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ToddNTheShiningSword — JoysDebutDump

#characterconcept #characterdesign
Published: 2019-11-13 04:05:26 +0000 UTC; Views: 592; Favourites: 18; Downloads: 1
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Description If you're here from
Or even if you're not, I'm looking for Comments on these CHARACTER DESIGNS much more than technical comments, because the point of this was to design the characters, not to draw & color them just right. 
What story does the character tell you, and how could I adjust them to make their story clearer? How does this page of characters make you feel, and does looking at them make you want to see more of them? Why, or why not?
If you don't want your Comment to count toward the group and/or want to leave a shorter one or comment on different characters, you could comment on this OTHER one HERE instead.

I haven't been as happy drawing as I was when I was drawing this in years.
This is what I was talking about when I said I was making a really good drawing yesterday.
I know the characters are too close together.
What I DON'T know, though, that I realized, is who might view this! SO I'll say this for anyone who comes along that feedback on these character designs- positive, negative, or obvious!- is really welcome! I want to know what story I'm telling, if you know what I mean.

This was supposed to be a drawing about fast design iteration only, like the previous one . BUT THEN when I started drawing it, all the characters were looking so good so effortlessly (meaning lots of effortlots of success ) I was like
I CAN HAVE BOTH! 
So I could get a good looking drawing and a functional one, when normally, for this purpose, the best way is a fast way, I learned.

Wanna see this with more construction lines? CLICK HERE !

THIS CONTINUES!
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Comments: 24

GeralArtesuki [2019-12-05 19:40:57 +0000 UTC]

You have character design skills!

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to GeralArtesuki [2019-12-06 09:41:18 +0000 UTC]

No, I don't have these skills. That's why I'm on , trying to get more.

Hehe when I saw this Comment was edited I KNEW that the one it used to be was long, so then I stalked the comment and found out the first edit WAS much bigger. >:3 But then it was the other one.

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Allodoxa85 [2019-12-05 12:29:15 +0000 UTC]

so what is the connection between Joy and May. My gut tells me its mother and daughter, yet i think their design could be slightly more different, be the hair, clothes or body as now it looks like their the same character.
for the mage and the giant they look mysterious, like they got a weird relationship with several levels of layers. Are their lovers, do they protect each other, do they know each others real name and no one else does, it seems the giant is the protector of yhe mage but tye mage is the emotional protector of te giant. By far this looks so promising.
now Jona the lance looks like an squire in training. Kinda like a sidekick joke character, but better than that mechanic guy you drew with the baggy pants before.

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Allodoxa85 [2019-12-06 10:20:32 +0000 UTC]

I'll reply in reverse.
Hmm people are saying that about Jonathan. I'll need to remember people seem to feel that way.
No one seems to like the black guy with the baggy pants much, which is a little sad because I like him, but also because... I feel like he's actually really good artwise, and always was, right from the start. When I would post characters at ProjectComment  , people generally had a hard time imagining things the characters might do, but everyone imagined what the black guy was for. I was happy I'd created a character people consistently reacted to, and were able to imagine his purpose, but the reaction was almost always negative for one reason or another. Their feedback was really helpful though, because I was able to make very small changes that made him look a lot less like a gangster and more like a pirate, and then eventually I decided to make him a mechanic, so I'm glad you noticed he's that.

For The Mage and The Giant, for the questions you asked, yes, they do protect each other, and kind of yes about the names, too. Some know The Mage's name but few know The Giant's real name. The Mage is one of only 2 people that know this. Other than him and his family, of course. His family doesn't know his codename, although it's probably easy to guess! I'm glad you see the potential for many layers being with them. I want there to be a lot of layers with their group. People are responding to The Mage and Giant much more strongly than I expected them to. I'm really happy to have done that, since, like I saidI like finally being able to make characters people can react to. But wow you had some interesting thoughts!

