Author Archives: Sam

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Apparently I have 28 ideas for Sanctuary gifsets

(I counted)

Now I’m pondering what to do with that information. Doing them sporadically when I feel like it has been fun, but it’s not exactly fast or efficient. I’m wondering about maybe designating a month as an “appreciation month” and attempting to do a gifset daily.

On one hand that seems like a lot of pressure and a recipe for burnout. On the other hand I like creating gifsets and having a creating blitz does seem like it might be fun. Can something be potentially fun and stressful? Hmm.

It would be a huge commitment and therein lies the scheduling problem. I’ve picked up drawing heads this month (1 head a day for 100 days). I’m trying to write like mad this month, so as to be in a good place for Camp NaNo next month. I’m still doing Sketch a Day, and I want to do a big digital drawing every month. Plus you know I do have other commitments.

Maybe something smaller. I think I might moot the idea of an appreciation week on the Sanctuary discord. I’ll quite happily just do it solo but I need more Sanctuary in my life, so encouraging others also sounds like a good idea.

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Wrote loads today. It was 4thewords fault. I just had to keep beating Tylu for claws. Managed to hand in a few quests. I love that feeling! 🙂

Also decided to move up the source blood experiment from “hinting at the end of the epilogue” to “part of the actual fic”. I’d introduced both Nigel and Nikola so it made sense. Plus I needed something to give the next bit some structure. They are being miscommunicating idiots at the moment and I don’t want to bang on about that too much, but timeline wise I needed the story to go on before the resolution. Pacing.

So Helen just told John and James about the existence of abnormals. They discussed research but that isn’t going to hold for long hence bringing in the source blood. I’m a bit concerned about length. I’m not trying to drag it out but it’s getting to be long (almost 40k) and I really hope it’s not boring.

I’m thinking about how long it’s going to take me to finish it. I’m thinking about Camp NaNo and what project to pick. Ideally it would be good to start a new one and try and do the NaNo experience with a fresh project and try and finish it. However I don’t know how that’s going to sync up. If I finish Choosing Fate middle of this month and then move to Fall of Camelot where is that going to leave me for the start of April?

My inclination last 2 days has been to try and write faster but it’s a crazy hope to think I could finish Fall of Camelot by the end of the month. I’m still tempted to try though. I guess maybe I’ll know better what is likely later this month. Still after hoping that I’d finish Choosing Fate by the end of January I am relieved at least to feel like I’m approaching the end.

Words Written: 2,846
Current Total: 39,675

Blog Circle: Revision Process

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It’s March and there’s a blog topic up already, very cool. These topics seem to run on a similar theme on a month to month basis. I had a feeling that I had done a blog topic on revision before (and I had) but the questions are a bit different so let’s do it again!

Explain your revision process. Do you go through multiple stages of editing?
It depends on what I’m working on as I confess I don’t put as much effort into revising fanfic, as I do into original work. With fanfic I’ll proof-read it and make minor changes. With Our Darkest Hour I rewrote parts of a couple of scenes, cut a couple of scenes, and made some dialogue/voice adjustments, in addition to checking for typos etc. However, original work is a lot more extensive.

I don’t like (and I never have) that the terms editing and revision seem to be used interchangeably because to me they are two entirely different things. Revision is about structure, plot, the meat of the story. Whereas editing is about grammar, word choice, making it pretty and proof-reading for errors. There is no point in my mind to edit before revision, because what’s the point in polishing something that is going to end up cut or rewritten? The more time/effort goes into something, the more attached you get, so best to keep the draft rough until then.

A decade or so ago I took Holly Lisle’s “How to Revise Your Novel” course. I’ve adapted the process to better suit me after using it repeatedly but the core revision structure remains. Basically finish the first draft and print it out. Remind yourself why you wanted to write the story in the first place. Then see what you have. Go through the draft and find world, character, plot, story problems. Mark it all up and say why it feels wrong. Also, don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, if something is awesome and on point, mark that up too so it doesn’t get thrown out accidentally. Only once you have identified the issues, then you can start analysing how to solve them. Form a coherent plan, replot the story, mark up all areas that need adjustment and then do a redraft.

