Disaster and confrontation
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@blehb said:
Of course, this can also apply to superficial things like hair and eye color and stuff. I love being able to visualize what the author is intending.
Yes! All of that shouldn’t discourage someone to give thought to what their characters look like. The emotional and physical features of a character aren’t mutually exclusive after all.
I generally give more grace to kink stuff especially (not just creations but forum posts and reflections too, no kinkshaming!) because of how personal they can and often are. For example, my giants are almost always handsome and attractive - to me, at least, because it’s my fantasy. I would like for a giant in another person’s story to be attractive, but I don’t always need specific details as to what, why or how. Tbh part of it’s to subvert the “ugly giant” trope. I just want big man and little lady.
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@miss-lillipants I prefer my giants to be conventionally attractive as well, but I have read some good stories that make the giant more on the “unhygienic/unattractive” side, I suppose. Seems to be a common humiliation aspect across the size community. Again, not really my thing, but I wanted to acknowledge the variety of stories out there.
Plus, beauty is subjective! Which is why I think some writers will leave out descriptions. They’ll imply the giant is attractive and what that means is up to you and your preferences. I do think there is a benefit to going into detail about physical descriptions though. Things like body hair, muscle mass, etc. obviously influence interactions on such a small scale.
(I totally agree with you on the ugly giant trope. I’ll hear about a piece of media that has giants in it and go to look and they’re definitely more on the monstrous side. I mean I’m not expecting the real world to cater to my strange little interests but c’mon.
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@miss-lillipants said in Disaster and confrontation:
an opinion or thoughts in a hopeless situation, rather than some voiceless, mindless doll.
Loved your thoughts on the fem/male/gaze. I think you nailed something important to me - agency in the face of a grim situation. I love it when a SW in a story uses everything to escape her fate, and doesn’t give up even if she ultimately fails. No fun in her being this passive victim, which can be found even in a lot of classic SW stories.
@blehb said in Disaster and confrontation:
Or maybe he’s just an average dude that’s just trying to help the best he can.
Yes, this… all the while keeping his urges in check, pushing his willpower near the breaking point. That’s my trope lol. Personally I like character descriptions to remain vague, as they allow me to project more easily into the story - if the giant is a handsome, strong and tall 20-something, it makes it harder for my early midlife self to insert.
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@blehb said:
Plus, beauty is subjective! Which is why I think some writers will leave out descriptions. They’ll imply the giant is attractive and what that means is up to you and your preferences.
This was my initial instinct when I first started writing Size stories, but I quickly changed my mind for two reasons.
Interior monologues are too important to erotica not to include the POV character’s opinions on the physical attributes of the character they’re having feelings about. Those little details are going to take on greater significance as the protagonist reflects on what it’s like to be near them (or separated from them). If the reader is just too repelled by the giant’s mustache or beer gut, well, you can’t please everybody.
Similarly, another well-known trope of erotica/romance is that emotional attraction often precedes physical attraction, and attributes that might be insignificant or even unattractive on a dating app or in a singles bar become endearing or even arousing later in the relationship.
Reasons specific to Size: being overwhelmed by a giant’s physical attributes is a central experience in size fantasy. How they smell, the texture of their skin, the color and style of their hair, the clothes they wear (and enclose tiny POV characters), how their voice sounds to tiny eardrums—it’s not a Size story without these details.
Another aspect of Size that is important to me is that tinies can’t be choosers. Meaningful consent is an elusive beast in all but the most gentle Size stories, and becoming acclimated to the tiny role in a mixed-size relationship includes accepting all the physical realities. That process of acceptance is a crucial element of this genre.
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@foreverlurk said:
if the giant is a handsome, strong and tall 20-something, it makes it harder for my early midlife self to insert.
It’s getting harder and harder for me to write college-age characters the farther I get from those years. It’s not just that I don’t know the current slang, I don’t even know how they hook up any more.
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@Olo I know - one thing that helps me keeping a connection with the young folks is having someone at home who’s clos(er) to that generation and doesn’t mind explaining his old man what’s what these days.
I also like to generate AI renders with 35-40 year olds sometimes, without them looking like supermodels or pretty boys. Strangely it’s harder to get the AI to generate just plain normal looking moms or dads lol.
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@foreverlurk I’m not a 3D render artist, so I don’t know what models are available, but I’d like to see more normal-looking people in Size renders. Plain faces, higher BMI, and older folks. Enough with the boobs that look like helium dirigibles. Bring back gravity.
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I had another thought on the whole male/female gaze thing, because initially I was only thinking about written stories, but it’s also something that I’ve seen with art. I’ve seen so many collages or drawings of naked sexy lady on a desk, or in a fist, where the focus does seem entirely on the SW. As opposed to there being more of a focus on the giant - seeing the both of them, or seeing his face in the background. Or heck, even if it’s just a lady in a hand, there can still be personality in that hand, a difference in the way he’s touching her, the way she’s looking at him - the focus being more on whatever level of emotional connection they share.
Of course, some of the differences here stem from how tricky it is to make art that fully illustrates both the tiny and the biggo (I’m all too aware of that struggle lol). But I still think there’s something to it. Again, I’m doing a lot of generalizing, and I’m not saying anything is objectively right or wrong, just interesting things to think about!
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@littlest-lily I mean, the term “the male gaze” originated in film studies and I’ve seen it much more in reference to visual arts. That’s part of why I asked: its application to text seemed less obvious to me.
I’ve complained about this before; search on Subject for “Sex Objects.” Unlike textual depictions, visual representations have to be specific about the objects of their gaze(s). For better or worse, the bottom line remains: if we want more gratifying representations of giant men in M/f art, more tiny straight women need to make it.
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@Olo Working on it!
If you’d like to support me and my work, please feel free to leave me a tip and I will be so grateful! https://ko-fi.com/littlestlily
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@littlest-lily Don’t be afraid to get raunchy.
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@Olo I actually think almost all of these points wrap back around to the appeal of “femgaze” content. Like I said, I understand why some authors will leave out descriptions but I personally prefer the details and how they influence the scenario- and it seems like a lot of women in this thread agree (and men for that matter!).
Typically “malegaze” stories will focus on the attributes of the tiny woman, and “femgaze” of the giant man. Though I do think women are more likely to go into describing both, since we typically put more thought into our own looks.
And while it seems shallow to focus so much on appearances, it does make a difference no matter how you like your size content! In my experience it’s not even that I have one “type” of look I like to imagine. For example, I like my meaner giants to have a more pretty/beautiful man appearance. For the opposite, I’m into a more masculine and rugged look, like a true gentle giant. Idk why this is…
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@blehb said in Disaster and confrontation:
Typically “malegaze” stories will focus on the attributes of the tiny woman, and “femgaze” of the giant man.
I’m so guilty of this it isn’t even funny.
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