It was interesting what you said about May and Joy, too. It means everything about their development is showing here. At first I had May only. I got feedback on my character designs from Seeeks and she called May Joy because she didn't have a name, but DID have ideas for how she could be improved, and I really wanted to do those things in the future somehow. So, eventually, when I got my idea for my big project, I realized I needed a new OC for it, so I made a new one where I turned Seeek's idea for May INTO that character instead, while also making sure she gets to be the thing I was inspired to make her.
So that's how Joy came about!
Joy is much older than May, but not old enough to be her mother. It's great you used the word "mother", though, because Joy is supposed to play a motherly role in the upcoming story, so she will mother other characters eventually. So I had to make her the eldest in her grouping by at least 2-3 years for that to be possible.

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Allodoxa85 In reply to ToddNTheShiningSword [2020-04-17 00:54:32 +0000 UTC]

Hmmm I really want to continue adding more of your characters to this drawing 
It's my all time favorite drawing I think

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Burke23 [2019-11-24 04:58:05 +0000 UTC]

cool coool

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Burke23 [2019-11-25 01:40:06 +0000 UTC]

Thanks and so's your +fave

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Burke23 In reply to ToddNTheShiningSword [2019-11-25 02:18:40 +0000 UTC]

you're welcome

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Seeeks [2019-11-23 09:09:34 +0000 UTC]

I think you're showing progress. Especially May's pose is very praiseworthy, I don't think I could draw something like that myself. Your understanding of three-dimensionality is pretty great. Do you still make lego models for reference?

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Seeeks [2019-11-25 01:57:02 +0000 UTC]

Hey thanks! It's you! I remember you! And it's particularly good that YOU, of the people, found this on your own. Why? Because I basically have you to thank, in a large way, for the existence of the this. These characters (Old and new) are all part of a new story that I've made by shifting the focus of my old story and radically changing things.

Way back you looked at these characters and drew me an improvement drawing you Sta.shed. But one thing you did was you called May Joy, because she didn't have her name posted back then. This was inspiring to me, so I wanted to use that in character one day.
For some reason my story just needs a mary sue type character to revolve around, but my original Gary Stu, Todd, pictured here, just wasn't doing it. So in my new story, I'm relegating him to a different role, and have created a more proper mary sue to be the story glue. Once I realized exactly what type of character I needed my plot to actually revolve around, I thought back to your old Joy drawing you made me and in some ways I made that redrawing of May you made me into the character I needed. I made a new character, made her be May's sister so she can look just like her, but not have square boobs named her Joy and BAM! The plot started writing itself. I've got a lot of notes written down so I won't lose any of my best ideas, and now I finally have a functional cast of characters that I am inspired to make a comic episode about after all this time. YEARS. :3
So thanks for that. It's funny that Joy is in this picture directly under Todd. I didn't plan that for that reason, but it's appropriate. So this new Joy is in this picture because of you. And so the whole picture exists. :3

I don't use LEGOs anymore because now I have Sculpey to REALLY help me with that when I need it. IMG 0884whiuD  So if I need to get perspective super right and it's not going right I can use that, because I always know my characters' proportions, and so I can actually make a mold with the approximate proportions, rather than just a box like before.

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Seeeks In reply to ToddNTheShiningSword [2019-11-25 17:19:57 +0000 UTC]

I'm glad my sketches could inspire you in such a great way. The feeling of having the wrong main character is very familiar. I wrote a long story when I was a teenager, but the side character was far more interesting than the main character, who was basically a self-insert. She (the side character) was all the things I wasn't allowed to be. Maybe you invested in Todd all the things you wished you could be, but maybe it didn't serve the story. I haven't read your stories properly because I find it hard to concentrate, but maybe I will, one day. I read your comment this morning before I started work and it made my morning better.

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Yenbiie [2019-11-23 03:33:04 +0000 UTC]

oh god !! how can u have this so talent drawing skills? The design of your characters is simple and complicated at the same time. To be honest, some of your characters looked not beautiful but all are so IMPRESSIVE in their way(like in the cartoon).
You know well about perspective and how to draw upward and downward face. Also, you can show your character emotion in a very real way. THAT'S WHY TOUR CHARACTER LOOKS SO IMPRESSIVE(i thought they are a cartoon character for the first time I saw it ). However, I hope you will line your pic by a black pen before colouring, it will make the pic more clearly. Your shaded skill is very good, nevertheless, your colouring is not the same at a different place(IDK what is the word can describe this problem). I mean, at the place you should use the same colour, you make someplace looked darker and someplace looked brighter so the colour is not the same. I suggest u to use a pencil instead of crayon to fix that problem.
Hope this will help!!

