Matt Lichtenwalner

May the Fourth Matt Lichtenwalner 5/4 '23

For those who celebrate...

Also, this makes me happy on all the levels...

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5/4 '23 2 Comments

And also with you.

Lindsay Harris Friel

*Jedi gestures*

Matt Lichtenwalner

What’s Outside This Here Box? Matt Lichtenwalner 5/2 '23

Jill "xtingu" Knapp said something in a brief chat recently that has me thinking about other folks who might appreciate the kind of illustrative stuff that I do.

So I decided to do some brainstorming, and this is the list I currently have:

DMs / Players
Developers (ttrpg)
Developers (apps / digital games)
TTRPG Adjacent Companies (Think Role Play Grow interviews)
Authors (children's books)
Authors (fantasy)
New Artists
Librarians / Bookstore Owners
Social Media Profile Owners

Anyone else have any ideas that I should add to the list?

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5/2 '23 13 Comments

Librarians.

Lindsay Harris Friel

Bookstore employees. Literacy campaigns. After-school programs. If you drew a picture of your nephews reading a big hardcover book, surrounded by a big male lion, a cool-looking elf archer, a mermaid, a giant robot, a lady scientist, a jungle explorer and a witch, you’d have every librarian, teacher and bookstore worker buying that t-shirt, poster and mug.

Lindsay Harris Friel

These are great - I'll add them to the list!

Matt Lichtenwalner

Now that everyone works remotely, and they all rely on Slack or Discord or some equivalent service, I think there's a market for someone to come draw avatars for everyone to use on their comms channels.

Robert Bryan

I’d use that.

Lindsay Harris Friel

Thanks guys - I'll add it to the list. A couple years back, I did these, and they might work.

Matt Lichtenwalner

I like these a lot.

Robert Bryan

Thanks! They're even fun to do. :)

Matt Lichtenwalner

Considering the trend of creepy AI crafted avatars, I’d much rather have an artisanal hand drawn avatar that makes me look a little younger and healthier than I am in real life, especially if it has a real artist’s signature on it.
On Slack our avatars are so tiny that they might not work for promoting the artist much, which is a problem. But I have to have a team bio picture and I often have to have a professional picture for work presentations that are open to the public. How much do you charge for social media avatar images?

Lindsay Harris Friel

Something like what I did above would be between $30 and $60 (depending on complexity etc).

If you just need some "Photoshopping" of an existing pic to *ahem* 'remove imperfections' I'd happily do that for you for free. 😁

Matt Lichtenwalner

I like the idea of these, but for me the lightning bolt split down the middle makes it hard to see the person’s face.

Lindsay Harris Friel

Yeah - I thought about that a bit too late. You can see if a bit in the pics for the ladies. In theirs, I reduced the 'haze' given off in the area of the face. In the future, I would likely do even less there.

Matt Lichtenwalner

Well Lookit That Matt Lichtenwalner 4/25 '23

Guess I'm just going to have to try number 2.

For the record - it's a rain day, so I'm back at my favorite local coffee shop (The Spokesman).

If you're curious, a quick search yields this article about Lichtenhainer beers at the Beer Advocate.

Heh. Spellcheck auto corrected the beer name to my last name.

Update:

It's delicious! Honestly, I've never had anything like it before. I suppose I should point out that I'm generally not a 'beer guy' so maybe this sort of flavor is more common than I realize, but...

It seems salty and sour. Kinda like a dill pickle brine. Obviously, I wouldn't drink a dill pickle brine down, but this is in that direction. If nothing else, it's something interesting for a change.

Also:

In the Mario Brothers series of games, my understanding is that you play the Mario Brothers and have to rescue Princess Peach. Then, Bowser immediately recaptures her and wash, rinse, and repeat.

This seemed... like it was in need of an update. So I didn't spend long on this, but I wanted to get the idea down before I lost it.

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4/25 '23 3 Comments

[small voice in the corner] I used to drink pickle juice as a kid…

Anne Mollo

Oh, I’m not saying I’ve _never_ done that…

…a lot…

Just that it wouldn’t be a go to. But this seemed like something I could drink fairly regularly. I won’t, because it’s apparently a seasonal ‘ short run, but…

Matt Lichtenwalner

We drink pickle juice as an Eagles football superstition. Green, a little rough ... go Eagles!

