Looking for a few good artists

[Maglad]

Alright, here it goes, a bit of background –I apologize if this is actually longer than intended, but I do tend to over explain things sometimes- and the character descriptions. Again, to those of you who don’t know, I will also explain a few things.

To those of you who don’t know what this is about: (the few who do, don’t need to read this fragment, but feel free to do so if you want, of course)

It has been a while, years even, during which I constantly worked over a story in my mind, polishing it, pampering it, nurturing it. Like with anything you put so much time and energy on it, it is my great pride and of course, my weakest point. When you spend as much time on something, the reaction of your peers to it can certainly be heaven or hell for you as its creator. In time, this took its current form, that of a illustrated novel, even if originally the idea was for a web comic, I couldn’t get the right people interested on it, people with the skills to maintain the site and such. Now I’ve realized I wish to write, and that I don’t have the skills to make a web comic from the ground up… note that I still wish we can make this into a web comic, tough, but for now, this is about giving a feeling of the characters, asking you guys to show your designs for the same and some key scenes of the story. So basically, im asking for you to use some of your valuable time in aiding me flesh out the characters and their world even more, maybe we can make this into our dream, and together breathe life into it, ne?




On to a resume of the history, this will be the world at the beginning of the story. Some words will be explained at the bottom:

Rain, it is ever present, not as much as an hour goes by without rain now. Legends and myth tell of a time when rain would only fall at night, but no one believes that anymore, some even claim that rain is a recent addition to the world, that there was a time when mist would gently blow across the world at night, providing the humidity necessary for all living things, but of course, that doesn’t sounds any more likely than considerate rain that only falls at night, does it? Humanity is rather miserable, and has drifted back to a barbaric state of things. Ever present rain does not support an agriculture friendly society, and without crops you cant support animals either, so farming and herding have both become lost arts, more legend and myth from some time in the past, forcing humanity to go all the way back to a life of hunters and gatherers… then again, is not much what you can find in the way of plants or animals that can survive in such a world. The worst part seems to be the absence of warmth, as humans seem to have lost the ability to ignite fire. The oddest thing, really, as other races can do it just fine, take some dry plants, add some sparks, and poof! You have fire, but humans cant, somehow, for some reason, fire simply cannot be started by humans. What fire exists in their communities is carried there from forest fires, picked up and carefully nurtured. No fire means no craftsmanship, no steel. Currently, is not that humanity has gone back to a state of beasts, we still have culture, and the emperor still holds court, is just that… is just a title, and the palace is now just a collection of natural stones that look more or less like a building, wrapped up in leathers and guarded by warriors with weapons of bone and wood. Some of them have weapons of steel, but they are incredibly ancient weapons, and no human is able to repair them anymore, just as we are not able to make fire, or grow crops, or breed animals, or even build anything anymore. Take a stone and put it over another stone, and they will just slip apart and crumble to the ground, refusing to stick together and blown away by wind. The other races say humanity is cursed by the Kami and they are right, the divine spirits that once protected and nurtured humanity have turned on us, ignoring us, and sometimes attacking us openly. Tales exist of a time when we worshipped the Kami and in return they cared for us, but then something happened, and this world was born.

Alright, that is the resume, that’s the situation in which the story begins. Humanity is pretty much done and gone, with just a few bands of hunter-gatherers here and there. They can’t as much as put stone over stone to build anything, use fire to craft anything harder than they can pick up with their hands, nor grow their own food. Over the story we’ll see what it was that happened, how and why humanity was tossed into a world where the elements not only are unmerciful, but openly hostile. Now to the dramatis personae, in no order whatsoever:

Tsudao: Imagine your classical samurai armour, wood, steel and silk interwoven with a face mask for protection, im sure it won’t be hard for most of you. Now imagine it moving on its own, without anyone inside it, and actually floating an inch off the floor as it moves quietly forth. Tsudao is an animated, floating suit of great samurai armour that has fallen into disrepair and is somehow trapped in a large underground cave. A true aura of evil and darkness around him, he poisons the air around him and gives off a chilling cold whenever living creatures get too close to it. Tsudao played a main role in the tragedy of the world, as back when he was a young mortal he stood in the crossroad between duty and love, and the repercussions of his decision are still felt trough the ages. His armour was blue, white and gold, but over time it has turned black, but you can still see some parts where the old colours can still be seen. As a bit of background, is not that he floats by his own power, rather, the earth feels so offended by his touch that it constantly rejects it, thus forcing him to float instead of walking, much as every other element, rain bouncing off from him without touching him, fire dying down rather than licking at his armour.