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Yenbiie [2019-11-25 02:02:35 +0000 UTC]

THANK YOU.
I agree with everything you say but I'm not good at drawing expressions. But I guess I can still draw them in a real way and that is good.

I always do line my pics with a black pen before coloring, but it does not always show. If you look at "Jonathan Lance" in this picture, the things on his back are not lined in pen, so they are gray and lighter.

And yes I understand what you meant about the problems, too! One of the words is "highlights". I almost never use highlights. But there are other parts about what you were explaining, too, that I should do in the future.
Thanks for Commenting!
Did you find this in your messages or did you find this on Project Comment ? :3

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Yenbiie In reply to ToddNTheShiningSword [2019-11-25 02:52:23 +0000 UTC]

I found it in my notification box

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Yenbiie [2019-11-25 07:03:41 +0000 UTC]

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Anna-mator [2019-11-23 02:19:27 +0000 UTC]

these are all very nice!

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to Anna-mator [2019-11-25 02:02:45 +0000 UTC]

I'm glad you think that!

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theJfluffy [2019-11-16 02:52:23 +0000 UTC]

Developments are on high!
I'm really liking how everyone looks!

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DanVzare [2019-11-15 13:04:08 +0000 UTC]

I certainly do like the look of this.
I kind of feel sorry for The Giant though. What with him being named "The Giant" just because he's slightly taller than average.

You asked for what story each of the character's designs are saying, so here's what I think.

Ryugo: Cocky. Probably been praised a lot, which is what resulted in his overconfidence.
Todd: Down to earth, kinda looks like he's about to go out on his very first adventure.
Dappy: It's Dappy. What else is there to say.
Lance: Total nerd. Looks like he wants to help, but ends up making everything worse due to his clumsiness.
Bullet: A bouncer at a night club.
May: Spunky fighter chick.
Joy: Overly joyful and carefree.
The Mage: Possibly a member of an elite adventuring group? Whatever the case, she looks like she's done giving a shit about anything and everything, and constantly responds in a sarcastic manner.
The Giant: Laid back, a bit quiet. Just kinda goes with the flow. Clearly in the same group as The Mage.

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RetSamys [2019-11-14 15:18:48 +0000 UTC]

They do look great! I love how much work you put into making everything look threedimensional.

  • Ryugo
    Lots of details look good here, but the way the suspenders are done is a really nice touch!
    I see him spinning his blaster while talking down to Todd
    (did you know there's an asteroid called Ryugu ? They're going to send back a sample!)
  • Todd. It's Todd. His clothes look extra threedimensional here. Although I think his pants overlap the wrong way? And the back line of his yellow shirt is missing a little, making him look too thin in that place.
  • Dappy! Looks like he's stopping just before he's about to do something nyoom
  • Jonathan Lance. No idea who he is. He looks like he's the one they sent from The Official Hero Place, and therefore both very fancy and very incompetent. Just graduated. The world will chew him up and spit him out. It won't stop him, and maybe he'll learn the right lessons. But in the meantime he's one big
  • Bullet
    Do not want to mess with this one. The tie is one thing. His eyes are like sunglasses. Looks like the team leader of the other two.
  • The Giant and The Mage
    OK, so we have some government institution dealing with magical artifacts. They don't mess around. In fact, they're the sledgehammer when otherwise you would use your smallest surgical knife. Plus, the Giant is good with paperwork, so he isn't afraid of the bureaucy involved with... bigger tasts...
  • May is still someone I haven't learned about, I think I said before that she's more of a city girl, but I also think she has a hero background and would kick Todd's and Ryugo's ass any time
  • Joy
    Hi Joy, new character! She might work in a business in a service capacity or something. "Hello my name is Joy, welcome to R.A.R.E. (Rare Artefacts from Real Explorers). What can I do for you?"

