Concept Sketches of Yore: Alec in Cyberland

Straight out of the "Stuff I've Been Meaning to Upload For a Ridiculously Long Time" archives, I decided to be nice and show you all some character designs for a one-shot comic story that you might remember me mumbling a few things about last year. Well, I may revisit this project in the future but it all largely depends on how strongly I feel about it. You have no idea how many times I've swung back and forth between "nay" ("Does the world really need another 'Alice in Wonderland' adaptation?") and "yay" ("Wonderland goes futuristic cyberpunk?! Hell yeah!") on this concept.

However, when I look back on these character designs I can't help but feel like they deserve at least some kind of showcase since I spent so much time on some of them (you'll know which ones I'm talking about as soon as you spot them) hence why I'm posting them now. ;-)

Up first, we have Alec, the would-be hero of this tale. At the time, I was contemplating the classic female lead for a Wonderland story until I got the suggestion to swap it to a male main character. Immediately, I was quite intrigued by the idea of thrusting an 18 year old otaku manchild into a high tech world he'd seen, played in and read about in anime, video games and manga...and finding out the hard way that it's not what he expected it to be at all. Not even all those hours puttering around TV Tropes could have prepared him for Cyberland!

Oh Chesh, you shapeshifting, flamboyantly androgynous ol' scamp! I have been told that Chesh leans a little closer to the feminine side of the gender scale. Maybe I oughtta dial back on the hips.

You all knew she was coming. The Queen of Cyber-Hearts is easily my favorite design out of this batch. Sure, a full-body sketch of her takes roughly two hours (yeah, you read that right) but y'know what? If she looks this bloody awesome, it's totally worth it. ;-)

Finally, we have our catalyst of the chaos Usa. Perhaps you may remember her in a much bigger and colorful context. In fact, she was what inspired this whole crazy idea in the first place. I still have a soft spot for her big buck teeth.

So whaddya guys think? Potentially awesome or a cliche best left behind?

Oh, Usa

DISCLAIMER: Usa belongs to me, baby.

Another addition to the list of "subject matter I'm not totally done with playing around with and drawing yet": bunnies.

Well, okay, I technically drew this piece about a month or two ago but I only recently decided to recolor the backdrop so the black looks more stark and solid.

For those of you who have been following me on DeviantART and/or Twitter, remember my little offhand mentions about an upcoming book? Yeah, you're looking at the drawing that kick-started this idea. It all stemmed from my attempt to draw something "bubble goth-esque" but it ended up turning into something a little more Harajuku raver than I had anticipated (must have been due to the music I was listening to at the time).

Before deciding on a color scheme, I wanted to draw a full-body sketch of her outfit. I was faced with the temptation to draw this character standing in front of a portal in the ground with a floating digital sign flashing the word "WONDERLAND".

And so an idea was born.