Random, But A Really Handy Way To Make Things Seem Creepy Or Wrong In Horror Is To Make Them Incongruously

Random, but a really handy way to make things seem creepy or wrong in horror is to make them incongruously neat or clean:

In the middle of a horrific battlefield, you find one corpse laid aside neatly, straightened and arranged, its arms crossed neatly across its chest

As you walk through the garden, you gradually realise that the oddness you’ve been noticing about the trees is that they are all perfectly symmetrical

As you move through the abandoned house, you realise that suddenly that there’s no dust in this room, no dirt or cobwebs

You hear hideous noises coming from behind a locked door, screams and pleas, and visceral sounds of violence. When you manage to break down the door, there is no one there, and the room is perfectly spotless

In the middle of a horrific battlefield, a hollow full of churned mud and blood, you find five corpses cleanly dismembered, each set of limbs or parts neatly laid out in their own little row

You witness a murder, a brutal, grisly killing that carpets the area in blood. When you return in a blind panic with the authorities, the scene is completely clean, and no amount of examination can find even a drop of blood

You run through the night and the woods with a comrade, pulling each other through leaves and twigs and mud as you scramble desperately towards freedom. When you finally emerge from the forest, in the grey light of dawn, you turn to your companion in relief, and notice that their clothes are somehow perfectly clean

You hand a glass of water to your suspect, talking casually the whole while, and watch with satisfaction as they take it in their bare hand and take a drink. There’ll be a decent set of prints to run from that later. Except there isn’t. There are no prints at all. As if nothing ever touched the glass

You browse idly through your host’s catalogue, and stop, and pay much more attention, when you realise that several items on a dry list of acquisitions are ones you’ve seen before, and it slowly dawns on you that each neat little object and number in this neat little book are things that belong (belonged?) to people you know

Neatness, particularly incongruous neatness, neatness where you expect violence or imperfection or abandonment, or neatness that you belatedly realise was hiding violence, or neatness that is imposed over violence, is incredibly scary. Because neatness is not a natural thing. Neatness requires some active force to have come through and made it so. Neatness implies that the world around you is being arranged, maybe to hide things, to disguise things, to make you doubt your senses, or else simply according to something else’s desires. Neatness is active and artificial. Neatness puts things, maybe even people, into neat little boxes according to something else’s ideals, and that’s terrifying as well. Being objectified. Being asked to fit categories that you’re not sure you can fit, and wondering what will happen to the bits of you that don’t.

Neatness, essentially, says that something else is here. Neatness where there should be chaos says that either something came and changed things, or that what you’re seeing now or what you saw then is not real. Neatness alongside violence says that something came through here for whom violence did not mean the same thing as it does to you.

Neatness, in the right context, in the right place, can be very, very scary

And fun

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bowtieroosten

4 months ago

in one of the servers I'm in, we've been discussing looking back at your old art, and a couple people mentioned that getting compliments on their old art makes them feel like their artistic growth isn't as evident to other people as it is to them, or like they havent improved as much as they thought for people to still be complimenting their old work

but it's really not like that! Your personal perception of your art is inherently going to be very different to the audience. This is how i explained it in there & i thought i'd share it here as well:

A compliment on your old art doesn't undermine the growth in your new art, it's just admiring the qualities of your work that were already there!

Our art can change direction, our grasp of the fundamentals can get stronger, and this means our personal standards will always go up and the choices we would make creating a piece change, so when you as the creator look back on your old art, you're hit with a lot of "oof, I'd do x and y and z differently now".

But your audience doesn't have any of those hangups, to them youve drawn some good art, and when they look at your current art, you're making even stronger art, and both of them are worth admiring.

not that any of this makes it any less psychic damage inducing to look at your own old art LOL but putting yourself in the shoes of the audience and looking at it for what it is rather than how well it reaches your current standards can still help a little with that

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bowtieroosten

2 months ago

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sobbing? AMEN BROTHER FUCKING AMEN

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bowtieroosten

2 months ago

Everyone here on Tumblr you know that the war in Gaza is over but for me the war is not over because when you see yourself living in a tent that does not protect you from the rain and cold or you see yourself unable to provide food for yourself and your family and you see your memories become a dream and you cannot do anything and you are confused this is the real war your donation makes a difference in my life

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important

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bowtieroosten

2 years ago

An illustration of a zebra isopod. It is a black pillbug with white striping along the body.

Invertober Day 29 — Zebra Isopod (Armadillidium maculatum) 🦓✨

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precious creature cant figure out it out right now but just pretend that theres a pleading emoji right here

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bowtieroosten

2 years ago

BOW TIE ?!?!

CORRECT SIR

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bowtieroosten

2 years ago

For Trans Day Of Visibility, I’ve Released Almost All The Queer And Trans Photos I’ve Colorized/restored

For Trans Day of Visibility, I’ve released almost all the queer and trans photos I’ve colorized/restored in one place! Check out some incredible moments from our community’s history going back to the 1890s at elierlick.com/color.

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so epic

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bowtieroosten

2 months ago

Texas’ HB 3399 bill will kill people if it passes. It will make hormone therapy illegal. For all ages. Period. This was never about women’s sports. It was never about bathrooms. It was never about “protecting the children”. They want us dead. If you’re a fellow trans person and you live in Texas, I strongly urge you to be ready to move somewhere safer.

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important

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bowtieroosten

4 months ago

Dog from The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

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THATS MY BOY BLUE !!!!

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bowtieroosten

1 month ago

which one of u was going to tell me that tea tastes different if u put it in hot water?

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bowtieroosten

2 months ago

Update (70)

The Israeli occupation's decision to close the Gaza Strip crossings quickly affected the lives of 2.4 million Palestinians, who have not yet recovered from a devastating war that has ravaged them for 15 months.

This crime, which represents a disregard for the international community and international humanitarian law, and a blatant violation of the international charter of human rights, which stipulates that water, food, medicine and shelter are basic rights that cannot be violated, in addition to its use as a means of cheap blackmail to achieve political goals at the expense of the suffering of hundreds of thousands of people.

This crisis poses a risk to the elderly and children in my family who suffer from malnutrition, as we cannot afford to buy basic food after the skyrocketing prices in the markets.

The goal is to reach €4000 to be able to buy only the basic food needs that enable us to survive.