Back in 2005 (!) I started a forum called TheBackAlleys. From then until 2012-ish, I put a link to it on all my Flash cartoons, and the result of that spawned a demented sub-community of Newgrounders. Over those years we put together some collabs, chatted a lot amongst ourselves, spawned a lot of needless drama, and had a lot of fun.

Things settled down a bit after I went on my long Newgrounds hiatus, then Discord appeared, and everyone pretty much migrated there - but I kept the site up because I like to preserve all the history. In early 2020, my webhost complained about my forum hogging up too much memory or something, and by that point it was so out of date and broken that I simply decided to put it in maintenance mode, locking away all the threads and posts.

And it stayed that way until a few days ago when I randomly decided to take on the task of updating the forum software. Somehow, I was able to do it without the entire thing going up in flames. Sadly, it was so old that it forced me to ditch the theme I created for the site, so now it looks very "default" for lack of a better word. But all the memories, history and insanity is back for everyone to see - for better or worse. And, of course, you can post there!

I plan on (slowly) restoring it to its former glory, adding Ruffle/SWF support/BBcode, changing the layout, etc. I've always likened TheBackAlleys as a place for artists, animators, creators, and fans of them to hang out, share resources, etc. The site has worn many hats over the years, and I have no intention of abandoning it.

All that being said, whether you are new or old, you are more than welcome to join us once again at the humble, fucked up home we call TBA.

https://www.thebackalleys.com/forum

There's already so many things that have been said about AI, especially AI art. I've been mostly sitting on the sidelines watching this equally fascinating and terrifying technology evolve faster than we can keep up with. I've also been thinking about it a lot and what it means for you, me, and all of us as creators.

To start, I think it's safe to say that Pandora's Box has already been opened. I've seen some advocate for the regulation or even destruction of AI art software and tools. But it's too late. There's so many AI art tools - both open source and not - that are rapidly evolving and in the hands of millions of people.

Because of this, we must learn to live with the technology. AI art isn't going anywhere, for better or worse. So the best we can do is figure out how we can protect ourselves from it, like making sure the places where we share and enjoy eachother's art isn't polluted by a never ending flood of AI generated art. Because let's face it, we can't keep up. AI doesn't get tired, it doesn't need to take breaks, and its only limitations are dictated by the power we give it.

All emerging technologies have been used for good and evil, and this time is no different. I do genuinely believe that AI can be used as a force for good for artists. I believe that all artists should strive to understand the technology, if only so that you can take control of your own AI art model and essentially take ownership of something that should belong to you before someone else does.

That being said, I think the future of AAA game studio and entertainment industry art could be very grim. The pessimist in me sees artists - who are already treated poorly by most corporations - being relegated to doing nothing but touching up and correcting piles and piles of AI generated art. I don't know how long this would last or how bad it would get, but I don't think we're far off from this becoming a reality.

Nothing will be the same again, but we don't know how much things will change yet. Some artists fear their livelihoods will be at stake and they will lose their jobs to AI. But I think there will always be a desire for human-made art, the same as there is desire for anything hand-crafted or made independently. And if anyone was to have you replaced by an AI, you don't want to work for them anyway, because they clearly never respected you to begin with.

AI can only become more powerful. And the more powerful it becomes, the less accessible it will be to the average person. I believe that someday AI will be such a technological force that it will be prohibitively expensive or simply inaccessible to the public at large, so much so that we will go full circle and it will simply be cheaper and more practical to hire human beings for the jobs AI was doing. Perhaps I'm wrong, and AI is just a passing fad. But when I look at how rapidly AI is evolving, it really does feel like the next epoch in human technological advancement. Computers, the internet, the smartphone, and now AI. I think that's where we are.

Again I will say that I am fascinated and terrified of this emerging technology. I can't help but feel we're getting so very close to playing god and tapping in to something we maybe shouldn't have. But in the meantime, we can do nothing but go along for the ride. So stay informed, don't give up, and keep adapting. The world is moving fast, too fast - so all we can do is try keep up.

yes, with the pixelization and everything. the original had been deleted for 'sexualization of an underage character' so i re-submitted it to be safe for their Christian Website. unfortunately, since she isn't inflated, being tickled, doesn't have dirty feet in front of the camera, isn't being vored, and isn't wearing a diaper, they had had enough of me.

i was later informed that if i had removed her scarf and skull hairpiece, that would've been ok. nothing wrong with her body, just the clothes she was wearing, because she wore those when she was 14.

anyway, i just wanted to share that with you all so you can point and laugh at how stupid deviantart is. more like deviantfart, am i right?

honestly, it feels like a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. i've been on that god forsaken site since 2004 and now i never have to go back there, because i can't! good riddance i guess.

and now, memes.

I made a quick movie to celebrate Piconjo Day and his glorious p3n0r. Click it and vote 5 or you're a filthy toadie.

On Saturday I participated in the Art Office Hours event where I talked about animating in CSP for an hour and a half, showing my process, example files and making an animation on stream while answering Q&A. If this is something that interests you, below is a timestamped VOD. As someone who animated in Flash/Animate for a very long time and recently migrated to CSP, I talk about some strengths, weaknesses and differences as well. Enjoy!

Example CLIP file

Have any more animation questions for me? Feel free to ask below.

Every year I normally sell art at anime conventions all around the country. That didn't happen this year for obvious reasons. So this week i'm offering free shipping on all orders above $15 as well as other x-for-x discounts. You can take advantage of them until Friday. Thanks for any support!

http://rtil.storenvy.com

One of my favorite things about putting together Flash movies was the interactive menus. Sure, preloading was a chore, but the reward - in my opinion - was being greeted with a fun and unique menu. Usually they were on collabs with lots of parts, special credits or even minigames, bonus featurettes or easter eggs to amuse yourself with.

A lot of the old flash cartoons I have uploaded here obviously have had their menus and other things cut when they were converted to video, including the features that came with them. Something that made them special that had to go with the inevitable death of flash player for the web.

I've noticed that a lot of that interactivity in general is removed from video players, like the death of annotations and community subtitles on Youtube. One i'll always remember in particular was CAD: The Annotated Series, in which anyone on Youtube could contribute annotations overlayed on top of the CAD animated series, which was the only way to really tolerate watching such trash. Fortunately, it was preserved here before Youtube killed off annotations for good.

Anyway, maybe someday they will come back as menus continue to live on even in the slow death of physical media where they were ever present on DVD's and Blurays, as you sometimes still get cool menus on streaming VODs. They have a charm to them that I will definitely miss. Maybe they will live on in some fashion through Ruffle? I haven't seen it in action yet, but here's hoping.

Come join the artist alley stream at the NG Podcast Discord, where I will be drawing some generic anime girl with cyberpunk stuff on her head.

I was interviewed recently by @The-Great-One. Although my last post was an interview of sorts wherein i interviewed myself, these are questions someone else asked me. So, if you'd like to read it, you can check it out here. If you were hoping for a different kind of exposure, i'm still mulling starting an OnlyFans to post pics of my bare ankles and shoulders. TRY NOT TO CUM IN 15 SECONDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!