NSFW/Image Macro: Accidental Pornomancer

Someone recently added a cropped section of a Ménage à 3 strip showing the lead male in a bondage scenario. Not only is this a little too NSFW for use, I'm not sure it fits the trope at all. I've commented it out for now, we can decide on a pull. Any ideas for a replacement, or should we just go "no pic"?

edited 22nd Mar '14 6:01:03 AM by Willbyr

Here's a link to it.◊ I'm fine with leaving it off for now. Not because it's NSFW, but because it just wasn't very good. I can't think of anything for now, but let's keep this open in search of a replacement.

Image Source. Please update whenever an image is changed.

Agreed - the cropping on that image is just really rough, all else aside.

The character (Gary) is a pretty good example of the trope, but finding the image that illustrates it effectively is hard. The best I can suggest off the top of my head is panel 4 of this strip, and that's not very good.

= Spindriver =

It's better though, if we decide to have an image. If anything, it shows me that this trope isn't unpicturable. It may have some overlap in image themes with Unwanted Harem. Still, I wouldn't oppose "no image".

The sad, REAL American dichotomy

I'm the one who added the picture in the first place. I wasn't aware that was NSFW.

I don't really think it's NSFW, but I don't think it illustrates the trope. Not sure about the suggestion in #3 either.

Check out my fanfiction!

No, it's not quite NSFW, though I could see some people getting twitchy about it coming up on their screens at work - but it just doesn't quite illustrate the theme of "This guy gets lots of sex despite not trying at all", and the fetish/BDSM elements distract from the supposed point.

Gary's stunned-codfish expression in the other panel I suggested at least conveys something of the cluelessness of the true Accidental Pornomancer. But anyway - if the page goes back to no illustration, the entry for Menage A 3 in the Webcomics subsection will need to be edited to remove "(pictured above)".

= Spindriver =

Oh yeah - that image, in case it helps anyone:

(The irony is that Gary wasn't sleeping with anyone when that strip appeared. Plus, the "woman" on the left, isn't. But never mind.)

= Spindriver =

This looks like a trope that is simply crying out for a montage, because it's a trope that's defined by repetition. Gary would be a good subject for it — Yuki, Sonya, Dillon, Senna — who all else? I quit reading Ma3 a while back.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

Every single girl except Zii now.

edited 22nd Mar '14 8:36:24 PM by KingZeal

If the question is who's attracted to him in some way or on some level, it's basically the entire female cast (plus Dillon and arguably Matt). If it's who he's had actual sex with, it's just Kiley, Sonya, and Senna. If you're asking about sexual contact, you can add Yuki, Amber (sort of), and Chanelle (briefly).

For now. Bets on the results of the current plot sequence are wide open.

But doing a montage that fits on that page would mean compressing the relevant images down below readable sizes. It's a non-starter.

= Spindriver =

Oh, and I've taken out that no-longer-applicable "pictured above".

edited 23rd Mar '14 3:18:36 AM by Spindriver

= Spindriver =

"But doing a montage would mean compressing the various components down below readable size..." Not if we pick the right components.

...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.

I agree with the OP, and object to the current image. Whether or not that character is an example to those familiar with the work, those frames do not illustrate Accidental Pornomancer. Also, I am not a fan of collages for page images but it is unreasonable to say something won't (can't?) work, with so little information about the plan.

However...

This Wiki's Not Safe for Work page (and this is similar to or the same as the widespread definition of NSFW) says "It's one thing to just look up the latest news or check your email. It's another to be looking at porn. Anything with nudity in it at all will often get labeled thus, on the off chance that a passing observer simply thinks you might be looking at porn. So called because if you are caught reading a page that is Not Safe For Work at work, you can get fired." (emphasis added, and this is often extended to gory imagery also, which is mentioned later in the article)