Once the second draft is done, print it out again and do a mini-version of the above analysis. The idea is to get all the problems the first time round, so you aren’t repeating work/effort by adjusting something you then need to change again. However, I certainly like to check that there aren’t any lingering issues and I usually spot a few, something I thought was a good idea on the fix turns out not to work so well. So I’ll fix any remaining issues

Now I would be a lying liar that lies if I said I didn’t do any polishing before this point. Making minor edits when you see them is just impossible to resist. However, it is at this point that I make an effort to ‘edit’ if you like, to the best of my ability. I really should leave this until after the next step but I want the story to be the best I can personally make it, otherwise I’m too embarrassed to show it to someone else, even someone I’ve hired to help me.

Now I’m holding a third draft.

Or just one and then leave the rest to the professionals?
This is when I like to call for some help. I see things the way I see them. Sometimes because I understand my story, I know what I’m trying to say, I don’t realise that it’s not clear to somebody without that background. So it’s beta reader time. Basically getting story/plot/character issues from the perspective of somebody else. In the past I have hired a beta reader and I probably will do so again. I mean it would be nice to have a handful of perspectives (a team of friends) but I don’t really have that so I go with what I can get.

Once I’ve got feedback from the beta reader I make changes. Now I might not agree with everything they say but I always make myself think very carefully about why I’m disagreeing. It’s just their opinion so they aren’t necessarily correct but I’m not necessarily right either. Ultimately it’s my story but I want it to be the best story possible. So yeah I make considered changes based on feedback and then I’m holding draft four.

Do you/will you use professional editors?
Yes. This is when I go for a professional copyedit. I did sign up for an editing course in the hope that I would maybe be able to save myself some money and edit my own work. I know that’s risky because (as I said above) it’s my story. It’s always best to get different eyes on it. However, I have to be honest people that know good grammar and punctuation must be among the smartest people on the planet. I understood the theory no problem but applying it? Yeah I really couldn’t get my head round it. So there’s no debate about whether to hire a professional – I will be doing so!

When I hired a editor in the past they marked up all the edits on Word ‘track changes’ and then I went through them. Mostly I agreed but there were some word alterations that I didn’t agree with and a couple of other stylistic points.

That makes for draft five aka the final finished draft. It’s then complete and ready for formatting.

Drawing 2: The Proposal

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Better late than never! I was supposed to finish this for the 14th but I didn’t. I had the first half of the gift (the gifset) ready to post and so I didn’t screw up the exchange. Plus I still finished the drawing within the month so I’m going to take that as a win.

I swore when I was working on this that I was never doing a full room again. It took forever. However, I guess if I do eventually get into drawing comics how I’d like, then I’ll need to get used to drawing backgrounds better and faster.

With this I really tried to think about the lighting sources. I confess I used a reference for the room but I had to adapt it as it was decorated for christmas and had four other characters in it. So I had a leg up with working out the lighting on the background at least. I got lucky with the reference for the kiss as both characters had kissed someone in the show (but sadly not each other). So I made a manip of them kissing and then used that as my reference.

Shading is still hard for me. I tried to be less tentative with the full faces on the kiss and use bolder shading colours. It’s a scary thing. The more I look at it, the more I’m not happy with it, but have to draw a line at some point. The firm deadline for finishing was today. I’ll hopefully learn more from doing more drawings, than I would endlessly fiddling with this one. Plus fiddling for ages makes me totally sick of what I’m doing. Best just to move on.

One thing I do want to praise myself on, and I think I’ve said this before so I’m sorry, is that I do hair so much better these days. Looking back at some of my older drawings and the hair is embarrassing. I can’t believe I actually posted those on the internet! I did one of them for an exchange and I just want to die thinking that, poor person getting that as a gift /hides.

