Her plan was simple enough

laughingsquid: Bored Snake Flips On Light & Opens a Door By...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 17:01:12 -0400

laughingsquid:

Bored Snake Flips On Light & Opens a Door By Itself

THEY CAN OPEN DOORS NOW???

That’s it. We’re fucked.

jhameia: Cover of Lady Gaga’s “Telephone” on the koto and...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 16:29:12 -0400

jhameia:

Cover of Lady Gaga’s “Telephone” on the koto and shakuhachi by Team Kozan

that shakuhachi player is really rocking it

All of my perceptions about NYC have been shaped by Marvel Comics

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 16:24:13 -0400

How I force myself to feel when I have to drive somewhere

What I think of near the Bronx

What I think of near the Upper West Side

etc

fuckyeahungulates: Baby Mountain Tapir (Tapirus...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 16:01:07 -0400

fuckyeahungulates:

Baby Mountain Tapir (Tapirus pinchaque)

It’s so fuzzy!

marvelentertainment: MARVEL PANEL OF THE DAY From: Thor (1966)...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:42:52 -0400

marvelentertainment:

MARVEL PANEL OF THE DAY

From: Thor (1966) #145

Even Thor finds riding in elevators awkward.

(Source: marvel.com)

I’m sure we’ve all felt this way at one point or another.

taikonaut: Monument at the landing site of Valentina Tereshkova...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 15:41:27 -0400

taikonaut:

Monument at the landing site of Valentina Tereshkova in Siberia, 53°N, 80°E

Soviet Art is the best Art.

The Atlantic

She sure looks like Carol.

A white tiger and lion rescued from a roadside zoo in New...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:31:27 -0400

A white tiger and lion rescued from a roadside zoo in New Hampshire are best friends and live together at an animal sanctuary where they have their own specially-constructed enclosure in which to frolic and play.

xoxogossipgita: noblerinthemind: medievalpoc: Unknown...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:18:46 -0400

xoxogossipgita:

noblerinthemind:

medievalpoc:

Unknown (formerly att. Johann Zoffany)

Dido Elizabeth Belle

Scotland (1779)

oil on canvas

Scone Palace, Perth (private collection of the Earl of Mansfield)

Although this painting falls outside the usual scope of this blog, it is one of my favorite historical European paintings. Dido Elizabeth Belle was the illegitimate daughter of Admiral Sir John Lindsay and enslaved African woman named Belle.

This painting was most likely commissioned by her father, the nephew of the Earl of Mansfield, and depicts the beautiful and vivacious Belle alongside her cousin, Elizabeth Murray.

The first time I saw this painting was in an art history classroom, accompanied by a story regarding the dehumanization of Africans in the Unites States, and the scores of visiting Americans who were scandalized by this painting. In America and several places in Europe, contemporaneous paintings always depicted people considered Black in subservient positions in relation to people considered White, if they bothered to paint them at all. To raise a bastard daughter of color alongside legitimate heirs was antithetical to American thought.

Dido Belle was raised and educated alongside the other highborn daughters of the household, and remained a favorite of the Earl and her father well into her thirties, after which an advantageous marriage was arranged.

Her position in the Earl’s household supervising the poultry yards was typical for any lady of high birth at the time, but her job overseeing the lord’s correspondence was usually a task reserved for a highly educated male clerk or scribe and is evidence of her importance and elevated rank. She received an allowance of £30 per year, more than any except the heiress herself and a sum unheard of at the time for any illegitimate daughter.

Upon Lord Mansfield’s death in 1788, Belle was furnished with a £500 lump sum in addition to a £100 annuity, as well as a suitable marriage to John Davinier, with whom she had three children. In Mansfield’s will, her status as a free person was carefully confirmed, since many would have been all too happy to divest her of her fortune.

Belle died in 1804 and was interred in St. George’s Fields, the parish to which she and her husband belonged.

My interest in this story was renewed recently when I learned that an upcoming film, Belle (currently in production), will be a dramatized biopic of Dido Elizabeth Belle’s life. The titular role will be played by South African actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw.

[x] [x] [x] [x]

OMG OMG OMG I’m so excited for this movie!

nothing in the world is gonna stop me from seeing that movie

doctorwhoslostcompanion: It’s not raining on my face-

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 14:11:33 -0400

doctorwhoslostcompanion:

It’s not raining on my face-

tart-pastry: A 3D nightlight, in the shape of Mjölnir, the...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 11:42:09 -0400

tart-pastry:

A 3D nightlight, in the shape of Mjölnir, the hammer of Thor, the Norse god of thunder.

I wonder how many days it’s going to take for me to get sick of playing house in my new...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 02:05:01 -0400

I wonder how many days it’s going to take for me to get sick of playing house in my new apartment. Probably before the third load of laundry, is my guess.

justnuts: oliviawhen: What if sleeping beauty became a knight...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:38:42 -0400

justnuts:

oliviawhen:

What if sleeping beauty became a knight instead?

