see, this is how you do clothing that is aggressively ugly in a cool and awesome way

got that Robin Williams in Toys swag

Hotel Puerta America - Madrid, Spain (2003-2005)

Each floor was designed by a different architect: Norman Foster (Image 1), Kathryn Findlay (2-3), Marc Newson (4), and Zaha Hadid (5-7)

A glorious fuck-ton of perspective angle references (per request).

[From various sources.]

Sources:

There’s zero way I’m not reblogging this

godsend

Elegant grasshopper, Zonocerus elegans, family Pyrgomorphidae (gaudy grasshoppers)

Found throughout southern Africa

Photos 1-3 by bushboy, 4-6 by colin25, 7 by sallyslak, 8 by tjeerddw, and 9-10 (nymph) by happyasacupcake

ever since sites like the new york times caught on to the private browsing trick to get around their bullshit paywall, i’ve been using the google translate trick instead. google translate isn’t restricted to text you paste; you can also paste in a url and it will generate a link to a translated version of the webpage you wanted. it’s this service you’ll be using

go to google translate and paste the url of the paywalled article you’re trying to read on the lefthand side (where you’d normally paste foreign text). set the “from” language (the one on the left side) to russian, arabic, japanese, etc. – any language that doesn’t use the latin alphabet. set the “to” language (the one on the right side) to english. it will generate a url on the right, and you can click it and enjoy

(the reason you want to pick a language that doesn’t use the latin alphabet is that false cognates are inevitable. if you don’t want to read an article that’s mostly intelligible but every instance of the word “after” is changed to “anus”, for example, you don’t want to go with german)

this DOES NOT work with every paywall! i just tested it on a number of sites, and it doesn’t work on wall street journal. but it does work on the new york times, the la times, the washington post, and the san diego union-tribune. i make no guarantees!

hope people find this helpful!

many/most paywalls can be foiled by putting the url into Archive.is as well. this has the secondary benefit of creating an archived snapshot of that particular article on that day, which is invaluable to historians and researchers

What people thank an animal should be kept in and what the animal actually should be kept in. (click the pictures)

For one about ferrets, rats, mice, hedgehogs, and chinchillas go here.

Not based on personal preference, but observable fact. An animal kept in an environment that is too small is unhappy and stressed. This can absolutely lead to a short miserable life.

I see a lot of people, virtually every day, who have these preconceived notions about what an animal can live in. A hamster lives in a hamster cage of course, because the happy little hamster on the box says so! This cage is for finches, they even keep them in it at the store! My friend had a rabbit and it lived in that cage so I’ll get that one. This sort of dangerous socially accepted neglect is not just limited to bettas and goldfish. Mammals and birds are subject to it as well.

What people don’t realize is that almost all commercial or common cages are completely unacceptable as homes for what they are marketed for. Those guinea pig/rabbit cages? Garbage. Those tiny finch cages? Torture. That cute technicolor hamster cage? A gimmick.

All animals need a certain amount of space for enrichment and general well being. That does not mean the cages someone is trying to sell you. It means the cages that are best.

And to all those people who are thinking “Well I had a hamster in a cage that size and it was fine.”

Stop.

You have only observed your animal. You have only observed the animal in a confined space and most likely showing signs of distress or behavioral problems. But you interpreted it as normal because that is all you know. You haven’t seen rabbits in appropriate sized cages. You haven’t seen parakeets in appropriate cages. You haven’t seen a hamster who is happy.

Signs and symptoms of cruelly confined hamsters. (The same applies to mice, gerbils, and rats):

Signs and symptoms of cruelly confined rabbits:

Signs and symptoms of cruelly confined guinea pigs

Signs and symptoms of cruelly confined parakeets

Signs and symptoms of cruelly confined finches

Animals are more complex than people give them credit for. They to do all of the natural behaviors they’re built to do. Exploring, foraging, playing, hiding, interacting (or not interacting) with another animal, etc. All of this is taken from them in cages like the ones above.

