Erin Ptah

· 7mo ago

Everyone send good vibes to the 10,000 hamsters running in wheels that it took to power the #AO3 database reboot

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· 7mo ago

Official vet analysis on Fiddlesticks' two mystery bumps: "probably just cysts, could develop problems in the future, but as long as she isn't messing with them, we won't mess with them." Good job not having cancer, kitty 👍

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/nightmares-in-the-north-4-1/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Nightmares in the North 4/1

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/nightmares-in-the-north-1-11/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Nightmares in the North 1/11

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· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! The AU That’s Got Religion, page 12 https://leifandthorn.com/comic/the-au-thats-got-religion-page-12/ #webcomics #lgbtq

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· 7mo ago

Replying to on universeodon.com

Tangent about the suspect: TP cops say he's a crossdresser [not that politely, either]. SS cops just refer to him neutrally as a guy. I'm guessing this was a TP innovation. It would explain the femme appearance and perfume-y scent...and by PSOH:Tokyo, Akino is very overt about including LGBTQ side characters...but there's nothing femme about this guy in the one panel he's in. And the SS dialogue has been more overt about "this character is being racist right now." If you're being this blunt about the racism, why soften the transphobia? ("Well, why *add* the transphobia?" Because it's the '90s/early '00s, when this is overwhelmingly treated as a low-stakes funny thing to joke about. Including by people who would be embarrassed to be racist on purpose.)

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· 7mo ago

If I had better brand synergy, I'd schedule this behind-the-scenes bonus #LeifAndThorn post to release alongside "the next public #Vampire Hunter AU update." But I don't know when that's going to be! So you're getting it now: https://www.patreon.com/posts/deleted-and-in-147411150

patreon.com

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· 7mo ago

Replying to

The *very* end of the chapter gives us the obligatory "animal all along" reveal: The Empress wasn't a human asking D to stop another human from having the artificially-inseminated baby of her deceased human husband, she was a rare bird asking him to stop a zoo from hatching the artificially-inseminated egg of her deceased bird husband. Look, I'm fine with "the bird who needs D's help" having an exactly-parallel situation to "the human case Leon is dealing with." That level of coincidence is a twist PSOH runs on. But if D is out stealing the artificially-inseminated egg, don't show him sneaking away from the building where the artificially-inseminated human just got blown up! At that point it's not a satisfying well-done misdirect, it's just contrived. (Would've given it partial credit for "D was sneaking away from the zoo with the egg, and just happened to be walking past the bombing"...but he's not carrying anything, let alone anything egg-sized. I went back and checked.)

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/sketchbook-liana-actually-looks-happy/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Sketchbook: Liana Actually Looks Happy

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Chapter 13: Digital A fish story! The murder victim is Jody McDowell in TP, Geordie MacDowell in SS. Looks like "Jody" is a significantly more popular name (446th versus 20847th)...but it's also a woman's name 2/3 of the time, while "Geordie" is mostly male...but considering what we're going to learn about this person, I wonder if Akino picked the name *for* its Gender Implications. Leon immediately thinking "what if the Count could get the dead guy's fish to testify?" is just (chef's kiss)

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/the-au-thats-got-religion-page-11/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! The AU That’s Got Religion, page 11

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· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Sketchbook: Bap the plush https://leifandthorn.com/comic/sketchbook-bap-the-plush/ #webcomics #lgbtq

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Visiting the shop (for D's help in *taking care of* the fish, not interviewing them), Leon hears voices arguing inside. Opens the door, and it's just the pets. Asks D where his guests went, and D replies: TP: I'm not sure what you mean, detective. We're the only two people here. SS: As you can see, there are no humans here. Love the pointed hint in the SS version. (Which Leon totally misses either way, of course.)

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

One last reveal: the woman walking around and introducing herself as "Merrow" wasn't the digital pet in humanoid form, she was Geordie in femme mode. What tipped D off was, all of Geordie's tropical fish were the kind that can change sex: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequential_hermaphroditism The specific thing D says: TP: They're all what you would call...transsexuals. SS: They're all hermaphroditic. So, okay, D would certainly *know* the scientifically-accurate term. Fish that can switch from one sex to the other are "sequential hermaphrodites." At the same time, it's true that Leon would definitely just *call* them "transsexual fish"! (Or y'know, something ruder. But if he was trying to use a non-offensive term, this would've been the standard in the '90s.) On the one hand, I get the value of being precise, here. On the other, I like D making the explicit connection to the human trans community. Geordie/Merrow identified with these fish because ze was trans (possibly bigender), not because ze was a hermaphrodite (which is not a thing in *human* biology, and D would know that, too).

