Ramblings on Fandom,
How the way I enjoy it has changed over the years, and all that other crap you don't care about.
To be honest I don't remember exactly when my parents got us our first online capable computer. I think I was around 13, or 14 at the time, but I admittedly have a crappy memory so I can't be sure. I do remember I did what any other kid around my age would do, I lied about my age to get into places I shouldn't have.
I spent most of my time lurking, reading fanfiction, looking at fanart. My first online fandoms I do remember clearly; Sailor Moon, Fushigi Yuugi, and Final Fantasy VII. I have no shame in admitting I was a huge slash fan from the very beginning. Something at the time I recall only sharing with a few close friends. Kunzite/Zoicite is still my favorite Sailor Moon paring. Even find out Zoicite was unlike in the dub actually a man (which i really should have noticed in retrospect.) didn't change my opinion of the paring at all, and I think is what started me on the road to being a slash fan.
Over time I moved on to other things, new games came out, I watched more anime, and read Harry Potter of course. I never really left any old fandoms behind however, I also discovered fandoms for things I'd loved as a child, and found I still enjoyed them just as much. Eventually I started writing ridiculous, but fun mostly crack fanfiction with friends, and started dabbling in fanart. I wasn't really very good at either, falling into the traps I think a lot of girls at that age do. I would fortunately not post any of this on the internet, I wouldn't have the courage to post anything for a few more years. I think the first fanfiction I posted anywhere was a Harry Potter ficlet somewhere on LJ. Once again bad memory plagues me. Anyway this began my first, rather short, and very mediocre fanfiction writing attempt.
My first fanfictions were mostly for Harry Potter, and all of them were slash, or hinted slash. My favorite characters were Black, Lupin, and Snape. The three of them together being my first OT3, I also enjoyed Black/Lupin, and Snape/Black, but I never really liked Snape/Lupin. This oddity in my shipping tendencies is something that has stuck with me for nearly all the fandoms where I have OT3s. I also noticed other things about how reading fanfiction affected my view of things. I wasn't very invested in Harry, Ron, and Hermione as far as fanfiction was concerned at the time, but I couldn't help but notice that in most of the fics I read that even hinted at Harry/Hermione, Ron was either a complete idiot, or jerk on a level he never was in the books, or he was just left out entirely. Honestly being fond of Ron, and the Ron/Hermione paring from book one it gave me a rather nagative impresion of the Harry/Hermione ship long before I ever ever heard of Fandom Wank, or Harmonians.
Anyway, back to my writing. I had fun at first, my writing wasn't terrible I suppose, and people enjoyed it and left reviews. This is where the problems started. I fell into that trap of trying to write what I thought would get me more reviews. It didn't take me that long to get burned out on anything more than a short ficlet. Eventualy, (in 2006 apparently, according to my FF.net account) I stopped writing all together and began focusing more on original art, and fanart leaving all my WIP from that time unfinished, recently I officially abandoned them.
Overtime, while I was mostly lurking again my fandom habits began to change with out me quite noticing. I found that character issues which had bothered me before, even to the point of making me wonder if I really liked that character anymore, now made the characters who had them more interesting and appealing. At some point my shipping preferences also shifted. I still like slash, and still enjoy fics, and art of my favorite slash pairs. I am however mostly focused on het parings now, where I would have ignored them before, and prefer OT3s involving female characters. I think it started way back before my writing hiatus with finding girl characters that I completely adored, like Namine from Kingdom Hearts, and Scheris Adjani from Scryed. I also looked back at other female characters from other fandoms I'd been in and found I actually like quite a few of them very, very much, a lot of them a lot more than I originally thought i did.