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to RetSamys [2019-11-15 13:12:32 +0000 UTC]

I first saw this Comment 20 hours and 14 minutes ago
and was like DARN you missed me completing Jonathan by 3 minutes! but it of course turned out to be a few more than that.

For Ryugo we have to thank for Ryugo's suspenders . I'm not sure suspenders were what he was going for, but I told him he inspired me, and... inspiring me was part of the point. So cheer for Mr. Jeremy!

 He's also responsible, not for the gun, but for it being in the picture, due to his epic design tweaks. That's why Ryugo's twirling it. Why NOT twirl something as cool as what Mr. Jeremy made!? I mean, what I made was so close but just wasn't good enough!
I'm glad it looks like he's twirling it. I wasn't thinking about him talking down to TODD in particular, but that doesn't matter. Todd's head IS RIGHT THERE, anyway!
I did not know about that asteroid. I hope that sample gets back to Earth!

Thanks for the corrections on Todd. I... took my basic philosophy with him too far in this picture and rushed him. The idea with Todd is he's supposed to be quick and easy to draw even if everyone else isn't, but that translated to a sever lack of effort that makes him an eyesore on the page... except his colors look so nice! So they save him, but also make him more of an eyesore.
I'M GLAD YOU LOVE DAPPY! Everybody loves Dappy.

But going back to Jonathan Lance... well I guess I was a little off the mark with him, and I think he's the only one on this page where I might have missed it! Or it might just be that he had no head at the time.  
Jonathan Lance is so named because in my old childhood version of Todd & The Shining Sword Todd had a round-haired friend named Jonathan, and I wanted to make him after I got inspired by THIS VIDEO to make a lancer for Todd. 

But heh yeah I think the way I missed the mark for Jonathan with ya was that he looks too incompetent and too fancy. Now, sure, you're right in that he Virtually got sent from The Official Hero Place ( ) because he learned from TODD, of all people, back in the day, BUT I wanted him to, well, SHOW that he learned some lessons from Todd. 
So it was supposed to show in a little less flair (compare hair. It takes less flair for a person with curly hair to get an afro than it takes someone with ANY HAIR to get what TODD  has. ) and more practicality. His boots make more practical sense, and have steel toes (which Todd "obviously doesn't need") and he had knee and elbow guards. Mostly useless in combat, but practical. At least he might not "Take an arrow to the knee" and no longer be an adventurer like others He carries his SWORD in a more normal place and he's supposed to have shoulder pauldron things, but I forgot to draw them here! Didn't realize it until I went to reply to you! IT WAS TOO LATE . Where Todd sometimes carries a supply bag, Jonathan ALWAYS carries a supply bag, and SOMETIMES carries a canteen. Todd would surely need that. What does Todd drink from in his long adventures? Epic? You can see the gear I left out for the Lance in this drawing HERE . 
Also, Jonathan attaches his lance(s) to his back (and his canteen to him, too) with an actual leather strap! Todd uses magic velcro to attach The Shining Sword's scabbard to him! I love that, 'cause then it can just fall off whenever I need it to. But that's less practical, so for The Lance, he has to not have that. He wears gloves, too. Gauntlets would be useful, since he doesn't have proper armor, but NOPE. Just gloves. Which are practical by themselves. And then there's the gorget. Todd's too weird and magical Jonathan Lance does not have epic hero magical. So he needs a regular gorget. Well, he actually doesn't need a gorget at all, since he doesn't have proper armor, but remember, he learned from Todd Axzeus. So he has a metal gorget and shoulder pauldrons. I think I'm going to update his design with a not-very-useful "helmet" on top of his hair, so he can also more closely resemble old Ryugo's design.
BUT THERE'S ONE THING JONATHAN LANCE LEARNED TO WEAR FROM TODD THAT IS EXTREMELY PRACTICAL. Look at Jon's crotch. ( ) He's got an armored codpiece! You can probably tell he learned to wear that from Todd Axzeus so he won't be like him! SEE? LEARNING. THAT'S how he "graduated!"