Also it's perfect that the beer with (almost) your name is the beer you like.

I know "Lichtenwalner" means "Light in the Woods" so Lichtenhainer is "Light in the something".

"Hainer" is a name and translates as a name as far as I can find with some quick googling/translation dictionary searching.

This is as close as I could get to a translation of the name, "Hainer Name Meaning
South German: from the ancient Germanic personal name Haginher composed of the elements hag ‘hedge enclosure’ + hari heri ‘army’."

Light in the army's hedge?

Shelle Klein Houser

What I'm Listening To (Podcasts) Matt Lichtenwalner 4/16 '23

A friend asked for some podcast recommendations, and this is what I offered up. Since I get the question fairly often, or some variation on the theme, I thought I would share it here (and on my travel blog rideoffintothesunset.com) publicly so I could reference it when folks ask.

The Creative Penn - about independent author life. Production and sale of books without traditional publishers.

The Dungeon Run - an Actual Play of 5e that I like.

The Great Detectives of Old Time Radio - just what the title says. Old radio shows from the 50s in podcast format. I can't take the host's voice for very long and tend to skip straight to the shows. Johnny Dollar are my fave.

How Not to DM - interview show about ttrpgs and how not to...

LORE - 1 part Twilight Zone + 1 part mythology. Been listening to this guy forever. Pure mood.

Make Me Smart - NPResque news show. Different style to each weekday (deep dive v fun v etc)

Life in the Ted Lane - my friend Lindsay (who you may know) and her brother Ted talk about Autism, the Muppets, and their myriad adventures.

Re: Thinking - interview show with industry leaders, scientists, etc about looking at subjects from a different/ new perspective

Science Versus - one of my faves. A scientific breakdown of different popular opinions like "Is one adult beverage / day a health benefit?"

The TED Interview - a deeper dive into the topics of TED Talks.

Think Like a Game Designer - how to do what the title says.

Travel Writing World - about writing about your travels and interviews with folks who do that.

Twenty Thousand Hertz - a podcast about sound.

Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me - the NPR news game show in podcast format.

Tech News Briefing from the Wall St Journal - news about tech from the WSJ.

There are many more that I personally subscribe to, but this list has a bit of diversity to it, and (I believe) will be enjoyable to a larger collection of people.

If you're reading this, and you're wondering about some specific genre or topic of podcast, feel free to ask me about it, or tell me if you have some recommendations! I’m always looking for new and interesting stuff to listen to.

(Also, while this list has links to each of the shows for convenience, they should be available through most any podcast catcher. I personally use PocketCasts. If you haven't chosen one yet, I can recommend it. Simple and effective.)

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4/16 '23 2 Comments

Ooooh! Forgot about Lore! Thank you for reminding me.

I so often forget about podcasts.
When I remember, I listen to either Cracked (Stained Glass podcast) or SawBones (a fantastic podcast about old medical devices/practice. It's very funny. And informative.). Love, love, love that one.

Shannie

I used to listen to Sawbones. Don't remember why I stopped.

Matt Lichtenwalner

(Yet Another) New Thing Matt Lichtenwalner 1/24 '23

One of the themes in my life of late is to try to get as many folks as I can to see the illustration stuff I'm doing. In an era of "you don't see everything from everyone you follow" social media, this is... more challenging than seems reasonable.

I understand that mailing lists are the way to go for that, but the problem with mailing lists are two fold: 1. You have to get people onto them, which many folks are loathe to do. 2. Once they're on your list, many folks ignore / delete the emails because they're 'extra'.

Which isn't to say I'm not going that route. On the contrary. I probably will. I've started to before, but never really finished (see all my previous commentary on ADHD).

Even if / when I DO manage to create a reasonable email list, that still doesn't get around issue 1. The vast majority of the internet using world won't be on it. And dragonbones.net is accessible to pretty much everyone who has access to the web.

Shut up, man. Get to the point.

Okay, okay. Sorry. Verbose Guy here.

I thought I would start doing a monthly summary post on dragonbones about the sketch work that I did the month prior.

It's a good art-news system, it gives folks a taste of what's in the Patreon page if they might be interested, and it keeps dragonbones fresh(ish).

So here's the first one: The Sketchy Stuff from December 2022.

