Your Guess Is as Good as Mine

It's day 12 of Horrordailies! Do I know what is going on in this image? No, I do not. But it's scary if you're scared of heights or green lights glowing in the misty darkness. So...

The kitten picture and the lichen-covered stick he is on are both my pictures. Everything else is drawn or otherwise created in GIMP.

Foster Kitten Updates

Everything was very calm today, which was nice. My friend Elisabeth came over to socialize kittens, her superpower. Garage kittens Spanner and Sabot were quickly won over with Churu. Bagheeri and Bailey Potato paused in playing to come over to say hello. Humphrey Grumpybutt ate some Churu for her. Harrison Ford the Explorer did not, but there's always next time. Herbie Lovebug made air biscuits when she held him, which is... 

[brief intermission for me to catch the four kittens who escaped the office while my attention was elsewhere]

Okay, where was I? Oh, yes, Herbie was his usual adorable self. We decided mom and the kittens will be named after snacks, but didn't get more specific. The kittens were on the bed between us and they spent all their energy attempting to make suicidal leaps off the edge. No sense of self-preservation whatsoever.

Other Stuff

I realized this morning that I was out of paper plates to feed kittens on (which reduces cross-contamination and also means that I don't have to constantly wash dishes). I find Costco exhausting and generally avoid it until I run out of Diet Coke, but this was an emergency. So I went and found out that the onion soup is back! (It's a seasonal item.)

Light and Shadows

It's day 11 of Horrordailies, and while I've pretty much given up on the horror, I'm still here for the daily!

It turns out I like playing with purple, so I indulged myself for another day. This time I took inspiration from an image from The Art of Evelyne Schulz (the search was random, but I really like her art). The image in question has a person silhouetted by a night sky, with a bunch of little fantasy additions.

I'm not that skilled or patient, and 99.9% of my images are of cats, so my results bear no resemblance to the original. I still like mine, though, and I did get that haloed silhouette effect I was aiming for.

I really need to get my drawing tablet out and figure out why it stopped working with my computer. That's a goal for another day.

Foster Kitten Updates

It turns out I was not being paranoid about that one kitten. He crashed yesterday evening and was gone less than two hours later. This part of fostering sucks and I'm exhausted today from taking him to the emergency vet and also worrying about the remaining kittens. They seem fine at the moment, but everything can change so rapidly that I will remain worried until they grow up and leave for adoption.

In happier news, the kittens I found in my garage have finished their two-week quarantine, so Spanner and Sabot are now running around in my office playing with Bagheeri and Bailey Potato and the whole area is chaos.

Other Stuff

I need to replace the flapper on one toilet and I thought this would be simple, but the company no longer makes that part, and the replacement for that discontinued part has been discontinued, and the replacement for the replacement for the part has been discontinued and...

I think I've figured out what info I need to buy the correct thing, but this feels far more complicated than it needs to be. I'm really not cut out for home ownership.

Purple Skies

It's day 10 of Horrordailies! Today's picture is just random stuff I put together. It has a bat; ergo, it's spooktacular.

Gaussian blur was my friend.

Foster Kitten Updates, or Why I Am So Tired Today

Warning: The sarcastic "Fostering is so glamorous!" applies here.

The semi-feral mom has been eating a ton of food, but her poop has been somewhat unformed. And late last night when I was scooping, I found this long tapeworm in the mess. So then (of course) I mentioned this to my fellow foster-parent Jennifer, and she wanted a picture. (I love that my friends are the type that hear stuff like this and immediately demand pictures.)

This is what gloves are for.

Anyhow, I found the tapeworm, rinsed it off, and then photographed it next to a tape measure. It was over seven inches! Disgusting, yet fascinating!

Today I mixed anti-parasitics that treat tapeworms into mom cat's food and she ate it, so hopefully there will be no new gross surprises.

Mom has occasionally been hissing and swatting at the babies, and I'm not sure if it's because they are nursing with teeth or if she's got mastitis. There's really no way for me to safely get close enough to check. One baby hasn't gained weight, so I'm keeping a close eye on their weights. Hopefully I'm being paranoid, but I don't think I am. 

Things I've Read Recently

I finished listening to Three Bags Full by Leonie Swann. It's a murder mystery about a herd of Irish sheep, translated from the German. It's delightfully weird, but I didn't like the ending. Or, put another way, it was a very German ending, and I can say that as someone who has a minor in German literature.