A mini project I’ve been thinking about for awhile. You can find a backstory comic [here].

attn Xina

I resent my attraction to military-style fashion. I blame coming...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:38:19 -0400

I resent my attraction to military-style fashion. I blame coming of age in the post-9/11 era.

fyeahlilbit2point0: You think it’s funny but seriously, think...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:36:51 -0400

fyeahlilbit2point0:

You think it’s funny but seriously, think how accurate this prediction turned out for Summer blockbusters.

suckmycholo: cherryblossomsparkle: baconsavingcosplay: Circle...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:19:26 -0400

suckmycholo:

cherryblossomsparkle:

baconsavingcosplay:

Circle Skirt Tutorial by Kapalaka

Circle skirts are one of the handiest things you can learn to make for cosplay. As far as simple-to-make skirts go, there are two types: circle skirts and rectangle skirts. A rectangle skirts is where you cut out a large rectangle, and gather or pleat all of the excess material until it will fit your waist, giving you a nice full skirt (we explained it in a bit more detail on this over here).

Circle skirts, on the other hand, give you a lot of nice fullness, but with minimal bulk at the waist. For example, my Babs Bunny skirt:

It might not seem like it, but there are a ton of different things you can do with circle skirts. Long circle skirts (as outlined in the tutorial) are perfect for ball gowns. If you need less fullness, you can make a half circle skirt or a 3/4 circle skirt (just use a half circle or 3/4 of a circle, instead of the full circle). If you need more fullness, make several circle skirts (make sure you adjust the waist measurement accordingly, i.e. for 2 circle skirts, use half your waist measurement on both of them), and sew them all together. Here’s an example of that technique (with gathers and horse hair braid in the hem. Tutorial for how she made it here)

You can add pleats or scallops in the hem, layer a whole bunch on top of each other, or whatever else you want to do:

I’ve even known some people to make capes and cloaks and the like using a circle skirt as the basis of their pattern. So go forth! Go forth and use circles!

FREAKIN JUST WHAT I NEEDED

O HMY GOD IVE NEEDED THIS FOR LIKE EVER

bedussey: bedussey: and then of course there was the time...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:14:32 -0400

bedussey:

bedussey:

and then of course there was the time where i synchronized keyboard cat with panic! at the disco’s “but it’s better if you do”

FUCK I WAS THINKNIG ABOUT THIS VIDEO THIS MORNING I’M SO GLAD I FOUND IT

nug-wrangler: that doesn’t make any sense, sten

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:08:27 -0400

nug-wrangler:

that doesn’t make any sense, sten

mickeyrenee: Holy mother of interior design.. Give me.

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 20:25:38 -0400

mickeyrenee:

Holy mother of interior design.. Give me.

devildoll: thecakebar: Individual Whole Peach Pies lawwwd...

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 20:23:51 -0400

devildoll:

thecakebar:

Individual Whole Peach Pies

lawwwd Jeeeezus…. THIS IS A PIE

LIFE FOREVER CHANGED

O_O

mattfractionblog: bendiswordsforpictures: The visual...

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 20:21:28 -0400

mattfractionblog:

bendiswordsforpictures:

The visual linguistics of a comic book page

Inside Science recently wrote about the study by UCSD’s Neil Cohn, Navigating Comics, which looks at the underlying structure of the comics language:

People who read the English written word scan text from left to right. Once our eyes hit the end of the page, we stop. Then ding!, like an old-time typewriter, our eyes shift downward and snap back to the left to start reading the next line. This is known as a “Z-path,” as our eyes whip about like the end of Zorro’s sword.

But that linear track gets derailed in comics with complex layouts and Cohn wanted to know if experienced readers had strategies to follow along.

Cohn rustled up 145 participants at the 2004 Comic-Con International, a comic book convention held in San Diego. Participants had varying experience with reading comics, ranging from “never” to “often.”

Each participant was given a booklet containing 12 pages of blank panels. Each page was independent of the rest and used different design techniques.

Read More →

I met Neil Cohn outside of the old Comic Relief; Rory Root introduced us. Neil had literally just come from getting his monograph EARLY WRITINGS ON VISUAL LANGUAGE back from the printer. He gave Rory and I a copy each — we spoke on the street for a few minutes and I walked away with a head full of stars. That book, along with Ben Saunders’, Charles Hatfield’s Kirby book, and a few others I’m sure I could think up if I paused to stop typing long enough, are must have, must read, must learns if you’re a comics-obsessed, form-and-function-obsessed, process-obsessed maniac like me. That he’s continued to explore the way we read comics — and writes about it on his blog — delights me to no end. He has no reason to remember the meeting, but it was one of those chance street encounters that changed my life.

Thanks, Neil. And, once again — thanks, Rory.

(EDIT: the essay referred to in the link above is here)