The place where Jonathan Lance has the flair is on his belt. He's got a fancy one buckle like Todd, and his buckle has his initials on it. It is is prized possession. And in old middle ages places IRL, belts were a status symbol, so even peasants needed one.

*I hate it when something happens to a long Reply, so I don't usually let it.*

Finally someone noticed Bullet, now that he's had his name posted! He looks like the boss of the plapper creatures, ...... the boss of The Giant and the Mage?! So of course I love you noticed the tie and sunglasses. I'm glad you know the "sunglasses" are eyes, and hoped you also know the "tie" is actually that neck coloration plapper creatures- especially male ones- mainly have. It's great that new characters are getting noticed.

OH MAN your description of The Giant and The Mage! I think I'm learning character design. But I still get influenced by people like you.

I love your Comment on May, too! Yes, I think you said city girl before.  
But here, Check out THIS PAGE of Todd VS Lukian  . It's back when I somehow thought May would have brown hair. That's Todd & Ryugo getting their asses kicked in a city prior. So it's funny you mentioned the two of them.

And lastly, there's Joy. Your description of her made me really happy. Much happy because I think maybe I must know how to get a character's character and such to shine through now better than I could before, because even though she's dressed in a dress that looks like a bath towel and a karate uniform had a baby she STILL basically looks such a way that you'd say what you said. What you said is very close to what she is. REALLY CLOSE. In fact, I'm going to make it even artificially close because I like R.A.R.E. THAT wraps up her backstory quite nicely, actually. Her backstory only had one hole in it that truly needed to be filled, and you just accidentally filled it.

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BrendanRizzo [2019-11-13 17:14:40 +0000 UTC]

Joy (the new character) looks great. One can definitely see the similarities and differences to May. And May now has a fiercer expression, as if you decided to give some traits to her sister or something. But I think the two people to their right, dressed in black, look even better. The Mage and the Giant, huh? I wanna see more about them. 

I don’t think the characters are too close together at all; I think they look fine this way. 

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ToddNTheShiningSword In reply to BrendanRizzo [2019-11-15 12:03:44 +0000 UTC]

I think the characters look fine this way too, but they ARE too close together. I had to actually draw them overlapping. I've never overlapped two characters the way I overlapped them here. I measure my characters out, like I mentioned in that Wall Of Text, and I used the scale I use for design and lineups, and they KINDA BARELY didn't fit standing up straight.

I really like how Joy looks, but she still looks weird, BUT I'm seeing things I can fix, which is good because this is a first go. Not bad for A VERY FIRST TRY! Usually those go horribly. RandomO Drawing: All the New Characters  Remember the black guy from my lineups? That's him center top. Very first drawing. Damn. Although there's something retroactively appealing about his hair, if it's possible for something to look BAD because it's plain BOY does he do it!  

Wow hey could you tell me a little more about what you meant with May and her sister in your Comment? Unless you're down because of the critique I gave you that I almost finished.
The Mage & The Giant turned out a million times better than I ever thought they would. I've literally never drawn The Giant before, nor any character with a face like that. EVER. FIRST GO. MOST BEAUTIFUL MAN I'VE EVER DRAWN. I was proud in a way I haven't ever been proud of a drawing before. That's why I posted a status. Because he and Ryugo looked so darned good in their heads. But when I finished this drawing I started thinking The Giant looked like Kobe. I've drawn The Mage before, but no one ever commented on her the rare times I put her in a lineup. The creater above The Giant, too. But in this picture, they all turned out better than I ever could have imagined these kinds of characters turning out. the previous one . had an absolutely new character in the lower left, and he looks like absolute sh|t, like the black guy did in that first drawing.
Now I've got two new characters that people actually want to find out more about. That's all I ever wanted with new characters (well, not quite all) and it was cool to hear that from you too.

Now I've got all kinds of ideas as to where I can go with this story, and can go to places I never imagined years before.
And I'm glad I'm seeing things I can fix

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BrendanRizzo In reply to ToddNTheShiningSword [2019-11-18 23:12:36 +0000 UTC]

I thought it was something like May having originally been rather cartoony and smiling, but Joy is the one smiling now, while May's in a fighting pose. But I don't remember all the details. 

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