I'm none too happy about this FA policy.
"Pokémon or Digimon [adult characters] who have childlike body proportions" is very subjective. Even among my friend group, that opinion is different from person to person. That makes me wonder how this is going to be enforced in any reasonable manner. And we've already seen that it is being enforced in an unreasonable manner. Already have multiple very different responses from FA mods about what counts and what does not count. Cool way to run your website, staff.

The rules are extremely vague. That has to be on purpose because no policy-creator would create a rule so vague in sound mind. I would challenge you to question what motive they have for doing so. This is a vague policy of which the only true guidelines to follow are the whims of the ones who enforce it. That's not a content policy, that's chaos.

That would be bad enough on its own, but we've seen already how far the mods are overreaching. It's not uncommon for Yoshi fanart, Pikachu fanart, you name it, to be judged as "childlike in appearance" even when they're clearly not. Staff claims that "cute adults, Pokemon/Digimon or not, will not be removed unless they proportionally/anatomically represent a child," but I've been seeing leagues of art getting flagged that don't even look like teens, much less children.

Update: If what Fender wrote in the May 22 journal was actually true, then Argon Vile's Pikachu and Yoshis and Koopas wouldn't have been flagged. They do not meet the childlike proportions which were listed.

Update 2: This staff feedback appears to confirm through example that non-Pokemon canon adults will be taken down if there is any sort of size difference. Because literally what else other than the size diff is there in those examples that would violate current policy.

Who is this protecting? You're delusional if you think removing smut of a cat creature from a video game is doing anything to prevent minor exploitation. Is it because of some other reason? Then maybe you should be transparent about it.

It's obnoxious that you can't have cute and sexual in the same image. It's unjust that a lot of "cute" art gets hit with that broad "underage" brush. The general perception of media all over seems to be moving to "what the viewer personally sees" over what the creator drew and it's scary.

The fact that the administration would think that any of my sonas count as childlike is a disgusting insult. Don't forget that. They are directly calling your characters that you created "childlike" and banning them on those false grounds. I don't know about you, but I do not accept being lumped into that group because I think it's nice when an anatomically-accurate Helioptile is drawn as a cute lil fella and wants sex.

There's so many more thoughts I want to share here, but I would simply be repeating what Jaki's journal said. Read Jaki's words about the matter. They are wise and important for more reasons than just getting artwork removed.

Someone I know was of the opinion:
"Honestly the best bet is doing absolutely nothing and letting [FA staff] meticulously search through their gallery with the absolute complete fucking garbage search options and delete the shit themselves. If they want their site to be shittier, you might as well force them to do all the legwork for it. Bonus points for untagging the mons in question so they can't just search for them."

I'm going through difficult stuff in 2021. I'm healthy physically, and so is my family, but there are so, so, so many furries online (e.g. Discord) who want to hurt me in various ways. My mental and social health is devastatingly low. I hope you guys will bear with me if I ever come across... short on patience. It's not an excuse, I know. I'm just asking for a little understanding.

Don't be surprised if you hear rumours or allegations about me that sound pretty contrary to how you actually see me act.

In my opinion, cancelling someone when it's proven that they are abusive and unapologetic, is the right thing to do. But I've also seen that rumours have made it very hard for me to live a mentally and socially healthy life.

I'm a reviled person in this pokemon furries community. Due to past harassers of mine who vilify me, spreading their stories about what I "did" to the people they know... There are many pokemon furries who avoid/report me on sight, though they have no direct interaction with me.

I have a difficult decision to make.
And I wanted to write it out in a place where people who follow me and wish to stay in the loop will be able to know where my head’s at if they want to.

A friend recently told me that it’s important to spend time doing what makes me smile, and avoid what pulls me down.
Recent complications have made me call into question whether drawing is something that is good for me or bad for me at this point.

What about drawing brings me joy:
1. The pride I feel when I finally, finally complete artwork to my satisfaction.
2. Creating something I’ve pictured in my head in a way that others can now see, in a way I get to share with others.
3. Contributing to the Pokémon fanart community.

What about drawing makes me stressed out:
1. The process of drawing is frustrating. Despite practicing for about twenty years, I have the following frustrations.
1a. I draw very slowly. Slower than any of my peers by an enormous margin. It takes me months to complete art, even though I don’t tackle complicated projects.
1b. Forming a sketch from reference images is frustrating. Getting the anatomy to make any sense on the page is not clicking for me, and it’s not gotten any easier.
1c. When I DO get the anatomy correct, someone calls me out for copying the art I looked at on another screen to reference the pose.

2. I am feeling very ostracized from the community of Pokémon NSFW fanartists. A large number of these fellow fanartists have explicitly called me annoying, or much worse things. This is endlessly aggravating, as it always comes after I try to do the right thing, stick up for what’s right, or offer a constructive suggestion. Which is, of course, annoying (or worse) to some people.