Tristan: A young man, Tristan is tall but thin, with clear hair and eyes, preferring to wear clear clothes on white and blue. Over the story he will grow into a physically powerful man, but at the beginning he’s just a young man in way over his head.

Mako: Seemingly the personification of tenderness and care, Mako is a young Kami without any memories of her past, which is in fact extremely important to the plot, and involves Tsudao and his decision, somehow. If there is a great maker, Mako would be one of his finest works, flawless and graceful, her long dark hair constantly “flows” behind her, and it takes a few seconds before anyone remembers what it looks like. It’s as if she was underwater, her hair following her movements as if she moved under the waves instead of walking over solid ground. She wears only simple clothes and wooden sandals, apparently having some kind of vow against owning things.

Road: A Kami, his appearance reflects his essence, tall and thin, his eyes are dark stones and his skin seems like thousands of pebbles put together, but you’ll have to take a really good look at him to notice. He wears classical traveller clothes, but seems to be extremely out f date with that such means, wearing clothes of a quality impossible to achieve to modern humans, and walking with a stick on his left hand, posing as a travelling shugenja.
That’s it, for now, please post your pics of them under this post, and hopefully we’ll choose the ones that are the closest to the original concepts for the characters. If you feel you need more info, please send me a private message or post so in this thread. Hum… don’t know if this will help, but for Tsudao, you may want to hear to a song called “Angels” by “Within temptation”, and remember, he’s as cursed as cursed can be.

Some words (thank you wikipedia):

Kami: In Shinto, the ancient animistic religion of the Japanese, Kami are understood as the divine forces of nature. The worshippers of the Shinto religion in ancient Japan revered creations of nature which exhibited a particular beauty and power such as waterfalls, mountains, boulders, animals, trees, grasses and even rice paddies. They strongly believed the spirits or resident Kami deserved respect.
Shinto believers also adhere to Kami having an anthromorphic form with the ability to act and communicate, as in a kind of avatar. They could not be seen by men. However, they were not omnipotent and omnipresent. In Japanese mythology, for example, Amaterasu, the sun goddess of the Shinto pantheon, could not see the events of the human world. She also had to use divination rituals to see the future.
The Kami traditionally possessed two souls, one gentle (nigimi-tama) and the other aggressive (arami-tama). This human but powerful form of Kami was also divided into amutsu-kami ("the heavenly deities") and kunitsu-kami ("the gods of the earthly realm"). A deity would behave differently according to which soul was in control at a given time. In many ways, this was representative of nature's sudden changes and would explain why there were Kami for every meteorological event: snowfall, rain, typhoons, floods, lightning and volcanoes. The ancestors of a particular family can also be worshipped as Kami. In this sense, these Kami were worshipped not because of their godly powers, but because of a distinct quality or value. These Kami were regional and many shrines (hokora) were built in honour of these kami.
Shugenja: were the 7th century practitioners of the Japanese religion of Shugendo. They were sometimes known as yamabushi, variously rendered as "mountain warriors", "mountain hermits", "warrior priests", "bandit monks", etc.
Shugendo (修験道) is a Japanese old way of searching and knowing better what the Man and Nature are. Shugendo literally means "the path of training and testing." It centers on an ascetic, mountain-dwelling lifestyle and incorporates teachings from other eastern philosophies. The focus or goal of Shugendo is the development of spiritual experience and power. Some of the Japanese martial Arts derived from the profound knowledge of Shugendo.

If you want even more background, look for my other post in this very forum, the one called "Please come in, comments apreciated" is the one that started this whole thing, but you may be better served by looking for the post by my name instead.
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[flash]http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/439/tsubannerpl0.swf [/flash]

[Doukutsu-Monogatari]

Sigh. Why does everyone feel the need to use Japanese mythology? Japanese words? They don't make your story any "cooler".