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Leon gets shot on the job. Co-workers yell his name in concern. TP has them say "Orcot!", SS goes with "Leon!" Gonna guess the former is more professionally-accurate... Wakes up in the hospital and D is just. There. Waiting at his bedside. Starts cutting up fruit to hand-feed him. D, buddy, you are so unprofessionally attached to this human now.

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· 5mo ago

Can I get a billion-dollar investment if I redefine every piece of software I use making #LeifAndThorn as "an AI-assisted art tool"?

Yesterday I saved hours on manually redrawing a layer by using the high-tech "ctrl+C" and "ctrl+V". Truck of VC cash, please

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Leon asks D to water his plant, D reveals that it died to save him. (Through some kind of magical tradeoff -- this is not a case of "he was carrying the plant around in his pocket and it took the bullet.") TP: She bloomed for you, Officer Orcot. Her red flowers have fallen in your place... SS: For you, they bloomed crimson. And for you, they died. Same meaning, but I like the poetry of the TP version more.

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

...Kinda don't have anything more to say about this one, so that's a wrap on the thread! The rest of the translation is either the same, or the differences aren't interesting. I'm glad none of the horses died, and Betty got her win, and D+Leon scored a bit of money out of it. (Now I'm wondering if Akino was a horse girl.)

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/sketchbook-armadillo-guy/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Sketchbook: Armadillo guy

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

15: Dark Horse Proofreading breakdown at the TP office this issue. Apostrophes got replaced with Õ in the font they use for funny little asides. As in, D says Leon has to come along because "HeÕs my chauffeur." D makes friends with Betty, the jockey/stuntwoman on a movie set. Asks her about her experience with horses: TP: My family breeds and raises thoroughbreds. Racing's in my blood. SS: My family runs a stable. We even have a racehorse. Basically the same meaning, but props to TP for using the expression "in my blood," it'll be thematically relevant soon.

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· 6mo ago

I have 1 more "the entire #LeifAndThorn backlist" preorder to pack...and I'm down to my last 2 copies of Volume 3. Fate was on my side with this one.

#webcomics #crowdfunding

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· 7mo ago

Replying to

A thing I did like about the ending: D cooks breakfast for Leon. It's (secretly) endangered bird egg on toast. Both translations specify "sunny-side-up." Look, this is a little incongruous after the last chapter. D was so upset about species going extinct because of humans, and now he's sabotaging the endangered-species-restoration efforts of humans. But it's funny enough that I'll give it a pass.

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· 6mo ago

Watching a video on iconic DC writer/artist Darwyn Cooke, which led me to an interview with this quote: "I don’t work in a formal fashion — I don’t sit and type a full script and then draw it. What I do is I plot it. And then I sit down and draw it and then I write the dialogue afterwards." Oh, hey, that's what I do. Pretty sure I've never heard anyone else describe making comics this way. Maybe they just won't admit to it, because Having A Script is seen as the "professional" way to do things? But nobody could accuse Darwyn Cooke of not being a professional -- and here he is, revealing this is the process that works for him. Vindication, hah. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvrjSumxtg4 https://www.tcj.com/the-darwyn-cooke-interview-by-markisan-naso/3/

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· 7mo ago

Replying to

Note from earlier in the chapter, the Empress describing her backstory: TP: Then one day...I fell ill. For a week, I was fluttering between life and death. SS: Then one day...I fell gravely ill. I was bedridden for days, on the verge of death. Same meaning! But props to TP for adding a bird pun.

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· 7mo ago

Replying to on universeodon.com

When D follows somebody else's dessert offer instead of Leon's, Jill teases "you got dumped!" in both translations. Aww. Another dessert, candy (TP) or baklava (SS), called "Lips of the Odalisque" in TP, and "Beautiful Woman's Lips" in SS. First time I've noticed TP using a more obscure/"neither English nor Japanese in origin" term than SS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odalisque

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Weirdly, the second-to-last page of the chapter is almost totally different between translations. I'm not typing all of it, but the TP version starts with D asking "Do you think it's possible for a fish to cry?", and then getting poetic about the connection between Geordie and Merrow-the-fish. It's a callback to an earlier scene where Geordie was crying, so Merrow asked what tears were. And it leads neatly into the last page, a sweet moment between the couple. (The implication I get is, this is their reconnection in Silicon Heaven.) SS starts with D saying "Perhaps he became a woman in both body and spirit," and then getting poetic about how computers only think in binary, but humans don't have to. It's a sweet sentiment in general...but it feels disconnected from the plot. It's not a callback to any earlier scenes of Merrow-the-chatbot struggling to understand/accept Geordie for being nonbinary. Or struggling to process "being two things at once" in any other context. SS also gives Leon a side comment about knowing that intersex people exist. *Do* you know that, cis perisex man from the 1990s Leon Orcot?? I am not sure that you do!

