amserpand reblogs stuff

Dun horse study

Also me:

#sorry to take away from the rightful love of lichens but damn i wanna know the geology of this place it looks wild

The state of graphics creation in the wildland fire world is, shall we say, abysmal. Which isn't really anyone's fault! Graphics/design training is not a part of wildland fire training at all, and it used to be that outsourcing graphics was a viable if expensive option. But as the pace of the wildland fire world continues to increase exponentially, outsourcing just isn't possible for most graphics. This means a lot of people with zero training are forced to make graphics in house and they're just doing things as best they can.

This has resulted in some...ah...not great stuff. Which is not on the people creating them at all, usually! They're being asked to do things not in their job description that they have no background or training in.

But there needs to be training. If people can learn to run a damn chainsaw, they can figure out font hierarchies and basic color theory.

So, in my never-ending quest to shove better art skills into the wildland fire world, I created this 25 page guide last year! It covers why good graphics matter, the history of art in the wildland fire world, basic design terms, and basic design principles.

Now, I know, I KNOW, some other professional designers/artists are going to look at this and go "Katy, what the fuck? Some of this is not right." I know. But I wasn't going for the Most Technically Perfect and Correct way to do things, I was going for easy to understand and grasp at a basic level when you're just starting out and not aiming to become a full on design pro. Because let me tell you, the bar is in hell. If I have ONE MORE PERSON tell me that PowerPoint is the best and only accessible design program (yes, fucking PowerPoint) I am going to lose my mind. So yes, maybe I didn't explain the full breadth of DPI and print qualities and color spaces. But if it stops at least one brochure being made in PowerPoint then I'm calling it a win.

I had another client today get confused and upset at how I labeled their final file.

(If you don't know already, I'm a graphic designer)

The filename was something like "ProjectnameFNL-BLEED-DIE.pdf"

I also named the email "Projectname Final File - Bleed & Die"

Now, for the non-designers out there, a bleed is how you get the picture to the edge of the page in a document. You can't just print an 8.5x11 page in that situation, you have to print a larger page, and trim it to 8.5x11, and that overprint that you cut down is called the "bleed".

Die is short for dieline. If you are printing something in a different shape than a cutter can make (basically anything without straight lines) then you need a die. A die also helps trim things a lot faster, some can do a hundred sheets at a time, as opposed to manually doing it (which I'm not even sure how you'd even do that)

In this situation, I was making a box. They are notoriously tricky, but I've done a bunch before. And the person I was dealing with was new, and she had to send along the final approval to her boss.

She wasn't rude, but was clearly uncomfortable in our meeting today. I really had to explain it to her, and said that these were industry standard things and her printer needs this info. I also have worked with her boss before and absolutely knew that they'd understand the terms.

This is a kind of sample of what I mean. The dieline is the pink line. It is where things will be cut. You can see that it is a special shape that can't just be cut out regularly.

Everything blue outside the pink line is the bleed. you won't see any of that in the final folded box.

And the white lines you see are just the fold lines. They are usually part of the die line, but have a different process to use them.

OP: Why couldn’t traditional Chinese Yinpiao银票/silver drafts be forged if they were merely slips of paper? (cr大明宝钞，渐越)

Traditional Chinese yinpiao/silver drafts were paper vouchers issued by private banks starting from the Song Dynasty(960–1279). People could exchange these slips for physical silver at bank branches across the country.

Silver drafts were made in multiple copies with matching serrated seal edges. One copy went to the customer and others stayed at the bank. All edges had to fit perfectly together to withdraw silver. The unique split edge marks were almost impossible to copy.

This mechanism is known as qifeng骑缝 (split-joint seal) in China. It first originated in the Western Zhou Dynasty (1046–771 BC). The Rites of Zhou records that contracts were written on bamboo or wooden slips in duplicate. Notches and marks were carved in the middle before splitting the slips, with each party keeping one half. The two halves would be matched by their notches for verification.

During the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods (770–221 BC), this idea evolved into hufu虎符/tiger tally tokens. A military tally was split into two pieces with identical inscriptions carved along the split edge. Troops could only be deployed if the patterns and characters on both halves perfectly aligned, serving as a metal version of the split-joint anti-counterfeiting system.

The technology matured in the Tang Dynasty (618–907). Government documents and private contracts commonly used split-joint seals stamped across the dividing line. The Chinese character "hetong合同" (contract) was written across the middle before the paper was torn apart, so the complete characters would only appear when the two halves were put together. This split-coupon system was later adopted for Song Dynasty (960–1279) jiaozi paper money and yinpiao/silver drafts of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368–1912).

Official Song dynasty paper money (Jiaozi交子) was abolished in 1107. Private silver drafts issued by Qing-era piaohao票行 (ancient exchange banks) vanished completely in 1951, hit hard by modern banks and currency reforms. Nowadays silver drafts no longer circulate as currency. Their collectible value depends on their rarity and physical condition.

First they were called "chirographs", but later the word "indenture" (in its earliest meaning as just a legal document of any kind between two people) came to be used, originating from the practice of a contract being written twice on a single piece of parchment and then cut in half with serrated edges (as in dent, "teeth" -> indents -> indenture) in order for each party to take one half, so they could later piece them together and verify that there had been no forgery -- same as the Chinese silver drafts!

(Charter of the Clerecía de Ledesma, 1252, showing the serrated indents at the top -- presumably they are cutting rather than tearing because they're using parchment, which I expect is much harder to tear than wood-pulp paper like the Chinese were using)

what's your thoughts on spp (if you have played)?

Hi! Thank you so much <3 <3 <3 <3 :D

ooh... thoughts on 7pp... I have so many. But in general they are "7PP IS A GREAT GAME AND EVERYONE SHOULD PLAY RIGHT NYOWWWW 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️"

It really makes you feel wizard-y.

In game, you get to have the grand sense of power as a wizard. There's powerful magic at your fingertips, people respect and/or fear you, etc. But you also have the crushing responsibility of ruling 1/7th of the world, you are subject to strict societal pressure (both which can uplift you or destroy you), and you never have enough time to do everything you want. It's such a tasty balance and statement on the patriarchy+cycles of power.

(Something to be aware of is that the world this takes place in is bigoted. Your wizard cannot openly be a woman, or queer, or let their disabilities disable them, which is not fun for everyone. Your wizard can be diverse, but you have to think about how someone who doesn't fit within societal norms would have to navigate their life)

On the player side, you start to realize that the text can be heavily biased and contradictory. For example, there's a great analogy of wizard magic being art but witch magic being craft (even tho they're both magic. it's the patriarchy!!!). It's really fun picking the text apart to draw your own conclusions.

Another thing I enjoy is how lore is set up. You're given enough to go off with and then can expand upon it yourself. In fact, it's encouraged. There are different player roles specifically for a section of world building (for example, one player is in charge of society and npcs, another is in charge of nature, ect). I've heard someone say that 7pp is not gm-less, but instead gm-full. And I really like that description because you always have something to do as a player when you aren't being your wizard.

Over 500 years spent trying to cut down a whole trunk of human culture.