People need to educate themselves about an animal before getting one. It’s a thought that’s been said a million times over and yet nobody actually does it. The reality is people who want a hamster/guinea pig/rabbit are not going to sit down and read ten articles and three books waiting 2 months while they set everything up unless they are already enthusiasts who are willing to put that much into their pets. I can say from experience that over 80% of the people who buy pets buy them to make their kids happy with no regard to what the animal needs. What is most important to them is getting a present for their child regardless of any consequences that decision comes with.

So we have to try and get this information out there. We have to try and make THIS the general knowledge about these animals.

Resources and very good reads for anyone who has or wants any of the animals listed here. I’ll add more when I find them.

Rabbits: X X X 

Guinea pigs: X 

Hamsters: X X X 

Finches: X

Parakeets: X 

Thank you so much for getting this post to 50k.

I’m so glad it’s got so much attention.

Can I just go on a little rant about hermit crabs here? Because I rescued one the other day and, sadly, I’m not sure if it’s even going to survive it’s molt. The way people treat these poor things drives me up the walls.

If you go to any touristy beach spot in the US during the summer months, chances are that along with shitty fridge magnets and T-shirts, every gift shop you walk into is also going to have a cage full of hermit crabs for sale. 

You can typically buy a “hermit crab kit” of couple animals, a cage, bottle of nutritionally-lacking hermit crab food and some tackily-painted shells for $30 or less. Hermit crabs are sold as cheap, short-term, low-maintenance pets that will probably be dead by the time your kid gets tired of them anyway. This is what a typical hermit crab cage looks like:

The one I rescued just spent the last four months of his life in here, along with two of his friends, who are now dead as a result.

And this is what a hermit crab enclosure is supposed to look like:

You may notice some differences here. Let’s start breaking them down. 

Hibernation can also be induced by stress— for example, oh, any of the factors listed above! When this happens, most hermit crab owners will assume that their pet is dead and THROW IT AWAY.

Please, please, do not do this to your pet! It’s still alive!! The man I rescued my hermit crab from the other day had three animals in the cage when it was given to him as a gift this summer. Despite the fact that he thought he was doing everything right, the other two “died of natural causes.” And so he just threw the bodies away. They might have survived for years if he hadn’t done that. And, his mother-in-law, who also got herself a cage of hermies, apparently did the same thing to all three of hers. :(

This is why hermit crabs are sold as short term pets. Not because they have short lifespans, but because hermit crab buyers aren’t given adequate information or supplies to care for their pet properly, and the people who sell them know that tourists who buy them are just going to neglect their animals and then kill them.

You may notice that I keep bringing up the “short-term pet” thing. You might also notice I seem kind of angry about this. Why all the rage? Because the average purple pincher can live UP TO TWENTY YEARS IN CAPTIVITY. Some other species can live for THIRTY.

Hermit crabs are NOT a short term commitment!! If you take care of them properly, these guys will STILL be in your life after you’ve graduated from college, gotten married, had kids, gotten old and fat, moved across the country a couple times, and possibly even after your human children have moved out and left you and your crab to be hermits together. TWENTY YEARS. It’s a pretty respectable lifespan for an arthropod. 

It’s not an impossible commitment though. Hermit crabs are easy enough to take care of, and they don’t make noise or messes. Hermies are funny, and cute, and more social than people realize. Despite the name, purple pinchers hardly ever pinch. What they do do is follow each other around the terrarium, bonk off the walls like misguided tiny tanks, and fall over each other a lot. 

They’re shy by nature, but they can be comfortable with people if they’re socialized. I babysat one for six months who used to cuddle up in my scarf and climb my sleeves. It was adorable. Hermit crabs are climbers, and if you let them out of their cage they’ll scale the sides of your couch like it’s mount Everest, and try to join in your movie night by eating a single piece of popcorn. Hermit crabs are great pets.

