WE GOT HEAVY GAMING, WE GOT MEDIC GAMING BOYS, YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO...

Click the link. This is a threat.

You guys just have to trust me on this one and click here okay?

How would Spy react to not being able to find his knife, only to see some little kid messing with it?

LET ME SEE WHAT YOU HAVE,

A KNIFE!

NO!

SMALL CHILD WIELDS SHARP OBJECT, LOCAL SPY CONFOUNDED!

His first feelings would likely be of confusion, anger, followed by seething rage when he noticed his knife was missing. After all, he was the Spy, no filthy pickpocket could simply take it. There was no way he had forgotten it either, as he triple checked his belongings and kept them on his person at all times. Being in public, there was no way for Spy to necessarily do much about it. He couldn’t just shout “WHERE IS MY KNIFE?!” To the world, and so he forces a deep breath and begins to search, splitting off from the team and looking about without garnering attention, as if he were merely a tourist.

At first, he had expected to be looking for any suspicious individuals, not anyone barely up to his middle in height. Yet, after a minute or two of scanning the room, there had been no other options, and right there. A lone child, holding a knife.

They were practically begging to be yelled at, dragged by the ear and taken to their guardians for such a bold defiance of all things he held dear, yet… It seemed the child had no parents in their midst. They were enthralled by the blade, flicking it between their fingers and trying to get the butterfly knife to do a trick or two, the light metal clattering far less satisfyingly in their smaller hands. Yet, while not masterful, the little kid treated the weapon with respectful caution, lacking precision but aware that their plaything was dangerous and sharp.

Spy found himself staring, rather than doing anything about it. Nothing about their appearance resembled his son, it wasn’t as if he had reason to not snatch it away and be done with it, yet here he was. Perhaps he saw a bit of his younger self in their eyes, or in the way they had healthy caution for the unknown, yet played with it anyway. 

Eventually, he exhaled and wandered over to the child, unsure what angle with which to approach the situation. Putting out his cigarette and kneeling down to get to eye level, he left a hand outstretched for them to return the knife, frowning.

“This is mine, mon petit, may I have it back…?

The child seems afraid, immediately shocked that they were caught. They shake their head, mumbling a “noo…”

“And why is that?” He has to force himself to be patient. Interacting with children is not his forte, but perhaps it feels like a second chance.

 Reminding himself this is a stranger, but unwilling to walk away without at least getting his knife back, and giving the child reason not to do such a thing again.

They blink, looking down at the butterfly knife. “Cause it’s pretty and feels good to use… Whus your accent from? S’all sounds pretty...”

Spy, shocked by the answer, goes silent, before sighing.

“Well, it is unwise to play with dangerous objects, mon ami. And… It is French. Do you know French?”

“My momma was from France! I knew I recognized th’ talking…”

“And where is she now..?”

The child’s expression immediately falls, and Spy needs no verbal answer to know what may have happened.

“Have you any other guardians?”

They shake their head, pointing down the road towards the old orphanage, shrugging sadly.

“Don’ matter, s'alright…”

There was the anger again, but now tenfold. Not at this child, but at himself. Of course he had to converse with the child, feel protective, now look at him. He had a job to do, he should have just grabbed the knife and went on with his day. 

When they finished talking, and Spy had left, there was a hollow feeling in his chest. Guilt, was it? Insecurity? Knowing the effect of not being present, it felt as if perhaps he was being given a second chance, yet he wasn’t sure how willing he was to throw it away.

Returning to the base, there were quite a few phone calls made to Miss Pauling, then the Administrator herself. Paperwork, negotiations, how in gods name would he work this out- Convincing Miss Pauling to allow a child into the base-- so long as battles were separate and hidden from their view, had been a breeze, but it was the Administrator, a cold, cruel hag of a woman whom he knew would take issue with the idea. It was to the point that he had been conversing through the night, even just in his white button up and suit pants, but he continued to talk.

What would his teammates think? He dreaded to find out, he merely hoped none of them would question it or tease him, but he knew he would come under fire, if only because he was the Spy, an uncaring, cold, emotionless figure.

At the very least, he knew he had time to pass, since the time in which it would take to get the paperwork in order, a new room built, etcetera, would give him ample time to learn more about who it is he was about to bring to the base.

That next day, a child wakes up to a gift by an unknown donator, all they know is it was a man with a vest and tie, with salt and pepper hair, inside of which is the materials to make the popsicle stick butterfly knife, a soft rabbit plushie, and a note written in a very simple cipher for them to solve.

“Pack your things in two weeks, If you see a woman in purple, she is your friend.”

...that your audience won't hate.

This is a method I started using when NFTs were on the rise - thieves would have to put actual work into getting rid of the mark - and one that I am now grateful for with the arrival of AI. Why? Because anyone who tries to train an AI on my work will end up with random, disruptive color blobs.

I can't say for sure it'll stop theft entirely, but it WILL make your images annoying for databases to incorporate, and add an extra layer of inconvenience for thieves. So as far as I'm concerned, that's a win/win.

I'll be showing the steps in CSP, but it should all be pretty easy to replicate in Photoshop.

Now: let's use the above image as our new signature file. I set mine to be 2500 x 1000 pixels when I'm just starting out.

Note that your text should not have a lot of anti-aliasing, so using a paint brush to start isn't going to work well with this method. Just use the standard G-Pen if you're doing this by hand, or, just use the text tool and whichever font you prefer.

Once that's done, take your magic wand tool, and select all the black. Here are the magic wand settings I'm using to make the selections:

All selected?

Good.

Now, find a brush with a scattering/tone scraping effect. I use one like this.

You can theoretically use any colors you want for this next part, but I'd recommend pastels as they tend to blend better.

Either way, let's add some color to the text.