(Dwarf at the top of the page is just something I was noodling on... yesterday? This is at about the 1/2 hour stage.)

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1/24 '23

Bigger, Better Coloring Book of My Stuff! Matt Lichtenwalner 12/19 '22

Yes, we get it. You made an ebook.

Sorry - I know you've probably seen me posting about it elsewhere. Thing is, you can have it for free, if you like, and I want as many people to have access to it as possible.

Didn't get anything for your neice for the holidays? Bingo. Grandson's into fantasy / D&D? Sold. They can print the pages out and color them as many times as they like.

I won't tell if you're there coloring alongside them. ;)

Anyway, if you haven't picked up a copy yet, it's available on my site / Gumroad here:

If you do download / gift / check it out, I would love to hear what you liked or disliked about it! (I'm planning to do more like this in the future, so all feedback helps.)

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12/19 '22

Demoing Maze of Minos Tonight in York Matt Lichtenwalner 12/8 '22

Sorry for the late notice, but if any of y'all are around York, PA (or willing to go there) tonight at about 7pm, my buddy Brad and I will be demoing Maze of Minos at Brad's FLGS - The Gamehaven Cafe and Bakery.

We're going to demo the game and I'm going to record the process so I can practice and take a copy with me on the road and do demos in the various game shops I come across while traveling.

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12/8 '22 3 Comments

Sadly unavailable tonight. All I can find out is that “Ionquest Games is a Pennsylvania Domestic Fictitious Names”. Everything else is still secret, I guess.

nerdsholmferret

OMGOMGOMG GOOD LUCK

Thomas Boutell

Eeeeeeeeeee! This is soooo exciting!!! Gonna need an update :)

Shannie

Twitter Breach Matt Lichtenwalner 11/27 '22

Since some of us have been talking about Ye Olde Birdsite, I thought I would make sure y'all saw that there's been a breach, so you might want to reset your passwords and / or add two step authentication if you hadn't already.

You may feel 'done' with the site, but just remember that things can be done in your name if someone gets ahold of your account.

(Okay, I'll stop telling you all things you already know. I just worry about my peeps.)

For reference: (the teaser text is a little misleading - this is a recent breach)

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11/27 '22 5 Comments

The breach consists of a database correlating Twitter handles, email addresses and phone numbers. This sucks, but as breaches go it could be a lot worse. It predates the recent change of ownership from "normal capitalists" to "one totally batshit lone wolf capitalist plus some banks desperately selling off their stake at 60 cents on the dollar."

Thomas Boutell

Ahhh. So no PW leakage? I should have read further.

Of course, my habit of (securely) resetting my password at the drop of a hat is one I don't mind having.

Also, my longer / more complicated passwords policy as described by my buddy Tom a while back...

Matt Lichtenwalner

Never hurts to change your password periodically.

Lindsay Harris Friel

#truth

Matt Lichtenwalner

Poor Elon. Discovering that he's not really King of The World must be so painful.

Shelle Klein Houser

Fediverse Too Difficult? Matt Lichtenwalner 11/26 '22

I've been seeing a lot of talk about how many Twitter users are trying out Mastodon (and others on the Fediverse) but that they find it too difficult to use.

While I realize that the crowd here tend to be a bit more tech savvy than the mean, I was wondering if any of you had that experience?

Rest assured, I won't judge - I'm just curious where the tricky parts are and if I could offer any help. I'm guessing that if any of you had challenges with some or all aspects of Mastodon, there's certain to be others.

So far, I'm finding it really tough to find anyone who will say "I had trouble with x, y, and z aspects." There's just a lot of hand waving and 'generally too complex'.

That's hard to help with.

(Image selected because it's the closest to Mastodon of the things I've done.)

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11/26 '22 10 Comments

I like it. I don’t find it terribly difficult. That being said, let’s let my inner newbie talk a minute.

First you choose an instance on which to make your account. Some say it doesn’t matter. Others say you should choose one that represents your interests, because of the local timeline. Someone points out the federated timeline includes content from many instances. But oh, the first friend says, only content that someone on your instance is following, so you’ll never get everything. A third friend says “this is all beside the point if you use the official iOS app, it doesn’t even support the local and federated timelines, because they are ridiculous firehoses of information.”