Which, actually, brings me to my next point… Now that I’ve just spent all this time telling you how how great hermies are, and how to take care of them properly, I’m going to do a complete 180 and ask you to please not buy a hermit crab in the first place. Hermit crabs in captivity can’t reproduce. The first part of a hermit crab’s lifecycle is spent floating in the tropical waters of the Bahama islands as a kind of planktonic larva (the technical term is zoeae, and yes, I have recently used that in a game of Scrabble). That stage of the development can’t be reproduced in a fishtank. That means that all of the thousands of hermit crabs for sale in the United States every year are captured from the wild. Generally speaking, you shouldn’t ever buy an animal that’s been taken from the wild anyway. But for an species that breeds only once a year, and is susceptible to basically every pesticide ever invented… well. There are whole islands where purple pinchers used to be found in the hundreds of thousands, and are now totally gone. :(

These poor babies need a lot of help. If you want to have a hermit crab of your very own, please consider rescuing one— there are so many out there in unsafe homes. There are also organizations online that help rescue and re-home crabs. And if you already own one, please research how to take care of him properly. It might be more work than you planned on, but I promise it is worth it!

<3

This is awesome info! Just to let you know, scalestails did actually include hermit crabs in one of her posts about commonly mistreated animals. here’s the link: http://scalestails.tumblr.com/post/72682885053/ive-covered-a-lot-of-mammals-and-some-birds-but

Long post but it’s got good info.

I’ve made some of these mistakes in the past but never intentionally. Unfortunately pet stores (#notallpetstores of course) are years if not decades behind the times on proper care for pets and so mislead customers who think they can trust the information and products that are available to them. Yes, of course there are people out there who get animals with no true intent to care for them as living beings. They will continue with that attitude and behavior no matter what anyone tries to do to stop them. But what we DO need to do is to get proper education and resources OUT THERE to pet owners/potential pet owners so that people don’t make ignorant mistakes. I mean heck, that hermit crab reply above? Taught me something I didn’t know. And now I know better than to consider buying a hermit crab in the first place. I’ve learned to do extensive homework, triple check “facts” and “opinions” on pet care, and spend time preparing for pets, but that’s after years of doing it wrong. And be understanding of other pet owners, as well as be prepared to correct yourself. Some of these mistakes are made even AFTER research - my rat cage, for instance, was too small but everything I could find about it said it was an acceptable size. tl;dr: pets are hard. Do research. Seek help. Prepare for correction & change. Assist others in proper care without hateful judgment.

Thank you for the person who linked to my other post including hermit crabs! Honestly, I think hermit crabs are just as if not MORE widely abused than goldfish. Excellent hermit crab info guys!

When Guillermo del Toro had a practical effect fish-man suit in The Shape of Water but used cgi to make the eyes look more real.... he had the right idea.

Practical effects are the meal and cgi is the spice. Both important. One sustains me, fulfills me. The other adds flavor and depth. But serve me a plate of spices and nothing else and I will revolt.

idk. i think fandom could use a lot less of “every person’s interpretation of a text is valid and true!” and more of “reading a text means taking all parts of it into account, including the bits you don’t like or the pairings you don’t ship, to consider what the full picture is and what the larger themes are.”

projecting your fantasies onto a text, hyperfocusing on the characters you think are hot/shippable and building entire theories based on micro interactions that don’t take other competing dynamics and plotlines into account isn’t “analysis” it’s projection and fantasy. which is fine, but take responsibility for your desires and your fantasies instead of making fandom inhospitable for everyone. some readings of a text are plain wrong, others miss or willfully erase vital context just to rationalize romantic pairings. these are not accurate readings of the text. doesn’t mean they should be attacked or shamed, but neither can you expect people to validate every single headcanon and shipper fantasy as a legitimate “reading” of the text either.

magical girl with a legitimately shitty personality

magical girl where all her teammates are relatively normal nice kids and they hold her back from a human rights violation every episode

Princess bubblegum

OpenToonz

It’s finally here!

We have been waiting for days and OpenToonz is finally available!