Once that's finished,

You're going to want to go to Layer Property, and Border Effect

You'll be given an option of choosing color and thickness. Choose black, and go for at least a 5 in thickness. Adjust per your own preferences.

Now create a layer beneath your sig layer, and merge the sig down onto the blank layer.

This effectively 'locks in' the border effect, which is exactly what we want.

Hooray, you've finished your watermark!

Now let's place that bad boy into your finished piece.

You'll get the best mileage out of a mark if you can place it over a spot that isn't black of white, since you'll get better blending options that way. My preference is for Overlay.

From here, I'll adjust the opacity to around 20-25, depending on the image.

If you don't have a spot to use overlay, however, there's a couple other options. For white, there's Linear Burn, which imho doesn't look as good, but it still works in a pinch.

And for lots of black, you have Linear Light

Either way, you're in business!

EDIT since this has escaped my usual circles, and folks aren't as familiar with my personal usage:

An example of one of my own finished pieces, with watermark, so you can see what I mean about 'relatively unobtrusive'-- I try to at least use them as framing devices, or let them work with the image somehow (or, at the very least, not actively against it).

I know it's a bummer for some people to "ruin" their work with watermarks, which is part of the reason I developed this mark in particular. Its disruption is about as minimal as I can make it while still letting it serve its intended purpose.

There's other methods, too, of course! But this is the one I use, and the one I can speak on. Hope it helps some of you!

96!! whats edith's humour like???

( Sorry for the late reply, I was working on another one and accidentally closed the tab, not even heeding the warning that "unsaved changes might be lost..." 😔)

Edith's humor really depends on the day. Normally she'll find any sort of physical comedy or good word play hilarious-, but if she's having a bad day, pretty much any sort of irony will get her. Her humor gets much darker when she's tired/exhausted, but it's also a lot less coherent.

The day I saw RED.

SHRIEKS OVER HOW GREAT THE RED THE BLU AND THE UGLY IS????

The animation is superb. I cannot WAIT to use some of these for headcanon posts ya’ll- my lil animation loving heart melted at all of it- every single frame is just. amazing.

Feel free to send asks relating to the characters i make gifs of, or others, either way I love seeing new ones even though I might not ever get around to em- its really a matter of time because it just relies on motivation and what I’m inspired by mostly.

what

bungus

“Maybe…”

Personally, I think Demo would think it’s sweet, but also be a bit ticked off because he’s independent and doesn’t necessarily need someone else to see for him. Just because he’s blind in one eye doesn’t mean he’s completely deaf on that side either.

I think he does know that Sniper is there, or is at least aware of it. He just never mentions it and eventually forgets he’s there entirely since he’s so used to his presence being there. It’s not that he doesn’t care, it’s just that Sniper is way too quiet and is there so often that he becomes adjusted to it.

He does try and make it clear to Sniper that despite enjoying his presence, he’d like to have a bit more trust that he knows how to operate without one eye. And, as much as he appreciates it, he needs Sniper to focus on doing his job and taking people out before they reach him instead.

Soon, it becomes a challenge to see how many people Sniper can headshot before they get to the rest of the team or even get close to getting a hit in, and the team is better off for it. Demo tallies it and congratulates Sniper every time he beats his own record, making him better in the long run and ensuring that the trust between them isn’t lost.

headcanon that Sniper always stands on Demoman’s blind side bc he considers himself the ‘eagle-eyes of the team’ or something & feels personally responsible for making sure Demo doesn’t get surprised by shit coming at him out of left field.

So a decent amount of people showed interest about this when I gave the idea of this through an sfm poster I made, so I wanted to talk about it here! (Also to show off my work, im rather proud of it!)

Taking place during MvM’s arc, a few of Gray Mann’s bots malfunction and become creepily... sentient, if you could even call it that. They displayed keen interest in their real counterparts, most notably the bot medic. Deep within the tunnels that usher tanks into the scene, a makeshift infirmary was created, where they attempted to mirror the real RED medic, their medicine, their birds, and most of all their excitement. 

They would take pieces of worthless, broken comrades and spare them from incineration, instead repairing them. Unfortunately, they didn’t seem to understand their surroundings quite like he did, and in turn deactivated themselves. So, out of sheer loneliness, they saw one other option...

But enough talk about the Medic, who’s that Sniper?

Bot Sniper was just another pawn of Gray Mann’s, and a younger one at that, fresh out of the factory and emotionless just like the others. Hurriedly rushed onto the battlefield and clueless of what would become of them-- (not having an ai will do that to you) --and began to pick away at the enemy team. 

They aren’t sure what happened that day that allowed them to survive, but a stray rocket hit them square in the chest, exposing their circuitry and leaving them for dead. Yet, as the battle raged on, they held on by a thread, malfunctioning and twitching the entire time. And as it ended, Scout found them convulsing and sparking on the ground long after the mess of cogs had been collected and sold off. 

While he was initially tempted to put it out of it’s supposed misery with his trusty ol’ bat, he uh, wouldn’t tell ya this but he kinda felt bad for the little guy y’know? I mean, not like he didn’t enjoy bashing their heads in, but he was reminded a bit of his own sniper, who very much despised Scout despite his advances to try and be friends.

So, he carefully brought the bot all the way to the base. 

The others did not react well. After all, it could have tracking on it! it could self destruct! spy! what the hell was this kid thinking?!

But he was adamant, saying it couldn’t do crap. I mean, he wasn’t wrong, the bot had little to no function in the first place, but being moved around had... Changed something, wires crossed and code malfunctioned that enabled the experimental programs meant to allow for better fighting tactics in the other robots.

And in that moment of clarity, Sniper let out a fairly broken and staticky transmission.

[ H E L P - M E ]

...

But that’s all in the past. Who are these people, what’s up with scout’s leg? I suppose you may know in the future... Or not! :)