Sometimes ideas just don’t stick.
Just because you have a great idea, doesn’t mean it’s practical, or even healthy in some cases, especially when it comes to art.
Expression is a gift that we have as human beings, and that makes is incredibly powerful. What you express in your art is going to impact you, that is a fact. Art is a very personal process. Far be it from me, to tell someone not to do something just because it’s questionable. I’m just saying that you should recognize the power that you have to express concepts and ideas, and to normalize those things.
Just because these characters didn’t stick doesn’t mean they didn’t affect me, or my friends.
Ymir and Cain Daganhart
Ymir and Cain were inspired by a couple of my favorite movies like Van Helsing (the cheesy one with Hugh Jackman), Solomon Kane, and a bit of Lion King somehow? I didn’t ever play them long enough for them to grow their own personalities.
Ymir was intended to be the heir of a noble house with a great secret in their blood. I wanted her plot to be about being tempted by madness, power, and bloodlust. Cain was her brother and twin, who was supposed to be beyond saving. So lost in his own version of the world that he had completely warped everything, even his twin.
But like I said, it never happened, so I guess she’ll retire here.
Bomani
Bo was a character I made for a campaign I believe was going to be set in the Ebberon world setting. She had the soul of an old mummy-king housing itself in her, making her it’s vessel and possibly a demi-god or sorts?
I love her design so much, especially the colors. The colors were surprisingly hard to work with, especially because I was dead set on the turquoise to be the focus.
All of my characters with wings have a certain bird that I used as reference for the shape and patterns of the wings, usually owls, but this one is a falcon.
Kazimir Grimgaze
Kazimir was one of the designs I made without much of an idea in mind for personality, or aspirations. I think for the most part, she has remained that way too, no matter how many times I’ve tried to remake her in a new setting.
Certain aspects of her, I refuse to change, and that makes her hard to work with. I’m okay with that, as an artist sometimes you set up boundaries with your art.
Usually those boundaries will be with other people, but sometimes you have to set them up with yourself as well. What about your art (or form of expression) is most important to you? Is it your freedom, your escape? Or your voice? Is it how you escape your day to day life? Is it a beacon of optimism, calling attention to what is still beautiful in our world? Is it a statement against something?
Not all of your art has to mean something crazy important, but in my experience, once you start to take it seriously, you realize that it’s been alive the entire time. It’s speaking to your friends, your loved ones, to you, even.
Kazimir however, has yet to say anything meaningful. She’s more of an aesthetic than a statement of any kind. Sure, she is visually stunning, but why should anyone pay attention to her if there is nothing behind her concept?
It can be exhausting to think about these things all the time, to the point where it could even straight up kill your drive to create. So I don’t really advice keeping this in mind constantly, but rather let it be a question you ask yourself occasionally.
Below…
Kazimir’s initial design. I was going for a pastel goth look, and I wanted her horns to be absolutely massive. I also intended for her to have two tails, but it felt like too much and I ditched it later on.
Pictured on the Right…
On Kazimir’s second playthrough, I recreated her as a barbarian with monstrous lycanthrope blood in her veins. She had military history and no parents, and I was exploring the whole super soldier trope where she didn’t really know who she was supposed to be once she was discharged.
Mechanically (within the rules of 5e D&D) she was amazing as a build, she was amazing on paper, but sadly the group wasn’t right for her and she didn’t get much exposition.
Currently she’s in use again in a roleplay with a friend of mine, where she is a high ranking general in a demon army, who has a fascination with mundane life.
