(Cider: This post is ported over from our game jam forum post)

This is cheddar with an art update!

The first thing I do before I make any art (including our project page) is grab a reference image that captures the colors and vibes I'm trying to replicate. This makes it easy to keep each game (I hope) super distinct. I got these from Pinterest, which means I have no idea where they actually came from, but as you can see we're trying to get a nice spring green theme going here.

I hate making backgrounds. hate hate hate hate it. I am probably going to put off making backgrounds until Cider forgets that I was supposed to make them. But whipping up placeholder backgrounds, on the other hand, is very easy, thanks to this handy dandy tool that I learned about right here on the OtomeJam Forums--FotoSketcher! Oh my god! I cannot believe I never heard of this before now. You just put in a photograph--I got all mine from Pexels (which has a slightly better library than Unplash imo), and run it through the "Painting 10" filter--a cool trick I learned with Fotosketcher is that you can PAUSE the generation of the painting by hitting "ESC", which leaves the image rendered in these rough, broad, paintstrokes. Amazing results! I had to color grade some of the photos to get them to match our color palette, but I was able to get all the backgrounds we need for the project in one day.  This example below is like, SO pretty??? The photo is by Ksenia Chernaya, and the generated "painting" actually looks like a piece of art I would hang on my wall.

Okay, on to the good stuff, CHARACTERS!!! So far, I have only made sketches for Ivy, the main character. She has 20+ character poses, because the story jumps back and forth in time, so her outfits and mood changes a lot. I may have to end up cutting some poses, though. This is a lot of work!

The setting of the story is loosely based on Gilded Age America, but in a more country setting. There are a lot of fashion things I like about this period, but one thing I've never been on board with is the weirdly dropped, bulging waistline, so I stuck with a more contemporary silhouette.

I always base my protagonists' features  off of a photograph, otherwise I end up doing same-faced syndrome too much. I based Ivy's face on a drawing by one of my favorite artists, Charles Dana Gibson. He did AMAZING pen-rendered illustrations for TIME Magazine, and if you ever heard of the term "Gibson Girl", that is from the women that he used to draw. This reference pic is called "Not Worrying About Her Rights".  She is supposed to look carefree, but I think the girl has this sort of melancholy, reserved quality, which is just what Ivy's character is in the story. I borrowed the slope of her nose and the little point of her chin and gave Ivy this sort of heart-shaped face, which I don't normally use!

Ugh, just Look at how Gibson uses penwork to create dimension, yo. His work is very influential to me--you'll probably see that more when I do the linework. Anyway that's it for meeee! I am going to do sketches of all the characters so Cider has placeholder artwork to start programming with.