PART 2 of 3: btvsats20in20 alts & extras, early-seasons Buffy, the Summers Women

[red_satin_doll]

Just what the title says - and don't forget to add your vote at all four parts of Round 5 of btvsats20in20 if you haven't done so already. The voting has stalled out at 22 voters - so on the one hand, go fandom!  On the other - get the heck over there, fandom, what are you waiting for?

I've split the remainder of my alt/extra icons chronologically by season with slight exceptions to be explained. Any and all of these, with a few exceptions (3, 5, 15) were nearly entries in my Round 5 set; I am simply that indecisive. A huge inspiration for me this round was the 1992 Melissa Etheridge single "Dance Without Sleeping". My original plan was to make a set focused on OMWF and Buffy hairporn from that episode. (kikimay will understand) Even though my plan didn't eventuate the song is a perfect fit for the episode, for Buffy and the 'verse in general*

Thanks also to eilowyn's beta advice after Round 4; I tried to keep her thoughts in mind while making these especially in terms of use of textures and color.

001

002

003

004

005

006

007

008

009

010

011

012

013

014

015

016

017

018

019

020

021

022

Table generated using angelamaria's Icon Table Generator.
Icons by their own makers.

As ever all icons are made by me but for the taking with proper credit; feedback is lovely and much appreciated; stealing, failing to credit or archiving on another site without express persmission is not.





1-18 are all season 1 or 2 icons; 19-22 skip to S5 & 6 - or rather, 19 merges seasons 2 & 5.  (The only S3 icon I made was the Amends #16 icon of my final entries; I didn't make any S4 icons.) 1, 2, 3, 5 or 6, 17 - 18 were all in rotation as entries until the last minute; #1 & 5 especially.  I like both of those but worried that the textures were distracting and not really adding anything to the image or saying anything.  I likewise replaced 15 with the more distant crop at the last minute. 18 I excluded because it would have been the only icon to not have someone's face in it.

I've not done a lot of early-seasons Buffy; this round convinced me I want to do more. Focusing on the late seasons as I tend to, it's easy to fall into the same trap I see with fans who have only seen "certain" episodes or seasons of the tv canon series (or deny those seasons existed) and miss the whole story on either end.  It's not that I missed anything but I've forgotten how young she was, how tender, but also how she walked into Sunnydale with a suitcase full of baggage that only got bigger and heavier with every day, every death, every Apocalypse and every trauma.  In other words, I just wanted to take her up and hug her and make the hurt go away.  I can't not feel for her.  Buffy Summers brings out my Inner Mama Bear.

And of course there's the aesthetics of it, taking pleasure in her face - not because Sarah's the prettiest woman but there's just something very particular about her features, and her performance. (Making icons of Aly as Willow is the same sort of pleasure, and I think there are surprising points of similarity or at least congruity between them. They are not really similar but they are "not the prettiest" in similar ways.)  Kristine Sutherland, Michelle and Amber OTOH are no less lovely or perhaps are more so but are somehow harder for me to grasp fully and do them justice.

15-22 all involve Joyce in some way, but mostly as an absence rather than a presence. After focusing on close ups of faces for so many icons, hands suddenly became very important here. I do love the richness of hand imagery in btvs, and the Summers women have such visceral ways of connecting.

I'm always going on about the absence of Joyce in the show, how I wanted more of her in it (and why aren't there more icons and fanfics about her?) And I admire debris4spike's Joyce icons and the attention she pays the lady but when I tried to make icons with her myself, I could only render her as an absence or at best a partial presence. And as much as I love their interrelationships and the moments when they do truly connect, 15-22 are all about the failure connect. The only ones we see Joyce's face in here are 20-21, as a dead husk; those icons are as much portraits of Dawn, whose face we don't see, only her hand.  It was important to me to get the detail of her ring in the image, which made the hand more particularly her's. 22 reverses this a bit and we see Dawn's face and Buffy's hand. Unlike the Body icons they are physically connecting, but emotionallly disconnected; and in between them is Joyce's presence, again expressed as an absence or negation.

18 owes a debt to pickamix, who altered one of my Vamp Willow icons from Round 2 with permisson by removing a red soda cup in the frame. and I wanted to try the same to remove a red straw from the green cup here thanks to color matching tools in ipiccy.


* (I did not however watch the original video on repeat - perhaps if I had the results would have been more light-hearted. Unironic lesbian interpretive dance? Complete with fog, overexposed blue lighting and that damn belt buckle? Sorry Melissa, you're no Ellen.)

Comments

[kikimay]

I really really like number 19, you already know that. Not only I love the icon in a pure conceptual way (Parallels between Buffy taking care of Joyce and the prophetic dream Joyce) but I like how you blended the different images.

I correct my mistake! The 8 icon - why is also a favorite - is from Surprise. I also tend to rewatch/love more the later seasons and yesterday I casually rewatched Surprise instead and, man, I really feel for Buffy. I want to protect her from the emotional trauma that Angel will be. Her first sexual experience is so filled with guilt and pain.

(Also number 2 and 4 because of pretty colors)

[velvetwhip.livejournal.com]

These are so incredible! Have to say that, though I love them all, my faves are: #1, #3, #7, #13, #14, and #20. Bravissima! Your work just keeps getting better.


Gabrielle

[teragramm.livejournal.com]

I really like #17 and #18 and I'm not really a fan of the color green but those two icons are stunning with their clarity and nice pop of color.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

Voted! I remembered I already voted for one of them, but couldn't remember what it was. Anyway, I just want to reiterate how much you've stepped up your game from last round. The coloring is much more subtle, which should have been hard to pull off based on the round's theme. I'm pretty happy with the icons you chose to submit, though there is something to be said about a couple here - 8 uses the strong coloring in an interesting way because of the blocking, 10 uses bokeh (sparkly out-of-focus dots) well, 14 is a good contrast of images, and the green in 17 is beautiful.

Oh I voted for 4 for the re-use of the Vampire Willow as Silent Screen Star image, 13 because the brightness and coloring makes it almost look HD even though BtVS has some of the crappiest film/screencaps because it's pre-HD, and 7 because I liked how it illustrated a pro-Spike subtextual message. I don't know if I was supposed to use that as a criteria for my decision, but dammit I liked it and I'm sticking with it.

Friday November 21

[livejournal.livejournal.com]

User audela referenced to your post from Friday November 21 (http://su-herald.livejournal.com/760680.html) saying: [...] la, Spike/Buffy. Explicit. [Images & videos] Icons: Early-seasons Buffy, the Summers Women [...]

[snogged.livejournal.com]

You are definitely learning how to do some creative things in your iPiccy program and I think that's so awesome. I love seeing your icons and reading your thinky thoughts on how these beautiful icons came into being.

My favorites from this set are #4 (coloring), #5 (crop and emotion), #11 (placement of text, angles), #14 (the blending of faces), #17 (the pop of green), #18 (crop and color), and #21 (oh my heart. :/)

[double_dutchess]

Oh, can I have number 4? I love the cropping and the colours!