Endings are a theme here — I also finished A Feast of Phantoms (Book one of Lingua Magika) by Kat Ross and I really enjoyed it. The genre is sort of steampunk fantasy western? There are different grades of demon-like creatures that can be harnessed to do things. Each type is commanded in a different language, so the powerful people are the ones who can speak multiple languages. My only real complaints are

1)  One character I thought was somewhere in the 40-60 year-old range is revealed to be 24 years old at the end — I think he's being set up as a possible love interest, so that threw me off. I was picking up mentor/father-figure vibes. (The age confusion could be lazy reading on my part, but I think I just interpreted vague clues differently than I was meant to.) 

2) The book just sort of ends. I guess it wraps up some things, but the main quest isn't resolved. Far be it from me to tell other people how to structure books, but it felt unfinished. Then again... all three books in the series are published and they're in Kobo Plus, so I can treat this as the first third of the story.

I already have the next book loaded on my ereader.

Shane Peers Through from the Other Side

It's day 9 of Horrordailies, though you wouldn't know it by looking at what I'm posting. You could be forgiven for asking what this has to do with horror or Halloween. It's purple! And it has a cat! That's good enough, right?

The window grate is from my own photo. I thought it would be a breeze to remove from the background, but I was smoking the crack, as they say. I ended up finding the ivy brush to fix my slapdash isolation from the background. Whatever works is my motto.

I could probably do a better job with the window by adding some shadows, but I have a critique meeting in an hour and I have cats to feed. Speaking of which...

Foster Kitten Updates

A bunch of the hoarder-case kittens have bad diseases, so I took in a semi-feral mom and her kittens that didn't come from that area so they would be less likely to contract something horrible. The kittens are about three weeks old and mom is doing a great job with them, so my role is just to make sure the kittens continue to gain weight and also handle them enough that they're used to people.

When the kittens are weaned, mom will be spayed and returned to the area where she was found. The kittens will be adopted through the shelter.

So... yeah, I currently have 14 foster cats/kittens. That's probably frightening enough to count as horror.

Ronan Runs Off with the Fae

Today, I wanted to play around with photos that I've taken. I'm a pretty terrible photographer, but every once in a while I come across something (moss, leaves, tree bark, etc.) that looks cool and I remember to take a picture of it. Sometimes I even remember to load it to the directory I created for just those sorts of things.

So here we go:

That includes "moss1", "Ronan", "curved_branch", and "bricks_wavy2". I like how it turned out.

It may not be spooky, but it has a touch of the uncanny.

Foster Kitten Updates

Everybody gained weight today, which seems like it should be a regular occurrence, but... Bagheeri has started running around the office, which I'm taking as a sign she's feeling good. The three new fosters are doing well — one has an eye that looks pretty ouchy, but hopefully that will resolve.

There was a hoarding case in my town today, so we got an email looking for fosters and it sounds like a bunch of cats that are in bad shape. If I didn't already have seven foster kittens, I would take a litter, but I don't have a separate room to hold panleuk or calici kittens, and both those diseases are easily transmissible. Some days I just have to remember that I cannot save them all and it makes me sad.

Just Pretend it's Spooky

It's day 7 of Horrordailies. I was rushing around this afternoon (see below) so I'm tired and I decided to do something simple.

This is a picture of a tree that I took. I added the background and then threw in some lightning. Is it artistic? Meh. It's 8:45 pm and I have other things to do.

Foster Kitten Updates

Orla, Shane, Ronan, and Finn all went back to the shelter for their regular 2-week appointment and they stayed for surgery and adoption. Yay! That is the goal.

Finn

Ronan

Shane

Orla

Then I came home with three new snotty kittens. They're all older and seem pretty stable, so they aren't a ton of work on their own, but...

I had to break down Finn's playpen, clean that area, set up a new playpen and move Bailey into my office, clean up the spare room where Orla, Shane, and Ronan were, set up the shelter's dog crate for two of the new kittens, clean my own dog crate (which was still in the garage from the feral mom using it last week), set that crate up in the spare room for the other new kitten, and then weigh/examine/medicate/feed the new kittens.