Over the years, I have made appeals to people who hold me in disfavourable opinion, using all manner of different advice from my friends on how to handle these kinds of situations. Sometimes to the individuals themselves, sometimes to the moderation team of whatever subcommunity it took place in. Often the moderation teams respond in ways that my friends and I agree are unjust.

When that hasn’t worked and things get especially nasty, I’ve taken others’ advice and tried moving on and finding different peers. It’s happened again. And again. Often to the point of me gaining people who verbally harass me.

Knowing that such a large number of my peers in this community find me annoying, or actively hate my guts and say bad things about me, has been pulling down my morale for years now, and lately it’s become a weight that is too much to bear.


So, I have a difficult decision to make.
A. I form a plan to tackle ALL of these problems and I continue to create art. I do not know what this plan will look like, since I have already tried everything that both my friends and I can think of.
B. I decide to stop drawing entirely. I leave the Poké fanartist community (they’d no longer be peers). I focus my time to create the one thing that I know I am skilled at, faster at, I take pride in, and I enjoy doing: writing Pokémon fiction stories.

I don’t have an answer yet. But thanks to those who wanted to catch up with what I’ve been going through lately.
Best,
-Afterglow

Projects I'm looking forward to drawing/writing:

-Drawing a Pikachu and an Ampharos duo and a Miltank (commissions).

-Finishing a Totodile foodplay drawing for myself.

-Finishing an open species (drawing but also lore writing) that I'd like to share with the world.

-Finishing a story about an Ivysaur and an alien Pokemon.

-Writing a Pokémon whodunnit mystery that I have lots of ideas for (I will make this either a story for everyone to read, or a TTRPG for a party of 4).

Thanks for taking an interest in my future projects!

I think having a fan is a promise.
I promise you that I will not be terrible. And that I will work to try to deserve your respect, your love, and the fact that you support me.

Commiss.io's main purpose is a place where I can handle my commissions, communicate with customers about the ongoing process/updates, and receive payment.

However, Commiss.io also has a way for you to leave tips if you'd like! There are two options: monthly support donations, or one-time tips.

This page is an easy way for customers to give tips if they're happy with a commission -- and, non-commissioners, if you'd like to give me a little just for the sake of supporting me, I'd definitely appreciate that very much!

Commiss.io/AfterglowAmpharos

Making art and stories for people is a passion of mine, and as they say, every little bit helps. Thanks for stopping by!

In 2018, I'm moving to
Commiss.io/AfterglowAmpharos
concerning my story-writing and art commissions.

All prices, details, and examples are now over there.

(Since some people aren't noticing it:
There's some important info behind the "Creator Project Guidelines" button.)

Now that some people are inquiring about exchanging monetary goods in exchange for artwork and stories I produce (crazy, right??), it's time I decide on some prices.

What I love to draw and write:
● Cute creatures, quirky critters, Pokémon, similar designs.
What I can't/won't draw and write:
● Anthros and humans give me a hard time.
● Certain over-the-top OCs. Yeah you know the ones.
● Most(?) fetishes. I'm not gonna put a laundry list here so you can ask in private.


Writing pricing:
● $10 per thousand words if you want me to write a story for you, usually with some clean story in the first part and then some smut in the last part.

Art pricing:
● Flat colour, single character, simple: $11 to $15 depending on complexity. +Additional characters are $10 each.
● Flat colour, single character, complex: $16 to $22 depending on complexity. +Additional characters are $15 each.
● Icons are $5

● For shading, +$2 to the price.
● I can also colour the lineart. This is a small detail but it adds a nice touch. Free by request.
● White or transparent or simple backgrounds are free. More complex backgrounds are negotiable.

● NSFW artwork isn't inherently extra, but it might cost a little extra if the fluids, positions, or details are complex.
● Extra closeup views are gonna be $5 because that's essentially an icon but lewder, pff.
● Alternate versions of images of the same pose: Making a clean version of a smutty pic is usually easy enough to be free, as is different stages of arousal. Clothing or other complex stuff will probably be a little extra.


I will show you progress screenshots along the way and ask if you'd like changes made, in an effort to make the finished product as satisfactory as possible!

Some projects I have currently half-finished:

1
A story about Elgyem and Ivysaur. It explores the differences between the alien and the earthling in a friendly manner.
The story section of this is shaping up to be quite long. I will either A) write it up as one long thing, that has much more story leadup than smut, or B) I will write one story that is clean, and a sequel that is just smut (and probably shorter).

2
A picture of my Totodile character in closeup, a very smutty picture where she's using ice cream for foodplay. She loves that stuff.

3
I'm sketching out idea for an original sheepy species. Not Pokemon, but also not realistic.
I've got practically all the ideas I want, down, as in the text that explains the species and their qualities/abilities.
So now I just have to finish the images, where I draw several different individuals from this fictional species, each one in a different shape and size.