I still haven’t picked my March project. I’ll need to declare it tomorrow when I post my goals for March in my WriYe progress thread, so I still have a little time to think about it.

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I haven’t rambled again in a while oops but I have been writing. I haven’t missed a day since I last rambled.

Since then I finished that “AU of an AU” and I’ve been working on Choosing Fate. I really wish that I had a beta reader, I think I’ve said this before, because I could do with another set of eyes. I want to know if it’s boring to read. Basically I’m worrying that it’s not any good. I don’t know why because I only had one person (maybe two) read Our Darkest Hour so it’s not like I’ve got many people to disappoint.

Anyway, I’m starting to get a better feeling on the stories direction. A couple of days ago I hit a point and I wasn’t sure where to go next. I mean I have the ending but it’s the middle part, I wasn’t sure how to structure it. But since then the threads have started to come together.

You know I posted the bulk of my Rumbelle fanfic between May 2016 and May 2017. There were a few little stories after that but nothing to write home about. That was over 500k in a year. Heady days, a fandom obsession and like a lot of things that burn hot it didn’t last. A lot of that was to do with things that were going on IRL but I think the passion also faded.

Since then I’ve written odd things but nothing got my attention the same way. Nothing until … Sanctuary. I don’t know why it grabbed me so hard but it has. I started writing November 1st last year and I’ve gone over 100k already. Heady days, a new obsession. I also love that even though I get crickets, I’m still just as passionate about this OT3.

True I miss having fellow fans to bounce off. There’s an energy to that which I miss, and yeah sure comments are lovely and don’t get me wrong I’d love more. But I do find myself content enough with just the journey. I love writing for this OT3, for this show, I love immersing myself in that world. I’ve already started taking notes for the actual AU (my next big fic) and I haven’t finished this multi-chapter yet.

I don’t know when this obsession will fade, though I’m sure it’ll happen sometime. Until then however 🙂

Words Written: 2,724
Current Total: 33,210

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I just had a thought which made me sad.

Hayward only got away with what he said/did with Vision because Tony is dead.

Hayward told Wanda “I can’t let you have 3 billion dollars of vibranium to put in a hole in the ground” but Tony would have let her. Tony would have seen Vision as a person first.

Now obviously Tony wasn’t snapped and Vision was removed from the Wakandan battlefield somehow and got to Sword pre-Endgame. When Wanda came back from being dusted, he wasn’t there.

BUT Tony was in space when the Wakanda battle went down. He didn’t get back until some time later and he was in bad shape for a bit. I’m guessing perhaps Cap and the remaining Avengers brought Vision’s body back to the tower and Sword took it from them. Tony walked away from the Avengers, and by Morgan’s age Pepper was pregnant pretty quickly. I don’t think Tony would have let Sword take Vision if he knew about it, but I’m guessing he didn’t.

Tony was busy grieving for Peter, and trying to put some kind of life back together with Pepper. Also knowing Tony he was probably trying to fix the world, to deal with the logistics of half the population randomly vanishing and all that meant. I mean it was random who got dusted and that would have meant chaos. Experts, leaders, entire teams who take care of important stuff like power stations – big holes in infrastructure. He had a lot on his plate.

If Tony had lived then when Wanda immediately went looking for Vision to mourn him post-Endgame, he would have helped her. He would have found Vision at Sword and he would have moved heaven and earth to give Vision his dignity as a person – not just as a machine.

Hayward dismissed Wanda basically as “upset family member” who didn’t have the clout to argue. She wasn’t a citizen in Civil War (I remember Tony saying something about how they don’t give green cards to weapons, which suggests that he fought hard for Wanda’s legal rights and had trouble). She has that history as a fugitive post-Civil War (though that was presumably rescinded post-snap because Cap can move about freely). Whereas Tony is Tony Stark, head of Stark Industries, with more money than Midas and Pepper’s rolodex of important people to call.

I miss Tony 🙁

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Lol I just watched WandaVision early because I thought it was the finale but there’s one more episode.

