters: 1

[whatsupbeanie]

I was reading one of my childhood diaries the other day and there was a whole paragraph saying how hopeful I was that my writing will help the archeologists in the far future. Then it proceeded to describe my lunch that day and how my dog was probably secretly able to talk. 

[thecottageinthedark]

#it IS of historical value#children's experiences are underrepresented in historical sources#it doesn't need well written or profound to be of historical value#comic#funny#art

[charlesoberonn]

[bemusedlybespectacled]

there is a fucking statue of a kid who lived sometime in the 1200s, around 800 fucking years ago, because we have pieces of his homework that he doodled on while learning how to write. this is one of his drawings:

when I was googling him (because I couldn't remember his name), I stumbled across this twitter thread about him, which includes a different doodle by an italian boy in the 1400s of knights besieging a castle:

It's at the back of one of his schoolbooks for learning Latin.

ALL WE KNOW OF THESE KIDS IS STUFF THEY DREW WHILE THEY WERE BORED AND IT'S STILL HISTORICALLY IMPORTANT.

[inspired-lesson-plans]

Social Studies, grades K-2, Connecting with History

Do Now:

Turn and talk.

What do you think it was like to be a kid 500 years ago? How would it be different than being a kid today?

Class Discussion:

Discuss their thoughts from the Do Now, then transition into showing the doodles provided by @bemusedlybespectacled without providing any context. Ask them when they think those drawings were done and how they can tell. In the former, note that the drawing is done with a stylus instead of a pencil, and in the latter have the students observe that there are castles, horses, and bows and arrows.

Direct Instruction:

Explain to students that historians only know about what happened in the past because of what people in the past left behind. Old books and scrolls tell us what they used to believe, or about the lives of important people. Old weapons and tools show us how good their technology was. For example, show the stone age spears vs the 18th century pole arms.

Drawings of plants and animals show us what animals used to live there and what they looked like. For example, the Lascaux cave paintings in France

Or the painting of watermelons from 17th century Europe

Guided Learning:

Ask students to turn and talk to discuss the following question.

What will people in the far-off future know about us from what we are leaving behind right now?

Regroup and hold another class discussion about what current humans are going to leave behind for people in the future to know about how we live.

Then, ask one last question.

What do you want people in the far-off future to know about your life?

Higher Order Learning:

Give students a doodle book to fill out. On every page, they should draw something about their lives or the world around them so that historians in the far-off future can study it and learn about the world of 2025. You may give a few examples as well as model a doodle in your own notebook. And, just like the Italian boy from the 1400s, they are encouraged to doodle in this book during school (unless they need to pay attention).

[inspired-lesson-plans]

Appraised

& Approved

Relevant standards for this lesson:

[urgetocreate]

Elena Wuest (Kazakhstani/German b.1977), Lost in a Dream, 2026, Oil on canvas

[catsbeaversandducks]

By Vanessa Stockard

[entiretorridaffair]

this is literally me on tumblr.com

[art-from-another-time]

Ducks on the Vert by Henri Martin

[requiem-on-water]

“Storm at Sea off the Norwegian Coast” (details, 1837) by Andreas Achenbach

[recolored-classics]

Hylas and the Nymphs (1896) by John William Waterhouse

[requiem-on-water]

Cat sleeping on a cushion (1892), oil on panel by Francisco Domingo Marqués

[inspirationpainting]

Edmund Blair Leighton (English, 1852 – 1922) The Accolade (1901)

[classicalcanvas]

The Secret Rendezvous by Pierre Charles Comte

[classicalcanvas]

Galatea (1847) by Charles Jalabert

[luna-azzurra]

Things to consider when writing a character!! --1

⊹ What do they want vs what do they need. these should not be the same thing. what they want is the surface goal ( the job, the person, the revenge, the answer.) What they need is the thing underneath that they can't name yet. The story is what happens in the gap between those two things. if they're identical your character has nowhere to go.

⊹ What are they wrong about. Not morally wrong necessarily. just. what belief do they hold that the story is going to test. What assumption do they make about themselves or the world that turns out to be incomplete? A character without a wrong belief is already finished. They have no arc, give them something to learn even if learning it hurts them.

⊹ How do they talk when they're nervous. Do they go quiet or do they talk too much? do they deflect with jokes? do they get weirdly formal? do they ask questions instead of answering them? the way a person behaves under pressure is who they actually are. And it should be different from how they behave when they're comfortable.

⊹ What do they find funny. this one sounds small and it is not small at all. Humour is worldview. What makes someone laugh tells you what they value, what they're afraid of, how they handle pain. A character with no sense of humour is just flat. even the gravest person finds something absurd. find the thing.

⊹ What are they ashamed of? not their tragic backstory. their actual shame. The small ugly thing they would never say out loud. The time they were a coward. The feeling they pretend not to have. The desire they think disqualifies them from being a good person. Shame is where the most interesting character work lives and most writers skip straight over it :(

⊹ What do they do when no one is watching? how do they move through a space alone. What do they reach for when they're sad. What do they do with their hands??? Public behaviour IS performance. Private behaviour is truth. you don't have to show all of it but you have to know it or the character will feel hollow in a way the reader notices without being able to name.

[luna-azzurra]

The most interesting question you can ask about any character is not what do they want. it's what do they believe they deserve. because those two things are almost never the same and the gap between them is where your entire story lives. a person can want love completely and believe they don't deserve it and that belief will destroy every good thing that comes toward them in ways they won't even notice they're doing. write the gap. the gap is the character.

[eggsdoodz]

trying my best to anyways !!