4
A *commissioned* story about a Buneary sister who craves her Lopunny brother's dick.

5
A commissioned artwork of gay Kecleon x Ampharos.

After hours of searching the web and finding nothing that works for me, I thought I'd ask you folks.

I'm looking for a web service that I can accept art commission payments with, that is NOT U.S. only.

Ideally it should be lesser or equal to the Paypal rate, 2.9% of transaction (plus whatever hidden fees people keep complaining about with Paypal, etc. etc. we've all heard the moaning)

A great example would be: Dwolla. I did research on it and it's the best option by far, having a super low rate of charge, and very few complaints about the service. It's US only, so I can't use it, but I'd encourage my american watchers to look into it. But anyway, something kinda like Dwolla but including Canada would be my ideal match.

Drop me a line if you've got an idea, thank you very much.

I just finished moving my gallery to a Weasyl account.

I haven't decided yet if I'm actually leaving FA.
But now you can find me on Weasyl as well as Inkbunny. The username is Afterglow.

Now that some people are inquiring about exchanging monetary goods in exchange for artwork I produce (Crazy, right??), I guess it's time I decide on some prices.


● Flat colour, single character, simple: $11 to $15 depending on complexity. +Additional characters are $10 each.
● Flat colour, single character, complex: $16 to $22 depending on complexity. +Additional characters are $15 each.
● Icons are $5

● For shading, +$2 to the price.
● I can also colour the lineart. This is a small detail but it adds a nice touch. Free by request.
● White or transparent or simple backgrounds are free. More complex backgrounds are negotiable.
● NSFW - artwork might cost a little extra if the fluids are complex.


What I love to draw: Cute or quirky critters, or Pokémon, etc.
What I can't draw: Anthros and humans give me a hard time.
Certain over-the-top OCs. Yeah you know the ones.


I will show you progress screenshots along the way and ask if you'd like changes made, in an effort to make the finished produce as satisfactory as possible!

Many artists, when they go on to pursue a career, they fear that someone from work will look up their info online, and find out that they have drawn porn in the past.

This is no longer a valid fear.

ZONE. Some of you might know this porn artist. Famous for making high-quality animations of Rule 34, voice acting and all.

They made porn of Skullgirls, and the Lab Zero Games guys STILL hired ZONE on as an animator. (And ZONE's porn works aren't exactly a secret or anything.)

So yeah. I'd love to see less artists taking their adult artwork off the internet, just because they don't want companies peeking at it and judging them. Adult artwork STILL shows off your experience as an artist.

So you wanna contact the cabbit (or his other characters) and he's being terribly inactive on FA?
Find me here!
I play Sparkz (the cabbit) there, as well as everyone in the character list on the left side:
Afterglow
Cadbury
Crackle and Pop
Drake Dunes
Esther Bunny
Frankie Froakie
Glendale
Gooie
Hurtle
Lucille Esp
Nyan Cat
Olive Blanche
Popcorn
Pounce de Leon
Sachi Wishmaker
Sparkz
Spike the Fledgling
Spinni
Tecco
Thurman
Toroko Mimiga
Trace Brush
Viceroy Bubbles
THAT'S ME! =D ALL OF THOSE!

Between college and RP I have had basically zero time for FA, I apologise guys. I just love RP so much.

Thus, I wondered if I could kill two birds with one stone (no offence, avian anthros).

What do you guys think of submitting my best RPs as FA text submissions?
At heart, an RP is just a story that is co-written, in turns. Story submissions are allowed. So would RPs on my FA be kosher?
I wouldn't post anything mundane, just the best ones, with decent-length posts.

Often, I like to draw inside my imagination.

It's the most forgiving and free medium. No line is ever out of place. Any change of mind can be corrected as quick as you think it.

In your imagination, brushstrokes are formed in an instant.
The canvas is infinite, bound by no physical limits.
You can take it with you anywhere, and draw at absolutely any time that ideas come to you.

There is only one downside to the canvas of your mind.

Only one person may see it.

Or is that an upside...?


-From the mind-canvas notebook of Sparkz

This.

Just referring you folks to the journal of another, because it's enlightening stuff that should be heard.

I'm reaching out here~!

As you can see, I'm great with my subjects, and I'm even pretty good with objects. But I struggle in drawing backgrounds.

I would really appreciate some tutoring in this area. It doesn't have to be anything stunning, just enough that my art stops having the white nothing in the back so often.

I'd mainly draw outdoor scenes in my art of ferals. If I wanna go simple, maybe a pattern.
Helps?

Lucky me.

Just a heads up, I hardly ever check Journals or Submissions in my update box. Who has the time to go through all that? Considering I'm running Tumblr blogs too.