I am frustrated by the label "NSFW" being used to describe things that may be objectionable for similar reasons but are not "NSFW", not even "a little too...", not at all. Bondage (say) may not be family friendly, but having that image on your monitor would only get you fired if looking at any page on this web site would get you fired. Please please please say "not family friendly" if that's what you mean, instead of "not work safe"; among many other things, different people (especially different mods) using different definitions contributes to the confusion about what it means. They are similar but not synonymous. One is not the same as the other but moreso. Yes that image depicts partial nudity, but in black-and-white cartoon, no way would it ever be mistaken for porn, no way would being caught looking at it result in something different than being caught looking at an image on (say) The Onion's web site. "NSFW" does not mean that the boss decided, on closer inspection, that you are doing something at work that you shouldn't be doing, and you get fired... it's immediately a problem. For the NSFW label to be appropriate, the image would have to potentially get you fired from a job where it would be okay to look at different TV Tropes pages but not that one.

edited 23rd Mar '14 4:22:44 PM by rodneyAnonymous

Becky: Who are you? The Mysterious Stranger: An angel. Huck: What's your name? The Mysterious Stranger: Satan.

I guess that this is sort of thing people mean by a possibly-suitable montage.

edited 24th Mar '14 2:32:26 AM by Spindriver

= Spindriver =

I love it.

The second pic on the right might be a bit too raunchy, though.

EDIT: Also, if possible can you keep the "he just does whatever they tell him to do" part from the pulled image? I think that would be the cherry on top. What I would do is crop out the argument at the top of the left panel as well as the thought bubble on the right. Then, put both of Tatiana's thoughts from each panel at the very bottom of the image.

edited 24th Mar '14 4:41:09 AM by KingZeal

That's great, although the bottom right panel and the 3rd left panel looks blurry to me. I also have minor nitpick for top right pic, though my concern is less about the raunchiness and more about how the guy is barely visible.

I had to shrink all of this stuff to a greater or lesser extent to fit it in, so some blurring and artefactual effects are inevitable. I wouldn't want to make anything smaller to cram more in, especially as some bits of text are now as small as they can go and remain legible.

If I had more space, I might cram in Tatiana's "perfect sub" thought bubble and also a recent image of Gary getting his head slammed into DiDi's cleavage (yes, recurring theme), but I decided this selection covered the ground fairly well. I know that Gary is barely visible in the top right picture, but he is there, and hey, it's him going spiral-eyed while being straddled by two women — it's too good to leave out.

People who know that comic might protest that Gary was actually still a virgin in the period covered by many of these images, and only two of these scenes actually led to sex. But pictures of him having sex are less funny and invariably NSFW, so whatever. Likewise to the fact that one of these women is actually a gay man in drag (and another is a transsexual).

= Spindriver =

It seems that you saved the files in JPG which, IIRC, does worsen the image quality.

Saving in PNG would make the file size larger, but it would not artifact the image, and I don't believe we need to use all the images currently in that montage to clearly define the trope anyway.

Saved in JPG, but at maximum quality, which I'm assured is lossless.

I tinkered with the image a little more and saved it as a PNG, but then it blew out the 200 kb size limit. So here it is as a maximum-quality JPEG again. Note that adding any more material to this might well take it over the 200 mark again - it's currently 191.

= Spindriver =

I should point out that artefacts will come from the process of resizing the images, not from saving them in a lossless format like this. The only way to avoid that is to use the images at their original size; unfortunately, given the size of the original strips, that would probably mean only using two or three of them, which really isn't enough.

Unless someone with better Photoshop-Fu than me would care to prove me wrong. I'm no guru.

= Spindriver =

Well, I still think Tatiana's exposition would be the icing on the cake, buuuuut...

Good job with that cake.

No. Only saving an image as a lossy format like JPG creates artifacts. Though resizing an image by definition reduces resolution, and therefore, quality, it does not create artifacts as long as you save in a lossless format like PNG.

Always save as PNG. If it's still over 200 KB, use a lossless compressor like PNG Gauntlet. A black and white image should have no trouble fitting as a PNG. JPG is a last resort. But if you do, highest quality is best.

Image Source. Please update whenever an image is changed.

Comparing the original PSD with the JPEG shows that, yes, there are some differences. However, one of the main consequences of this was to make some of the speech balloons more legible — losing some of the subtle grey shading makes the letters crisper. So I'm disinclined to tinker with this image much more.

= Spindriver =

Hmm. And it's all gone quiet here. Does this actually require a crowner, or should I just put that montage image up on the trope page?

= Spindriver =