Anyway, I'm not exactly a great artist, but if you need me for anything...I could help, sort of.

[Maglad]

Oh thats good, i hope you will post your pics soon ^_^

Is not that i choosed a japanese mythology to "be cooler" as i also have other works that are western based, is just that this is the story i enjoy the most. The characther development turned out the best, and i actually poured more feelings into it than n most of the others, to the point of crying at some points when a really good idea came up for it. Please step carefully, cause you are doing so over other people`s dreams
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"It ain`t dead, just life impaired"
0- Going close to the 100 post marks, and not ONE of them has been spam, no matter how short, they where each carrying a real message! XD

[flash]http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/439/tsubannerpl0.swf [/flash]

[Doukutsu-Monogatari]

I never said your story was bad. I was just a bit tired of people using the Japanese theme so heavily, but seeing as how it's not your main theme, I suppose I was wrong to assume that. Sorry.

I'll get a practice picture up as soon as I can. Do take note, though --- I really am not that great.

[Takasan]

Alright I have a 3 day weekend! Wow, your story seems really complex. If this were an anime I think this would've been great. I thought this story was going to be a heroism type of story, but I guess not. This is really unique(to me at least). I've never seen anything close to this before. Only one more information needed-whos the hero/main character?

Edit: Those pictures really do help! I'll try to post my vision of Tsudao soon.
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[Maglad]

Well, i domt believe in "main characther" types. They all have their importance, for example Tristan gets them together, but they all have their own background, let me think how to explain it... is more like an adventuring party! They are all equally important


...well except the guy from the tavern, he just sits there drinking while people goes in and out, but he`ll be sort of a recurrent joke, so i guess he has some importance too... ^^
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"It ain`t dead, just life impaired"
0- Going close to the 100 post marks, and not ONE of them has been spam, no matter how short, they where each carrying a real message! XD

[flash]http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/439/tsubannerpl0.swf [/flash]

[meganekko]

Pretty much like Eden's Bowy plot. A young man, a goddess and some other pips put together... I sure do hope some people would take the time to read it......

Please do so. The story's not long, the explanations are the ones that are long...
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[Maglad]

After reading the rest i posted in this forums, do you still think its like the anime you mentioned?
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"It ain`t dead, just life impaired"
0- Going close to the 100 post marks, and not ONE of them has been spam, no matter how short, they where each carrying a real message! XD

[flash]http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/439/tsubannerpl0.swf [/flash]

[Hiddencamela]

just to get the pics started

Tsudao, a rough of how I see him.

[meganekko]

[Hiddencamela]

really? The description depicted an armor in disrepair.
Also, its an animated armor, black with faded gold/blue colours (of course i didn't colour it).
Also..... emanates poison + evil aura?...
but yeah, I probably should have slimmed it up abit heh.

[meganekko]

Oh! I thought you were drawing the "live" tsudao, not the spirit one.

[Hiddencamela]

I'll try my hand at Mako tomorrow morning. It will definitely look better than my attempt at inanimates.

[Maglad]

Ooooh... we have a pic already! ^_^ *does the happy dance*

Well... yes, the living Tsudao was rather slim and you could almost say like a shojo characther (you know, pretty boy kind of guy, womanizer too) but the current tsudao is just a floating suit of empty armor. Btw i liked your armor ^^

Me? I`m really looking forth to Mako/Tsu

A friend sent me some pics i really liked and i thougth of showing them, hoping they will help.


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"It ain`t dead, just life impaired"
0- Going close to the 100 post marks, and not ONE of them has been spam, no matter how short, they where each carrying a real message! XD

[flash]http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/439/tsubannerpl0.swf [/flash]

[Takasan]

Here it is, my version of Tsudao.
Rough sketch but more time went into it. hope this looks about right
Next I got to slim him down a little for you. And after that I'll try to work on Tristan and Mako.

What do you think guys? This was my first samurai EVER.
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The hardest person to forgive is yourself~