You’re nervous now. This isn’t as simple as signing up for twitter.

Then friend one says, “oh of course you shouldn’t pick an instance with bad moderation policies.” You nod. That sounds bad for sure. “Or an instance where people don’t use content warnings for everything. Or an instance that allows cops to join.” Wait. What? You know why people have issues with the police and you share those concerns, but your cousin is a cop and you can’t quite picture banning her from the local Twitter-equivalent outright. Maybe they don’t mean banning private accounts for cops? How would they even know? This sounds complicated and you need to examine your feelings.

“The guy who made the official app is a jerk for taking away those timelines.” “Nah, they were impractical.” “The local timeline is great on a small instance about your interests.” “Just search for hashtags. That always works.” “Yes, but (vague gesture) it only knows about stuff other instance users are following, because something something something federation.”

Finally friend four says “geez guys, you’re scaring friend zero.” He turns to you and says, “Go to joinmastodon.org and there’s a little quiz to help you pick an instance. Them just use it like it’s twitter. You’ll have a pretty good time.” You nod and swallow and give it a go. A month later you’re contributing to a Patreon for the upkeep of your chosen instance, and you’re vaguely aware you should consider volunteering as a moderator. A friend asks about Mastodon. You try to be friend four, but you have thoughts you’re bursting to share.

Finally you say: “look, I know it sounds like a lot, but Twitter has all these problems too. They just hid them under a pile of money until the money ran out and a crazy billionaire took over and made it a hellscape. Mastodon is run by the people for the people. That’s good, right? Just give it a go. You can change instances later if you want to.”

Your friend takes the plunge, or doesn’t. You go back to looking at cat pictures. Mastodon has an excellent Caturday participation rate.

Thomas Boutell

>>> "Finally you say: “look, I know it sounds like a lot, but Twitter has all these problems too. They just hid them under a pile of money until the money ran out and a crazy billionaire took over and made it a hellscape. Mastodon is run by the people for the people. That’s good, right? Just give it a go. You can change instances later if you want to.”"

Sounds like you and I are thinking the same way about it.

I think I have a kind of flexibility that most folks don't. A decade of bouncing from 'home' to 'home' in anywhere from a single day to a month at a shot has left me with a "nothing is permanent, so stay agile" mindset.

That's just not reasonable for most everyone, and I think it's skewing my view of this.

I also think it (Mastodon / Fediverse) requires continued effort from people in a way that any service with an algorithm feeding you content doesn't. You have to find all of your people. They won't be presented to you.

That might sound condescending, but I sincerely don't mean it that way. Social media already asks a lot of us. Working to find out tribe is a not insubstantial addition to that.

Still, I kinda want to do a stripped down slide deck / video explainer with Friend Four's perspective. Something simple to help folks who are struggling, but curious.

Matt Lichtenwalner

I've not looked at any alternatives yet; I'm happy to see this clown show through to its inevitably hilarious end, and I'm really not using Twitter for anything meaningful, so there's nothing to replace. But I'm watching this post for its wealth of insight and info. Mostly I just wanted to chime in to say I want that beastie in every game I'm ever in from now on. What's its taxonomy?

Rob

Yeah, I'm still on Twitter too. I haven't seen any issues directly and personally. Politics, sure. And Musk's willingness to give a the Cheetoh his account back (regardless of the fact that apparently he didn't want it?) is a pretty big red flag, but...

I just saw enough chatter about Mastodon that I thought it warranted a look, and I'm really glad I did.

As to the beastie: it's just my version of a 'hollyphant' ( https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Hollyphant ). That entry actually mentions one based on a Mastodon, but I hadn't seen that before. So when I saw 'winged elephant', I thought "I can do better!"

This was long before I knew that Mastodon existed. 😅

Matt Lichtenwalner

Why didn't Saruman just take the flying mastodon to Caradhras and finish off the fellowship in person?

nerdsholmferret

Right?! Would have made those movies so. much. faster.

Matt Lichtenwalner

I very, very much enjoyed my self-curated Twitter echo chamber of news, information, Canadian #lawtwitter, and oddball stuff that would be peculiarly to my sole interests. By the end, I was able to use it essentially like Google reader from back in the day to find content and keep track of people I wanted to stay in touch with. Twitter was also a huge timesink of workday distraction for me.