So Hayward is confirmed to be full of shit because Wanda never took Vision’s body. I guess we know who the bad guy is for the big showdown fight next episode – Hayward’s Vision.

Wanda losing herself in her powers also confirmed. I know she’s taken an entire town hostage which is bad but I really don’t think she meant to. It happened in a moment of blind grief. I think in episode 1 she had no idea and I think she gained awareness of it steadily, but still didn’t really know how she did it. Without that knowledge could she even stop it? Might it have been dangerous to stop it? It must have been quite frightening. She lost control and didn’t know what to do.

I’m a bit sad that fake!Pietro is just fake. I had hoped that it was a reality thing but Agatha seems to have implied otherwise. I guess it was just a fun haha for those who saw the X-Men movies.

Also sad that this entire episode went by without Monica and so we still don’t know if she is ok after being found by fake!Pietro.

Wanda being called the Scarlet Witch though was pretty damn cool! 🙂

If Wanda has the powers of creation why did Vision start to disintegrate when he left the hex? I guess it’s not really creation if he has to stay within the hex field. What does that mean for Billy and Tommy as they are presumably created to? Real or not real Wanda has lost too much already 🙁 it’s sad.

Ugh I really thought it was the end today and now I have to wait an entire another week! I just want answers dammit. I know we kinda got a lot of confirmation but I still have questions.

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“Go get them … Supergirl”

I knew Cat Grant knew! I knew it, I knew it, I knew it! Oh she is the best. I love her. Ahhhh I knew she knew and they confirmed it eeeeek 🙂 🙂 🙂

Wow the repair bill for the city with all those crashed into buildings is going to be pretty high.

I love how Lena is the smart one but I did cringe at the “did you know Mon El is dating Kara Danvers” because really? As much as I cheer that Cat Grant knows I despair that Lena doesn’t because it seems so obvious. Maggie worked it out. Lena is the smartest around – she made that device thing work! – she is more than smart enough to see the truth.

Just more evidence I guess that Lena is Lois to Kara’s Supergirl because I remember on Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, they did a whole couple of episodes about how/why Lois didn’t see it. HG Wells said that was part of their love story for the ages. So because Lena is in love with Kara she has the same love blindness blinkers that Lois did.

There I fixed it and made myself feel better.

So Mon-El got zipped into some kind of portal. I should care. I do a bit. He grew on me eventually but I still find him a bit yawn-worthy. The teaser of the evil kryptonian obviously took their decorating tips from the Sith Empire with all those evil red accents.

I would celebrate Alex and Maggie’s engagement except I know spoilers and I think it’ll make me cry so I’m trying not to get too attached.

Got to be honest aside from the punch the air moment when Cat Grant revealed she knew the truth this finale wasn’t as much of a ride as the previous episode. Think they peaked a little early.

Anyway onto season 3! Well another day haha.

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Why did I choose to do such a big background? My skills are not good enough for this /cries.

Every time I attempt a drawing I despair. I guess it’s part of the process but man it sucks.

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(OMG guys guess what mobile tumblr just kicked back. This post from a couple of weeks ago. It said “found a lost draft, do you wish to restore?” and curious I said yes and boom. This had failed to post and then the app froze and I just want ugh and didn’t bother rewriting it.)

Went downstairs and found mum watching Timeless. I said NoSpoilers but she wanted to know if Lucy got her sister back (and I did sadly confirm no) and then she wondered about her mom. I hesitated at this point but said she didn’t get sick again (and mum knew I was hiding something) so I did say she was a bad guy. I then repeated NoSpoilers! Because I didn’t want to wreck it for them.

But I did tell her that it got better as time went on (because it did when Flynn was revealed to be more of an anti-hero). I wanted to make sure she gave it a chance.

And I told her that the ending was a bit crappy (because it was as they made Lucy hook up with Wyatt which is a big NoTP for me yuck).

But I sat and watched about 15 minutes before I remembered I was supposed to be going to bed. It was only episode 2 so I didn’t see any Garcy interaction but /sigh I am definitely having Garcy feels.