(There are two crates in the room because two of the kittens came from one place and one came from another, and they need to be quarantined from each other and also all the other kittens. Ideally, they might be in completely different rooms, but this minimizes germ transfer and they're all on the same upper respiratory meds, so it will be fine.)

It was a few hours of cleaning and moving stuff around that had to get done while the new kittens were waiting in their carriers. Luckily, all three of the new kittens seem very sweet.

Other Updates

Decided on my run this morning that I need to cut back to two runs per week and lengthen the training schedule. My body just can't handle three times per week. I had come to this conclusion five years ago and forgot.

I still need to write up that critique. Also, I need to come up with a Patreon digital bonus in the next week. No problem.

October Butterfly

Maria pointed out yesterday that butterflies are creepier than bats. And she's right. Maybe this stems back to a story I read where the butterflies are actually small fae and attack people? I've read a lot of stories during my lifetime, and I think they're all back there percolating and exchanging DNA.

Anyhow, I was having a hard time finding a tutorial, so I just started playing around, with this butterfly (the Glanville fritillary) as my starting point.

Is it spooky? No. But we knew my dedication to the task wouldn't last long. It has some orange in it and that's going to have to be good enough for today.

Foster Kitten Updates

Bagheeri is doing well and gaining weight. Three of the kittens (Spanner, Sabot, and Bailey) have decided they'd like to remain around 500 grams forever, which is not okay. In Bailey's case, it's because she's meat nursing — I have to believe she'll figure it out at some point. I think Spanner and Sabot have plateaued because they're holding out for more Churu.

Other Stuff

I have finished the 381 page novel I need to critique by Thursday. Now I just need to write up something helpful. 

Spooky Tree

It's day 5 of Horrordailies. Spooky and interesting GIMP tutorials are getting thin on the ground, but I found this one and followed some of it. I added bats instead of a child on a swing because bats are just better.

I need to look up how the dynamics on a brush work — sometimes I would like it to change the size but not the angle, and it's not obvious to me how one would do that. I suspect there is a way, though.

(I looked and indeed there is a dockable dialogue that lets you edit what things are affected.)

Thing I learned: Creating a cliff edge adds tension to the image. That might be useful in book covers.

Anyhow, this art speedrun used these components:

Sky image: https://www.deviantart.com/andahliasaur/art/Sky-41-194225713

Tree image: https://clipart-library.com/clipart/yikrL966T.htm

Bats brush: https://www.deviantart.com/kencho/art/Bats-brushes-27854473

Foster Kitten Updates

Everyone seems to be doing pretty well. I've set up a 2-week recheck/vaccine appoint on Tuesday for Finn, Orla, Shane, and Ronan. They might keep the latter three there for surgery and adoption (depending on the surgery schedule), so I should take graduation photos tomorrow. Spanner and Sabot now sit in the doorway crying for me to give them Churu, so I would say socialization has been a success.

Other Stuff

This was the end of week 3 of the 10k training schedule, so I ran an "easy" 3 mile run this morning. My knees have been bothering me since Thursday's 30-minute run/walk so I was literally jogging an 18-minute mile this morning. That's walking pace. But I still ran the whole distance and my knees seem no worse this evening. (I pushed the pace a little hard on Thursday's run/walk and the asphalt was slippery because it had just rained. Live and learn.)

191 pages (of 381) in this manuscript I'm critiquing. Sarah J Maas has a lot to answer for.

Bats!

Day 4 of Horrordailies and I'm still mostly sticking to the scary theme. Amazing. This may be the longest I've ever followed any directions.

Today I went with this tutorial to make a Halloween background. Most of what was covered I already knew how to do, but I did have to take a detour to figure out how to make an animated brush. (There are four bat brushes; the animated brush cycles through them so you don't have to selected each one manually.)

In fact, the majority of this is done with custom brushes (the bats, the grunge marks on the paper), which is great, but the brushes aren't licensed for commercial use, so... I definitely appreciate artists making stuff like this available, but I also need to be careful not to use these on a book cover.

Anyhow, here we are:

Bats brushes by =Kencho on deviantART

grunge.28 by ~ShadyMedusa-stock on deviantART

Font is (once again) Rubik Glitch because I'm too lazy to find something more legible. It doesn't look as bad on this one.

Foster Kitten Updates

Bagheeri is brighter today, so let's hear it for azithromycin, fluids, famciclovir, and time! Fingers crossed she continues to improve.