Mastodon looks like it would not measure up to my Twitter experience (in particular, the multiple server concept doesn't sound like the one-stop shopping experience I had with Twitter), while at the same time it would also be hitting me up for money and even more time, whether going to different servers to find content/people, or as a volunteer to improve the experience. Not for me, I'm afraid.

Michele Grant

>>>"I very, very much enjoyed my self-curated Twitter echo chamber of..."

Me too. I've encountered a LOT of venom from folks when I mentioned that Twitter was my social media of choice. "Isn't that just a cess pool of crappy politics and bullying?!"

But I wasn't seeing that. Like yourself, I just spent some time and effort being careful with what and how often I interacted, and I was finding it quite fruitful. Still am, if I'm honest.

As I see it, Twitter has one thing that is both better and worse than Mastodon: the algorithm fountain of content.

It's better because once we've done the work of cultivating the who and what of our interactions to a point where it 'understands' us, we don't have to keep working at finding new and interesting stuff. The algorithm takes over and we can (for the most part) kick our feet up and just enjoy.

The down side is that doing so hands over control of what we see. It's always frustrated me that even after I say "I want to see posts that opadit makes." I might very well NOT see a certain post.

I know some sites are better about this than others. I can do notifications. (I loathe notifications.) And it might be no better on Mastodon once I have a large enough collection of folks I'm following. But for now, I kinda love that everything friends post, I will see.

It's also possible that the rough edges on the Fediverse are actually a big part of why I like it this far. There's something Web 1.0 - feeling about it. I get that sense of stumbling on something cool that I found by looking.

Arguably, that's a rabbit hole that I shouldn't go down if I want to stay productive, but I can't deny that it's pleasurable.

*shrug*

I'm sincerely not trying to sway people into something that they don't want to do, and I REALLY appreciate that you gave me specific elements that aren't for you. It helps me understand what (at least some) folks are not loving about it.

Matt Lichtenwalner

I didn't have any issues, but I created an account a couple years ago and saw it as exploratory and an addition to my other accounts rather than "the ship is sinking the ship is sinking how do life boats work?"

Chris Herdt

Yeah. I'm (mostly) feeling that way myself - but now. I mean, I have a definite sense that the ship is sinking and I even feel that loss pretty intensely since it's my social media platform of choice. Enough so that I made a meme. But (and I'm guessing here) maybe I just appreciate that these are systems that we're not paying for - at least in the traditional sense - and we just accept that they MUST be part of our lives.

I kinda like the exploring. Finding cool new stuff is what the net is all about to me. Guess I'm showing my age there.

Matt Lichtenwalner

To NaNo or Not - That is the Question Matt Lichtenwalner 10/31 '22

Thinking about doing NaNoWriMo this year, but I'm behind on the very tail end of Inktober and want to finish that first.

And really, this year, Thanksgiving is going to be the 'big' holiday since Trina, Ben, and the boys will be in town then and not for Christmas.

But with all of that said, I know I can 'win', and I kinda want that.

I first attempted NaNo in 2008, and it was a rough attempt. I mean, I started at least a week late (though memory says more) and with tremendous support from Jill "xtingu" Knapp I still almost crossed the finish line.

So it's kinda stuck in my craw ever since.

I've only made half hearted attempts in subsequent years.

I think that, as I'm writing this, I'm 'talking myself into it'.

Well, I guess I better get my Inktober images finished. I've got a lot to get done in the next 24 hours.

It will almost be something fantasy or urban fantasy based, but what do you think I should write about?

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10/31 '22 3 Comments

I'm predisposed to terseness, so 50,000 words in a month seems extremely difficult, but I had fun with my "planet" series which postulates a society and extrapolates from a few of its features. If you have a novel's worth of story in you, putting it in an invented setting like that can be a bonus.

nerdsholmferret

I dig it.

I think I want to go a little more 'traditionally novelesque', but don't have anything in mind. I'm considering doing it almost like a form of roleplaying, but if I'm going to do that, I need to come up with a strategy that will keep me from outlining - at least in depth outlining.

Hmmm...

Matt Lichtenwalner

I loved that series. By contrast, I met the nanowrimo victory conditions once, but it was unreadable garbage. Finish things that resonate for you.

Thomas Boutell