Merlin ladies

[sophinisba]

Have you seen astolat's new Morgana vid, Watershed? Go watch omg! Be disturbed by Arthur/Merlin moments you usually find charming! Marvel at how well Vienna Teng's lyrics fit (what could be) Morgana's story! Tell Astolat to come back to Merlin fandom and make us more awesome stuff like porn with Merlin on top!

I went ahead and signed up for merlinfemfest! Sign-ups close tomorrow, so if you're like me and you've been dithering, make up your mind quick!

It was interesting looking at people's sign-ups at the fest and the patterns that form when we all read each other's requests. I think this is the first specifically femslash exchange I've signed up for. At most of the ones I've done if you look at the "things I don't want" and "things I won't do" you tend to see noncon, watersports, and scat. (Last year eruthros had an interesting post about anti-kink messages and boundary policing in Yuletide letters that I had mixed feelings about but that got me thinking anyway.) At merlinfemfest you see again and again are noncon but also pregnancy, kidfic, genderswap, and sex with boys. I'd never thought of those as common squicks and, come to think of it, had all four of them in my giant Hunith/Nimueh fic last year (and only thought to warn for there being a het scene in a femslash fic).

I requested fic or art or a vid, which is another difference with my sign-ups at other fests because usually either they are just fic or I just request fic. But I realized earlier this year (during the last big blowup about fandom neglecting female characters) that most of my favorite fanarts and vids are about girls, even though most of the fic I read is about boys. So that seemed fine. If I get art I will feel anxious about not knowing how to comment ("Yay so pretty!") but I will be happy anyway.

But that got me noticing also that my request (and almost everybody's requests) is all about the kinds of stories I like, and nothing about the kind of art or vids I like. And that could be really annoying for an artist or vidder who gets assigned to me, not only that I'm not giving them any kind of guidance but I'm kind of ignoring their medium. But on the other hand I really don't know how to talk about what I like the way I can with fic, and I also don't know what kinds of things people tend to say in their requests. I did say no photomanips and am hoping that's not rude. Is it appropriate to suggest artists or songs for vids?

What kind of art do I like? The pretty kind! What kind of vid do I like? The kind that makes me cry and also the kind that makes me happy! I don't know! :(

Oh hey, I haven't watched any Rizzoli & Isles yet, but I know a few of you have been, so the Rizzoli & Isles Femslash Porn Battle might be relevant to your interests!

Comments

[shopfront]

Huh, that's an interesting observation! I may have to go back and edit in some vid specific info into my own request, although I did try to make sure some of my 'likes' could apply to both in a general sense. I'm thinking artists and specific songs might be too much detail to negotiate in the sign-up format, although there's nothing stopping you doing a 'dear creator' letter so you have enough space to talk about that sort of stuff without it being too presumptuous/full of pressure to do any specific artist/song (although, I don't know if they intend to encourage that for this exchange, you might want to set up a holder post and edit a link into your sign-up info if you wanted to do one.) On the other hand, I'm going to go edit in a link to my fanmix tag and some general notes of the sort of music/clips I like in vids right now, heh.

[sophinisba]

Thank you, these are good suggestions. It's too bad so many of the posts on my music tag are flocked, or a person could get a pretty good idea of my tastes from that. :/ I will probably do a dear creator post though. Those are always fun to write anyway!