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· 7mo ago

Replying to

#PetShopOfHorrors reread chapter 10: Desire! Most of the pet sales are about *some* kind of desire, I don't think it stands out in this one...and the pet's name is Daisy...but maybe Akino didn't want to fall back on "dog chapter where the title is the dog's name" a second time. Leon is stopping some kids from picking on a dog, when he gets a call: TP: What's that? A 211? Where? I'm on my way! SS: Armed robbery at the grocery on 17th?! On it!! TP feels more natural. SS is doing the "we didn't have a voice actor to play the person calling, so the person taking the call will say all the exposition as if repeating after them" trope...in a comic. Although maybe that's the joke. Props to TP for including the real CA police code for a robbery: https://police-codes.com/basic-codes/211

police-codes.com

211 Basic Code - Police Radio Codes

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

The main pet of the story is a fish named Mellow (TP) or Merrow (SS). "Mellow" does fit -- she's associated with being chill and relaxed, in contrast to Geordie being finicky and withdrawn -- but it turns out "Merrow" is an Irish type of mermaid, so I bet that was the intended name: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrow Kudos to SS for giving Merrow's lines a fun sci-fi font. Foreshadows the ending without totally giving it away.

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· 7mo ago

Replying to on universeodon.com

Human!Daisy calls D to give Maggie back, reveals she was dog!Daisy all along, the family stays together. Back at the shop with the other dogs, D reflects on how confusing their loyalty to humans is, and also remarks: TP: Well, guys, for better or for worse, I doubt anything will come between Daisy and Maggie now. SS: I wasn't going to go easy on her, child or not. The meaning here is completely different, but they both have a format of "in X case or Y case, [definitive statement]." Was D saying something extra-vague along those lines, and both translators guessed at how to fill in the details...? (Negative points to TP for the "Well, guys." D would *never*.)

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· 6mo ago

New Patreon bonus: I made a post about playing with Waveform outputs back in 2023, on some soft-shaded character art. Mentioned that the results were very different with cel-shaded comics. ...And then I never posted those. Until now! https://www.patreon.com/posts/vampire-hunter-147417461 #webcomics #MakingComics

patreon.com

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· 5mo ago

It is still your moral duty to vote against Republicans. The leopards will keep eating faces, for everyone, until "we support leopards eating your face!" stops being a platform they can win elections with.

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Dirty (for some reason this is their branding for cream soda flavor): They went way too hard on the flavor, oof. If I'm in the mood for this taste, I'd rather just buy regular orange cream soda Baja Blast (tropical lime): Meh. Finished what I bought, but won't buy more

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· 6mo ago

Real tired of seeing people complain about "liberals" when they mean conservatives.

"This Republican policy is traumatizing people and destroying lives, because liberals--" Republican voters are conservatives! Please hold them responsible for the consequences of their actions!

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· 6mo ago

Fully into the International Shipping phase of campaign fulfillment, aka the "gosh I wish these prices were April Fool's jokes" phase

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· 7mo ago

Replying to on transmom.love

Feels like this is glossing over the existence of specific anti-LGBTQ laws that had "...because it's a choice" at their foundation. Also, "these are the natural traits I was born with, and I get to be proud of them" is a theme of plenty of anti-racist and anti-ableist campaigns. You don't have to believe "this will magically end all discrimination forever" just to agree with "this is true, and it's worth saying."

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· 6mo ago

Posted a new #AO3 chapter. In the first 12 hours I got two separate "unhinged rant" bot comments (in the style that https://leifandthorn.com/comic/ignore-all-previous-instructions-15-21/ was based on).

Immediately marked both as spam, but it's wild these keep happening. Has anyone figured out what the goal is yet...?

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· 7mo ago

Replying to on mindly.social

@floofpaldi@mindly.social There's some detailed info here: https://www.reddit.com/r/AO3/comments/1ribx10/comment/o8bogih/ They posted on socials earlier that they're investigating. AFAICT they haven't updated since because there hasn't really been anything to say, just "still not back, still working on it, sorry."

reddit.com

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Chapter 14: Flowers and the Detective, part 1 This is a very short bonus story (the first of 3), but it's numbered as if it's a full-fledged chapter, so I'll go with it. SS continues to be better at translating the incidental text. From the TP translation, I didn't know Q-chan was openly laughing about Leon getting dumped. D presents Leon with a plant (on the grounds that he's not responsible enough to trust with an animal.) Calls it "Gattolotto" in TP, "Gertrude" in SS. Searching for "Gattolotto" just got me inundated for results about...the Georgia lottery. Good job, internet, I love how much search sucks now. From the Gertrude version, I immediately wondered if there was a reason the plant shares a name with the Rose Garden witch from Madoka Magica: https://wiki.puella-magi.net/Gertrud Well, this might explain it: Saint Gertrude is a patron saint of gardeners: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_of_Nivelles

wiki.puella-magi.net

Gertrud - Puella Magi Wiki

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Leon is driving along the coastline when he spots D being aesthetically windswept on a cliff. Pulls over to say hi, and... TP: "What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?" Isn't that the line? SS: You got a drug deal going down out here? Leon already greeted D by asking about drug deals earlier in the chapter, so I like that TP switched it up a little. (and, yeah, I like that it's flirtier)