While I had quit writing, and at the time didn't think I'd ever write again; I never stopped thinking. I was always coming up with silly ideas, both fandom and original. One of these ideas was an original character I'd thought up around 2008. She was captain of a space ship, and inspired by a character I'd seen in an anime years ago. I just couldn't remember which one, it started to really bother me so I started looking not thinking I would find what I was looking for. Turns out I did rather quickly. The character my OC was inspired by was strangely enough Alex Row, my forgotten favorite character from Last Exile. I decided I needed to watch it again, and after finding a place to watch anime online I did, and fell in love with the series all over again. It didn't come without it's pains of course, I was reminded of one of my favorite het ships from a time I didn't have all that many, and how it broke my heart when that ship didn't happen. I of course I went looking for fic, and art, and didn't find much. I was inspired though, for the first time in years I realized that if it wasn't out there I could put it out there! Screw the haters, screw review numbers, I had an idea I wanted to share, a story I wanted to write and I was going to do it! XD, But first I wanted something better to go on than fandubs I had to wait to download all the way, on a site that could get a C&D at any time, so I started looking for DVDs. At first it turned out Last Exile DVDs were hard to come by, or way to expensive for me. As luck would have it however just as I was losing hope Funimation released a new Last Exile box set! Yay for me! So after getting myself a very nice little B-day present, I was able to re-watch the series and after a lot of fretting and procrastinating I finally started working on my fics.
Even though I'm still a slow, not the best writer, and I don't get many reviews I'm having more fun with fic than I've ever had. I feel a lot more confident about my writing, even if i think it would be a really weird or bad fic idea to other people if I like it enough I'll write it and post it. I have so many ideas I want to write for LE, and I'm getting ideas for other fandoms too. Mostly I want to finish my current fic series, but the last fic I have in mind for it is still fighting me beyond the first chapter. I am working on a LE fic very loosely inspired by The Little mermaid, that is it's hardly looking like The Little Mermaid anymore. I'm really enjoying this one, even though I'm on the third version of what is now three completely different first chapters. I'm getting ideas for more Wild Birds stories. I'm making lots of notes on a Kingdom Hearts fic I want to start working on soon, and I'm still getting several ideas for an Alex/Sophia/Vincent OT3 fic I want to write, one of the ones I like the most is, of course, an AU that has Sophia, as empress finding out she can have concubines instead of getting married.
looking back it's been a long strange, and sometimes embarrassing road, but I don't regret it. I look forward to more fandoms along with the ideas they bring in the future. I don't plan to quit any time soon. You can never be to old for fandom, I hope to be a Fandom Granny someday, and I hope you guys will be there to put up with me! XD
To be honest I don't remember exactly when my parents got us our first online capable computer. I think I was around 13, or 14 at the time, but I admittedly have a crappy memory so I can't be sure. I do remember I did what any other kid around my age would do, I lied about my age to get into places I shouldn't have.
I spent most of my time lurking, reading fanfiction, looking at fanart. My first online fandoms I do remember clearly; Sailor Moon, Fushigi Yuugi, and Final Fantasy VII. I have no shame in admitting I was a huge slash fan from the very beginning. Something at the time I recall only sharing with a few close friends. Kunzite/Zoicite is still my favorite Sailor Moon paring. Even find out Zoicite was unlike in the dub actually a man (which i really should have noticed in retrospect.) didn't change my opinion of the paring at all, and I think is what started me on the road to being a slash fan.
Over time I moved on to other things, new games came out, I watched more anime, and read Harry Potter of course. I never really left any old fandoms behind however, I also discovered fandoms for things I'd loved as a child, and found I still enjoyed them just as much. Eventually I started writing ridiculous, but fun mostly crack fanfiction with friends, and started dabbling in fanart. I wasn't really very good at either, falling into the traps I think a lot of girls at that age do. I would fortunately not post any of this on the internet, I wouldn't have the courage to post anything for a few more years. I think the first fanfiction I posted anywhere was a Harry Potter ficlet somewhere on LJ. Once again bad memory plagues me. Anyway this began my first, rather short, and very mediocre fanfiction writing attempt.
My first fanfictions were mostly for Harry Potter, and all of them were slash, or hinted slash. My favorite characters were Black, Lupin, and Snape. The three of them together being my first OT3, I also enjoyed Black/Lupin, and Snape/Black, but I never really liked Snape/Lupin. This oddity in my shipping tendencies is something that has stuck with me for nearly all the fandoms where I have OT3s. I also noticed other things about how reading fanfiction affected my view of things. I wasn't very invested in Harry, Ron, and Hermione as far as fanfiction was concerned at the time, but I couldn't help but notice that in most of the fics I read that even hinted at Harry/Hermione, Ron was either a complete idiot, or jerk on a level he never was in the books, or he was just left out entirely. Honestly being fond of Ron, and the Ron/Hermione paring from book one it gave me a rather nagative impresion of the Harry/Hermione ship long before I ever ever heard of Fandom Wank, or Harmonians.