OpenToonz is the Open Source version of Toonz, the animation software used by Studio Ghibli and Futurama’s animators. The software was developed by the Italian Digital Video and this free version was created by Dwango in collaboration with Digital Video and Studio Ghibli.

You can download the software here!

Silver Bullet and Diego Brando 2nd Colorway, confirmed by Medicos.

May 2022 release, pre-orders open October 21. Sold separately (￥7800 and ￥19800, respectively) or as a set (￥30360, includes D4C arc bonus head and rein-gripping hand parts).

I don’t disagree that shows that are released at a rate of one episode per week seem to develop more robust fandoms than shows that drop all at once, and the idea that this is because it gives the material more time to percolate is plausible, but anecdotally, going on a random hiatus of indeterminate length right in the middle of a major story arc seems to work almost as well for this purpose as a sensible release schedule does.

Sanrio Pochacco – Wallpaper (2000)

ayo i found 2 pages with head angles of humans and animals, could be useful to anyone reading this

hoomans

animals

Holy FUCK, this is an amazing tool.

Reblogging for my artist fellows.

Reblog this!

A GAME BASED ON MIYAZAWA KENJI-SENSEI’S WORKS?

I just discovered that there is an old Nintendo game that is based on the short stories of Miyazawa Kenji-sensei, released solely in Japanese. But people have translated this game. You can download it and play it through an emulator. Otherwise, I’ve found this playthrough. (You can find in the description where you can download the game) I thought I’d share this information with you, if anyone is interested and/or also loves these kind of games

About the game, Wikipedia says:

“The story depicts the action as taking place in the utopian world of Ihatovo. 

The game focuses on collecting information (notebooks from Miyazawa’s fairy tales) and items (that are related to those fairy tales) instead of fighting monsters. The game is broken up into eight chapters, each of which tells its own story in which the player helps the denizens of Ihatovo, often featuring talking animals.

Inspired by the stories of Kenji Miyazawa, the story covers nine chapters and surreal environments.“

OP of this video says in his caption about the game: 

“It never feels like it’s taking from the original stories - it doesn’t take its source material for granted, but rather, it’s a charmingly well-made frame through which we can have our own experiences within the text. The plot is deceptively engaging for all its simplicity - you’re a man who one day decides to get off the train at an unfamiliar stop and finds himself in a idylic little town taking inspiration from whatever happens to be around him, and eventually finds himself looking for Miyazawa’s notebooks in hopes of finding the man himself.”

and 

“There isn’t much challenge at all, but that’s one of the best things about Ihatovo Monogatari. It’s a game, yeah, but it’s not a "game” in that you can win or lose - it’s more of an experience, like an interactive walk through a cleverly conceived museum/monument honoring the works of a highly influential, well respected man. For whatever it lacks in traditional gameplay mechanics, it more than makes up for in the simple charm of its plot, the care that was taken in its presentation (good God that soundtrack!), and the sheer respect it shows for Miyazawa himself. It’s a fairy tale that frames a man who created fairy tales, and the warmth conveyed by the development team is apparent from the get go.”

The game sounds very charming to me. Maybe this spiked someone else’s curiosity too. I def gonna check it out sometime.

not to be boring but I like when evil characters.... well not become “redeemed,” more like they become domesticated. its just delightful when like an evil monstrous little bastard man goes from committing murder to getting mad someone misplaced their costco card or left the jar of mayo on the counter all day.

I just needed to preserve these tags. For reasons.

“Spectacles”, 1995. Via press_sf on Instagram.

Guys, if you want to be a good artist and storyteller you need to absorb other media and influences beyond popular comics and movies and video games. Hell, even beyond visual art. Read novels, science articles, history books. Listen to podcasts, watch documentaries. Dip into different disciplines. Explore stuff outside your everyday. What you create and the pool of ideas you can pull out of is expanded by the knowledge you gain. Don’t do yourself a disservice by limiting your library. You never know when some weird shit you read about mushrooms could end up inspiring you or helping you solve a design/story problem.