Alright, brace yourselves, this is gonna be long!
First off, I want to thank @Steve_Kim, @ajramsey and @hagraeven for the feedback, it's very appreciated! For the longest time the thread was silent and that usually happens when things are so bad, that people have no words to describe them. Well, I'm glad someone could ;Π·
Second, indeed I have been more active in other people's threads rather than my own. I hope you understand I have no ill will towards anyone and I'm genuinely trying to help. I'm very passionate about art and I'm happy beyond words that there are other people who share a similar attitude towards the craft. I can't tell if someone's ironic when praising my critiques, so I'll just take that as being as genuine as my original intent. I do hope I'm helpful in any way, even if you disagree with what I have to say about your work.
So, what the hell have I been doing in the last week or so when it comes to my own entry? Exploring. Thinking. Trying to find interesting things.
I made a little idea/reference board, mainly focusing on shapes and patterns.
{I had to re-save it as JPEG, the file was too big xD}
And with these in mind, I made some sketches. The point of them is further exploration, so all of them are fairly simple and most don't really work.
{Please don't mind the inconsistent wind, it's there only to help see things better}
{tsk, tsk, tsk, JPEG again}
And I also expanded the first eight concepts, just in case.
So, what did I find?
* A more "whimsical" approach fits the character better, imo, more flow-y fabrics, hair all over the place, little thingies dangling everywhere. Neoma is not a warrior, so it's not a problem that you can hear her jewellery clinging a kilometre away.
* Eyes should definitely stay white. You might notice that the "expanded" concepts also have all white eyes, despite the original ones being in different shades.
* No armour. I knew it wouldn't work, but tried it anyway to see how it looks. It doesn't make sense for her to have armour, again, she is not a warrior, she's a summoner. She should never be in the front lines.
* Flowers should not overpower the design. They shouldn't even overpower the crescents. If she has too many flowers, as @hagraeven noticed in the original No8, they give the character an earthy vibe. That's literally the opposite of what I'm trying to do. She works with dreams, illusions, she doesn't physically make creatures, she recalls them from her memory or makes them up on the spot.
* Big headpieces definitely seem to work, as long as they are kept simple. I'll probably try some more complicated designs in future sketches, since it's seems I'm lacking them here.
* Very light with accents of near black and very dark with accents of near white value compositions seem to work very well with the lore and core idea of the character, I can't say the same for more balanced ones or ones that are more towards the middle of the value range.
* Both fully clothed and more revealing designs work, but I'm personally leaning a bit towards the more open ones. The closed ones make sense, because she could be shielding herself from people's expectations after "failing everyone", but the more open ones show a potential growth in character, she's willing to try new things, maybe even dangerous ones (liiiiike summoning nightmares when everyone says it's a bad thing)
* I really like the idea of the symbolic horns, the sketches where they are missing (ex. 12, 20, 21, 22) don't work as well as the others, imo again.
* I really don't know about the transparent fabrics, I haven't really explored those yet... (20 /shoulders/, 22 /legs/)
* I'm debating whether or not to give her a weapon. I've decided she can summon up to four creatures, so maybe a weapon with four points could be incorporated? I do draw staffs like fancy chandeliers but I don't want her to be holding an actual candelabra. I still need to figure out how she could defend herself without the use of dreams/nightmares, but so far I haven't come up with anything better than bitch slapping and running. I mean, if you can summon just about anything to fight for you, why would you engage anyone dangerous yourself?
With ALL that being said, I think 1, 3, 4, 6, 11, 15, 16, 20 & 23 are the closest to where I want to go with the design, but not all of them are very strong, which is to be expected.
Next I'll try to sketch some dreams and nightmares, see what connects them and how can I incorporate that into the character design. Then another long post with twenty+ options. xD
Now imagine this wall of text but three/four times larger, filled with swearing and insults towards myself and my work. This is what happens inside my head. Send help.
Happy New Year! ~(^O^)~
P.S. Apologies if there are any slipups in the grammar or anything that needs to be re-read a couple of times until it makes sense. It happens, you have no idea how many typos I had to fix. x3