I'll still check your comments, of course. And Notes!

A journal by Kipikipo made me think I should post up my favourite webcomics, for anyone interested. Read on, curious viewers!

Furry comics:

Commander Kitty His previous saga poofed, this is what you could call the second batch. Sci-fi, lovable characters.

Count Your Sheep A girl, her sheep, and her mom. Charming.

Freefall More sci-fi and lovable characters.

Housepets A dog, a cat, and their friends. They live as pets, but seem more like children.

Jay Naylor's two series, Better Days and Original Life (in that order). Good for feline fans, most of the families are felines. Even if you're not, the mix of everyday-life, humour, and watching the kids grow up all the way from about 8, to having kids of their own, and then watching THOSE kids in the next series - will have you along for the ride and enjoying it.

Kevin and Kell A male rabbit and a female wolf fall in love and have a family, despite being on opposite sides of the food chain, and go against the society they live in.

Sabrina Online You may have seen Zig Zag before in furry porn? She runs an adult site. This comic is about working in that sort of situation, and about her friends. Mirror Site, too

Zeu U A university of furries!


Video game comics:

8-Bit Theater Even if you're not a fan of Final Fantasy 1, this strip is hilarious and stylish, with lovable characters, once it passes its beginnings. You can pass by said beginnings with more style by watching the first 35 comics redone in Flash animation.

Alternate Universe and Carmela The first hosts a variety of characters, Pokémon, Kirby, Earthbound... Completed series. The second is a story set in the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon (Red/Blue) game - that means it's about Pokémon (no humans involved) in a rescue team.

Brawl in the Family Characters from Super Smash Bros. Brawl (mostly Kirby in the beginning). Interacting with each other, or parodies of Brawl, or other games said characters are included in.

MegaTokyo Two American gamers in Japan. Basically a manga. Most serious tone of all of these.

VG Cats Two cat anthros, and video game parodying/criticizing. Gets graphic sometimes.

Super Effective Short comic from VG Cats creator, about Pokémon (earlier games).


Other:

xkcd No story. No linearism. Just stickmen making profound, and/or humourous points.


Yeah, a lot. I haven't even finished any of them, except three.

"You know, growing up, we're told we have to be strong no matter what. We're told that, in this world, it's the survival of the fittest. But I don't think that's right. We're people, we're not animals. Shouldn't it be okay to feel weak sometimes?"

-Yuki Sohma, Fruits Basket episode 17


If you're interested in the anime, go waaaatch! LiveVideo (CryToTheMoon3) and WatchCartoonOnline have it in English.
GoGoAnime has it in Japanese with subtitles.

It's been an emotional day. Here's another quote from the Fruits Basket anime, which I hope some of you will find useful during reminiscent days.


"But you know, there's something I believe. I want to try and live my life carrying all of my memories with me.
And even if those memories are painful, even if they do nothing but hurt me, I want to keep them.
Even those memories I sometimes wish I could forget. As long as I carry them with me, as long as I can keep holding on, then someday, someday I'll be strong enough that those memories don't hurt me anymore, and I'll be glad that I have them. That's what I believe. With all my heart.
That's why all my memories are precious to me. I don't think it would be okay to forget a single one."

-Momiji Sohma, Fruits Basket episode 15


If you're interested in the anime, go waaaatch! LiveVideo (CryToTheMoon3) and WatchCartoonOnline have it in English.
GoGoAnime has it in Japanese with subtitles.

Watching an anime online, called Fruits basket (which has many funny moments, I highly recommend it), I came across a lovely little nugget of truth. I thought I would quote it.

"That still doesn't change the fact that it's admirable. Why can't he see that himself?
...Maybe the reason you don't see it is, that it's stuck to your back.
What I mean is, a person's admirable qualities. They're just like, say, a pickled plum on a rice ball. In other words, the person's the rice ball and the plum's stick to their back.
So, all over the world you could have rice balls made with all sorts of wonderful ingredients. All different flavors and shapes and colors.
But since they'd be stuck in the middle of everyone's back, someone could have a plum and not even know it! They'd look at themselves and think, 'I'm so plain, nothing but white rice.', even though it isn't true. Because turn them around, and sure enough, there it is, there's the plum!
So if someone is jealous of somebody else, well then, it's probably because it's easier to see the plum on someone else's back than it is on your own.
Yup, I can see it. I can see it very clearly Kyo. You don't know it, but you have a great big plum on your back."

-Tohru Honda, Fruits Basket Episode 7


If you're interested in the anime, go waaaatch! LiveVideo (CryToTheMoon3) and WatchCartoonOnline have it in English.
GoGoAnime has it in Japanese with subtitles.

The road of life is filled with many turns and road conditions. And most of us drive a stick-shift. We need to learn how to shift gears to adapt to each change.