Here are some tips and tricks I've come across, figured out or otherwise learned in the all the times I've been doing icons, the occasional larger graphics and photography. I've taken notes for at least two more posts: One with general stuff about editing an image in general and what tools I know about and another with different techniques I use to brighten an image. They need some more editing and probably some sample images...

A note about the images used in this post as examples:
All photographs were taken by me and are unedited outside of resizing (and adding some lines). All icons were made by me and while I adore some, I'm not as happy with others. Some are probably over a decade old. I'm unashamed to use them as examples.

( click here for the tricks and tips )

I might or might not read this again tomorrow or in a couple of days and edit some wording. I've been procrastinating on this one since mid-January and just need to get it out.

I hope this was helpful to someone :)

Here are some screencaps for the episodes that aired of season 5 of 9-1-1 Lone Star so far. They're all unsorted and I only gave them a quick look through to remove end credits. They are getting posted as part of my advent calendar this year :)

Unfortunately, I had to remove the season 3 caps I had uploaded to have enough space. They can be reuploaded if needed.

Please give me credit in some form when you use them :)

Edit 08 December: Fixed link for 5x09 Fall From Grace.

( Click for download links and other information )
( Click here for the Previews )

Due to limited space, these might be taken down for newer screencaps. If the links no longer work, I will reupload them upon request.

Day three for my little advent calendar posting this month. This one is a bit of a "ran out of time" post as I didn't get the fic I'd intend to post edited and had a bit of a social event (playing board games with coworkers) after work. I had planned to post these months ago, but never did because I intended to make some more first... oh well, now they're posted and maybe I'll get around to actually posting a set like these next spring ;)

I've posted a tracker for my advent calender here at my personal journal. It'll (hopefully) contain a mix of stories, icons, textures, wallpapers and music lists. Not sure if I'm going to think of another format as the month progresses.

Artist: immortalje // love_sacrificed
Rules:
1. Don't hotlink;
2. Please comment when you take one of them or simply to say you like them or not;
3. Credit? Yes, please do. It's not mandatory BUT very much appreciated;
4. Textless icons are NOT bases.
Credit: Credits for the resources I use to make icons can be found here.

Preview:


( 25 Stock icons icons )

Apparently I'm making icons again. Truthfully, I've got a bunch of stock icons waiting to happen and one I made for lgbtrainbow, but I'm kind of switching between just posting those and wanting to collect them for a bit longer. In the mean time, I opted to go for two claims over at dailyicons to kind of force myself to actually make icons instead of just intending to and skipping out on it. In part because I really love the icons others have been making for lgbtrainbow and it really makes me want to get out of my cookie cutter method for making icons. I'm hoping to achieve that with my two claims here. Icons will be updated as I make them (as will the icon count at the top depending on how many alternates I'll end up with.

NOTE: One icon contains spoilers for the season opener of 9-1-1 Lone Star.
NOTE 2: In the general section I also added the icon I made for lgbtrainbow.

Start Date: 19 October 2024
End Date: 28 December 2024

Artist: immortalje // love_sacrificed
Rules:
1. Don't hotlink;
2. Please comment when you take one of them or simply to say you like them or not;
3. Credit? Yes, please do. It's not mandatory BUT very much appreciated;
4. Textless icons are NOT bases.
Credit: Credits for the resources I use to make icons can be found here.

Preview:


( 25+11 9-1-1 icons )

( 25+9 General fandom icons + 1 for <user name= )

Title: The Boyfriend
Author: JE / immortalje
Pairing: Carlos Reyes/TK Strand
Summary: Spending the night at her son's place, leads to some unexpected revelations for Andrea when TK sneaks in after returning from fighting the wild fires.
Rating: FRT
Words: 2,809
Beta: None
Other Locations: Ao3 ~ Squidge World
AN: I'm kind of obsessed with alternate takes on TK meeting Carlos' parents - both set before and after being introduced as a coworker/friend at the farmer's market. This is one version I've come up with :)

( Click here for the story... )

Here are some screencaps for season 7 of 9-1-1. They're all unsorted and I only gave them a quick look through to remove end credits and removed a few screencaps that looked really wonky to do an ad bar squishing them. I hope I didn't miss any others while quickly scrolling through.

Please give me credit in some form when you use them :)

( Click for download links and other information )
( Click here for the Previews )

Due to limited space, these might be taken down for newer screencaps. If the links no longer work, I will reupload them upon request.

Title: Hold My Hand
Author: JE / immortalje
Pairing: Carlos Reyes/TK Strand
Summary: Carlos enjoys holding TK's hand as they're lying on the hood of his car.
Rating: FRT
Words: 802
Beta: None
Challenge: This was written for the prompt "Holding Hands" on the table "Touch" (my table) at 10prompts
Other Locations: Ao3
AN: This is a little introspection at the end of "1x10 Austin, We Have a Problem"

( Click here for the story... )

As requested by impala_chick in my Ask a Maker post, here's a tutorial for how I made a two-toned Mateo Chavez icon:

Going from to .

Let's start with a bit of background information: This icon was made for dailyicons using the prompt "Two Toned". So, I knew from the get go that the result wouldn't contain any "regular" colouring. However, I still like to treat making icons - whether they are black & white, monochrome or two toned or whatever other limited colour scheme might be out there - like I would any other icon. At least most of the time. Courtesy of experience, I feel the most comfortable judging sharpness, brightness and contrast that way.

This was made using Photoshop CS5 and, unless noted otherwise, layers are set to normal and 100% opacity. I used this website to translate the German terminology of Photoshop to English.

( Click here for the steps )

I hope the tutorial isn't all over the place. Mentally, I've been a bit all over the place today and that can lead to a mix of run-on sentences and sudden change in topic.

I'm slowly coming to a close with claiming every main character (and several minor characters) for 9-1-1 Lone Star at dailyicons. This time I claimed Mateo and Judd (posted in a separate entry) to go along with my current claim of Grace Ryder. The only one left is Owen Strand. I might do a more general one to cover any minor characters I haven't claimed yet where I'm not certain that I'll have a sufficient amount of screencaps to cover a variety of prompts...

Start Date: 18 August 2023
End Date: 19 October 2023

Artist: immortalje // love_sacrificed
Rules:
1. Don't hotlink;
2. Please comment when you take one of them or simply to say you like them or not;
3. Credit? Yes, please do. It's not mandatory BUT very much appreciated;
4. Textless icons are NOT bases.
Credit: Credits for the resources I use to make icons can be found here.

Preview:


( 25+12 Mateo Chavez icons )

Back in May/June, I decided that I wanted to make some summer inspired icons. I knew I had the perfect source - namely the thousands of images I took while on vacation in Namibia and South Africa back in February of 2019. Well, between whittling the number of source images down and then starting to make icons, it took me far longer to work on these than I imagined. I also made far more icons than I thought I would.

Out of 17 days (including the days travelling to Africa and home again), I've completed icons for two days. Granted, some of the days (which I had sorted the original images into to keep the numbers manageable and keep track of what part of the trip they belong to) have 100+ images and some have 20 at most. The second day of our trip was to the Namib desert (specifically the Sossusvlei in the southern part of the desert), so the majority of the pictures are from there. Some are from the flight and bus trip to our first place of residence.

Artist: immortalje // love_sacrificed
Rules:
1. Don't hotlink;
2. Please comment when you take one of them or simply to say you like them or not;
3. Credit? Yes, please do. It's not mandatory BUT very much appreciated;
4. Textless icons are NOT bases.
Credit: Credits for the resources I use to make icons can be found here.

Preview:


( 55 Namibia icons )