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https://leifandthorn.com/comic/sketchbook-standing-in-black/

· 6mo ago

New #LeifAndThorn comic! Sketchbook: Standing in Black

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

If it has a URL, it's a website. The number of websites that are also web apps seems like "most of them" these days...even if most of the pages are static, there's still an interactive software aspect if it has submission form, a comment section, or a search bar... So I think the question is, what's a relevant sorting criteria for *you*? What definition would make "web app" useful for you to have as a separate tag?

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Got curious enough about this one that I dug up a scanlation...and, yeah, the meanings correspond to the SS text. Looks like D's examples of "binary choices" aren't even translations, these English words were printed in the original: All or Nothing, To be or Not to be, Man or Woman. Even knowing it's basically a complete rewrite, though, I can't help but like the TP text better!

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· 4mo ago

Replying to

These bots keep getting shoved into areas where you would think "basic accuracy" should be the minimum standard. My web host put an LLM interface in their customer service, and every time I've had to use it, it wastes my time with responses like "try changing this setting that doesn't exist." It sucks, and I hate that managers keep getting suckered into buying it. Users regularly get dangerously-wrong answers from LLMs. "Cleaning tip: Mix bleach with vinegar" isn't just "not the purest scholarly research," it's deadly! (You might think something like "a philosophical chat about questions that don't have objectively right answers" would be safer...until you look at the logs from pretty much any case of chatbot psychosis, and it turns out, nope, those can end in serious-to-fatal harm too.)

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

One thing before I start: There's an AO3 tag for a PSOH character called "Madam C". She only shows up in one fic, in this chapter: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36073837/chapters/89930803 Haven't seen her in my reread yet. Anybody know what part of canon she's from? There's a "Madame" in the Sofu D spinoff manga, but she doesn't get an initial. And this fic has "Madam C" interacting with Leon, so, probably not the 100-year-old Paris woman.

archiveofourown.org

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

Another big divide in character names: Betty's precious family horse is "1,000 Deaths" in TP, "Sazandis" in SS. This time, googling the SS name got me nothing useful. Search engines are convinced that I really meant to type Sarandis, Sandis, Satan, Gandhi (??), Sandi's, Cindy, or Zande. So it's not one of those mythological/historical references the SS translators found after the TP translators missed. ...I think this is the first divide where the SS translators are the ones who just fell back on the phonetic, "sazan-dis", while TP came up with a meaning, "Thousand-Deaths." (Ruthless Nights Scans went with "Southern Death." I'm genuinely surprised nobody here went with "Sudden Death.") Also, TP uses "she" for the horse, SS uses "he." Did one of them miss a gender indicator, or is this just a completely gender-ambiguous horse? There's a reference to the Thoroughbred foundation stallions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thoroughbred#Foundation_stallions SS names the Godolphin Arabian, the Byerley Turk, and the Darley Arabian. TP names a trio of their descendants: Matchem, Herod, and Eclipse. Looks like "all modern thoroughbreds descend from these 3" is accurate for both groups, and Akino originally wrote the names of the younger generation, but SS decided to swap in the older one.

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· 5mo ago

Replying to

D freaks Leon out by saying the fish are asking about Merrow, and that Merrow witnessed the shooting. Leon has a moment of "even if you *can* understand them, it's not like fish testimony will hold up in court!" D's reply: TP: But you know I'm right, don't you? That's why you brought them to me, wasn't it? You knew the fish would be able to provide you with a clue. SS: *You* could understand them too. I'm quite certain you could also hear what Merrow has to say. Both versions have broadly the same vibe -- they're ominous for similar reasons. But SS nails the specific balance of "the reader can assume it's a callback to the way Leon heard the pets' voices earlier, then it turns out Merrow is a chatbot who interacts in English, and Leon can assume D was just referring to that." Leon wonders if *this* is admissible in court...and D points out how much humans trust computers. Oof. Because this is PSOH, *we* know Merrow-the-bot is as much of a conscious/thinking being as the non-digital pets are! But yeah, plenty of humans in-universe would trust a non-conscious chatbot, even 30 years before Replika came on the scene. Purely on the grounds of The Computer Said So, It Must Be True. (Our species really is living down to D's expectations, huh.)

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