Retro-vagabond - Latest Fixation

Party: In Ghoul's defence I did distract him. Ghoul: He's very distracting 😉 Party: Ghoul! 😠I'm okay, Kobra. Jet: You're missing an eyebrow!!! Party: Motherfucker!….It'll grow back. Kobra: YOU'RE ON FIRE! 🔥 Ghoul: He is smoking hot. Party: NOT HELPING GHOUL!!!!

I'm trying to be a bit more expressive and cartoony with this one. Don't know if it worked as my style is too realistic sometimes. I just wish I had a cartoony style some days. One day I'll draw Kobra Kid and Jet Star fully, they're who you can see at the edges.

please protect Ke Huy Quan and Brendan Fraser at all costs. they deserve the entire world

late night thoughts 

This started a while back as experimental thumbnails and evolved into a small intimate sequence ♡

Chasing sunsets and saying goodbye to fall 🖤

It's weird, Eddie thinks. When Eddie and Steve holds hands, they intertwine it together. However, almost always, Steve ends up untangling it, his hand creeping up and holding him on his wrist instead. It makes Eddie feel like a child, with a mother holding on to him.

He thinks it might be his rings, thinks it might be annoying Steve. But then, he remembers Steve telling him how much he loves them.

He thinks it might be because he sweats when they hold hands for too long. But then, he remembers Steve trying to hug him after work and telling him he couldn't care less if Eddie's sweating or smells like oil.

He thinks it might be— no. He doesn't— Steve might be ashamed of him? And doesn't want to be seen with him, their hands slot together so perfectly the whole world may crumble? No. That's definitely not right. Steve is open to the people who matter, tells Dustin of their last endeavor, tells Robin about how good Eddie is to him, tells Hop that Eddie is good and kind and everything to him. He kisses him in the Wheeler basement, slots his head on his shoulders in between the empty aisles of Family Video, takes Eddie in his arms in the trailer in front of Wayne. That can't be it.

Eddie finds out in the middle of a campaign. Steve, Robin, Max and El hanging out on the sides while the boys busy themselves with defense and strategy. He didn't mean to look Steve’s way, but like a boat, his eyes will always find his lighthouse, bright and guiding in the dark.

Steve is holding Max's wrist, just like he always does with him. At first, it's weird because Max doesn't really like prolonged physical touch. They stay like that for half of the game, whenever Eddie looks back, Steve's hand is still wrapped around Max's wrist.

When Eddie calls for a break, and Steve rushes upstairs to help the boys get a snack, Eddie sits beside Max.

"Hey, Red." Max gives him a nod of acknowledgment as she reads the latest comics.

"Can I ask you a question?" Max hums in agreement, eyes still glued on the page.

"Why was Steve holding your wrist like that?" Max freezes, eyes looking up to meet Eddie's. Eddie is aware of how it sounds like, so he word vomits, "I— I am just curious. He does the same for me and I've never understood why."

Max squints at him behind her thick glasses, "It helps him calm."

Eddie tilts his head in confusion, "Calm?"

Max takes his hands, wrapping a hand around his wrist, just directly above where his pulse is, "When he found us after the Upside Down, we were barely alive. Now, he feels our pulse and it's a reminder that we're alive, we're okay. It calms him down, helps him stay in the moment."

It hits him like a bucket of cold water. How Steve makes it his mission to burrow his head on Eddie's chest, directly above his beating heart, his hand always wrapped just above his pulse, Steve staring at his eyes first thing in the morning like he's looking for something in it.

It's a reminder that Eddie's alive, that Max's alive, that they're all alive and that they get to live and breathe in peace without the impending doom looming over the edge.

Eddie never brings it up. He lets Steve hold his pulse, splay a hand on his chest to feel his heart, lets Steve fall asleep to the sound of Eddie breathing.

Eddie's never gonna bring it up. Steve can do it for the rest of their life for all he cares.

It's the least he can do.

Touch

More and more

There’s a protest going on against AI art over on artstation, so I feel like now is the time for me to make a statement on this issue! 

I wholeheartedly support the ongoing protest against AI art. Why? Because my artwork is included in the datasets used to train these image generators without my consent. I get zero compensation for the use of my art, even though these image generators cost money to use, and are a commercial product. 

Musicians are not being treated the same way. Stability has a music generator that only uses royalty free music in their dataset. Their words: “Because diffusion models are prone to memorization and overfitting, releasing a model trained on copyrighted data could potentially result in legal issues.” Why is the work of visual artists being treated differently?

Many have compared image generators to human artists seeking out inspiration. Those two are not the same. My art is literally being fed into these generators through the datasets, and spat back out of a program that has no inherent sense of what is respectful to artists. As long as my art is literally integrated into the system used to create the images, it is commercial use of my art without my consent.

Until there is an ethically sourced database that compensates artists for the use of their images, I am against AI art. I also think platforms should do everything they can to prevent scraping of their content for these databases. 

Artists, speak out against this predatory practice! Our art should not be exploited without our consent, and we deserve to be compensated when our art is exploited for commercial use.