Anyway, back to my writing. I had fun at first, my writing wasn't terrible I suppose, and people enjoyed it and left reviews. This is where the problems started. I fell into that trap of trying to write what I thought would get me more reviews. It didn't take me that long to get burned out on anything more than a short ficlet. Eventualy, (in 2006 apparently, according to my FF.net account) I stopped writing all together and began focusing more on original art, and fanart leaving all my WIP from that time unfinished, recently I officially abandoned them.
Overtime, while I was mostly lurking again my fandom habits began to change with out me quite noticing. I found that character issues which had bothered me before, even to the point of making me wonder if I really liked that character anymore, now made the characters who had them more interesting and appealing. At some point my shipping preferences also shifted. I still like slash, and still enjoy fics, and art of my favorite slash pairs. I am however mostly focused on het parings now, where I would have ignored them before, and prefer OT3s involving female characters. I think it started way back before my writing hiatus with finding girl characters that I completely adored, like Namine from Kingdom Hearts, and Scheris Adjani from Scryed. I also looked back at other female characters from other fandoms I'd been in and found I actually like quite a few of them very, very much, a lot of them a lot more than I originally thought i did.
While I had quit writing, and at the time didn't think I'd ever write again; I never stopped thinking. I was always coming up with silly ideas, both fandom and original. One of these ideas was an original character I'd thought up around 2008. She was captain of a space ship, and inspired by a character I'd seen in an anime years ago. I just couldn't remember which one, it started to really bother me so I started looking not thinking I would find what I was looking for. Turns out I did rather quickly. The character my OC was inspired by was strangely enough Alex Row, my forgotten favorite character from Last Exile. I decided I needed to watch it again, and after finding a place to watch anime online I did, and fell in love with the series all over again. It didn't come without it's pains of course, I was reminded of one of my favorite het ships from a time I didn't have all that many, and how it broke my heart when that ship didn't happen. I of course I went looking for fic, and art, and didn't find much. I was inspired though, for the first time in years I realized that if it wasn't out there I could put it out there! Screw the haters, screw review numbers, I had an idea I wanted to share, a story I wanted to write and I was going to do it! XD, But first I wanted something better to go on than fandubs I had to wait to download all the way, on a site that could get a C&D at any time, so I started looking for DVDs. At first it turned out Last Exile DVDs were hard to come by, or way to expensive for me. As luck would have it however just as I was losing hope Funimation released a new Last Exile box set! Yay for me! So after getting myself a very nice little B-day present, I was able to re-watch the series and after a lot of fretting and procrastinating I finally started working on my fics.
Even though I'm still a slow, not the best writer, and I don't get many reviews I'm having more fun with fic than I've ever had. I feel a lot more confident about my writing, even if i think it would be a really weird or bad fic idea to other people if I like it enough I'll write it and post it. I have so many ideas I want to write for LE, and I'm getting ideas for other fandoms too. Mostly I want to finish my current fic series, but the last fic I have in mind for it is still fighting me beyond the first chapter. I am working on a LE fic very loosely inspired by The Little mermaid, that is it's hardly looking like The Little Mermaid anymore. I'm really enjoying this one, even though I'm on the third version of what is now three completely different first chapters. I'm getting ideas for more Wild Birds stories. I'm making lots of notes on a Kingdom Hearts fic I want to start working on soon, and I'm still getting several ideas for an Alex/Sophia/Vincent OT3 fic I want to write, one of the ones I like the most is, of course, an AU that has Sophia, as empress finding out she can have concubines instead of getting married.
looking back it's been a long strange, and sometimes embarrassing road, but I don't regret it. I look forward to more fandoms along with the ideas they bring in the future. I don't plan to quit any time soon. You can never be to old for fandom, I hope to be a Fandom Granny someday, and I hope you guys will be there to put up with me! XD