The two garage kittens, Spanner and Sabot, are getting friendlier by the day. Spanner enjoys "helping" me clean her litter box. She is what Jennifer calls a "scoopervisor".

Bailey Potato keeps meat nursing instead of actually eating the food, so we are working on that.

Finn eats well but believes he must bathe in the food for maximal effect. He needs a bath.

The other three foster kittens (Ronan, Orla, and Shane) are doing great. They're big enough to have surgery and find their permanent homes. Which reminds me — I need to set up recheck appointments for them next week.

Other Stuff

I am currently on page 77 of a 381 page manuscript that I need to read and critique by Thursday. Clearly I need to get my butt in gear.

Ominous Sky

It's day 3 of Horrordailies and I'm still here!

Today's tutorial, recorded 15 years ago, changes an image from a bright day to more ominous skies.

I started with this picture, which is ominous enough even with a blue sky:

(Some houses burned down near my neighborhood.)

And I ended up with this:

I practiced using the fuzzy select tool, which I haven't really used before, so that was good.

As usual, I changed a few things...

• Getting the blue background out of leafy trees is nearly impossible, so I just wiped most of them out. The tree I left in probably should have come out as well since I tried to reconstruct it and failed.
• I didn't have an orange sky image, so I used a gradient. That was mostly successful.
• I didn't have a cloud image, so I used solid noise. It was a little less successful.

The whole thing turned out a little too dark, but that might partially be a problem with the original image. It definitely does make the whole thing kind of spooky, though, so I'll count it as a win.

Other things I did today

Foster kitten Bagheeri went from snotty-but-active yesterday to more-snotty-and-sleeping today, so she had a quick recheck at the shelter. She's on slightly different antibiotics. Fingers crossed she bounces back quickly.

I formatted and loaded the Dragon Fortune ebook to all the retailers. It would be nice if that stemmed the tide of "You only have X days to load your manuscript!" emails, but they send them whether you have a file loaded or not. Anyhow, October 14th! https://books.tmbaumgartner.com/DragonFortune

What's Spookier Than a Kitten?

It's day 2 of Horrordailies, and I'm already having a difficult time finding spooky tutorials that aren't of the "Load the picture and select this special script."

Am I just jealous because there are a bazillion Photoshop scripts and I am using GIMP? Possibly. But also, where's the fun in that?

Anyhow, after some random searches, I found this tutorial which boils down to "create a ghost by setting the layer mode to grain extract." Sometimes simplicity is called for.

I didn't have a picture of a person I wanted to turn into a ghost, but I do have a lot of kitten pictures! And what's spookier than a ghost kitten?

This is the picture I started with:

The Aristocats, former fosters. Look how cute they are!

My original plan was to use all four kittens, but after two failed attempts to use the Scissors Select Tool, I finally looked up the instructions (after you click a million times to create an outline, click inside the form to make the selection). By that point, I was too lazy to do it all again, so just the kitten on the left (Marie) got selected. It probably turned out better that way anyhow.

I added the kitten to yesterday's image with the mode set to Grain Extract, masked some of the harder edges so the kitten looked less pasted in, and voila!

It might be worth trying this with a kitten that doesn't have black on her face, but I thought this was kind of fun.

Welcome to Horrordailies!

It's October, and Zenzalei reminded me that means it's time for Horrordailies, in which I post something sort of spooky every day. Last month, I made it 11 days before giving up. (I thought I'd made it through the entire month, but Blogger tells me otherwise.)

Confession: I'm not really into horror or spooky things. I'm not even a pumpkin spice girlie.

(Tangent: Okay, I can't even say girlie with a straight face. I'm 56. It just sounds like Steve Buscemi saying "How do you do, fellow kids?")

(Tangent to the tangent: I'm going to be sad when the internet goes away because I was able to search for "Joe Pesci Hello fellow kids" and it gave me the actual reference.)

ANYHOW... Maybe if I use this as an excuse to do tutorials to learn new things, I will get beyond 11 days this year. No promises.

After much screwing around, I followed parts of this tutorial.

Welcome to Horrordailies.

Details:

The font is Rubik Glitch. If I did it again, I might use something else because some of the letters are hard to read.

GIMP modifications: I used Filter->Render->Noise->Solid Noise instead of Cloud Noise and the mode was "Dodge" instead of "Color Dodge".